Closed Caption Desperation

[MyMedia08]

My 89 year old mom can hardly hear. She uses closed caption on all her three TVs ( old and new, HDTV and not) on her Rogers service.. Even PVR works great.. No issues there.

I just bought her a whack of DVDs for her favourite TV shows. They are all clearlt marked CC on the package, on the cover and on the discs.

I cannot get it to work. . I know they dont work over component connections so I used the composite outputs on her old DVD player- nothing.

Took the DVD home. Tried them on the blue ray player- nothing ( okay as expected its HDMI). Tried on an old LG DVD player, old TV, all composite, nothing.

Checked all settings to turn OFF progressive scan - nothing.

I will spend any kind of money to get this to work for my mom.. will buy any equipment if I can be assured it will work...but I dont think there is such a thing. I have exhausted all my options.

I am really going to hate the drive back to Future Shop arguing with some 8 year old manager but I dont realy see any other options. And thats not even a solution.

What am I missing???

Tried 3 TVs, 3 DVD players, all type of connections.

If its the DVD, thats even worse as it means I cannot trust any labelling whatsoever.

What a dissappintment in technology and in marketing, If I didnt know better, I would call it a scam.

[talljak]

On DVD players closed captioning only works at 480i. If your DVD player is up converting then the TV will not be able to display the CC.
Have no fear there is a work around. Turn on subtitles. Its just like closed captioning.
Most think subtitles will only display other languages. English is always included. Just press the subtitle button on the DVD remote and cycle through them until you get English though its usually the first one.

[MyMedia08]

Thanks, but I've done that.

Does not even work on a a 27" CRT screen and an old non-progressive player that does not upconvert; using composite video out. Cant get much closer to 480i than that.

DVD only gives option for English or Spanish (no option for subtitles). Pressing subtitles on any DVD player gives me either a hand or a NONE depending on the player.

I am playing NCIS Season 1.

Specs
Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
Format: Box set, Color, DVD-Video, Widescreen, NTSC
Language: Original: English; Dubbed: Spanish; Closed Captioned: English Duration: 1009 minutes
Region(s): Region 1 (US and Canada only)
Number of Discs: 6

[57]

In the audio options of most DVDs (the main menu (can't remember if it's title or pop-up) that eventually comes up after inserting the DVD) there should be an option there to turn on/off subtitles. Some DVDs don't have the option. On some players it may be necessary to "stop" the DVD if it's playing to access various options.

If there is no such audio option, then it's not on that DVD and I don't recall DVDs having CC, but I could be wrong.

[MyMedia08]

Yes, I can easily get to the setup options...but the only choices presented are English and Spanish.

So I agree with you that if there is no such audio option to turn subtitle on or off,, then indeed perhaps it's not on that DVD . .. which leads to a more troubling concern that I will never ever again be able to trust the labelling on any DVD !!

See below....

Does this not suggest the DVD is closed caption??

I hae seen close caption DVDs before, at my mom place, a while back.. But as we bought more, we could get it to work. At first I just thought I was buying the wrong versions... so now I very carefully look explicitly for closed captions on the packaging. Bought $100 worth yesterday as they have a few sets on sale....... only opened one, the one below.

Again what does CC mean if one cannot see any closed captions?????

[talljak]

Do other DVD's have a working CC or Subtitles? Or is it just this dvd set?

[JamesK]

I will spend any kind of money to get this to work for my mom.

My Samsung BDP1600 displayes CC. In fact, on some discs, I have to turn it off, as it comes on automagically. This is via HDMI. If you go shopping for a new player, take some of those discs along to verify they work properly..

[MyMedia08]

Hmmm...



1) Do you get the CC on DVD's, BR's, or both?

2) I thought CC was analog and does not work over HDMI.

3) What would this source say the Samsung BDP1600 does NOT have a cc encorder?? Specically:

In response to an earlier thread asking if I was happy with my 1600. In general, yes. However, I *really* wish I would have researched BD players before I bought this one because it was cheap at the store. The 1600 does not have a closed caption encoder (like most of the panasonics) and if I put in an older DVD that doesn't have subtitles (like Band of Brothers), I get no closed captions. Therefore, I have my oold panasonic DVD player sitting under my 1600 for those old DVDs with no subtitles. So, in this case, the 1600 does not suit my needs. This is an issue that will not affect 85% of the community. But, since my wife and I watch everything with subtitles or closed captions (TV included), this is a big deal for us.

So, yes I will spend money to get it to work, but only if indeed I can get it to work.




.

[JamesK]

^^^^

I don't recall the details, as for me it was an annoyance. However, I just checked the manual and what it refers to is subtitles and not specifically CC. It also says not all Blu-ray and DVD discs have subtitles. Apparently, Blu-ray supports up to 255 languages in subtitles. The ones I saw were in English, as was the audio. I just checked 3 DVDs (I don't have any BR available at the moment, possibly one tomorrow). Two of them had no mention of captions or subtitles. One said English captions and French & Spanish subtitiles. All 3 had English subtitles. Do subtitles work on those discs? Again, this is with the BDP1600 & HDMI.

[MyMedia08]

Another option is to forget cc altogether, set the language on her DVD to spanish and use english subtitles. But even that woat work as I cannot puchased DVD with subtitles with any certainty as the packaging is bogus and unrealiable give there are no standards.

I suppose i should be grateful I really got NCIS content on the NCIS DVD I purchased.

Anyway, thanks for trying - I'll be retruning everthing tomorrow and am giving up. The CC on purchased DVDs, is totally hit and miss and thus the while thing is a crock. Have no interest or patience for such misleading marketing and chasing ghosts. If I find the right hearing impaired assocation to raise this to, for them to take up the fight for standards, I think thats where my time is better served.

I will treat my mom to some more Rogers channels... at least the CC works ... even on HD channels, and via HDMI.