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selowitch · Mar 1, 2005, 09:38 AM

I'm about to burn some DVDs of a short video presentation and I need it to work in the widest range of set-top players possible. What format and media should I choose? It's probably a fairly complicated subject, but can someone outline a fairly straightforward procedure that is likely to work?

tooki · Mar 2, 2005, 04:02 PM

How about DVD-Video, burned on DVD-R media?

tooki

selowitch · Mar 2, 2005, 04:33 PM

Originally posted by tooki:
How about DVD-Video, burned on DVD-R media?

tooki

I was lead to believe that it's not that simple.

MountainMac · Mar 2, 2005, 05:27 PM

It has been recommended to me to burn the fastest media possible in the fastest drive possible at the fastest speed possible (i.e., 8x media burnt at 8x) for the best possible results. It's also important to use high-quality media, and RITEK brand was recommended to me. I have used RITEK media burnt at 2x and 4x and have had no problems, but then again I was not using it "in the widest range of set-top players possible."

MM

tooki · Mar 2, 2005, 10:27 PM

Originally posted by selowitch:
I was lead to believe that it's not that simple.

Have you actually tried iDVD?

There's no way to get 100% compatibility with DVD players -- many older models are just plain finicky. But all halfway recent players have been designed to play all the latest burned DVD types. Nonetheless, if the media wasn't good, or the burn was marginal for some reason, perfect readability may not be ensured. It's the nature of the beast.

As for media, I recommend Verbatim. Ritek is often recommended, but I have good reason to believe they don't properly speed-code their discs, so in many drives they won't burn at the maximum speed.

tooki

selowitch · Mar 3, 2005, 12:07 AM

Originally posted by tooki:
Have you actually tried iDVD?

I'd love to, but at work I'm forced to use Pinnacle Studio and Nero on Windows XP. Yeech!

k_munic · Mar 3, 2005, 02:36 AM

a few points from here:

+ and -
use dvd-r and not dvd+r; some standalones are able to recognize +r media, but not all; minus R is THE standard (that's why Apple has choosen it)

r and rw
some standalones accept rw (very handy for testing purposes) but most doesn't. you have to "format" before using them. again here: dvd-rw, dvd+rw�

speed:
many tests have proofen: maxmimum speed actually burning a dvd should be x4; the error correction system inside a dvd-standalone is not that good as in computer-drives; remember: commercial dvds a "pressed mechanical", the pits are much deeper and more precise then done with a laser on a rotating disk�-
you can buy - $$$ - socalled high-speed media (x8, x16) but not every burner's firmware does support that speed.
if you got too much errors on the player, lower down burn speed.

media:
buy brands, not nonames; verbatim and sony are recommended by users; different burner/different player = different brands�- try&error

specs:
trust the settings of iDVD - it IS a compromise of quality and speed, but it does work; with oher tools, as e.g. ffmpeg, you can do your "own" settings (e.g. pressing more then 120min on a 4,4Gb dvd-r) ; but, a standalone expects a very specific stream of data�

svcd/mvcd/mini-dvd/divx data dvd/�
there are hundreds of flavors on the market for compressing and authering "video on a silver disk"; some work flawless, some not; modern dvd standalones accept mpeg4, which is a very good compressor in meaning of length vs. quality, but you got different "versions", the pure Apple codec, divx, even wmv. files can contain some kind of mpeg4�
all that "video on a cd-r" (svcd, mini-dvd) was nice, but you get dvd-rs for very small money�- no needful thing anymore (my five �cents)

tooki · Mar 3, 2005, 08:56 PM

Originally posted by k_munic:
r and rw
some standalones accept rw (very handy for testing purposes) but most doesn't. you have to "format" before using them. again here: dvd-rw, dvd+rw�

Not true. They behave just like a DVD-/+R disc, except that you can go back later and erase the whole disc. (On the Mac, it's not possible to selectively erase parts of a DVD-/+RW disc.) Once erased, it behaves like a new disc.

Just as with CD burning, the "formatting" on writable DVDs is applied during the data burn, it is not a separate step.

tooki

tooki · Mar 3, 2005, 08:56 PM

Originally posted by selowitch:
I'd love to, but at work I'm forced to use Pinnacle Studio and Nero on Windows XP. Yeech!

Ewww! I'm sorry to hear that!

But I will grant that Pinnacle and Nero are both good products, and I would expect the result to be ugly, but functional.

tooki