Why won't my DVDs work?

[judethepude]

I am a bit of a DVD virgin, but shouldn't Rewritable DVDs last longer than a few months with fairly light use?? Two of the DVDs I bought around Christmas 2007 wont play back already!! I've tried them on several players, and nothing - one player says 'Wrong Disk'. This seems ridiculous after the hype about them! Is there something I am missing??

Thanks
Judethepud

[Zen]

I believe you have to finalise a disc once it has been recorded on to enable it to play on other players,at least I do with my
DVD recorder and I don't seem to have any problem even with cheap DVD-RWs. Are you doing so ?

[judethepude]

Thank you Zen. Indeed, I am not bothering to finalise disks because, normally, I only play them on my main DVD player. That MAY explain why the two disks in question won't play on other players, but doesn't explain why they won't play on the player on which I originally recorded them. All the other disks do! However, it's a good suggestion, and I will now act upon it and see what happens.

Jude

[poinsy]

Also, most DVD players tend to favour certain brands of DVD media more than others. I have had the odd problem with Tesco's own brand DVDs & CDs, where one wouldn't work and another did. Oddly enough, the cheapo DVD players that you often see in supermarkets tend to play just about anything!

[Hugh Spencer]

You don't have to finalise DVD+RW's - they play on other players, other things being equal.

[judethepude]

Thanks everybody. I realise I may not have made myself clear and so answers are now dealing with the question of my DVDs not playing on other players. My issue is that the DVDs were playing just fine on my main player (on which I originally recorded them), and now they aren't. I have several more of the same types of DVDs - one a good brand and one a bit cheaper. It's just that two of them won't work any more. (I also see that I write Christmas 2007 instead of 2006!!!)
Anyway, I guess that's just life - they've stopped working and I'll have to consign them to the bin.