playing iMac computers: they can't seem to play DVDs.
The new iMac DV model is marketed as a mini movie-theater, but they are "plagued with problems" playing movies on DVD, says Wired, citing reports on Apple's technical support Web site and other sites such as MacFixit and MacInTouch.
The problems are said to include constant stuttering, unexpected stops and restarts, and pictures which break up or pixilate, Wired says. But the magazine says the most common problems seems to be audio synchronization, with a movie's sound and pictures falling out of synch according to users at the tech support sites.
"It's like watching a badly dubbed Hong Kong Kung Fu movie," Joseph Rose, an Oregon journalist who bought an iMac DV last week, tells Wired. "I'm pretty ticked about it. Especially since Apple marketed the iMac DV as giving users 'a front row seat' to the movies."
According to Wired, the trouble seems caused by flaws in "four or five different pieces of software, including the DVD playback…the Mac sound management package, and Apple's QuickTime multimedia software." To fix them, Apple has released five software updates in the past four months, the magazine says, including a firmware upgrade for the DVD hardware version 2 of Apple's DVD Player software; two updates to Sound Manager; and, a new version of QuickTime.
SoundManager technical lead Jeff Moore has recommended iMac users install the sotware updates available on the Apple Web site. But Wired says the troubles continue for some users even after they update.
The trouble first arrived last October, when Apple changed DVD decoding from hardware to software, according to MacFixit editor and publisher Ted Landau. He says the trouble seems to be widespread and not limited to iMac DV owners - he says it happens on the company's Mac G4.
"I'd say that the majority of users will see this at least occasionally if they regularly play DVD movies," he tells Wired. "But what is so puzzling is that the problems are inconsistent. "Some users never have seen this problem. Others get it only when virtual memory is on. Others get it all the time. Some get it only occasionally. Others get it often. There has been no word from Apple that would account for all of this variability."
The troubleshooting and tech support sites are also suggesting users disable AppleTalk networking software and virtual memory, Wired says, while also allocating up to twice as much memory to the DVD Player software. The glitches seem limited to movie playback so far, the magazine says, but that's because so few Mac-compatible games ship on DVD.
