DVD Burning

[Mysticeti]

After determining my PC crashing probs were hardware related and discovering some bad capacitors on my mobo I opted to do some major upgrading.... I'm now several hundred dollars poorer but I have a very stable HTPC system for my Hauppauge 500 and SageTV. As a "burn in test" I had SageTV record on both tuners all night long and it appears to have worked great!

So what's next? I'd like to be able to burn recorded shows to DVD. I've seen lots of postings here about Cayars DVDBurning STV. I'm still new to SageTV so I'm not even sure what an STV is but I'm also not sure if Cayars STV is a good match for me.

My #1 priority is stability with respect to getting shows recorded to the hard drive. #2 & #3 are picture/audio quality (including smooth playback) and responsiveness from the SageTV UI. High "Spousal Acceptance Factor" is #4. Hard drive space usage is not an issue.

The HTPC is in the basement and my system with a DVD burner is upstairs. I'm hoping to be able to burn on the upstairs PC by pointing some software at the network mounted SageTV mpg file and pressing a button. I don't want any transcoding to happen by defalt unless the source material won't fit on the DVD. Basically I'd like burning to be fast and painless. That said, additional frills such as show titles and other info on a generated title screen would be appreciated.

So far the one piece of software I've tried, Adobe Encore 1.0, has not met my requirements. First, Encore didn't like that the mpg file was on a network drive. So I copied the file locally. Then Encore didn't like the fact that there was no AC3 or PCM track in that mpg file. Is there a way get Hauppauge/SageTV to do encode the audio as AC3 or PCM? Is there additional software out there that can add an AC3 or PCM track to an mpg file? Should I not worry about this because most set top DVD players handle DVDs that have mpeg encoded audio? Should I forget about PCM because it's a disk space hog?

So, do folks think Cayars DVD Burning add on will work for me given my priorities and requirements? Any other suggestions?

Thanks!

[Mysticeti]

Maybe I asked too many questions at once or do I need to do some more reading?

Anyone else using Adobe tools to burn DVDs?

[JUC]

I have been fond of Nero---easy and you don't have to convert the files if you record in one of the DVD compliant settings. Good interface too. Using Cayars STV is an option too, but you need to buy VideoReDo ($50) and pay for the DVD application in Cayars STV (another $25)....makes it pretty expensive. Add on VIP membership and you are talking $100. Nero works fine for me now.

JUC

[ezeitler]

When burning a file that is larger than 4.7G, I use Nero to convert the Sage recorded files to a VIDEO_TS folder format. Then use DVDShrink to compress and burn the files to my DVD.

I also use VideoReDo to remove commercials if necessary - after running the Sage file thru comskip to create a VideoReDo cut list that is very accurate. I usually only have to trim the start & finish of a program. Then Nero & DVDShrink if necessary.

OR

If the files are small (<4.7G each), I use ULead or Nero to make & burn the DVD, no need for DVDShrink

[gplasky]

Why wouldn't you just use Nero Recode to shrink it and then burn it from there? Nero Recode basically picks up from where DVDshrink left off. (Same app.)

Unless you don't have Nero 6 Ultra Edition.

Gerry

[JUC]

I was just about to ask the same question. if you have Nero 6 just import the video, select fit to disk and it does all the work.
JUC

[Lastb0isct]

You guys are saying that Nero has an option to re-encode things? Can you tell me where this option is?!?!

[gplasky]

That would be the Nero Recode program that comes with Nero Ultra Edition.

Gerry