Burning a 3.5 hour MPEG2 Video/Question

[alegator]

I captured a TV program using ATI All-in-Wonder Radeon 9800 Pro. The video file generated is a 12.5Gb (3.5 hours approx) Mpeg2 DVD-ready file.
Is there any way to fit this file in a single DVD WITHOUT further compression (i.e. without quality loss)?
I would assume the answer is NO since a single DVD-R has 4.7Gb capacity. What about dual layer DVD's? I guess the answer is also negative since their capacity is twice that or 1.4Gb approx....
In case I need to compress the file to be able to fit it in a single DVD, will this mean a significant quality loss?
Thanks for any suggested solution.

[Gurm]

Well, you can certainly compress it further.

LOTR:ROTK is 3.5 hours, and fits with menus and multiple soundtracks onto a single dual-layer.

What's the trick? Bitrate.

Odds are the AIW created an absurdly-high bitrate file. You can use any of the popular encoders to re-encode with a substantially lower bitrate... even low enough to fit it nicely onto a single DVD-R, and still have acceptable quality.

And let's face it, was your TV program in HDTV? I doubt it, since the HDTV Wonder isn't available yet. So the SOURCE resolution of your TV program (assuming you're in NTSC) is LOWER than low-res DVD. You could easily re-encode at 352x240 and cut that size down by a factor of 4, considering that 352x240 is broadcast TV resolution ANYWAY.

- Gurm

[alegator]

Good point Gurm.
So you mean to say that since the original broadcast has low-res DVD quality, then I can compress it by a factor of 4 and still obtain the same source-quality?
By the way, the original TV program was in PAL-N so what settings should I apply for the reencoding to be able to fit in a single DVD-R? Can keep the same bitrate and just decrease framesize?
Thanks.

[Gurm]

If you keep the same bitrate, you'll keep the same size. Think about it.

You want to re-encode, but cut the resolution to 352x480. That alone will make the file HALF as large, all by itself.

PAL broadcasts are like 352x288 or something... so you'll have to fiddle with things to make sure that you get the right aspect ratio, there are plenty of good guides.

- Gurm