Hi. This seems to be a common problem. I got mine on Amazon. The review section has numerous complaints about the DVDs not working. Initially, I thought it may have had to do with the regional coding like maybe Amazon got the wrong supply but then I saw that some Walmart purchasers were having the same issue. I had no problem with mine. This got me to thinking that it may have to do with the DVD players and the DVD duplication process.
It is quicker and less expensive to duplicate a DVDs and CDs by duplicating them as DVD-Rs and CD-Rs respectively. If you have an older car with a CD player and you try to play a CD-R, most likely, it will either eject or not play. In that same way, all DVD players are not created equal. I purchased a $49 DVD player from Circuit City (actually got it on sale for $29) the same day I purchased a higher end model. The less expensive one was for projects I did at work. One day I tried to preview a DVD that I burned for a project but didn't work. I brought it home and it worked fine in the other one. Customer service told me that I needed to finalize the DVD-R, something I had already done. After some troubleshooting, the service rep told me that particular DVD player could only play DVDs and CDs not record-able discs even if they have been finalized.
I don't think its a matter of a low end or high DVD player. It has to do with the features of the DVD player. On the box it should say what it will play, e.g, DVD, DVD-R, CD, CD-R, MP3, etc.
I suspect that if Ruthless is coded for the U.S. (based on mine they appear to be) and works in some players and not others, they are probably DVD-Rs. I suspected this when I previewed the first Ruthless workout because the chaptering had no rhyme or reason to it. It didn't move you from one movement to the next like most of Cathe's and Insanity does. It just moves somewhere within the workout in a manner that seems random. I've only been doing the workout a few days but I've watched all of them to make sure they work. I like the workouts so far but I think it's fair to say, it's a very low end production. This is another reason, based on the problems people were having, that I suspected they were duplicated as DVD-Rs.
Don't picture a guy sitting in his basement burning the videos to a disc. There are companies that duplicate DVDs and CDs that also replicate DVD-Rs and CD-Rs. Independent music artists will sometimes use CD-Rs and DVD-Rs for their projects. It's much faster to duplicate and less expensive. I don't see anything wrong with selling them other than some players won't be able to read them and the buyer won't know that beforehand.
Sidebar:
This is another reason I admire Cathe and the SNM (aka Cathe.com) machine. The amount of time, planning and effort that goes into the pre and post production of her workouts is massive. It shows in the quality of what we get. No detail is left undone. I'm thinking of the Cathlete shirt that Cathe wore in one of the workouts. The writing was purple to color coordinate with the outfits. Someone on the forum asked about getting the shirt with the purple writing. It turns out someone used a marker to color the writing in. Heck, even the shoes match. That's Cathe and I love it. Now back to Ruthless...
Ruthless ain't easy but its easy to modify, especially using some of the low impact moves from Cathe's Low Impact Series. It's a pretty good workout but I think a longer warm up and stretch is in order, especially first thing in the morning. If you can play it on your computer and hook it up to your T.V. using HDMI, maybe it will work for you.
Good Luck.
Fitness Friend,
Teals
