Click,

As JohnnyRoy said, DVD Architect supports only DVDs. I personally find that to be quite strange, since almost all of the competing programs, including entry level programs like Ulead's $49.95 DVD Movie Factory, can author and burn VCDs, SVCDs, and miniDVDs as well as DVDs. Hopefully the next version of DVD Architect will remedy this shortcoming, but for the time being it is good news for the competition that Sonic Foundry has applied such severe self-imposed limitations onto DVD Architect.

I tried to "jawbone" SoFo into adding miniDVD as an option for DVD Architect, but they adamantly refused. MiniDVDs have the same data structure as DVDs. They are just "short" DVDs that are burned onto CD-Rs (or CD-RWs) instead of DVDs, so it would have been almost trivially simple to support miniDVDs. In fact, I used Nero to burn the DVD Architect sample project to a 20-cent CD-R creating a miniDVD that worked just fine on my system in a $99 DVD player.

If DVD blanks cost only 20 cents and everyone already had a DVD burner, this would be a non-issue. But DVD blanks cost dollars, not cents, and CDRW drives outnumber DVD burners by hundreds to one, so Sonic Foundry just "blew off" a big part of the potential market for DVD Architect. Like I said, good news for the competition.

That said, I am going to buy Vegas 4+DVD at the special introductory price before the March 15 expiration, because I will be able to use DVD Architect and Nero to make miniDVDs. I actually prefer miniDVDs over VCDs and SVCDs, because miniDVDs have higher video and audio quality and they support a richer menu and navigation structure than VCDs or SVCDs. Later this year I will get a DVD burner, but even then I will still make a lot of miniDVDs because they are handier and cheaper.

The DVD Architect sample project is an excellent example of why anyone who authors DVDs should also have the capability to make miniDVDs. The DVDA sample project has a file size of 71.9MB (the size of its expanded VIDEO_TS folder) which used only about 11% of my 650MB CD-R to make the miniDVD, or only about 2 cents worth of space on the 20-cent disc. When you have a "2-cent" project, it just seems a waste to use a DVD blank for it. If you want to experiment with new DVD authoring techniques, the option of making "tiny DVDs" let's you carry your experiments to completion on your home theater system without wasting your DVD blanks. Or you may want to make a bunch of inexpensive "short subjects." A lot of times you don't want to author a full-length DVD.

-- Seeker --

> so Sonic Foundry just "blew off" a big part of the potential market for DVD Architect

Hey Seeker,

I’m not so sure. You can’t purchase DVD Architect separately (i.e., without Vegas 4) so their entire target market is Vegas 4 users. And we seem to be buying it anyway. ;-)

I may be wrong, but I would guess that professional videographers probably don’t make VCD’s and SVCD’s for their clients because of the low quality and spotty support in DVD players. So if you’re targeting professionals, and you ask them if they’d rather see multiple audio streams and subtitle support in the next release or VCD/SVCD support, I would guess that VCD support would NOT be high on their list. I would rather see SoFo work on more DVD options than add VCD support. I already have all the $49 packages that do VCD’s. I don’t need another. I want a DVD authoring program to make... well... great DVD’s. DVD Architect is that program.

I respect your concerns as someone not having a DVD burner yet. That was me a year ago. But DVD media is getting cheaper by the day and burners are already under $200. VCD’s days are numbered. It was a great format to hold us over but DVD’s are here now and it might not make sense to add VCD support if by the time the next release comes out no body wants it anymore. I think they should move the DVD support forward and just let VCD’s die a natural death.

~jr

But isn't a SVCD just another MPEG2 file? I know that the file size can't be as large as for DVD but what else is differant the bit rate?

SVCD specs
Max bitrate of 2600kbs (2778kbs with audio)
Resolution of 480x480 (NTSC) & 480x576 (PAL)
Maximum of 4 subtitles
Maximum 2 audio tracks
Only MPEG-1 audio

JR,

"You can’t purchase DVD Architect separately (i.e., without Vegas 4) so their entire target market is Vegas 4 users."

You are right. They have severely restricted their target market, apparently deliberately. But is severely restricting your target market really a good strategy? I suppose if the boxed product were in really short supply that might make sense. I don't know. I am probably missing something here. This marketing strategy can't be as dumb as it looks. Perhaps they know that the version 1.0 product might embarrass itself in a head-to-head comparison against more mature competition. And there is a modern saying that you shouldn't buy version 1.0 of anything.

