Hi. Just started using DVDMF3. Am confused by the manual and cannot find a direct answer on the boards. (You guys are way too technical for me). I simply want to take home movies off of my digital camcorder (and eventually transfer old VHS home movies) and put them onto DVDs. I read that there is a "legal" bitrate setting between 2 and 5 Mb/sec. for DVD's, but also read that I can choose between 4, 6, or 9Mb/sec for DVD's using a USB 2.0 connection (which I am).
Hope this is a simple question - what video bitrate should I use to capture my videos in? I want the best quality pictures that I can watch on a normal DVD player hooked up to a TV. I am using DVD format and NTSC. I want to be able to edit a little and add menus, etc. if that matters.
Also, I used 6 Mb/sec bitrate to capture some video already. Am waiting to add more videos to the project before burning a DVD. Before I tape over my original video (on my camera), should I re-capture using a lower "legal" bitrate?
newbie question - what bitrate to use
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heinz-oz
Don't know where you get the idea of a "legal" bit rate from. AFAIK, there is no such thing except that most DVD players will have problems with bit rates >8000 kbps. Anything below about 4000 kbps would deteriorate the quality something drastic.
It's best to capture via IEEE1394 (iLink) to DV AVI if you want to do some editing after. This is also the method that puts the least strain on your resources. Bitrates around 6000 kbps tend to give you good quality at reasonable file sizes.
To capture via USB is generally not the best option and has been the root cause of many a headache by inexperienced users. Capturing directly to mpeg2 for DVD authoring tends to require a machine that is tuned to do that kind of work. Higher end ones with more than 1 GB DDR RAM tend to perform better than lower end ones.
It's best to capture via IEEE1394 (iLink) to DV AVI if you want to do some editing after. This is also the method that puts the least strain on your resources. Bitrates around 6000 kbps tend to give you good quality at reasonable file sizes.
To capture via USB is generally not the best option and has been the root cause of many a headache by inexperienced users. Capturing directly to mpeg2 for DVD authoring tends to require a machine that is tuned to do that kind of work. Higher end ones with more than 1 GB DDR RAM tend to perform better than lower end ones.
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Gerald M. Payne
Heinz,
From the original post, I'd guess he has an ADS DVD Xpress, or similar model, capture device that hardware encodes video to MPEG and spits the stream to the PC via USB. That's probably where the "legal" bitrate reference came from, the DVD Xpress's manual.
To the original poster,
I have a DVD Xpress and regularly capture using the S-video jack, a 4Mbps video compression setting, and 48Khz, Mpeg1 Layer2 audio compressed at 224Kb/sec which allows for about 2H&20M on a standard 4.7GB DVD. The 4Mbps rate is also handy for storing three edited 1 hour episodes of a series which end up at around 42+ minutes each after commercials are edited out by MF 3.0 SE in my setup. You might find that the 3Mbps rate is pretty decent as well and allows for a bit over 3 hours per DVD. That said, you can go for higher bitrates like 6Mbps(source was a Sony DV cam), but from what I've seen trying it you probably won't notice a lot of difference unless you have a considerably larger screen and sit closer to it than seems comfortable for most people... Now, if you have HD TV to compare to your mileage may vary since you're only capturing to MPEG at 720x480 to begin with...
For the videophiles that are cringing, I have good vision, and I get very decent results at this compression ratio(4Mbps) with the DVD Xpress. I'm really quite impressed with the hardware encoding which allows me to EASILY record in MPEG on an older PC powered by a 900Mhz AMD Thunderbird processor.(considering how little disk access there is while recording I'd guess you could get by with a lot less under the hood) Granted, I watch the resulting video on a 27" 4:3 ratio TV from a distance of about 7 feet with sound decoded by a $40 5.1 channel surround sound processor Home Threatre system not on a 42" plasma screen. However, on my setup, my DVDs recorded at 4MB/sec seem quite good, in fact comparable to most commercial DVDs I've rented or own.
For most people with a Dish Network or Direct TV system transmitting at 3Mbps, or so, compression the DVD Xpress at 4Mbps will look great if you're capturing the occasional bit of video for time shifted viewing.
Good luck and experiment to see what works for you. Blank DVDs are certainly cheap enough to burn a couple short test Mpegs to see what YOU think.
PS As I recall, the DVD Xpress manual states 9Mbps is the high end for DVD video, and then sort of contradicts itself a bit further down the page by saying 2-5Mbps is the "Legal" video bitrate range for DVD... From what I've seen 9Mbps is probably the upper limit, but 4Mbps from the DVD Xpress is GREAT!
From the original post, I'd guess he has an ADS DVD Xpress, or similar model, capture device that hardware encodes video to MPEG and spits the stream to the PC via USB. That's probably where the "legal" bitrate reference came from, the DVD Xpress's manual.
