Audio synch problem using Ulead DVD Movie Factory

[newtbert]

Im having problems with my Hauppauge WinTV PVR-350 card. I use it with Sage Recorder to record cable tv like a tivo, except my intent is to burn the recordings to DVD. The problem is at higher bitrates (> 4 Mbps) it seems that its dropping frames! Symptom is the audio and video slowly get out of synch, so that after an hour or so the synch error is very obvious and painfull to watch.

The weird thing is when played back in SageRecorder there is no synch error.

I use Ulead Movie Factory to master the dvd, and there is no synch error when playing inside of movie factory! But when I make the DVD, there is the synch error!

Anybody know where this is coming from or how to fix it?

I'm guessing its dropped frames tho can't tell for sure. But even then, why doesent it show up when played on the computer?

Seems like this problem may be related to file fragmentation, since it seems to recur when the disk gets filled and cluttered. Im using win2k with ntfs filesystem, but didnt format with 64k blocks. Guessing that file fragmentation cause sage recorder to drop frames, causing the synch problem. But then, WHY doesent the synch error appear when played on the computer? Are the computer players compensating for the dropped frames, while the DVD format doesent?

And lastly, if the corruption is in the sage recorder file itself, is there any inexpensive software I can use to fix the recordings? Or is there other DVD mastering software that gets around the problem, like the computer players?

Please help, this driving me crazy!

[newtbert]

Solved!

Problem was with Ulead Movie Facotory. It can cause timing errors when used to edit videos. Use VirtualDub (mpeg mod) to diagnose problem, it reports something like "anacronistic timing error or bad joins".

Switched to using Womble MPEG-VCR V3.14 for editing, which works well for me. Note that while womble's editor is great, its mpeg encoder is inferior when compared to ulead's. I stull use ulead for that, and for dvd mastering.

Good Luck!

Oh, and another problem was the codec's on my windows 2000 machine got hopelessly confused by trying a whole bunch of time limited software demos. A complete windows re-install was required to fix the codecs.