What version of VideoRedo are you all using? I can't get the Shft+Tools>Options or Tools>Shift+Options to reveal the parameters.

Thanks.

What version of VideoRedo are you all using? I can't get the Shft+Tools>Options or Tools>Shift+Options to reveal the parameters.2.5.2.491

I've been a registered user for a long time. I don't know if Tools>Shift+Options works with the trial version.

But it definitely needs to be v .490 or .491

Did anyone else buy the Super MPEG2 Transcoder from InterCOM Japan? If you did, have you received any updates for the application?

I think my problem is beginning with the original .m2t file I'm capturing from the Motorola 6412. I downloaded one of the test videos from http://www.w6rz.net/ that were listed on Page 1 of this thread. When I run one of those videos through MF5 it does not try and re-encode it. However, I just tried with a 30 second clip I took from DiscoveryHD and MF5 even tries to re-encode that.

I'm just getting my feet wet with making these HD-DVD's but have run into a wall with one.

Anyone else have their DVD recognized as a CD by the A1 and then completely lock up the player (forcing me to hold down the power button)?

I ran the video through the various utilities to get reports on bad timecodes etc. Everything looks perfect. MF5+ recognizes the files immediately and doesn't recode but does take some time processing the audio.

I'm burning with the latest version of Nero and specifying UDF with XBOX compatibility mode and the A1 is locking up. Using Taiyo Uden high quality media and even tried a Verbatim DVD+R DL as well with the same exact result.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

Which is the best software for MPG extraction from TS?

Womble MPEG-VCR

VideoReDo
Are they similar, or are there different pros and cons with each?

StooMonster

I loaded some hd avi files into ulead and it took and age to convert them.
I then burned it with nero and played it on the a1, the picture was great but no sound on any of the files.

Anyone got any idea why?

Nick

Which is the best software for MPG extraction from TS?

Womble MPEG-VCR

VideoReDo
Are they similar, or are there different pros and cons with each?

StooMonster

In my experience you have to use both, some files work better with one some with the other, I use mostly videoredo, but some times mpeg-vcr works better, although I always use mpeg-vcr to check the specks of the file first (opens quicker and got good info)

I loaded some hd avi files into ulead and it took and age to convert them.
I then burned it with nero and played it on the a1, the picture was great but no sound on any of the files.

Anyone got any idea why?

Nick

you should have checked the specks of the avi file after you loaded it first (would have saved you a disk), it will tell you if the soud is being recognized, some formats are not, you might want to pass it thru virtualdub mpeg2 prog and maybe convert the sound to a more common format, then use the ulead.

Well I'm off to see some more movies :D

I'm just getting my feet wet with making these HD-DVD's but have run into a wall with one.

Anyone else have their DVD recognized as a CD by the A1 and then completely lock up the player (forcing me to hold down the power button)?

I ran the video through the various utilities to get reports on bad timecodes etc. Everything looks perfect. MF5+ recognizes the files immediately and doesn't recode but does take some time processing the audio.

I'm burning with the latest version of Nero and specifying UDF with XBOX compatibility mode and the A1 is locking up. Using Taiyo Uden high quality media and even tried a Verbatim DVD+R DL as well with the same exact result.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

You'll have to discribe better what you doing, ie.: what are the file types that you burning into the disk? EVO? VOB? or something else?

In my experience you have to use both, some files work better with one some with the other, I use mostly videoredo, but some times mpeg-vcr works better, although I always use mpeg-vcr to check the specks of the file first (opens quicker and got good info)
Well I bought I license for MPEG-VCR so I guess I have to pay VideoReDo some cash too!

StooMonster

You'll have to discribe better what you doing, ie.: what are the file types that you burning into the disk? EVO? VOB? or something else?

You're right, my apologies for not being specific at all. Thanks for the offer of help. Here's what I've done:

1) Downloaded the park run 1920x1080 22.5Mbps file from w6rz.net to make sure I'm working with a true valid file.
2) Opened mpeg-vcr eval version 3.14 and opened the single ts file. Selected OK.
3) Clicked the third button from the right on the left hand bottom row (yellow/pink icon).
4) Selected MPEG-2 Program Stream and specified the file output. Clicked save. Let it do its thing and then close mpeg-vcr.
5) Opened fully licensed purchased DMF 5+ (version 5.30.0107.0)
6) Selected Video Disk, New Project, select radio button HD-DVD. Click OK
7) Selected Add Video Files from Add Media section. Browsed for mpeg that was created from mpeg-vcr. checked info: MPEG-2 Video, upper field first, 24 bits, 1920x1080 16:9, 29.970 frames/sec, variable bit rate max 22496 kbps, Dolby Digital audio 48000hz, 384kbps bitrate.
8) Selected Open. Deselcted the create menu option. Next, Next to step 3.
9) Select create HD DVD folders and specify location.
10) Click project settings button and make sure do not convert compliant mpge files is selected. Click OK then click burn. MPEG is not re-encoded.
11) Launch Nero Burning ROM version 7.5.1.1 Select DVD-ROM(UDF).
12) Make sure NO Multisession is selected. Click UDF tab and select xbox compatibility mode. Ignore warning.
13) Click New. Drag and drop the hd_dvd folder to the root of the compilation.
14) Click Burn--select same speed as media is rated for, click Burn.

I'm using a Plextor 716AL and Taiyo Uden 8x DVD-R media.

I also downloaded the ISO image from w6rz.net and burned it to the same media using IMGBurn 2.1.0.0 and that DVD was recognized in my A1 as an HDDVD and it played perfectly fine.

I'm guessing Nero at this point but haven't eliminated every other possibility. It's very frustrating though.

Thanks for any advice.

You're right, my apologies for not being specific at all. Thanks for the offer of help. Here's what I've done:

1) Downloaded the park run 1920x1080 22.5Mbps file from w6rz.net to make sure I'm working with a true valid file.
2) Opened mpeg-vcr eval version 3.14 and opened the single ts file. Selected OK.
3) Clicked the third button from the right on the left hand bottom row (yellow/pink icon).
4) Selected MPEG-2 Program Stream and specified the file output. Clicked save. Let it do its thing and then close mpeg-vcr.
5) Opened fully licensed purchased DMF 5+ (version 5.30.0107.0)
6) Selected Video Disk, New Project, select radio button HD-DVD. Click OK
7) Selected Add Video Files from Add Media section. Browsed for mpeg that was created from mpeg-vcr. checked info: MPEG-2 Video, upper field first, 24 bits, 1920x1080 16:9, 29.970 frames/sec, variable bit rate max 22496 kbps, Dolby Digital audio 48000hz, 384kbps bitrate.
8) Selected Open. Deselcted the create menu option. Next, Next to step 3.
9) Select create HD DVD folders and specify location.
10) Click project settings button and make sure do not convert compliant mpge files is selected. Click OK then click burn. MPEG is not re-encoded.
11) Launch Nero Burning ROM version 7.5.1.1 Select DVD-ROM(UDF).
12) Make sure NO Multisession is selected. Click UDF tab and select xbox compatibility mode. Ignore warning.
13) Click New. Drag and drop the hd_dvd folder to the root of the compilation.
14) Click Burn--select same speed as media is rated for, click Burn.

I'm using a Plextor 716AL and Taiyo Uden 8x DVD-R media.

I also downloaded the ISO image from w6rz.net and burned it to the same media using IMGBurn 2.1.0.0 and that DVD was recognized in my A1 as an HDDVD and it played perfectly fine.

I'm guessing Nero at this point but haven't eliminated every other possibility. It's very frustrating though.

Thanks for any advice.

Well I am back, batman begins is very nice in HD DVD and the true HD track is amazing (had to keep lowring the sound on the explosions not to disturb the neighbours too much :D

anyway you seemd to be doing the right thing except for the dvd-rom udf, I think.

I also use nero 7, but I never tried with the dvd rom UDF I always thought that was for data files (not sure if I am right about this assumption).
I set nero to DVD-Video, I put the HVDVD_TS folder on the root like you and put a blank VIDEO_TS.VOB in the VIDEO_TS folder.

if you have a dvd rw, try it this way to see if that works for you

PS: I just checked Nero explanation for dvd-rom in the help, here it is what it says:
"Creating a DVD-ROM (UDF)
The only difference between creating a DVD-ROM (UDF) and creating a CD-ROM (UDF) is that you select the 'DVD' media type instead of 'CD'. All other points are identical and are therefore not explained here again. Please read the chapter 'Creating a CD-ROM (UDF)'."

This to me seems to indicate that it does not create a video DVD, try the way I described.

I'm just getting my feet wet with making these HD-DVD's but have run into a wall with one.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

Yes, I've had the exact same thing happen. The HVDVD_TS folder needs to be at the top level. You probably burnt the folder containing the HVDVD_TS folder; thus the HD DVD player could not find the HVDVD_TS folder.

Yes, I've had the exact same thing happen. The HVDVD_TS folder needs to be at the top level. You probably burnt the folder containing the HVDVD_TS folder; thus the HD DVD player could not find the HVDVD_TS folder.

I just came in here to admit the same thing. Sheesh I feel like an idiot! Especially after the countless DVD backups I've done of my own collection. :D

Thanks kkonfucius! Your line about the _TS folder at the root level was enough to open my eyes and make me realize the errors of my ways. Works perfectly!

I put the HVDVD_TS folder on the root like you and put a blank VIDEO_TS.VOB in the VIDEO_TS folder.


Mine play fine without this step.

I am using Cucusoft Avi to VCD DVD Mpeg Converter Pro Ver5.07 to changer my ts file to mpeg 2. I been using this program for a while changing avi to mpeg or dvd file . it work great.

I just came in here to admit the same thing. Sheesh I feel like an idiot! Especially after the countless DVD backups I've done of my own collection. :D

Thanks kkonfucius! Your line about the _TS folder at the root level was enough to open my eyes and make me realize the errors of my ways. Works perfectly!

Glad it works, it's great to be able to see these files in HD :D

Mine play fine without this step.

I don't believe the HD-DVD player needs the blank VIDEO_TS.VOB file. Nero requires it to enable burning the dvd.

I don't believe the HD-DVD player needs the blank VIDEO_TS.VOB file. Nero requires it to enable burning the dvd.

I am using Nero 7.2.7 and it burns without the VIDEO_TS folder. What can I say?

I don't believe the HD-DVD player needs the blank VIDEO_TS.VOB file. Nero requires it to enable burning the dvd.

That is correct the HD DVD does not need it it is only for nero to burn and it seems that in newer versions of nero it is no longer needed.

Is there an easy way to identify which newsgroup downloads would fit on a single layer disc? eg the episode 2 of lost I downloaded is 5.3GB. At the moment I'm streaming to my 360, but occasionally I have network problems so direct playback would be useful.

Anyone got an update on when common authoring software (nero etc) might support h264 on DVD5/9 discs? Or even if the A1 or other players will playback this combo at all? Was thinking perhaps they might have been fiddled to only allow MPEG2 on DVD.

Is there an easy way to identify which newsgroup downloads would fit on a single layer disc? eg the episode 2 of lost I downloaded is 5.3GB. At the moment I'm streaming to my 360, but occasionally I have network problems so direct playback would be useful.

Please do not talk about piracy in this thread, this just puts a bad light on people that make legal fair use copies of programs they recorded.

Please do not talk about piracy in this thread, this just puts a bad light on people that make legal fair use copies of programs they recorded.
WiFi -
Is newsgroups use always piracy? Excuse me for being ignorant, but I'm not real experienced with them.

Is there any way to extract an MLP stream from DVDA and author an HDDVD with it?

Please do not talk about piracy in this thread, this just puts a bad light on people that make legal fair use copies of programs they recorded.

I don't mean to derail this, but I can't let this go unanswered.

I consider my use 'fair use' I only download episodes of programs that are airing on channels that I have paid any due subscriptions to. I just like to get them in HD as my channel doesn't broadcast them in HD (not due to me not subscribing to their HD channel - they don't have a HD channel). I was previously downloading Stargate SG-1, Atlantis and BSG, but now my local station is starting to broadcast it in HD so I will watch that.

As much as you might quote 'fair use copies', surely most people don't really use this method to back their own PVRd material up? And even if so, copyright law is vague on your rights here. Timeshifting is one thing, permanent archiving is another.

I'd say we were as grey as each other in this regard.

I don't mean to derail this, but I can't let this go unanswered.

I consider my use 'fair use' I only download episodes of programs that are airing on channels that I have paid any due subscriptions to. I just like to get them in HD as my channel doesn't broadcast them in HD (not due to me not subscribing to their HD channel - they don't have a HD channel). I was previously downloading Stargate SG-1, Atlantis and BSG, but now my local station is starting to broadcast it in HD so I will watch that.

As much as you might quote 'fair use copies', surely most people don't really use this method to back their own PVRd material up? And even if so, copyright law is vague on your rights here. Timeshifting is one thing, permanent archiving is another.

I'd say we were as grey as each other in this regard.

Im not saying I support them, but the copyright holders would beg to differ. Plus this is the wrong thead to discuss what is or isnt piracy.

yeah, let's not talk about copyright stuff. but rather let's look into this gadget http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/ and see what it can do for us in this process. :p

Hi

I still have problems trying to burn a direct output of my HC1 camcorder. The attachment contains the video format data from the camcorder.
Why is MF5 trying to encode this ?

Thanks

Eugene

I hope that attachment is there.

Hi

I still have problems trying to burn a direct output of my HC1 camcorder. The attachment contains the video format data from the camcorder.
Why is MF5 trying to encode this ?

Thanks

Eugene

I hope that attachment is there.

are you setting the resolution to 1440x1080 ?

Thanks for the response WIFI-SPY

No I did not , will try that.
I was under the impression that once the box "do not convert etc" was checked that setting the res was not needed.

Gene

People, I really need some help here. I already know that the MLP can be extracted from DVDA. Now, is there a possibility of joining the MLP with some mpeg2 (like a constant photo) and create a HDDVD with it?

So the real question would be... Is there a program that accept MLP for audio in HDDVD?

Thanks in advace.

Hi,

Following the high-level instructions:

1. Womble MPEG2VCR (version 3.14).
MPEG2VCR frame accurate transport stream (.ts) to program stream editing software
2. Ulead Movie Factory 5.
Ulead Movie Factory 5
3. Nero Burning ROM (versions 6 and 7 work, although some people report problems creating discs with version 6).
Nero Burning ROM 7

can someone confirm that I do NOT need to do step 1 if I use VS10 to capture the HD video from my Canon HV10 camcorder (as VS10 produces an .MPG program stream)?

For Step 2 and 3, I followed the instructions in this post, and created an HD DVD on single layer media. Took it to my local bestbuy. The Toshiba HD DVD player recognized it as an HD DVD, but would only play the last 5 seconds or so of the video. My question above is to start zeroing in on what went wrong.

Thanks for any help and thanks to all who contribute to this forum - very informative.

Mike

Hi,

Following the high-level instructions:

1. Womble MPEG2VCR (version 3.14).
MPEG2VCR frame accurate transport stream (.ts) to program stream editing software
2. Ulead Movie Factory 5.
Ulead Movie Factory 5
3. Nero Burning ROM (versions 6 and 7 work, although some people report problems creating discs with version 6).
Nero Burning ROM 7

can someone confirm that I do NOT need to do step 1 if I use VS10 to capture the HD video from my Canon HV10 camcorder (as VS10 produces an .MPG program stream)?

For Step 2 and 3, I followed the instructions in this post, and created an HD DVD on single layer media. Took it to my local bestbuy. The Toshiba HD DVD player recognized it as an HD DVD, but would only play the last 5 seconds or so of the video. My question above is to start zeroing in on what went wrong.

Thanks for any help and thanks to all who contribute to this forum - very informative.

Mike

I don't use VS10 enough to answer positively, but I think you are correct on that point. As far as your HD DVD only playing the last few seconds, I had a similar situation with the free evaluation version. That went away when I upgraded to the full version. (I'd almost forgotten that until your post. It's been a long time.) That also happened only with material I shot with my Sony HC1, not from any of the material captured from satellite.

yeah, let's not talk about copyright stuff. but rather let's look into this gadget http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/ and see what it can do for us in this process. :p

Not a lot. It'll allow you to interface an HDMI device without HDCP and capture AVI files in HD. If you have an HD camera that supports HDMI, you'll get a potentially lossless transfer (depending on what codec you capture into).

But for our purposes you'd still need to encode into MPEG2 with your final clips, so it's still far from optimal. AVC or VC1 would allow for pretty much pristine transfers.

I have one of these cards on order and will report on it when I receive it.

WIFI-SPY

THAT WAS IT, tried again by setting MF5 to 1440x1080 and there was no rendering involved.
The video was captured with MF5 from my HC1.

Thanks for your help
Gene

WIFI-SPY

THAT WAS IT, tried again by setting MF5 to 1440x1080 and there was no rendering involved.
The video was captured with MF5 from my HC1.

Thanks for your help
Gene

No problem, I ran into the same issue back in april on the first HD DVD I authored (HC1 footage I took @ CES)

Hi everyone.

Thanks for this thread. I bought the Toshiba HD-XA1 so I could do this and my successful results are fantastic.

I'm having a problem similar to what Eugene157 and efranzen seemed to be having, and that's with video captured from Firewire. Even though it's a 1920x1080i stream, MF5 seems to feel it needs converting. I also have the R5000 and those captures work with no problems. But I can only get HDNet through cable so I can't work around this for certain programs. I thought maybe the PIDs needed to be 0x11 and 0x14 so I ran a 30 sec test through tstoatsc but it still get the dreaded "Converting Title...". I did a mpegrepair on both a R5000 clip and a Firewire clip (Cable to D-VHS to CapDVHS) and they are close to identical. I also tried running it through HDPatch just on the off chance something just needed tweaking. Can anyone recommend any other analysis tools? I feel it's really close as it seems some other people have been successful with firewire captured material.

On Double Layer DVDs, I just bought a Memorex DVD+R 2.4x Double Layer Spindle (25 pack) for $27.99 from Buy.com with free shipping using the $10 off $30 Google Checkout. ($1.12 each). I've burned one HD-DVD disc with them and it played with no problems. I don't know how long the Google Checkout deal is supposed to last. http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?loc=101&sku=10405802

Thanks for any help.

-Bret

There's a new thread on burning HD DVDs using Pinnacle Studio 10 (their beta 10.7 software). Do we have any Pinnacle users here who have the upgrade? The poster says its better than MF5. Anyone here who can report?

Here's the thread:

Pinnacle Studio 10.7 Beta for burning HD DVD's. (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=8682440#post8682440)

I'm fixing to jump into HD DVDs. I currently record all my HD via Dish 211 with R5000 mod. I have been editing and dumping to DVHS. I would like to record onto something more permenant such as the HD DVD. I have skimmed this thread several times and haven't got a definitive answer on what the quality will be when converting a .ts file to the HD DVD format. Many say it's very good. I'm wanting to know if it is same as or exactly the same HD quality as the original .ts file? If not, I will wait until they come out with the internal PC HD DVD recorders and just copy and play the data .ts file from HD DVD disc via MyHD card.

Any comments on the actual quality would be helpful. Sorry if it has been covered and I just couldn't find a good answer in this thread.

