Smoothest running, most compatible format??

kkraning wrote on 10/31/2001, 10:46 AM

My VF presentation is complete. I've burned a copy in mpeg format and it will play on some DVD players, but not all. The DVD players it will play on have a grainy picture and the music sounds like it is being played on speakers that have been blown.
For the DVD player:
In what format do I need to create this presentation so that it will run the smoothest on the most DVD players?
For the non DVD player:
Is there an exe file that can be burned with the presentation that will automatically execute the file when is is placed in the PC's CD drive?

Comments

wvg wrote on 10/31/2001, 11:54 AM

http://www.vcdhelp.com is a good resource, but they have their forum down due to too much bandwidth being used. :-( The how-to area still seems to be up and running.

The fact is all DVD players can't play home brew CD-R or CD-RW.

Reasons:

a. reflectivity of the media (the coating of the CD). Simply stated some DVD lasers can't read either CD-R or CD-RW disks. They bounce off. You generally have less trouble with CD-RW because the coating has different reflective properites than CD-R. Also be aware the coatings vary from brand to brand. So your DVD may be able to play a video on Brand X media and stumble on Brands Z and Y.

b. you picked an incompatible format. You must use VCD or SVCD in either PAL or NTSC flavors. Many DVD players can also play XVCD, but not all.

c. Even though many set top DVD players are rated to play video CD they can only play the commerically made variety. Those are pressed, not "burned" as in the case with home made CD's.

d. The above site has an extensive list of what DVD player plays what format, max bitrate, etc..

Presently Video Factory is very limited in what it supports in included templates as far as making video CD's. Unless you have a DVD burner you need to use the Video CD NTSC template which only supports basic VCD which is just MPEG-1 quality. If you have a DVD burner then you can use MPEG-2. If you only have a CD burner and want to make SVCD (super video = higher bitrate and better overall quality) CD's, you should do your edting in VF, export as AVI, then finish in some other application like TMPGnc which supports SVCD and also adds many tools VF is lacking.

To answer your second question, yes you can add auto start on CD's you create. Again the how-to is available at the site I mentioned at the top of this post. Again, it works on some DVD players, others it don't.