DVDWS 2 is garbage! Tech Support of no help.

[drrvideo]

I purchased this software with the idea that at the $400 price point, it would be more of a professional application. It is no where even close and actually worse in some cases compared to the more 'consumer' apps.

I have been trying to burn a project for a week and a half and here is the story if you care:
1. My first try was to have DVDWS do the encoding for me so I exported quicktime reference files from Avid. I had 5 different titles now in the edit phase and created a link for each one in the menu phase. The project was ready so I hit burn..... 21 hours, yes hours later, it spit the disc out only to see the crappiest looking footage I've ever seen. The movie was 1 hour 20 min so a little bigger than the norm but not out of the question. I already missed my deadline by this point with my client by the way.
2. I brought the quicktimes into Procoder Express which is a great encoding engine by Canopus. I should have done this in the first place because the quality is superior and much faster. Everything checked out again and at the burn stage it showed 4.0 gigs required out of 4.4 so I should be okay right? Even at AC-3, no luck. DVDWS says there's plenty of room but there really isn't. Thanks Ulead.
3. I finally get the file small enough to fit (even though it say's 2.9 reqired) and now I'd like to cut up the titles and make 5 titles again. Wouldn't you know it, DVDWS doesn't match up the audio when you cut a title. Your video starts where you want but you're audio file goes back and plays from the beginning. Who's the genius who thought of this (or didn't think of it I should say).

So, unless there's something I don't see or I;m plain crazy and doing it all wrong, I can't see how Ulead can charge Pro prices for an extremely entry level program.
I've spent enough time with the program at this point to know most of the ins and outs. A week and a half of problems will do that for you.

[thecoalman]

Sorry to hear of your troubles but I'll disagree. Not only is it a very versatile tool with multiple format support for both video and images, support for VTS, mainconcept encoder, AC3, completeley customized menus from scratch.... but it's also the easiest to use.

If you want to see what I mean pick up the trial version of DVD LAB Pro and compare how you make motion menus.

[drrvideo]

Thanks for your reply. I understand what they SAY it can do. I wouldn't have purchased it if it didn't do these things. But being able to vs. actually doing them, I'm afraid are two different things.
I do agree the customized menus and even the templates are very nice. But, most of the things you mention are fairly commom to even the cheapest of software. Ulead seemed to forget the fundamentals and just plain intuiteveness on this app. Audio not syncing up with video during a cut title. Come on, give me a break!
One other thing I failed to mentioned is they SAY (they being tech support) there is support for quick time reference files but upon import into DVDWS, you can't actually see the video. You can hear the audio though, so if you are an amazing guesser, you can just add you're chapters by ear. What a nice feature that is.

[GeorgeW]

I don't get it, if you encoded the files in PCE, how big were they? Were they under 4.37gb? If so, DWS should have been able to just use them "asis". Did DWS re-encode your PCE files?

What if you encode each title individually in PCE, then use them in DWS "asis", would that work?

[drrvideo]

Hi George-
Yeah actually when I do the whole movie which is 1 hour, 23 min, it's under the 4.37 mark but it shows it in DWS as 2.9 ish. Believe me I don't get it either.
I've also encoded each individually like you say but that's a little harder to do in PCE because the size is more of a guess with smaller files. Plus I have to babysit more and not just let the whole thing encode by itself and do something else or get some sleep. It takes about 4.5 hrs.
I understood that DWS sees the mpg's as just that and will not in turn re-encode but maybe I'm mistaken?

[GeorgeW]

If you know the total minutes of your video, and the type of audio you want to use, you can use a bitrate calculator to figure out what settings to use in PCE. So let's take the "guessing" game out of the mix, use this bitrate calculator to figure out the optimum settings (don't use the full amount because your disc might not be playable -- try to keep the total disc usage to about 4gb or less). You can do this by entering the "Advanced Mode", and then putting in a custom size of 4000mb
Bitrate Calculator

As long as you are creating compliant videos with PCE, you have the option of letting DWS use them "asis", or you can tell DWS to re-encode in the EDIT step under the VIDEO and AUDIO tabs (check the "convert to disc template" to have DWS re-encode).

