DVD either plays wrong movie file, stops while playing, or won't play

Question

Hi, everyone. I'm pretty new to Macs, having got a MacBook a couple of months ago. I just made my first dvd using iDVD, and it played perfectly in preview, but it has all kinds of playback problems. In addition to my main feature, which I made in iMovie, I included a few .mov videos from my digital camera, created a slideshow using iDVD, and, for kicks, put a single image of my cat with a caption exported from Power Point (for Mac) to play before the title menu. (Ah, yes, the newbie likes to play with new toys!)
Problem 1: I placed the newly burned disc in my mom's HP laptop to see if it would play, and we chose Real Player to play it. At first nothing would play, but we tried a couple of buttons, and then the dvd started. But, instead of the pic of my cat I expected, one of the .mov file began to play. It then went on to the title menu as it was supposed to. However, none of the buttons would respond to the mouse or the keyboard.
Problem 2: Wondering why that was going on, we tried the Windows Media Player, QuickTime, the HP QuickPlay player, and a 4th player on her laptop I was unfamiliar with. None of them worked. I even tried ejecting and reinserting the disk each time, Finally, Real Player would not play the disk on a second try.
Problem 3: I put the dvd in a dvd player hooked up to a t.v. The same incorrect .mov file played, followed by the title menu. I started the Main Feature (iDVD movie, 30 minutes long); it started, but then after a couple of minutes, the video just stopped. I hit play again, and the same wrong .mov file played again. Any time I went to the title menu and clicked to play any of the .mov files or the slideshow, the same single .mov file played.
I am using some DVD+Rs 4x that my friend gave me (the videos are for her). They are the CompUSA brand, which she apparently uses all the time. I've never had a dvd burner before. I encoded for Professional Quality, chose Single level dvd, and used widescreen aspect ratio in NTSC mode. There are 46 minutes of content in the project, and the little arrow on the Capacity meter is just a little over the halfway mark, still well within the green. The content size is 2.43GB; I have 111.53 freespace.
If anybody has any idea of what when wrong, I would appreciate it. I have double- and triple- checked everything I could think of, and read every help topic I could find, and I can't find anything that I did wrong.
Thanks.

Answer 1

Ah, yes, the newbie likes to play with new toys!
If anybody has any idea of what when wrong, I would appreciate it. I have double- and triple- checked everything I could think of, and read every help topic I could find, and I can't find anything that I did wrong.
My suggestion is that you use the 'crawl before you walk' and 'walk before you run' approach.
Don't try a 'kitchen sink' project before you have cut your teeth on a couple of simpler projects. If you don't want to waste a DVD, just create a disk image file (an option under FILE in iDVD) and play it with the Apple DVD Player application.
The only sure way to test your DVD is with a set top DVD player hooked to a TV set. There are too many strange variables associated with the many Windows DVD playing applications.
instead of the pic of my cat I expected, one of the .mov file began to play. It then went on to the title menu as it was supposed to.
It sounds like you put the files in the wrong locations within iDVD. (Look at the MAP view for positioning.)
Try a simple first project.
F Shippey