Error on creating dvd from 4x50 min mpeg files

Jim Hunt · Post by **Jim Hunt** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 8:57 pm

I am using DVD MovieFactory 3 SE that came with my recently purchased Creative Labs video capture unit. I have captured 4 episodes of a show on VHS as MPEG files on my HD. I plan to write the DVD-Video to my HD then use DVD Shrink to reduce its size to a single DVD.

When I attempt to create a new DVD (written on the HD) combining all four 50 min episodes I get an error message after some time into the process: "Source File had some Problems" & the number 504. After clicking on this message a second appears stating: "cannot create file [14252:1:0]".

If I clip each episode to 40 min then the process works fine. Is there some sort of size limitation here? I have about 40 G available on my hard drive so that shouldn't be the problem.

I am using a Pentium 4, 1.3 GHz; windows xp pro service pack 2.

I am considering upgrading from the SE edition to a full up version but am not sure I should if I can't resolve this problem.

Thanks for any help.
Jim

keithm · Post by **keithm** » Tue Dec 06, 2005 9:09 am

If your hard drive is formatted to FAT32 you won't be able to produce a file over 4GB in size: you'll need an NTFS partition and you will need to point movie factory's working folder to the ntfs partition: you will also have to save the combined file to the NTFS partition too.

Why don't you just put three files on each DVD and keep the quality up, DVD media isn't exactly expensive anymore.

Also, because of the colour noise in vhs, if you reduce the bitrate too much (which dvd shrink will do to fit 4 a dvd) it might get very blocky as the systems tries to encode the noise from the picture! If I record direct from satelite or freeview I can use a bitrate of 4000 and get a good picture, if I try VHS at that setting it's very blocky. Unless your capture card comes with some kind of noise reduction you might find the quality quite disappointing.

Jim Hunt · Post by **Jim Hunt** » Tue Dec 06, 2005 1:41 pm

Thanks for the response Keithm.

Both my hard drives are NTFS and since I have more room available on my D: drive (~40G) I am using it to write the DVD-Video output. I have also set movie factory's working folder to the same drive.

The Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS Video Editor capture card I use is new to the market and includes noise reduction in its hardware. The output is pretty good. It was reviewed as excellent by PC Mag.

Barring some other resolution to my issue I will follow your advice and limit my episode count to three per DVD. Your make a good point that, after all, media is now low priced and I may see some quality improvement.

keithm · Post by **keithm** » Tue Dec 06, 2005 1:54 pm

As a rule 120 minutes is about the maximum to fit on a single DVD, I try to stick below 4gb as I have read that the disks can get more errors towards the outer edges - but that might be hearsay!

If you are in the UK and into classic televsion - check out ITV 4:

Randall & Hopkirk
The Champions
Department S
The saint
Space 1999

Costing me a fortune in blank DVD's!

keithm · Post by **keithm** » Tue Dec 06, 2005 2:08 pm

just checked the web, ouch that's an expensive capture card!!!

I use some old Miro DC30's (off ebay) and they capture audio and video on the card - so its lip synced - but they only work properly under windows 98. There are XP drivers but I think you have to capture the sound through the PC soundcard. But the DC30 will capture full frame video on a Pentium 2 300 and not drop frames!

I also picked up an old Panasonic vcr with noise reduction built in and that helps to clean up the video.

Funny though: my 20 year old VHS tapes still play fine, not sure the DVD's I burn will play in 20 years; but my betamax tapes is another story

Jim Hunt · Post by **Jim Hunt** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 4:03 pm

Unfortunately I'm in Canada so ITV4 isn't available to me (my loss I suppose). I wonder if they broadcast anything over the internet. Anyhow, with the capture card I now have access to VHS rentals of older material.

Yes the cost of the card did make my eyes water a bit (~$250.00 Canadian). The big draw was 1/ it combines a video capture capability with a very good sound card (my computer isn't anything to write home about); and very importantly 2/ the video/audio capture and compression is all done in hardware external to my PC. All I needed was to use my USB 2.0 connection to handle the data stream. My somewhat aging computer is easily able to handle it.

Jim Hunt · Post by **Jim Hunt** » Thu Dec 08, 2005 3:30 pm

I has occurred to me that Ulead MovieFactory 3 SE may not be able to write a DVD-Video to hard drive that exceeds the capacity of a dual layer DVD (about 8.5 Gs I think). Perhaps this is the cause of my problem.

Any thoughts?

Lukeyson · Post by **Lukeyson** » Sun Dec 11, 2005 2:20 pm

Jim,

From my experience, in movie factory or workshop, if your VIDEO_TS folder is going to be over 10gb, it will crash everytime

Jim Hunt · Post by **Jim Hunt** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 3:43 pm

Thanks for the conformation. It appears the file size is my problem. The only work around I can think of is to make two DVD-Videos and shrink each to 50% then convert to mpeg and use Movie Factory to creat new DVD-Video with the smaller files. Not worth the effort and probably would be a some loss in quality.

jcc · Post by **jcc** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 1:56 am

I would expect that you should be able to make a disks of 2 episodes. You can shrink to 60% and still have a watchable result. 2x50mins = 100min, 60% = 60mins which fits on a single side disk.