I posted this a few days back on another site:

----------------------- I have always read with interest postings here and elsewhere about out of sync sound, have been contacted by numerous people who have the problem and not been able to give an answer. There have been some interesting get arounds developed which I have had no need to try, well till today that is:

Here is a history of the tests just carried out. The file has a requirement for sync with someone hitting a chisel in a quarry on Machu Picchu.

1) DV PAL source file encoded to SVCD (CBR 2376, my standard Philips 725 template) file length 11.1 minutes, sync required at 5 minutes 58 seconds. Build 12a Nero 5.0.3.5, Sony CRX145E burner. Pioneer 104 DVDRom and Philips DVD 725 stand alone.

2) File played from hard drive to computer screen and TV monitor with Hollywood Plus decoder card - full sync.

3) File burnt to CD-RW, played as above and to TV in Philips 725, full sync.

4) File burnt to CD-R, played as above - full sync, played in Philips 725 - OUT OF SYNC.

Well now ............ is TMPGEnc really to blame? ------------------------

Seems to me there is a battle with the players and media here.

1) Just a comment on a re- occuring cycle - do not need to be told how to fix it, plenty of sites apply the band aid, but what is the true problem here, who is at fault I wonder?

2) Wonder what happens to a "corrected" file on a player that played the original correctly?

3) Have those that have had these troubles ever compared the files in this way? Would be nice to get lots of positive answers to this one with results.

4) The CD-DVD project gave full sync via the RM HW+ and software players, wonder what will happen with the DVD-R?

Answer by numbers

-- Ross McL (rmclennan@esc.net.au), December 27, 2000

Answers

It seems that 1 & 2 are doing OK for both the putter and stand alone unit, but 3 creates problem for the stand alone unit. If it is indeed TMPGEnc's fault then you will see it in all 1,2, & 3 cases or at least in 2 & 3.

I have the same issue with TMPGEnc out of sync when i convert my captured & compressed divx/mp3 to VCD/SVCD in TMPGENc. It seemed that TMPGEnc can not deal with compressed mp3; It likes uncompressed wav much better. Nevertheless, It will show up on all three accounts. When I convert the mp3 to uncompressed wav, all three cases are fixed.

Which means case 3 is the media that is causing the stand alone unit to skip and causing the video/audio out of sync. Have you tried the CD-R out on a different stand alone unit to see if it is doing the same thing? Alternative, clean the reader's head...maybe it's dirty from all the testing that you've done :) My Pioneer is starting to skip a few of my VCD/SVCD now from extended used and no clean...It was not doing this on these VCD/SVCD before.

-- lnguyen (wingstarzz@hotmail.com), December 27, 2000.

Goodday Long, great to see you up on this one.

I had another reply on another site that said the AD 600a Apex did not like a non remuxed file and he simply remuxed the file without changing any offsets (which he said will upset the other players that currently do it correctly) and it played the file perfectly in sync.

I have had a remuxed file for a few days now but have not burnt to CD- R to test it. Too much water goin under my bridge right now with DVD and all that and currently with only 150M left on my 43G drive means I gotta be careful in what I do.

My feeling was media initially as I have not been able to get Kodak silvers anymore, so there was a change in media involved (got lazy and did not walk further to get the Sony's I would normally use). Kodak have changed to a mixture of gold and silver so I wondered (as reported here, my burner will not burn them faster than 4x as it says its an un supported media for above that speed - interesting also).

So taking one thing at a time and not rushing into a bandaid fix that stuffs other player options up if that be the true case, besides my CD-RW's work but a CD-R would be better!

-- Ross McL (rmclennan@esc.net.au), December 27, 2000.

ooopps Long

Not actually tried in another standalone yet but a few are out for testing, have not cleaned yet either so thats an option that needs attention as I have done nothing to the computer DVD (Pioneer 104) or the standalone since I had them.

Thanks

-- Ross McL (rmclennan@esc.net.au), December 27, 2000.

Long I could not remember yesterday which way around the sound/vision was, so I re checked last night, the sound comes first and the vision later, thats, as understand it, the opposite of stuttering somewhere in the presentation, or have I got that wrong?

Any comments.

I burnt the remux to CD-R last night and there is some improvement, its now only a couple of frames out as also described above. Now to a different media.

Any comment on that also.

