DVD burning mod (7/14/06 - v1.4.2)

[ldavis]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

1) Originally, I believe that dvdAuthor only supported elementary streams, but in the latest version it support audio/video mpegs as long as they have nav packets. This is how I use it.

2) Basically the only reason I pack the video_ts folder into an image is because I need to make sure the DVD gets burned with the proper file structure so that it is playable on standalone DVD players. However, if your burning software is smart and can create the file structure on the fly, then it is possible to skip the img step and just burn your video_ts folder directly to DVD. ImgBurn 2.0 supports this with its new build mode and I plan on taking advantage of it in the next version.

Though I may be wrong about some of that. Like i've said before, I just write the scripts that tie everything together, other stuff does the black magic

Thanks for the input. Looking at the latest version of ImgBurn, it appears to me that build mode only supports the creation of iso files. Am I missing something here?

GUI for dvdauthor does support mpeg directly but how do you place NAV packets in your mpeg files? For that matter, what are NAV packets?

[evilpenguin]

Nope, with imgBurn 2.0+ you can build directly to DVD.

As for the nav packets, I have no idea what they are, I just know the DVD VOB's need 'em

[ldavis]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

Nope, with imgBurn 2.0+ you can build directly to DVD.

As for the nav packets, I have no idea what they are, I just know the DVD VOB's need 'em

Thanks for the heads up on ImgBurn. The toggle for changing from build iso to build directly to disc takes a little while to find

For the NAV packets, how do you add them to an mpg file?

[evilpenguin]

I use SageTVTranscoder (or ffmpeg if you like ) and the command...

SageTVTranscoder.exe -i input.mpg -target ntsc-dvd -acodec copy -vcodec copy nav_packet_output.mpg

It does a very good job IMHO

[nyplayer]

evilpenguin,

I am having a problem with your DVD program.

This is my Setup

SageTV Server
Recording to Drives m:\ and n:\ .... no unc paths
Sharing drives as sagem$ and sagen$ full access

Sage Tv client
I have mapped drives m:\ (sagem$) and n:\ (sagen$)

Below you will find your logs.

vdinfo
FFmpeg version CVS, Copyright (c) 2000-2004 Fabrice Bellard
configuration: --enable-memalign-hack --enable-a52 --enable-gpl --enable-xvid --enable-faac --enable-mp3lame --disable-debug
libavcodec version: 51.9.0
libavformat version: 50.4.0
built on May 12 2006 11:07:09, gcc: 3.2.3 (mingw special 20030504-1)
M:\LawOrderCriminalIntent-Blink-235208-0.mpg: I/O error occured
Usually that means that input file is truncated and/or corrupted.


log posted below...

[evilpenguin]

can you rename the logs to .txt and post them directly to the forums, it looks like some data is getting eaten.

[nyplayer]

Here it is.

[evilpenguin]

Hey, there should be another file in your Y:\DVD folder called dvdList.log, can you rename it to txt and post it?

[nyplayer]

Here it is :-)

Ps if I run this batchfile it works so I know The file is good.

SageTVTranscoder.exe -i M:\LawOrderCriminalIntent-Blink-235208-0.mpg -target ntsc-dvd -acodec copy -vcodec copy c:\output.mpg

[evilpenguin]

Bah, XML file, my old nemesis... I was wondering how those illegal chars were sneaking out of there.

Oh well, this should be an easy fix. Try opening up your advanced.pref file and changing the lines...

RegEX to Strip out problem charactors for file names='|"|\\|/|\||<|>|:|\*|\?|\&
RegEX to strip out problem charactors for menu generation='|\&

to

RegEX to Strip out problem charactors for file names='|"|\\|/|\||<|>|:|\*|\?|\&|\;
RegEX to strip out problem charactors for menu generation='|\&|\;

edit:
and if that works, even better might be...

RegEX to Strip out problem charactors for file names='|"|\\|/|\||<|>|:|\*|\?|\&|\;|amp\;
RegEX to strip out problem charactors for menu generation='|\&|\;|amp\;

If none of that works, i'll try and crank out a fix for you on monday.

[nyplayer]

Penguin,

Neither change worked. Same error.

here is the log for the first change.

[Tim M]

Hi all,
I'm very sorry that my first-ever post is a probably a stupid question, but since I'm not getting an error message, I'm having trouble finding an answer by searching.

My spankin' new HTPC seems to working working fine--we're not watching anything on it, but I got SageMC installed and it's been recording favorites all week.

I installed the burning mod and thought I had everything going, but nothing burns. When I hit "Burn to DVD" and then pick Single Video, I get the busy icon and then nothing. In fact it just goes back to the "Send To" menu.

I've also tried a multi-video DVD and then went to Other Programs to burn it, but clicking on the file results in no visible activity.

