FAQs
With ever more people tuning in to the possibilities of DVD, we’re often asked the same questions about the format, so we’ve compiled some answers to the most frequently asked questions.
Region coding
What is region coding?
Imposed by the film studios due to the staggered theatrical release of movies worldwide and to protect exclusive markets, region coding was designed as a method of ensuring discs would be playable only in certain geographical locations.
- Region 1: The US, US territories, Canada
- Region 2: Europe, Japan, Middle East, Egypt, South Africa, Greenland
- Region 3: Taiwan, Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia, Hong Kong
- Region 4: Mexico, South America, Central America, Australia, New Zealand, Pacific Islands, Caribbean
- Region 5: Russia (former USSR), Eastern Europe, India, most of Africa, North Korea, Mongolia
- Region 6: China
How can I be sure a disc will play on my equipment?
European law demands that any DVD player bought within the EU (prior to any modification) will have R2 set as it’s default region. Any R2 disc available on TravelShop should therefore be compatible with your player.
All R2 discs (excluding those designed solely for the Japanese market) use the PAL broadcast standard.
What is Region 0?
Also known as ‘Region All’ or ‘Region Free’, Region 0 discs are compatible with any DVD player as they are specifically enabled for all geographical areas. However, Region 0 discs are sometimes encoded in NTSC (the American broadcast standard) rather than the usual European PAL standard which will require a NTSC compatible TV in order to ensure colour playback. In such a case, we will endeavour to clearly label this in the product information page.
Why are R1 runtimes longer than their R2 equivalent?
Due to the nature of PAL and NTSC broadcast standards, PAL titles run approximately 4% quicker than their NTSC counterparts (see NTSC vs. PAL for more information).
The longer a film the greater the difference in duration between the two formats, even though the content of the movie may be exactly the same. (You will need an NTSC-compatible TV to view NTSC discs.)
R2/PAL duration |
R1/NTSC |
R2/PAL |
R1/NTSC |
|
1:20 |
1:23 |
2:34 |
2:30 |
|
1:26 |
1:30 |
2:43 |
2:40 |
|
1:36 |
1:40 |
2:53 |
2:50 |
|
1:46 |
1:50 |
2:53 |
3:00 |
|
2:05 |
2:00 |
3:02 |
3:10 |
|
2:14 |
2:10 |
3:11 |
3:20 |
|
2:24 |
2:20 |
NTSC vs. PAL
What is NTSC/PAL?
There are two different methods for picture decoding standards: Europe (R2) uses the PAL system; North America (R1) uses the NTSC system.
What will I need to view NTSC discs?
In order for stable colour reproduction during playback, you'll require a NTSC compatible TV, often referred to as a 'multi-standard' or 'world' specification.
How are NTSC and PAL different?
Firstly, NTSC and PAL differ in the number of scan lines available in the vertical axis of the screen; NTSC has 480, PAL has 576.
Secondly, there is a slight variation between NTSC and PAL running speeds. Where conventional film runs at 24 frames per second (fps), a TV signal runs at 30 fps (60 fields) for NTSC, or 25 fps (50 fields) for PAL.
For a PAL display, the simple method when transferring film is to present the film frames at 25 a second instead of 24 (the 4% speedup as mentioned above) and speed up the image to be synchronous with the images. The speedup raises the pitch of available audio tracks by one half of one tone although it's debatable as to whether this is distinguishable by the human ear.
The solution for a NTSC display is to spread the 24 film frames across the 60 video fields by alternating the display of the first film frame for 2 video fields and the next film frame for 3 video fields. This process is referred to as 2-3 pulldown and, again, it's questionable whether this process is noticeable to the human eye.
Neither format is inherently better than the other.
Fullscreen vs. widescreen
What is aspect ratio?
Aspect ratio refers to the relative dimensions of the film image (the width-to-height ratio) – there are two standard ratios: fullscreen and widescreen.
What is fullscreen?
This is the typical ‘square’ image favoured (until recently) by television presentations. This aspect ratio is expressed as 4:3 or 1.33:1, which means that the frame is 1.33 times as wide as it is tall.
Fullscreen presentations fill the entire screen of standard ‘square’ televisions. If a fullscreen image is viewed on a widescreen television, the screen will be wider than image and black bars will be visible on the right and left sides.
What is widescreen?
Widescreen is the characteristic ‘rectangular’ image favoured by in most film presentations. There are several aspect ratios that may be called ‘widescreen’ but the most common are (in order of increasing width) 1.66:1, 1.78:1 (also referred to as 16:9), 1.85:1 and 2.35:1.
If a widescreen image is viewed in on a standard television, the screen will be taller than the image and black bars visible at the top and bottom. The thickness of these bars will depend on the aspect ratio of the widescreen presentation: the wider the aspect ration, the thicker the black bars.
What is letterbox widescreen?
Letterbox widescreen (sometimes referred to as LBX) is a method of preserving the rectangular image of a widescreen presentation.
Unfortunately, letterboxed presentations (depending on the aspect ratio) do not always reach the sides (left and right) of viewable screen on a widescreen TV set, prompting the need for viewers to use the 16:9 or ‘Zoom’ feature of their DVD player or TV to expand the image causing a loss of resolution. This issue relates only to widescreen TVs.
