Comparative to Tracking Problems on a VCR

[Antimattercadet]

I'm relatively new to to VCD and its uses. I recently bought a fairly cheap Sharp DVD player. I have used Nero to burn a few VCD's with multiple videos. They are music videos that I've downloaded and converted using TMPGEnc. (if neccissary) Most work fine. There are a few exceptions that when burned, look like the "tracking" is off *Compare it to a VCR, and you'll understand.* The movies play with no problem whatsoever in Windows Media Player 7.1. Let me know what/if I'm doing wrong!

Thanks in advance

[adam]

Thats what happens when you mix tv formats. The US and Jap use ntsc. If this applies to you then encode your videos in 352x240, 29.97fps. If your in pretty much any other country then you are pal and you must use 352x288, 25fps.

If you use the wrong format then you will either only get black and white or you will get the scrolling effect you mentioned. You dvd player might be able to convert the vcds for you. Look in the options for pal, ntsc, and multi modes and select the one that applies. Multi mode should play both formats properly. If your dvd player doesnt have any of these options you will have to re-encode the file to the proper format and re-burn it.

[Antimattercadet]

Wow, that was pretty prompt. Ok, I'll try that. Would it make any difference if the movies are not all PAL, or NTSC? Meaning, that there are both PAL and NTSC on the same disc

[adam]

You can mix different formats (pal and ntsc) on the same vcd and it will still be compliant. If your dvd player has a multi mode it should switch between the two with no problem. But if you only have a pal and ntsc mode then you will manually have to switch between the two depending on which one is playing.

If your dvd player only has the format native to your tv, for instance in your case probably just ntsc, then all the ntsc clips will play fine and the pal clips will be B&W or scroll. In this case you would have to re-encode the pal clips to ntsc and re-author all of them onto a new vcd.