is there anything better than "Audio DVD Creator"?

[upshot]

before I dump $40 on this program I was wondering if there are some alternatives. My goal: compile a boatload of CDs and MP3s on DVD. I like the ability to add album covers to chapters and that it creates stand alone compliant DVD's (as apposed to the oddball 'dvd audio' format). This is primarily for my home system and maybe eventually I'll slap a dvd player in the car to play these compilations....

Suggestions?

[bazooka]

Try other software and see what you like.

You are asking a subjective question.

Everyone is going to tell you something different.

[upshot]

Exactly... In your opinion is there a better alternative?

or... Is there a cheaper alternative?

Subjectivity is "ok". It spurrs ideas and alternatives. At the moment I'm coming up short on both...

[mats.hogberg]

Tried Blaze Medias Music DVD Creator yesterday, in fact, and that one sucked big time compared to Audio DVD Creator. (only LPCM for one thing!) I've seen another similar product out there, but I couldn't find it again.
ADC seems rather potent, and to do what it should - the alternative is to create and prepare all audio/video sources "by hand" and author with a potent authoring app like DVD-Lab Pro, which would be rather easy but also time consuming...
I think there are some guides on the subject here if you're willing to invest some time in the task.
<edit>Yes, I found it (here at the tools section of course!) DVD+Audio Gotta try it out tonite.</edit>
/Mats

[upshot]

I do have dvd-lab and have used it (it's better when you want some videos in the mix) but as you stated it's not a 'quick' method. Thanks for the input!

[tygrus2000]

I seem to remember someone mentioning that Wavelab can do something like this quite well, but it is a more expensive program that $40 I would bet.

[upshot]

dvd+audio looks like a decent alternative... It is +$10 USD though.... doh.

[mats.hogberg]

The extremely brief glance I had time to throw at dvd+audio didn't impress me, but it was extremely brief. I'll give it a 2nd chance! (I didn't find any AC3 audio option, for one thing...)

/Mats

[upshot]

Same here.... dvd+audio seemed very klunky, no ac3, and more expensive. Guess I'm heading toward audio dvd creator ...

[mpack]

Same here.... dvd+audio seemed very klunky, no ac3, and more expensive.

Depends what your goal is. For many people (me for example ) the goal was to take advantage of DVDs greater disk capacity to fit more music on a single disk, but without losing CD quality. That meant static backgrounds only, and LPCM audio. So, the lack of AC3 (or MP2) wouldn't be a problem.

I had problems with Audio DVD Creator when I tried it, but ADC has been updated several times since then.

[delius]

i use audio dvd creator to make 5:1 surround at 464 kbps ac3
or 1536 k lpcm quallity is great easy to use

menus are fine havn't found anything better are reasonable cost
c

[upshot]

forgive my ignorance but, Is 192 kbps AC3 not 'near' CD quality? Most of my collection is ripped at 44100 sample/ 192 bit MP3 to start with...

[mats.hogberg]

I'd say so, but others may not... No matter, fitting 8 times as much on the same disc, to me, by far outweights the drop in audio quality that I may or may not (most likely) percieve. If I feel like an audiophile one day, I can always play the original CD...

/Mats

[steptoe]

Have a look at the audio guides on my site, there are 3 different guides that take different ideas, but all do the same thing in getting Cd quality audio onto a DVD, not as MP3's, but 'proper' audio

http://www.thescrapyard.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/audio.html

[mats.hogberg]

i use audio dvd creator to make 5:1 surround at 464 kbps

How do you create 5.1 AC3 with ADC, or even, how to make it take a 5.1 AC3 as source without reencoding it?

/Mats

[mpack]

No matter, fitting 8 times as much on the same disc, to me, by far outweights the drop in audio quality that I may or may not (most likely) percieve. If I feel like an audiophile one day, I can always play the original CD...

As you say, it is up to the listener to decide if the audio quality is good enough for him. However, I just wanted to point out that you can fit over 7 hours of 48kHz LPCM audio on a single DVD-R (assuming there isn't much else on it), which I think is quite enough! Eg. with that capacity I personally wouldn't even consider compressing and therefore maybe compromising quality.

I'm sure if we had access to high quality Dolby encoding software then the encoded audio would be damn good. But, in my subjective experience the freeware AC3 encoders are not that good - I reckon I can hear the quality drop on my VHS->DVD projects, never mind transferring CD audio.

[virendra]

well, i have used ADC and when used lpcm format it performed very well (48k and 448kbps and 16 bit)

but when i tried to use 5.1 ac3 format it did perform very poor way. ( i have not tried 2ch ac3 though)

there is one more software DVD2ONE which does the same job but seems to have lot of bugs ( i could not make a dvd out of it )

when i tried ADC with 96k with 24 bit hoping to have better result, i found my dvd player does not support that ( surprise to me!!!!)

but still i say ADC is a good software and now they have new version 1.9