To the original poster,
I have a DVD Xpress and regularly capture using the S-video jack, a 4Mbps video compression setting, and 48Khz, Mpeg1 Layer2 audio compressed at 224Kb/sec which allows for about 2H&20M on a standard 4.7GB DVD. The 4Mbps rate is also handy for storing three edited 1 hour episodes of a series which end up at around 42+ minutes each after commercials are edited out by MF 3.0 SE in my setup. You might find that the 3Mbps rate is pretty decent as well and allows for a bit over 3 hours per DVD. That said, you can go for higher bitrates like 6Mbps(source was a Sony DV cam), but from what I've seen trying it you probably won't notice a lot of difference unless you have a considerably larger screen and sit closer to it than seems comfortable for most people... Now, if you have HD TV to compare to your mileage may vary since you're only capturing to MPEG at 720x480 to begin with...
For the videophiles that are cringing, I have good vision, and I get very decent results at this compression ratio(4Mbps) with the DVD Xpress. I'm really quite impressed with the hardware encoding which allows me to EASILY record in MPEG on an older PC powered by a 900Mhz AMD Thunderbird processor.(considering how little disk access there is while recording I'd guess you could get by with a lot less under the hood) Granted, I watch the resulting video on a 27" 4:3 ratio TV from a distance of about 7 feet with sound decoded by a $40 5.1 channel surround sound processor Home Threatre system not on a 42" plasma screen. However, on my setup, my DVDs recorded at 4MB/sec seem quite good, in fact comparable to most commercial DVDs I've rented or own.
For most people with a Dish Network or Direct TV system transmitting at 3Mbps, or so, compression the DVD Xpress at 4Mbps will look great if you're capturing the occasional bit of video for time shifted viewing.
Good luck and experiment to see what works for you. Blank DVDs are certainly cheap enough to burn a couple short test Mpegs to see what YOU think.
PS As I recall, the DVD Xpress manual states 9Mbps is the high end for DVD video, and then sort of contradicts itself a bit further down the page by saying 2-5Mbps is the "Legal" video bitrate range for DVD... From what I've seen 9Mbps is probably the upper limit, but 4Mbps from the DVD Xpress is GREAT!
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maddrummer3301
- Posts: 2507
- Joined: Fri Dec 10, 2004 10:24 pm
- Location: US
>>most DVD players will have problems with bit rates >8000 kbps
In my opinion:
It's not the bitrate. It's usually the burned DVD's error tolerence.
The problem is usually the DVD media you have used.
A DVD+R has better error correction along with closer gaps between
data sections on the dvd. ( a better burn).
Dvd players don't display how many times they have to re-read and
re-sample the dvd the get the data from it.
The same for your computers floppy/harddisk. Dos/windows will try to
read up to 6 times to retrieve data from a given sector from the media.
After that the Abort/Retry/Ignore error is displayed (no pre-warnings).
DVD players sold in the US are supposed to meet the dvd spec's.
I record 9800kbs and play the Dvd's on sony or panasonic units.
No Problem.
MD
In my opinion:
It's not the bitrate. It's usually the burned DVD's error tolerence.
The problem is usually the DVD media you have used.
A DVD+R has better error correction along with closer gaps between
data sections on the dvd. ( a better burn).
Dvd players don't display how many times they have to re-read and
re-sample the dvd the get the data from it.
The same for your computers floppy/harddisk. Dos/windows will try to
read up to 6 times to retrieve data from a given sector from the media.
After that the Abort/Retry/Ignore error is displayed (no pre-warnings).
DVD players sold in the US are supposed to meet the dvd spec's.
I record 9800kbs and play the Dvd's on sony or panasonic units.
No Problem.
MD
PERFECT! At 6M you can get 90 minutes of quite-good video on a DVD, if you use AC3 audio. Lots of commercial DVDs have bitrates of around 6M. (They are starting-out with a very high quality source, and they probably have a better MPEG encoder.)Also, I used 6 Mb/sec bitrate to capture some video already.
Here's a link to a Bitrate Calculator.
Legally, you can have a video bitrate up to 9.8M, and a up to 10.08M combined video, audio & subtitles. But, heinz-oz is right. Some players have trouble with high-bitrate "burned" DVDs.
[size=92][i]Head over heels,
No time to think.
It's like the whole world's
Out of... sync.[/i]
- Head Over Heels, The Go-Gos.[/size]
No time to think.
It's like the whole world's
Out of... sync.[/i]
- Head Over Heels, The Go-Gos.[/size]
High bit rates (9500) have never been a problem for me on thousands of 'burned DVDs' in hundreds of DVD players, the problem has always been with the speed of the burn. A 4x burn is acceptable for most component DVD players but I always burn at 2x to make sure that everone can play my DVDs. Hope this helps
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sjj1805
- Posts: 14383
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- 32bit or 64bit: 32 Bit
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Couple of pointers.
1. You may get some ideas here:
http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=11379
2. Some information on bit rate settings here:
http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=12122
Regards
Steve J
1. You may get some ideas here:
http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=11379
2. Some information on bit rate settings here:
http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=12122
Regards
Steve J