Burned DVD Audio Drops Out

[aktivator]

DVD Audio Problem

I have a Sony VRD-VC20 stand alone DVD USB 2.0 burner. I bought it with a friend to burn a collection of old videotapes. We input the video directly to the unit using firewire or SVHS or regular video.

Lately I have been getting good video burns using the HQ mode but after a while the audio just drops out on some of the projects, not all! On a few DVDs the audio quit playing back at exactly 1:00 minute in. On a recent DVD burn, it quit after 9:03 minutes in. And with some other DVDs that seemed to be OK all the way through, the audio became a problem after I would rip the master to a HD and try to burn copies. Then the copies might have the audio drop out problem. I have tried using various brands of media including Sony brand DVD-R and still have problems. The problem is that the problem seems somewhat erratic. Any ideas?

I am using a 2.4Ghz Pentium with 1Gb ram on the computer. [/b]

[harley2ride]

When you play the capture file from the HD, is the sound ok there, or is it bad at the capture level. If it is good at the capture level, it has to be your encoding method. Please provide specifics....

[aktivator]

Let me try to be more clear. The Sony VRD-VC20 stands alone. You input whatever video source such as a VHS player or Camcorder via firewire. You push a button on the recorder and it records the video directly to a DVD. When finished I finalize the DVD.

Then I take that DVD and play it on various different DVD players. I had a cheapo Sungale for testing and a lot of the finished DVDs would not play on it and some would not play on a new Toshiba player either. I tried many kinds of media including Sony brand. So maybe the recorder unit is defective.

On other burns that played well using the master burned DVD, the audio probem would only show up after ripping the files to a computer H.D. And then the copy of the Master Burned DVD had the audio problem. I use DVD Shrink 3.2 for this. I also tried using a more advanced ripper, but the results were still bad.

I am not sure what you mean by "When you play the capture file from the HD." Do you mean the ripped DVD files?
I can capture from the same original say VHS or miniDV tape directly to a timeline and edit and burn a DVD from there with no problems, but the SONY VRD-VC20 burner seems to be, in my mind the issue. It's too late to return it to Frys so it would have to be returned to the manufacturer at this point if it is indeed a problem. And I searched the internet trying to find out if other people have had any similar problems with this model, but so far I haven't seen any. I wanted to make sure that the unit isn't a bad product in general before I determine if it is just THIS particular unit.

Thanx.

[harley2ride]

[
Sorry.. I should have paid more attention. Have you noticed if the unit feels warm. Is it doing it more now, than it used to.

[aktivator]

Rob -

The unit seems normal temperature. It is only a month or so old. I have a lot of coasters to show for my efforts so far. You set up to burn a DVD, come back maybe an hour or two later, finalize the disk, etc. It's supposed to be automatic. Supposed to be easy. But when you keep getting sporadic bad results... This audio problem should not be happening. Maybe I should send it back to Sony...

[aktivator]

FOLLOW UP: I finally figured out through testing against another identical unit and also by downloading and running a test from Sony that the drive was indeed bad. So I was able to get an RMA for it and have sent it back for exchange. What a collossal waste of my time! It's also important to know what brands of DVDs Sony recommends!