Easy Question about copying my own discs.

[Doug2006]

I produced a training video with UL 10 plus and everything is fine except I get some people who can't play it. Now if they could not play both discs of the two disc set I could fault their equipment but usually it is they can not play one of the two discs I send them.
I have tried to burn disks in two ways. First is I take a master disc that is good, made right from my video on day one, and I use nero to make a copy of that at 8X. This is annoying as the nero program has to copy disc to hard drive first.
The second way is I have each disc stored on the computer hard drive and use nero to burn a data disc from file. The problem, with this supposed easy method, is that nero always comes up with a warning message saying I am doing something wrong. I won't have the right data structure on the disc. (I am just putting audio folder and video folder on the disc.) If I click ok it does it anyway and the disk plays fine in the computer and on my $29 dollar dvd player. So am I doing something wrong with this method and why do these discs that I burn on computer one and test on computer two not work on customers computer three? Doug

[GeorgeW]

Because NERO is correct when it is warning you about burning a DATA disc. The files within the VIDEO_TS folder should be written properly in order to follow the structure of a DVD-VIDEO disc. So, if you have a choice, try to use a burning mode of DVD-VIDEO 9instead of just DVD Data).

An easy fix is to create a dvd IMAGE file (tell VS10 to burn the IMAGE -- *.ISO). The files within the IMAGE file will be in the proper order, and then when you burn the image file, you won't have to worry as much about the sequence of the files...

Regards,
George

[Ken Berry]

I think your second method is the better, and certainly greater time saving, way -- with some modifications. And I would also tend to blend in the idea of your first method with it.

I would not make a Master Disc which you simply copy each time. As you have found, that takes too much time. I would have to add that I also suspect copying with a DVD burning speed of 8x is too fast. If you continued using this method, I would try dropping the speed to 4x or even lower. It gives the laser more of a chance to embed a firmer signal into the disc, and will give other DVD players, whether in computers or stand-alone DVD players, a better chance of reading that signal.

Instead, I would prepare a Master Copy on your computer by burning a 'DVD Folder' to my computer instead of actually burning a DVD when you get to the burning module. It is not absolutely clear to me that this is what you are doing in your second method. Anyway, it gives you a Video_TS folder of your final disc on the computer, and you can then write it to as many DVDs as you like.

Now this is where the other variation comes in. You say you burn the files on your computer to a DVD as data files. In a sense, this is what you are doing when you make a video DVD from such a folder -- merely transferring the Video_TS folder (and an empty notional Audio_TS folder) to a DVD.

But I am not sure you can do this as a simple Data transfer. You can certainly do it (as a video DVD) in the VS burning module, but if you prefer Nero, then with Nero set for DVDs, choose the 'Burn DVD-Video Files' command instead of any in the Data category. This will add the empty but necessary Audio_TS folder -- as well, as you will see if you watch the little explanatory titles that appear during the process, as a Lead-in and lead-out which (I assume) tell the eventual DVD player the disc is put in, that it is a Video DVD...

And again, I would burn at 4x or less.

[maddrummer3301]

.

[Ken Berry]

Ah yes ... but "there be dragons"!! When I am copying even only one disk, I prefer to be safe and sure, rather than fast and ... furious after the event of another wasted disc!

[Doug2006]

Thanks for the help you guys are great!
I did just find the option in Nero to burn video files. Funny I never saw that before. It tells me to add the ifo bup and vob files to the video folder. So I am assuming that all the files from the video folder on my computer get added to this folder and it looks like it does have a audio folder placed there. I assume they can be placed or added there in any order? I will try this and see. Thanks again Doug
Oh also I have tried to burn at 4x before Ken as per your advice and found that the Nero would alway bump it to 6X. So last time I move it to 8 to see if that would have any effect. What is irritating is I test these before I send them out by running through chapter by chapter and they almost always work perfect with no skips or problems. And that is on a different computer than the one that burned it, just to really test them. And usually when people complain they say one works and the other doesn't play at all.

[GeorgeW]

What is irritating is I test these before I send them out by running through chapter by chapter and they almost always work perfect with no skips or problems. And that is on a different computer than the one that burned it, just to really test them. And usually when people complain they say one works and the other doesn't play at all.

Using a computer to test them is not a good test -- because software dvd players are more forgiving in terms of playing a dvd (either from dvd-rom drive, or VIDEO_TS folder on your hard drive). They do not care as much in the "sequence" of the files within the VIDEO_TS folder...

