I am attempting to copy about 13 videos about 22 minutes in length each to a dvd. I have tried DVD styler, DVD Flick and Ashampoo with mixed results. DVD Flick and Ashampoo will not even do the last 3 videos. The 10 videos that it will fit, it tells me the quality will be crap. DVD styler was working for a while and then I started getting errors halfway through on any project. Something about illegal jumps. Is there something I should convert these avi files into first that would be small so I can fit more on the disc? Thanks in advance!
In DVD Flick under Project Settings > Video > Advanced you can check the box for 'Half horizontal resolution' (AKA half D1). If you use FAVC, under the encoder tab, you can select 'Half D1'. It saves space on the disk. http://www.afterdawn.com/glossary/terms/half_d1.cfm
I tried turning on the Half Horizontal Resolution option in DVD Flick but did not see any changes. I still was unable to fit all 13 videos onto disc. Upon further research I have learned a few things. If I wish to burn these videos to dvd they have to be burned into a DVD format which takes up a lot more space than the 1.28 gigs they currently are. It would be nice if I could simply burn them as Files and the DVD could still play them! It would appear that I might be able to convert them to DivX or mpeg2 and I would be able to fit alot more hours onto disc. Are these assumptions correct? Thanks for the help!
If your player can play Divx or Xvid, you can certainly encode them to that format and fit them quite easily. I do this often, and can typically get 10 hours, perhaps even a little more on one disk. The issue with what you've tried, and the reason you didn't like the result, is that it is not the size in MB of the source that's the issue, but rather their running time (in hours and minutes) To maintain quality, you should only put about 3 hours on a regular mpeg-2 DVD at the most. 1/2 D1 is a way to squeeze out a little more. It works by lowering the bitrate requirements a little - but in this case you're trying to put too much on one disk.
Well, I can use my 360. It appears that plays xvid of divx. Any recommendation on which I should try first and with what program? Why is time on the DVD a limiting factor and not the size of the file? Any link that could explain that easily? Thanks!
The size of an mpeg-2 file (DVD format files) is the product of the bitrate used during the encoding and running time. Size = Rate (in kilobits per second) x Time (seconds) Using notional numbers. For a two hour movie (7200 seconds) Rate @ 4800 kb/s (which is 600 KiloBytes/s) Size = 600 x 7200 = 4320000 KB = 4.3GB which is the size of a standard blank. For a movie that runs longer than two hours, the bitrate has to be reduced (lowers the quality). In computers there are 1024KB in one MB, so the numbers are fudged, but the general rule holds.
I take from that then, that once these avi files are converted into mpeg-2, the size of the files increases. I think I understand for the most part what is going on here. Thanks guys!
