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Games Entertainment

PS2 Class Action Lawsuit Against DVD Player 73

Posted by simoniker from the dewey-cheatem-and-howe dept.
Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing us to this class action lawsuit against Sony regarding the Playstation 2's DVD player. You can fill in a form on the page to be informed of 'material developments' and assist the case, which alleges that the PS2's "..DVD player component suffers from a number of defects that prevents it from playing a wide-variety of DVD movies." Unfortunately, it seems the lawyers forgot to change the page title, which still reads 'Palm M130 Class Action Home Page'. Uhm, whoops.
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PS2 Class Action Lawsuit Against DVD Player More

PS2 Class Action Lawsuit Against DVD Player

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  • Other suit (Score:5, Interesting)

    by DonkeyJimmy ( 599788 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @03:56PM (#6000979)
    I'd like to sue Sony's Playstation 2 DVD REMOTE for not having a properly working fast forward. I've spoken to at least half a dozen other PS2 owners (with varying brands of remotes) and all of them have the same problem (if you hold fast forward it only goes for about a second and then you have to press it again).

    I really was going to rely on my PS2 as my primary DVD player, but this caused me to have to get a different one (an X-box).
    • The PS2 dvd player sucks, but I've never had a problem with it not properly playing a movie.

      You should never use a DVD player in a video game console to serve the role of a real dvd player. It's a decent idea for a dvd player in your kid's bedroom, or as a device to bring with you on vacation though.

      • Re:Other suit (Score:3, Interesting)

        by aridhol ( 112307 )
        You should never use a DVD player in a video game console to serve the role of a real dvd player.
        Why not? It's supposed to do the same thing -- play a movie.
        • see this is where you're wrong. never buy something expecting it to do a function properly. even if its advertised as a feature.

          sheesh. how do you people make it across the street without getting run over?

          ;-)

        • Re:Other suit (Score:4, Insightful)

          by NanoGator ( 522640 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @04:19PM (#6001203) Homepage Journal
          "Why not? It's supposed to do the same thing -- play a movie."

          The problem occured because Sony didn't put enough energy into developing it or testing it as a DVD Player. It's hard to justify putting that much energy into that aspect of the unit when the primary (and profitable) purpose is to play games. It was inevitable that it'd be half-assed at best.

          It's an unwritten law: the more your game console does besides play games, the less successful it will be. The Phillips CD-I pops into mind. It wanted to be a game machine and a movie player, but didn't exactly excel at either. As a game unit, it didn't have a very good controller, nor did it have the graphics hardware to do anything particularly interesting. It couldn't even scroll images without it being choppy. As a movie player, it was kind of cool because this was before DVDs. Unfortunately, the movies were roughly VHS quality and you had to swap discs, at least the audio was really good on it.

          So yes, the PS2 was supposed to 'do the same thing' as a DVD player, but they didn't focus it on that, and the consumer got burnt. Fortunately for most consumes, DVD players are cheap enough (even considered a household item) so a lot of people just didn't care.

          • Re:Other suit (Score:4, Insightful)

            by jvmatthe ( 116058 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @06:41PM (#6002445) Homepage
            It's an unwritten law: the more your game console does besides play games, the less successful it will be.
            So, the PS2 can be used as:
            • a console for PS2 games
            • a console for PSX games
            • a DVD player
            • a Linux terminal with an officially sanctioned Linux distribution
            • part of a movie streaming station with Qcast (or something like that)
            ...therefore it is less successful? That seems at odds with reality, if you ask me, and probably not deserving of an "Insightful" mod. Maybe "Informative" for the CD-I stuff, but certainly not for that glaringly wrong statement.

            Even if you meant it could have been more successful without any but the first ability, I still dont' believe your statement. The PS2 is the most successful console in the past several years and three years on it is still selling like hotcakes compared to the competition. None of the above secondary abilities (DVD, PSX compatibility, Linux distro) have necessarily made it sell any better (although DVD and PSX were important to me, and others) but they certainly haven't hurt it either.

            • Re:Other suit (Score:1, Redundant)

              by NanoGator ( 522640 )
              "So, the PS2 can be used as: ...therefore it is less successful?"

              Apples are not the same as oranges. I'll explain why. The PS2 can be used as a console for playing PS2 and PSX games. PSX compatiblity is for gaming and as such does not contradict what I said.

              As a DVD Player, as I've already mentioned, the PS2 suffers. The time and money put into making that work would have been better spent making the system a better machine. The graphics on the PS2 looked blurry compared to the Dreamcast simply beca
        • Why not?

