DVD motion is jerky, start-stop, not smooth.

[fshelledy]

Playing a DVD movie on my DVD drive, motion is start-stop with a cycle time of about 2 seconds. Is this a problem with the hardware, driver, decoder or media player software?

Desktop, Windows XP, Windows media player, Sony DVD drive.

[Broni]

Computer info: processor speed, amount of RAM, video card specs (RAM).

[Dias de verano]

Does it affect all DVDs, including pressed ones and burned ones, or only some disks? Or just one?

[fshelledy]

An old Gateway desktop. 800 Mhz. 512 MB RAM. No information in control panel about video card.

I played another pressed DVD and did not observe the problem. I don't have any burned DVDs. I have played the DVD on which I observed the problem before, and there was no problem then.

[fshelledy]

An old Gateway desktop. 800 Mhz. 512 MB RAM. No information in control panel about video card.

I played another pressed DVD and did not observe the problem. I don't have any burned DVDs. I have played the DVD on which I observed the problem before, and there was no problem then.

[Broni]

Everything back to normal, then?

[fshelledy]

Nope. Guess my last post was unclear. Still getting start-stop on the disc where I initially had the problem. What I was trying to say was that I had previously had normal result on thad disc.

[Broni]

Do other DVDs play OK? Did you try to clean DVD in question?

[fshelledy]

I only have a few DVDs. I tried one other and it was OK. I haven't tried cleaning the CD. Will do that and reply.

[Broni]

When you clean CD/DVD, always use radial motion, not circular.

[dahlarbear]

Is this "onboard" video with the motherboard or a separate video card?

Look at the back of the PC box.  There will be a group of connectors on a single vertical panel.  These come with the motherboard.  If your monitor is connected there you're using onboard video.

On the back of the PC box towards the bottom there is a series of horizonal slots.  These are for additional component cards that plugin to the motherboard.  If the monitor is connected there you have a separate video card.

Onboard video frequently uses system memory for all or part of its graphic memory needs.  This shared memory usage can cause the symptoms you're seeing.  Although I am puzzled that it seems to be limited to a single DVD disc.

You may be able to modify the "AGP Aperture" value in the system BIOS to increase the maximum amount of system memory available for graphics use.  If you can provide the Make and Model Number of that Gateway system, we may be able to pull the documentation off the internet to see what user modifiable settings are available in the system BIOS.