Actually, considering its short, accelerated development cycle, DVD Architect is an amazingly good product. But a side-by-side feature-by-feature and benchmark-by-benchmark magazine comparison review of the current relatively mature Ulead DVD Workshop and the newbie 1.0 DVD Architect could be potentially humiliating. And the disparity could be even greater when a new version of DVD Workshop comes out, which may be fairly soon, considering that Version 2 of DVD Movie Factory just came out and raised the bar considerably in its entry-level market segment. A new version of Ulead DVD Workshop will be just the other shoe falling.

"So if you’re targeting professionals, and you ask them if they’d rather see multiple audio streams and subtitle support in the next release or VCD/SVCD support, I would guess that VCD support would NOT be high on their list."

No argument there. And I am not even a professional. But that brings up another marketing question. Obviously SoFo is targeting professionals. While Ulead is targeting everybody, children included. [Actually, SoFo did put out a version of ACID for kids--I saw a couple of kids demoing it on TechTV, and they were wild about it]. By marketing to a broader market segment, Ulead can afford the costs of adding extra features to their products to please both professionals and "the rest of us." Ulead DVD Workshop already has many of those extra menu and navigation authoring features that we are going to be begging SoFo to include in DVD Architect 2.0, and Ulead is also putting in some features to please the professionals:

Ulead DVD Workshop AC-3 Now Available

Professionals right here in this forum are putting their DVD Architect 1.0 on the shelf to "mature" while continuing to use other DVD authoring products that happen to support, perhaps coincidentally, VCD, SVCD, and miniDVD. DVD Architect is playing a game of catch-up, with a long way to go, and the target is itself moving ahead rapidly.

"VCD’s days are numbered. It was a great format to hold us over but DVD’s are here now...

I personally don't need VCDs either. I have been agitating, totally unsuccessfully I might add, for miniDVD support. MiniDVDs are just "tiny DVDs" with the identical DVD data structure and DVD authoring versatility, only with a shorter playing time and since you burn them to CD-Rs they cost only about 20 cents each. I have no idea why SoFo has been so adamant against supporting miniDVD. But they have, at least for version 1.0. And while VCDs may hold no attraction to you, miniDVDs should be attractive to you, if for no other reason than to bring DVD authoring experiments to your home theater system for testing for only about 20 cents a pop, without using up your DVD blanks. MiniDVDs have full DVD video and audio quality--they are just shorter. Great for short subjects, for mailers, and who knows? A client might request a batch of them.

-- Seeker --

"I personally don't need VCDs either. I have been agitating, totally unsuccessfully I might add, for miniDVD support. MiniDVDs are just "tiny DVDs" with the identical DVD data structure and DVD authoring versatility, only with a shorter playing time and since you burn them to CD-Rs they cost only about 20 cents each. I have no idea why SoFo has been so adamant against supporting miniDVD. But they have, at least for version 1.0. And while VCDs may hold no attraction to you, miniDVDs should be attractive to you, if for no other reason than to bring DVD authoring experiments to your home theater system for testing for only about 20 cents a pop, without using up your DVD blanks. MiniDVDs have full DVD video and audio quality--they are just shorter. Great for short subjects, for mailers, and who knows? A client might request a batch of them."

First off, you can create VCDs. You just have to use Vegas 4.0 to do it. Secondly I just use DVD+RW media to preview and "experiment" on my home system, when I am finished I erase the DVD+RW and start over again. I have never used miniDVDs, are they rewriteable? My personal preference for experimenting is to use media that can be erased and used again, no DVD blanks with +RW.

miniDVDs (otherwise known as cDVD) are DVD format MPEG on a CD - designed for Computer playback & very few Set top players play them.

Vonhosen,

"... & very few Set top players play them."

While it true that a lot of standalone players will not play miniDVDs, particularly the older models, I think there is a popular misconception that almost no standalone players play miniDVDs. A recent test of 737 players showed that 211 of them did play miniDVD.

That shows that 29%, or nearly a third of the players play miniDVDs. In my opinion, that's not as you say, "very few."

