Software Or Standalone DVD Recorder

[Dubinvero]

I want to transfer my analog home videos to DVD while retaining the best possible quality. I would like to create an edited and unedited version of my tapes. I own a Panasonic DMR-E80H. I have gotten good results using XP on the Panasonic. I can see the lessening of quality on a 110 inch front projection system when I use SP. As you probably know, editing on the Panasonic is cumbersome and the menu capapilities are limited.

My question is, will I obtain appreciably better final quality by going the software route?. I am a relative newcomer to video but have learned a great deal on this forum. I own the following:

Canopus ADVC100
ScenalyzerLive for DV capture
TMPGenc Express 3.0
TMPGenc Author
Womble MPEG Video Wizard

Is there a better solution that uses both the Panasonic and the some of the software packages?.

I would greatly appreciate any advice.

Derek

[David K]

Well since you have the Womble software, you can at least transfer the mpeg video you create on your DVD Recorder and edit it on your computer. Much easier and more precise editing that way. Then you author using your DVD authoring program.

I take it the Canopus is a DV capture device. Thus you can alternately capture your tapes to DV. But then you'll need a software editor that handles DV (not that hard to find). Then you encode to mpeg with TMPGenc. Then author.

Will you like the video quality better this way? Maybe. Use two pass VBR and high quality setting. You do not say what your source tapes are: VHS or High 8. If they are VHS there is a limit to how good they are going to look no matter what you do.

I just bought a DVD Recorder (a Philips 615) recently, and previously did all my encoding through DV capture and software encoding. I still plan to do my digital 8 home movies the old fashioned way, but for a lot of routine stuff like commercial VHS tapes and TV captures, it's so much quicker to use the DVD Recorder and the quality is really pretty good.

[edDV]

"home videos" "best possible quality"

If by home videos you mean important camcorder originals, then serious work should be captured and edited in DV format on the computer and authored to DVD with a non-realtime 2 pass MPeg2 encoder for best quality. This takes considerbly more time but the results will be better.

For general TV recording and volume utility projects, the DVD recorder will be ok to use and you can edit the MPeg2 later if you desire.