The official AVS Guide to HD DVD Authoring. - Page 64

I notice you have not mentioned book-type there... I assume that on the +R discs you are setting the book type to +R?

It is important that you do not leave it set as 'DVD-ROM' or they wont work in the Toshibas.

By default most modern DVD burners set +R (& +R dual layer) discs to book type 'DVD-ROM', e.g. the Pioneer models are permanently set to this and you need to flash your drive to allow it to be changed.

Most importantly - after making sure your burner can set the book type to +R then often you also need to force your burning programs to set book type to +R as well. E.g. in ImgBurn this is an option under Tools->Drive->Change Book Type...

Thanks.
This Is Good Information On Top Of The Best News This Year....


Hd E1's Do Not Play Pal Sourced Hd Files On 3x Dvd !!
But They Do Play Ntsc.
Why Anyone That Purchases A European Hd Player Would Use Ntsc Is Anyones Guess More Alone The Question Of Why Our Mating Pal Format Is Not Supported Is Even More Perplexing !!!
Come On Toshiba !!
But Thanks To All Once Again.

I don't know about PAL - NTSC, so if you record on PAL but select in MF to use NTSC, does MF reencode the video in any way? the time it takes is longer? the end size is bigger? If there is no big difference I think that's the way you need to work, or start with NTSC if possible.

All I have read about HD DVDs from other countries I haven't seen any mention on PAL or NTSC, so I guessed that for HD DVD they use the same fps all over the world. People importing foreign HD DVDs and play on USA they only say it plays great, not a single mention that the HD DVD is PAL and it doesn't work on the A2.

PAL/NTSC is a SD term, nothing to do with HD. HD should be referred to as 720p50, 1080i60 etc.

AFAIK HD DVD @ 25fps (50Hz) has not yet been ratified by the DVD Forum, hence why Toshiba don't support it. You cannot buy a commercial HD DVD which is at 25fps.

It is Not a NTSC vs PAL issue. The fault is the authoring software, not the player - MF6 never should have allowed you to select PAL when writing a HD DVD. There is no such thing as a PAL HD DVD disk, just as there is no such a thing as a NTSC HD DVD disk.

This is a great feature of the player! It means that you can buy HD DVDs from the US, Germany, France, or Japan and it will play on your E1. This may be important to you because some movies that will never appear on HD DVD in your country may well do so in another. So thank Toshiba, and enjoy it.

MF does ask for either.
So how do you explain that the imported NTSC hd files work fine and the HD PAL files cause the error?
I think the error relates to the dvd 3X that needs to see PAL or NTSC.
I've had to convert PAL files to NTSC and obviously they do not look near as good quality as original source material from my PAL camcorder

When I import a NTSC file into MF , everything works fine.. it asks to adjust import to project settings etc.
If I import the PAL file into MF and set MF to NTSC it takes much additional time and obviously encoding the 25fps to 24.9xx.
The quality this way is more jumpy vs using procoder master settings/ double variable bit rates etc.
When I then import the procoders encoded NTSC from original source PAL all works the best but is far from what you should see with HD all the way thru without these unnecessary encodes.
Thanks.
ideas other than the world complain to Toshiba appreciated.

Hi!

I'm not so sure about that. Because Sonic Scenarist does support HD with 25fps/50Hz. And Scenarist is normally very serious about specs.

The Toshiba website says, that a firmware update is coming for this. They keep saying this year. We´ll see if they can make it in time.

From toshiba Website:


50Hz HD-DVD support will come. Because european HDTV over Satellite is 50Hz, European Porn industry is 50Hz, HDV in Europe is 50Hz.

If this update for the HD-E1 is not out till end of the year I´m on BluRay for my HDV recordings

What happens if you run HDPatch to set just the first header? You may be able to fool MF6 and the E1.

Hi Hyrax,
This sounds like it's on the right track if I've any chance at all.
As I mentioned, I know very little regards authoring details and file structure on the final disk.
Could you explain in more detail how to do what you suggest.
Thanks.

Gearo-

• First, read the first post in this thread (it does a good job of telling you what to do) and download HDPatch from the link.
• Next run HDPatch and open your file with it.
• Set the Framerate of the first header only to be 29.97 and save the file.
• Open the resulting file with MF6 and create the HD DVD directories and files as though for a NTSC machine. Which is to say, do not create an ISO.

Burn the file to DVD and see if it plays.

Is that doesn't work (because the video looks bad, skips, freezes, whatever); run HDPatch again, but this time on the first EVO file in the HD DVD file and have it set the framerate to the orignal value. Burn and try again.

GL. There is little chance this will actually work, but you never know...

