We package each disk is in an individual slimline case, with a nice label on the spine and on the disk itself. The top shell of all cases is transparent; the bottom case shell is colored, with premium (silver) disks in amber or red bottoms, and standard disks in white or clear bottoms.  (Gold premium disks are in cases with black bottoms.) The cases line up on a shelf nicely, with the titles easily readable, and take up very little space.   We print the labels using a color printer, then apply the labels by hand.   The disks do not have a large edge-to-edge label, but instead have a small 1.5 inch round label on the top face of the disk.   (Don't try to remove the label -- you might damage the disk. If you insist on trying to remove the label anyway, apply alcohol to the label and allow it to soften, then peel it off. Never use a sharp tool.)   Also note: the labels are printed with a water-soluble ink so avoid splashing water on them!  See photo.   Disks with removed labels are not returnable. A Usenet FAQ on DVD's incorrectly states that labels can "unbalance" a disk and cause read errors - this is absolutely untrue, at least for the types of labels used here.

DVD Players:
    In my opinion, the DVD players which have the best optical systems are the Pioneer models. We have never seen a compatibility problem between a Pioneer DVD player and one of our generic disks. They only cost a bit more than the Chinese/Singapore units, and are well worth it. However, the quality of the South Asian units is rapidly increasing.
As a viewer of CJK video you may also want (1) region-free operation so you can play Region 2 DVD's, and (2) Macrovision-free operation so that the output of the DVD player doesn't wipe out the picture in your VCR when playing commercial DVD's.   The last is important if you want to ever record a commercial DVD to tape (you can't, if the disk has Macrovision, and all major US DVD releases do have Macrovision).   You can get a Pioneer 333, an older but extremely fine model, for $120-150 on the Internet.   For just $230 you can buy a Pioneer DV-343, a very fine DVD player, with added modifications to allow region-free playback and macrovision-free playback.   This is an example of one of the slightly-modified units for sale at World-Import.Com.   (Be sure you understand that their units are modified.   Buying the same model at a lower price from "buy.com" will not give you region-free, macrovision-free operation.)   This is where I got my unit, the region-free/macrovision-free Pioneer DV-333, and it is a terrific unit.   I send all my friends to this web site and they have all been very happy.   I am not affiliated in any way with them and they don't know I'm sending people to them - this is a pure recommendation on my part.   If you really do want a SE Asian unit, then at least get one which has some interesting features. Here is a link to a remarkable little unit which can play virtually anything you can put into it (even jpeg images from your camera transferred to disk) for only about $55, plus it has karaoke. Amazing. And it is "region free" too. However, caveat emptor. I bought two of these, one for me and one for my daughter. My daughter's failed after about 6 weeks. Mine is still working, but it produces a "pixellated" image sometimes playing disks that my Pioneer dvd player can play perfectly. Many of these Chinese/Singapore/Indonesia DVD players are made from parts lots rejected by major manufacturers and then put on the market by parts brokers at extremely low prices, and anything made from low quality parts will not be high quality.

Charges:

After submitting your request, you will receive an email showing the total amount due.  Standard DVDR's are approximately $5.45 each, and premium ones are about $8.20.  Your total will also include postage, handling, and packaging, plus Paypal fees if applicable.   Handling/packaging charges are fixed at $1 per USA package or $2 per non-USA package.   Paypal's fees (if you pay using Paypal) are 2.9% (3.9% foreign) plus $0.30. All these charges will be figured and totalled in the email confirmation which you receive.   When you filled out the form, you specified a payment method: money order, cash by mail, Paypal, etc. Paypal is the favorite payment method, especially for people outside the USA since Paypal takes payments in foreign currency.   A table showing typical charges for orders of 1, 3, or 11 disks is on the right. (You can order any number or combination of disks, the table is only an example.) As you can see from the table, you can save money by avoiding making single disk requests. There are fixed charges per package, so it is more efficient to get several disks at once in a single package instead of getting them one at a time.   (Note for European members: because of the way postage is figured and the average weight of each disk, it is somewhat more efficient to make sure your request is an ODD number of disks.)   Your total will be rounded up or down to the nearest dollar, so your final total could differ from the table by 1 dollar plus or minus.   One more thing: as you can see, our per-disk charges are low.   In fact, I did a survey of 12 other distributors who had DVDR's, and all but 1 of them charged more, so our charges are nearly the lowest. We've recorded a lot, using up quite a lot of expensive disks (our masters are on premium disks) and we're not making any profits overall.   Many of the disks on the list have not been requested even one time.   Our goal is to break even.   You can help by trying out a few of the less-popular disks.   Don't ask me to make a "quote" for you. Few who ask for "quotes" ever make an order, so I stopped doing them. Figure it yourself using this guide, or just fill out the form like a regular request, and you'll get the exact total. If you leave out your complete mailing address, your form will be ignored, unless your address is already on file. If you still want a quote, please see the quote information page.

