Perhaps I'm spinning my wheels a bit. I just tried playing some commercial DVDs on that player and got the same not recognized type response from it. Eternal Loading.... I guess Mom's chain smoking finally caught up to that device. As planet of the apes, cast away, and V for vendetta don't play on it either.

It turns out that I didn't need the overlayed image on the base images. Depending on interpretation though, without the pre background on the source mpeg, there's a bit of bleed over on the subtitling from the source mpeg, making the smaller fonts harder to read. And with the overlay on the animation I can add other extras like a website URL on the bottom, without being limited to 4 colors. In the meantime I guess I'll burn what I've got and visit a neighbor or two with a working stand alone player.

Confirmed, dvd.iso burned with cdrecord plays on a stand alone player.

Although even with a 20px padding for the menu content, most of the first 50px or so was off screen on the neighbors TV. Some serious vignetting on that old / odd TV and player. And the battery for her remote was dead so I couldn't navigate the menu. I guess I should rethink my layout and menu scheme accordingly.

Confirmed dvd.iso burned with growisofs functions in a stand alone player.

So I cleaned the lens on my player and it plays now. Anyone know why it puts a significant portion of the image off screen? On a traditional CRT style TV connected by a cable. Probably 50 pixels or more of the menu and footage is lost in the borders. Is there anyway to stop that from happening? Or is this normal / expected for stand alone players?

With the below dvd.xml for dvdauthor.

<dvdauthor>
<vmgm>
<menus>
<video format="ntsc" aspect="4:3" resolution="720x480"></video>
<audio format="mp2" channels="2" samplerate="48khz" lang="en" />
<pgc>
<button>jump title 1;</button>
<button>jump title 2;</button>
<button>jump title 3;</button>
<vob file="menu.mpeg"></vob>
<post>jump cell 1;</post>
</pgc>
</menus>
</vmgm>
<titleset>
<menus>
<pgc entry="root">
<post>jump vmgm menu;</post>
</pgc>
</menus>
<titles>
<video format="ntsc" aspect="4:3" resolution="720x480"></video>
<audio format="mp2" channels="2" samplerate="48khz" lang="en" />
<audio format="ac3" channels="6" dolby="surround" samplerate="48khz" lang="en" />
<pgc><vob file="./source_dvd/as7_hp.mpg" chapters="0,1:40,3:20,5:00,6:40" ></vob><post>call menu entry root;</post></pgc>
<pgc><vob file="./source_dvd/as7_hr.mpg" chapters="0,1:40,3:20,5:00,6:40,8:20,10:00,11:40,13:20,15:00,16:40"></vob><post>call menu entry root;</post></pgc>
<pgc><vob file="./source_dvd/as8_re.mpg" chapters="0,1:40,3:20,5:00" ></vob><post>call menu entry root;</post></pgc>
</titles>
</titleset>
</dvdauthor>