Environmental DVD Wrecks Apple Drives 459
FST777 writes "The British Mail on Sunday published its latest DVD giveaway on the EcoDisc, a thin and bendable DVD format that is supposed to be more environmentally-friendly than regular DVDs. Despite the clear warning against using them in Apple slot drives, some Mac users decided to give it a go. The result? A brisk trade for repair shops in the UK. 'The EcoDisc's manufacturer, ODS, insists the disc won't break drives. "We've produced over ten million of these discs — we've had less than a dozen phone calls," says managing director, Ray Wheeler. "There are ways to get the discs out." Wheeler says the problem stems from Apple's slot-loading drives. "It uses an ejection system that doesn't get approval from the DVD Forum." He claims the EcoDisc should work in other types of slot-loading drive, although admits that it hasn't been tested in the PlayStation 3.'"
pot, meet kettle (Score:4, Insightful)
And these new discs do?
Re:Luckily for Apple Users there is a simple fix (Score:5, Insightful)
Who takes an unknown disc that they find in a newspaper and sticks it into their machine without so much as reading the cover? It says right on the thing, don't use it in a Mac. Then they want to complain?
Bunch of Flakes.
Who is out of specs again? (Score:5, Insightful)
environmental friendliness (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Luckily for Apple Users there is a simple fix (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't imagine anyone's going to trash their Mac for a few EcoDiscs, but still, it's a bit unsettling that the drives don't properly conform to standard.
Re:environmental friendliness (Score:5, Insightful)
Because the Internet doesn't use any electrical power?
I agree that it's probably more efficient to download data instead of burning it on DVD and distributing it that way, but by how much?
Re:Luckily for Apple Users there is a simple fix (Score:5, Insightful)
The companies that were producing these disks just dropped the logo, going under the assumtion that if is was the same size as a CD and had a shiny bottom, that people would put it in thier CD players, and people did just that.
To most people a CD is defined as "something that is about 5 inches across and has a shiny bottom. If I put it in my computer something happens."
Re:Nelson points and says "Haha!" (Score:4, Insightful)
That being said, you could always get an iMac. Nothing says "high technology" like a complete lack of a floppy drive.
Re:Luckily for Apple Users there is a simple fix (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, you can always boot the machine into console and issue a direct "eject disk" command.
But then, of course, you'd say it was the user's fault for not knowing the disk was bad before inserting it.
This will be fun: Non-standard DVD player and an unusual DVD. Does the DVD adhere to appropriate standards, in which case, we can all gloat that the stylish and disposable Mac du jour falls victim to its own preciousness, or is this a matter of shared liability?
Re:Luckily for Apple Users there is a simple fix (Score:4, Insightful)
Doctor! Doctor! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Nelson points and says "Haha!" (Score:5, Insightful)
Hello, standards (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Who is out of specs again? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Nelson points and says "Haha!" (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, it's a problem for high schools too, but that's because it's school computers and HS students tend to be dicks when it comes to other people's property. That issue applies to both slot- and tray-loading drives, though.
Re:Who is out of specs again? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Who is out of specs again? (Score:3, Insightful)
That's the point of adhering to a standard: everything works because each half of the interface is complying with the same pre-arranged rules. One product can deviate from the spec, and maybe it's no big deal... but only so long as everyone else follows the spec.
So it is not an absolute defense to say "we are compatible with everything that follows the spec." Only following the spec itself is actually a defense, and this case shows exactly why. In short, both Apple's drive and the bendable CD ignore the spec. They are both at fault.
Re:Luckily for Apple Users there is a simple fix (Score:5, Insightful)
I'll bet his post has a -1 by the end of the day.
Re:Never trusted slot loading (Score:1, Insightful)
Are you just trolling, or...? I mean, what keeps the disk from being scratched up when sitting and spinning in a tray? *roll eyes*
Slot-loaders have been in common consumer use for well over a decade (mostly in car CD players to begin with). The only real issue is if there's a problem with ejecting the disc since they're not as easy to get out manually as a tray-loading drive. I've never had a problem with any of the slot loading CD/DVD players I've had, and the ones in my and my family's various vehicles have had high volume, continuous use in less than optimal conditions (being driven around constantly is a lot worse for moving components that sitting in a PC on a desk somewhere) without a single issue. Aside from the occasional hardware failure which I'm sure is just about the same as tray-loaders, the only problems I ever hear about are with non-standard media like the irregularly shaped CDs and, apparently, these "Eco" discs. While tray-loaders handle them OK, even then you have to be careful to get them propertly aligned in the tray before feeding it in so, really, it's like putting an oval tire on a car and being surprised that the ride isn't quite right.
Re:Nelson points and says "Haha!" (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm fairly certain your parent post was pointing out how people bitched up a fit about the iMac not having that piece of junk back in 1998, not when the major PC builders finally dropped them from their standard configuration within the last 2 years.
Of course, back then the complaint was perfectly valid because Apple didn't replace it with anything.