Hello and thanks Hyrax.
I have just done what you suggested.
I have run hd patch over the original PAL hd file.
The first header was set to the 29.97 ntsc format.
I opened up MF6, settings to NTSC (I'm guessing thats what you'd meant)
and created not only the hd dvd files but also an iso.
Burnt with nero and ...
GUESS WHAT...?
It worked !! (both the iso burn and the hd dvd file burn)
BUT.. the playback was jumpy BUT VERY VERY CLEAR on both..
FINALLY THE QUALITY THAT A HD MOVIE SHOULD BE !!!

I then followed with your 2nd suggestion and patched the first of the evo files and final results on disc were the same as the above...ielayed, jumpy but very clear.

You are obviously on the right track but I sense the jerky/jumpy playback relates to the 25fps/50hz stuff rather than what MF expects with the NTSC setting.
Tell me if I'm wrong but the Toshiba needs to be able to work with PAL HD files??
It only wants to work with what it sees as NTSC.

When the original PAL files are encoded back to NTSC with procoder, authored with MF AND burnt, the playback is much smoother but the quality is lost to a noticeable degree being a bit blurred in detail.

Another important point with your suggestion...
The MF6 project completes VERY QUICKLY to completion and I'm sure no other encoding is taking place with the input file that has the first header changed.
At first I didnt' get the option of setting the project the same as the imported HD file but later did.
I am confident MF didn't re encode the PAL files ! (well done)
I'm not sure how multiple HD PAL imported files would go after each one had the hd patch treatment. I will try this out later..
But for now, I am hopeful that this information will assist many people.
Unfortunately the final picture with this method IS JUMPY but at least with the high quality of clarity gives me something to look forward too !!!
Suggestions ??
and thanks again !

gearo,
Please continue posting your progress here, very interesting.

Gearo-
I was afraid it might jump or skip. You've told the E1 that the files are in one frame rate whereas they are in another. I, unfortunately, have no suggestion other than playing with procoder (which I've never used) or some other prosumer program to transcode the file from PAL to NTSC. But that is not really much of an option because it could take hours to transcode. Before I bought a HD DVD player, I used to use Sony's Vegas to transcode HD material to SD and each hour of HD material took over 4 hours to transcode. The results were a very hight quality DVD, but the effort involved was substantial.

hi,
It will take time for me to find a good PAL to NTSC conversion.
I am presently looking at dvfilm atlantis as it looks like it has all the right stuff.
I am working thru problems with this however as it does not output mpegs.
Will keep in contact or please get back with suggestions of excellent conversion software that I may be able to try.
Thanks

Hi,
Although a long time member, most of my loitering has been at the Kenwood DVD 5900m list. That being said, I have also been lurking on this forum for some time. I have the Canon HV10 and received the free Pinnacle ver. 10.5 and then paid $49 more to activate the HD program. Only to find out that the dang thing was not supported by the Microsoft HD DVD add-on. So, off I went and got the Toshiba a20 from best buy. But, still no luck, apparently the first gen Toshiba played HD rendered by Pinnacle, but not the second gen.

Yesterday, I bought the Pinnalce 11 ultimate, downloaded the patch to ver 11.1 and at exactly midnight EDT I actually burnt 2 different HD video from the Canon onto DVD's at the HD resolution. Not only were the pictures very sharp (as compared to the same program on SD DVD) but the menus all worked, no stuttering, no out of sync, just perfect. I used cheap Compusa DVD-R blanks and burnt at highest rate allowed. I will be trying different media to see if there are any burps. It also rendered 18 minutes of HD in about 7 minutes (vs all night for ver 10.5). Somebody at Pinnacle must have slipped up and finally wrote some good software. I would have changed long ago, but I was used to the editing features and just too lazy to learn another program. I am running with an older Gateway, 3.2 GHZ INtel Pent D, three 500 GB sata drives and 1 gig of memory that came with this old warhorse about 4 years ago.

Hi all,

I have been trying to learn this new adventure of authoring HD DVDs for a few days now... I usually try to research everything I possibly can before diving into a project or a new endeavor.

I have a MacBook Core Duo. I know it is possible for me to install Windows and use all the programs mentioned in the first post, but I just dont like working with windows anymore. I am not a Mac Fanboy that preaches that macs are better than windows pc in any aspect. I just like macs for what they are - simplicity...

So my approach to this is from a different angle. Authoring HD-DVDs through a Mac based software...

After much searching I have stumbled on a tutorial:

http://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage...vds_young.html

The tutorial details the steps needed to author HD-DVDs in DVD Studio 4 (Final Cut Pro 2).

I am trying to start a dialog with some of the members that are trying this approach from a Mac perspective. I dont have the Final Cut 2, but believe that one of my buddies does and he will let me use it (will double check the availability of the software a bit later when I return from work).

