IF you are just wanting to edit the chapters, you only need to rip the video and audio, using many of the free software packages out there to do it.

Then use that media in DVDA and adjust your chapters as necessary.

If you need to actually change the video then videoITguy is correct.

I am sure that you could edit the position of a chapter using PGCEdit, but I have never done it.

Another way to proceed might be to open DVDArch and create a new DVD project as appropriate. Drag VTS_01_0.IFO from your DVD to the menu in DVDArch. This will load the audio and video plus chapter markers. Edit the markers as you like. You will need to create a new menu from scratch, however.

Due to DVDArch's stupidity, it will re-encode the audio because it is included with the video and not in a separate file. You could prevent this by extracting and concatenating the VOB files, for example with VOB2MPG, and then demuxing with say TsMuxerGUI to produce an audio-only file, and using this to replace the audio in your project.

I don't find DVD Architect behaves stupidly with VOB files. Provided they are compliant it will happily not recompress video and audio, irrespective that they are in the same file. But I'm in PAL land and only dealing with two channel stereo. Maybe NTSC is different. From memory the only time DVDA has recompressed the audio is when its mpeg2.

That accords with my own experience.

I didn't say that it behaves stupidly with VOB files, I said that it behaves stupidly when the audio and video are not in separate files. If they are in the same file, the audio will be recompressed even when it is compliant.

The need for separate audio and video files has been mentioned countless times in these forums.

TMPGEnc Authoring Works, on the other hand, quite happily accepts video and audio in the same file.

But VOB files have the audio and video in the one file? And the audio doesn't get recompressed if compliant. Or have I misunderstood and we are talking about something different?

Yes, VOB files have both audio and video. Perhaps you have missed the little notice that says that the audio will be recompressed.

We are talking about two sets of VOB files here. The source VOB files in the disc to be modified and the VOB files in the modified disc.

Its the source (whether VOB or normal MPEG2) that has to have its audio in a separate file, or the audio will be recompressed.

The created disc will have both audio and video in its VOB files.

Have you created DVDs using VOB files as source before? I hadn't until I tried it for this thread.

On page 196 and 197 of DVDA Pro 6 manual it says:

"You'll need to render your audio stream separately..."

This is very strange. I have imported .mpg files and .vob files from NLEs (not Sony) into DVDAS 5.0 many times and have never seen an indication that the audio component would be re-compressed.

I have never tried using the VOB files directly in DVDA but I have had good luck using the elementary streams.

TOG62, if you import an MPEG file with the audio muxed, DVDA will have to process it. I don't know if it actually recompresses but it has to demux it first.

Check under optimize next time you do it and see if there is an indication of recompressing.

Also, Vegas does not normally give you the option to use AC3 audio muxed with an MPEG file, so you end up with an MPEG2 audio which is not a DVD standard, although many DVD players will use it. If you want AC3, you have to make separate streams.

The same thing applies when making a Blu-ray Disc. In this case you can render a video file with a compliant AC3 audio file, but DVD Arch still wants the audio separate or it says that it will recompress it.

I've never had DVDA recompress audio in a VOB file if it's compliant i.e Dolby or LPCM, not mpeg layer 2. And certainly I would have spotted the recompression message plus I also check for compliance in the Optimize Disc window before I create a disc image.

But none of my VOBs, to my knowledge, were created by Sony Movie Studio. They have come off DVDs made by other club members using a range of editors on pc, mac and Casablanca editing systems. I recall reading in another post recently that PAL and NTSC are treated differently by DVDA in respect of audio streams so my experience with PAL could be different to those of you with NTSC?

As for Blu-ray discs this is another matter because DVDA 5 is pathetic here as it only does LPCM audio. So if you have a m2ts file with Dolby audio then yes it will have the audio recompressed. I've not tried it but even if you have an AC3 audio stream separate I suspect DVDA5 will recompress it because it only does LPCM.

I just went through the exercise I have been suggesting, using a recently made DVD.

When I go to make the DVD, DVDArch says that it will recompress the video AND compress (not recompress) the audio. I set it going and it was obviously recompressing the video because it said so and was taking many minutes in the process. I had thought that it would not recompress a video it had previously accepted without recompression, but wrong again!

So this procedure is suboptimal.

I will fiddle a bit more to see if I can find a workaround where the video at least is not recompressed.

Eric, I am using PAL too.

How do you use the VOBs?

If you drag the VOBs directly to the timeline in Vegas you will get small breaks at the joins of the VOBs. You have to concatenate them first, or import the VOBs, or drag the IFO file to the timeline. I would have thought the same would apply to DVDArch as well.

"As for Blu-ray discs this is another matter because DVDA 5 is pathetic here as it only does LPCM audio."

Eric, I normally use DVDA Pro 5.2, but I just tried 5.0 and I have the option of setting audio to

PCM Stereo
AC-3 Stereo
AC-3 5.1 surround

Are you using the Pro version of DVDA?

Peterduke, I always rip them to elementary streams first. If your DVD has multiple audio streams I would see possible problems in using the VOB straight.

Dave, I agree.

Here is the best practice I have come up with so far to re-author a DVD:

Create a Vegas project to match your source DVD.

Drag VTS_01_0.IFO from the DVD to the Vegas timeline, using Windows Explorer.

There will be orange lines corresponding to the original chapter markers. Insert new scene/chapter markers as desired, using the orange lines as a guide if you don't wish to change the marker positions.

Render the video only, using matching properties. The video will smart render.

Render the audio to AC3. I don't think Vegas can smart render audio, so the audio will be recompressed.

If you don't want to recompress the audio, do this instead of the previous step. Extract the VOBs from the DVD into a single MPG file, by using the COPY /B command or using VOB2MPG (or your own preferred method). Then use TsMuxer (or similar) to extract the audio.

Create a new project in DVDA with matching properties.

Load in the video and audio, create a new menu from scratch, and create your new DVD.

Post Script

Vegas may not smart render the video of a DVD not created by Vegas+DVDA. If so, it may be possible to do so by extracting the VOBs as an MPG file and authoring in TMPGEnc Authoring Works. TAW seems more tolerant than SCS software in this respect.

Well, I think I will now withdraw from the battle before I get any more scars. I had a maths teacher once who was very sharp but still claimed that doing maths kept you humble. Even he was liable to errors at times, apparently.

I just made a DVD project using the MPG file from a DVD extracted using VOB2MPG. It contained BOTH the audio and the video. I inserted some markers and made a scene menu, and then created a DVD (folders only).

IT DID NOT RECOMPRESS EITHER VIDEO OR AUDIO!

Using computers keeps you humble.

"Eric, I am using PAL too.

Peter, my VOBs have been of short videos so I've yet to have the problem of joining any.

As for the audio in DVDA my version is 5.0 Build 186. For DVDs I get the three options of - PCM Stereo, AC-3 Stereo and AC-3 5.1 Surround. But with Blu-ray there is only one option namely PCM Stereo. I know I'm not alone with this as I've seen others complain

My latest version of DVD Architect Pro 5 is version 5b (build 180). Whether I create a new DVD or Blu-ray project, I have all three audio options.

You didn't say whether it was the Pro or Studio version of DVDA that you have.

I see from this page
http://download.sonymediasoftware.com/current/

that 186 is the studio version. That could explain it.