VCD on one CD-R

[DVation]

I see lots of guides on converting divx movies to vcd, but they all show how to do it for TWO CD-Rs, how can I uses TMPGenc to convert the divx file to a vcd format I can burn to just ONE CD-R ?

[Martin Green]

Sure you can, just reduce the bitrate, but you may not want to since the quality sucks (there are other methods with slightly better results, but they are complicated and IMHO don't buy you much). By splitting onto 2 disks you can keep the bitrate up above 2K/s, which looks way better than VHS, and at rates above 23-2500 can approach DVD quality. In fact, for long movies (1:45:00 and up) you might want to split into 3 disks or more.

Incidentally, my comments apply mainly to SVCD. Standard VCD's are a fixed bitrate and allow about 1:10:00 per disk. Some players choke on non-standard VCD's, so you might not have any choice about squeezing more on a disk. For best results, stick with SVCD (if your player supports it) and keep that bitrate up.

CIAO - Martin.

[DVation]

ah so im guessing thats why the bitrate is locked in TMPGenc when I load up the VCD template...i guess there really is no way...hmmm, seems strange that you cant get a divx movie onto ONE vcd...

[Martin Green]

Yep, full standard VCD's have very specific characteristics, MPEG1, 1150Kb/s constant bitrate video, 224Kb/s audio. SVCD's are more flexible, MPEG2, choice of video bitrates (also fixed or variable), choice of audio bitrates, etc.

Note that you can mess with the locked settings for a VCD in TMPGEnc, but remember that you will then be creating an XVCD instead (non-standard) and some players (many?) won't be able handle it. On the main window click the "Load" button then go into the "Extra" directory and open "unlock.mcf". As the name suggests this unlocks all the settings in TMPGEnc. Load the template for the format you want to produce first, then the unlock template so all your settings will start off standard. You can also create your own templates or modify existing ones to unlock only the settings you are interested in, but this takes somewhat more knowledge of TMPGEnc to do properly.

As for fitting a one-disk DivX movie on a single VCD, remember that DivX is an extremely high compression codec similar to MPEG4, 8-12 times higher for instance than MPEG2 of similar quality. This is how you can compress a 7Gig MPEG2 VOB file from a DVD rip into just 700Mb as a DivX. When you go back to MPEG1 or MPEG2 your file size goes up again. In fact, it is only by keeping the bitrates down around 1Mb/s for VCD and 2.5Mb/s for SVCD that a reasonable amount can be stored on a single disk in these formats.

CIAO - Martin.

[loumarx]

if you want to unlock the bitrate, just load the "unlock" template in TMPGenc.
yes, the quality is crappy, but why not? :)

[DVation]

thanks guys

...encoding as we speak

[Pied-Piper]

Load Kwag's Template and start encoding to have 2 hours svcd quality on a single disk.