My question is for the people that are familiar with the proper steps in the procedure, whether it be from a pc standpoint or from a mac, to comment if this is the software that will allow me to accomplish the following (tell me if the procedure / software in the above link will be able to do this):

Encode x264 HD streams to HD-DVD on DVD5 or DVD9
Encode other HD Material available on the internet free to download to proper HD-DVD on DVD5 or DVD9
Handle HD Mpegs in proper format keeping everything compliant in terms of picture quality
Cut HD Video source if it is too large to fit on 1 DVD5 or DVD9 into multiple compliant streams to accomplish the same, above tasks

Will this be enough for me from an all-in-one package to accomplish HD-DVD Authoring from different angles and different file types?

I really dont mind letting the Software re-encode everything into the proper format as long as I dont lose quality. What I mean is that I would rather give up time (through encode) rather than jump through 20 different programs to accomplish the same task (but save some time)...

I thank all of you for the input...

If my questions dont get answered, I hope that some can use the info in the above link to explore the possibility of doing the same thing that is discussed in this thread on a mac...

BTW, I dont want to get into the issue of Legality of my source material. I will be recording / authoring Legal, free source available on the internet at this point...

Best regards

I hope you can get this working, and please report your success back to us. I plan on buying one of the new iMacs when they become available. Unlike yourself, I'll be bopping back into Windows frequently.

Many recordings do not have resolutions that exactly fit the expected HD DVD resolution, and will cause you problems. I don't know if that is because of we've got meager authoring software on PCs or because of the HD DVD players will not accept them. These files will either need to be recoded or a program like HDPatch needs to be run to fool the authoring software. From all of my experiences you will lose quality if you need to recode.

As far as I know, no one has been able to create anything except MPEG based HD DVDs with the PC software. It would be fascinating if a Mac could create .h264 disks that play in a HD DVD player.

Thanks for the reply. Before I actually dive head-first into this project, i want to be sure I can get HD-DVDs working through Mpeg Encode first... I will probably want to do that first... Once I get a successful burn, I may take it a step further and try other Codecs...

However, I may need to get educated on native HD-DVD Toshiba player codecs in order to know if it is at all possible...

So, If you or anyone can comment if I can get the basics down through this program, I may give it a legitimate shot...

Lets say I take a footage like that 'Elephant Anime', would I be able to author the DVD5 using this program?

Thoughts?

The reason I want to use the 'Elephant Anime' is because it is of high quality and of a small size... about 1gig Thus it wont take long to work with this file.

BTW here is the link to it http://orange.blender.org/download

In MF6+ I stumbled onto a workaround that eliminates the need for using other programs like Videoredo, Womble etc. to convert ts to ps.

Included in the MF6+ suite is a utility for authoring Blu-ray BDAV files. The program is called Ulead BD DiscRecorder 2.7.

1.) Start BD DiscRecorder 2.7. Open the ts file. A window pops up, "File cannot be edited. Do you want to perform pre-process to make it editable?" Choose "Yes."

2.) BD DiscRecorder 2.7 converts the ts file to ps stream without rendering it, and saves it to a folder.

3.) Now close BD DiscRecorder 2.7 and open the newly saved file with MF6+.

With Ulead MF6+, you can potentially do the whole workflow now, capture, edit, burn to HD DVD without any other software, if you so desire.

I confirmed that BD DiscRecorder "pre-process" maintains the AC3 5.1 audio. Its fast and flawless.

Just a FYI.

Hi guys I'm another newb to this thread and also a Mac user. Maybe there should be a dedicated mac thread? Frankly I caught myself smirking that this is 'The official AVS Guide to (PC only) HD DVD authoring'. But yes we're the minority so maybe we should start our own?

I don't just start one myself in case you other Mac users feel there's enough common data to stay in this one and/or a Mac users thread already exists.

Thoughts?

Doesn't that mac movie software it comes with have built in HD-DVD authoring ? I just don't know how you'd go about burning it to DVD5/9...

I'm almost certain that iDVD (even the new '08 one) doesn't support HD-DVD authoring. DVD Studio Pro does, as it should considering it's a pro app.

MacBook Pro owner here I try to avoid using my Vista desktop for anything other that burning discs.

FYI you can buy a real HD DVD of Elephants Dream.

I know that... I just want to use it as a test footage, because of the quality and size of the file...

Does not look like I may get my hands on the Final Cut Pro. Will give it one more try tonight and then I may cave and install windows...

Glad to hear there are more Mac users... Anyone have had success yet on the mac side?

Best regards,

Personally, I'd like to keep the Mac discussion here. Otherwise stuff will get scattered within two threads, and the Mac thread may not be sticky.