Regards,
George

[Doug2006]

Ok, thanks for the help. Two thoughts occurred to me.
1. If the files need to be in a certain order on the Dvd then maybe by luck some of mine did get in order which would explain that the ones I tested in the tv dvd player worked fine.
2. My computer room is right up stairs from a outside entry door and my kids have taken to slamming it as the latch is out of alignment. I noticed the other day, while I was burning these things, that when they slam the door it sure shakes the floor and the computers are on a table right over that. Has any one done any research or know if vibration, while the laser is writing, is going to throw it off. I am thinking that if this was a turntable with a 33 1/3 on there it would be ten grooves over every time the door slammed. Just a thought. Doug

[Ken Berry]

A couple of things. First, Nero. When you select Burn DVD Video Files, Nero Burning ROM should open (that is what I use instead of the other choice of Video Express). The Burning ROM screen is divided into four columns. The third one across from the left contains the directory tree of your computer drives. When you click on the one where your video folder is, it will show -- still in the third column -- all the directories on that drive. Click on the one where the relevant DVD folder is located, and it should show simply another sub-folder called Video_TS. (The files within it will be shown in the fourth column).

The easiest way to get the files over to the burning part of the screen is to simply drag and drop Video_TS from the third column to the second column. In other words, you don't have to select all the individual files in the fourth column and drag and drop them in the second column.

An Audio_TS folder is inserted by default. It will be empty, but this is as it should be. However, a valid DVD needs to have both a Video_TS and and Audio_TS folder, regardless of what is in them. The Audio_TS these days is only really relevant if you are burning an audio DVD, when the roles are reversed. For those, the very great bulk of files will be in the Audio_TS folder, and the Video_TS folder is there, perhaps to contain a menu or such, but mainly to fool a DVD player into playing the DVD the same as it would a video DVD!

Next, burning speed. Obviously, you are burning with blank DVDs which Nero detects cannot be burnt lower than 6x. If that is the case, then use 6x. We recommend 4x if possible, but it is not always possible depending on the blanks concerned. But the basic rule remains: burn as slow as possible. It may seem a bit of a pain, but when you think about it -- what's a few extra minutes on top of the (potentially) hundreds of minutes you have already spent assembling your project.

[Ken Berry]

Sorry -- I was writing my last message while you were posting yours!

A couple of thoughts. First, the order of files. If you actually look at the files within a Video_TS folder, you will see they are ordered sequentially with numbers 1, 2, 3 etc for the various subcategories (VOB, IFO and BUP). As far as I am aware, it does not matter how you think you might have dragged them in in some particular order, the computer sees them in the order of the numbers. So in that sense, it is highly unlikely that the unreadable discs were unreadable because the files were somehow out of order. The were unreadable because they were data and not video DVDs.

Second, the things that go bump in the night. It is of course possible that frequent bumps from a slamming door, if hard enough, could affect the computer. They are, despite everything, fairly delicate in some of their parts, and the burning laser is one of them.

The other thing you have to watch is essentially to leave the computer alone while it is burning. Don't sit down and try to run other programs, particularly if they are demanding of system resources. And particularly if your computer is not a particularly powerful one. Just let the computer do its own thing free from interferences which might just interrupt the smooth flow of data to the burning laser. Even a microsecond drop-out could interrupt the continuity of the signal and thus disrupt play on another player.

But I repeat, I am 99% sure that your problem was caused essentially by what you were doing, rather than the environment in which you were doing it...

[GeorgeW]

A couple of thoughts. First, the order of files. If you actually look at the files within a Video_TS folder, you will see they are ordered sequentially with numbers 1, 2, 3 etc for the various subcategories (VOB, IFO and BUP). As far as I am aware, it does not matter how you think you might have dragged them in in some particular order, the computer sees them in the order of the numbers. So in that sense, it is highly unlikely that the unreadable discs were unreadable because the files were somehow out of order. The were unreadable because they were data and not video DVDs.

If the problem is with playback on a DVD Player, then I think the "probable" cause for the discs being unreadable by some DVD Players is because the files were burned to disc out of order (by choosing DATA DVD). When you view the contents of your VIDEO_TS folder using windows explorer, chances are you ARE NOT seeing them in the order they will be written to disc for DVD-VIDEO. True, they are written by their "numerical" grouping; however, for DVD-VIDEO they are actually burned in the following sequence (IFO/VOB/BUP)

For example:

VIDEO_TS.IFO
VIDEO_TS.VOB
VIDEO_TS.BUP

VTS_01_0.IFO
VTS_01_0.VOB
VTS_01_1.VOB
...
VTS_01_0.BUP


That being said, some DVD Players will still play the DVD even when the files are written out-of-order (for instance, my Lite-on DVD Recorder/Player unit can handle dvd-video that has been burned as regular DATA DVD). It just depends on the "tolerance" level built into the firmware of the DVD Player...

Regards,
George