VCD or SVCD?

[Mike_Minh]

When ever I burn a VCD, the quality is ok. But I've read that making a SVCD is better. But when I make SVCD, my picture becomes more blocky then usual. Is this suppose to happen with SVCD? Should I keep with VCD? Or SVCD?

[Phunkie Munky]

SVCD is generally a better quality than VCD. The problem with SVCD is that it takes more space, so instead of being able to fit a movie onto one CD you may need two. This increase of space is due to the video quality of you film being better.

As for the 'block effect' of your film, one reason for this is you may have encoded it wrong and/or you are using VCD video 'MPEG-1' in your SVCD.

You can fix this problem 'if that is the reason' by re-encoding it with software like TMPGEnc into SVCD film 'MPEG2'.

Or quite simply you may have created the SVCD wrong, firstly check which MPEG format you film is encoded to.

If it is a problem of you using MPEG-1 film. Re-Encode it to MPEG-2 and YIPPIE you should have a good guality SVCD.

Hope this helps.

[Fusmali]

SVCD is the better choice, VCD is very low quality not quite as good VHS.

As for fitting a film on one VCD, well most films are over 74-80 mins and not all CD rom drives can handle the 90 min CDs, so even a VCD can take 2 or more CDs for a film. If you use Tmpegenc VBR 2 pass setting it is possible to to get 60 mins plus on to a SVCD. The SVCD produced using Tmpegenc (I burn my SVCDs using EasyVCD) when played back via a good quality SVCD compatible DVD player and TV are excellent. If it is a ripped movie of a DVD then quality is very good and you would need to play the original and the SVCD versions side by side to spot the quality loss.

If play back is via a PC monitor using WinDVD or PowerDVD4 or under, then SVCD wins again over VCD.

Beware some of the burning and video editing packages so called SVCDs are not much better than VCD in fact Tmpegenc can produce better quality VCDs than some softwares so called SVCDs.

[poopyhead]

But when I make SVCD, my picture becomes more blocky then usual. Is this suppose to happen with SVCD?

assuming that this isn't a dvd player problem (i.e. if your dvd player has a hard time playing SVCDs and/or the media you're using, then general blockiness, stuttering will occur).

check here first to make sure your dvd player supports SVCDs: https://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers

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once you verify your player supports SVCDs, then you should go ahead and do so. however, with higher quality comes some sacrifice. with standard VCD (1150 kbit/s CBR), you will be able to fit 80 min of video on 80-min CD-R. with SVCD, you will prolly be able to squeeze in about 50 min of video per CD-R and still have good quality.

the reason being is that when you use higher bitrates, your filesize will increase, so 800 MB per CD-R will now hold less video.

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possible reason for your blockiness...you're simply not using high enough bitrates. because SVCD has a higher resolution than VCD, the SVCD will look SHARPER than VCD because of higher resolution....however, because SVCD has more pixels per frame to encode for, you need to increase the bitrate. if you were to say...use the exact same bitrate for SVCD as you would for VCD. then, that same 1150 kbit/s bitrate would be spread between more pixels in SVCD...so each pixel would end up receiving less bitrate than VCD.

so, if you use the same bitrate, it's a trade off.....higher resolution means SHARPER, but since each pixel now receives less bitrate, it will be BLOCKIER

so, in order to avoid blockiness on SVCDs, you need to increase the bitrate...which is why SVCDs hold less video per CD-R than VCDs.

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however, the advantages with SVCD are enormous. you get to have higher bitrate, higher resolution, and better encoding method. SVCD allows you to use VBR, rather than CBR...which is required for standard VCD.

VBR has better bitrate allocation. CBR gives each frame the exact the bitrate...meaning the end credits (i.e. scrolling text) will receive the exact same bitrate as a fast action scene. however, do you think that the end credits require nearly as much bitrate as a fast action scene??? this is where VBR comes in. VBR takes some of the "unncessary" bitrate from slow scenes (i.e. end credits) and transfers them over to fast action scenes, which require more bitrate to look good.