          Video quality isn't as good as dedicated device.
          Audio quality (normally) isn't as good as dedicated device.
          Controls sucks.
          Configuation options are poor.
          Menu handling is poor.
          Limited featureset.
          Etc.

          A video game console isn't a dedicated piece of AV equipement. If you arn't expecting that kind of quality, a game console's built in DVD player is probably just fine, but I sure wouldn't want it as a part of my home theater setup...

    • Remote possibility (Score:5, Funny)

      by lightspawn ( 155347 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @04:16PM (#6001174) Homepage
      I'd like to sue Sony's Playstation 2 DVD REMOTE for not having a properly working fast forward.

      Um, you're supposed to sue the company, not individual products.

  • I bet Nintendo's smiling right now. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by NanoGator ( 522640 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @03:59PM (#6001011) Homepage Journal
    "Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing us to this class action lawsuit against Sony regarding the Playstation 2's DVD player."

    Nintendo made a pretty strong stand with the GameCube that a game machine should only be a game machine. Gotta admit, they had a point. The GameCube was $100 cheaper than the PS2 or XBOX, plus it was considerably smaller. From what I gather from this story, the DVD player on the PS2 wasn't exactly a stellar. For the cost of a DVD Player and a GameCube, you could get a Playstation 2 that wasn't exactly stellar at either. I realize that the PS2 has games people like, however at launch Dreamcast games were looking better because of a nasty little bottleneck the Playstation 2 has.

    Well I've drifted away from the point a bit. When making a game system, focus on making it play games. Not everybody is happy to spend $300 on a game system.

    • Yet on XBOX... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by malakai ( 136531 ) *
      playing DVD movies rock. I love the zoom and pan ability as well. Maybe all DVD players have that, but it was a nice touch on the XBOX.

      I used to use my PS2 to play DVD's. I never had a 'remote' for it though, I justed used the joystick. That wasn't the greatest. But the XBOX DVD/Remote combo worked really well. It's my primary DVD player, you get the AC3 out, as well as HDTV if your TV can handle it. All that other jazz. I'm sure the offset the cost of testing and perfecting the DVD playback capability by
      • > used to use my PS2 to play DVD's. But the XBOX DVD/Remote combo worked really well. It's my primary DVD player, you get the AC3 out,

        You *do* know that the PS2 has an optical out, right? Sure it doesn't decode Dolby Digital and/or DTS, but it will put out an AC3 digital signal that your receiver will decode.

      • *Everyone* uses the dirty disc as a general error. I suspect it's the only media-related error the Xbox can throw.


      • It's my primary DVD player, you get the AC3 out, as well as HDTV if your TV can handle it.

        Actually, you don't get HDTV, the DVD playback is limited to 480i, no better then, well anything that outputs 480 lines. It's not even fsking progressive 480, it's interlaced. It says so right on the back of the package.

        And, yes, I do have a Widescreen HDTV. I also happen to be using the X-box as the DVD player on it, but simply because our other DVD player doesn't have progressive scan either.

  • I have a dedicated dvd player, but when I tried the ps2 one I never had a problem. My dad did initially, but I bought him the dvd remote that came with updated dvd software for it. That fixed all his problems.
    • funny, i was unable to watch Tron when i had my memory card (with the updated dvd player) in. i got loads of random artifacts on the screen. lots of yellow shit. when i took the memory card out, and it used the original dvd player software, the movie played just fine. stuck the card back in, and voila, the yellow shit was back. weird. that's the only movie it's done that on so far.
      • Between my roomie and I, we are on our 3rd PS2. The current one no longer plays dvds I am moving back to Nintendo for the next gen. of game systems for sure.
  • I'm reading the lawsuit filed and it spends a couple pages explaining DVDs and a couple pages explaining the PS2 (!!!???)

    "26. A DVD is the same size and thickness as a CD, approximately 4.72 inches in diameter and about as thick as a penny."

    "28. Compared to a VHS (which plays on a VCR), the DVD (which plays on a DVD Player) offers consumers significant advantages as a format for playing studio released movies at home."

    "29. The video and audio quality of DVD is significantly better than VHS.
    • "PlayStation 1 was a breakthrough in computer technology due in part to its capability to play computer games on CDs."

      It's a breakthrough to do something that had been done many times previously? The only radical thing Sony did with the PS1 was to not include a disc activity light.

      • If putting your games on CD isn't a breakthrough when a console does it, perhaps you could explain why the N64 did so poorly, compared to said PS1?

        Here's a hint: one of the advertising campagins for Final Fantasy VII said something like 'Somebody take those cartridge guys out back and given them a cigarette.'

