Problems burning a video on DL disc

[Davidk]

Hi Trevor,

The system runs all its drives on FAT32, and yes I acknowledge the individual file size limitation at 4gb for the system. I'm the only user of the PC and I've had so much grief - in terms of access management and Backup/recovery tools and process from NTFS - that now I try and use FAT32 only.

I'm not aware that the FAT32 file size of 4gb is a limit in burning a disc image using VS11. Maybe the moderators could jump in and comment on that. It doesn't seem to be for the other p[acakge anyway

Recall that I mentioned in the PPS that the PowerProducer package burnt a 6.5Gb image at the first attempt - using the same 4Gb source files, processor RAM and DVD drive that I'd been using with VS11. The fact that worked and VS11 didn't - over many attempts on 2 different DL brands really isolated the issue to VS11.

David

[skier-hughes]

If VS tries to make a temporary file of the whole 6.5gb then it will fail due to the 4gb size limitation.
Whereas if PP just burns on the fly it will bypass the 4gb limitation.

[Trevor Andrew]

Hi David

I don¡¦t know much about Fat 32 but was aware of the 4 Gb limit. So I don¡¦t understand how you are producing 6.5 Gb files.
Others in the know will enlighten us on how this possible with Fat 32.

As Graham has said, when VS renders the project in the burner module, Mpeg 2 files are created in the ¡¥Create and Burn¡¦ folders. These files being used to burn the disc. They are located in the ¡¥Burner Working Folder¡¦ Please be aware that this folder is separate from the Edit/Capture working folder.
The files temporary and are usually deleted after the burn.

From the ¡¥burner module¡¦ Press F6 or select the lower left icon ¡¥Settings and Options¡¦.

I would suggest that you avoid rendering in the burner module, instead create separate Mpeg files keeping your size below 4 Gb.
Yes this will mean splitting your project in two.

[skier-hughes]

I was assuming he'd made a 6.5gb disc made up of files msaller than 4gb, so if a programme doesn't need to make a temp file of the whole disc it won't reach the 4gb limit

[Trevor Andrew]

I was assuming he'd made a 6.5gb disc made up of files msaller than 4gb, so if a programme doesn't need to make a temp file of the whole disc it won't reach the 4gb limit

That true, thats how i see it.

[Davidk]

The more I thought about this, the more I thought that Trevor was onto it.

Firstly, the burner module is VS11+. In the create a disc panels, after unticking menu, specifying the project settings/mpeg settings to fit the output to the drive, and the DL capable drive identified with a disc loaded, VS does it's thing. Anyone who has observed this process will understand that the rendering process is generating the burn data files and only at the end - sometimes several hours later - does it burn the disc.

There's no exclusion specified (anywhere in VS11 that I could find) on using a FAT32 system for large - either DVD DL or Blu-ray - discs exceeding 4.7Gb capacity. However if it was assumed that NTFS was the platform, then it follows that the burn file can be as large as needed, since that is the only file system for windows which permits that. If operation on FAT32 was included in the spec, then the create disc segment should be capable of generating and then knitting together burn files of 4Gb or smaller. Since I observed the el cheapo PowerProducer doing this, it seemed reasonable to assume the top software did it too. Since everything else hasn't worked out, this seems the only thing that makes any sense.

I posed (what I thought was a straightforward) support query to Corel:
"is it a system requirement that to burn DVD DL Blu-ray or other large capacity discs that the PC system be operating on NTFS"

It's been over a week since then and apart from the automatic response email, nothing has been heard or logged to the query.

Has anyone been successful burning a DVD DL or BluRay disc using VS11 with the whole file or project required, and if so what was the file system in use at the time???

Davidk

[Davidk]

To clarify a few points raised by both Trevor and Graham on the size of the project files.

Capturing the analogue VHS imagery as digital mpeg2 video and audio data is what the interface and PP do. The specs either allow a specific output size or default to the windows limit (FAT32 =4Gb). When the movie capture is complete and the digital recording is stopped, PP generates the video project files, saves them with a date and time stamp plus any title you give it, with suffixes for the second and later files, and sticks them in a storyboard time sequence much like VS11.

For the Medicine Man movie which has been the target of the testing, there were 2 captured files of 4gb and 2.5gb, totalling 6.5gb. Each of these files played nicely in WinDVD and imported to VS11, could be readily re-sized to fit onto a 4.7gb disc. However, we started with VHS quality (the analogue tape) and each conversion along the way each conversion lost a bit of resolution. Hence the effort get DL discs burning right - the captured files will usually (except for a 2.5hour tape) fit straight onto as DL disc without further re-processing.

Since VS11 seemed unable to burn to a DL disc, I tried isolate the cause more and used the capture package and PowerProducer - it claims to work with 8.5Gb discs. So I simply imported the video files to the timeline, in sequence, specified a title, the drive with a DL disc, and burn. The performance bars (what its doing and how far each stage has progressed) are much like VS11. It took a little while and only when the burning process was going did the drive lights illuminate. Burning the disc is last - as for VS11.

Stitching data files together isn't rocket science - VS11 does it all the time when assembling clip files into a project - so if it is unable to do that with several 4Gb or less files to burn to the large capacity disc then it seems that the software design is based on a single output burn file. For large capacity discs, either DVD DL or Blu-ray, under windows that logically requires an NTFS platform.