[Mike_Minh]

I use Nero 5.5 to burn my SVCD. I just click on a movie file that I want to make a SVCD of. Or is it the software I'm using that is the problem? I've seen different SVCD on my DVD player, and it looks really good. But when I make them, they're only ok. Should I use a different program? If so, which one?

[Phunkie Munky]

Alot of people do use Nero to create their SVCD's and it works okay; me, personally I use VCDEasy which I think is one of the best authoring programs about. If you do want to try another program to make 100% sure it is not Nero you can, go to www.vcdeasy.org

But most likely it has nothing to do with the program you use to author your SVCD's. It most likely is due to the encoding of your movie.'In a Nutshell' what has been discussed before this reply is that:

*ONE: Either you are creating a SVCD in Nero using an MPEG-1.

MPEG1's are used in creating VCD's so when you try to create a SVCD there may be a 'clash' in the authoring because you are supposed to author a SVCD with MPEG-2 files NOT 1. This is one of the 1st things I suggest you look for, check which MPEG you have, if its 1 then you know that is a likely problem, so it is simply fixed by re-encoding the file into MPEG-2

*TWO: If when you check your film and it is SVCD 'MPEG-2' then the problem is most likely due to when it was encoded, the bitrate of the film was lowered in order to reduce the size of the file. To find out the correct birate of a SVCD film go here:
https://www.videohelp.com/svcd

If this is the problem you will need to re-encode the film, (prefferably with the source '.avi' ). When you re-encode the film you should select the bitrate that is explained in the second link. If you do re-encode the film and it is to big for the cd, you can always use a splitter program to split the file into two.

After you have checked this, re-encoded the file as needed either by increasing the bitrate or changing it from MPEG1 to MPEG2 then all you need to do is author the SVCD and put it in you player, this should have resolved the problem.

[poopyhead]

@Mike_Minh,

only use nero to author/burn the SVCDs....do NOT...and i repeat do NOT let nero encode the SVCD for you....nero absolutely sucks at that..you will get horrible quality if you let nero encode/convert to SVCD for you...

use tmpgenc or CCE to encode/convert and just burn it with nero

[DUKE107]

Better advise than all you have received, use DVDTOSVCD and the quality will be almost as good as the DVD itself, use nero copy cd to burn.

[poopyhead]

Better advise than all you have received, use DVDTOSVCD

still requires CCE (or tmpgenc) to encode...so not really "better" advise

[DUKE107]

Yes it does require TMPGE but it configures for you or it least it does in my case.

[g_shocker182]

VCD is very low quality not quite as good VHS.

Not in my opinion. On a TV a VCD may look minutely distorted/ blockly. VHS is just horrible, even unacceptable .

[cana51]

I think the best it´s CVD, the quality it´s great , like a DVD.
Run in lots of standalone DVDs without problems.
Very easy to make, author and burn.
I use Adobe premiere 6.5 with lsx plugin.
My board it´s a pinnacle DV500 with the last drivers.
I have burned it on CDs and DVDs and both run on standalone DVDs.

[Yvon]

I easily burn VCDs using a Mac and Toast 5.
The pictures look fantastic, VHS-like at its best on my tv.

The standalone dvd player is connected to the tv through the "S" connector. This is why they look so sharp. If you connect through the RCA (yellow) jack, the resolution gets fuzzy.

VCDs look better on a tv than on a computer monitor.


Yvon

[poopyhead]

The pictures look fantastic, VHS-like at its best on my tv.

errr.... SVCDs are DVD-like, in your terms.... :P

at this stage in DVD backup, most ppl are trying to achieve more than just simple VHS quality.

"S" connector.

you mean S-Video

If you connect through the RCA (yellow) jack, the resolution gets fuzzy.

not in my experience....

the source VCD vs. SVCD makes a much bigger difference

VCDs look better on a tv than on a computer monitor.

this is true w/ almost every format....even SVCDs