Help a DVD newbie out ;)

[larciel]

i have several .avi files that i'd like to burn to dvd-r to watch on my standalone player.. (is this called dvd-authoring?)

well, i use nero vision 3 .. and it works ok.. (no fancy stuff.. )

but problem is.. i have two system w/ similar specs, but one comp is able to complete process in 30 min. while other takes 90min..

comps are

Dimension 8400
3Ghz p4 (one is 540, other is 640)
512mb DDR2
80gb sata
all same.
one has GF6800 while other has X300SE

i'm thinking it is video card that slows down the process, but am i right on this? if so, do you guys recommend a new video card (say 6600?) or a decoder card like WinTV pvr150 ?

i'm as dumb as my dog when it comes to this, so your help is really appreciated..

thanks

[Baldrick]

Video cards does not affect any video converting or authoring.

are you using exact same video source?
same versions of nerovision express?

[johns0]

Are you encoding the exact same file,might be programs running in the background like virus scanner and spyware slowing down the process.

[wpsatisfide]

have you virus/spyware scanned the computer?

[ebenton]

Video cards should not affect anything *unless* one of the PCs has a video card and the other one only has integrated graphics that shares memory with the motherboard. Then the integrated one might be somewhat slower.
But both of those cards have onboard memory, so they shouldn't affect anything.

[junkmalle]

Are the DVD writers the same model and same firmware rev? And the same media? Some DVD writers will revert to 1x (or 2x etc) when they don't recognize the media.

Also check the DMA settings for both the hard drives and the DVD drive.

[larciel]

well.
the burner on slow comp has Phillip 16x while i have 3520A .. they both use same DVD-r disk, and i reformatted both machine right before i tried NeroVision .. so it only led me to believe it was video card.. but guess not..

during the 'recording' process.. CPU usage on slow machine drops to 20-30% while other fast comp's CPU usage is always above 80% ...

really weird

[johns0]

Doesnt sound weird,more like your burner is in pio rather than udma mode,do a search on pio/udma and see if your burner is set to pio,there is lots of links on how to get it back to udma.

[budz]

link on how to set to DMA MODE.
http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=7625

[junkmalle]

during the 'recording' process.. CPU usage on slow machine drops to 20-30% while other fast comp's CPU usage is always above 80%

Sounds exactly like the slow one has drives in PIO mode, not DMA.

Right click on My Computer, select Manage, click on Device Manager, open IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers, double click on Primary IDE Channel, and/or Secondary IDE Channel, select the Advanced Settings tab. Make sure both Transfer Modes are set to "DMA if Available", not "PIO Only".

You should also check your IDE cables. Make sure all cables are 80 wire cables, not 40 wire cables.

[larciel]

nope, sorry guys, but it has been in DMA mode all along..

any idea? i'm wondering if it's the video card.. but all of you guys says it's not..

[guns1inger]

When you say identical, this means same hardware (except where you have specified), same software, same movies, same process. If not, what other differences are there ? (and forget the graphics card)

[pfh]

How are the drives arranged on the IDE channels?

[dcsos]

The Video Card could only be a bottleneck if it in itelf is not properly installed.
The Video Card again could only be the issue if NERO VISION 3 presents you with a full screen display or ENCODING WINDOW during encoding.
A slower refresh of this window by a lesser video card could slighly affect processing times.
Sounds more like some hardware unhappiness in one of the machines or trojans as someone suggested