I currently use FusionVW/Project-X/Cuttermaran/Ulead DVD Moviefactory to copy programmes from the DHD4000 to DVD so that I can watch them using my DVD Player. Whilst my DVDs look quite nice with menus and chapters etc., it take quite a while to create one.

What I would like is a (cheap!) DVD Player that will either play the .PES files direct (very unlikely) or the resulting MPEGs.

There seem to be a few on the market but they all seem to have compatability problems to some degree. I've just seen SVP advertise the Umax Kazuki DVD7400X which sounded great until I found a forum where people said that it won't play the output from the Humax PVR - so will it play DHD4000 output?

I could have put this in the forum with the other DVD Player questions but I think it's best here as I'm specifically wanting one that is compatable with the DHD4000 output.

Is anyone successfully using such a player?

I feel your pain!


FWIW I use VideoRedo to take the raw files generated by Syphon (.ts) and trim them / convert to mpg (just a straight trim / frame copy - no re-encoding involved).

The resultant files play without issue when burnt on to a "data" DVD on both my Yamada DVD recorder (8400x) and my cheap bedroom player Umax Chili 6100XS. File names are a little truncated though!

Assuming FusionVW / Project-X will produce similar files, I would say there is a high probability of such files playing on the DVD7400x. A lot of the Chili/Yamada/Umax players share similar chipsets, and it will be what does the grunt of the work.

YMMV - Rufus.

$50 for a licence for VideoRedo?

Having a laugh....

It is a reasonable chunk of money. However compared to some commercial editing software it's comparitively cheap, and the cost appears to include unlimited support / future upgrades.

For me, having used the trial, the product was so intuitive (compared to Project-X et al), that the time I was saving on editing a weeks worth of recordings, was worth more to me than the licence cost.

YMMV - Rufus.

Yeah, I had a play with it and it's simple to use - although a bit "mickey mouse" interface wise, it does a fine job and can also handle PES file directly - should people want to use FusionViewer rather than Syphon.

I do have a question though, I burned a couple of mpgs to a DVD (just as a data disc) - using both the mpeg and mpg extension (just in case) but my Pioneer DVD player (565A) just gives a "cannot play disc" message. Do I need to do something special? Put them in a folder, create some form of menu? Any tips, ideas or suggestions would be appreciated....

Quite agree. Although I use Project-X and Cuttermaran, for other things I prefer to pay a reasonable amount to save me time and effort

This is what I'm wanting to find out - which DVD palyers will play the MPGs direct from a data DVD. To work on your Pioneer you will need to author a DVD. I use a freebee version of DVD Moviefactory that I got with a capture card a year or so ago. It does the job but it does take a while especially if it has to convert the MPG to a DVD complient frame size (not all broadcasts are in a DVD complient frame size eg. 720x576)

Thanks Rufus, sounds like the cheap player from SVP might do the trick then.

Hmmm, these things are never easy...

I'm trying to convert loads of PES files to MPG/MPEG so that I can easily burn them to a DVD (data) to be watched on a PC, DVD player etc.

I can convert the PES files to MPEG using the trial version of VideoRedo (well, I can for the next two days anyway) and I've tried burning them straight to a DVD (in the "root" folder and also in a VIDEO_TS folder) and yet the Pioneer 565A DVD player just keeps saying "cannot play disc".

I've checked and the DVD player can a) play MPEG and b) play DVD+R (the discs I'm using).

So I'm stumped now. I was kind of thinking (hoping) that it would give me some sort of simple file browser on the TV screen and I could simply pick the MPEG file I wanted to play.

If only....

The other reason I don't want to author a DVD is that I have no idea how to create menus and suchlike....

Are you sure about that? I've just checked a few websites (including pioneers) and theres no mention of MPEG and only DVD-R compatable.

DVDs use MPEG-2 so all will be MPEG compatable - it's just that it uses special formats so most won't read a 'data' DVD.

Have a look at this for more info:
http://www.digitalfaq.com/dvdguides/...burn/intro.htm

That's why I currently use Ulead DVD MovieFactory. You could also try dvdauthor / gui for dvdauthor which are free downloads. Look in http://www.videohelp.com/tools for details

I can see that I'm just going to have to try and figure out how to author multi chapter DVDs....

I've had a look through that list and I'm not exactly sure what I'm looking for....

Also I don't really know anything about (video) DVD formats and suchlike.

What is the best software to create a multi-chapter DVD from mpg files?

If you're comfortable using open source software, and don't want anything fancy, I suggest a good long read of www.doom9.org 's section on DVD authoring.