        • "If putting your games on CD isn't a breakthrough when a console does it, perhaps you could explain why the N64 did so poorly, compared to said PS1?"

          The N64 didn't do poorly. It did quite well. Being beat by PS1 isn't the same as doing poorly.

          As for the PS1, I'll happily concede that it's CD-ROM choice did help in it's success. However, I doubt we'll agree on the reasoning. The PS1 had a shitload of games. (Mostly shit games, so it really was a shitlaod) The cost of entering the PS1 game world was ve

          • For further education, find the book "Game Over: Press Start To Continue."

            To make a game for the Nintendo/Super Nintendo, and to a lesser extent the N64, you had to buy a batch of carts from Nintendo. Therefore, if you overestimated your sales, you were stuck with carts; underestimate, and you had to wait several months(!) for the big N to make you some more. Carts were expensive. Oh, and for the Nintendo, at least, big N limited you to five titles per year.

            Now, the PS1; cds are dirt cheap to make.

            • "Now, the PS1; cds are dirt cheap to make. Any production house can stamp out hundreds of thousands over the weekend. You didn't need to go through Sony. You could do a small run, or a big run."

              Fair point. I think you make sense, but I'm not willing to concede for the simple reason that they're not the first to do it. PCs have an even lower barrier to entry (even in the PS1 days) and were quite successful with CD-ROM titles. Heck, people could put out games for free without any media at all, simply usi

    • Re:Are "normal" people this technologically unsavv (Score:4, Interesting)

      by lightspawn ( 155347 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @04:23PM (#6001237) Homepage
      Any lawyers in the house? Is this type of "explanation" normal in a lawsuit? Or even necessary?

      You know, his honor might not be a GTA fan. In fact, he may not even own a PS1, let alone a PS2.

      If you'd like a ruling based on the technological merits, you'd better let people explain them.

      Not to mention that some parents (I know this scenario is hard to imagine, but stay with me on this) may buy consoles for their kids; these people may have no idea what they do (some of them may have professional and/or personal lives) but they need to understand the issues before becoming part of this class action lawsuit.

  • Launch day PS2 and my old PSX (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jvmatthe ( 116058 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @04:26PM (#6001259) Homepage
    There have been a lot of complaints about Sony's hardware. Just read USENET newsgroups for a while to get an idea of what I'm talking about. Here's my story, although not all of it has to do with the posted class-action lawsuit.

    I stood in line on launch day, 26 October 2000, and got my PS2 at a local Best Buy. Ever since that day, it has traveled four times on trips to visit the in-laws (12 hours away, by car) and over to a friends' apartment several dozen times, always travelling in a padded case. It has always been used standing in the upright position. I have completed several PS2 games and even some PS1 games during that time. I've watched dozens of movies on it.

    I've never had a problem playing a game. Well, ok, I did once, but that turned out to be a dirty disc and once cleaned it played without problems.

    I've only had trouble with two movies that I can think of. One of them was Jurassic Park 3 [imdb.com] and the other was The Mexican [imdb.com]. Everything else has worked flawlessly, to my knowledge. The glitches have always been at the layer change. One or both of these might have been before I go the updated DVD drivers with my Sony-made remote control.

    Others have had trouble with PS2 consoles. Many also had trouble with PSX consoles. Back then, I suspect much of that was because the machines were put on carpet and didn't have adequate ventilation. I always put my PSX on a hard surface, like a large book or a shelf, and never had trouble with it, after four years of heavy use. I wouldn't be surprised if many of the problems with PS2 consoles you read about on USENET and so forth were from habits similar to those that caused problems with PSX machines.

    I've had good luck with my systems, using a little care. Others have had trouble. Perhaps it is Sony's problem, but I've seen more than enough games and hardware that were obviously abused to think that much of the problem could well lie with the consumers. Is there a link to data that shows that it's Sony's problem and not the consumers? Something like "here's a list of movies tried with a just-out-of-the-box PS2. See how they don't play?"

    I sure hope my luck holds.
    • Well, I didn't get a PS2 until the summer after launch, and mostly because I caved in for the Gran Turismo 3 package deal. I didn't have a DVD player either, so that was a bonus. First DVD I bought didn't play the whole way through. It was "Gladiator". Gets about halfway through then gets garbled, skipping scenes randomly. I basically lose about half an hour of movie there. I exchanged it, because I thought maybe the DVD was defective. Exact same problem on the new one. I take excellent care of my s
      • Sorry about that; new user here. I didn't notice that it posted in HTML by default, hence no paragraph breaks.

