AVI to SVCD - Point me to the right guides/Where to begin?

[i3lueHorneT]

Hello all,

I am a complete newb to video conversion and am needing some help on where to start. I want to turn some .avi's into something DVD player (standalone for TV) readable. As I understand it, SVCD is the way to go. I'm looking to keep as close to original quality as possible. I'll also be wanting to add some subs in I already have.

NOTE: I don't have a DVD burner, only CD-RW

I have been looking through the 'How To's' here ( https://www.videohelp.com/convert ) and am a bit lost. I am hoping you guys could help whittle down a few hours of reading through and testing for me to something a bit more manageable, that is I'm wondering just which guides I should start with. If you could just note some starting points, which guides to go to, and anything I should be aware of before my first conversion (time & HDD space requirements, things I might not even think of, etc) that would be immensely helpfull.
/Thanks.


peace,

[jman98]

Go to http://www.dvd2dvd.org and download DVD2SVCD. You will need an encoder of some kind, such as TMPGenc or CCE. I think there is a free encoder that might work, but I don't remember the name of it. http://www.doom9.net has a guide to DVD2SVCD, but you are not allowed to directly link to it. Sorry. Go to the site, click on Guides, and then look for SVCD and you will then click on DVD2SVCD. DVD2SVCD is not all that tough to use. Just start it running before you go to bed and your finished SVCD should be ready in the morning. I must warn you that if you burn with Nero, it is NOT possible to have SVCD chapters (also known as "entry points") AND subtitles. If you burn an ISO image with Nero, chapters will work, but not subtitles. If you use Nero's SVCD setting to burn the final muxed .mp2 file instead of the ISO, subtitles will work but not chapters. Well, that was true of my old DVD player and some others, so just be aware of that if it happens to you. There may be a few DVD players that will play both chapters and subtitles from an ISO burn, but many people in the past reported this problem where you could only have one or the other, depending on whether you burned the final .mp2 file or the ISO image.

You should be aware that while SVCD does allow for up to 4 selectable subtitles, some DVD players won't display any SVCD subtitles. Some demand that SVCD subtitles are in CVD format, some demand SVCD format. Some won't play either.

Depending on the quality of your original AVIs, converting to SVCD may result in some quality loss due to the low bit rate. In my opinion, CCE is the best encoder for SVCD, but it costs a fortune unless you can find a (cough! cough!) "demo" version that never expires. TMPGenc is pretty darn good and quite reasonably priced, although I think CCE is somewhat better for MPEG-2 encoding.

I think SVCD is a dead end and I would encourage you to save your money and buy a DVD burner. They really aren't any more expensive now then CD only burners. SVCD is a good way to get your feet wet, but it's not really a good long term solution. Too many DVD players don't fully support them. Even Philips. who wrote the spec, ignores the fact that the format supports 2 separate audio streams and 4 subtitle streams. My Philips DVP-642 will play ONLY the first audio stream of an SVCD and it will play ONLY the first subtitle stream. Worse, if it finds an SVCD subtitle stream, it can't be turned off! So much for "selectable subtitles".

[i3lueHorneT]

-alright I'll look into what you've given me so far

About subtitles, I suppose I could use something to 'burn them in' right? That should open up some options for the chapters being that I'll be using NERO should it not?
/Thanks for the reply.


peace,

[j4gg3rr]

Canopus Procoder 2 adds subtitles as it encodes using the DirectVobSub filters.
Just name the sub files the same as the source avi and put them in the same directory and it loads them automatically.

[Nelson37]

First step would be to make sure your DVD player supports SVCD. Next would be to see if it supports higher-res and higher-bitrate "X"svcd.

Assuming these are downloaded files which you have only viewed on a PC monitor, be prepared for an apparent dramatic quality loss when viewed on a comparatively large screen TV. Moving an Xvid from a 17 to 19 inch monitor to a 25" TV thru MPG conversion is going to look a LOT worse.

DVD2SVCD is an excellent program. Studying the log file it creates and investigating step by step will teach you a lot about the process.