Thanks

-- Ross McL (rmclennan@esc.net.au), December 28, 2000.

Hi Ross,

I don't know what to say at this point. Remuxing a clip to resolve CD-R playback on a stand alone unit is saying that the clip is corrupted all along and your computer is not seeing it or the CD-RW will be able to fix the corrupted mpeg1 somehow. My feeling is still with the media and the laser lens, both the burner and the player. I too own an APEX 3 disc changer and it play the VCD that i've made before fine, which the Pioneers will also do (after the cleaning!!). I still do not see the remuxing process will fix problem on CD-R. It simply does not make any sense. If anything is that the authoring process writes better to the CD-R this time around!

-- lnguyen (wingstarzz@hotmail.com), December 28, 2000.

Long, got me "wacked" as well, in nearly 2 years of VCD's (generic) not had this problem till now, others have and have applied bandaids.

Its a SVCD actually cause I no longer author to a VCD. I will be cleaning the lens(s) as you suggest and changing the media as well to see what happens then.

This sort of thing worries me in DVD, I am about to go to a DVD-R with the same files (well not quite, DVD compliant full frame sizes of course) and with the expense it will be a problem if this sort of out of sync problem can occur in that process. 30 times the media cost is a bit of a worry. Guess I will find out, maybe the hard way, but at least I will find out with "hands on" and will live to tell the story - I hope!

Catchup sometime!

-- Ross McL (rmclennan@esc.net.au), December 28, 2000.

Ross,

I've been doing XVCD, SVCD, and experimenting with MiniDVD on this end as well. XVCD(704x480 @29.97fps constant quality VBR @ 75% 4000kbit data rate max) is faster with TMPGEnc on my 950Mhz 1:2 ratio, and the quality is as good as SVCD. For some reason MPEG2 encoding in TMPGEnc is slower then MPEG1. The best I can get is 1:6 ratio. Anyway, I did not have any issue with SVCD on either CD-RW or CD-R media. What I've fed to TMPGEnc is components only, AVI(DivX) and WAV(uncompress PCM). As I've mentioned before, TMPGEnc has a slight problem with compress audio file, and it will desync the video and audio by a few miliseconds or so. This is all I've noticed on my end with both VCD and SVCD.

-- lnguyen (wingstarzz@hotmail.com), January 01, 2001.

Long thanks

I cleaned the DVD player using the radio shack cleaner, no difference.

Then I found some "old stock" Kodak silvers that I had used in the past - sync is back again so it was a "media" problem. I bought the lot, I will not say how many that involved but a b...dy lot. I will have to check out some other media with the demise to gold + silver from Kodak, gezzzzzzzzzzzzz nothin is easy!

-- Ross McL (rmclennan@esc.net.au), January 01, 2001.

:) This hobby of ours is not easy to say the least. First you have to invest a lot of time and money, then the frustration in getting it "RIGHT". However, the end result is pure bliss!!!!

I am glad that you've solved the problem :) Happy new year (new millenium) to you my friend :) Some day when DVD gets down to the level of CD-R right now, we will be having the same issue again..gezzzz. Have you look at how many softwares are available for DVD? Too many I think. Nevertheless, I do wish that MPEG4 will be the main focus instead of MPEG2. Quality wise versus filesize MPEG4 is way better over MPEG2 at the same bitrate.

-- lnguyen (wingstarzz@hotmail.com), January 01, 2001.

Long,

My DVD-R project using CD-R data discs for the file is about to go airmail to the UK for a kind fellow to burn to DVD and send back. Why! Well I want a DVD-R authored in SpruceUp to see what trouble I get into with DVD players and all that stuff. A NEW chase your tail with a 1000 alteratives no doubt. A challenge being tackled head on ahead of time I think, (certainly is without a DVD burner) but its got ta be done and why not now? The image quality out of TMPGEnc using my modified DVD templates is great in PAL, good enough to archive for any other purpose, the 650M is a limit but not in surmountable with Avisynth now at long last working.

http://www.geocities.com/aussie01au/DVD.html

You know what is so great when you have a web site is the emails you get to say thanks I followed your instructions and burnt a SVCD of high quality first time up. Others come back and say why did ya not use this or that? My site relates one of the 1000 choices that might work if your lucky, at least I have stood up to be counted with hands on information.

-- Ross mcL (rmclennan@esc.net.au), January 01, 2001.