What is anamorphic widescreen?
Anamorphic enhancement is a process for widescreen TVs where the original image is compressed by 33% in the vertical axis during encoding. When the player decodes the image, the vertical axis is decompressed giving a higher resolution and greater clarity.
Anamorphically enhanced DVDs can be viewed just as easily on fullscreen TVs as widescreen ones although the process is usually not discernible. PC monitors, despite almost universally being 4:3, have a higher resolution than TV sets and so can display the widescreen image in a window 854x480 pixels or higher for NTSC, 1024x576 or higher for PAL).
Despite a common misunderstanding, the term 'anamorphic' does not ensure that the image will entirely fill the screen of a widescreen TV set.
How can I tell if a widescreen DVD is letterbox or anamorphic?
In the ‘Technical Details’ section of the page for each DVD listing is a field highlighted as ‘Screen’. In this field you should find the aspect ratio listed for the DVD in question. Only titles with confirmed anamorphic transfers will display ‘Anamorphic’ in this field. If it does not, the widescreen presentation will be letterbox.
Why can I still see black bars on my widescreen TV?
Widescreen TVs have an aspect ratio of 1.77:1; the same ratio can be expressed as 16:9. Widescreen presentations with aspect ratios higher than this (i.e. 1.85:1 or 2.35:1, for example)will still exhibit black bars at the top and bottom despite these being much less than those on a standard 4:3 ‘square’ TV set.
Audio
What is Dolby Digital as a sound format?
Dolby Digital is a system capable of multi channel digital audio, coded using technology previously known as AC-3, often abbreviated as DD.
What is Dolby Digital 1.0 Mono?
A single channel of digital audio. On a surround sound system, the audio stream will be directed through the front centre speaker.
What is Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono?
Somewhat confusingly, this is actually also a single channel of digital audio. The same audio stream is directed to the front left and front right speakers. Very few discs use this format.
What is Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo?
Two channels of digital audio. One stream will be directed to the front left speaker, the other to the front right speaker.
What is Dolby Digital Surround?
Initially known as simply Dolby Surround, this is an audio mixing technique that bolts on a rear channel and a centre channel onto a standard two-channel signal. With a two speaker sound system, these extra channels will beautomatically mixed into the audio streams for the left and right speaker
What is Dolby Digital 4.0?
Four channels of digital audio. On a surround sound system the audio streams will be directed to the front left, front right, rear left and rear right speakers.
What is Dolby Digital 4.1?
Four channels of digital audio incorporating an additional low frequency effects channel (denoted by the ‘.1’, this channel is otherwise known as LFE). On a surround sound system the audio streams will be directed to the front left, front right, rear left and rear right speakers with the LFE channel directed to the subwoofer.
What is Dolby Digital 5.1?
Five channels of digital audio incorporating a LFE channel. On a surround sound system the audio streams will be directed to the front left, front right, rear left and rear right speakers, the low frequency channel directed to the subwoofer with dialogue generally confined to the front centre speaker.
What is Dolby Digital 5.1 EX?
Five channels of digital audio incorporating a LFE channel, including support for a rear centre speaker by mixing across sound from the rear left and rear right speakers.
What is Dolby Digital 6.1?
Six channels of digital audio incorporating a LFE channel. This format differs from DD5.1 EX as it provides dedicated support for a rear centre speaker. This format is fully compatible for owners of a traditional 5.1 surround sound system.
What is DTS?
An abbreviation of Digital Theatre Systems, DTS is a rival audio format to Dolby Digital 5.1 and also involves five channels of digital audio incorporating a LFE channel. It differs slightly from DD5.1 by utilising a slightly narrower dynamic range and higher bit-rate audio encoding.
What is DTS ES?
Five channels of DTS digital audio incorporating a LFE channel, including support for a rear centre speaker by mixing across sound from the rear left and rear right speakers.
Can I view a DVD with a Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track if I don’t have a surround sound system?
Absolutely. Dolby Digital will automatically downmix the audio streams depending on how many speaker channels are available.
Can I view a DVD with a DTS audio track without a DTS decoder?
Unfortunately not. To benefit from DTS audio you'll require a dedicated decoder in your DVD player, your home cinema amp/receiver, or your TV.
Subtitles
Where can I find which subtitles are available on a DVD?
In the ‘Technical Details’ section of the page for each listing is a field highlighted as ‘Subtitles’; here you should find listed all the available subtitles for the DVD in question.
Please note that for many pre-release products few details regarding subtitles are confirmed by the studio responsible until the release date is very close. We strive to display these on the site as soon as this information becomes available for the benefit of our valued customers.
Subtitles in the language I want are not listed. Why not?
The number and nature of subtitles vary from disc to disc and are entirely at the behest of the studio producing that particular DVD. If you can’t find the subtitles you’re looking for in the ‘Subtitles’ field of the ‘Technical Details’ section, chances are they’ve not been included on the disc!
What are subtitles for the hard of hearing/hearing impaired?
These are subtitles specifically designed for viewers who may have trouble clearly defining particular dialogue or sound when viewing a DVD.
Such subtitles streams not only reproduce dialogue in text on the screen but also give visual clues to sonic events taking place on the screen. For example, if the sound of a telephone can be heard then ‘[phone rings]’ or similar text will be displayed.