Steve

I'm fixing to jump into HD DVDs. I currently record all my HD via Dish 211 with R5000 mod. I have been editing and dumping to DVHS. I would like to record onto something more permenant such as the HD DVD. I have skimmed this thread several times and haven't got a definitive answer on what the quality will be when converting a .ts file to the HD DVD format. Many say it's very good. I'm wanting to know if it is same as or exactly the same HD quality as the original .ts file? If not, I will wait until they come out with the internal PC HD DVD recorders and just copy and play the data .ts file from HD DVD disc via MyHD card.

Any comments on the actual quality would be helpful. Sorry if it has been covered and I just couldn't find a good answer in this thread.

Steve

There's no impact on video or audio quality. This process just reformats the file to EVO that plays in the Toshiba. If you can get your MyHD card to play .ts files from the computer's DVD drive without hiccups or freezes (I can't), then this process is less attractive.

I will take a look, being a S10 user.
Gene

From Pinnacle forum EUGENE1

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The 10.7 version of Pinnacle S10 will burn HD-DVD on red DVD.

Just did a short 4 min HD-DVD burn to a 4.7 red DVD and it played fine in my Toshiba player.
No menues etc just wanted to check it out.
However you have to fork over $50 for the plug in, that was a 1 sec. decision.
There was some rendering involved, it took app 35 min for the image, and a few more minutes to burn.

Glad to have that feature, was using trial MF5 so far and was getting ready to buy it.

Fantastic to do capture, edit and HD-DVD burn all in one program!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
GREAT JOB PINNACLE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gene

Same forum , from Blackbill

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I bought the Toshiba Hd-dvd player this morning and tested the pinnacle HD plugin (burned a disk).

And the bloody thing worked perfectly!!!! A beautiful picture!!

The plugin cost $50... and it's worth EVERY PENNY!

The 5.1 surround even works. You can fit about 20 minutes on a single layer disk (haven't tested the doubles yet), but the bit rate is completely adjustable so if you knock down from 25M to 20M you can get 30 minutes on a disk without too much difference in quality.
Signature:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Canada...
mosquitoes in the Summer and scared thermometers in the Winter...
I would not for a second choose to live elsewhere!

From Pinnacle forum EUGENE1

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The 10.7 version of Pinnacle S10 will burn HD-DVD on red DVD.

Just did a short 4 min HD-DVD burn to a 4.7 red DVD and it played fine in my Toshiba player.
No menues etc just wanted to check it out.
However you have to fork over $50 for the plug in, that was a 1 sec. decision.
There was some rendering involved, it took app 35 min for the image, and a few more minutes to burn.

Glad to have that feature, was using trial MF5 so far and was getting ready to buy it.

Fantastic to do capture, edit and HD-DVD burn all in one program!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
GREAT JOB PINNACLE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gene

Same forum , from Blackbill

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I bought the Toshiba Hd-dvd player this morning and tested the pinnacle HD plugin (burned a disk).

And the bloody thing worked perfectly!!!! A beautiful picture!!

The plugin cost $50... and it's worth EVERY PENNY!

The 5.1 surround even works. You can fit about 20 minutes on a single layer disk (haven't tested the doubles yet), but the bit rate is completely adjustable so if you knock down from 25M to 20M you can get 30 minutes on a disk without too much difference in quality.
Signature:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Canada...
mosquitoes in the Summer and scared thermometers in the Winter...
I would not for a second choose to live elsewhere!

Thanks, Eugene. Could you double check on the need to render video and audio? 35 minutes for a 4 minute video means some really long rendering times. That's one of MF5's greatest strengths (not having to render compatible files) and the reason I find it so attractive.

Yes, that bothers me too, but my video files may have been nonstandard because I played with a higher bit rate.

Will have to see what Blackbill's experience is.
Gene

Blackbill reports that a 5 min video took app 10 min from placing onto the timeline to burned DVD in hand.
Gene

Mr. Clark...
first thanks so much for your posts and your time and expertise. I am just jumping into HD so am a newbie and beg your patience in this post. I have some questions and would like to clarify some things from your initial post if you don't mind...I will separate the questions so you can respond to each, if you would...

First I will be using directtv and their dvdr.

1. Does the brand/model of dvdr matter as far as quality of the HD record?
If it matters can you recommend one that will produce the best quality with directv?

2. What does the DVDR record the HD movie or stream to, a file type or what, on the hdd?

3. On your hardware list, you said a device that allows mpeg2 captures to computer. By this did you mean a dvdr that will record the HD and then allow it to be transferred to a computer? Or a dvdr and then another device for transferring?

4. For transfer to computer is usb2 enough? firewire not required?

5. you said i will need to convert directtv 1088i to 1081i...is there any quality loss in this? And is there a way to tell what i it is and if is 720p or not? (my Hd not installed yet...2 wks tho)

6, The three software requirements...are those optional, i.e. pick one of the three....or are the three necessary, each software performing a unique funtion...i.e. womble transfers from dvdr to computer, ulead creates the disk and nero burns? Or is there a good program out there that does it all? I have invested some in Canopus, and wondered if you are familiar with them and if perhaps they have something that would work?

7. Doesn't Ulead also burn cd's and dvd's and would it not burn an HD dvd?

8. As for burning software if Ulead moivie factory won't burn it, is Nero required or are there other programs out there that will burn an HD dvd? I am not too fond of Nero..I use Roxio Creator 9....but if there are other softwares out there for burning HD dvd's I would like to look...

9. I guess my main question is the software you listed are examples of what to use, but there may be other software options out there?

10. And last but not least, thru all of this , transfer, converting and making the Hd folder, is there any losss of quality in the video?


And again, if moviefactory willl burn the folder to dvd, is there a any speciall reason you would not use it but use nero instead?


thanks again so much and I would appreciate responses to each question as I am learning this new technology and getting HD installed in a couple weeks.

Oh and 2 more questions..

with SD, we try to get a recorder to record the best quality dvd we can of a movie, game or whatever...is that a concern with HD? i.e. with sd you have 2 hrs to a disk, 4 hrs, 1 hr and so on. Through the process of capturing all the way thru to burning to the dvd, is the final quality on dvd the same exact as the broadcast or is there a little loss?

Is it possible and would it be recommended if so, to capture straight to a computer via a capture card or something? or what would you need?

Do I need to worry about bitrate and that type of stuff and if so which gives the best quality, ir that part of the process?

Lastly, other than viewing is there any way to know if your finished product is actually an HD movie? a special file type or something?

thanks again...t

One other question, sort of partial authoring question.

Since dvd's won't hold a whole lot of HD, let's say I wanted to save several shows or games that were HD....I capture them to the DVDR....how would I go about storing them on a separate device..i.e. hdd or something for later when blu ray is affordable? and how would I go about transferring them to a storage device? Any sugestions for storage devices...will hdd's work?


also since you know i will be getting hd directtv, what is the best hardware to get from them for these tasks? i.e. tivo, dvr, etc and what other can i get from them to help and which is the best for what i want to do?


thanks...t

dv13,

Lots of questions there. Let's get to the basics for someone subscribing to DirecTV:

You send your compatible DirecTV satellite receiver to Nextcom for the R5000 mod. When it's finished you have a device that connects to your computer via USB2. You don't need a DirecTV DVR (it's called a DVR or PVR, not a DVDR). A simple receiver is sufficient. As far as I'm concerned, it's actually better not to have a DVR, since scheduled recordings could easily conflict between the DVR's timers and the R5000's timers. See the first post for a link to the Nextcom site (for a list of DirecTV compatible receivers).

With software, you set up captures from the satellite to the computer. You don't take recordings from a D* DVR. They are recorded directly to the computer. What you get are files on the computer that are MPEG2 transport stream. You convert those MPEG2 transport stream files to program stream format with Womble (or VideoRedo).

You import those program stream files into MovieFactory 5 and create the HD DVD folders on the computer's hard drive. They are identical to the original broadcast in picture and sound quality. (DirecTV users have to use texmex's simple program to convert 1088i to 1080i. You don't lose any quality there either.) A program such as HDTVtoMPEG2 or TSReader Lite can give you information on what type of HD file you have recorded.

You can then use Media Creator 9 or Nero to burn the HD DVD folder to a regular DVD recordable. Ulead at first burned the HD DVD for you, but that feature was removed. At some point, it will probably be added again, but right now it's not there.

So, you can use alternate software, except for MovieFactory 5. There is another thread which says that Pinnacle Studio 10.7 (beta) can import, create and burn an HD DVD program onto regular DVD's, all within the one piece of software, but I haven't had a chance to use it.

Honestly, it sounds like you have a lot of questions unanswered at this point. Before you invest in anything, I'd suggest you go back and read the quide again. Make sure you understand each step of the process, hardware and software, before you buy. Although it's not rocket science, you want to know what you're getting into.

To sum up, what you end up with using this process is HD DVD's that have picture and sound quality that should be virtually identical to the original broadcast. As for your second post, remember that you capture directly to the computer's hard drive, not to a DVR first. The best way to archive shows longer than will fit onto double layer discs is to keep them on the hard drive (not too safe) or to break them into parts and store them on multiple DVD's, waiting for the time when HD DVD recordable or Blu-ray recordable discs are available.

Lastly, please don't call me Mr. Clark. That's my dad's title and it gives me way too much respect. I'm just a compiler of this information. There are lots of folks here who understand all this much better than I do.

Good luck.

dv13,

Lots of questions there. Let's get to the basics for someone subscribing to DirecTV:

You send your compatible DirecTV satellite receiver to Nextcom for the R5000 mod. When it's finished you have a device that connects to your computer via USB2. You don't need a DirecTV DVR (it's called a DVR or PVR, not a DVDR). A simple receiver is sufficient. As far as I'm concerned, it's actually better not to have a DVR, since scheduled recordings could easily conflict between the DVR's timers and the R5000's timers. See the first post for a link to the Nextcom site (for a list of DirecTV compatible receivers).

With software, you set up captures from the satellite to the computer. You don't take recordings from a D* DVR. They are recorded directly to the computer. What you get are files on the computer that are MPEG2 transport stream. You convert those MPEG2 transport stream files to program stream format with Womble (or VideoRedo).

You import those program stream files into MovieFactory 5 and create the HD DVD folders on the computer's hard drive. They are identical to the original broadcast in picture and sound quality. (DirecTV users have to use texmex's simple program to convert 1088i to 1080i. You don't lose any quality there either.) A program such as HDTVtoMPEG2 or TSReader Lite can give you information on what type of HD file you have recorded.

You can then use Media Creator 9 or Nero to burn the HD DVD folder to a regular DVD recordable. Ulead at first burned the HD DVD for you, but that feature was removed. At some point, it will probably be added again, but right now it's not there.

So, you can use alternate software, except for MovieFactory 5. There is another thread which says that Pinnacle Studio 10.7 (beta) can import, create and burn an HD DVD program onto regular DVD's, all within the one piece of software, but I haven't had a chance to use it.

Honestly, it sounds like you have a lot of questions unanswered at this point. Before you invest in anything, I'd suggest you go back and read the quide again. Make sure you understand each step of the process, hardware and software, before you buy. Although it's not rocket science, you want to know what you're getting into.

To sum up, what you end up with using this process is HD DVD's that have picture and sound quality that should be virtually identical to the original broadcast. As for your second post, remember that you capture directly to the computer's hard drive, not to a DVR first. The best way to archive shows longer than will fit onto double layer discs is to keep them on the hard drive (not too safe) or to break them into parts and store them on multiple DVD's, waiting for the time when HD DVD recordable or Blu-ray recordable discs are available.

Lastly, please don't call me Mr. Clark. That's my dad's title and it gives me way too much respect. I'm just a compiler of this information. There are lots of folks here who understand all this much better than I do.

Good luck.

thanks for your reply...yes a lot of questions...i am just jumping into this HD world.


i did not see a link for the nexcomm in the initial post but will look tomorrow...but i assume that the R5000 does not come from directtv and i need to buy it? and would I be correct in doing this we are just bypassing the record to dvr and then transferring to computer from dvr, in jut one step, which makes sense. How fast a hard drive to I need for this, or will a normal 7200 rpm drive work or sata drive or do i need a special scsi or firewire drive?

the software i set up to capture from satellite to computer then is installed on the computer right? does that software come with the r 5000 or which software might that be? or is that what wombie is, to capture from satellite to computer?


i don't have a prob with ulead movie factory 5 as it would be an upgrade to me..


ok, I thnk I get most of the picture from your reply and going back thru your initial post....the only lingering question is what software is used to set up to capture from the satellite to computer....and from what you said firewire is not needed, just usb 2, right?

Researching a little more a little while ago...i have a 3.2 ghz prescott on an asus p4c800 motherboard with 2 gigs of ram..is that enough and so i need fast firewire hardrives so i don't lose any frames? or will regular hard drives handle the capture fine?(i as reading this at videoguys.com)

were i to break up and put on dvds for storage any recommended program to do that with?

that's about it for now..and I do thank you...t

thanks for your reply...yes a lot of questions...i am just jumping into this HD world.


i did not see a link for the nexcomm in the initial post but will look tomorrow...but i assume that the R5000 does not come from directtv and i need to buy it? and would I be correct in doing this we are just bypassing the record to dvr and then transferring to computer from dvr, in jut one step, which makes sense. How fast a hard drive to I need for this, or will a normal 7200 rpm drive work or sata drive or do i need a special scsi or firewire drive?

the software i set up to capture from satellite to computer then is installed on the computer right? does that software come with the r 5000 or which software might that be? or is that what wombie is, to capture from satellite to computer?


i don't have a prob with ulead movie factory 5 as it would be an upgrade to me..


ok, I thnk I get most of the picture from your reply and going back thru your initial post....the only lingering question is what software is used to set up to capture from the satellite to computer....and from what you said firewire is not needed, just usb 2, right?

Researching a little more a little while ago...i have a 3.2 ghz prescott on an asus p4c800 motherboard with 2 gigs of ram..is that enough and so i need fast firewire hardrives so i don't lose any frames? or will regular hard drives handle the capture fine?(i as reading this at videoguys.com)

were i to break up and put on dvds for storage any recommended program to do that with?

that's about it for now..and I do thank you...t

The R5000 software is what you use to capture the video files to the computer. You send them your DirecTV receiver and they modify it to capture the satellite broadcasts. Sorry about the Nextcom reference. Here's the link:

Nextcom R5000 compatible DirecTV receivers. (http://www.nextcomwireless.com/r5000/products.htm#Compatibility)

Any regular 7200rpm IDE drive (or SATA) will work just fine for capture. Such drives have more than enough speed. No SCSI drive is needed. Also, you can stop worrying about FireWire. You would probably need to think about that only if you are working with HDV camcorders - that is, if you are shooting your own HD video. The R5000 uses USB2.

Your computer has more than enough power to do all this. If you've been looking at VideoGuys, your may be getting info on video editing computers. They are serious overkill for this process.

Although it can't be used to edit out commercials without creating problems, HDTVtoMPEG2 can split a transport stream video file into pieces for storage on regular DVD's. It's free, too. Google it.

NEW problem..sorry to trouble you but got and email from nextcom and they are not supporting the new directv h10 and h20's now...so any other recommendations to replace the r 5000? thanks..t

Joseph, i found their website ....but he said the 5000 will not support the new h10 and 20 from directtv, due to the mpeg4....so where does that leave me? are there any more of these devices, other brands that will work just as well, can you tell me the next best one if there is one, and if there aren't then am i stuck with the dvr way? and if stuck with the dvr way, is there an authoring thread about how to do it that way?

are there any devices that will support the h10 and 20 mpeg4 stuff?


am I resigned to going with a dvr and then transferring from computer with that? if so is there any loss in that method?

And to Joseph or anyone is there a thread or directions for authoring an hd disk using the dvr method if I am stuck with that route?

Joseph,...will one of the capture cards you mentioned work on the directtv h10 or 20 and capture mpeg2 and 4?

thanks..t

Joseph, i found their website ....but he said the 5000 will not support the new h10 and 20 from directtv, due to the mpeg4....so where does that leave me? are there any more of these devices, other brands that will work just as well, can you tell me the next best one if there is one, and if there aren't then am i stuck with the dvr way? and if stuck with the dvr way, is there an authoring thread about how to do it that way?

are there any devices that will support the h10 and 20 mpeg4 stuff?


am I resigned to going with a dvr and then transferring from computer with that? if so is there any loss in that method?

And to Joseph or anyone is there a thread or directions for authoring an hd disk using the dvr method if I am stuck with that route?

Joseph,...will one of the capture cards you mentioned work on the directtv h10 or 20 and capture mpeg2 and 4?

thanks..t

At this point it looks like your only option with DirecTV is MPEG2 material via either R5000 or a hacked HR10-250 (if you can still find one). There is no other way to get HD video streams from DirecTV to your computer. Maybe the R5000 guys will come up with a solution for the H10 in the future. Capture cards are not an option.

R5000 support for the H10 seems likely at some point. From their FAQ:

Will you be supporting additional STBs or Cable boxes?
Support has been added to cover Motorola set top boxes for StarChoice, 4DTV and Cable. We are looking into the possibility of capturing MPEG4 broadcasts from new DirecTV receivers. Check the R5000-HD product page for any changes or additions in this area.


Keep in mind that we have no idea if MPEG4 streams from DirecTV and DISH will be HD-DVD compatible. And even if they are, there currently isn't a consumer level tool available to author MPEG4 streams to HD-DVD.

Capture cards are not an option.

what about these listed in Joseph's first post? OTA computer capture cards such as MyHD or Fusion


are there any firewire devices that would work?

ALso as noted in tex's post, about mpeg 4, in the hughes receiver for directv would the mpeg 2 qualiity be just as good as the mpeg 2 in the new h10 and h20?


And Joseph, when you transfer your HD to your computer....it takes a lot of space doesn't it?...huge files?..thanks..t

what about these listed in Joseph's first post? OTA computer capture cards such as MyHD or Fusion


are there any firewire devices that would work?

ALso as noted in tex's post, about mpeg 4, in the hughes receiver for directv would the mpeg 2 qualiity be just as good as the mpeg 2 in the new h10 and h20?


And Joseph, when you transfer your HD to your computer....it takes a lot of space doesn't it?...huge files?..thanks..t

Capture cards are for OTA HD (and sometimes "in the free" QAM channels from your cable company). There is no capture card for DirecTV. There are no firewire devices for DirecTV. The mpeg2 quality is exactly the same in every directv receiver - the receiver is simply passing along the digital stream (mpeg2) from the dish. There is no (re)encoding going on in a DirecTV receiver. DirecTV mpeg2 HD files vary in size, but you can count on an average in the neighborhood of 4-5GB per hour. No worries, big drives are getting cheap; Frys.com had a 400GB Seagate for $99 this week.

Capture cards are for OTA HD (and sometimes "in the free" QAM channels from your cable company). There is no capture card for DirecTV. There are no firewire devices for DirecTV. The mpeg2 quality is exactly the same in every directv receiver - the receiver is simply passing along the digital stream (mpeg2) from the dish. There is no (re)encoding going on in a DirecTV receiver. DirecTV mpeg2 HD files vary in size, but you can count on an average in the neighborhood of 4-5GB per hour. No worries, big drives are getting cheap; Frys.com had a 400GB Seagate for $99 this week.
wow that is cheap...

sso i can get the modified hughes from David and the 50000 and be ok for now and upgraade if ever to the mpeg 4..t

I have been having some problems with DL media lately. I use ImgBurn or Nero 7 for burning. I have always left them at default settings. Before recently, had no problems.