Try a small test right now -- just use ONE of the titles you have. Create a new project, and burn to your hard drive. If it doesn't re-encode, you will know it because it will build your DVD very fast.

Check the size of the resulting VIDEO_TS folder to see if it's close to your input video -- that will give you an indication that everything is working ok.

[drrvideo]

George-
I just tried the test and it did work very fast like you said so I know things are working well. The resulting file was 262 mgs on disc vs. 216 in DWS so I guess that's close enough?
The videos are compliant Elementary Stream .m2v files for DVD authoring from PCE with coinciding wave files for audio. It gives me the option of Program stream .m2p files but I'm not sure it that works with DWS. Also, I know what you mean with the advanced mode in PCE.
I also noticed that when I check convert to disc template for my wave files, with high quality Dolby AC-3, the used space actually jumps. I thought it should be the other way around.
I think I miss the days of just dumping to tape.

[GeorgeW]

Looks like you are re-encoding the audio -- this could be throwing off your video/audio sync.

Make sure you create 48khz audio out of PCE. It could have gone from 262mb to 216mb because it compressed the audio from lpcm to dolby digital? That should be ok, and compressing the audio goes pretty fast (compared to the video).

Next question, do the total of all 5 titles add up to less than 4gb? If so, you can create your DVD using the individual titles, and don't tell DWS to re-encode them -- it should create the dvd folders pretty quickly (compared to 21 hours)...

[drrvideo]

Yes they add up to less than 4gb but DWS doesn't see it that way. There's a glitch somewhere and it doesn't do the math correctly, therefore giving false or inaccurate required disc space readings. I've been over it a hundred times and have done everything twice, sideways and upside down but DWS still has a major design flaw.
I've even brought the same project which supposedly didn't fit in DWS into Sonic MyDVD and it showed it has space left. I thought by buying this program I wouldn't have to use Sonic, but it seems I've taken a giant leap backwards.

[GeorgeW]

Did you apply the patches from Ulead's Support pages? What version does yours say?

Are you using motion menus/buttons, and heavy menu background music? That would increase the size -- how close are you to the "max"? Is your project setup for Dolby Digital audio, and are you re-encoding anything?

Have you actually burned the DVD Folders to your hard drive?

[drrvideo]

I applied the patches from Ulead's site. When I go into add/remove programs my version says 2.0.
The project has no motion menus and uses text as buttons and does have wave audio which gets re-encoded at the finish stage to Dolby Dig.
I haven't burned the folders to the hard drive, I usually just burn to a re-writabe disc so I can check it on my set top player.

Well, now that I've successfully figured out an extreme workaround to the inaccurate disc space required readings, I've encountered yet another problem.
My workflow so far has been encoding as one big video file in Procoder and then bringing in the entire clip into the project. Once there I use cut title to splice it into 4 different segments of varying lengths. I then go back to Avid, where I do editing, and export a 48khz stereo wave file of each segment's audio and match it up in DWS. This is an assinine way of doing things but seems to be the only way with DWS.
The problem is the burn stage once again. In my single menu page, I have the four videos as text links with the first one being the Opening (Play Movie) whereby you can play all the titles in order by pressing it. The other three are set to play just that title and then back to the menu. The latter works fine but it is the play all feature that works improperly after burning. When I test the disc in finish, all is okay. After I burn though, the play all plays the first two titles fine but then doesn't switch to the third and fourth but continues to play past where I selected to mark out which of course has no audio.
I thought I finally had things squared away, but here I am again, pissing away my profit because Ulead's $400 software is worth about a nickel.
Any help is appreciated.

[drrvideo]

Sorry. Actually the version says 2.0.0.2 in the program file.

[htchien]

Check http://www.ulead.com/tech/dws/dws_ftp.htm and look for the v2.231 patch.

Hope this helps.

H.T.