an alternate method to fix incompatible SVCD on a DVD player?

[Pro-289]

I made 2 SVCDs using TyTool7r4. Both play fine on my RCA 6001P. But they don't play on my brothers Pioneer DV-503. It will play SVCDs, as it plays one I didn't author myself.

I had TyTool transcode audio from 48 to 44.1. Then used Nero to burn the .MPG in SVCD format. Nero liked it, didn't complain about non standard. I had also created a menu with Nero too. 6 thumbnail version, but only used one, with a background pic. The menu works fine on the RCA, comes up and I have to press '1' for it to play which is normal. But on the Pioneer it doesn't do anything when the disc is inserted.

Has anyone else experimented with creating SVCDs on a known incompatible DVD player? Have you found a compatible method? Maybe no menus? Maybe de-mux then re-mux with another program?

[Pro-289]

What's a good program to give you info on an .MPG file? I tried MPEGID (http://www.manzanitasystems.com/), and it seems accurate. I'd just like another opinion. It says my TyTool created .MPG is 9 seconds @ muxed rate 10080.00 kbps. But it's about 28 seconds long.

If I demux then remux the .MPG with TMPGEnc, MPGID now says it's 29 seconds @ muxed rate 3048.40 kbps. Seems a bit more correct. But isn't 3048 too high for SVCD spec? And possibly that's why it doesn't play on the Pioneeer?

[lmurray]

try creating it w/o the menu. Its one of the things that players get tripped up on. Second would be to make sure the audio is correct (you said you changed it w/ tytools.)

-lloyd-

[VideoJedi]

In order to get SVCDs to play on my Panasonic RP-91, I use a trick that fools the player into playing the format.

Take my mpeg2 and use TMPGEnc's multiplex tool -> change the video type from mpeg2 program to MPEG1-VCD! It will take a few minutes or less depending on speed of your computer. Basically you rewrite the headers on the mpeg2 to mpeg1.

Next in Nero you burn that altered mpeg2 as VCD format. Nero will ask about non-standardness, but burn it as a VCD anyway.

With this method you still have mpeg2- SVCD, but it fools DVD players into thinking you are playing a VCD. Works for me.

[Pro-289]

ok, I'll try that too. Since the DVD player my SVCDs don't play on is not mine, it makes it a bit harder to find a good method for making a good SVCD.

I made a small test video clip, and made 4 CDRWs. One I made with a menu like I did before which didn't play on the player. Then I think I remuxed it with TMPGEnc on another. Then filtered it though MPEG-VCR 3.14 on another. Then on the other I had TyTool create a standard mux, then had Nero encode it into complience before I burned it. And this disc didn't work that well on my RCA, so probably won't either on the Pioneer.

I gave all 4 discs to my brother to check on his Pioneer. I'll know later which ones worked for him.

[Pro-289]

Well, he said the 1st disc didn't work, the one with a menu. But the 2nd one did, the one without a menu. But they all seemed to still have a jerkyness to them. And got worse from, 2 to 3 to 4. So I guess his player does not like SVCD menus. Maybe the bitrate is too high for his player. Probably one of those that sticks to the rule book.

[mlanierjr]

Greetings,
I Tried The TMPGEnc SVCD trick above on my Panasonic DV-F727 which will not play a SVCD. It now plays the video on 3/4 of the screen. Full length of the screen, but 1/2 to 3/4 of the width. Any one know what I'm doing wrong?

Thanks In Advance,
Mikey

[VideoJedi]

Originally posted by mlanierjr
Greetings,
I Tried The TMPGEnc SVCD trick above on my Panasonic DV-F727 which will not play a SVCD. It now plays the video on 3/4 of the screen. Full length of the screen, but 1/2 to 3/4 of the width. Any one know what I'm doing wrong?

Thanks In Advance,
Mikey

What's the resolution? I've only done the trick to SVCDs that are 480X480. Anything else and it may be doing the weird thing you mention. Not sure. I haven't tried it with direct TiVo rips. I have always reencoded to SVCD format and then done the trick to make it compatible with my Panasonic DVD player.

[Pro-289]

Well, another thing I'm going to try to make it compatible with the Pioneer is to re-encode, compress, the video a little more than it already is. Because when I play it in PowerDVD, and have it show the information while it's playing, the video bitrate shoots up to 4.14Mbps at some points, which is far beyond the SVCD spec of around 2.6Mbps, and might be why the video still skips on his player at some points too. So I think the Pioneer must be very strict about being compliant.

So I think I'm going to re-encode the video with FlasKMpeg or XMpeg or anything else which can compress the video a wee bit more to make it very SVCD compliant.

[VideoJedi]

Oh yeah.. I have a Pioneer DV414 (one of their oldest models) and it is really picky about bitrate. Anything over the bitrates by the book and it stutters. Stay within the bitrates noted at www.vcdhelp.com and you'll likely be good to go.

[Pro-289]

Got the Pioneer to play burned SVCDs! :)

When I played the .MPG created from TyTool in PowerDVD, I saw the video bitrate sometimes hit 4.0-5.0Mbps. Supposed to be around 2.6. I also had to get rid of the SVCD menu, it didn't like the menus.

I had to re-encode them using TMPGEnc. I set the video bitrate to 2520 kbps. I was able to use all settings like CBR, VBR, CQ. Even used 128/192/224 kbps audio at 44.1kHz.

So if anyone else reads this and is having problems playing SVCDs they made on their DVD player. Make sure your SVCD is by-the-book (http://www.digvid.info/media/svcd.php). 44.1K 32-384kbps, 480x480, total bitrate 2.7Mbps. You can check the total bitrate with other programs, like PowerDVD with 'show information' on.

So you might have to degrade your video. If you can't stand compressing it more, buy a DVD burner and burn the original video without re-encoding.

edit: Oh, and Nero won't tell you if your video bitrate is too high, out of spec. It only checks for audio compliance.