I have read suggestions as to setting the book type to DVD-ROM. I can't see where to do this for either program. Can someone point me in the right direction?

I have been having some problems with DL media lately. I use ImgBurn or Nero 7 for burning. I have always left them at default settings. Before recently, had no problems.

I have read suggestions as to setting the book type to DVD-ROM. I can't see where to do this for either program. Can someone point me in the right direction?

That's a function of the DVD burner you have. Some burners can be set and some cannot. If they can be set, you'll find the option when you hit the button to select the DVD burner to use for a session in Nero (don't know about IMGBurn). Click the "Options" button in the lower left of the dialog window. If your burner supports setting the Book Type, that option will appear as a drop down. If not, you may be out of luck. Some Pioneer burners are supposed to set the book type automatically to DVD-ROM (in firmware), but even so my Pioneer burners don't produce usable discs for this process. My Plextor 750's do, as does my Mad Dog (NEC).

That's a function of the DVD burner you have. Some burners can be set and some cannot. If they can be set, you'll find the option when you hit the button to select the DVD burner to use for a session in Nero (don't know about IMGBurn). Click the "Options" button in the lower left of the dialog window. If your burner supports setting the Book Type, that option will appear as a drop down. If not, you may be out of luck. Some Pioneer burners are supposed to set the book type automatically to DVD-ROM (in firmware), but even so my Pioneer burners don't produce usable discs for this process. My Plextor 750's do, as does my Mad Dog (NEC).

I have a NEC ND-3530A. Don't see that option. There is an option to write extended lead-out on double-layer discs. Would this help?

I have a NEC ND-3530A. Don't see that option. There is an option to write extended lead-out on double-layer discs. Would this help?

Try DVDDecrypter, source contextual menu:

http://img346.imageshack.us/img346/3667/decrypterqt6.png

Try DVDDecrypter, source contextual menu:


Tried that. Doesn't have any options to change for the NEC - Says unknown.
Guess it just isn't an option for this drive.

Anyways, updated the firmware on the drive - supposedly "better performance on DL media" - whatever that means. Will try it out.

Have played with Pinnacle S10 some more and come to the conclusion that it works well for me with capture from my HC1 camera and produces excellent video quality HD-DVDs with menus, transitions and extremely easy to edit.

But is near useless with imported material like video from HD NET that is not encrypted, producing render failures and audio delays, while these same files give me no problems when using MF5.
And S10 does not allow chapters, unless a menu is used, and very limited even then.

So I will have to use both.

Interestingly, of all the most likely, thousands of S10 forum users only two, Blackbill and myself seem to use the HD-DVD plugin.

Edit: Pinnacle stopped selling the plugin, I was able to buy it because of a mistake on their part.

Gene

Thanks for the info guys!

I just burned my first HD DVD from some footage I shot with my HV10.

VERY cool and great quality.

Bring on the real HD DVD burners!

Have played with Pinnacle S10 some more and come to the conclusion that it works well for me with capture from my HC1 camera and produces excellent video quality HD-DVDs with menus, transitions and extremely easy to edit.

But is near useless with imported material like video from HD NET that is not encrypted, producing render failures and audio delays, while these same files give me no problems when using MF5.
And S10 does not allow chapters, unless a menu is used, and very limited even then.

So I will have to use both.

Interestingly, of all the most likely, thousands of S10 forum users only two, Blackbill and myself seem to use the HD-DVD plugin.

Edit: Pinnacle stopped selling the plugin, I was able to buy it because of a mistake on their part.

Gene

You mean, it's not even available at all anymore? Any idea why they pulled it?

Thanks for the info guys!

I just burned my first HD DVD from some footage I shot with my HV10.

VERY cool and great quality.

Bring on the real HD DVD burners!

Glad to hear you've had success with the process. How do you like the Canon HV10? I've read good things about it, but I seem to remember it doesn't have an external mic input. That's a deal breaker for me. The Sony HC1 has some fairly serious limitations, but it does have a mic input.

Glad to hear you've had success with the process. How do you like the Canon HV10? I've read good things about it, but I seem to remember it doesn't have an external mic input. That's a deal breaker for me. The Sony HC1 has some fairly serious limitations, but it does have a mic input.

I really like the HV10. I compared it to the Sony too. I thought the picture with the Canon was better.

I needed a built in light with my camcorder and the HV10 had that so it was the deal breaker for me.

I would never hook up an external mic as most of my use with the HV10 is point and shoot.

Not sure but 10.7 is a beta and the plugin was to be part of the upgrade , not beta. (That is the guessing on the Pinnacle forum)

Did a 35 min HD-DVD from some video I shot a year ago with a 17Mbitt rate. Titles menu etc, turned out fine w/o problems.
Gene

I have a mpeg2 file (25 kbps) with 5.1 ac3 audio passed throughout the whole process for HD-DVD (mpeg-vcr etc). But frame rate is 24.976 fps and I don't want Ulead MF5 to re-encode it. I've tried to change Project mpeg settings but I'm unable to touch frame rate and Audio compression.
Any idea to fix this?
Regards.

I have a mpeg2 file (25 kbps) with 5.1 ac3 audio passed throughout the whole process for HD-DVD (mpeg-vcr etc). But frame rate is 24.976 fps and I don't want Ulead MF5 to re-encode it. I've tried to change Project mpeg settings but I'm unable to touch frame rate and Audio compression.
Any idea to fix this?
Regards.

It's possible that the instructions (first post of thread) for 720p streams will work for this stream. You'd use HDPatch on the first header to trick MF5 into thinking the frame rate is different. Give it a shot and let us know if it works.

EDIT: Ok, just wanted to clarify: dowload HDPatch from the first post in this thread.
- Open the mpeg2 file in HDPatch
- Change the FrameRate to 29.97; leave "First Header Only" checked
- Click on "Patch Stream"
- Try to author the patched stream in MF5
- If it works without re-encode, open the resulting EVO file in HDPatch
- Change the FrameRate back to 25; leave "First Header Only checked
- Click on "Patch Stream"
- Burn

Hope that works...

It's possible that the instructions (first post of thread) for 720p streams will work for this stream. You'd use HDPatch on the first header to trick MF5 into thinking the frame rate is different. Give it a shot and let us know if it works.

EDIT: Ok, just wanted to clarify: dowload HDPatch from the first post in this thread.
- Open the mpeg2 file in HDPatch
- Change the FrameRate to 29.97; leave "First Header Only" checked
- Click on "Patch Stream"
- Try to author the patched stream in MF5
- If it works without re-encode, open the resulting EVO file in HDPatch
- Change the FrameRate back to 25; leave "First Header Only checked
- Click on "Patch Stream"
- Burn

Hope that works...

texmex, your solution was simple and... effective. HD-DVD was burned and tested.
Thanks!

texmex,

Do you know why there would be re-encodes with MF5 even after your patch? I'm kinda stuck with my firewire captured files and my 720p R5000 files (just tried once though, could be user error).

texmex,

Do you know why there would be re-encodes with MF5 even after your patch? I'm kinda stuck with my firewire captured files and my 720p R5000 files (just tried once though, could be user error).

I don't want to answer instead of texmex but mf5 re-encodes everything that is not exactly like his presets (bitrate, fps).

Presets for bitrate is 18000 kbs. If your file is under that, no problem. If no, you can easily push bitrate preset to 30000 or more. But, for fps, there was no way to change it.

The patch is there just to "fool" mf5 enough to let your mpeg2 untouched and let mf5 multiplexing the HD-DVD.

Except for HDPatch, mpeg-vcr is, for me, always the last software to process my mpeg2 before import it in MF5.

Cheers.

Red laser HD-DVD is part of the spec - all HD-DVD players are REQUIRED to play red laser HD-DVD.

Is this true of the BR spec?

Or, are high bit-rate red-laser playable because BR players play red-laser DVDs?

Assuming only the later is true -- how high a bit-rate can BR players playback at?

It would be a major disadvantage if it is not possible to play our HD discs on PS-3s!

It dosen't seem to be the case with BD specs.
When Samsung player first came out a few months ago people on this forum tested the same process with the Samsung player. And what was clear was that using the same process with Ulead a home made DVD would actually play in HD in Samsung but at a much lower speed thus creating stutters in the video. If the same authoring process was used but the file was burned onto a BD disk it would play properly in Samsung. That led me to believe that Ulead did the correct authoring for BD but the BD player had issues with playing the red laser media in HD.

texmex,

Do you know why there would be re-encodes with MF5 even after your patch? I'm kinda stuck with my firewire captured files and my 720p R5000 files (just tried once though, could be user error).

Caffespresso is right on - HDPatch is used to "trick" MF5 into thinking that it doesn't need to re-encode. The question is, what are the video properties of your captures (bitrate, resolution, framerate)? And what kind of audio do they contain? If you tell us a little more, we can probably help you out.

I had posted this on the Pinnacle forum. :

found that the problem with HD-DVD sound delay was not caused by S10 but by the conversion of the D-VHS file that I used, from ts to ps.
I had used MPEG-VCR to do the conversions and it seems that in that process the sound was delayed.

Last night I made an other HD-DVD from that D-VHS file but used the Wizard in VLC, a free program, for that conversion.

I changed the name of the original D-VHS file from xxxx.MPEG to xxxx.ts and ran it through the Wizard. The resulting file was XXXX. here too I chanded the name to XXXX.MPEG, and the file went into S10 w/o any problems.
Made two DVDs, one with, the other w/o a menu, and there was no sound delay noticed in either.

Mediainfo properly identified the original D-VHS xxxx.MPEG file as a ts, and the Wizard converted and renamed XXXX.MPEG file as a ps.



Sorry about the confusion I caused

Gene

That led me to believe that Ulead did the correct authoring for BD but the BD player had issues with playing the red laser media in HD.

Looks like they use the red-laser mechanism simply for compatiblity purposes.

The solution it seems is to use either AVC or VC-1 and keep the bit-rates to the typical 8Mbps. This bit-rate is more than adequate for 1080i or 720p HD.

Which raises the question, which software creates HD files/folders acceptable to BR and HD DVD players that imports either AVC or VC-1 files?

And, that supports DL burning?

Which raises another question -- do DL red laser discs play well in BR players? In HD DVD players?

Which raises the question, which software creates HD files/folders acceptable to BR and HD DVD players that importants either AVC or VC-1 files?
This is the biggest and more frustrating mistery in the history of mankind. ;)

Looks like they use the red-laser mechanism simply for compatiblity purposes.

The solution it seems is to use either AVC or VC-1 and keep the bit-rates to the typical 8Mbps. This bit-rate is more than adequate for 1080i or 720p HD.

Which raises the question, which software creates HD files/folders acceptable to BR and HD DVD players that imports either AVC or VC-1 files?

And, that supports DL burning?

Which raises another question -- do DL red laser discs play well in BR players? In HD DVD players?

Sonic Scenarist HD is like $60k

do DL red laser discs play well in BR players? In HD DVD players?

They play just fine in HD-DVD players.

Caffespresso is right on - HDPatch is used to "trick" MF5 into thinking that it doesn't need to re-encode. The question is, what are the video properties of your captures (bitrate, resolution, framerate)? And what kind of audio do they contain? If you tell us a little more, we can probably help you out.

I think I figured it out, or rather the way out. When I loaded these seemingly legitimate 1920x1080 mpeg files in MF5 it would show me a data rate of "Variable bit rate (Max. 13100 kbps). I loaded it into HDPatch anyway, and it shockingly said "1920x 1080, 16:9, 29.97fps, 80000000bps". 80000000?!?!?!?!? WTF?

So I change it to 25000000, hit the patch stream, and voila, no re-encoding. I would suggest anyone who had trouble with firewire captures give that a shot, it worked great.

Now I'm on to burning some 720p material. I believe I'm following the instructions correctly, but when I play the disc, the TV screen is filled with the top, I'm guessing, 720 lines with the movie, and the bottom 1/3 is garbage from the previous disc I had played.

I don't believe I saw anyone have these issues in the previous pages the last time I read them, but I apologize if this has already been answered.

Texmex and Caffespresso, thanks for your help already.

-Bret

P.S. Should lines 2 and 3 be reversed in the instructions for 720P? It didn't seem to work the other way.

1. Process your .ts, .tp or .m2t file with Womble MPEG2VCR to convert transport stream to program stream.
2. Run HDPatch and in the menu select Preset>>720p> Pre - patch 720p for MF5/VS10+.
3. Select your 720p stream by clicking on the "..." box at the end of the "File:" line. In the browser, find your file.
4. Select the "Patch Stream" button at the bottom.

Don't forget you have to re-patch back to 720p the hd-dvd files that MF5 makes on the disc for you to burn.

On a side note, I've noticed that the A1 conversion of 720p HD-DVD to 1080i sucks! No biggie for me as my PJ is 720p. Almost looked as bad as the 480p setting. Just a Heads Up for those outputing 720p as 1080i into their RPTVs.

On a side note, I've noticed that the A1 conversion of 720p HD-DVD to 1080i sucks! No biggie for me as my PJ is 720p. Almost looked as bad as the 480p setting. Just a Heads Up for those outputing 720p as 1080i into their RPTVs.

Not only that but also A1's conversion from 1080i to 720p looks awful too. So I concluded that to get the best PQ you have to toggle the output res on A1 to match that of the original material. Otherwise you get a really soft looking picture.

It dosen't seem to be the case with BD specs.
When Samsung player first came out a few months ago people on this forum tested the same process with the Samsung player. And what was clear was that using the same process with Ulead a home made DVD would actually play in HD in Samsung but at a much lower speed thus creating stutters in the video.

Can you or anyone point me to these posts. Using MPEG-2, one would need a 20Mbps not a 10Mbps maximum bit-rate. So when you say "slower" I don't know HOW slower it was.

I think it is important that the whole hd on red laser media be supported, and I see this as a way forward that based upon BD support might be politically feasible. Other wise the focus seems to be just on HD DVD content, playing back standard DVD's and ignoring officially the HD on red dvd media.

anyone else out there interested in this support???

John

YES. I've already posted several questions about play RL HD on the Sammy. The problem seems to be that that vast majority on this list are looking for a way of saving Hollywood content for their own use.

But the real value of RL is that it can be cheaply duplicated and so can be used for HD production. I know of no way to get 5-1000 BD duplicated.

If BD players are limited to 10Mbps, then a second issue is getting uncompressed video from your NLE encoded to VC-1. And, then onto a RL disc because one sure can't use MPEG-2 at 10Mbps.

----------------

On the postive side, after reading about all the software needed to burn RL HD DVDs -- I was pleased to find that after exporting 1080i60 HDV with PCM stereo from Vegas 7, that WMF5+ simply imported it and burned it to disc. (No recording to get a 25Mbps bit-stream.) I could only burn to DVD, but it was sure simpler than Womble and Nero, etc.

Isn't there a single application that inputs 1080i60 HDV with PCM stereo and burns RL discs?

Because without a single application, RL will never be popular.

Can HDPatch be used on 1080i captures? MF5 tries to re-encode everything.

My workflow is to capture a 30 second file from DiscoveryHD, convert the .m2t file to MPEG2 Program Stream using MPEG2VCR, and then add that video within MF5 with no chapters, titles, and don't re-encode checked. But it still tries to re-encode. No big deal with that 30 second clip, but a 2 hour movie takes about 8 hours to re-encode.

I wish HDPatch could be used to fool MF5 into thinking H264 was MPEG2.

Can HDPatch be used on 1080i captures? MF5 tries to re-encode everything.

My workflow is to capture a 30 second file from DiscoveryHD, convert the .m2t file to MPEG2 Program Stream using MPEG2VCR, and then add that video within MF5 with no chapters, titles, and don't re-encode checked. But it still tries to re-encode. No big deal with that 30 second clip, but a 2 hour movie takes about 8 hours to re-encode.

efranzen, this is the problem I was having. Yes, put it in HDPatch and "only" change the bit rate to 25000000. Everything else should be ok, press the patch stream button, you should only have to do the first header, and give that a shot in MF5. It should fly right through. This will be good for me as well to see that my solution works for more people than just me. One other thing, I always change the MPEG settings to the 1920x1080 in MF5 even though the "don't reencode" is checked. I don't know if that is a necessary step or not.

Check that your source is not 1088 while you are using HDPatch, and follow the 1088 directions if it is. For some reason, some stuff I captured last year was 1088 and I'm not sure why.

Good luck, let us know how it goes.

-Bret

I wish HDPatch could be used to fool MF5 into thinking H264 was MPEG2. I don't know if anyone has posted this site but for those that would like to author HD-DVD in something other than MP2 like VC1/h.264 AVC; you might want to check this out. I hope this helps.

http://blogs.msdn.com/ptorr/Default.aspx?p=2

THANK YOU BRET! HDPatch did fix my problem by only changing the bit rate to 25000000 as you suggested. MF5 immediately accepted the file and did not attempt to re-encode. I did not make any other changes with MF5, infact I even left it at the default 1440 x 1080 with the do not convert box checked.

I checked to see if the original file was 1088 but it was a standard 1920 x 1080.

Might I ask why you chose a bit rate of 25000000? The original bitrate of the file I was using was reported as 38810400 when I first opened it in HDPatch. Are there other numbers I can use besides 25M?

Anyway, you REALLY made my day. I burned and watched my first HD DVD, even if it was only a 1 minute random clip from DiscoveryHD. I think my JVC HM-DH5u is going to get very lonely in the near future!

... although 448 for each of it's 5 channels is not too bad ...

It seems you are getting AC3 5.1 from DVD MF+. I'm not!

1) I've exported 1080i HDV (with no audio) from Sony Vegas and imported it into MF with no problem. Import takes no time. It plays fine.

2) Then I exported from Sony Vegas an AC3 encoded file and "added" it to the HDV file in MF. Import takes no time. It plays fine with the video. But, when I export, the "5.1" audio comes out as "2/0" AC3. The export takes almost no time.

Does anyone know how to force the output from MF to be AC3 5.1?

Or, what format must a 5.1 file have to be encoded to 5.1?

Or, what format must a 5.1 file have to remain AC3 5.1?

Might I ask why you chose a bit rate of 25000000? The original bitrate of the file I was using was reported as 38810400 when I first opened it in HDPatch. Are there other numbers I can use besides 25M?


Well, the max bitrate for HD-DVD is ~30Mbps - that's audio + video. So apparently MF5 is checking the average bitrate reported in the header and trying to re-encode if it's too high. These clips from cable, sat and OTA will NEVER have an average bitrate higher than 19Mbps, so changing the header via HDPatch to anything less than 30 should work. FWIW, the headers on D* streams report a bitrate of 65000000. Nothing on D* is getting more than 14000000 these days.

It seems you are getting AC3 5.1 from DVD MF+. I'm not!

1) I've exported 1080i HDV (with no audio) from Sony Vegas and imported it into MF with no problem. Import takes no time. It plays fine.

