Making VCD's or DVD's from VHS and TV

[CrystalDoll]

Hey everyone!

I have a few basic questions, along with what I "think" would be a good answer. Just need some feedback to direct me in the right direction.

First issue:
I am soon to purchase a new computer with Windows XP with sufficient RAM and HD space, along with a DVD burner, so that I can accomplish the following issues (my current computer isn't capable). I need to do a few things. First, I need to transfer my VHS recording onto DVD discs. I figure that I need to get a converter for transferring the tapes to my computer (like an ADS Instant DVD 2.0) and then getting some software to covert them to a disc. Is this correct? I would like the easiest and simplest solutions here. For this project, I have really NO interest having to have the best video quality or anything (I MIGHT want to edit commercials, but I am not even sure if that will be on my list of things to do). I want to know if I can take my 6 hour VHS tape (recorded on lowest setting) with six 1-hour shows and make them all fit onto a DVD disc that I can play in my standalone DVD player in some kind of lesser quality format. And if so, what is the EASIEST way to go about doing that? Having 1 DVD disc to replace a big bulky VHS tape would same me LOTS of room.

Second issue:

I have current TV recordings stored on my TIVO and would like to transfer them to disc as well. Right now, I figure that the ones that are currently on there, I would have to save them to VHS and then proceed to transfer them to computer and then to disc (unless you know of an easier way to do that). I have just recently read some info that talked about hooking my cable line into a video card (like an ALL-IN-WONDER card) and just directly saving the shows on my computer, thus cutting out the need to save to VHS. Is this correct? I have never owned a computer with a video card with a TV-out or anything. And if putting the All-in-Wonder card into my computer directly does the trick, how would I go about converting the shows and putting them on DVD's?

For most of my use, I DON'T need MPEG-2 (or higher) quality. So is it possible to put recordings in a simple form (like MPEG-1 or AVI or something) onto a DVD disc and have the player just play them that way? I know that it is possible to just burn low quality shows onto a regular CD-R (without a DVD burner) but that would just be trading 1 six-hour VHS tape for having to need 6 CD-R's to hold the same info, which would not suit my needs.

I am truly a newbie, so be gentle and explain things carefully to me. I appreciate any help you could provide.

[redwudz]

I transfer old VHS tapes to my computer in DV format with a ADVC-100. A little expensive if you only have a few tapes. (About $250US) If you want to use a video card, look at lordsmurf.com for some info on video card use. If you want to use DV, it is fairly easy to edit, compared to MPG video. Some of the USB cards work OK, but spend some time to look into the different cards. As far as TVIO, sorry, can't help you there. With the price of DVD burners dropping, I would really recommend getting one. CD's are just too limited for space for video. With DVD you can encode at VCD quality and get six hours on a DVD.

[vcdforme]

I believe the instant DVD will work
fine for you, so long as you don't need to edit. Mpeg is not edit friendly. If you want to edit, get the ADS pyro av link. You'll capture in AVI, edit, then make your mpeg stream.
Also, If you like, with the proper software, you can also capture to
mpeg 'on the fly'. (you wouldn't
have the choice with the "Instant".)
I've been dumping alot of my VCD's
into DVD lately, and have been quite happy with the results.
If you use TMPGENC AUTHOR, it will
automatically convert your vcd's to
the DVD file for you, ready to burn.
I would use Win 2000, but you should be OK.
If you're doing VHS tapes, you may want to put a TBC in between the
VHS and your converter.

[bodybuilders1]

hi. i noticed that you mentioned, that tmpg author utomaticaly converts svcd's to dvd automatically! how is that done, i cant figure it out?
heres my situation. i am trying to convert my svcd that i have recorded onto 2 or 3 different cd's into dvd format to record, but every time that i try to convert, it tells me illeagle stream type, or somthing of the sort, i cant remember exactly. i have extracted the mpeg out of the disc using iso-buster, and saved it onto my hard drive. what exactly next?
also whenever i try to join the files together from disc 1 to disc 2 or 3, i get a 30 or 40 second gap of audio loss, wher it joined disc 1 to 2 and so forth. what am i doing wrong?
your help is verry much appreciated!
thanks

[redwudz]

bodybuilders1: This may not exactly answer your problem, but I would recommend SVCD2DVD. It does the conversion more or less automatically. As far as the gap you mention, this is common with SVCD on two discs. There is usually an overlap of video/audio between the discs. You can trim this out when you author.