        My apologies, won't happen again.
    • I also have a PS2 and have beaten the shit out of it and NEVER had any problems playing DVDs......This sounds like a case of stupid people trying to get money......Oh look two people have complained about a problem that has a very narrow scope...better sue someone...that would solve all our problems....
  • I've had my PS2 for about 6 weeks now and the only problem I had with it (aside from figuring out how to turn it off the first day I got it), was the loud click and "disc error" that only lasted as long as it took me to shut it down, look at the warrantee label, and then spary some canned air into the fan port. Not a single issue with playing DVDs though, and I've done that on many occasions.

    At anyrate, aren't all the games themselves DVD discs too? I can understand people getting miffed over having to pay
    • The suit addresses two points:

      1: The DVD Movie player isn't as compatible with DVD movies as it should be.

      Personally, I never had a problem with it, except for one disc, and even then, a lot of other players did the same thing. After installing the update, even this disc played with no problems. Yeah, the PS2 had problems with layer switches, but then again, so did a lot of players circa 2000. Again the upgrade helped a lot.

      2: The DVD mechanism itself is defective, resulting in a $120 repair charge fo
  • One was playing a not entirely legal Power Puff Girls DVD - it seemed to only play the keyframes - while my Samsung POS dvd player handled it fine.

    The other problem has been several PS1 discs - Finaly Fantasy 8, Resident Evil 2 - they don't recognise the disc. Not that it matters I still have my old school playstation and it's more than capable of handling these.

  • Hmmm... I just used google to fix mine. (Score:4, Informative)

    by JofCoRe ( 315438 ) on Tuesday May 20, 2003 @05:38PM (#6001955) Journal
    I think I may have had the problem they are talking about... a few months back, my PS2 stopped reading any DVD movies. Just kept saying "disc read error". After running a cleaner thru it many times, and dissasembling and blowing out any dust, it still didn't work. So, I turned to the mecca of all answers: google. W/in a few minutes, I had found a solution [google.com]. I don't think this is the exact same link that I found back then, but it has the same information. The portion that mattered to me was the laser voltage adjustment. A minor turn of the screw, and it's been working flawlessly ever since. (Although I was stumped for a little while until I realized I was turning the wrong screw and adjusting the CD voltage instead of DVD voltage -- doh!) Of course, doing so voids my warranty, but my PS2 was old enough by then to be out of the warranty anyway, so...

    Much easier than lawsuits...

    However, I do see the point of the lawsuit, considering that apparently Sony's position on this is that you should send or take your unit in for service, costing you around $100-$120...

    Sony should just fess up and fix them for free when people have these problems, since it seems to be a widespread enough problem and not just "isolated incidents"...
  • I havent encountered any problems playing discs on my ps2. However the sound is AWEFULLY low (the tv has to be turned to full volume to hear the dvd at normal tv volume - and this has been tested on 2 tv's) also it sometimes plays things in the wrong aspect - Lee evans live in london plays fullscreen and looks all screwy. My downstairs tv has a widescreen button which squashes it down so it looks fine but my bedroom tv doesent :-(
    • Read the manual. The low sound is deliberate, so that if you're using DTS or Dolby 5.1 then the TV sound doesn't interfere with the 5.1 sound. To get a regular volume curve, go into the DVD player and play a movie, go into the options and turn off Optical Output.

  • My PS2 is the only DVD player in the house. It's never had a problem playing a disc. I have a 3rd party remote and I use DVD Region X to play non-Australian releases.

    But then, I wasn't an early adopter.

  • Ive had two different PS2s. I bought one about 2 years ago, used it for a couple months, then sold it when I was strapped for cash. In that time, I never had a problem playing any games, or watching any movies.

    Ive had another one for about 9 months or so. I have the sony dvd remote (dont use the updated drivers, because my model already has them built in. Most of the newer ones do, if you RTFM and check), and this is the primary DVD player of the house. I use the optical output for audio, the svideo f
  • For Christ's Sake, change the page title! Probably got some high school kid to do the web page. Didn't know what he was doing so got another page as a template and modified it for this PS2 page and forgot to change the <title></title> information.
  • ok, someone posted these instructions on how to fix it (http://www.geocities.com/djyayo/PS2errorFAQ.txt [geocities.com]) and i followed those instructions to clean the lense on my ps2 (i bought it soon after they came out, so i have no warranty anyways) and it worked like a charm. all of my ps2 blue cd games that didn't work, now work again, as well as all of the dvds that didn't play before.

    huzzah!

    i kinda feel like kramer when he used that balm during his coffee lawsuit.

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