2) Then I exported from Sony Vegas an AC3 encoded file and "added" it to the HDV file in MF. Import takes no time. It plays fine with the video. But, when I export, the "5.1" audio comes out as "2/0" AC3. The export takes almost no time.

Does anyone know how to force the output from MF to be AC3 5.1?

Or, what format must a 5.1 file have to be encoded to 5.1?

Or, what format must a 5.1 file have to remain AC3 5.1?

you need Video Studio 10+ for Dolby 5.1 ( at least from my experience)


Hey Texmex , did you ever get a chance to make a version of HDpatch with the ability to trick Ulead (MF5 or VS10) into thinking a 640 or 576kbps DD track was 448 or 384?

-Tyler

Can you or anyone point me to these posts. Using MPEG-2, one would need a 20Mbps not a 10Mbps maximum bit-rate. So when you say "slower" I don't know HOW slower it was.

I recall it was a while back in BD software forum where it was discussed.
But with a some simple maths and assumptions you can get an idea of how slow it was. For example, RL DVD holds 4.7GB and BD holds 25 GB, that means that the density of the data pits on BD is 5.3 times that of the DVD. That imples that if the motor speed is constant on the DVD player the data pickup rate from BD is 2.3 (square root of 5.3) times that of DVD. If the Sammy player does not adjust motor speed to compensate for the red laser then the HD video would be played at 43% (1/2.3) of its normal speed. So what you would see on Sammy is the video would play for 1sec and then freeze for next 1sec...

BTW, my MF5 would produce 5.1 if it is fed 5.1. Have you tried to encode 5.1 into your HDV footage in Vegas or VS10 before you author HD-DVD in MF5?

THANK YOU BRET! HDPatch did fix my problem by only changing the bit rate to 25000000 as you suggested. MF5 immediately accepted the file and did not attempt to re-encode. I did not make any other changes with MF5, infact I even left it at the default 1440 x 1080 with the do not convert box checked.

I checked to see if the original file was 1088 but it was a standard 1920 x 1080.

Might I ask why you chose a bit rate of 25000000? The original bitrate of the file I was using was reported as 38810400 when I first opened it in HDPatch. Are there other numbers I can use besides 25M?

Anyway, you REALLY made my day. I burned and watched my first HD DVD, even if it was only a 1 minute random clip from DiscoveryHD. I think my JVC HM-DH5u is going to get very lonely in the near future!

Thank texmex, he made the great fixit program. I picked 25000000 because that was the default for 1920x1024 in MF5. As texmex wrote, probably any number in that range would work and the number doesn't mean anything other than to let MF5 accept it untouched.

But I'm glad I helped make your day. I know the feeling you had, I had it the day before :-)

-Bret

I recall it was a while back in BD software forum where it was discussed.

BTW, my MF5 would produce 5.1 if it is fed 5.1. Have you tried to encode 5.1 into your HDV footage in Vegas or VS10 before you author HD-DVD in MF5?

Thank you for the tip.

I'm taking HDV (without MP2 audio) and AC3 5.1 from Vegas 7 and importing them into MF5+. While the output from MF5+ is AC3 it seems to be set to "2/0" rather than "3/2."

I'm sure it is not re-compling either HDV or AC3.

Hopefully, MF5 checks the nature of the ADDED AUDIO and doesn't simply assume if you import HDV, you want "2/0." I seem unable to forced AC3 to be 5.1.

Are there any free tools that really let you check an AC3 stream to see its characteristics.

d-v-c
Mpeg2Repair may provide the information you are looking for. It will scan a .ts file (and maybe other formats of mpeg2) and report errors. It also reports the bit rate, average bit rate, audio format (AC3 2/0 or 3/2) and other interesting information.

I found it throught a different forum on this site.

Run the program and select Log Errors check box to get the report. And it's free, as requested. The liink is
http://users.adelphia.net/~mwilczyn/mpeg2

Good luck.
Greg

Forgive me for giving up on reading thru 600 plus posts, quick question:

If I have an avi or xvid file of a tv show I can't simply convert it to mpeg2 to play it smoothly on the HD-A1?

I've coverted files using VSO convertxtodvd and played them on my old Pioneer dvd player without a problem. Is there any easy way to do this to play hdtv dvd on the Toshiba?

erased

If I have an avi or xvid file of a tv show I can't simply convert it to mpeg2 to play it smoothly on the HD-A1?
I've coverted files using VSO convertxtodvd and played them on my old Pioneer dvd player without a problem. Is there any easy way to do this to play hdtv dvd on the Toshiba?

David-

At this point you need to first convert the AVI file to an MPEG file and then use the techniques discussed in this thread. There is very little software support for creating HD DVD content right now. Hopefully this will change soon.

I know nothing avout convertxtodvd, but if it takes an xvid encoded file and converts it to a SD DVD movie, then yes you can do that on a Toshiba - in fact the Toshiba will do an excellent job of up-converting that content.

New Xbox 360 dashboard out today with the HD DVD support built-in.

The good news is that any WMV file can be run from DVD (high bitrate stuff seems to choke on CD). This includes VC1-encoded WMVs using Windows Media Encoder Studio Edition or indeed Windows Media Encoder 9 with the High Profile plug-in.

The bad news is that red laser HD DVD titlesets do not run on the internal drive. Tried both burning an ISO and the old Nero technique. Probably quite right from a corporate perspective, but would've been nice to have been chucked a bone!

Double post, soz.

The bad news is that red laser HD DVD titlesets do not run on the internal drive. Tried both burning an ISO and the old Nero technique. Probably quite right from a corporate perspective, but would've been nice to have been chucked a bone!
That's indeed bad news. But isn't that a requirement for all HDDVD players if it's within official specs? Perhaps it doesn't apply to add-ons. :(

That's indeed bad news. But isn't that a requirement for all HDDVD players if it's within official specs? Perhaps it doesn't apply to add-ons. :(

I thought so too when I first read the post - then I realized that he was talking about putting a red-laser HD-DVD in the 360 itself ("internal drive"), not the HD-DVD add-on (which isn't out yet). The add-on drive will support red-laser HD-DVD, as is required by the spec...

Anyone know how to make a disc which repeats on an endless loop.

Need to create a demo-disc.

Can use either Movie Studio 10 or Movie Factory 5.

Thanks

PeterS, I haven't actually tested it but in Movie Factory 5 there is an option "Auto Repeat When Disc Playback Ends". It's on the same page with the option to not convert compliant MPEG files.

The good news is that any WMV file can be run from DVD (high bitrate stuff seems to choke on CD). This includes VC1-encoded WMVs using Windows Media Encoder Studio Edition or indeed Windows Media Encoder 9 with the High Profile plug-in.


What bit-rates are supported?

Question... is there an easy way to tell if your video is 1088i or 720p? I have tons of .ts streams from a variety of sources, and I need to know which ones to apply the fix to :)

Yes, just open it w/texmex's HD Patch, from the first post in this thread.

Question... is there an easy way to tell if your video is 1088i or 720p? I have tons of .ts streams from a variety of sources, and I need to know which ones to apply the fix to :)
Earlier in this thread:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=8499130&&#post8499130

VideoReDo (Tools menu... "Show Video Program Info" [Ctrl+L]) or Media Player Classic.

Also, in Ulead MovieFactory, right-click on the video clip and choose "Media Clip Properties".

I made a minor change to the guide a few days ago - added a reference to the ability of a recent VideoRedo beta to create MPEG files that don't slow the load process down to a crawl. I now use VideoRedo almost exclusively for editing .ts files. I've yet to create one that MF5 hasn't liked. I'm not using MPEG2VCR much anymore. The sole exceptions have been when VideoRedo has choked on a few .ts files with wonky PIDs.

My friend and I have been following the authoring guide and both of us have problems opening any .mpg in Ulead MF5 if it has a 5.1 audio track. Clicking on the file causes it to hit the hard drive for about 10 minutes, then it loads, clicking next takes another 10 minutes. Any mpg with 2.0 sound loads fine. We've tried Womble, hdtv2mpeg and videoredo to convert and all have same problem across at least a dozen different movies.

.

My friend and I have been following the authoring guide and both of us have problems opening any .mpg in Ulead MF5 if it has a 5.1 audio track. Clicking on the file causes it to hit the hard drive for about 10 minutes, then it loads, clicking next takes another 10 minutes. Any mpg with 2.0 sound loads fine. We've tried Womble, hdtv2mpeg and videoredo to convert and all have same problem across at least a dozen different movies.

Josheph updated the guide just this morning to [hopefully] address this very issue by using VideoRedo. The instructions are in the first post, but here is the relevant section (new info in BOLD):

Using VideoRedo (version 2.2.1.491) to convert transport stream video files to MPEG2 program stream format:

Special Note: As of this writing (late October, 2006), version 2.2.1.491 is a beta release. You must follow the instructions below to access the special feature that allows VideoRedo to work seamlessly with Movie Factory 5. Future full releases should have this feature available without having to hold the shift key.

1. Start VideoRedo. Select File>Open Video… . In the browser, select the movie you’ve captured.
2. In the main menu, select Tools>Options. Hold down the shift key as you click on "Options." This will bring up one additional selection - "Add GOP Timecode to all GOPs... .") Click on this and change the value to "True."
2. Use the play and navigation buttons to find the start of a section of the video you want to delete. Click “Set Start.” Find the end of the section you want to delete and click “Set End.” Click “Cut selection.” (It will turn red.)
3. Repeat this process for all the sections you want to delete. (Tip: use the arrow keys and your mouse’s scroll wheel to move quickly through the video.)
4. Select File>Save Video As… . Select a folder on the hard drive to save the video. By “Save as type:” select “MPEG Program Streams (.mpg .mpeg).”



Let us know if this step solves your problem....

Using that new option appears to fix the loading problem. I tried it on 2 ts/mpg converted files that previously would hang the program on load and they now load in a few seconds.

Here's a little different problem. I've read through about as much as I can stand, so I hope I havn't missed the obvious. I've successfully authored several HD DVDs, but all 1080i.

I'm trying to author a 720p using the HDPatch routine and MF5 with no menus. Everything seems to be working OK, but it seems the "back to 720p" EVO patch isn't working right. The result is "perfect", except the picture only fills the top 2/3 of the screen with color blocks below. It's as if the EVO repair did not work. I even tried unchecking the "first header only" block. The EVO files play properly with VLC and Nero. It's an OTA movie from Fox and Fusion card.

I've noticed that movies on Fox (I'll have to try some other stuff) have very high quality at very low bitrates - below 10Mb/s. Has anyone else noticed the apparent ability of some MPG2 encoders to get high quality at very low bit rates.

Thanks to all for the help this forum has given me.

Dave

Killer guide ;-)

Anyone been successful with authoring any 1080P MPEG2 content with MF5?

I'm trying to author a 720p using the HDPatch routine and MF5 with no menus. Everything seems to be working OK, but it seems the "back to 720p" EVO patch isn't working right. The result is "perfect", except the picture only fills the top 2/3 of the screen with color blocks below. It's as if the EVO repair did not work. I even tried unchecking the "first header only" block. The EVO files play properly with VLC and Nero. It's an OTA movie from Fox and Fusion card.

You are picking the first EVO right (HV001T01.EVO)? Picking the wrong one should cause an error to pop up, and the result would mean that the original EVO isn't patched back and the IFO isn't patched at all, causing the behavior you report. Here's a way to check what's going on. Before you do the post-EVO patch, check the "Date Modified" on the EVO and IFO files (HV001T01.EVO and HV001I01.IFO). Then run HDPatch in post-EVO mode. Check the "Date Modified" again. Were both files updated? Only the EVO? Neither? Let me know what you find and I'll try to figure what's going wrong.

Anyone been successful with authoring any 1080P MPEG2 content with MF5?

I haven't tried. I assume that it will work either directly in MF5, or by using HDPatch to trick MF5 into accepting the file. If I have time this weekend I'll encode a few short 1080P streams and give it a shot. It's possible that I may need to update HDPatch to work for 1080P

I haven't tried. I assume that it will work either directly in MF5, or by using HDPatch to trick MF5 into accepting the file. If I have time this weekend I'll encode a few short 1080P streams and give it a shot. It's possible that I may need to update HDPatch to work for 1080P

Sweet!

Looking forward to it. :D

New Xbox 360 dashboard out today with the HD DVD support built-in.

The good news is that any WMV file can be run from DVD (high bitrate stuff seems to choke on CD). This includes VC1-encoded WMVs using Windows Media Encoder Studio Edition or indeed Windows Media Encoder 9 with the High Profile plug-in.

The bad news is that red laser HD DVD titlesets do not run on the internal drive. Tried both burning an ISO and the old Nero technique. Probably quite right from a corporate perspective, but would've been nice to have been chucked a bone!

Do AVI's work?

Never mind

Question:

How do you guys handle the splitting of the .ts file? I've been using TSSplitter 1.0 using the DVD-R DL profile and am finding after running through the process that my end HD_DVD folders are ending up anywhere from 7.5 to 7.75GB in size; leaving about 500-750MB of unused space for a DVD+R DL.

Any recommendations?

I use HDTV2MPEG to split my files at 8.1GB. I may go smaller if the last disc will only have something like 10 minutes of footage on it.

good news! here are some HD DVD custom covers made by another AVSer:

http://www.wifi-spy.org/coverart

if anyone else has custom HD DVD coverart, PM me for upload info.

Question:

How do you guys handle the splitting of the .ts file? I've been using TSSplitter 1.0 using the DVD-R DL profile and am finding after running through the process that my end HD_DVD folders are ending up anywhere from 7.5 to 7.75GB in size; leaving about 500-750MB of unused space for a DVD+R DL.

Any recommendations?


I use VideoRedo to split .ts file. The advantage of that is it can cut it to quite precise size while it shows you the scene at the same time. VRD will tell you the total minutes of the file and the length of time in the output file. After some simple calculation simply drag the timeline cursor to the place that will give you the desired length, then save the selected video. After saving the video VRD will return to its window. Simply flip the selection/cut to save the rest of video.

good news! here are some HD DVD custom covers made by another AVSer:

http://www.wifi-spy.org/coverart

if anyone else has custom HD DVD coverart, PM me for upload info.

somehow I couldn't access the page.

Those are my covers & had my personal collection name branded on them. I'll un-brand them & re-send WiFi-Spy those & additional new covers shortly to host.

Does this by anychance work on a XBox360 via the normal DVD drive, because it has the new codecs. Someone please try if they don't mind :)

1) Sony ships a restricted version of MF5 with their laptop that has a BD burner. Which makes me think that MF5 creates and burns BD.

But, the instructions here talk about making red-laser discs for HD DVD plays. I'm totally confused:

a) Does MF5+ create HD red-laser discs for HD-DVD players?

b) Does MF5+ create HD red-laser discs for BD players?

d) Does MF5+ create HD blue-laser BD for BD discs?


2) How do you tell MF5+ whether you want a red-laser disc for an HD-DVD or a BD player?


3) How do you tell MF5+ whether you want a blue-laser disk for a BD player?


4) The Guide at the beginning still mentions Womble MPEG2VCR (version 3.14) and Nero Burning ROM.

MF5+ captures HDV and imports HDV (.m2t) and it burns the disc. Doesn't MF5+ replace both of these applications?


5) Will HDPatch patch 720p .ts or .m2t files? (If not, the it means Womble MPEG2VCR must be used to convert .m2t to a PS which is a waste of time.)


6) What's the simplest way to extract the AC3 file from a VOB?

Ulead DVD Movie Factory 5 Plus does not care what color laser disc you are authoring for. Only by burning it to one or the other kind of disc does that get decided, the authoring file structure doesn't care.

From what I can tell by using it, BD discs are part of its capability. What I don't know (and think not) is that BD players can support red-laser discs with HD content.

So that answers (although not definitively!) your first five I believe:

a) Yes. (I've done it.)
b) I don't think there's such a thing. (Someone please correct me if I'm wrong!)
d) Looks like it.
2) EDITED: For a given project you declare that it is either for BluRay or HD-DVD.
3) See b) and 2).

Ulead DVD Movie Factory 5 Plus does not care what color laser disc you are authoring for. Only by burning it to one or the other kind of disc does that get decided, the authoring file structure doesn't care.

1) Are you saying the HD folders placed on an HD-DVD is indentical to the one placed on a BD? That would be wonderful, but it's hard to imagine the two groups have somehow come to identical HD folder/file structures?

2) There have been posts that red-laser "HD" discs DO play on BD players even though it's not part of the BD spec. Supposedly, data-rates are limited, but no one has reported exactly how much lower the rate must be.

I would be happy with 20Mbps although 25Mbps would be better.

Thank you for your quick response!
Steve

1) No I did not mean to say that the same authoring file structure will work on BluRay or HD-DVD. I tried to say that the same authoring file structure will work on either color of laser disc (red or blue), at least for HD-DVD.

YOU DO have to tell Ulead DVD Movie Factory 5 Plus whether your project is for HD-DVD or BluRay. BUT NOT what color of laser disc (red or blue) you will be burning it to after authoring.

2) Sounds like you know at least as much about BD players being able to play red laser HD discs as I do. So I can't help you much on that front.

EDITED my answer to 2) above after re-reading your question more closely.

YOU DO have to tell Ulead DVD Movie Factory 5 Plus whether your project is for HD-DVD or BluRay.

My version offers "HD DVD" but I don't remember an option for Bluray or BD. Where do you make this choice?

My version offers "HD DVD" but I don't remember an option for Bluray or BD. Where do you make this choice?

I believe the Bluray authoring option was in the original release of MF5, but was removed in the first update (maybe a week or two after release). If you can get your hands on the original installation (and don't let it update), I think you'll get Bluray authoring.

I believe the Bluray authoring option was in the original release of MF5, but was removed in the first update (maybe a week or two after release). If you can get your hands on the original installation (and don't let it update), I think you'll get Bluray authoring.

That must be the more limited version I found on a VAIO. I think it is not the + version.

Anyone know what is was called and where it might be?

Silly question!!

What if the result iso is like 500mb, If burned on a CD, can the A1 read it?

I use VideoRedo to split .ts file. The advantage of that is it can cut it to quite precise size while it shows you the scene at the same time. VRD will tell you the total minutes of the file and the length of time in the output file. After some simple calculation simply drag the timeline cursor to the place that will give you the desired length, then save the selected video. After saving the video VRD will return to its window. Simply flip the selection/cut to save the rest of video.




Thanks! Haven't spent alot of time with VideoRedo yet--I'll have to check it out. Looks like you still have to make a manual calculation/guesstimate on when to make the cut.

HD DVD coverart is back up.

http://www.wifi-spy.org/coverart

I have a couple of 720p files, that have been run thru MpegRepair, nothing wrong with them - however, when i use HDPatch, as per guide, they stay at 1280 Hor, but change to 1080 vertical. When loaded into Ulead, they have massive green borders. Even i change them in HD patch to 1920 by 1080 they have bigger green borders, in the preview section (and once burned and played in the tosh)...

Any help appriciated, especially as they are both 7.6gb each and only 90 mins long...