As it happens, not entirely by accident, all three of the players in my immediate family play miniDVDs, and two of them were priced less than $100. Anyone who wished to purchase an inexpensive player to play miniDVDs (as well as many other media and formats) would have no trouble picking from the following list of 211 players. Since only 50 players are shown per page, you will need to page through 5 pages to see all of the miniDVD player models.

List of DVD players that play miniDVD

-- Seeker --

seeker:

It's easy to make miniDVDs with DVD Architect, but it's not an official feature. Just "prepare" your DVD, then burn the data in the prepare directory to a CD-R disc using a 3rd party burning application, such as Nero. And don't use high bitrate video. Just please don't call our support department if you have any problems making these or playing them.

///d@

Please Seeker, could you explain in details how you burn on Nero mini DVD after DVDA rendering Video_TS and Audio_TS(thats always is empty?)folders?
Which way to burn on Nero?
Thanks, erick

Erick,

"...could you explain in details how you burn on Nero mini DVD after DVDA rendering Video_TS and Audio_TS(thats always is empty?)folders? Which way to burn on Nero?"

I will post a more detailed step-by-step procedure in a later message. I will provide a few "high points" here. Make sure your DVD player is listed as capable of playing miniDVDs. You should use the very latest verson 5.5.10.7b of Nero. It is quite recent, and earlier versions have caused problems.

Make a note of the maximum speed of your CD-R blank and do not exceed it. Nothing can already be on the blank, or the miniDVD session will fail, so the blank needs to be "blank." I used a cheap TDK 8x blank, so I burned at the slowest available writing speed in Nero, namely 4x. The default was 16x, so you can't always rely on defaults. I guess Nero can't "sense" the speed of the blank you have inserted. The sample project took only about 3 minutes to burn at 4x, so there isn't any pressing need for trying to "push your luck" with higher burning speeds. In order to have a "clean" working environment, I did a system restart and then closed down my anti-virus program.

You will simply put the VIDEO_TS folder and the AUDIO_TS folder on the CD-R to make the miniDVD. Some, but not all, DVD players require that those folder names be in all-caps, so if your authoring software creates an Audio_TS and a Video_TS folder, it would be a good idea to rename them using all capitals to satisfy a wider range of DVD players.

When I started Nero, the "Wizard" appeared, but I closed it, and just used Nero's standard interface. (I kind of doubt that you can make a miniDVD with the current Wizard. Nero should make the Wizard more versatile.) On the New Compilation dialog I clicked the "CD-ROM (UDF/ISO)" icon, to be compatible with both UDF and ISO. Under the Multisession tab, click "No Multisession". I accepted Nero's defaults on the ISO tab, except I unchecked Juliet on a whim, which may have been a mistake. I accepted Nero's defaults on the UDF tab, the Label tab, the Dates tab, and the Misc tab. As discussed above, on the Burn tab I changed the Write Speed to the slowest available choice, 4x, and I also changed the default Track-At-Once to Disc-At-Once.

I guess a "Root" directory exists on the CD-R by default. All I put on the CD-R was the VIDEO_TS folder with its contents and the AUDIO_TS folder and its non-contents, but my DVD player showed an onscreen Root directory, under which the AUDIO_TS folder and the VIDEO_TS folder existed. In order to "play" the video, you had to use the DVD player controller to navigate to the VIDEO_TS folder and click on it. I was disappointed in the demo's main menu. I expected something fancier and less "spartan". Maybe that Juliet thing screwed up the menu. But the video played nicely. Good picture, good sound.

I plan to do some more experiments. I'll try checking Juliet. And I will also try creating a disc image and then burning the image. That might help later on when the miniDVDs are more fully "populated."

-- Seeker --

Dear Seeker, thanks so much for your help, I burned2miniDVD one unchecked Juliet and other checked Juliet. Both are the same video and sound quality that is very good, but something is wrong with the loop menu, introducing media and other DVD video to play in order. For example my DVD players load first the nenu, then the intro video and after all video in order but no stop, the remote control is ok only to next or prewiev video. When the last video finish,it return for my DVD Video menu with MP3 Menu on the screen.
Maybe is my DVD Video, that is Phillips, and is not in that list.
Any way thanks alot for your help and I understand who havent a DVD driver, looking for a way to burn your DVD project. Is dificult to who that get about U$300a month to live with 4 persons at home buys a DVD driver at moment in Brazil.
thanks, erick