Kinda Newbie - Help with DVDSP3 and divx's

[xtrawidth]

I have a bunch of 20-30 minute clips of video in a .avi divx type format, that I would like to make a dvd out of (obviously single layer). I should also note they are PAL in origin and I'd like to make a NTSC dvd.

I've done this with ease on my old PC, using Nero, and Nero Vision. I simply loaded up the clips into Nero Vision, dropped the bitrate so that they will fit onto a 4.7GB disc, and set the output to be NTSC. Leaving it running overnight resulted in a perfectly acceptable DVD in the morning.

I'd like to do this with my new mac. iDVD handles the clips fine, but won't squeeze more than 3 30 minute clips on there. I am suspecting this is because of the fact it's not encoding the audio as AC3.

I am told I can use DVDSP3 - which I have, but have never used. I understand this cannot handle divx type files though.

What would my process be? Converting the clips to something DVDSP3 likes with QTPro? And then dropping them into DVDSP3?

[terryj]

I am told I can use DVDSP3 - which I have, but have never used. I understand this cannot handle divx type files though.

What would my process be? Converting the clips to something DVDSP3 likes with QTPro? And then dropping them into DVDSP3?

You are absolutely correct!
You will need to take the avi's into Quicktime ( provided they
are somewhat QT compliant, meaning they playback ok in QT)
and save them out ( export) as Quicktime .mov files.
You can also reset the frame rate from PAL standard to NTSC standard,
before saving the files.

Once you have done so, you will need to run the files through
Compressor, which came with DVDSP 3, and create your
.m2v files based upon the total overall time and max bitrate
of all files as learned through BitRate Calculator.

Once Compressor creates your audio and video streams, you then
need to post process the audio stream via another sub-program included
with DVDSP 3 called A.Pack. A.Pack can take the AIFF's generated by
Compressor, and create 192khz AC3 files.

From there, you can take the files into the Track timeline of a
new DVDSP3 project, and author to fit onto a DVD.

[xtrawidth]

Sounds like too much hassle for the sake of using one disc instead of two! I think I'll stick to iDVD. But thanks though!