HD DVD coverart is back up.

http://www.wifi-spy.org/coverart
Hope other people send WiFi-Spy covers. They're time-consuming & I already have over 100 homebrew HD DVDs! :)

I have a couple of 720p files, that have been run thru MpegRepair, nothing wrong with them - however, when i use HDPatch, as per guide, they stay at 1280 Hor, but change to 1080 vertical. When loaded into Ulead, they have massive green borders. Even i change them in HD patch to 1920 by 1080 they have bigger green borders, in the preview section (and once burned and played in the tosh)...

Any help appriciated, especially as they are both 7.6gb each and only 90 mins long...

Ignore the preview section in Ulead - you're using HDPatch to "trick" Ulead into accepting the file and it won't display properly b/c you've changed the resolution. Are you using HDPatch on the EVO/IFO files after you author the HDDVD folder? If you don't patch the EVO/IFO back to 720p, the video will not display properly on the tosh.

Aah, maybe thats what ive not done (evo thing)... Yeah it changes all sorts of shapes in the preview and on my plasma the HDDVD will play but it will have the main menu (ive made) strobing in the background LOL

So, ive just done it now, and its changed only the vertical res to 1080 but kept the horizontal at 1280... is that right or should i change it to 1920 manually?
Thanks!

Hope other people send WiFi-Spy covers. They're time-consuming & I already have over 100 homebrew HD DVDs! :)

Ugh, just what I need. A whole new cover-art page. I've got about 160 DVHS recordings and I made extensive use of the DVHS cover-art page along with countless hours making my own. Looks like I need to start all over again :( or is that a :D

Are you using HDPatch on the EVO/IFO files after you author the HDDVD folder? If you don't patch the EVO/IFO back to 720p, the video will not display properly on the tosh.

Is that true for the 1088 files as well?

I ask because while I have been running HDpatch on the .mpg file before loading into MF5, I have NOT been running it on the resultant EVO files.

The interesting thing is that my DVD's play perfectly on the A1 and I have made a LOT of them thanks to this great guide.

Can't recall running across an 720P files though. Just 1920x1088 and 1280x1088 files.

Aah, maybe thats what ive not done (evo thing)... Yeah it changes all sorts of shapes in the preview and on my plasma the HDDVD will play but it will have the main menu (ive made) strobing in the background LOL

So, ive just done it now, and its changed only the vertical res to 1080 but kept the horizontal at 1280... is that right or should i change it to 1920 manually?
Thanks!


From the guide on page 1 (with one minor clarification):

2. 720p files: Movie Factory 5 and VideoStudio 10+ do not recognize 720p as a valid HD-DVD format. They will attempt to re-encode 720p files during the authoring process. In order to avoid this, you can use HDPatch to "prep" a 720p file for authoring.

To use this feature:

1. Process your .ts, .tp or .m2t file with Womble MPEG2VCR to convert transport stream to program stream.
2. Run HDPatch; select your 720p stream by clicking on the "..." box at the end of the "File:" line. In the browser, find your file.
3. In the menu select Preset>>720p> Pre - patch 720p for MF5/VS10+.
4. Select the "Patch Stream" button at the bottom.

The patch should be virtually instantaneous. Complete the process outlined above to create the HD DVD folder on the hard drive.

Before you can burn the HD DVD to disc, you must patch the .EVO file within the folder.

1. Run HDPatch and click on the "..." box at the end of the "File:" line. In the browser, find the first .EVO file in the HD DVD folder you just created.
2. From the menu, select 720p>Post - Patch EVO/IFO for burn.
3. Select the "Patch Stream" button at the bottom.

The patch should be virtually instantaneous. Your HD DVD folder is now ready for burning in Nero Burning ROM.

Is that true for the 1088 files as well?

I ask because while I have been running HDpatch on the .mpg file before loading into MF5, I have NOT been running it on the resultant EVO files.

The interesting thing is that my DVD's play perfectly on the A1 and I have made a LOT of them thanks to this great guide.

Can't recall running across an 720P files though. Just 1920x1088 and 1280x1088 files.

No, this is not true for 1088 files. 1088 is not a valid vertical resolution in the HD-DVD spec - MF5/VS10 will try to reencode any 1088 stream unless you patch it first. I recommend patching ALL headers from 1088 to 1080 (Fix1088 preset in HDPatch) before processing with MF5/VS10. No "post-patching" is necessary - you want to burn the stream to disc with a vertical resolution of 1080.

I just made some minor corrections to the guide that texmex pointed out. A couple of steps were reversed in the sections on using HDPatch. The text on selecting the file and doing the patch were reversed. Sorry if this created confusion. No other changes at this point. Anyone else pick up on errors, major or minor?

No, this is not true for 1088 files. 1088 is not a valid vertical resolution in the HD-DVD spec - MF5/VS10 will try to reencode any 1088 stream unless you patch it first. I recommend patching ALL headers from 1088 to 1080 (Fix1088 preset in HDPatch) before processing with MF5/VS10. No "post-patching" is necessary - you want to burn the stream to disc with a vertical resolution of 1080.

Just to be clear.

I AM running HDpatch on the 1088 files BEFORE I run MF5.
If I do not, I get that super long load time in MF5.

I just now looked at a bunch of EVO files produced from MF5 and it DOES show 1088.

So,the DVD's I have been making have a resolution of 1088 but play just fine on my TV set.

Confused? I know I am.

Also, I only patch the FIRST header from 1088 to 1080 because it takes so long if I let it do all headers. Since I never saw any problems, I stuck with that.

I AM running HDpatch on the 1088 files BEFORE I run MF5.
If I do not, I get that super long load time in MF5.
Right - running HDPatch is necessary to avoid MF5 re-encoding.

I just now looked at a bunch of EVO files produced from MF5 and it DOES show 1088.

So,the DVD's I have been making have a resolution of 1088 but play just fine on my TV set..
I think that we're just getting lucky here; the tosh seems to accept the streams b/c the first header is 1080. And even if it were displaying the stream at 1088, we probably wouldn't see the difference (maybe a thin gray line at the bottom of the picture if your display has zero overscan).

Also, I only patch the FIRST header from 1088 to 1080 because it takes so long if I let it do all headers. Since I never saw any problems, I stuck with that.
I guess I'm anal and want the HD-DVD to be "correct", so I take the extra 3-5 minutes to patch the entire file to 1080. It seems to work by just patching the first header, so the choice is yours.

I haven't tried. I assume that it will work either directly in MF5, or by using HDPatch to trick MF5 into accepting the file. If I have time this weekend I'll encode a few short 1080P streams and give it a shot. It's possible that I may need to update HDPatch to work for 1080P


texmex,any luck with 1080p

Mmm... It didnt work when i patched the EVO file (HV000M02.evo)
Should it be all evo files? Or just HV001T01.evo???

Haven't waded through the thread yet - but has anyone managed to master an HD-DVD from BBC H264 material yet?

Haven't waded through the thread yet - but has anyone managed to master an HD-DVD from BBC H264 material yet?

Not in this thread - MF5/VS10 are limited to MPEG material. As far as I know, there still isn't an HD-DVD authoring tool available [to the masses] for AVC or VC1 material.

Mmm... It didnt work when i patched the EVO file (HV000M02.evo)
Should it be all evo files? Or just HV001T01.evo???

It should be just the first EVO file (HV001T01.evo). In fact, if it's anything other than HV001T01.evo it won't work - I probably need to modify HDPatch to ensure that the right file is selected.

texmex,any luck with 1080p

I encoded a few short clips but haven't run them through yet. If I get a break from "real work" I'll run them through in the next few days.

Not in this thread - MF5/VS10 are limited to MPEG material. As far as I know, there still isn't an HD-DVD authoring tool available [to the masses] for AVC or VC1 material. I have and it is pretty easy if you know HTML/XML.. Here is a link to some sources to get you going. http://blogs.msdn.com/ptorr/
you can also use VC1

I have and it is pretty easy if you know HTML/XML.. Here is a link to some sources to get you going. http://blogs.msdn.com/ptorr/
you can also use VC1

So how are you creating the EVO/IFO files? We need a muxer, yes? For example, how would one take a VC1 stream and create a basic HD-DVD (no menus, no chapters, no interactivity)? We need to get from VC1 or AVC to EVO/IFO. The link you provide is nice if you want to learn iHD, but doesn't seem to offer any help in creating the title sets. If you know the "secrets" to the EVO/IFO formats and are willing to share, we can probably come up with a simple app to create HD-DVD's from different sources.

So how are you creating the EVO/IFO files? We need a muxer, yes? For example, how would one take a VC1 stream and create a basic HD-DVD (no menus, no chapters, no interactivity)? We need to get from VC1 or AVC to EVO/IFO. The link you provide is nice if you want to learn iHD, but doesn't seem to offer any help in creating the title sets. If you know the "secrets" to the EVO/IFO formats and are willing to share, we can probably come up with a simple app to create HD-DVD's from different sources.

Second that, except I'll leave it to texmex to come up with the "simple app." I'm a little too simple for that. :)

So how are you creating the EVO/IFO files? We need a muxer, yes? For example, how would one take a VC1 stream and create a basic HD-DVD (no menus, no chapters, no interactivity)? We need to get from VC1 or AVC to EVO/IFO. The link you provide is nice if you want to learn iHD, but doesn't seem to offer any help in creating the title sets. If you know the "secrets" to the EVO/IFO formats and are willing to share, we can probably come up with a simple app to create HD-DVD's from different sources.

Here is an example I found on how to play a file. You can tie chapters PIP and other interactivity with a framework like this.

<? xml version = " 1.0 " encoding = " UTF-8 " ?>

< Playlist xmlns = " http://www.dvdforum.org/2005/HDDVDVideo/Playlist " majorVersion = " 1 " minorVersion = " 0 " >



< Configuration >

< StreamingBuffer size = " 0 " />

< Aperture size = " 1920x1080 " />

< MainVideoDefaultColor color = " 705040 " />

</ Configuration >



< MediaAttributeList />



< TitleSet timeBase = " 60fps " defaultLanguage = " en " >



< Title titleNumber = " 1 " titleDuration = " 00:00:20:00 " id = " Intro "

displayName = " Intro " onEnd = " Intro " >



< PrimaryAudioVideoClip titleTimeBegin = " 00:00:00:00 "

titleTimeEnd = " 00:00:20:00 "

src = " file:///dvddisc/HVDVD_TS/movie.wmv " dataSource = " Disc " >



< Video track = " 1 " />

< Audio track = " 1 " streamNumber = " 1 " />

</ PrimaryAudioVideoClip >



< ChapterList >

< Chapter titleTimeBegin = " 00:00:00:00 " />

< Chapter titleTimeBegin = " 00:00:05:00 " />

< Chapter titleTimeBegin = " 00:00:10:00 " />

</ ChapterList >

</ Title >



< PlaylistApplication description = " Test " language = " en "

src = " file:///dvddisc/ADV_OBJ/Manifest.xmf " >



< PlaylistApplicationResource multiplexed = " false "

size = " 500000 " src = " file:///dvddisc/ADV_OBJ/Manifest.xmf " />



< PlaylistApplicationResource multiplexed = " false "

size = " 500000 " src = " file:///dvddisc/ADV_OBJ/Script.js " />



< PlaylistApplicationResource multiplexed = " false "

size = " 500000 " src = " file:///dvddisc/ADV_OBJ/Markup.xmu " />

</ PlaylistApplication >

</ TitleSet >

</ Playlist >

Any one can get their feet really wet by downloading an open source movie that you can edit however you want. http://orange.blender.org/download

Any one can get their feet really wet by downloading an open source movie that you can edit however you want. http://orange.blender.org/download

Ok, so if I understand correctly, you're not actually creating a "standard" titleset? There are no EVO/IFO files? What file does the xml example below go in (is it Markup.xmu?) and what folder does that file go in (ADV_OBJ I assume)? What do Manifest.xmf, Script.js and Markup.xmu look like? If you can create working HD-DVD's with only an xml file, the sky's the limit! We would then only need to worry about using the correct encoding params for AVC/VC1 (another can of worms).

Ok, so if I understand correctly, you're not actually creating a "standard" titleset? There are no EVO/IFO files? What file does the xml example below go in (is it Markup.xmu?) and what folder does that file go in (ADV_OBJ I assume)? What do Manifest.xmf, Script.js and Markup.xmu look like? If you can create working HD-DVD's with only an xml file, the sky's the limit! We would then only need to worry about using the correct encoding params for AVC/VC1 (another can of worms). I used the Windows Media Encoder Studio Edition for my files.

I used the Windows Media Encoder Studio Edition for my files.

Ok, but WME-SE doesn't support exporting VC-1 Elementary Streams, so how are you getting anything to play on the tosh? I've been playing around with the MS HDDVD Jumpstart tools and can create "discs" that work in the simulator (with WMV video). It's still not clear to me how you're "creating" video that works once the project is burned to disc? Any help here DarthJedi? Have you created a disc that plays in the Tosh (either MPEG2, VC1 or AVC)?

oops! double post

Ok, but WME-SE doesn't support exporting VC-1 Elementary Streams, so how are you getting anything to play on the tosh? I've been playing around with the MS HDDVD Jumpstart tools and can create "discs" that work in the simulator (with WMV video). It's still not clear to me how you're "creating" video that works once the project is burned to disc? Any help here DarthJedi? Have you created a disc that plays in the Tosh (either MPEG2, VC1 or AVC)?I am doing a poor mans author. Look a my previous posts. The HD-DVD player can decode wmv files that are on a disc. You can use xml/css to create menus and chapters points, PIP and more. Go here http://blogs.msdn.com/ptorr/archive/2006/11/07/live-vs-loaded-dom.aspx to get more info on how to play wmv files.

I am doing a poor mans author. Look a my previous posts. The HD-DVD player can decode wmv files that are on a disc. You can use xml/css to create menus and chapters points, PIP and more. Go here http://blogs.msdn.com/ptorr/archive/2006/11/07/live-vs-loaded-dom.aspx to get more info on how to play wmv files.
I understand the iHD side, and it's very powerful. But without being able to "create" a "valid" video stream, we're not much better off than with MF5. The video on the disc has to be in an HDDVD acceptable format. This requires something a little different for each codec: elementary streams for VC1, an EVO/MAP (?) for MPEG2, or ????? for AVC. If we can find out how to "package" the video for the disc, then we're home free.

So, apparently you've had success with wmv clips. Do you just drop the clips into HVDVD_TS and reference them directly from VPLST000.XPL? In other words, do you drop test.wmv into HVDVD_TS, then use the following:

<PrimaryAudioVideoClip
titleTimeBegin="00:00:00:00"
titleTimeEnd="00:00:20:00"
src="file:///dvddisc/HVDVD_TS/test.wmv"
dataSource="Disc">
<Video track="1" />
<Audio track="1" streamNumber="1" />
</PrimaryAudioVideoClip>

Will this work for any wmv clip, or does it have to be HDDVD compliant? I'll be testing all of this shortly, but just wanted to get some background from your experience so far. Thanks DarthJedi!

I understand the iHD side, and it's very powerful. But without being able to "create" a "valid" video stream, we're not much better off than with MF5. The video on the disc has to be in an HDDVD acceptable format. This requires something a little different for each codec: elementary streams for VC1, an EVO/MAP (?) for MPEG2, or ????? for AVC. If we can find out how to "package" the video for the disc, then we're home free.

So, apparently you've had success with wmv clips. Do you just drop the clips into HVDVD_TS and reference them directly from VPLST000.XPL? In other words, do you drop test.wmv into HVDVD_TS, then use the following:

<PrimaryAudioVideoClip
titleTimeBegin="00:00:00:00"
titleTimeEnd="00:00:20:00"
src="file:///dvddisc/HVDVD_TS/test.wmv"
dataSource="Disc">
<Video track="1" />
<Audio track="1" streamNumber="1" />
</PrimaryAudioVideoClip>

Will this work for any wmv clip, or does it have to be HDDVD compliant? I'll be testing all of this shortly, but just wanted to get some background from your experience so far. Thanks DarthJedi!


It has worked for all of my Smallville converts so far. I used a template from the sight so I could have some basic menus, but you get the gist.

I stumbled on this by accident and have only been doing this for the last two weeks. Give it a try and let us know how you made out.

It has worked for all of my Smallville converts so far. I used a template from the sight so I could have some basic menus, but you get the gist.
Ok, so can you tell me anything about your "converts"? What was the original file format (MPEG2 TS, AVI, MP4)? What settings did you use in WME-SE to convert the file to wmv? Forget about the menus and xml for a moment - anything/everything you can tell me about the video itself would be most appreciated.

The HD-DVD player can decode wmv files that are on a disc. to get more info on how to play wmv files.

I checked the link and could not find where it explains how to play a wmv file with an HD DVD player (unless you refering to the PIP window link), I would apreciate if you could point me to the rigth place. TIA

Ok, so can you tell me anything about your "converts"? What was the original file format (MPEG2 TS, AVI, MP4)? What settings did you use in WME-SE to convert the file to wmv? Forget about the menus and xml for a moment - anything/everything you can tell me about the video itself would be most appreciated.I used HDTVtoMPEG to convert my TS files to mpeg files. I then used auto Gordian Knot to generate the avisynth script (720p 24fps) which I then used in WME-SE . The audio converted in the standard WME using AC3filter. I combined the 2 files using Windows Media Stream editor. I then used my edited template and place my files in the appropriate file structure burned it to a dvd5 disc. The Toshiba took forever to load, but it did work with zero pops or choppy play.

Sorry my other post were very quick but I am at work and have to be quick.

I understand the iHD side, and it's very powerful. But without being able to "create" a "valid" video stream, we're not much better off than with MF5. The video on the disc has to be in an HDDVD acceptable format. This requires something a little different for each codec: elementary streams for VC1, an EVO/MAP (?) for MPEG2, or ????? for AVC. If we can find out how to "package" the video for the disc, then we're home free.

So, apparently you've had success with wmv clips. Do you just drop the clips into HVDVD_TS and reference them directly from VPLST000.XPL? In other words, do you drop test.wmv into HVDVD_TS, then use the following:

<PrimaryAudioVideoClip
titleTimeBegin="00:00:00:00"
titleTimeEnd="00:00:20:00"
src="file:///dvddisc/HVDVD_TS/test.wmv"
dataSource="Disc">
<Video track="1" />
<Audio track="1" streamNumber="1" />
</PrimaryAudioVideoClip>

Will this work for any wmv clip, or does it have to be HDDVD compliant? I'll be testing all of this shortly, but just wanted to get some background from your experience so far. Thanks DarthJedi!

Texmex -
The fact that you can give a source location (src="file:///dvddisc/HVDVD_TS/test.wmv" ) is intriguing. It iplies that you can also play clips from a network/internet location.

I just wish I understood XML even slightly, because almost all of this is Greek to me.

Texmex -
The fact that you can give a source location (src="file:///dvddisc/HVDVD_TS/test.wmv" ) is intriguing. It iplies that you can also play clips from a network/internet location.

I just wish I understood XML even slightly, because almost all of this is Greek to me. I have not tried to play over my network but I will try it tonight and get back to you.

Texmex -
The fact that you can give a source location (src="file:///dvddisc/HVDVD_TS/test.wmv" ) is intriguing. It iplies that you can also play clips from a network/internet location.

I just wish I understood XML even slightly, because almost all of this is Greek to me.

