Not enough space converting to DVD

TechiMan

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I am currently in the process of converting alot of home videos that where mostly filmed in HD 1920x1080p, with some being 720p in MPEG4 format. I've been using a variety of programs but nearly all of them seem to produce really large file sizes in the final ouputted file even when they've been compressed. I have also been using Nero Video converting some of MPEG4 files which have already been converted twice from their original MTS and MPEG4 files, but for some reason I can never be able to fill a complete 4GB disc even when the extra added file (which goes over the red line) is only about 500GB in size. For example I have just converted some files to a TS folder ready to burn to a DVD (which in Nero Video prior to converting, including the menus etc, was about 3GB), but when I tried to add an extra file to fill up the free space (probably about 1GB left), the extra file exceeded past 4GB to about 5GB, even though the file itself was 1.65GB, which is exceded 4GB but surely not to 5GB. So I just removed the extra video file and converted what I could add. When I checked the converted TS file, the outputted file size was only 1.76GB, which means I would've wasted alot of DVD space if I had burned the TS file to a DVD.

Anyone know why it does this?. And why should a compressed video be larger in file size than the original?. I could've trimmed the video down but I didn't want to lose any valuable footage, but I suppose the extra video I was trying to add was around 40mins long.

And also, does anyone know why an MP4 file I tried converting to DVD in MPEG2 format (TS folder) which was only 1.57GB exceeded to 5GB?. I know AVI files do this but I've never known MPEG4 files to do this. I guess it's to do with the codecs used. Is there anyway or converting these files to fit onto a disc without losing too much and resulting in too much compression?.
 
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I can't speak for the specifics of the apps you are using here but in general terms:

Assuming by "DVD" you mean a compliant DVD-Video (i.e. highly likely to be playable in tabletop DVD players) then you have to be aware:

DVD-Video is limited to MPEG2 compression for video.
The MPEG2 compression method pre-dates and is less efficient (file size vs. quality) than later codecs (such as MP4). Rule of thumb - for similar quality, use twice the bitrate (file size).
When re-encoding, the original format is of little relevance; re-encoding in effect first DEcodes the source (so at this point it's - let's call it - an uncompressed copy of the source) before re-encoding it using the new codec.

So your resultant file size will be a factor of duration, resolution, quality (of the finished product) and not determined by the source.

You should be able to get your file sizes down to fit. I'd assume there are settings in the app you are using to specify the output size. But expect some degradation if you try to get too much into too small a space; whether it will be visible enough for you to care is up to you......
 
Yes, as above. Lower the bitrate or quality setting in Nero before converting and the file size will reduce. But you will lose quality and only you can decide if it will still be good enough.

But, do you really need the DVD-Rs you are burning to be playable on all standard DVD players, and with the standard menus? Because if not, you could just copy/burn the original mp4 files onto the disc, retain all the original quality, and you would know exactly what would fit and what wouldn't. Not sure if Nero will do this but there are many free programs that will.

Many modern DVD players and all desktop computers should play mp4 files on a DVD-R just fine, if you don't mind just having a list of file names without standard DVD menus. You can rename the file names to be meaningful before you burn the files. But remember if this is for long-term archival purposes, DVD-Rs have limited life - after many years they may start to fail. Oh, edited to add, single layer DVD-R capacity is at most 4.7GB. I'd be inclined to copy the lot onto a standard hard drive (cheap as chips) too for backup - not SSD unless it's used occasionally as they too can fail if stuck in a cupboard for years.
 
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Why would the files be safer on a standard hard drive than an SSD (you mean an external HDD?)?. A standard harddrive could just as easily fail after so long I would imagine.

I didn't know you could just drop the MP4 files onto a DVD without encoding (if that's what you were meaning), I didn't know any program could do this (not sure if Nero does this). I kinda like having a DVD with the menus etc as it's easy to navigate through the disc, but seeing as it's very rare that I ever watch my home videos I suppose it doesn't matter.

I did another encoding of another MP4 file which was 744MB in size, I put the file into a program and converted to MPE2 using a 75% quality rate, with PAL and 25fps, pretty much standard settings, but it takes ages to convert. The outputted file in MPEG2 was 3.33GB in size. I then dropped the file into Nero video (which took a few moments) to see what space it would take for a standard 4.7GB disc, and it took 3GB. Why would the original MPEG4 be 744MB when the converted video is about 3GB?.
 
Why would the files be safer on a standard hard drive than an SSD (you mean an external HDD?)?. A standard harddrive could just as easily fail after so long I would imagine.

I didn't know you could just drop the MP4 files onto a DVD without encoding (if that's what you were meaning), I didn't know any program could do this (not sure if Nero does this). I kinda like having a DVD with the menus etc as it's easy to navigate through the disc, but seeing as it's very rare that I ever watch my home videos I suppose it doesn't matter.

