Playing DVD's, Burned on a PC, on a DVD Player

[jackowens]

Dear Friends,

I am trying to burn a home-video from my computer to a DVD-R that will play on a Panasonic DVD recorder (DMR-ES20). I can record to a DVD-R on my desk-top and play it on both my desk-top and lap-top, but the recorder will not play it.

What do I need to do to be able to a) burn a video to a DVD-R on my computer and then b) play it on the Panasonic recorder?

Regards to all,

Jack Owens

[redwudz]

First you would need to give us more information. Most important, what DVD media are you using? That is the most common cause of these type of problems.

Some players can be picky about the DVD media they will play. The same goes for a few burners. You can look up your media to the left in 'DVD Media'. Also look for media recommendations in 'DVD Players' and 'DVD Writers.'

And what steps and programs did you use to create, author and burn the DVD? When you say your player won't play it, what exacty does it do or what error does it show?

[bobkart]

And what steps and programs did you use to create, author and burn the DVD?

Here is where I suspect the problem lies. Does the OP know he needs to "author" the video material to get a DVD-compliant file structure that then needs to be burned with an application that knows you are trying to burn a DVD with video material.

[jackowens]

Dear Redwudz,

"First you would need to give us more information. Most important, what DVD media are you using?"

I use DVD-R's to record on the Panasonic itself, so I'm assuming that the medium itself is not the problem.

"And what steps and programs did you use to create, author and burn the DVD?"

I used the Windows XP Windows Movie Maker program to burn an .avi file to the DVD-R.

In Windows Movie Maker I dragged the video down to the clip-bar and copied. I then clicked on <Tasks> in the tool bar, above, then, in section 3, <Finish Movie>, I clicked <Save to CD> and burned. That gave me, as I said, a DVD-R that will play on my desk-top and lap-top but not on the Panasonic recorder.

"When you say your player won't play it, what exacty does it do or what error does it show?"

"Err" is what appears on the unit screen. The explanation given in the Panasonic manual is a) "You have inserted a disc the unit cannnot play or record on", which pretty obviously is not true as far as the medium itself goes, or b) "You have inserted a DVD-RAM or DVD-RW that is unformatted or recorded on other equipment", which appears to be half true.

Thanks for your interest in my problem.

Regards,
Jack Owens

[bobkart]

As I suspected, you didn't do the "author" step (or even encode to MPEG). Click on the link in my previous post to learn about the need to author DVD-compliant file structures before burning to DVD for use in standalone DVD Players.

[redwudz]

What bobkart said. It sounds like you burned the files as a AVI format and that player needs DVD/MPEG format.

If so, you will have to encode the files to DVD compliant MPEG-2, then author them to the DVD specification before you burn them to disc. Look to the upper left for 'WHAT IS' DVD for the DVD format and specification.

For an easy conversion, you might try ConvertXToDVD. But you do need to do some reading, also.

[bobkart]

Now that I look at it, the link I gave does not really motivate why authoring is required.

There is an entire Forum here for Authoring issues: https://forum.videohelp.com/viewforum.php?f=30

A quick Google search came up with this FAQ about DVD Authoring: http://www.aidinc.com/features/dvdfaq.asp

I have great success using TMPGEnc for the MPEG encoding and TDA for the authoring.

[jackowens]

Dear bobkart,

In reply to your post of 11/10/06, and after mulling over the idea of using 2 programs, one to convert and another to author, I did a little exploration and came across SmartDVDCreator, <http://www.smartdvdcreator.com/index.htm?id=sdvdcgg>. After trying it, it did the whole job. I just put my .avi file in, made a few selections, put my DVD in, clicked "start" and wound up with a DVD that plays on my Panasonic recorder. :P

Before actually buying the program, do you or any others interested know the pros/cons of SmartDVDCreator?

Regards to all and thanks for the info provided me

Jack Owens

[bobkart]

I used a half-dozen "all-in-one" DVD encode/author applications before getting frustrated with the lack of MPEG encoding quality, reasearching the problem, and winding up with the TMPGEnc solution. None of them had the quality of MPEG encoding that TMPGEnc provides. The particular application you mention was not one I tried so I can't address the quality of its results. But if I were to guess, I'd say it also will not be up to the TMPGEnc level of MPEG encoding quality. So there is a key consideration in your decision.