It is very intriguing, and you're correct in that you can play clips from a network location. However, I think that functionality is only allowed with AACS encoded discs. Without using AACS, my understanding is that only a subset of functionality is allowed, and from what I've read, network access is not part of that subset (along with access to persistent storage).

I used HDTVtoMPEG to convert my TS files to mpeg files. I then used auto Gordian Knot to generate the avisynth script (720p 24fps) which I then used in WME-SE . The audio converted in the standard WME using AC3filter. I combined the 2 files using Windows Media Stream editor. I then used my edited template and place my files in the appropriate file structure burned it to a dvd5 disc. The Toshiba took forever to load, but it did work with zero pops or choppy play.

Sorry my other post were very quick but I am at work and have to be quick.


Thanks DarthJedi - this is exciting stuff and I'm going to play around and see where I can take this.

ULead DVD MovieFactory Studio Pro Edition, which should be available this winter, can use VC-1 and AVC instead only MPEG2. I should get a free copy from my boss when it arrives. Will let you know how it works.

ULead DVD MovieFactory Studio Pro Edition, which should be available this winter, can use VC-1 and AVC instead only MPEG2. I should get a free copy from my boss when it arrives. Will let you know how it works.

Should be interesting. Can it encode VC-1 or AVC from MPEG2, or do you need another tool? Any idea on pricing?

Thanks DarthJedi - this is exciting stuff and I'm going to play around and see where I can take this.

Here are some template files to play with
Template files (http://blogs.msdn.com/ptorr/attachment/602465.ashx )

I used HDTVtoMPEG to convert my TS files to mpeg files. I then used auto Gordian Knot to generate the avisynth script (720p 24fps) which I then used in WME-SE.


What do you mean by use in WME-SE? What is the process here? Are you adding the *.avs file as a source?

When I do this and hit encode I get the following message.

"Class not registered (REGDB_E_CLASSNOTREG)"

I don't know if ULead DVD MovieFactory Studio Pro Edition can encode VC-1 from MPEG2 Sources. But i don't think so. It only creates the container for HD DVD. But there are several tools out for converting MPEG2 to AVC or bettr VC-1, like Canopus ProCoder.

What do you mean by use in WME-SE? What is the process here? Are you adding the *.avs file as a source?

When I do this and hit encode I get the following message.

"Class not registered (REGDB_E_CLASSNOTREG)"yes.

I don't know why you are getting that message. Do you have auto grodian knot installed?

I do have AGK installed. I started over and it worked.

I did the following steps I did the first time when it didn't work; TS --> Mpeg2repair -> Womble fixing GOP and converting to mpg -> Ran through AGK -> made one small mod to the resulting *.avs file (set removegrain to mode = 1 instead of 2, don't want too much softening) -> Loaded into WME-SE using the *.avs file as the video input. Viola, she is a finished.

Darth - thanks for the tips.

ULead DVD MovieFactory Studio Pro Edition, which should be available this winter, can use VC-1 and AVC instead only MPEG2. I should get a free copy from my boss when it arrives. Will let you know how it works.
I talked with Ulead guys in Barcelona, at the DVD Forum Conference yesterday. They didn't mention that application at all, but they did talk about "HD Creater" which will support VC-1, transport streams and maybe 720p streams as well. It's got Memory-Tech's muxer built-in, and it's basically the same very very expensive muxer as the one used by authoring shops.

I used HDTVtoMPEG to convert my TS files to mpeg files. I then used auto Gordian Knot to generate the avisynth script (720p 24fps) which I then used in WME-SE . The audio converted in the standard WME using AC3filter. I combined the 2 files using Windows Media Stream editor. I then used my edited template and place my files in the appropriate file structure burned it to a dvd5 disc. The Toshiba took forever to load, but it did work with zero pops or choppy play.

I created a VC1 stream using a method similar to the one you describe (Avisynth, WME-SE, WMStreamEditor), but it won't play in the Tosh - ERROR 4094C504 (Video Controller Error). Are you changing any of the default settings in WME-SE? FWIW, the "project" did play in the simulator. I'm not using any menus or 'applications'. I just create the playlist and identify the title. The only errors that HDDVDValidator identifies have to do with the video source. I'm surprised that you get audio on the Tosh - wma is not a "supported" codec in HDDVD.

For those of you following along, this authoring method has potential, but we need to identify the proper video format. Technically, we need a muxer to get the video in HDDVD compliant format (for any of the three codecs - MPEG2, VC1, AVC).

Movie Factory 5 and VideoStudio 10+ do not recognize 720p as a valid HD-DVD format.

Which version of VS10 makes HD DVDs? I've gone to their website and they are selling v10.5 but no mention of creating HD DVD. There is a mention of a beta program, but no details.

It is very intriguing, and you're correct in that you can play clips from a network location. However, I think that functionality is only allowed with AACS encoded discs. Without using AACS, my understanding is that only a subset of functionality is allowed, and from what I've read, network access is not part of that subset (along with access to persistent storage).
I wonder what is involved in adding AACS to our own disks? The reason I'm asking is that it seems to me that playing clips from a network location has the most amazing potential. In theory the disk only needs code to navigate to a network location and then let the user select what to play. Thus the HD DVD player becomes a simple to use front end to a media server.

In the very insignificant news category, I was able to author an HD DVD of Discovery HD Theater's "Road Trip" (possibly the most superficial travelogue ever created). I mention it only because it was one of those shows I was never able to get to work with Womble. It edited just fine, but save options were limited to VCD resolutions for some reason I could never figure out. I edited an episode of the show in VideoRedo (since the beta allows us to edit there without those interminable load waits) and it created the normal MPEG without issue.

Thanks again for the secret key to VideoRedo. Womble is becoming a more and more distant memory, although I still find that the occasional show still gags VideoRedo and I have to resort to Womble. Between them, I can't remember the last time I had an attempt fail.

Thanks again for the secret key to VideoRedo.
Joe-
What secret key are you referring to? The new beta version, or something in the new beta version. I'm still having trouble with VideoRedo creating files that MF5 can read in reliably. Specifically, I took a VideoRedo output that MF5 would not load quickly and passed it through VideoRedo again. MF5 still took forever to read in the file.

I think he's referring to the latest VRD beta.

Joe-
What secret key are you referring to? The new beta version, or something in the new beta version. I'm still having trouble with VideoRedo creating files that MF5 can read in reliably. Specifically, I took a VideoRedo output that MF5 would not load quickly and passed it through VideoRedo again. MF5 still took forever to read in the file.

The latest VideoRedo beta allows you to set an option that has solved all the slow loading problems I used to have. It's a change I made in the guide from a post I read here. The instructions are in the section on using VideoRedo. You'll love it.

DarthJedi: how about giving a 720p/60 VC-1 WMV file a go? There are two such files on my company website here. (http://digitalfoundry.org/showcase/high_definition.html)

I encoded them using Windows Media Encoder with the AP upgrade, as opposed to the 'final' version of the encoder bundled into Windows Media Player 11, so there's a chance they'll be 'out of date' but they look pretty good and I'd be interested to see how the A1 works with them.

Does anyone know a program that will re-encode h264 to movie fatcory compatible hd mpeg 2?

Question:

How do you guys handle the splitting of the .ts file? I've been using TSSplitter 1.0 using the DVD-R DL profile and am finding after running through the process that my end HD_DVD folders are ending up anywhere from 7.5 to 7.75GB in size; leaving about 500-750MB of unused space for a DVD+R DL.

Any recommendations?

I use my own sw called Chunker to split mpeg ts and ps files into pieces that fit on DVD5. I guessed, and confirmed by trial, that one can in practice break up a ts at any 188-byte block boundary, and a ps at any 2048-byte boundary, and all the editors and players I use have no trouble with picking up at the start of any of the pieces. (In theory this could lead to problems, depending on how frequently the control streams data is repeated in the file, but in practice I've never had any problems - with 6TB in the cabinet and still going).

I guess you are using DVD9, which I mostly don't, because of the big difference in $/GB, problems with burn quality, and doubts about durability.

I found a Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive yesterday at a nearby CC and grabbed it. I've been working through the procedures here for making HD-DVDs on red laser media, in test mode, with 4-5 minute chunks of three programs captured from cable on my HTPC, one from a 1080i commercial series (A), one from a 720p commercial series (B), and one from a 1080i non-commercial movie (C).

I have been using VideoRedo for cutting commercials for quite a while, so I am using that (rather than any of the Womble or free tools) for working with the files, and I got the trial version of Ulead Movie Factory. I have been able to make burns on DVD5 media of (A) and (C) that is both of the 1080i programs, that play in the X360 drive. I'm having some difficulty persuading MF to not convert the 720p program, and will have another go at the process ~tomorrow.

The drive tray can be operated without powering up the console unit, which is handy for unloading or loading media. When I power up the X360 console with a HD-DVD5 in the external drive, the video starts up automatically after the console boots, and it takes 28 seconds from hitting the power button to the first frame of video on the screen. If I load a HD-DVD5 with the console already running, it takes 15 seconds to start video. The unit responds "instantly" to remote control operations. This compares well to what I have heard about the tosh, though I have not seen one in action. Commercial HD-DVDs look a little better than what I am used to on HD movie channels on cable.

The HD-DVD5s I burned look as good as playing back the original transport streams using a MyHD (MDP-130) board on the PC, even though that is over DVI and the X360 is over component video. Playback on (A) is perfect; on (C) there seem to be a few minor "crackles" in the audio and a few odd moments in the video (slowing, speeding) which put it near the low end of acceptable (I still need to re-check the original for glitches that might be the source of those problems).

I have some questions, too, especially about audio, but I'll put them in another post later.

I will note that a key point to getting this to work was to set the header max bit rate value down from the 38Mb value that gets derived from the cable transport stream, to something under 25Mb, when converting from transport stream (or remuxing) in VideoRedo (I'm using 20Mb) ; otherwise MF insists on resampling the entire video stream, taking a really long time to produce a rather poor result. This is mentioned in some recent posts but really should be in the guide.

I have a h.264 stream and an AC3 stream. Is there anyway I can get these on an HD-DVD without having to reencode the video stream?

Thanks,

I found a Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive yesterday at a nearby CC and grabbed it. I've been working through the procedures here for making HD-DVDs on red laser media, in test mode, with 4-5 minute chunks of three programs captured from cable on my HTPC, one from a 1080i commercial series (A), one from a 720p commercial series (B), and one from a 1080i non-commercial movie (C).

I have been using VideoRedo for cutting commercials for quite a while, so I am using that (rather than any of the Womble or free tools) for working with the files, and I got the trial version of Ulead Movie Factory. I have been able to make burns on DVD5 media of (A) and (C) that is both of the 1080i programs, that play in the X360 drive. I'm having some difficulty persuading MF to not convert the 720p program, and will have another go at the process ~tomorrow.

The drive tray can be operated without powering up the console unit, which is handy for unloading or loading media. When I power up the X360 console with a HD-DVD5 in the external drive, the video starts up automatically after the console boots, and it takes 28 seconds from hitting the power button to the first frame of video on the screen. If I load a HD-DVD5 with the console already running, it takes 15 seconds to start video. The unit responds "instantly" to remote control operations. This compares well to what I have heard about the tosh, though I have not seen one in action. Commercial HD-DVDs look a little better than what I am used to on HD movie channels on cable.

The HD-DVD5s I burned look as good as playing back the original transport streams using a MyHD (MDP-130) board on the PC, even though that is over DVI and the X360 is over component video. Playback on (A) is perfect; on (C) there seem to be a few minor "crackles" in the audio and a few odd moments in the video (slowing, speeding) which put it near the low end of acceptable (I still need to re-check the original for glitches that might be the source of those problems).

I have some questions, too, especially about audio, but I'll put them in another post later.

I will note that a key point to getting this to work was to set the header max bit rate value down from the 38Mb value that gets derived from the cable transport stream, to something under 25Mb, when converting from transport stream (or remuxing) in VideoRedo (I'm using 20Mb) ; otherwise MF insists on resampling the entire video stream, taking a really long time to produce a rather poor result. This is mentioned in some recent posts but really should be in the guide.

Thanks, Tom. Interesting to hear about the X-Box tests.

As for your problems with VideoRedo, I've never had to adjust any bitrate settings for captures I've made from the MyHD 130 (OTA recordings in St. Louis) or from Dish captures via the Nextcom R5000. I did make a minor change to the guide recently. Take a look again at the section on using VideoRedo. The long delays some of us were experiencing have disappeared completely (at least for me). Again, though, this is without making any changes to bitrate settings - just asking VideoRedo to create the program stream (MPEG) from the transport stream (.ts). If your cable signals and MyHD signals require different settings, please detail exactly what you do and I'll put it in the guide.

I have a h.264 stream and an AC3 stream. Is there anyway I can get these on an HD-DVD without having to reencode the video stream?

Thanks,
As far as I know, at the moment the answer is no. Wait for Ulead's HD Creater, it supports AVC (i.e. h.264).

As far as I know, at the moment the answer is no. Wait for Ulead's HD Creater, it supports AVC (i.e. h.264).

Any news about Nero HD-DVD authoring tool for h.264 ?

RedDog']Does anyone know a program that will re-encode h264 to movie fatcory compatible hd mpeg 2?

Pretty much any mpeg HD encoder should do it, I imagine. Reading the h264 stream is exactly the same as when you play it.

If your mpeg encoder doesn't like h264, then you could probably use avisynth to frameserve it in.

A quick FYI, folks. In the past I've been able to burn perfectly working red laser HD DVDs with Roxio's Record Now 8. A while back I installed Roxio Media Creator 9 in the same PC, and it messed up something. Now I can't burn HD DVDs with either one.

Thanks, Tom. Interesting to hear about the X-Box tests.

As for your problems with VideoRedo, I've never had to adjust any bitrate settings for captures I've made from the MyHD 130 (OTA recordings in St. Louis) or from Dish captures via the Nextcom R5000. I did make a minor change to the guide recently. Take a look again at the section on using VideoRedo. The long delays some of us were experiencing have disappeared completely (at least for me). Again, though, this is without making any changes to bitrate settings - just asking VideoRedo to create the program stream (MPEG) from the transport stream (.ts). If your cable signals and MyHD signals require different settings, please detail exactly what you do and I'll put it in the guide.

Joseph, many thanks to you and all here for the pioneering work to start getting HD material onto red laser discs! I will elaborate my experiences so far, but! :o Some readers may prefer to skip to the end of this post for the net conclusion.

I had just re-studied the updated guide section on VRD, I am using version 491 and made the manual setting to "Add GOP timecode to all GOPs" (THANK YOU for that info!) . I don't consider that I am having a problem with VRD, at all; and I have not had the "slow opening " problem (except on files that I made with VRD before I had that option set - and WOW when it's slow, it's REALLY slow). All of the video I had been working with started as firewire captures of HD transport stream from cable box (Moto 6200). All evidently had header settings indicating the official main/high max bit rate of 38Mb. I never had any reason to change this before in VRD (on this kind of material) so when I cut and/or converted them I indicated "no change" to the bit rate. My understanding from long use and discussion with VRD is that the bit rate setting on its output dialog does 2 things: it sets the header max bit rate values and affects its mux's timestamp calculation, with the main consideration being, if you set it too low then it gets underflows and the output file playback is noticeably choppy. So, when I leave it "unchanged", my mpg file headers say max bit rate is 38M. When I feed said file to MF, it evidently concludes "max bit rate exceeds HDDVD standard, must resample entire file". It does this at "burn" time, not at file open, and takes about 7x real time to do under the conditions I have been testing. But, if I do nothing else different other than change the Video Properties/Bit Rate to something smaller e.g. 20Mb on the Options dialog from the VRD Save dialog, and feed that file to MF, then MF does not resample the video and completes the Burn process in better than real time.

I have been using the MDP130 for playback-only for quite a while (though I recently added the ability to schedule it to my capture software, for times when I need to capture two programs at one time :D ). I just did a small capture of an HD cable channel (40 seconds of 1080i) on the MDP 130, and the header values as captured that way are the same as I get over firewire (according to VRD "Tools/Show video program info"), indicating main/high with a max bit rate of 38Mb/s. Then I converted that to program streams file in VRD, 2 ways: first leaving the bit rate "unchanged", then changing it to 20M. MF5, with its "do not convert compliant video" option on, and with its 1920x1080 preset selected so it expects to output up to 25Mbps, reacts to these two files differently from each other and in exactly the same ways as above: for the "unchanged" file, it spends many times real time "Converting video of the title..." (in this case over 7 minutes), but MF5 with the same settings "burned" the "bit rate 20M" file without "Converting video of the title..." at all, and finished its entire "burn" process in better than real time (in this case 37 sec). BTW, I binary-compared the two files as output by VRD and they are bit-for-bit identical except for one difference (5EC0B2A9 vs 30D432A9) that re-occurs 81 times, about every 820K throughout the files. I'm going to have to scare up some mpeg doc to figure what that diff signifies.

{AH another kind of difference: if I read you right, you are capturing OTA from an antenna with the MDP130, but as there is absolutely no OTA signal where my house is located, my MDP130 captures are off the cable, using its QAM tuner, and I suppose there could be some differences introduced into the stream by the cable co's processing at the headend before they insert it onto the cable.}

I'm guessing some may not encounter this effect for a couple of possible reasons, one if you are using the HDPatch program e.g. on 720p material then you are modifying the header bitrate that way, and/or you may have at some point in the past changed the output bit rate setting in VRD and selected "Remember these settings", or there may be other VRD settings that have an impact.


I sincerely, truly apologize if all that seems a bit pedantic (it does to me :o ). This seemed simple when I "got" it, I saw a similar point in an earlier post, and tried to say it simply the first time, but evidently failed to convince and/or to convey what I intended?


Anyway, here is my net take from this, for anyone who does not want to suffer through the above:


One thing that is necessary in order for MF5 to consider the mpg file you feed it to be "compliant" and thus be willing to skip "converting" it, is for the file's header value for max bit rate to be within the HD-DVD spec. One way to ensure this when using VideoRedo is to set the bit rate to 20M in its Save/Options dialog. Doing so may not be necessary in all circumstances, but it should always be "safe" as long as the actual max bit rate in the video is less than that, which it almost certainly will be (the highest actual that I have yet seen was around 18M).

Regarding HDpatch, do I check the "first header only" box or should I let it alter all of them? The guide says patching is nearly instantaneous but with the box unchecked it does them all and it takes a few minutes. The guide doesn't specify the correct setting.

Pretty much any mpeg HD encoder should do it, I imagine. Reading the h264 stream is exactly the same as when you play it.

If your mpeg encoder doesn't like h264, then you could probably use avisynth to frameserve it in.


Its not that I cant find anything to read the h264. The only all in one programs I have found will only convert to dvd res. I've done some searching but havent come up with anything. I was hoping someone here knew of the software that would do it.

Joseph, many thanks to you and all here for the pioneering work to start getting HD material onto red laser discs! I will elaborate my experiences so far, but! :o Some readers may prefer to skip to the end of this post for the net conclusion.

