Help:How to author 3 disc vcd movie into single dvd without reencoding

[devstallion]

Hi,

Need some help over here. I got a couple of *.DAT files. They are of the vcd format. I would like to combine them into a single dvd disc. So that i do not need to have 3 vcds of a single movie but just one dvd disc. The reason why i do not want to re encode is due to the low quality of the source material.


Please do assist, thank you

[mgh]

you will need to reencode the audio to sample rate 48000Hz. Simplest is to join all the vcd files together, demux, rencode audio to 48000 Hz and then feed the video and audio to an authoring program such as DVDAuthorGui.

[pchan]

Here are the tools that you will need before authoring the DVD.
Go to the Tools section of this site. Under the Audio encoder section, download ffmpegGUI ac3 encoder. This tool will convert audio to ac3 and up from 44Khz to 48kHz in order to be DVD compliance. Next, under the DVD encoder section, download the free version of TMPGEnc. Use the MPEG Tool of TMPGEnc to demux all the VCD clips. First, copy all your *.DAT file to a folder and change .DAT to .mpg.

Then use the software that mgh suggested to author your videos into DVD. I personally use DVDLab for my authoring.

[AlanHK]

The methods other posters have outlines will work.

An alternative:

Get SVCD2DVDMPG. There is an older, free version, as well as the newer one which you need to pay for, with more features.

That has a 1-click conversion to DVD compliant MPEG1. Then you will need an authoring app, such as GuiForDVDAuthor. I suggest this one, because, unlike others (e.g., Nero) it will use the MPEG1 video without trying to convert it to MPEG2, degrading it in the process.

That will give you three separate video+ audio features.

I think GuiForDVDAuthor can be made to run them one after another, with perhaps a very brief break. Making a menu for three separate features is easy.

You might otherwise want to join them into a single video file.
For that you need an MPEG editor.
I like MPEG-VCR, but it is not free. You can also try TMPGEnc, which handles MPEG1s in its free mode.
But check that sync has not been scrambled, this is a common problem.

[devstallion]

I have done all steps until its comes to DVDAuthorGui. It merges the audio and video fine. But it upscales the resolution to match DVD format. How do i force it to remain at VCD (Original) resolution.


Also i have
1) Tmpgenc 4.0 express
2) Tmpgenc dvd author 3

Can these softwares make the process simpler?

Please advise, Thank you

[AlanHK]

I have done all steps until its comes to DVDAuthorGui. It merges the audio and video fine. But it upscales the resolution to match DVD format. How do i force it to remain at VCD (Original) resolution.

I use GuiforDVDAuthor (not the same as DVDAuthorGui) and it will definitely not change the video.

I've made many VCD -> DVD compilation discs using it.

PS: Are you sure the resolution has been changed?
VCD resolution (352 x 288 for PAL) will fill the screen as "big" as DVD (normally 720 x 576, others are possible),

[mats.hogberg]

I have done all steps until its comes to DVDAuthorGui. It merges the audio and video fine. But it upscales the resolution to match DVD format. How do i force it to remain at VCD (Original) resolution.

AFAIK, DVDAuthorGUI has no ability to reencode, so it can't change resolution. VCD resolution is also one of the valid DVD resolutions. Easiest way (IMO) to author VCD mpg as DVD is to use TDA. It will resample the 44.1 kHz VCD audio to 48 kHz DVD audio in the process.

/Mats