Transferring video from laptop Firewire to DVD Recorder

[edDV]

genie_dvd, you are missing the point of what DV is and how it is used. It is now unclear to me what you are trying to do with this port. The DV port is very narrow in function.

DV is a high quality digital video stream. It has a high data rate 25-35Mb/s. It is normally used with a MiniDV or Digital8 camcorder that has a hardware encoder/decoder that inputs/outputs DV in real time. The camcorder can produce the DV stream from the camera section, the tape, or from analog inputs. The Pioneer DVR is capable of accepting a DV stream, transcoding it to MPeg2 (using a hardware MPeg2 encoder) and burning a DVD in realtime.

A computer has only a IEEE-1394 port that can be used to import or export a DV stream. The computer has no hardware DV codecs like the camcorder or hardware MPeg2 encoder like a Pioneer DVR. A typical computer can only import or export a DV stream to or from a DV-AVI file in realtime. A computer is usually not fast enough to create a DV stream directly on the fly.

Editing programs can import a DV stream from a DV camcorder or other external device to a DV-AVI file. It can then edit these files, process the DV data, add effects (mostly non-realtime) and then stream the result from a file back to the DV camcorder for display or recording on DV tape. A DVR with a DV port can also "theoretically" receive this DV stream from the editing program, realtime encode it to MPeg2 and burn a DVD in one pass.

What we have been discussiong here is the problem of getting this stream to the DVR. The Pioneer DVR is not properly emulating a camcorder. A DV camcorder is capable of being remote controlled from the editor and has a formal "machine control" set of instructions that both the editor and camcorder follow. This works now with most editing programs that support DV editing. It's very cool and works great.

The Pioneer DVR is being very dumb (i.e. non communicative). It just turns on the port and expects a stream. The computer (or camcorder) sending the DV stream expects the DVR to "talk". When it doesn't answer the questions correctly, some editing programs like Windows Movie Maker and NeroVision are refusing to send the data.

Higher end DV editing programs (Premiere Pro, Vegas 5, etc. for PC and FCP for Mac) have an additional ability to output a more or less continuous DV stream from a DV-AVI file for the purpose of external monitoring on a TV monitor. This monitor output is a DV stream that goes through the IEEE-1394 link to a camcorder (in idle state) or a dumb transcoder (like a Canopus ADVC) to which the TV monitor is connected.

It is this continous feed monitor output that can be used to feed the Pioneer DVR. It is a workaround to get a signal to the DVR with current software. Future software improvements could be made at either end to make this work with all editing programs. Pioneer could add software to emulate a camcorder, or lower end editing programs could add simple DV stream playback of a DV-AVI file without requiring machine control dialog.

So, that summarizes the issue.

Now genie_dvd, what is it that you are trying to do with this DV port?

[quote="genie_dvd"]....

I guess it just begars for me to repeat my own question:

Are there any programs that will export video via Firewire to my Pioneer without having to convert the file(s) to DV-AVI format?

[/quote}

Direct answer is no. The DV port on the Pioneer DVR will only take a DV stream, (unless they add other formats like DTV Transport streams, etc.)
A simple PC can only output a DV stream from a DV-AVI file because it is not fast enough to transcode to a DV stream on the fly in software. Hardware processors could make this possible at the PC end, or very fast software processors could do it for limited functions but we are talking about a typical notebook computer here.

Bottom line for most folks:
You will get better DVD quality (compared to S-Video in) if you use an editor to transcode all your component video material to a DV_AVI file and stream that to the DV input of the Pioneer DVR.

[Frobozz]

That's a great explanation, edDV.

I Just learned I was doing this the hard way with iMovie. I just purchased iMovie HD (part of iLife 5) and noticed a preference I missed in iMovie 4 (it was there, too). It is "Play DV Project Video through to DV Camera." With this selected I simply play the movie that's in my timeline and the Pioneer sees and records this. So I don't need to fuss with the export (or share) steps. To support the above post, it makes clear that the video must be DV format.