I had just re-studied the updated guide section on VRD, I am using version 491 and made the manual setting to "Add GOP timecode to all GOPs" (THANK YOU for that info!) . I don't consider that I am having a problem with VRD, at all; and I have not had the "slow opening " problem (except on files that I made with VRD before I had that option set - and WOW when it's slow, it's REALLY slow). All of the video I had been working with started as firewire captures of HD transport stream from cable box (Moto 6200). All evidently had header settings indicating the official main/high max bit rate of 38Mb. I never had any reason to change this before in VRD (on this kind of material) so when I cut and/or converted them I indicated "no change" to the bit rate. My understanding from long use and discussion with VRD is that the bit rate setting on its output dialog does 2 things: it sets the header max bit rate values and affects its mux's timestamp calculation, with the main consideration being, if you set it too low then it gets underflows and the output file playback is noticeably choppy. So, when I leave it "unchanged", my mpg file headers say max bit rate is 38M. When I feed said file to MF, it evidently concludes "max bit rate exceeds HDDVD standard, must resample entire file". It does this at "burn" time, not at file open, and takes about 7x real time to do under the conditions I have been testing. But, if I do nothing else different other than change the Video Properties/Bit Rate to something smaller e.g. 20Mb on the Options dialog from the VRD Save dialog, and feed that file to MF, then MF does not resample the video and completes the Burn process in better than real time.

I have been using the MDP130 for playback-only for quite a while (though I recently added the ability to schedule it to my capture software, for times when I need to capture two programs at one time :D ). I just did a small capture of an HD cable channel (40 seconds of 1080i) on the MDP 130, and the header values as captured that way are the same as I get over firewire (according to VRD "Tools/Show video program info"), indicating main/high with a max bit rate of 38Mb/s. Then I converted that to program streams file in VRD, 2 ways: first leaving the bit rate "unchanged", then changing it to 20M. MF5, with its "do not convert compliant video" option on, and with its 1920x1080 preset selected so it expects to output up to 25Mbps, reacts to these two files differently from each other and in exactly the same ways as above: for the "unchanged" file, it spends many times real time "Converting video of the title..." (in this case over 7 minutes), but MF5 with the same settings "burned" the "bit rate 20M" file without "Converting video of the title..." at all, and finished its entire "burn" process in better than real time (in this case 37 sec). BTW, I binary-compared the two files as output by VRD and they are bit-for-bit identical except for one difference (5EC0B2A9 vs 30D432A9) that re-occurs 81 times, about every 820K throughout the files. I'm going to have to scare up some mpeg doc to figure what that diff signifies.

{AH another kind of difference: if I read you right, you are capturing OTA from an antenna with the MDP130, but as there is absolutely no OTA signal where my house is located, my MDP130 captures are off the cable, using its QAM tuner, and I suppose there could be some differences introduced into the stream by the cable co's processing at the headend before they insert it onto the cable.}

I'm guessing some may not encounter this effect for a couple of possible reasons, one if you are using the HDPatch program e.g. on 720p material then you are modifying the header bitrate that way, and/or you may have at some point in the past changed the output bit rate setting in VRD and selected "Remember these settings", or there may be other VRD settings that have an impact.


I sincerely, truly apologize if all that seems a bit pedantic (it does to me :o ). This seemed simple when I "got" it, I saw a similar point in an earlier post, and tried to say it simply the first time, but evidently failed to convince and/or to convey what I intended?


Anyway, here is my net take from this, for anyone who does not want to suffer through the above:


One thing that is necessary in order for MF5 to consider the mpg file you feed it to be "compliant" and thus be willing to skip "converting" it, is for the file's header value for max bit rate to be within the HD-DVD spec. One way to ensure this when using VideoRedo is to set the bit rate to 20M in its Save/Options dialog. Doing so may not be necessary in all circumstances, but it should always be "safe" as long as the actual max bit rate in the video is less than that, which it almost certainly will be (the highest actual that I have yet seen was around 18M).

Guide Change Alert

I added your instructions to the guide at the end under frequently asked questions. Thanks. Hopefully, others who may have experienced this issue will benefit from your solution.

Since I have Dish and not cable, I decided to experiment a little with the technique. My experience was different with a capture of "Twins" from Dish. VideoRedo informed me in "Video Program Information" that the "Bit Rate:" was 65.000 Mbps, well above what seemed to cause the problems for you with your Moto captures. I ran a few minutes of "Twins" through VideoRedo without changing the "Bit Rate:" settings at all (as I always have) and couldn't duplicate your problem. MF5 didn't force a reencode.

Perhaps there is some other difference in the source videos from Dish vs. cable.

ok worked great on the hd-dvd xbox360 addon burning to dvd5 :)
now working with mpeg2 with DTS, not so lucky was really out of sync :P
was wondering what program if any could tell me how many ms the dts was off, Also curious as to why the dts track might of been off after pulling the data out of the .ts

ok worked great on the hd-dvd xbox360 addon burning to dvd5 :)

Have you or anyone else tried the 360 add-on with DVD9's? I tried a couple I have and I was getting major stuttering and audio dropouts. They would play just fine in my Toshiba A1. I do not have any DVD5's at the moment to try and I'm wondering if the problem I had was related to the dual layers.

Guide Change Alert

I added your instructions to the guide at the end under frequently asked questions. Thanks. Hopefully, others who may have experienced this issue will benefit from your solution.

Since I have Dish and not cable, I decided to experiment a little with the technique. My experience was different with a capture of "Twins" from Dish. VideoRedo informed me in "Video Program Information" that the "Bit Rate:" was 65.000 Mbps, well above what seemed to cause the problems for you with your Moto captures. I ran a few minutes of "Twins" through VideoRedo without changing the "Bit Rate:" settings at all (as I always have) and couldn't duplicate your problem. MF5 didn't force a reencode.

Perhaps there is some other difference in the source videos from Dish vs. cable.


The way I found out about the cable/firewire issue was looking at the bit rate number through HDPatch. This is not the same number that MF5 says the bit rate is. In my opinion this should be added to the FAQ because you don't need to use VideoRedo to fix this problem:

Q: My input file in MF5 is 1920x1080i but it still tries to re-encode.

A: Check the bit rate in HDPatch. In cable/firewire captured files and some satellite captures, this bit rate is much higher than it actually is. Change the bit rate to 25000000 with HDPatch (first header only) and try again. MF5 should now take your file without reencoding.

-Bret

Have you or anyone else tried the 360 add-on with DVD9's? I tried a couple I have and I was getting major stuttering and audio dropouts. They would play just fine in my Toshiba A1. I do not have any DVD5's at the moment to try and I'm wondering if the problem I had was related to the dual layers.
It could very well be the drive in the add-on is a lot pickier about media and/or burn quality. The drives in A1/XA1 were manufactured by Nec, and the ones in the add-on are by TSST (i.e. Toshiba Samsung).

The way I found out about the cable/firewire issue was looking at the bit rate number through HDPatch. This is not the same number that MF5 says the bit rate is. In my opinion this should be added to the FAQ because you don't need to use VideoRedo to fix this problem:

Q: My input file in MF5 is 1920x1080i but it still tries to re-encode.

A: Check the bit rate in HDPatch. In cable/firewire captured files and some satellite captures, this bit rate is much higher than it actually is. Change the bit rate to 25000000 with HDPatch (first header only) and try again. MF5 should now take your file without reencoding.

-Bret

Can anyone else verify this? As I said, I tried a file with a reported bitrate of 65Mbps and MF5 had no problem with it. I didn't run it through HDPatch, but I did use the latest VideoRedo beta. Before I change the guide again, I'd like to make sure what it is that's happening and why it's working.

Also, does this technique have anything to do with the slow loads when pulling the file into MF5?

Regarding HDpatch, do I check the "first header only" box or should I let it alter all of them? The guide says patching is nearly instantaneous but with the box unchecked it does them all and it takes a few minutes. The guide doesn't specify the correct setting.

In what context Jesse? Are you using HDPatch because your file is 720p or because it's 1088? For 720p you only need to patch the first header. For 1088 I recommend patching the entire stream. If you're patching to fix the bitrate, you only need to patch the first header.

Can anyone else verify this? As I said, I tried a file with a reported bitrate of 65Mbps and MF5 had no problem with it. I didn't run it through HDPatch, but I did use the latest VideoRedo beta. Before I change the guide again, I'd like to make sure what it is that's happening and why it's working.

Also, does this technique have anything to do with the slow loads when pulling the file into MF5?


OK, I tried some re-testing freshly extracting a ~100MB, ~63 second chunk from a 1080i, firewire-captured transport stream file with a header data rate of 38Mbit, doing six variations as shown below (I made a nice table but it looked like crap when I previewed it).

For file open times I give two numbers, the first is the time from clicking the file in the file open dialog until that dialog becomes responsive again (file name is echoed to the input field), the second is the time from clicking OK on the file open dialog until the main UI becomes responsive again (Cancel button turns yellow with the mouse hovered over it). All times in seconds, determined by eyeballing the second hand on my watch for the file opens, and or the MF5 UI for the burns.


Case 1 - VRD GOP Timecode option = TRUE, VRD Bitrate setting = unch, HDpatch? Yes
open: 1 + 10, burn: 13, convert video: no

Case 2 - VRD GOP Timecode option = TRUE, VRD Bitrate setting = unch, HDpatch? No
open: 12 + 10, burn: 736, convert video: yes

Case 3 - VRD GOP Timecode option = FALSE, VRD Bitrate setting = unch, HDpatch? Yes
open: 36 + 34, burn: 22, convert video: no

Case 4 - VRD GOP Timecode option = FALSE, VRD Bitrate setting = unch, HDpatch? No
open: 38 + 27, burn: 6700est, convert video: yes yes yes

Case 5 - VRD GOP Timecode option = TRUE, VRD Bitrate setting = 20M, HDpatch? Yes
open: 1 + 11, burn: 13, convert video: no

Case 6 - VRD GOP Timecode option = TRUE, VRD Bitrate setting = 20M, HDpatch? No
open: 1 + 10, burn: 13, convert video: no

Case 7 - VRD GOP Timecode option = FALSE, VRD Bitrate setting = 20M, HDpatch? Yes
open: 50 + 38, burn: 23, convert video: no

Case 8 - VRD GOP Timecode option = FALSE, VRD Bitrate setting = 20M, HDpatch? No
open: 51 + 37, burn: 26, convert video: no




From these results I would agree with bret3d, that it is not necessary to use VRD bit rate setting to persuade MF to not "convert" the video, you can use HDpatch to do this if you already have a mpg file that has this problem. But, if you are using VRD to convert from TS to PS, then you definitely need the GOP Timecode option set to TRUE, and you might as well go ahead and change the bit rate setting at the same time.

For this material, MF5 seems to have a really really hard time "converting" the video if the header bit rate is left at 38M and the GOP Timecode option is left to FALSE. Not that anyone should ever be letting MF5 "convert" their video anyway.

Not shown above, when the file open was slow, so were other operations, e.g. changing the project settings took a comparable length of time to file open (groan).

As for slow file opens, it appears there are two effects, with the GOP Timecode TRUE setting fixing the bigger one (cases 1 vs 3 and 2 vs 4), and the header bit rate setting contributing to the smaller one (cases 1 vs 2 and 2 vs 5&6).

I think there my be some more insight to be teased out from 7 & 8, but am getting crosseyed for now.

I have to note that for 7 & 8 I needed to re-establish my selection in the input file in VRD, and got off by a frame or 2, making the file ever-so-slightly different and about 200k smaller. I do not believe this had any significant impact on the results.

Is there any software that will allow my to re-encode just a part of a transport stream (or even a program stream, I could convert the TS to PS, has to happen eventually to make HD-DVD) ? Specifically I want to encode the end credits at a lower bitrate to try and squeeze a few titles I have onto a 'HD9'. They're a few hundred megs too large (200-400MB or so) and the credits run for like 4 or 5 minutes at least, so I'm willing to sacrifice some quality there to fit the whole thing. I could just cut the end off, but I'd rather not.

Alternatively, anything that can re-encode the whole thing in a sane amount of time to be slightly lower bitrate and maintain very good quality (like DVD Shrink does, it's quite fast at shaving bits (I almost think that might be what it literally does) and the quality is almost always near indestinguishable from original even when you've shaved a few percent of file size off) ?

I just tried splitting a TS, re-encoding the end of it w/ tmpgenc and muxing it back together with its audio and copy /b the untouched and reencoded parts together.. when it hits the change it just stops playing. Might need to find some way to fix the timestamps ?

Is there any software...
http://www.intercom.co.jp/english/transcoder/index.html

Transcodes MPEG2 Program streams and does a wonderful job. You can't tell it to transcode only a part of the stream, however, but there are workarounds for that, as always.

http://www.cyberlink.com/multi/products/main_3_ENU.html

CyberLink PowerProducer 4
# Capture High-Definition videos and produce Blu-ray Discs
# Create HD DVDs and DVDs for playing on a home player

I have a couple questions after trying the process described in the first thread. Here's what I did:

1. Captured an episode of a HDTV program (1 hour long 720p w/commercials) with my Fusion5 HDTV card to a .tp file. note: this broadcast should have been AC3 audio

2. Opened the .tp file in VideoRedo (trial version with key they sent) and cut out the commercials and sections I didn't want. Then followed the instructions to the letter to convert to a program stream. Only thing I was confused about was the step that says "Add GOP Timecode to all GOPs" - I didn't see this option exactly, instead there was something like it. When finished this gave me an .mpg file.

3. Used HDPatch to change the first header to 720p patch. This seemed to work fine - it completed instantly.

4. I opened my .mpg file in Movie Factory 5 (trial version with key they sent me). Where the movie is supposed to display nothing would. It didn't show up at all. I wasn't sure if it was still reading it in, but it didn't really sound like my hard drive was still working. I used all the options it said to use, and when I looked at the file info about the .mpg, it showed that the file audio was somethign like "stereo PCM 44.1kHz", which should not be correct. This was an AC3 broadcast, and I thought that just got wrapped into the .tp file with the video stream while it was recording.

so my questions:

1. what happened to the audio? Why didn't it show up in MF5 as AC3 instead of "stereo PCM 44.1kHz"? Did I do something wrong? I want to make sure the burned disc has the true dolby digital 5.1 sound on it.

2. How come the video didn't load in MF5? Is it normal for it to read the file but not be able to play it back in the viewer?

3. I also noticed that the file size requirement that MF5 said it would need on the DVD was much larger than the .mpg. The .mpg was a lot smaller than I thought it would be - only about 3.5 GB for a 40 min movie in 720p, but MF5 said it would need close to 5.5 GB even without any menus. Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks very much! This'll be wonderful when I can get the process streamlined.

Chris, you say you "Used HDPatch to change the first header to 720p patch". Surely you're meant to patch the file into 1080i and not 720p? The fact that MF5 wants to 'bloat' the file from 3.5GB to 5.5GB means that MF5 is not happy with the file and wants to re-encode it. Sounds like you're feeding it a 720p stream and it wants to re-encode it into 1080i.

Chris, you say you "Used HDPatch to change the first header to 720p patch". Surely you're meant to patch the file into 1080i and not 720p? The fact that MF5 wants to 'bloat' the file from 3.5GB to 5.5GB means that MF5 is not happy with the file and wants to re-encode it. Sounds like you're feeding it a 720p stream and it wants to re-encode it into 1080i.


Hm, maybe I misspoke. I meant that I patched my 720p file so that it would recognize it as a 1080i (i think). I followed the steps he gave in the walkthrough to the letter:
---------------------------------
To use this feature:

1. Process your .ts, .tp or .m2t file with Womble MPEG2VCR to convert transport stream to program stream.
2. Run HDPatch. Select your 720p stream by clicking on the "..." box at the end of the "File:" line. In the browser, find your file.
3. In the menu select Preset>>720p> Pre - patch 720p for MF5/VS10+.
4. Select the "Patch Stream" button at the bottom.

The patch should be virtually instantaneous. Complete the process outlined above to create the HD DVD folder on the hard drive.
---------------------------------
It seemed to work fine, but maybe not..?

So I guess what you're saying then is that the final output from MF5 (all files it puts on the hard drive) should be roughly the same size as the .mpg file I'm feeding into it?

Have you or anyone else tried the 360 add-on with DVD9's? I tried a couple I have and I was getting major stuttering and audio dropouts. They would play just fine in my Toshiba A1. I do not have any DVD5's at the moment to try and I'm wondering if the problem I had was related to the dual layers.


I just burned a fairly short (6.6GB) 1080i movie onto a Verbatim DVD9 and played it back on the XBox360 addon drive. I played the beginning and spot-checked through it, played through the layer change and a region where DVDInfo Pro showed a major dropoff in burn quality. There were a few almost-subliminal a/v glitches early in the program, but it turns out they are in the transport stream as originally captured and as played back on the MDP130/MyHD (and when I burned the beginning 2GB onto a DVD5, it played the same glitches); overall the movie plays just fine, right through the layer change without a noticeable pause, right through the bad-burn region with no glitches. I haven't watched the particular movie yet, and this disc is going on the "keep" pile and I'll definitely watch it through on the 360.

FWIW, the DL disk I used was a Verbatim +R DL, MKM001, burned at 4x on a fairly old Sony burner.

...

2. Opened the .tp file in VideoRedo (trial version with key they sent) and cut out the commercials and sections I didn't want. Then followed the instructions to the letter to convert to a program stream. Only thing I was confused about was the step that says "Add GOP Timecode to all GOPs" - I didn't see this option exactly, instead there was something like it. When finished this gave me an .mpg file.

....

What version of VRD do you have? When you looked for the GOP Timecode option, did you hold the shift down while clicking the Options... menu item? - that's what you need to do in version .491, and the option name is exactly as quoted. {Updated} and I just test-installed the latest version 2.5.3.500, and it's still the same - you have to hold down the shift key, and the option name is exactly as quoted.

Version 2-5-3-500 is now available.

When I saw "Enhance: Ability to change the volume in the saved file." I was hoping this version would fix the "Tools.. Adjust Audio... Output volume" problem that I mentioned a few weeks ago. I have a demo HDDVD with various concert clips. A couple of them are much louder than the rest. But anytime I try to adjust the audio with videoredo, I lose the audio completely when I play that clip on the HDDVD. Has anyone beemn successful with adjusting the volume? I should probably sign up on the videoredo forum.

VideoReDo Plus Build 2-5-3-500:

Enhance: New Logfile support functions
Enhance: Program fixes for DVR-MS, CRID, and Humax files.
Enhance: Support for creating DVR-MS output files.
Enhance: Support for creating Topfield .REC output files.
Enhance: New zoom feature to magnify the timeline.
Enhance: New "Favorite places" on the Tools>Options pages. Allows you to setup favorite folders in the file open dialog.
Enhance: VideoReDo will work with Vista Betas using the Aero interface when using the VMR9 drivers.
Enhance: Ability to support 4:2:2 video.
Enhance: Ability to change the volume in the saved file.
Enhance: Batch will properly support the full ANSI character set for filenames.
Enhance: Complete support for NTSC 29.97 FPS drop frame time codes. Both in the display and output in the GOP header.http://www.videoredo.com/ReleaseNotesVrdPlus.htmVersion 2-5-3-500, Release date: November 10, 2006

Enhance: Logfile: Add ability to clear log file and more easily attach to an email. Log filename is also copied to the clipboard if the "Explore" option is selected.
Enhance: COM: New method FileOpenBatchPIDS( filename, videoPID, audioPID) to enable QSF with custom PIDs.
Change: New faster AC3 decoder library.
Fix: DVR-MS files with restricted content could get into infinite loop. VideoReDo attempts to detect and issue a warning.
Fix: Batch: Ampersand "&" in the filename would cause file name problems in batch.
Fix: DVR-MS: NTSC closed captions caused injection of bad user data into the video stream resulting in pixelation.
Fix: Humax PVR transport streams will not open properly.
Fix: CRID: Double clicking on an entry in the CRID list would cause a crash.
Fix: CRID: attemp0ting to open a CRID file with no available components could cause a crash.
Fix: Batch: In File>Queue To Batch, changing the suggested filename and then changing an output option would cause filename to revert to default.

