And that's what you use?

The MC encoder is really good for DVD encoding. For lower bitrate stuff like VCD/SVCD some people prefer TMPEG.

But you would say that, wouldn't you :)

OK, I believe you !

I've used the Main Concept MPEG2 encoder in VF and, frankly, I have been less than impressed with the results. The encoder is slow and the blocks are very apparent on the output especially video with a fair amount of motion with detailed background.

I recently downloaded TMPGEnc and used it to encode a 30-minute DV AVI file (highlights of my son's high school football game.) The quality of the picture using constant bit rate at 6000 kbs/sec was excellent (1.58 GB file size). Pixelation and artifacts were minimal. To me, the quality compared quite favorably to the original DV footage shot with my Panasonic camcorder.

I encoded the same AVI file using TMPEGEnc variable bit rate setting at 4000 kbs/sec and the quality was definitely not as good, but it was acceptable (1.08 GB file.) The variable bit rate encoding took a 6:1 time encoding ratio while the constant bit rate encoding took a 3:1 ratio (30 minute video took 3 hours to encode with VBR and 1.5 hours with CBR on a 1.6 Mhz, P4 with 384 MB RAM and 80 GB IBM ATA100 drive). The two-fold difference between VBR and CBR is to be expected since VBR is a 2-pass process.

I've also used the encoder in Sonic myDVD and it does a good job (better than Main Concept, but not as good as TMPEGEnc) but the file size tends to be on the large side resulting in less video fitting on a DVD.

I know I'm going to invest in registering my copy of TMPEGEnc. If you look on Canopus's web site for their ProCoder product, they provide a benchmark document in PDF format. It's interesting to see that TMPEGEnc ($48), compares quite favorably to Canopus's product that costs $700.

The one irritating problem I'm having is that for some reason, when I bring my TMPEGEnc MPEG-2 file into 'myDVD' to actually author and burn the DVD, 'myDVD' wants to re-encode the audio portion (the video component is NOT re-encoded.) I have to get this straightened out with the 'myDVD' people.

Good luck in your quest for the perfect setup. I know I've been experimenting for months, and at times, when I think things couldn't get anymore confusing, they do. In my opinion, home video editing has a long way to go before all the quirks and nuances are worked out so that it can be a relatively painless process. Right now, it seems I spend too much time and energy (and money) on the mechanics of editing and producing a video and not enough time on the creative part.

>And that's what you use?

Sort of! I bought it and then found my DVD player wouldn't play any any new CD-R VCDs or SVCDs properly. A VCD I made a year ago is ok, commercial VCDs are ok, but nothing I or my friends make now will play without problems!

That said, I made an SVCD of my old honeymoon stills and the quality was fine. I think the Nero plug-in is about $15, so it's not a huge investment. BUT!! I've just had a look at the Nero site to check, and the DVD plug-in is for Nerovision Express, not the standard cd writing package I've got, and it's vapourware! I'm sorry I misled you!

Cheers

Ian G.

"I've used the Main Concept MPEG2 encoder in VF and, frankly, I have been less than impressed with the results. The encoder is slow and the blocks are very apparent on the output especially video with a fair amount of motion with detailed background"

Apparently you are doing something wrong or your source file is bad to begin with. I've encoded literally hundreds of videos with the MC encoder and see no blocks at all even on lower grade MPEG source files.