Player support for video DVD stored on a CD-R? I want to produce many playable DVDs using a few burners (setting up a computer lab with each computer having an image of the same) 

I have close to no budget for this and am curious if a standard CD (the kind that have around 700mb) can be formatted as a DVD, and then played in standard DVD players? 

Obviously it would have to be a short and or low bitrate encoded video. 

But will this work? 

(This is based on the idea that bulk CDs being an older technology can be obtained in bulk for less money than the same of DVD-5s)
If you're authoring DVDs to be played on DVD players, then this won't work. I checked it out way back when there was a significant price difference between CD and DVD media.

If the end users are all going to be playing on computers you could send them instructions on how to open the DVD media folders, but realistically what you'd save (if anything) on media costs would be eaten up in time spent answering queries from disgruntled users who can't get it to play.

Just for reference - the first site I saw when I searched for "bulk DVD CD media" has 100 DVDs for $19.90 and 100 CDs for $18.90. So the difference in price is 1¢ per disk.