Example of total costs (including shipping, disks, everything) in US dollars.  D = standard disk, M = premium disk.  Paid by cash or money order. (Paypal is higher)  Due to rounding, actual charges may vary by $1.   1 D 3 D 11 D 1 M 3 M 11 M  USA local: zips 939xx-941xx, 943xx-953xx, 962xx-966xx (media mail or first class mail):  8 19 63 11 27 92  Rest of USA (Priority mail): 10 21 67 12 29 95  Canada (airmail): 8 20 67 11 28 95  Mexico (airmail): 9 21 70 11 29 98  Europe (airmail): 12 25 73 14 29 102  Australia, NZ, Japan (airmail): 12 25 75 15 30 103  Rest of World (airmail): 11 25 75 14 29 104

Shipping:
If you are in the US, you will get your package by US Priority mail, and we will supply you with a delivery confirmation number to assist with tracking.  (One exception: if you are in one of the nearby zones to us (zips 939xx-941xx, 943xx-953xx, 962xx-966xx) we will ship your box by "Media mail" and you will save about $2, and still get your box in only 1-2 days.)   If you are outside the US, you will get your shipment by "Airmail Letterpost".  We've had a lot of experience mailing to other countries.   We may split your items into smaller packages to avoid attracting the attention of customs inspectors, and we will mail your packages a few days apart.   If you are in Germany, Great Britain, or Canada, especially, we'll make your packages smaller than average due to your country's unpredictable customs system.  In the US, you should get your box in 1-4 days, but allow up to 9 days, especially if you live in New England or the deep South.  Outside the US, it takes 4-12 days to get the airmail packages.  If customs decides to open your package, it could take 3 days to 2 months more.  Usually customs is not a problem, but once in a while they do something unexpected. I have sent packages to the following countries: Canada, Mexico, Spain, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Chile, Finland, Malta, Denmark, Peru, Brazil, France, Sweden, Portugal, Russia, Kuwait, Israel, Philippines, New Zealand, Japan, Norway, Singapore, Malaysia, Switzerland, and United Arab Emirates.

Note: in general, we will only ship to the address of the person who is paying for the request.  If you want to send a gift, allow enough time to receive it yourself, and then send it to the person you intended it for.

Payment Methods:
The request page allows you to choose a payment option.  You must tell us how you would like to pay.  If you choose to send a personal check, and if this is your first request you have sent us, then your request will not be shipped until after funds have cleared, or about 15 days. You can avoid this by sending a money order, cashier's check, cash, or other method for your first request. After you have successfully paid for one request, future requests paid by check will not be delayed.  In addition, you can pay with unused US postage stamps if you want, which is a convenient way to avoid money order fees while saving us time at the postal counter -- but please make sure your stamps are large denomination ones, $1 or higher face value. (If you send me 37 cent stamps, I will send them back to you and cancel your request.) If you are paying by mail, mail it to the address provided in your email acknowledgment of your order.