[ferreter]

CrystalDoll,

Get the following for your new PC:
an ATI Radeon All-in-wonder card ($100 to $200)
Lite-on, NEC or Plextor dual format 8x DVD burner ($100) and
Aspire D-900 Standalone DVD player ($50)

Hook up your VHS or TIVO into the ATI AIW and capture in MPEG-1 or MPEG-4 (need to download codec). You can tweak your capture setting for your AIW using Lord Smurf's guides. Experiment with different bitrates. I thinks 353x240 resolution and 1Mb bitrate might be close to what you want.

Burn to DVD as 'data' using any software such as Nero.

Play in Aspire DVD player (it plays MPEGs)

This is the simplest method for newbies (I'm pretty much one myself).

Make sure you buy good quality DVDs such as Ritek or Ricoh or TY (people say this is the best).

Hope this helps. Please post back if this works for you.

PS - You can use TMPGenc to 'cut' edit your MPEGs if you want.

[FulciLives]

Well if you want to get 6 hours on a DVD you will have to use a resolution of 352x240 which can be done with MPEG-1 or MPEG-2

With MPEG-1 you are limited to a total bitrate limit of 1856kbps as your total bitrate. So VIDEO bitrate plus AUDIO bitrate must be no more than 1856kbps

You can also do MPEG-2 at 352x240 which has a much higher bitrate limit so you won't have to worry about that but then again you may not have to worry about the MPEG-1 limit either if you are shooting for 6 hours per DVD disc.

So I'm not sure which would be better ... 352x240 MPEG-1 or 352x240 MPEG-2

If you go with 352x240 MPEG-1 and use 224kbps MP2 audio your video bitrate must not exceed approximately 1600kbps otherwise you will be getting too close to the limit of 1856kbps ... however if you use 224kbps MP2 audio then you would use a video bitrate of approximately 1400kbps to fit 6 hours on a single DVD recordable. That puts you at a total bitrate of only 1624kbps total which is fine for MPEG-1 on DVD

So I would test both ways ... in other words use 224kbps MP2 and 1400kbps VIDEO but do one with MPEG-1 and one with MPEG-2 and see with your own eyes which looks better.

Of course this assums you have already gotten to the capture stage which you haven't ... not just yet anyways.

As for capture ... I would go with something that does AVI capture instead of MPEG-1/MPEG-2 capture because those bitrates are rather low and to get the best possible image at such low bitrates really requires using a software MPEG encoder such as TMPGEnc or CINEMA CRAFT ENCODER.

So you might want to look into the Canopus ADVC-100 or the ATI capture cards.

BTW it is better to use AC-3 audio on a DVD than MP2 audio but it is unclear to me (maybe someone else can chime in) if you can use MPEG-1 on a DVD with AC-3 audio. I know you can of course use AC-3 audio when using MPEG-2 but I've never used MPEG-1 on a DVD so I'm not as sure. If you go with AC-3 then 224kbps is still a good bitrate for that format although you could probably lower it to 192kbps but if you end up using MP2 audio then 224kbps is the lowest you would want to go. You do not want to use PCM WAV audio as the bitrate for that audio format is WAY too high for putting 6 hours on a DVD disc.

Hope this helps!

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[Nelson37]

Crystal, you may already be learning that you have a lot of options, and you need answers to questions you don't even know how to ask yet.

Advice - hold off on purchasing till you have done some research and reading. If you purchase an easy-to-use but poor quality device you may wind up trashing it, losing that money and then buying what you should have gotten in the first place. Look for something that offers flexibility.

Seems you have gotten the impression that MPEG-2 is inherently better quality than MPEG-1, which is not true. MPEG-4 was also mentioned but this takes a particular type of standalone DVD to play it. Or will you use your PC?

You mentioned a USB device, which often suck for capture, and also a AIW card, which I personally favor. However, if the video PC will be used for gaming, this indicates regular Video card updates which can get quite expensive if it is also your capture card.

Would also suggest looking at a second hard drive, preferably on an independent channel, both for sustained performance and to prevent intermittant OS traffic from causing lost frames. A mobo with RAID capability would be a good idea.

There are many variables to consider, many of which have been thrashed out at length, options discussed and changes made due to input of many people, overlooked issues added in over time, etc. Look over the Dropped Frames stickys, read through the capture and conversion forums, decide on both current and future goals, buy quality hardware.