Windows DVD Maker Size Questions...

[alank2]

Hi,

I am completely thrilled as I have finally found a way to get a bunch of video files off of my hard disk and burned onto DVD's using the built in Win7 DVD Maker.

I have started with stuff from my Tivo. I used the direct show dump to dump them to mpg from tivo. I then add them to Windows DVD Maker and they burn and look great.

My question is - DVD Maker is very wrong about how much size it thinks it can fit on a disc. Converting these Tivo videos results in a much larger file for DVD, around 1.65x their mpg size. I've seen this issue with some other AVI files as well where the resulting video is 6.5x its avi size.

I have found that it works great as long as you don't try to stuff too much on a DVD. You can't go by its estimate at all.

Has anyone else experienced this? Any workaround to it?

My workaround so far is to burn a smaller amount of video to a RW disc and see how much space it took up. I then use this to figure out how much of that type of video will fit on a 4.7 or 8.5gb disc...

Thanks,

Alan

[redwudz]

The size of a video file is based on it's running time and the bitrate used. We have several bitrate calculators available in our 'Tools' section that will tell you the bitrate if you input the running times of your video. Bitrate generally determines the quality. Lower bitrate=Lower quality, Higher bitrate=Higher quality. With a DVD, you want to stay around 9500Kbps for best quality. When the bitrate gets down around 3000Kbps and lower, the quality drops off fairly quickly.

Some bitrate calculators: https://www.videohelp.com/tools/sections/bitrate-calculators

You can encode a short representative clip at different bitrates to see the quality differences. If your display device is a small screen TV, you may not notice the quality loss on some lower bitrate files. You can also encode to the 1/2 D1 DVD specification if you do use a low bitrate and the low bitrate may still look fairly good. Acceptable quality is mostly based on your own perception.

Look to the upper left on this page in 'WHAT IS' DVD for more information about the DVD specifications, formats and structure.

[alank2]

Hi,

How much video at 9500kbps can you fit on a single layer or double layer disc?

Thanks,

Alan

[guns1inger]

You can use a bitrate calculator to work this out.

For a single layer disc at the maximum allowable bitrate you can fit around 60 - 65 minutes, and for a dual layer, around 110 minutes.