DVD Folders - Video TS & Audio TS

[bdr13278]

I am having trouble copying a DVD I received from a local news station. The DVD works perfect in all DVD players and ROMs. I just can't seem to make a copy using NERO. I have tried multiple computers and still no luck. It says, "burn process failed". So I tired copying the folders to the hard drive and noticed that there is no "AUDIO_TS" folder. I opened NERO and burned the DVD just fine using NERO Express. The weird thing is the newly burned DVD now contains the AUDIO_TS folder!

So my question is this. Why is an AUDIO_TS folder so important in burning/authoring a DVD? Why does it exist and is it a requirement? Any information would be nice. Thanks!

[TooLFooL]

that folder is not important, and not required. it is part of the original dvd specifications, but simply not needed. NERO obviously put it there on it's own to make your disc 'compliant'.

[aedipuss]

dump nero and start using imgburn, it's free and the best burning app around.

[jman98]

AUDIO_TS was designed from the beginning of the DVD standard to be for the future use of an audio format that would use DVD discs instead of CDs.
That format became DVD-Audio. It is normal for AUDIO_TS to be empty.

Nero is OK for these tasks: CD audio, data discs (CD or DVD), image burning, making "weird" hybrid discs (ie. CD audio/VCD combo discs).
Nero is a poor choice for making: DVD/VCD/SVCD

You would be better off to use ImgBurn for DVD burning.

[RabidDog]

You could just try to burn a dvd in nero .. that will show the audio-ts and video-ts folders in one pane (output) and an explorer window. All you then have to do is browse/explore your input dvd and copy the contents of the video-ts folder to the video-ts on the output disc. As TF points out, there never is anything in the audio-ts folder but it needs to be present. It was there for some future audio iteration of the DVD spec. You can even bung other stuff, like data files, pictures on the dvd disc as long as its not in the two folders.

[tomlee59]

As TF points out, there never is anything in the audio-ts folder but it needs to be present. It was there for some future audio iteration of the DVD spec.

Yes, strictly speaking, a compliant DVD needs to have the AUDIO_TS folder. However, modern DVD players don't care if it's there or not. I have not encountered a player in years that complained about the lack of this folder. That doesn't mean that such players don't exist anywhere, but it suggests that they are not very common.

Your problem is not related to this folder's presence or absence. It is almost certainly due to Nero, or bad discs. Try using imgburn, as others have suggested, and use good media (Verbatim, Taiyo-Yuden are most frequently mentioned here), and perhaps burn at a speed one or two notches below maximum (eg., burn a 16x disc at 12x or 8x). If you are using second-tier media, these considerations are more important. And if you are using third-tier media ("plastic in the shape of a disc"), chuck it and buy the good stuff. You'll never go back.

[Noahtuck]

Yes, strictly speaking, a compliant DVD needs to have the AUDIO_TS folder.

Actually, no it does not.

However, modern DVD players don't care if it's there or not.

That's because it is NOT required for the dvd video specs.
I own several official pressed disc's that do not contain the folder from way back in the day.

Even players that look for the folder, which are ONLY players that will play DVD-A(udio) disc's, if they don't find it, they move on to the VIDEO_TS folder.

The only thing the folder was designed for was highresolution audio on dvd disc's.
Which i saw someone actually post the other day that "most" standalone players will play DVD-A, which is incorrect, most will NOT play from the AUDIO_TS folder.

[tomlee59]

Thanks for the clarification, Noahtuck. It appears that the early DVD players that choke on the absence of an AUDIO_TS folder were simply poorly designed.

After doing a bit more research, I see that the DVD spec was finalized before the audio sig convened to come up with DVD-audio, so requiring the presence of an audio_ts folder clearly can't have been in the DVD spec. Thanks again for the correction. I do appreciate it.

[Alex_ander]

DVD spec was finalized before the audio sig convened to come up with DVD-audio, so requiring the presence of an audio_ts folder clearly can't have been in the DVD spec.