Essentially, an "ordinary" DVD player needs a series of descriptive files on a Video DVD to let it understand what to do. Any DVD authoring program will create these, some with a higher level of sophistication than others. But without those descriptive files (are these the *.ifo files or the *.vob files, I forget!!) the player won't have a clue what it is supposed to do with the MPEG-2 file sitting on the disk. As others have pointed out, there are some DVD players which will just read the files and play them back via a file selection menu, but most don't have this facility.

I'm no techy (as you've seen before!), but I've created a number of DVDs both from my own DV-camera and from material that I'm time-shifting from my Thomson and it wasn't particularly difficult, even with some clunky open source software thrown in.

Give doom9 a read!

Matt

Cheers Matt - I'll have a read.

I just don't know how to create menus, titles etc for a DVD. I've created single chapter type DVDs before. But have no idea what's involved with creating the menus etc....

Time for a read...

Had a quick into "TMPGEnc DVD Author" - seems like an OK piece of software, but this one's $90!

So I need to spend $150(ish) just to convert recorded programmes and get them onto DVD?!?!

As they overdub in action films - "Forget that!"

What about Nero? You can download a trial version and it includes authoring, burning and all sorts of other goodies.

As I've already said.........'You could also try dvdauthor / gui for dvdauthor which are free downloads. Look in http://www.videohelp.com/tools for details'.......this costs nothing and I've managed to create simple DVDs with it. It takes a little time to get used to it though.

You could try converting the PES files to MPG2 (as you have done already)

then:

1) make an ISO image file (not DVD file which requires DVD authoring in order to make regular DVDs) of the MPG2 files you created.

2) test this by burning to a RW disc and remember to select 'Finalise Disc' in the burning options.

If your player is capable of coping with the files (and most are these days), you will be presented with a listing of any folders you might have created along with the converted files.

If you don't get the menu of directories and files, check that you followed steps 1 and 2 fully, and if you followed these steps fully and still have no joy, you either need to get a newer player or be prepared to embrace the steeper learning curve of DVD authoring.

The recommendation of checking out videohelp.com or dorm.org is also endorsed by me.

I'm still looking into converting PES/TS files from the Thomson into either MPEG or DVD format and I've run across something a little odd.

I've been recording all the episodes of This Life on BBC2 and when I play it back on the Thomson/TV the picture is kind of widescreen. Not a full 16:9, but not 4:3 either - just a small black bar at the top and bottom.

When I view/edit the files on the laptop with either VideoRedo or ProjectX then things get a little odd....

The picture starts off widescreen (the end of the programme before and the BBC2 logos, trailers etc that preceed This Life), but when it comes to the actual programme (This Life) the picture seems to be a small 4:3 with a thin vertical line to the right of the picture and running top to bottom on the screen.

The 4:3 picture though is small - smaller than the actual screen, it's like half the size it should be and just centred in the screen.

I've tried playing with aspect ratios etc in VideoRedo, but it just seems to stretch the little 4:3 image rather than showing it properly.

Very confused.....

I've had that and was at first puzzled about it. For me, it was with BBC2 copies of Thunderbirds. After converting to DVD, when I played it on my DVD Player it displayed as a 4:3 screen within a 4:3 screen if you see what I mean - about 3/4 normal size. Playing on a different DVD player, it played as a normal size 4:3 screen.

My conclusion, and this could be wrong, is that the program is recorded in 4:3 format but broadcast as 16:9. Therefore, since it is 16:9 format you get black bands top and bottom, but, because it is also 4:3 you also get black bands left and right. The Thomson and some TVs or DVD players must compensate for this and show it as true 4:3 but others, like my cheap DVD Player (£19 from Richer Sounds a couple of years ago) cannot cope.

The file properties should confirm this.

Cheers

Yes, it does seem to be a 4:3 within a 4:3. Well, to be more exact, it seems to be a 4:3 within a widescreen layout - so you get bars at the top and bottom and thicker bars at the left and right.

Although I've not seen any way to change it's aspect ratio (using IFO Edit for example). This is really annoying as I've recorded dozens of episodes so that we can keep them all on DVD.

But the picture is all wrong and the vertical line at the side of the picture pretty makes it unwatchable.

I was happy to live with the results especially since it was only my 4 year old son who was going to watch the recordings!

You could download DVDPatcher to change the aspect ratio. It might work, and again it's free software so costs you only time!

Thanks - just looking at DVD Patcher but haven't got a clue what the settings mean or which I should use!