Had the iMac shipped with a CDRW drive, they would have actually been "innovative", rather than "cheap".
No (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:something stinks. (Score:4, Insightful)
wow, you criticized apple fanboys with a side swipe at apple. And didn't click the no Karma, or Anonymous check box?
b.) This is basically a throw-away account. I've been lurking on Slashdot for far longer than my ID implies. One day there was a story about another company complaining about iTune's monopoly. Everybody poo-poo'd that complaint, so I mentioned that he had a point and why I thought so. (As opposed to saying something like "APPLE SUX!! EVERYBODY WHO LIKES APPLE SUCKS!") My comment was initially modded insightful. Unfortunately, that invited criticism. Instead of taking my point head-on, lots of people took jabs at my post. One guy shot up to a +5 for cooking up a hypothetical (and, if anybody spent more than 3 seconds pondering it, non-sensical) scenario about my motivations for making the comment. Silly stuff, but not really out of the norm for Slashdot. The silliness shot to an extreme when all of my recent posts started dropping. Before long, some 30 negative moderations had been made, actually causing me to get banned from Slashdot for a couple of months. (It was specific to an IP range, I could still post from home.) A couple of months later, I started posting again, and those new posts were automatically modded as troll.
So I created this account to avoid that BS attached by my old nick. Frankly, if this one gets toasted by ridiculously organized Apple fanboys too, I really don't care. I can create a new account. BFD. I'm not giving Steve Jobs verbal fellatio just to be cool with a group of people. I'm also not giving Apple any more credit than I'd give Microsoft. They're motivated by profit just like BillyG, so I'm not defending them just because I like my iPod.
Re:Dear American Mac-haters, I have a correction.. (Score:0, Insightful)
Lets see..
It is Britain's second biggest-selling daily newspaper after The Sun
And it was the first to sell 1 million copies a day.
Well then...seems that this 'evil right wing, middle class' paper outsells your liberal stuff.
So..to you, the wingnut, makes it evil.
Compare this to fox news. It clobbers all other cable news shows, yet the wingnuts call it all 'lies', even tho 'their sources' are called out nearly DAILY about their miss reporting.
Example... The NYTimes ran a story about how our Iraqi vets are coming home all wierded out and committing murders at an incredibly high rate. Well, it only took a day for that to be rebutted and the figures vetted to show they..well..LIED. Our servicemen are actually far, far lower than the national average thus proving that being in the service makes you less likely to commit murder. But, as it goes, facts are irrelevant for you back of the small bus riding window lickers.
Of course this will be modded to ZERO because it includes information regarding circulation figures.
Re:Dear American Mac-haters, I have a correction.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Well then...seems that this 'evil right wing, middle class' paper outsells your liberal stuff. So..to you, the wingnut, makes it evil.
Compare this to fox news. It clobbers all other cable news shows...
"Folks, I'm no fan of reality...Who is Britannica to tell me that George Washington owned slaves? If I want to say he didn't, that's my right! And now, thanks to Wikipedia, it's also a fact. We should apply these principles to all information! All we need to do is convince a majority of people that some factoid is true, for instance, that Africa has more elephants today than it did ten years ago. Now, I don't know if that's actually true. But if it was true, boy, that would be a real blow to the environmentalists. As usual, the Bush administration is on the cutting edge of information management. While they've admitted that Saddam did not possess weapons of mass destruction, they've also insinuated he did have weapons of mass destruction--insinuations that have been repeated over and over again on cable news for the past 3 and a half years. And now, the result is, 18 months ago, only 36% of Americans believed it, but 50% of Americans believe it now! Man, that number's growing almost as fast as the population of African elephants!...What we're doing is bringing democracy to knowledge. Now, the "blame ignorance first" crowd is gonna say that something is either true or it isn't, and it doesn't matter how many people agree....If you go against what the majority of people perceive to be reality, you're the one who's crazy!...Together, we can create a reality we all agree on: the reality we just agreed on."
Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This worked for me (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Luckily for Apple Users there is a simple fix (Score:4, Insightful)
Floppy DVDs don't go in slot-loading drives. Apple is the highest-profile user of such drives. It's just doublespeak to claim that it's "Apple" slot-load drives that are affected. A quick search shows only 230 results for '"dvd forum" +ejection system'--the top results, of course, referring to this article, and the others referring to the emergency eject function (i.e. the paperclip hole). That is the "DVD Forum approved ejection system" and it is fundamentally incompatible with a slot drive--there's no tray to pull out manually even if it had such a trigger. Further, Matsushita is one of the four largest members of the DVD Forum.
Apple neither designed, engineered, nor manufactured the device, so while it's true Apple didn't build a device to comply with "standards", it's a tautology. There is no possible way for the statement to be UNtrue. The only way to have a "DVD Forum approved" ejection system is to have a tray drive.
Way to take the bait hook, line, and sinker, though.
Re:Nelson points and says "Haha!" (Score:3, Insightful)
Debatable. Remember, the thing sold like hotcakes, no matter how much we thought it was crap.