I did another encoding of another MP4 file which was 744MB in size, I put the file into a program and converted to MPE2 using a 75% quality rate, with PAL and 25fps, pretty much standard settings, but it takes ages to convert. The outputted file in MPEG2 was 3.33GB in size. I then dropped the file into Nero video (which took a few moments) to see what space it would take for a standard 4.7GB disc, and it took 3GB. Why would the original MPEG4 be 744MB when the converted video is about 3GB?.
SSD have a know issue that if they aren't occasionally powered up then the basically the memory cells lose charge and forget what state they are in leading to data corruptions. This could happen within the space of a few months.

And as people have explained MPEG4 had a better compression than MPEG 2 for the same quality. So one hour of mpeg2 is always going to take up more space than the same video in mpeg4 assuming you stay at the same quality. What you can do is drop the bitrate down in mpeg2 which means you will lose some quality but you will get longer video on the DVD.

If you right click on the file and select Properties then Details, look at the bitrate
 
I thought you meant Handbrake not Handshake, used it occasionally in the past.

I have a 1TB external HDD that everyone of my home videos are stored on (I should back them up on my internal HD really). Every so often I get the odd video file disappear for some reason out of a random folder (it's always my home videos nothing else), yet the rest of the files are still there, so I then have to trawl through my camcorders SD card to find them again. Strangely some of my photos often do the same, and those are stored on both the external and internal HD. It's like someone or something is deleting them every now and again but leaving the rest alone. People have said to me "are you sure you haven't placed them into a different folder by mistake or just accidentally deleted them" etc, but I know I didn't do that. If that was a virus or malware doing this wouldn't it delete other folders?. It seems to be certain video files and photos that vanish (always family videos or photos that were originally transferred from my camera/camcorder).

Speaking of external HDs, but the Seagate external HD I have (for some odd reason) on my Toshiba laptop won't allow me to safely remove it (ie there's no safely remove icon on the taskbar where it is normally located). I think it's the same with pendrives.
 
Accordi
SSD have a know issue that if they aren't occasionally powered up then the basically the memory cells lose charge and forget what state they are in leading to data corruptions. This could happen within the space of a few months.

And as people have explained MPEG4 had a better compression than MPEG 2 for the same quality. So one hour of mpeg2 is always going to take up more space than the same video in mpeg4 assuming you stay at the same quality. What you can do is drop the bitrate down in mpeg2 which means you will lose some quality but you will get longer video on the DVD.

If you right click on the file and select Properties then Details, look at the bitrate
According to properties of the MPEG4 video the video bitrate is 1091kbps (29fps for some reason). After I had converted the file to MPEG2, the the video bitrate is now 6224kbps (25fps). So the MPEG4 video has a lower bitrate.
 
Why would the files be safer on a standard hard drive than an SSD (you mean an external HDD?)?. A standard harddrive could just as easily fail after so long I would imagine.

I didn't know you could just drop the MP4 files onto a DVD without encoding (if that's what you were meaning), I didn't know any program could do this (not sure if Nero does this). I kinda like having a DVD with the menus etc as it's easy to navigate through the disc, but seeing as it's very rare that I ever watch my home videos I suppose it doesn't matter.

I did another encoding of another MP4 file which was 744MB in size, I put the file into a program and converted to MPE2 using a 75% quality rate, with PAL and 25fps, pretty much standard settings, but it takes ages to convert. The outputted file in MPEG2 was 3.33GB in size. I then dropped the file into Nero video (which took a few moments) to see what space it would take for a standard 4.7GB disc, and it took 3GB. Why would the original MPEG4 be 744MB when the converted video is about 3GB?.

With an external hard drive you can just copy the data onto your then main computer every 5 years or so then copy it back, or onto a new drive which will no doubt be much cheaper and bigger by then. There are free archival programs out there too, that will build in a lot of redundancy for error correction. HDDs are thought to be unlikely to fail within 5 years or so: DVDs are the more fragile media and are far slower to re-write after a few years. For belt and braces you could backup everything onto two separate drives.

As for writing your mp4 files direct to DVD, you can do that easily from Windows 10 with no additional software, this tells you how: How to Burn Files to CD or DVD on Windows 10

Just rename your video files to something meaningful before you burn them - they will remain at exactly the same file sizes as they are now with zero loss of quality: no other method will retain 100% quality. As long as you can live without menus, you'll save yourself a heck of a lot of time.
 
My aim really with the DVDs is to place as much video onto them as possible by converting them to a different format, ie MPEG2, and I know that's an old format.

I gave Handbrake a go but I don't think it's a very good program (well the version I downloaded), as when I converted a 2 and half hour video to what I assumed to be MPEG2 using the best settings (using web optimised, constant quality at 22, Video Codec: MPEG-2, framerate 25, etc) the outputted video looked noticeably pixelated more so than what standard MPEG2 video would look. Even the videos I've encoded through Windows Movie Maker didn't look this pixelated, in fact they looked just as good as the original files, but in Handbrake it the quality outputted was awful.
 
Ideally you should not be converting any video into MPEG2 unless you know for certain your DVD creation software can process the video without converting it into a DVD compliant video.

