More Demo Questions

[stagescrew]

I sucessfully converted an avi file (just over an hour long) and burned it using DVDdecrypter. A few questions I still have:

1) this avi has two audio streams (french/english). For whatever reason it encoded only the english stream. Is the ability to choose an audio stream only available on the registered version?

2) This took over five hours to complete. My system is Pentium M 725 (1.6Ghz) with 1gig ram. The working drive is a 7200rpm usb2.0 external drive. According to the log, the avi encoded at 9000kbs Full D-1 (the original was 1428Kbps). Does this amount of time seem right, or will this speed up with the registered version? I'm still a little confused about encoding bitrate and even if Kbps is the same as kbs.

3) Speaking of the original bitrate (1428Kbps), I've read here that authoring a DVD at a bitrate slower than 3000kbs will result in an inferior quality. What I noticed on my DVD was severe jagged lines during scenes with lateral camera movement. Is this due to the lower than 3000kbs bitrate of the original?

4) I did create a menu, with a background bmp captured from the original, however there was no menu on my DVD. Is this also a function only of the registered version?

Thanks for all the help.

[ChrissyBoy]

1) this avi has two audio streams (french/english). For whatever reason it encoded only the english stream. Is the ability to choose an audio stream only available on the registered version?

It may be that only single audio streams are supported in the demo (i honestly can't remember), but as stated before you will get a DVD with 2 selectable audio streams in the registered version.

2) This took over five hours to complete. My system is Pentium M 725 (1.6Ghz) with 1gig ram. The working drive is a 7200rpm usb2.0 external drive. According to the log, the avi encoded at 9000kbs Full D-1 (the original was 1428Kbps). Does this amount of time seem right, or will this speed up with the registered version? I'm still a little confused about encoding bitrate and even if Kbps is the same as kbs.

Five hours seems long but you have a slow cpu so it might be normal....

9000kbs is 9000kbits per second. The fact that your avi is 1428Kbps is totally irrelevent when converting to mpeg2. It is the duration that counts.

3) Speaking of the original bitrate (1428Kbps), I've read here that authoring a DVD at a bitrate slower than 3000kbs will result in an inferior quality. What I noticed on my DVD was severe jagged lines during scenes with lateral camera movement. Is this due to the lower than 3000kbs bitrate of the original?

What you have read concerns the bitrate of the mpeg in the DVD not the original bitrate of the avi. You are getting a 9000kbs mpeg from your avi so bitrate of the final dvd is not the problem. Are you watching on your PC or DVD player? What you describe sounds like interlacing. Should not be there on the TV.

4) I did create a menu, with a background bmp captured from the original, however there was no menu on my DVD. Is this also a function only of the registered version?

It is likely you chose "Quick DVD". This will ignore you menu. "Make DVD" allows you to include the menu you have created.

[stagescrew]

Thanks again for your quick responses. I appreciate you taking the time with my demo questions.

It is likely you chose "Quick DVD". This will ignore you menu. "Make DVD" allows you to include the menu you have created.

It is possible I did do that, I don't remember. There's no going back to burn the DVD with the menus, with out re-encoding, right?

Are you watching on your PC or DVD player? What you describe sounds like interlacing. Should not be there on the TV.

I am watching it on both. Upon close inspection of the original avi ( on my small laptop display) the jagged lines seem to be there, and I presume grossly exaggerated on the larger 27" LCD TV Iwhere viewed the DVD. I guess the true test would be to hook up my laptop to the 27" LCD and see if it look the same.

New question: I have DMA enabled on all my drives, so making the working drive C: rather than the external USB drive should make no difference in the speed of encoding, right?

Thanks again for all your help. My registration is on the way

[ChrissyBoy]

You can reuse the _S2D.mpg files in a new project. These will not be reprocessed: just the dvd creation.

Not sure about the best drive option. All i know is that SVCD2DVD is extreamly disk IO intensive, so your quickest drive is recommened as the working drive.... I daresay that would be an internal one if it is the same speed.