If you are outside the US, note that you must pay in US dollars, and checks and money orders must be payable by a US bank. Foreign money orders must (1) be drawn on a US Bank, (2) they must be payable in US dollars, and (3) they must be payable in the Federal Reserve System. Look at this foreign bank draft on the right. It was purchased by someone in Kuwait, and she was told that it was a "US dollar money order" but that is not true. Notice that it does not have a row of large black numbers along its bottom edge such as US checks all have. This means that it is not payable in the US Federal Reserve System, and fails requirement #3 above. If you send me a foreign bank draft of this type, I cannot deposit it into my bank account. My bank can only cash this check by employing an agent to go to the bank it is addressed to (Wachovia bank in New York, in this case) and presenting it there. Since I live thousands of miles from that bank, I cannot do it myself. My bank can do this procedure (called "sending out for collection") but they will charge me a fee of $35 for it. That is a large fee for a small check. So, be sure that foreign money orders have the row of Federal Reserve code numbers along the bottom edge of the check - that way you know it really can be deposited in the USA. You can get proper US dollar money orders in most offices of American Express, Barclay's Bank, or Thomas Cook travel agencies, and you will not have to send me the extra fee of $35 fee. However, I am still reluctantly willing to accept a foreign bank draft if you are willing to pay the expensive $35 extra fee. See special services below for information on how to send a foreign bank draft.

Many people outside the US send payment to me in cash (US banknotes) by registered mail. The postal registry fee may be much less than the money order charges. I have never lost a payment sent to me this way. However, this method is still at your own risk. Be sure the money is well hidden in the envelope. It must look like a letter so that customs officials do not open it.

You can also send payment by Paypal.com, if you like. Using Paypal will greatly speed up your shipment. If you choose to pay by Paypal, note that the total will also include a surcharge to cover the typical Paypal charges. The surcharge is 2.9% plus $0.30 for US payments, and a higher rate (3.9% + 0.30) for non-US payments. If you chose payment by Paypal, your confirmation email will give you the email address to use to send payment.

Special Services for those outside the USA:
I am now willing to accept foreign bank drafts payable in US dollars if you will pay my bank's collection fee of $35. A foreign bank draft looks like a check or money order, but it cannot be processed by the US banking system because it does not have a Federal Reserve routing number imprinted in magnetic ink along its lower edge. See payment methods above for more information. My bank can process such checks but they have to have it sent by an agency to the US bank holding the funds. They charge me $35 for this service, and I must pass the cost along to you. If you send me a foreign bank draft which does not include the extra $35, I will send it back to you uncashed and cancel your order.

I am also willing to send airmail packages to foreign countries as registered mail. This means that the package receives an official number and the package travels in a locked container at all times. Theft of the mail is much less likely if it is registered. This service adds an additional $13 per package to the total. You MUST specify to me at the time of your order that you want registered mail.

No registered packages have ever been lost, but so far, I've mailed very few of them. Of the many packages without registration sent in the past 2 years, only 3 packages to 2 countries have been lost, the two countries being Kuwait and Mexico. If you are in a country with a reliable mail service, the expense of the registration may not be a bargain since the risk is low. But if you live in a country where crime or postal corruption is a problem it may be a good choice. The registration fee costs the same whether the package holds one disk or 20, so the larger the package is, the more sensible is the option of registering the package. Packages sent by airmail letterpost to foreign destinations cannot be tracked by me, and if your package does not arrive, there isn't anything I can do here unless you chose to have the package registered. The choice is yours. If you live in Bangladesh and are ordering 25 disks, I advise choosing registered mail, but if you live in the Netherlands and are ordering only 1 disk, I'd say it probably isn't a worthwhile option.

Under certain conditions I'm willing to send packages to other countries using Federal Express International Economy. I will require an additional $35 fee in addition to postage, which will be almost twice that of registered mail. This will also add about a week to the time required to ship. This method is not recommended.

Turnaround: After receiving payment, your order will be shipped in 1 to 15 days. The average time required is 5-10 days. The exact timing of your payment and our work schedule will determine the time required. We work like this: on the weekend the disks are packed and readied for mailing, and on Monday or Tuesday they are put in the mail. At the same time, the paid-for requests are compiled into a list of disks to make. We keep an "in stock inventory" of one disk for each title. If there are more than one request for a title, we make the disks needed, plus one extra. At the end of the week, we will have all the disks needed, and will do the labelling and packing, and the cycle starts again. As you can see, a request paid for on a Sunday could possibly be shipped as soon as Monday, just 24 hours later, if it was for an item "in stock". But most orders need to have at least one disk made, so a typical order needs the one week to be made. All work is done by one person, by hand, in spare time - this is not a volume business. If we run out of stock, get sick, or have a massive equipment failure, there can be additional delays. Even with a "worst case" delay, it is unlikely to add more than 1 week to the shipping time. All in all, the "average" time to shipping is now about 5-10 days, with a best case of 1 day, and a worst case of 15 days. Since priority mail (or international airmail) is used, the time in the mail is usually not more than 2-5 days additional. If you need to see if your package has shipped, or need a tracking number, please see the status page. Otherwise, if it has been over 15 days and the list doesn't show that it has shipped, you are welcome to contact me and I will provide you with details about your order. This is important: in some cases, non-shipped requests are because you gave me a bad email address, or your email provider doesn't accept email from me (a misguided anti-spam function, especially AOL, MSN, or Yahoo), or some other problem with your order, and I am helpless to proceed until you contact me, so please feel free to do so.

