DVD Burning Problems - Need Help « Videomaker Community Forums

filmmaker920
Member

I'm having problems burning 2 hours of video to a DVD. As far as I know, I'm supposed to be able to burn 2 hours at standerd quality settings. But for some reason, a 2 hour DVD ready MPG2 file is over 5GBs and I have to recompress it to 4.5Mbps in DVD Architect. I am able to burn discs error free with these settings, but the video looks highly compressed on my TV. And after the 1 hour mark, I start to experience skipping problems on my DVD player and eventually, the whole player freezes up at about the 1 hour 45 minute mark. Any ideas of why this is happening? Is the video just compressed too much? I was able to burn the movie to a Memorex DVD+RW and +R disc and play with no problems, but when burning to the Memorex DVD+R printable discs and RiData DVD-R printable discs, I experience the skipping/freezing problems. Could it just be my DVD player? It is an Apex DVD player that we bought from Wal-Mart about a year ago. and I am burning my discs on a Lite-On LDW-411S with the latest firmware upgrade. Any tips or ideas would be very helpful.

Posted 7 years ago #
DaveC
Member

If you use Digital Dolby AC3 audio, you should be able to put 2 hours of video on a DVD. I do it all the time using a Panasonic DMR-E100 DVD recorder. It also uses Variable Bit Rate encoding. I use the 2 hour speed 95% of the time and the results are excellent. I have had no skipping/freezing problems with any of the various DVD-R brands that I have used.

If you are using PCM audio, you won't be able to get 2 hours on a 4.7GB disc.

Dave

Posted 7 years ago #
Starman
Member

I'm a newbie at this stuff and having similar related problems. I've been using Ulead Movie Factory 2 SE to attempt to create a DVD of some video recorded with my WinTV PVR 250 and Beyond TV 3. Ulead says I have approx 2.5G of video after making extracts on a 6.7G mpg source file. However, when I attempt to attempt to burn the DVD, it creates a set of VOB files totaling to approx 5.7G which will not fit on a single DVD. I tried then using DVD Shrink but ended up with a DVD with significantly reduced quality than my original recording.

You mention using AC3 for the audio. Is there a way to do this using my Ulead software or do I need a different authoring software to be able to do this? If so, could you recommend a couple of moderately priced packages I might look at? Specifically, do you have any feelings re: Ulead Movie Factory 3.5, WinDVD Creator, Pinnacle, or DVDLab?

Thanks.

Posted 7 years ago #
Anonymous

I have two APEX DVD players, I got at Wal-Mart for $58., sitting on the shelf collecting dust. They both worked fine for about 6 months. After that they just wouldn't work. I'd put in a DVD and it would tell me "no disc" or "loading" - but they just wouldn't play. I put a music CD in one of them and it played OK. Then I played a James Bond DVD after that OK. That's the last thing it ever played.

Posted 7 years ago #
Korak
Member

While it could be your dvd player, one of the symptoms you described Â– the disc freezing at the 1:45 mark Â– is something I ran into recently. I made 4 different disc and in each case the disc would play great for 75 minutes then freeze up. Turns out my burner was in the process of kicking the bucket; once I replaced it the problem went away. Now 4 months later my player is going -- it will play anything I burn and older commercial stuff, but has given me a Â“disc is dirtyÂ” error on every disc of the last 4 box sets I purchased, all of which were released in the last 2 months. If itÂ’s not one thing itÂ’s another Â….. LOL!

You could also be having media-compatibility problems. While RiData has a great reputation, some of MemorexÂ’s media is pretty cheap and should be avoided. Go to http://www.videohelp.com and look under the Lists sections Â– left column Â– for media, players, and burners; lots of info including compatibility and reliability. I have a thermal printer and use Verbatim Â–R media; out of the 1K or so disc IÂ’ve burned in the last year I can only recall one disc being bad out of the box, er, off the spindle.

I agree with DaveC in that you should be able to put 2 hours of video on single layer dvd. Before I found about DVD Shrink I was routinely burning 120-140 minute features using nothing but DVD Architect. I use Vegas for capturing/rendering and Sound Forge for tweaking the audio. The audio for all my projects is setup using 5.1 surround sound and rendered at 48K; all files coming out of Sound Forge are 48K, 16-bit PCM Â– sorry DaveC, but you can fit more than 2 hours on a single-layer disc using PCM audio!!

As far as DVD Architect goes, I occasionally ran into problems with it when using it for burning purpose. While I still use DVDA for disc setup/preparation I use Nero for burning Â– definitely has cut down on the coaster production.

Posted 7 years ago #