A very simple question about using NERO and Video Quality

[nadizo]

Hello

I downloaded a movie i wanted to watch on my dvd player
Im trying to burn 2 video files onto a dvd, each video is 700MB and im using a Taiyo Yuden 4GB Disk.

When I goto Nero I choose create a DVD and then I goto ADD VIDEO FILES, when I put both of them they seem to exceed 4gb, and then i get a pop up that sais :

Your project currently exceeds the capacity of a normal DVD, but still fits on a DVD-9 disc. Do you want to have the project quality reduced automatically so that your project will fit into the available space?

I selected yes and the DVD works fine on a dvd player,

My question is what quality did this reduce? Does it reduce picture quality or sound quality??? Also howcome if the videos are both 700 mb they come out to more then 2gb eacb when i add them to nero?


thanks for the help guys

[jagabo]

When your videos are encoded to MPEG2 for DVD they will grow much larger than the MPEG4 equivalent (if you want to maintain any kind of quality).

size = bitrate * running time

So use a lower bitrate. Use a bitrate calculater to deterimine what is appropriate for the total running time of your two videos. The lower the bitrate you use the worse the quality will get.

Or get a Divx DVD player that can play Divx/Xvid AVI files on ISO data discs, like this one:

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Philips-DVD-Player-with-HDMI-DVP5960/sem/rpsm/oid/14718...oductDetail.do

Then you can put up to six 700 MB AVI files on a DVD and won't have to spend time converting them.

[nadizo]

so your saying i should have just burned 2 disks, making the quality better?

[guns1inger]

That would be a start. There is a reason studios don't put 2 movies on a DVD5, and often use a DVD9 for a single movie.

The next step is yto use a better encoder. Nero is a very average quality encoder.

And finally, remember the basic rule of video : Garbage In, Garbage Out. While your 700mb movie might look OK on your PC, to convert it to DVD you have to resize it to DVD spec, re-encode it (both steps cost quality) then play it back on a device that has a higher gamma setting than your PC (your TV), which exposes all the blockiness and colour issues etc inherent in over-compressed movies. To fit a movie into 700 MB requires a bitrate way to low to truly preserve quality.

[redwudz]

If your source files are Xvids or Divx's off the net, I would use ConvertXToDVD instead. It will size them properly to fit on a regular DVD-5 without much effort.

Even without out that, most 700MB Xvid or Divx files will still end up about 1500MB or so each for good quality. Making them much bigger is unlikely to improve the quality, as it's been mostly destroyed by crunching them down to 700MB for the Xvid/Divx format anyway.

You can use many different methods for Xvid/Divx to DVD, but end the end, a program like ConvertX does about as good as any. Nero is about the last program I would use. It's a good burner program, but not good for much else. IMO.