Both DVD Video and DVD Audio specifications are parts 3 and 4 of the common DVD specification controlled by DVD Forum. The fact one of those parts was finalized earlier can't bring to conclusion that AUDIO_TS folder couldn't have been mentioned in the earlier one. By that time (1995) 'DVD' no more stood for 'Digital Video Disc'. The delay with DVD-A standard is known to occur due to the development of new copy protection measures (after the reverse engineering on CSS). Older DVD video players (not equipped with DVDA capability) needed that folder presence to recognise a standard DVD, unlikely they didn't conform to standards at that. Contemporary ones can support some deviations, so do some authoring applications. And it's still recommended (e.g. by dvd-replica) to use AUDIO_TS folder for full compatibility with existing players, good programs (like ImgBurn) will even add it if you forget, anyway it's zero cost.

[tomlee59]

Hi Alex_ander,

Since we've now had three people assert various things, and not all three quite agree completely, I am curious if there is an online source of the actual spec. I'd rather rely on the primary sources. From a brief online search, I couldn't find anything other than various folks disagreeing with one another as to what was actually in the specification. Rather than continuing an argument by authority, I'd much prefer reading the actual document.

That said, there is certainly no harm in including the AUDIO_TS folder, as you so logically point out. It costs essentially nothing, so if it does nothing, no problem. And if it does help compatibility with some players, then the utility-to-cost ratio is near infinite.

But for purely pedagogical reasons, I'm interested in knowing what the spec actually says, from reading the actual spec itself. If you know of a link to that document, I would be most grateful.

Thanks!

[Alex_ander]

I am curious if there is an online source of the actual spec.

No, copy of official document is offered by DVD Forum for $5000 + the buyer signs agreement of confidentiality.
There's an unofficial specification by DVD-replica, also not free (incomplete chapters are on their site). In their FAQ they say that folder is not necessary, but still recommended (they don't quote any document at that). I'm also curious what's there in the official docs .

[Noahtuck]

And if a frog had wings, he would not bump his ass when he jumped

An AUDIO_TS folder is NOT required, PERIOD!

[tomlee59]

Well, in the grand scheme of things, it's not something to get too worked up over. I can live with my appendix, so I guess I can live with a possibly superfluous AUDIO_TS folder. No harm in having it, so there's no practical argument against putting it in, even if it ultimately turns out that it's for silly, superstitious reasons.

I'm simply curious to see the ACTUAL spec, rather than being reliant on hearsay, however passionately articulated. From the quick online search I did, I see people with equal amounts of emotion and certitude asserting exactly opposite positions. I don't put much stock in "argument from authority" unless that authority is the official spec (or something traceable to it).

[Alex_ander]

BTW, VIDEO_TS folder is specially described in DVD-A part (part 4) of DVD specification (I have a copy of Disctronics DVD-A introductory article with references to that doc) and any DVD-A authoring application will add an empty one to a DVD-A only disc. I think it's a good practice to have both folders in both cases.

From DVDLab help file:
It is normal for the AUDIO_TS folder to be empty on a DVD-Video Project. Do not delete this folder as the DVD player expects to see it.

From Scenarist helpfile (Glossary):
AUDIO_TS
File directory on a DVD disc (or in a DVD Volume folder) where DVD-Audio data is stored. In a pure DVD-Video disc, this directory is always empty.
DVD Volume
Logical container for all of the data on a DVD disc. In a DVD-Video disc, the DVD Volume contains the VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS folders...

You can also find Scenarist mentioning JACKET_P folder as 'optional', while AUDIO_TS in the same place is mentioned as 'empty'.

[VegasBud]

tomlee59,

The closest you're likely to get (in publicly available documents) would be ECMA technical report TR-71, the "DVD Read-Only Disk File System Specifications" (available here).

In that document, Annex A, section A.19 details the requirements for files and directories for DVD-Video disk implementations. There is no specific mention of the requirement for a AUDIO_TS folder, which actually makes sense, since it is for a DVD-Video disk, not a DVD-Audio disk.

However, that doesn't influence my decision to always include an empty AUDIO_TS folder, and I'll explain why:

There is a recommended way for a stand-alone dvd player to read/play a DVD-Video disk, as is detailed in Annex B of TR-71, but it's not required to be that way. DVD-Video playback can be either sector based (using the tables in VIDEO_TS.IFO), file system based (using either the m-udf or ISO9660 file systems), or any combination of the two, and not violate any specification. The specifications for DVD-Video apply to the disk itself and its' contents, not to how it's accessed by a player.