A non-guarantee:
Well, it was nice when everything we did was informal, but now that we're dealing with a lot of new people we should have a formal return policy, I guess. If you receive a disk which won't play because it's defective, we'll replace it.  If you receive a disk which won't play because your DVD player can't play standard DVDR's, we'll replace it with a premium DVDR if you pay the difference between the two.  If we send you the wrong disk, we'll replace it with the right one.  We'll pay postage to send the replacement to you if you pay the postage to send the defective one back to us.  If your package is returned to us because we made a mistake in the address or postage we will mail it to you again at our expense. But if a package is returned to us because you gave an invalid address, moved without forwarding, refused delivery or failed to pick up your mail, we will mail it to you again only if you pay the postage again. Other than these promises, we don't guarantee that you'll like the contents of the disk's video, or that the postal service won't lose, damage, tax, or confiscate your package.  We also can't guarantee that your neighbor won't steal your package from your mailbox, or that your disks will survive an afternoon at 180 degrees Farenheit in your car trunk.  (They'll probably melt.)  Basically, we guarantee to properly mail to you what you asked for, and that the disks will play, and that's all.  The guarantee applies for only 30 days, (except for the premium disks, which are guaranteed for 90 days) so be sure to at least do a quick check of each disk you received. Note that returned disks must be unscratched and in perfect condition, with the original label and case.

Exception to the above, a real guarantee:
Although the internet is full of people making digital video, much of it is poor quality. Some of it is TERRIBLE. Our items are good or excellent quality, and at any rate they are fairly graded in the descriptions. (see video ratings.) Disks made from direct satellite transmissions are limited in quality by the original signal quality, which varies a lot. Disks made from source tapes are usually worse, and their video quality is mentioned in the description.  I'm willing to guarantee the quality of the first disk you request. This is to allow you to check it yourself. If you don't like it for any reason at all, return it and I'll refund the amount for the disk minus the amount for the postage/handling. We have to limit this guarantee to a single disk because we were "burned" by one person who received a very large request and returned it for no good reason. We found later that they had simply copied all the disks, which was probably their intention all along. So "satisfaction guaranteed" applies to the first disk only, please.  

A note on the playing time:
  (See chart at right.) You'll notice that for most of the DVDR's, the number of minutes playing time for the disk is given in the description.   I listed it so that you would have a choice.   However, remember that the more minutes per disk, the lower the video quality.   Whenever possible, I tried to choose the correct amount to put on each disk so that the video quality was not significantly degraded compared to source.   For the digisub compilations, for instance, the quality of the good source Avi's are about 7 on our scale, with very badly done ones dropping to as low as 5. Using the graph, you can see that the quality of the original video is only preserved if the packing doesn't exceed about 3 hours per disk for most anime. We like to keep it about 2.5 hours per disk. But for some very poor quality digisubs, it might be possible to put 3.5 hours on a disk without degrading the already-poor video even more.   It is common for people to choose the longer disks because they feel they are getting "more" but remember that "less" is sometimes "better".   Quality lost by over-compression is gone forever. We found someone else on the internet doing what we are doing recently, but they are trying to put almost twice as much on each disk. No wonder they look bad. (Amazingly, he also charges much more... sheesh!) If you want a compilation which doesn't look worse than the original digisub, you have to set the number of hours per disk so that it results in a quality which is no worse, at the very least, than the source video. Simple.

