What's the difference btwn a VCD Dat and Mpg file?

[EatMoreChickens]

I want to save some VCD disk on my hard drive for storage and for burning at a later time. Is it okay to copy the dat file and saving it directly to my HD? Can I just re-name the file as an mpg?

I'm able to play both file types on my system w/ zoomplayer, even after renaming the dat to mpg. I know they're not the same since the file sizes appear different.

Is it a good practice to re-name files? I plan to use Nero to make VCD disk and will drag my re-named Dats (now mpg) on to the new VCD window. I don't plan to convert these to other formats, ie SVCD or Divx.

I know VCDgear is available, but is seems faster just to copy the dats and rename them rather than have VCDgear convert.

Any insight would be appreciated!

[The Main Event]

Yes, .mpg is the same as avseq01.dat on a vcd, rename it

[KingJohn]

I want to save some VCD disk on my hard drive for storage and for burning at a later time. Is it okay to copy the dat file and saving it directly to my HD? Can I just re-name the file as an mpg?

I'm able to play both file types on my system w/ zoomplayer, even after renaming the dat to mpg. I know they're not the same since the file sizes appear different.

Is it a good practice to re-name files? I plan to use Nero to make VCD disk and will drag my re-named Dats (now mpg) on to the new VCD window. I don't plan to convert these to other formats, ie SVCD or Divx.

I know VCDgear is available, but is seems faster just to copy the dats and rename them rather than have VCDgear convert.

Any insight would be appreciated!

Rename anything like this, and you wont fool the programs. For what you want to do, you could add the .dat file as it is without renaming it. There is a header difference, but Nero wont mind a .dat file anyway.