As a result, if a player checks for the existence of the AUDIO_TS folder as part of its' preliminary determination if the disk is valid, that doesn't violate any specification I've ever seen. As an example, just a couple years ago I had a Panasonic player that did just that. If there was no AUDIO_TS folder, it wouldn't even try to play the disk...but if I reburned the same content to a new disk after adding a AUDIO_TS folder (with no other changes), the resulting disk would play fine.

Even in the unlikely event that player is the only model ever made that displayed that behavior, I still want any dvd I make to be playable on as many players as possible. I got rid of that particular player, so I don't (theoretically) need to worry about it anymore, but if spending just a few sectors of disk space to include an empty AUDIO_TS folder increases that disk's compatibility by only one player model, that's what I'll do...every single time I burn a dvd-video disk.

[bdr13278]

WOW! I did not know that there is such a debate on if an AUDIO_TS folder is really needed or not. It sounds like NERO might be the issue. As far as AUDIO_TS foler is concerned, it sounds like it doesn't hurt to have it and may not be needed today on modern DVD players.

[tomlee59]

As an example, just a couple years ago I had a Panasonic player that did just that. If there was no AUDIO_TS folder, it wouldn't even try to play the disk...but if I reburned the same content to a new disk after adding a AUDIO_TS folder (with no other changes), the resulting disk would play fine.

Even in the unlikely event that player is the only model ever made that displayed that behavior, I still want any dvd I make to be playable on as many players as possible. I got rid of that particular player, so I don't (theoretically) need to worry about it anymore, but if spending just a few sectors of disk space to include an empty AUDIO_TS folder increases that disk's compatibility by only one player model, that's what I'll do...every single time I burn a dvd-video disk.

Thanks for that great info, VegasBud. Your experience validates the wisdom of adding an AUDIO_TS folder, even if it doesn't appear to be required by any spec. As long as there are some players that behave in the way that you describe, it's worth the near-zero effort and cost to add a "superfluous" empty folder.

I'm still curious to know what the spec really says, but as I've said, it's for purely academic reasons. Regardless of the answer to that question, I'll keep including AUDIO_TS folders. Can't hurt, and might help, spec or no spec.

Again, many thanks.

[TooLFooL]

i'm just guessing, but i would think in order to bear the "DVD VIDEO" logo a disc MUST be compliant, and commercial dvd's DO exist that DO NOT contain the AUDIO_TS folder, so perhaps it is NOT required?? just a guess!

[tomlee59]

Sounds like good reasoning to me -- I'll buy that argument for now, seeing as I can't get my hands on the real spec without $$$, and I'm a cheap SOB.

[peter47]

I am having trouble copying a DVD I received from a local news station. The DVD works perfect in all DVD players and ROMs. I just can't seem to make a copy using NERO. I have tried multiple computers and still no luck. It says, "burn process failed". So I tired copying the folders to the hard drive and noticed that there is no "AUDIO_TS" folder. I opened NERO and burned the DVD just fine using NERO Express. The weird thing is the newly burned DVD now contains the AUDIO_TS folder!

So my question is this. Why is an AUDIO_TS folder so important in burning/authoring a DVD? Why does it exist and is it a requirement? Any information would be nice. Thanks!

My Panasonic DMR-EX79E recorder (new 20/12/09) will not play discs with the Audio TS file missing (the disk only has Vidio TS files.)
When I copy the Video TS files and add the AudioTS file it plays fine.
So some players need the Audio TS file.

[roberta]

Hello Peter,

While my reply may be not very technical, still I'm the right person to add my reply, as previous reply messages in the thread are rather video world limited. But I hope they can help me
There exist Pleiads of mixed hybrid audio DVD's (DVD-A standard) where audio_ts folder is full up to the last megabyte, so that there is no spare left to video_ts. And some hybrids may have data shared between audio and video_ts folder. Audio usually is multi track sampled at higher rates and encoded to DTS or Dolby.
Probably you Panasonic is capable to play DVD-A and therefore the presence of this folder is expected, while indeed when it's missing normally players continue searching for video_ts folder. As audio_ts presence is by standard, Nero creates it by default, even when empty.