Dell Inspiron 1505--DVD Video Lagging!!!!

I did not have this problem the first two days when I got the laptop in the mail but somehow everytime that I try to watch a DVD I get this jittery lag(not very intense but very noticeable and annoying). The lag is very short but very frequent and affects the sound and video. I can never get it to run smoothly. After speaking 2 1/2 hours on the phone with Dell-On-Call I still don't know what is wrong. The rep concluded that there was nothing wrong with the DVD drive itself and suggested I reinstall the PowerDVD program used to run DVD's.

I have tried many other DVDs and they all have the same problem. The werid thing is that this problem did not exist at the beginning. The only other thing I have added was the TV tuner and Microsoft GPS device(which I did not connect when I was watching DVD's). I also removed some programs to help my laptop run faster but I only removed the ones that I knew were not important(AOL, msn, etc)

I have also tried viewimg the video on MEdiaCent and WMP with the same problem. HOWEVER, I do not seem to have problem watching movies on the harddrive, only videos that come from DVDs. Also, the DVDs played perfectly fine on my DVD player

What should I do? Very frustrated. I have only gotten this laptop for 5 days and its already bothering me.

 

I have just reinstalled the PowerDVD software and it still has the same problem with lagging while playing DVDs. I have tried to play the same DVDs on my computer and they worked out fine. What is going on?

Also, my laptop seems to freeze from time to time for no reason.

 

You probably have too many processes or something. Try watchin the dvd using mediadirect (shut down comp. and press the mediadirect/house-looking button instead of power button) and see if you get the same problem.

 

Thank you! That worked perfectly! Now how do I have to do this everytime that I want to watch a DVD?

 

You may have to for the short term, atleast until you can fix the current problem.

Only thing I can think of right now is perhaps updating your video drivers. Although as you explained, running files from HDD was no problem. Though because Media Direct ran it, it doesnt seem to be a hardware issue.

Im not so familiar with MD as to the differences in osftware between it and its windows version.

Have you tried booting into windows and THEN pressing the MediaDirect button? Maybe try running DVD's through that.

Good luck with your problem.

 

It is not a video drivers in 90% of the time. It is a windows problem in IDE department. Anyway, use Windows Media player for DVD and see what is going on (you might have to install some free DVD player to get the right codec for WMP though, but AFAIK WinXP should have it).

 

What do you mean? I have tried playing it in WMP and it still has the problem. The only way I can watch it without lagging is through MediaDirect button.

 

Do you use the native resolution for your screen or...????

 

I'd say cut down on the number of programs you are running. The antivirus and other programs you have may be slowing your system down and causing the dvd playback problems. Exit the antivir and see waht happens

 

nowadays E1505 comes with 70+ running processes.

 

check to see if the drive is in PIO (i think) mode or DMA. either way, go to the hardware manager and uninstall the second eide or the dvd drive, it should be that one. then restart, it should reinstall itself correctly, and if you stilll have a problem then it's something else. This however has been the cause of most of the jittery playback of dvds with the dvdrws.

 

There are about 60 processes running right now. How do I know which programs I should delete from the Startup menu? I dont understand all the abbreviations. Can somebody give me a list of the things that I really need in startup? Thanks!

This might also explain why the computer freezes sometimes

 

Another big problem

I have these bootleg DVD's which I got from a friend and I can't seem to play some of them on my e1505 laptop (some of them work but they start lagging halfway into the movie). I've tried those DVDs on my comp and DVD player and they both worked perfectly fine there. What can I do? Is there something wrong with my laptop??