See the query and answer I got from Corel in the last post I made.

Davidk

[Ken Berry]

I can't answer you specific question at the end, because I have never burned a Blu-Ray disc, nor an AVCHD hybrid disc to a dual layer DVD. But I am wondering if we are talking about apples an oranges anyway. When you burn a standard DVD, regardless of whether it is single or dual layer, the conversion process, or rather the multiplexing process in the burning stage, creates VOB files which do not exceed 1 GB in size. That is the way things are structured on a DVD, so the question of FAT 32 4 GB limitations does not arise.

I just don't know if something similar occurs with Blu-Ray discs i.e. the burning or 'mulitplexing' stage creates a series of smaller files. As I say, I have never burned a Blu-Ray disc as I don't have a Blu-Ray burner (just a player). An AVCHD hybrid disc, however, uses a Blu-Ray BDMV file structure, with the video in the STREAM folder. I suspect, but don't know for sure, it just burns the full file coming in without trying to break it up. I don't know. I have just checked my AVCHD discs, and there seem to be a number of files, but I think they all correspond fully with the video clips on the disc (one file for each clip) plus the menu. In my case, I only use single layer DVDs, so the files involved are thus no larger than 4 GB anyway. (I use Vista/NTSC.)

Hopefully someone with the actual experience you are after will come along and answer your question properly.

[neonbob]

As Ken stated, when burning a dvd the FAT32 file size limit is just simply not an issue. DVD's have been around for years and NTFS hasn't hence one of the main reasons for limiting a VOB to 1Gb.

Burning successful DL disks more often than not has more to do with the quality of the disk itself and the quality of the burner.

With SL disks you can use pretty much any crap disk you find.... even the 100-disk no-name spindles for $5.99 plus tax.

DL disks on the other hand require a fair bit of precision to properly work and therefore the dime-a-dozen approach is almost always a sure failure every time.

I would first however try burning your project with IMAGEBURN (a pretty reputable freeware burner) and see if you get similar issues. At least this way you'll know whether or not VS is the issue. But I would definitely max out the quality of the DL disk that you are using. Try Verbatim... more expensive but quite good.

http://www.imgburn.com/

[skier-hughes]

As I don't use VS, I was merely guessing it might make a temp file and then burn from this.

Are you saying then that VS doesn't make a temp file?

Becuase as I see it, as the vobs are max 1gb, when it has 6 or 7 of these on a DL disc and makes a temp file, this temp file will be 7gb in size. The same as if an ISO was being made.

As I said, merely guessing here.

[Davidk]

Well, the details from Ken et al re VOB files looks like it makes the file size issue a washout, but I'm still interested in a response re NTFS.

Which takes me back to square two: VS11. The disc argument has been tried and failed, as outlined in the posts.
In summary:
VS11 fails 100% of the time on multiple tests after writing only 4gb using several brands of DL disc, including the Verbatim one alleged to be the best in one of the posts.

PP (the package bought initially to do the analogue to digital conversion from VHS, but also burns DL discs) succeeds 100% of the time on multiple tests using several brands (the same several as VS11) of DL discs. For the moment at least, this is my work around.

Both these sets of tests used the same source files and LG burner.

There has to be a reason why VS11 won't do this . . . and if it won't work for DVD DL, the prospects for Blu-ray and other high capacity discs/formats seems poor despite claims by Corel to the contrary.

puzzlement

Davidk

[Davidk]

Just got a notice from Corel support in reply to my NTFS query. Corel advises that an NTFS partition is required for VS11 to create an 8Gb file.

Interesting response given Ken's data on VOB files.

Davidk

[skier-hughes]

But not if you look at my suppositions, which is that VS makes a temporary file, this file will be as big as the whole dvd, regardless of whether it is made up of 1 or 50 vobs, so as soon as the whole dvd size goes over the 4gb mark, the temp file it makes will exceed the 4gb fat32 limit.

[2Dogs]

DVD Shrink does a much better job of re-encoding video than VS.

I would suggest you create DVD folders from your project, maintaining the video properties so as to enable Smart Render.

Then use DVD Shrink to shrink the folders down to a size able to fit a single layer disc. If you enable the high quality adaptive compression feature in DVD Shrink, it gives very good results and I believe there would be hardly any drop in the video picture quality. With that workflow, I think you can achieve good picture quality and avoid dealing with troublesome DL discs.

I would recommend only using decent quality blank discs, the best being those made by Taiyo Yuden, which are made in Japan and available mail order for about the same price as utterly mediocre discs found in stores.

[Davidk]

Well, Graham has it right.

On further dialogue with the support desk, in rendering VS11 generates a temporary file, from which the media burn files are created. The sizes of these files are not related in any way. The drive this temporary file is on is the one that must be NTFS for burning large capacity discs - either the default on C drive or whatever one has been selected in the create disc preferences.

Given the range of display options and media they can be on, I suppose it was logical that this be the way to do it. Nevertheless, the VS package is stated as windows compatible with no restrictions or warnings, and FAT32 file systems are windows standard on a lot of older machines - even with the latest OS an upgrade doesn't mean changing to NTFS.

The end of a long road. Many thanks to all who have contributed thire bit to this.

Davidk