Hey ppl.

Just a few quick questions:

I have a DV Camera, its all very nice i suppose but.......

VCD is supposed to be crap quality....is this true?

How much do blank DVD's & a burner cost?

I hear something about miniDVD, it this a myth?

Cheers all :)

-- Terry Hurcombe (spider@ukbronze.i-p.com), August 01, 2001

Answers

I do think the quality of VCD is crap and that's why I make SVCDs of everything, but no doubt many people here will not agree with me. After all, this is a VCD forum. Blank DVDs cost about $10 each if you can find a good source. Burners are around $900. You should be aware that although compatibility is pretty good, not all DVD players will play homemade DVDs. miniDVD does exist. It's DVD format on a CD-R disc. The bad news is that only Afreey and some Sampo model DVD players will play them, but PCs have no problem with miniDVD. If a DVD player supports CD-R media, it should be fairly trivial to make it support miniDVD, but most DVD player manufacturers have chosen not to do this. Depending on the bit rate you use to record your video, you can get 12 or so minutes of video per CD-R at high DVD bit rates (8 Mbps or so), but you can get more time if you drop the bit rate during recording. You might want to check the following web sites and read about VCD and SVCD before you get started to have an idea of what you are getting yourself into. www.vcdhelp.com (check the DVD compatibility list to see if your DVD player will even play your homemade VCD or SVCD discs) www.doom9.net www.digital-digest.com www.pcphotovideo.com members.home.net/richa www.labdv.com I guess it's also worth saying that there are 3 totally incompatible DVD burning formats on the market right now and if you get a burner, you do run the risk of buying a technology that will become orphaned if that particular format fails to capture market share. In my opinion, Pioneer's format is the best and most likely to succeed, but I could be wrong. Good luck.

-- Jason (Jason.Shumate@equant.com), August 02, 2001.