Turn off all smart menu junk

[phd]

I did a speed comparison between authoring to a folder using the same file with DMF4 and VS11+

I had to manually turn off everything I could find. I tried both thumbnail menu and text menu in VS11+

Creation time in DMF4 with thumbnails only. (no motion menu, background audio, etc.) is 3 1/2 minutes

Best creation time in VS11+ is 6 1/2 minutes.

I turned off everything I could find. Motion menus, audio, menu transitions, etc.

Obviously I'm missing something. What else do I need to turn off to match the speed?

The majority of the time I want to create a DVD rapidly. I don't need all of the fancy stuff.

My MPEG files are DVD compliant so no reencoding is necessary and obviously if I can author a 1.5GB file in DMF in 3 1/2 minutes, no video reencoding is occurring.

I wouldn't mind shutting it all off in the INI file either so my default would be quick and easy rather than performing a seek and destroy on all the time eaters for authoring.

[Clevo]

So, am I reading that right and it's only 3 minutes difference?

[Ken Berry]

Whoever said that video editing and authoring was meant to be quick?

Apart from anything else, MF is primarily an authoring program which happens to have some editing capacity thrown in. It is not particularly surprising that it will author a menu more quickly.

Video Studio, on the other hand, is primarily and editing program, which happens to have an authoring capacity thrown in.

But I don't think you will find much sympathy around here just to save 3 minutes. Many of us spend hours, if not days, doing our editing and authoring. Go and have a cup of coffee!!!

[Ilene]

Besides speed - which I agree, who cares about a 3 min differential. Is there a benefit to owning MF over VS for DVD authoring? Are there a lot more menu choices? Would I be able to import my MPG created in VS into MF to do the authoring stage? I always follow the recommended procedure of creating MPG's in VS before authoring.
I never looked into purchasing because VS pretty much covered what I needed - yet there seems to be a lot of people who have both.
thanks.
Ilene

[phd]

The important factor to look at is double the time. This is not a full DVD

These are simply time experiments to optimize it.

Also, the same thing applies in DMF5 and 6 with smart menus. (But I am posting about VS11 here.) VS uses the DMF engine to author with a limited feature set.

Older versions of VS and DMF were also able to achieve faster times. VS9 for example and DMF1, 2, 3, and 4

This is for quick and simple DVDs for recorded TV shows edited with VideoReDo to remove commercials to be placed on a DVD.

I have spent a considerable amount of time in previous years to create menu templates as well as optimize capture settings to make them not only DVD compliant but Ulead compliant so Ulead could author the DVDs quickly and without A/V sync issues.

For my regular editing, needless to say, editing and DVD menus take a lot longer using many of the bells and whistles available.

[sjj1805]

Please view:
Why do Smartscene menus take so long to create?

[phd]

Thanks Steve.

That's why I also mentioned I tried Thumbnail and text menus.

I had to manually turn off everything I could find. I tried both thumbnail menu and text menu in VS11+

DMF4 with TN is still quicker than VS11 with text.

I will try importing my custom templates from DMF4 to see if that makes any difference.

[sjj1805]

I haven't done any speed tests comparing the same menu template in one VS version -v- another (likewise with MovieFactory)

I would anticipate the newer versions would run slightly slower because the overall software package contains more functionality. Sort of like 'upgrading' from Windows 98 to XP and then again to Vista. - more 'bloat ware.'

Previous versions happily reside with the new versions (see my signature below) and so if you have a particular menu template that exists in an earlier version there is no reason why you cannot use the earlier version for that particular project.