What should I convert my AVI files to now?

[so]

I've acquired some old Hi8 videos which I have 'digitalized' through a Sony DCR-TRV30 camcorder onto my pc. They are now AVI files. My question is - I want to give these movies to the grandkids - with the best quality possible. Is it a good idea to buy a blu ray burner and convert to blu ray discs - or should I convert to DVD? (The kids have both players.) And would you please suggest the best software to convert - seems like there are tons of programs boasting they will convert anything these days - but i just want good quality though. thank you in advance for your help.

[guns1inger]

Simplest is DVD. Bluray will allow you access to higher bitrates, but if you keep the running time down 70 minutes or so per disc, DVD will give you pretty good quality. Compared to the cost of buying not only a bluray burner, but also the blanks media, DVD wins hands down. If your source was high def then the equation would be different, but for SD material . . . . .

Personally, if it were me, I would edit the footage down to what people will watch, divide it up into 60 - 70 minute chunks (keeping it DV AVI all the way) then encode and author it to DVD.

Software wise - Sony Vegas Studio is pretty good for this type of thing, although the mpeg-2 encoding is a bit limited if you don't pay the big bucks for the Pro version. I would edit with Vegas, outputting to DV AVI, then encode with the free AVStoDVD.

[so]

thanks for your response guns1inger! you provided all the information that I needed and explained it perfectly! CHEERS!