2 1/2 hours to do 90mins of MPG2 ?

[mikeu1]

My name is Mike, and I'm a newbie.

I just got a NEC 3500a and was trying to burn my first DVD. I had 2 MPG2 files that I had captured from my Winfast XP2000 TV card, one 60 minutes, the other 30.

I went through Nero using the Vision Express thing to create a very simple menu for each track. When I went ahead to burn the DVD I was surprised to see that it took so long. It spent a long time saying it was 'creating menus and transcoding', then a long time actually burning. I don't think it was much more than 1x since I could see the videos playing along on the screen as it was burning. I had set my speed to MAX and was using 8X +R discs.

Its obvious I underestimated the nuances between encoding, authoring, and burning, but is this normal? I thought that the captured MPEG2's were in a 'DVD format' so whats with the transcoding? I guess the idea that pointing to 60 minutes of MPEG2 to would require 12 or so minutes to end up with a finished, viewable DVD at 8x was naive on my part.

Am I missing anything? Is there anyway to improve this start to finish performance? I'm going to try Tmpenc at some point but was wondering if I'm missing something very obvious. I looked through some of the FAQ's here but couldn't really pinpoint what might be going on.

I'm dreading the idea of converting my mini-DV's to DVD since I have to add still another step of capturing the video before encoding, transcoding, burning, and anything else that has to be done.

Any help would be very appreciated.

Thanks,
Mike

[daveoggy]

The fact that Nero had to transcode your files suggests they are not in the right format. Download the latest version of GSpot from here http://www.headbands.com/gspot/GSpot252b01.rar and post what it tells you about the files...

[jimmalenko]

As long as your MPEG-2 files comply to the specs here, then NVE shouldn't have any need to transcode. I personally don't rate that software, and think you'd be better off trying something like TMPGEnc DVD Author (fully-functional free trial) or any one of the freeware authoring tools - IFOEdit, dvdauthorgui, GUI for DVDAuthor. These tools mentioned will never transcode your video on you (TMPGEnc DVD Author may resample your audio if it's not 48KHz, but this won't take long).

[Capmaster]

Ulead DVD Movie Factory will also not reencode your files provided you have the option selected in preferences.

[mikeu1]

Thanks for all the help. Here's what I was able to get from gSpot

--- File Information ---
File Name: Year Without a Santa Claus1202-1800(TV42).mpg
File Name (with full path): C:\WinFast WorkArea\Year Without a Santa Claus1202-1800(TV42).mpg
File Size (in bytes): 2,829,692,928

--- Container Information ---
Base Type (e.g "AVI"): MPEG (.MPG/.MPEG/.VOB)
Subtype (e.g "OpenDML"):
Interleave (in ms):
Preload (in ms):
Audio alignment("split across interleaves"):
Total System Bitrate (kbps): 230670
Bytes Missing (if any):
Number of Audio Streams: 1

--- Video Information ---
Video Codec Type(e.g. "DIV3"): MPEG2_Video
Video Codec Name(e.g. "DivX 3, Low-Motion"): MPEG-2
Video Codec Status(e.g. "Codec Is Installed"): Codec(s) are Installed
Duration (hh:mms): 01:05:11
Frame Count: 117201
Frame Width (pixels): 640
Frame Height (pixels): 480
Frame Aspect Ratio (e.g "1.3333"):
Frame Aspect Ratio (e.g. "4:3"):
Pixel Aspect Ratio ("SAR"):
Display Aspect Ratio ("DAR"): 1.333
Frames Per Second: ***ERROR***
Video Bitrate (kbps): 6000
MPEG-4 ("MPEG-4" or ""):
B-VOP ("B-VOP" or ""):
QPel ("QPel" or ""):
GMC ("GMC" or ""):
H264 ("H264" or ""):

MPEG-2 ("MPEG-2" or ""): MPEG-2
Interlaced ("I/L" or ""): I/L
Progressive ("Prog" or ""):
Top Frame First ("TFF" or ""):
Bottom Frame First ("BFF" or ""): BFF
3:2 Pulldown ("3:2" or ""):
Picture-per-field ("PPF" or ""):

- Aspect Ratio Related:

Broadcast standard: "PAL" (else blank)
Broadcast standard: "NTSC" (else blank)
src:"VCD", "SVCD", "CVD", or "DVD (else blank):
Instructions to convert to VCD, first part:
Instructions to convert to VCD, second part:
Instructions to convert to SVCD, first part:
Instructions to convert to SVCD, second part:
Instructions to convert to CVD, first part:
Instructions to convert to CVD, second part:
Instructions to convert to DVD, first part:
Instructions to convert to DVD, second part:
Instructions to convert to AVI, first part:
Instructions to convert to AVI, second part:

--- Audio Information ---
MPEG Stream ID (e.g. "0xbd"): 0xc0
MPEG VOB file Substream(e.g. "0x80"):
Audio Codec (e.g. "AC3"): MPEG-1 Layer 2
Audio Codec Status (e.g. "Codec Is Installed"): Codec(s) are Installed
Audio Sample Rate (Hz): 44100
Audio Bitrate(kbps): 224
Audio Bitrate Type ("CBR" or "VBR"): CBR
Audio Channel Count (e.g. "2" for stereo): 2

[mikeu1]

I downloaded TMPGEnc and tried to do the same files. It couldn't do anything with them because they were 640x480, I guess that's why Nero did the transcoding. I'll change my TV Card to capture in 720x480 and see what things look like with both Nero and TMPGEnc.

[FulciLives]

I downloaded TMPGEnc and tried to do the same files. It couldn't do anything with them because they were 640x480, I guess that's why Nero did the transcoding. I'll change my TV Card to capture in 720x480 and see what things look like with both Nero and TMPGEnc.

Also set the audio to 48k instead of 44.1k

- John "FulciLives" Coleman