MPG2 or MPG4???

[JennyBear]

Can I ask a stupid question? IF a file has an extension of ".MPG"...how can you tell if it is an MPG-2 or MPG-4????

Thanks,

Jenny

[Baldrick]

.mpg is mpeg1 or mpeg2. mpeg4 video is usually stored avi, mp4, mkv. You can use gspot, mediainfo to identify the video codec and other information about the file.

[JennyBear]

Baldrick, OK done that. It shows MPEG-1 Layer 2...so, is that an MPEG 1 or 2?

Can I burn this onto a DVD using any authoring software?

Thanks for your help.

Jenny

[redwudz]

MPEG-1, Layer 2 is generally just a audio file. In Gspot, you should see MPEG-2 or sometimes MPEG-1 under 'Video' to the upper right. Maybe you are looking at the audio section on the lower left.

You also want to use Gspot 2.70 or higher as the older Gspot's don't work well with MPEG videos.

[JennyBear]

I am so dumb...yes, it's an MPEG-1. I can burn this to DVD, can I not, with any authoring software?

[redwudz]

Most MPG-1 video will work in a DVD. You will have to change the audio sample rate from the usual MPEG-1 44.1Khz rate to the DVD audio rate of 48Khz, if it isn't already. Some authoring programs like TMPGEnc DVD Author will do this automatically or you can change it in a audio editor.

For NTSC DVD formats and specifications, see 'WHAT IS' DVD to the upper left on this page. The video should be 352 x 240 pixels or 352 x 480, or you may have to re-encode it.

[jman98]

I strongly suggest using a tool such as the free SVCD2DVDMPG program for making DVDs out of what is probably a VCD file. You can also use SVCD2DVD, but it's not free.

Jenny - It says you joined in 2002. To be blunt, if you had to ask this kind of question, it's pretty obvious that you haven't been reading much on the forums in the past 5 years. If you hang around longer than just however long it takes to answer your questions and spend time reading other questions and the answers, you can learn a lot from the people here. If you, like so many others, abandon the forum after you get the answer you want, you'll never really learn anything. However, it's your life and your decision on how to spend your time. If you're going to get into working with video a lot (ie. doing a lot of these kinds of conversions to DVD), it might be a good idea to learn more about what you're doing.

[JennyBear]

Redwudz...thanks for this.

Jman98...to be honest, I have done a lot of DVD conversion from my Mini-DV cam, but I recently picked up a Sony Cybershot which allows me to shoot some pretty impressive 640X480 video footage. And the camera is incredibly small. I can't find anywhere in the manuals what format it records in, hence, the question. I haven't worked with MPEG-1 at all, so, I thought I'd verify.

And no, I haven't been reading the forums much in the past few years as I have had other priorities and I haven't needed the help.

It is good to know that there are people in this forum that will answer without being a smartass (A big thank you to Baldrick and redwudz).

In future, if I require life advice, I'll be sure to contact you...you certainly sound like you have it all together, especially with posting an average of 1.42 times a day in 32 different topics.

Thanks again, Baldrick and redwudz...you were VERY helpful.

Jenny