My DVD directory has a 1kb qdvd file (and the dvdlist file) and my other programs directory has a batch file, but as far as I can tell nothing is transcoding and imgBurn is obviously not running.

I've changed the dirmonless option to disabled and back again a few times with no difference. I also restarted my whole system.


Any ideas where my breakdown is occuring?

Thanks,
Tim

[acrowe]

Originally Posted by Tim M

Hi all,
I'm very sorry that my first-ever post is a probably a stupid question, but since I'm not getting an error message, I'm having trouble finding an answer by searching.

My spankin' new HTPC seems to working working fine--we're not watching anything on it, but I got SageMC installed and it's been recording favorites all week.

I installed the burning mod and thought I had everything going, but nothing burns. When I hit "Burn to DVD" and then pick Single Video, I get the busy icon and then nothing. In fact it just goes back to the "Send To" menu.

I've also tried a multi-video DVD and then went to Other Programs to burn it, but clicking on the file results in no visible activity.

My DVD directory has a 1kb qdvd file (and the dvdlist file) and my other programs directory has a batch file, but as far as I can tell nothing is transcoding and imgBurn is obviously not running.

I've changed the dirmonless option to disabled and back again a few times with no difference. I also restarted my whole system.


Any ideas where my breakdown is occuring?

Thanks,
Tim

I'm no expert on this mod (I just got it working myself), but did you go into the "Other Programs" menu and see if the file is showing up there?

Are you using dirmon or not?

My guess is you aren't using dirmon (though I HIGHLY recommend it myself, then you can also use Show Analyzer and get great commercial detection!). So I think you have to kick off the work from the menu. Then once it has processed the file it will change from a little dot to a DVD symbol. You click on that, stick in the DVD and off goes img burn.

At least thats how it worked for me.

[UFGrayMatter]

is there a way to start img burn and the dos window hidden?

Thanks,
Ryan

[Tim M]

Originally Posted by acrowe

I'm no expert on this mod (I just got it working myself), but did you go into the "Other Programs" menu and see if the file is showing up there?

Are you using dirmon or not?

My guess is you aren't using dirmon (though I HIGHLY recommend it myself, then you can also use Show Analyzer and get great commercial detection!). So I think you have to kick off the work from the menu. Then once it has processed the file it will change from a little dot to a DVD symbol. You click on that, stick in the DVD and off goes img burn.

At least thats how it worked for me.

I am using dirmon but have also tried from Other Programs. The show does appear in the Other Programs menu, but clicking it does not appear to initiate any activity.

Tim

[UFGrayMatter]

Originally Posted by Tim M

I am using dirmon but have also tried from Other Programs. The show does appear in the Other Programs menu, but clicking it does not appear to initiate any activity.

Tim

what color is the button on the other programs screen?

[CanadianEh]

Originally Posted by evilpenguin

2) No sound, huh, that's not good. Have you tried playing back the DVD in multiple devices (SageTV, WMP, standalone DVD player)? If none of that works, go into perl2dvd.advanced.pref and enable "save files for debugging"., that will save all of the logfiles and temporary videos. Then try and burn another DVD and try playing the temporary videos with WMP and see if they have sound and also rename the .log file to .txt and post it here on the forums and i'll take a look at it.

BTW: I wanted to let you know that I figured this out - the problem was with my Pioneer DVD player (regular home entertainment DVD player) - I had to set it to convert MPEG audio to PCM and it now plays audio perfectly.


Thanks for the assistance, regardless

[Tim M]

Successfully burned two (single file) DVDs today.

Just one clarification, if you guys don't mind. If I have dirmon set up correctly, should it automatically transcode and automatically burn after I select "Send To DVD", or do I still need to go to Other Programs and burn from there?

Thanks guys,
Tim

[evilpenguin]

Originally Posted by Tim M

Successfully burned two (single file) DVDs today.

Just one clarification, if you guys don't mind. If I have dirmon set up correctly, should it automatically transcode and automatically burn after I select "Send To DVD", or do I still need to go to Other Programs and burn from there?

Thanks guys,
Tim

Nope, burning still has to be started manually from the Other Programs menu. The burning process is still to intrusive to just happen in the background so I make sure you have the option to run it when you are ready. Glad you got it working, enjoy!

[gand]

Hi all,

I've managed to burn a dvd with this plugin, but have a problem with the audio synchronising with video. It looked good when I started playing my dvd, but the sound was going slightly slower than the picture, so by the time I got half an hour in they were totally out of sync!

Has anyone else experienced this problem - I'm using the SageTV MPEG Audio decoder, Default Audio Renderer and Sage TV MPEG Video Decoder. Might it be anything to do with these settings?

Would be really grateful if anyone had any ideas - let me know if you need any more info.

Thanks,
Gand

BTW - great work evil penguin, I hope I can get over this hurdle.