I've been capturing TV to MPEG2 (using WinTV). I'd like to be able fit as much as possible on a single DVD +/-R. I know I can control MPEG settings while recording but what's the best way of getting large (or many) MPEGs on DVD? For example, I have a 7+GB 6-hour file that I'd like to put on one DVD if possible. I've tried using Nero and ULead tools but have not been successful.
For one thing, try to keep the overall size close to that of the disc. 6 hours on a single layer DVD won't look any better than VHS tape. You'd have to compress too much or reduce the resolution and bitrate to substandard levels. 3 hours, maybe 3 1/2 hours looks ok. One thing that's easy that you may consider is shrinking the 7gb file with DVD Shrink and then burning it. It'll look like junk, but it's a solution.
Yes, I figured quality would suffer but it's only a TV miniseries (The Bermuda Triangle from SciFi) and I want to see what it looks like. I also have a number of things recorded to SLP VHS that are already, er... "quality challanged" that I'd like to squeeze onto as few DVDs as possible. Using DVDShrink for compression is my goal but I've become frustrated trying to find an efficient program to convert large MPEG files to DVD format and that's the point of my question.
Personally, I don't care about "saving" discs by overcramming them. Used to when I was paying 1.00 or more each, but now that you can get good discs for less than the cost of a candy bar, I gave up with the DVD frugality. Anyway, nothing to do but to compress with shrink (or your favorite compression app) or to re-encode the whole affair with something like TMPGEnc to reduce the video resolution and bitrate to managable levels. Either way is the wrong way, as you should always capture to a size that requires the least amount of fooling around to get it to fit on the discs you are using. One other thing you might also consider is converting the audio to MP2. If it's currently PCM you are probably wasting many 10's of megabytes storing inferior sound in this format. My last bit of advice is to not cram your vhs dubs onto a disc this way. The quality is already bad, shrinking will reduce it further, and you'll just end up with a blocky, blurry bunch of junk.
