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In any industry there are always individuals and companies that will use methods and enticements to lure the consumer into a sale that may not be the best thing for them. The disc replication industry is no exception.
Unpaid royalties and license fees
Lets say you have an invention that you patent so no one can steal your idea. You then set up a manufacturing licensing and royalty structure so that manufacturers can produce your product anywhere in the world and you get the royalties on every product sold. And to your good fortune, your product is sold in the billions of units every year. Wouldn’t it be good!
Well – this is exactly the situation for CD and DVD production. Philips and Sony hold the patents for their intellectual property and manufacturers pay a license fee to be allowed to produce these products and a royalty on every disc sold.
The problem arises where manufacturers try to beat the system by either under reporting their production each month, or by simply not paying the royalties at all.
This leaves some producers with an unfair pricing advantage in the market. The consumer is totally unaware that this is an illegal product and thinks that they have found a real bargain.
Unfortunately for anyone in the supply chain, Philips will aggressively pursue the recovery of their lost earnings. This means the manufacturer, the broker, the client and the end user are all viewed by Philips as fair game for litigation. They categorically do not accept the defense of ignorance to the fact of the breach.
Protect yourself by only using companies that can provide you with a document called a License Status Confirmation Document that is issued by Philips. It is your proof of payment of the fees to Philips by the manufacturer.
There are other fees also associated with DVD production that are not covered in this payment to Philips. Be sure to use a reputable supplier like EverTechnology that ensures that all fees are paid to intellectual property owners and governing bodies and stakeholders.
Disc overproduction.
This is a method used to try and increase margin at the low volume end of the market.
It works like this. If you order 500 discs, which is the minimum order for a moulded disc run, the manufacturer will actually run 1000 pieces and give you the 500 and store the balance.
DVD Copying CD Copying DVD Replication CD Packaging CD Duplication
You then get a call 3 weeks later by an “embarrassed” sales rep who tells you that there was a mistake with your order and 1000 units were actually manufactured. You are then offered a “deal” to take the extra 500 discs at a rate that is well under what it would cost you to run another 500.
Even if the manufacturer only charges you the difference between the total price of 500 and 1000 – the manufacturer still wins because he has bumped you to 1000 instead of 500.
Use of sticky paper labels
Sticky paper labels are cheaper to produce than direct to disc printing on duplicated discs. However, sticky labels seriously affect the ability of the disc player to read the data on the disc.
You get a cheap price, but a disc that can have serious problem in the market.
For more information read our article.
Untested discs
Optical discs are NOT like floppy disks – they are optical, not magnetic. This difference means that when an optical disc, such as a CD or DVD is read back by a player, they are read back with errors.
The only reason a optical disc works is that there is an error correction system built in to the technology so that when the disc is read, the player can work out what the information should have been. This is called the CIRC system for Cross Interleaved Reed-Solomon Correction.
Now, this will work only when the playback errors are within the specifications set out by Philips and can be handled by the CIRC system. If the errors are outside these parameters – you get problems. CD audio will skip, jump, click and glitch. Data discs will hang, behave unpredictably, or not at all.
So the only way to guarantee that your discs will run 100% of the time is to ensure that they are duplicated from a master that is analysed to be within these specifications and to also check the discs that are duplicated.
This is done with a special software and hardware that analyses the number and type of errors coming off the disc as it is read to check if they are with specification.
Please note that this is the ONLY way to check the “health” of your discs. Many duplicators will promise you, verification, compare, disc surface scans, virus scans and other ‘Quality Assurance’ processes that are all next to meaningless when you are discussing discs playability. There is only one test for playability, and that is a CIRC test.
EverTechnology offers full CIRC tests of masters and duplications and can therefore offer a 100% guarantee of playability of your discs.
Hidden costs
When selecting a replicator for your next project, be sure to look for extra or included costs in the pricing supplied.
GST and Freight are common examples. Suppliers like their prices to appear to be low. Freight is often one item that is overlooked with dramatic results. Particularly where your discs may be packed in a DVD case for example, the freight to move them from Melbourne to Brisbane can be quite substantial.
Other ones to watch are film and proof costs. They should be quoted separately. Be wary of suppliers who do not supply a colour proof of your disc and label art. If the printing does not come out the way you expect you have not reference from which to argue that the printing is below par.
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