Guilty pleasures and a DVD-R question

First the question: Has anyone else had a problem playing DVD-Rs, whether in a regular player or one in your computer? I have a Toshiba 5-disc player and DVD-Rs will play fine for roughly half the disc, then it starts jumping all over the place. My old player, also a Toshiba, had this same problem. This can't be that common or there wouldn't be so many DVD recorders out there; I just wish I'd bought something besides Toshiba since the whole reason I replaced the player was to run my DVD-R's, and for all I know other brands don't have this problem.

These things won't play in my DVD-ROM drive either, but it's an older drive so a firmware update may be all it needs.

Now: the guilty pleasures I'm referring to happen to be DVD-Rs burned for me by a friend who's gotten hold of the two most recent Godzilla movies that Toho, for some reason, just doesn't want their USA fans to have. The big G is just one childhood leftover that I still can't quite part with, and the first half of both these movies look pretty sharp for this kind of thing -- too bad I can't see how they end.

The titles, though, are a mouthful: Godzilla vs. Megaguirus (2001) and, even worse: Godzilla-Mothra-King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2002). Try fitting *that* on a marquee...

Thanks James, but this is a different question. I already have a 'tweaked' player to run discs from other regions.

I'm talking DVD-Rs, in other words home-burned stuff. I had a standalone recorder for a while but since they're still pretty expensive and should come down in price soon I sold it. All the discs I burned played fine in my old player but have problems in the new one. Not only that, but a few that I received from someone who burned his on a PC DVD-RW drive barely play at all.

I get the feeling I'll need to try these in some other brand of dvd player before I'll have an answer.