Problem(s) AVI-> DVD

[MickeyD]

Ok, just when I think I know it all I go and try something new. Now I feel and probably look like an idiot. Anyway, here's my problem.

I've got several AVIs that I'm trying convert, author, and burn to dvd. Since I am an "expert" I can get my AVI playing on my standalone DVD...it just looks and sounds like crap.

Here are my steps (I'm doing this from memory so bear with me),
1) Load the avi in VirtualDub and save the wav.
2) Load the avi in TMPGEnc as the video source.
3) Load the wav in TMPGEnc as the audio source.
4) Using the wizard I select the DVD template and choose Layer 2 VBR.
5) Start the encode. I notice the the word "Analyzing" appears over the video at this point. I'm not sure why. I've successfully encoded a hundred times and not seen this message. Perhaps that should be my first clue.
6a) Loaded the mpeg2 into TMPGEnc DVD Author and authored away - accepted all defaults just to see if it worked. Result: video looks great, but will freeze, then restart. Audio is so far off I don't even know if it's ahead or behind.
6b) Used TMPGEnc to split the mpeg2 into m2v and mp2. Loaded those into TMPGEnc DVD Author and authored away. Result: Same as 6a.

There must be something I'm missing here. My guess is that it's a setting during the encode, but Mr. KnowItAll doesn't know which one.

Can someone point me in the right direction here? Let me know if more info is needed.

Thanks in advance,
Mick

[housepig]

5) Start the encode. I notice the the word "Analyzing" appears over the video at this point. I'm not sure why. I've successfully encoded a hundred times and not seen this message. Perhaps that should be my first clue.

well, when you do a VBR, that's 2 pass - pass one is analyzing the video to see where to allocate the bits, pass two is the actual encode. have most of your previous encodes been with CBR (one pass)?

and a question - why strip out the .wav file and load it separate? I load the avi capture direct to TMPGenc, and assuming I don't have any sync problems in the original, I haven't had any sync issues with the encode.

I would also suggest trying a different authoring software, like DVD Lab, and see if it's not a bug in that stage of the project.

[bugster]

Can you play the mpg file output by TmpGenc, is that in sync?

When you load the avi into virtuladub, does it warn about VBR audio.

When you 'extract the wav' using virtualdub, do you use 'full processing mode, no compression'?

[MickeyD]

VBR, CBR

I'll have to check out the other suggestions tonight when I can actually get in front of the apps. Thanks for the advice and I'll post back letting you guys know how it goes.

[MickeyD]

Can you play the mpg file output by TmpGenc, is that in sync?

When you load the avi into virtuladub, does it warn about VBR audio.

When you 'extract the wav' using virtualdub, do you use 'full processing mode, no compression'?

1) It is out of sync.
2) Yes, it warns me about VBR audio, so...
3) I'm going to extract the wav in an uncompressed format. Then I'm going to use that wav in TMPGEnc.

Let's see what happens.

Mick

[rodonoghue]

try scanning for bad frames in mp3freeze (a different version of virtualdub) that should (hopefully) cure the out of sync. If all goes well unless you need to convert the sampling rate of the avi you shouldn't really need to split the audio