Video Ratings:
You'll notice in the list there are video ratings that look like "A8" in one of the columns. Here is an explanation of those ratings.
The letter is the grade of the subtitle - "A" means perfectly readable, "B" means it is hard to read, "C" means it is very poor, etc. Subtitle quality for almost everything we have is "A". If the letter is "N" it means that there are no subtitles. Note: subtitles are generally in English, but in a few cases they are in another language, or are dual language (English and Spanish for example). If the subtitles are in any language but English, it will be noted in that item's description or comments column.
The number refers to video quality on a scale of 1-9. This is the same scale as the one explained above, under "playing time." The scale is like this:

• 1: Unviewable. Playable video not present most of the time.
• 2: Video present during much of the time but not watchable throughout.
• 3: Watchable video, but extremely low quality. Like a 4th or 5th generation vhs tape copy. Unpleasant to watch.
• 4: Fair video, but with many serious faults. Like a 3rd generation VHS tape copy. Tiring to watch.
• 5: Good video, with some evidence of degradation. Like a 1st or second generation vhs copy, or lower quality VCD. Pleasant to watch.

Grades 6 through 9: Very good video. The categories 6-9 are subdivisions of the top grade "very good video". The differences between 6 and 7 are much smaller than the differences between 4 and 5, so these grades are grouped together.

Very good video grades:

• 6: Equivalent to a high quality tape or lower quality digital source. Shows some loss of resolution or some visible but minor video faults. Very fine viewing. If digitally sourced, it is a high-quality VCD or low quality SVCD.
• 7: Better quality than most tapes. Usually this is digitally-derived video, perhaps showing some mild compression loss. SVCD quality.
• 8: Very high quality video, suitable for large screen showings. Digital video with few faults, similar to digital broadcast quality.
• 9: Extremely fine video, better than most satellite transmissions. Low noise and free of most compression artifacts. Near-DVD quality.

See the NHK website for more information on the samurai drama "Komyo Ga Tsuji".

Shows being recorded now:
  We're recording several shows currently, and you'll see new disks listed periodically.   However, due to lack of interest, we're cutting back a bit on some shows. We'll do a temporary halt to new disks of "Pop Jam". Some others we're still recording are:

"NHK Kayo Concert" - Enka music.

"Komyo Ga Tsuji" - the new NHK taiga drama, with English subtitles, which began in late March 2006, telling the mostly true story of a famous samurai and his loyal wife.

Resales:
If we find that you are reselling any of these disks by advertising on the Internet, Ebay, or any other method, we'll not accept any more requests from you, and we may pressure you to remove our titles from your lists, especially the "Curious Violet" disks. There is a difference between bootlegging and fanclub trading, and we'd like these disks to stay "underground."  You are welcome to copy them for friends, though.  Please treat these disks as being a benefit of membership in a private club.

Trades:
If you have something you think we'd like and you want to trade, just let us know.  However, we're not interested in copies of commercial video which is available for sale in the US, so don't bother offering us "rips".  Also, we won't want low-resolution or badly-mastered digital video.  So, don't offer us any VCD's, please.   We've traded for some VCD's in the past, and avi's, but only if they have full vertical resolution, 360 lines minimum, 720x480 preferred.   Also, no "adults-only" items.  But if you have top quality video of  CJK music concerts, sumo, anime, and rare subtitled movies or specials, we'd like to trade for them.  We also would like to see Chinese and Korean "sumo", and even Korean bull-fighting festivals.


Questions?
Just go below and fill in your name and write a message in the "comment" section, and press "submit" and I'll reply to you as soon as I can.  Be sure your email address is correct, or the reply won't reach you.

Important! Before pressing "Send Now" be sure that you have included all information in the RED fields. Be certain your email address is perfect, or your reply email will never reach you.
Your full name: Your email address: Your membership number:

---

My work is done with the following LICENSED legal software for which I paid the author's full license fees:
TmpgEnc 2.54
TmpgEnc Express 3.0
TmpgEnc DVD Author 1.5
CinemaCraft Encoder 2.69
TheFlyDS 1.9 Video capture
Subsonic 2.22 wavefile-based subtitle editor/generator by Barbara Chambers
AVI-IO video capture
Webdrive 3.0 FTP interface
Texturizer text editor

---

  "Despa" and logo copyright 2002-2004 Barbara Chambers
This entire site designed manually using Texturizer, except for generated lists.