One other tip that I wanted to mention, which seems logical and obvious... when you run HDPatch for the 720p files make sure you switch your HDDVD player to 720p. I get periodic interlace combing when I tried to play back 720p files at 1080i. But they look fine once I switched the HD-A1 to 720p. I wish there was a "native" mode... if the file is 720p then the player should output 720p, if the file is 1080i then output 1080i. Especially if it could switch the player's resolution between chapters, since some of my mixed demo clips are 720p and some are 1080i.

Fedex tracking shows my XBox360 HD-DVD player is on the delivery truck now, so I get to play with that tonight. :)

Throughout all of this does anyone know if it will work with 24fps 1080 mpgs? I have output 24fps HD PH files and want to import them into MF5 but they convert everytime. Under the customize settings there is no option for anything other than 29.97. Any ideas?

The mpg files are 1920x1080, 23.97 fps and around 15mbps data rate.

Thanks.....

So I guess what you're saying then is that the final output from MF5 (all files it puts on the hard drive) should be roughly the same size as the .mpg file I'm feeding into it?
Yes, approximately. You know something's gone wrong if the output size is clearly bigger than the original. Another sign is MF5 taking a long time processing the data. On my humble Athlon64 3200+, after clicking on the 'Burn' icon Disc creator progress bar jumps immediately to 99% while the lower bar (muxing) takes about 15 minutes for a full dual layer disc (i.e. approx. 8GB).

I just burned a fairly short (6.6GB) 1080i movie onto a Verbatim DVD9 and played it back on the XBox360 addon drive. I played the beginning and spot-checked through it, played through the layer change and a region where DVDInfo Pro showed a major dropoff in burn quality. There were a few almost-subliminal a/v glitches early in the program, but it turns out they are in the transport stream as originally captured and as played back on the MDP130/MyHD (and when I burned the beginning 2GB onto a DVD5, it played the same glitches); overall the movie plays just fine, right through the layer change without a noticeable pause, right through the bad-burn region with no glitches. I haven't watched the particular movie yet, and this disc is going on the "keep" pile and I'll definitely watch it through on the 360.

FWIW, the DL disk I used was a Verbatim +R DL, MKM001, burned at 4x on a fairly old Sony burner.

Thanks for the update Tom. It sounds like the problem must lie somewhere on my end. I used basically the same exact setup, even down to the same brand and type of media.

Unfortunately, I returned my 360 add-on earlier today. I mainly bought it for use on an HTPC but there are still some bugs to be worked out for that purpose. I'll likely pick one up again if/when those bugs have been worked out.

http://www.cyberlink.com/multi/products/main_3_ENU.html

CyberLink PowerProducer 4
# Capture High-Definition videos and produce Blu-ray Discs
# Create HD DVDs and DVDs for playing on a home player
I wonder if you can author a HD DVD and burn it to a standard dvd with this software? I have some slideshows I'd like to output to HD as well.

Thanks for the replies. Can anyone help me with how to ensure an AC3 audio track goes along with the video when its all recorded to the disc?

Thanks for the replies. Can anyone help me with how to ensure an AC3 audio track goes along with the video when its all recorded to the disc?
You're certain your file has AC3 in it? Could it have been converted to stereo PCM at some stage? What does VideoReDo say about the stream's audio properties?

You're certain your file has AC3 in it? Could it have been converted to stereo PCM at some stage? What does VideoReDo say about the stream's audio properties?

Well, to be clear, I'm not sure that the .mpg file contains it. What I do know is that the original signal was a 5.1 signal, and when I play it back in my Fusion 5 HDTV card's application, it plays back in 5.1, so it must be in the .tp file that was recorded off the air.

How do I check the audio props in VideoRedo? Sorry for my ignorance, your help is greatly appreciated.

I have tried 2 DVD's burned using the method at the beginning of this thread. When I put them in my XBOX 360 HD drive, it read the disk and then the screen goes black. I am pretty sure that it recognizes the format as an HD-DVD but it seems to choke after that. I setup no menus or anything. Just a simple 3 minute HD movie. Any thoughts on what I should look for? Is the burner I used or the media important at this stage?

I am using an older Liteon 4x DVD+ burner and some Maxell DVD+R that arereported as being made by RItek.

Thanks! Hope to join the ranks of those making HD-DVDs on DVD!

Oh, and what is res laser media? Just traditional DVDs or is it something special?

Thanks!

I just burned a fairly short (6.6GB) 1080i movie onto a Verbatim DVD9 and played it back on the XBox360 addon drive. I played the beginning and spot-checked through it, played through the layer change and a region where DVDInfo Pro showed a major dropoff in burn quality. There were a few almost-subliminal a/v glitches early in the program, but it turns out they are in the transport stream as originally captured and as played back on the MDP130/MyHD (and when I burned the beginning 2GB onto a DVD5, it played the same glitches); overall the movie plays just fine, right through the layer change without a noticeable pause, right through the bad-burn region with no glitches. I haven't watched the particular movie yet, and this disc is going on the "keep" pile and I'll definitely watch it through on the 360.

FWIW, the DL disk I used was a Verbatim +R DL, MKM001, burned at 4x on a fairly old Sony burner.

Has anyone else noticed that the XBox360 HD-DVD drive ignores Moviefactory's "Auto repeat when disc playback ends".

This works fine on my Toshiba HD-A1, at the end, the disc starts over from the beginning.

But with the same disc, the XBox just freezes at the end. The worst part is that it leave a static image of the last scene.
CRT owners hate static images.

Has anyone else noticed that the XBox360 HD-DVD drive ignores Moviefactory's "Auto repeat when disc playback ends".

This works fine on my Toshiba HD-A1, at the end, the disc starts over from the beginning.

But with the same disc, the XBox just freezes at the end. The worst part is that it leave a static image of the last scene.
CRT owners hate static images.
My current workaround is to add 3 seconds of blank black video clip at the beginning and end.

I just used videoredo to select the black screen between the studio logo and any movie's opening title.

But if anyone knows how to get the XBox to auto-repeat like the HD-A1, I'd prefer that.

Has anyone else noticed that the XBox360 HD-DVD drive ignores Moviefactory's "Auto repeat when disc playback ends".

This works fine on my Toshiba HD-A1, at the end, the disc starts over from the beginning.

But with the same disc, the XBox just freezes at the end. The worst part is that it leave a static image of the last scene.
CRT owners hate static images.

I did notice that, but not having a Toshiba player did not realize that it was a difference.

Another bit of awk with the 360 add-on: when I made a HDDVD with two clips, which are actually contiguous chunks of the same movie, and set it for "play the next clip", added chapters every 5 min but no menu, the 360 player does play right over the seam with just a momentary vid freeze, but after it gets into the second clip there is no way to nav back to the first one, the rewind & prior chapter only go to the start of the second clip, and if I forward to the end and hit Play again it starts the second clip; I have to either eject the disc or go all the to the xbox console display.

Anybody know if the Toshiba has a similar behavior with movies made from more than one clip?

I have tried 2 DVD's burned using the method at the beginning of this thread. When I put them in my XBOX 360 HD drive, it read the disk and then the screen goes black. I am pretty sure that it recognizes the format as an HD-DVD but it seems to choke after that. I setup no menus or anything. Just a simple 3 minute HD movie. Any thoughts on what I should look for? Is the burner I used or the media important at this stage?

I am using an older Liteon 4x DVD+ burner and some Maxell DVD+R that arereported as being made by RItek.

Thanks! Hope to join the ranks of those making HD-DVDs on DVD!

Oh, and what is res laser media? Just traditional DVDs or is it something special?

Thanks!

Heh. "res laser media" would be a common typo for "red laser media" :D , i.e. the good old CD, DVD5, or DVD9 discs that we've had around for years.


Several of my initial attempts behaved exactly as you described. I guessed that in some of those cases MF5 hosed the audio, thus choking the 360s codec - you may want to pay careful attention to the audio format you are inputting and what MF5 is doing with it. {Note the use of technical terms "hosed" and "choked" indicating a deep understanding - not!} Also, I have not gotten 720p material to play at all yet in the 360, only 1080i, it might be best to be sure you are working with a 1080i input file.

I have been testing using an old burner and mostly coaster-grade media, the 360 does not seem to me to be very sensitive to media quality or burn quality. (The Verbatim DL discs are not coaster-grade, but AFAIK & IME all DVD9 media suffers from poor burn quality and low readability compared to DVD5 in general).

Thanks! I meant to type "red laser media"!

I was feeding MF5 an 29.97 1920x1080 mpg file that had mpeg layer 2 audio or something. If I tell MF5 to convert the audio to Dolby Digital will it cause the entire mpg to be re-rendered?

Can anyone point me to a source known-good "mpg-file" that I could download and import into MF5 to verify that it actually works? Then I could focus more on the encoding side and not on the authoring side.

Thanks in advance!

Marty

In what context Jesse? Are you using HDPatch because your file is 720p or because it's 1088? For 720p you only need to patch the first header. For 1088 I recommend patching the entire stream. If you're patching to fix the bitrate, you only need to patch the first header.

For that video it was 1088 and I patched the whole file. Movie played fine.

I'm trying to do a 720p title now using the preset "pre 720p for mf5" which only patches the first header. MF5 is still trying to re-encode the movie this time though. Any ideas?

Upgraded to MF5 plus v5.3 and it's not re-encoding now.

Upgraded to MF5 plus v5.3 and it's not re-encoding now.
Could that mean MF5+ v5.3 supports 720p streams?

How do I check the audio props in VideoRedo? Sorry for my ignorance, your help is greatly appreciated.
Load your stream into VRD and press CTRL+L, or select "Show Video Program Info" from Tools menu.

If the file has AC3, it might have the wrong Stream ID and you need to re-map it to a Stream ID Ulead understands as AC3. It should have an ID of x80 - at least that's what VRD tells me when I drop in an MPEG-2 file with DD 5.1 audio.

One thing you could also try is output your stream into a Transport Stream with VRD, and use VRD to force Audio to have a certain PID. Enter Options > Transport Stream Output, uncheck the "Use PIDS From Source File" box, check "Show PIDS as Hex" and use the following values:

Program Map ID: x20
Video PID: x21
Audio Stream 1 PID: x24

Load your file and save it as Transport Stream, then open the resulting file in VRD and check the properties with CTRL+L to see if there's any change.

I'm not saying any of this will help, but it might be worth a shot.

I was able to test a DVD burned using MF5 and Nero 7. It worked but only when I allowed MF5 to recompress it. It looked like total crap though. WTF?

Any ideas on what to do to create compliant mpgs that will actually work on the XBOX360 HD-DVD? Keep in mind I am creating the content myself in Adobe Premiere and I can author the mpg using whatever specs will work.

Thanks!

Any ideas on what to do to create compliant mpgs that will actually work on the XBOX360 HD-DVD? Keep in mind I am creating the content myself in Adobe Premiere and I can author the mpg using whatever specs will work.

Try these:
- MPEG-2 at under 30mbit/s
- 1440x1080i/29.97fps or 1920x1080i/29.97fps
- Dolby Digital 2.0/5.1 audio at 384kbit/s

MF5 used to have a problem with DD5.1 audio according to some users (like me), but others have reported DD5.1 working just fine.

The problem here is that Adobe Premiere doesn't include a Dolby Digital Encoder. That is an add-on that is like $500 or something. I have no choice but mpg audio. When I do regular SD DVDs I export wave files and create the DD in Adobe Encore which does include an encoder. But it cannot be used outside of the program itself.

Try these:
- MPEG-2 at under 30mbit/s
- 1440x1080i/29.97fps or 1920x1080i/29.97fps
- Dolby Digital 2.0/5.1 audio at 384kbit/s

MF5 used to have a problem with DD5.1 audio for some users (like me), but others have reported DD5.1 working just fine.

The problem here is that Adobe Premiere doesn't include a Dolby Digital Encoder. That is an add-on that is like $500 or something. I have no choice but mpg audio. When I do regular SD DVDs I export wave files and create the DD in Adobe Encore which does include an encoder. But it cannot be used outside of the program itself.
Stereo MPEG audio between 64 and 384kbit/s should be fine as well.

Thanks for posting this guide. I have recently been doing some of this stuff with my recorded tv shows since I just bought the Xbox 360 HD-DVD player.

I have found something strange. In the previous posts and guides, you seem to indicate that changes need to be made to 720p recordings in order for all of this to work. I have made no changes to my 720p recordings and I get Dolby Digital audio.

I tested this with an episode of ABC's Lost which is broadcast in 720p. After creating the HD-DVD, I verified playback on the Xbox 360. I couldn't figure out a way in the Xbox 360 menu to tell me what resolution the video source was so I put it back on my PC. I took one of the generated EVO files and dumped it in Video Redo. It reported this:

http://thenoel.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/vid_info.gif

So, it looks like MF didn't touch the stream at all and simply converted it into HD-DVD format. Does that sound right?

I also tried dumping the EVO file back into MF (after renaming it to MPG) and MF also reports the file as 1280x720 (although, it shows no audio stream).

When I do the conversion, it does seem to do it very quickly (within 10 minutes) which seems to indicate that no transcoding/resizing is taking place.

I'm going to check other ABC 720p shows to see if I get the same results.

FWIW, I have gotten a 43 minute, 3700MB 720p/DD 5.1 program burned on a DVD5 per guide, using VRD, HDpatch, MF5, and Nero 6, to play in the Xbox 360 addon - it looks and sounds great.

I spent a long time looking at my earlier failures with 720p stuff and found at least once was due to a bad burn (uncorrectable errors, not just poor quality) and at least once was due to not following the guide properly when using HDpatch. On the bad burn, the XBox stays on the logo or console display, whereas it gives a blank screen when the content is not to its liking.

MF5 seemed to take a long time to remux this program though - twice as long on a per-GB basis as 1080i with DD5.1; has anybody else seen that and/or have any idea why that would be?

leonowski, what version of MF5 are you using? There's a new v5.3 out and it *might* support 720p natively.

Thanks for posting this guide. I have recently been doing some of this stuff with my recorded tv shows since I just bought the Xbox 360 HD-DVD player.

I have found something strange. In the previous posts and guides, you seem to indicate that changes need to be made to 720p recordings in order for all of this to work. I have made no changes to my 720p recordings and I get Dolby Digital audio.

I tested this with an episode of ABC's Lost which is broadcast in 720p. After creating the HD-DVD, I verified playback on the Xbox 360. I couldn't figure out a way in the Xbox 360 menu to tell me what resolution the video source was so I put it back on my PC. I took one of the generated EVO files and dumped it in Video Redo. It reported this:

http://thenoel.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/vid_info.gif

So, it looks like MF didn't touch the stream at all and simply converted it into HD-DVD format. Does that sound right?

I also tried dumping the EVO file back into MF (after renaming it to MPG) and MF also reports the file as 1280x720 (although, it shows no audio stream).

When I do the conversion, it does seem to do it very quickly (within 10 minutes) which seems to indicate that no transcoding/resizing is taking place.

I'm going to check other ABC 720p shows to see if I get the same results.

Well, I'll be dipped! I tried my 720p program again, without using HDPatch (and confirming that the header on my input file was indeed 1280x720p @ 59.94), took it through MF, and it does work for me too. MF5 does not try to "convert" the file, and also did not have the "slow mux" problem I just reported from the trial where I did use HDPatch - so it went much faster. VRD Properties display for my first EVO file looks exactly like yours, except I have a bit rate of 20.000 Mbps, which I have to modify in my files (I use the VideoReDo output options) to keep MF5 from "converting" (and I just re-verified that this is true with this 720p program - if I leave the header at 38.8Mbps then MF5 insists on converting the video). And after burning in Nero the disc plays flawlessly in the Xbox 360 addon drive.

Are you getting your captures OTA from an antenna... or what? (Mine are mostly from a Moto 6200.)


Aside: So, Joseph - it looks like we have a major divergence here... as leonowski discovered and I confirmed, we are not needing to use HDPatch on 720 programs to get them through MF5 without it "converting" the video, and I paid a big elapsed time penalty when I did use HDpatch.


FWIW, I have MF5 trial and it reluctantly admits to being version 5.3.0.0 (can't find any about box - the executable file's version number says 5.0.0.0 - but its ProductVersion attribute is 5.3.0.0).

leonowski, what version of MF5 are you using? There's a new v5.3 out and it *might* support 720p natively.

I have version 5.3. The version number is reported by clicking the small icon in the lower left hand corner of the application > about Ulead MF.

Well, I'll be dipped! I tried my 720p program again, without using HDPatch (and confirming that the header on my input file was indeed 1280x720p @ 59.94), took it through MF, and it does work for me too. MF5 does not try to "convert" the file, and also did not have the "slow mux" problem I just reported from the trial where I did use HDPatch - so it went much faster. VRD Properties display for my first EVO file looks exactly like yours, except I have a bit rate of 20.000 Mbps, which I have to modify in my files (I use the VideoReDo output options) to keep MF5 from "converting" (and I just re-verified that this is true with this 720p program - if I leave the header at 38.8Mbps then MF5 insists on converting the video). And after burning in Nero the disc plays flawlessly in the Xbox 360 addon drive.

Are you getting your captures OTA from an antenna... or what? (Mine are mostly from a Moto 6200.)


Aside: So, Joseph - it looks like we have a major divergence here... as leonowski discovered and I confirmed, we are not needing to use HDPatch on 720 programs to get them through MF5 without it "converting" the video, and I paid a big elapsed time penalty when I did use HDpatch.


FWIW, I have MF5 trial and it reluctantly admits to being version 5.3.0.0 (can't find any about box - the executable file's version number says 5.0.0.0 - but its ProductVersion attribute is 5.3.0.0).

I don't have time now, but I'm going to download 5.3.0.0 and see if it does the same for me. I snidely made a comment after techtom created HDPatch that Ulead would come out with a NEW version some time in 2007 adding 720p support, cost for upgrade $29. Looks like they may have just thrown it in for nothing. Kudos.

I never had any penalty in time for 720p shows with HDPatch, though.

Are you getting your captures OTA from an antenna... or what? (Mine are mostly from a Moto 6200.)



Yes - OTA recordings from a FusionHDTV card.

Also - I wanted to mention:

I have had no problems using Nero 6 and dual layer DVDs. I'm using some cheapo Playo DVD+R DL discs that burn at 2.4x. I do change the booktype so that these are recognized as DVD-ROMs as opposed to DVD+R DL discs. It may help with compatibility.

I have also burned a small HD test pattern that was less than 650MB on a CD and that worked on my Xbox 360 as well.