My DVD and VCR in one has always played DVDs, and now when I tried to play a DVD, it says playback feature may not be available on this disc. I've played the same DVD on the same tv perfectly before!!

Same thing happened to me... ended up being the laser was trashed Cheaper to buy a new one...

dvd player will only play movies for the COUNTRY in which you purchased it. There is no way to purchase a system or configure a system to play ALL MEDIA FOR ALL COUNTRIES. The country codes are specific and each country wants to prevent any other country from playing their dvds music, etc.

some older dvd players dont play dvdrs very well, but most wont play dvd in pal format only ntsc some movies are recorded in pal, you can change format if you are using nero on the last stage wher you click burn choose ntsc

Please clean laser lens with good quality cotton bud gently and check dvd disc playback, if still does not play, replace optical lens block.
Let me know model number of your Sony DVD-VCR combo to provide you optical laser block part number info.
Thanks.

Ok well I have a brand new disc from the store with Percy Jackson movie on it and it will not play. The disc plays in other players in the house and other discs play in the player just not this one.

Make sure that the DVD Disc is of the format that your DVD recorder can read. For example, if your recorder specifically requires a DVD -R type disk, it will puke on a DVD +R disk.

the message you are getting is the machines waay of telling you that it can not read that disc. which means you will have to burn your discs in a different format. or your are using a type of disc it does not recognize.

tom

Well first of all, why the hell would you press play when there was nothing in it???

is the country code different on the dvds than on the unit?

See the manual, page 8:

What are “Recording modes”? for DVD-RW
There are two recording modes available using this
recorder: VR mode and Video mode. When recording to
a DVD-R disc, recordings are always in Video mode.
DVD-RW discs can be formatted for VR mode recording
or Video mode recording.
VR mode recording
• 4 different picture quality/recording time settings available
(SP, LP, EP, XP)
• Not playable on regular DVD players
• Recordings can be extensively edited
• Total number of titles on the disc should be less than
99.
Video mode recording
• 4 different picture quality/recording time settings available
(SP, LP, EP, XP)
• Playable on regular DVD players (after finalizing)
• Limited editing features
• Total number of titles on the disc should be less than
99.
Note :
DVD-Video Format (Video mode) is a new format for
recording on DVD-R/RW discs that was approved by
the DVD Forum in 2000. You may therefore experience
problems playing recordable DVD discs in some players.
Symptoms include video artifacts, audio and/or
video dropouts and playback suddenly stopping.
Our company cannot take responsibility for problems
playing discs recorded on this VCR/DVD Recorder in
other players.