Otherwise your just converting H264.mp4 into MPEG2.mpg then the DVD software is converting that .mpg again into MPEG2/DVD (IFO/VOB) which will hurt quality.

Feed the H.264.mp4 direct into Nero or use something like this ConvertX software which has been around for ages, it will convert just about anything into a DVD, it does the video conversion, auto menu creation and DVD burning.

In ConvertX select PAL as default output
  • click on Default settings->Encoding
  • tick the box for use best video quality (increase conversion time)
  • tick the box for use 2 pass encoding
  • For target Size select DVD-5 (4300MB) if you have DVD-R or select DVD-9 (7700MB) if you have DVD-R DL which will give more quality.
  • drag and drop in a video and hit convert.

Thats the most you can squeeze from an MPEG2 DVD conversion in a simple one click process.

The longer your videos are the more time it will take to convert, a 2 and half hour video may take a few hours to do on a PC with a slower CPU. Oh and you should really be using DVD-R DL for 2 hour+ video to retain quality.
 
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My aim really with the DVDs is to place as much video onto them as possible by converting them to a different format, ie MPEG2, and I know that's an old format.

I gave Handbrake a go but I don't think it's a very good program (well the version I downloaded), as when I converted a 2 and half hour video to what I assumed to be MPEG2 using the best settings (using web optimised, constant quality at 22, Video Codec: MPEG-2, framerate 25, etc) the outputted video looked noticeably pixelated more so than what standard MPEG2 video would look. Even the videos I've encoded through Windows Movie Maker didn't look this pixelated, in fact they looked just as good as the original files, but in Handbrake it the quality outputted was awful.

Well converting your mp4s to mpeg2 will always result in lower quality, larger file sizes, and usually both. Just copy/burn the mp4 files as I mentioned earlier and you solve both problems.

To maintain most of the quality and reduce your file sizes you need to convert to mp4 using h.264 or even better h.265 codecs using Handbrake and then copy/burn them onto DVD - unless of course your mp4s are already encoded with one of those codecs or an equivalent. But you would have to understand how Handbrake and codecs work to do that so if I were you, I'd just copy the existing mp4 files onto DVD as already explained, and leave it at that.

's up to you.
 
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I use freemake video converter, you have to pay to remove their watermark on the free version. But it's dead simple to use. Just select the source files, whatever format, MP4, mkv, etc and it will work out the correct quality for single or double sided DVD. Of course the longer the source files, the lower the output quality.
 
For some reason my last post regarding Nero has gone. I was talking about why Nero when selecting the MP4 file to convert to MPEG2 and compressing it to 4.7GB (presumably), why the outputted video was 5GB when it should've been lower. The Nero program I was using was Recode and it's has straight forward as you can get, but for some reason the converted video was 5GB in size (in MPG) after I dropped it into Nero Video to convert to a TS file. Maybe it's the file that's the problem or that the file is actually much bigger than it says. And why in Handbrake does it say M4V when you select "MP4" from the options? it will open in Nero but you have select "All Video formats" as M4V isn't listed in the recognised video files list. The other two options are MKV and WebM.
 
Are you sure you haven't select DVD-DL as output format ?
 
Are you sure you haven't select DVD-DL as output format ?
No, I selected DVD5 (4.7GB) from the drop down option.
I just did a test of a home video file that I copied over from a DVD, a DVD which I transferred from a stand alone DVD/VHS combo years ago of a 2 hour long video that was transferred to a standard 4.7GB DVD. When I dropped one of the VOB files (which was .99GB) into Nero Video the video size went right over 8GB beyond even the 9GB limit, even though the full DVD structure is 4.7GB or thereabouts. Why is it doing that?. I then decided to drop the same file into Nero Express, and this time the file size seemed about right. Very strange.

Edit: I've also tried to add another video file (an MPEG-2 file) of a 2 hr & 36 min home video which I digitised to my laptop a while back using a program called Debut Video Capture, with settings being:
768x576
Data rate: 9000kbps
Total bitrate: 9192kbps
Framerate: 25fps
Audio bitrate: 192kbps
And a file size of 4.70GB

Yet when I dropped the file into AVS Video Converter it says the file size is too big for a DVD and needs to split to two discs, the file size is 10GB lol. How can an MPEG2 video be 10GB?

Here's the screenshot:
 

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SSD have a know issue that if they aren't occasionally powered up then the basically the memory cells lose charge and forget what state they are in leading to data corruptions. This could happen within the space of a few months.

I know they'll exhibit this behaviour if used in low temperatures and then stored at high temperatures but unless you're using them outside in the Scottish winter and then storing them in your conservatory through the summer then it's going to be many years before you start losing data.

Is there some other condition that accelerates data loss that are likely to be relevant here?
 
I think the problem I was getting with the very large file size in Nero and other programs (even though the file itself was supposed to be smaller) may've been down to the video being at a higher frame size (ie 720x576) especially the VHS home videos I had captured which I must've captured them at a higher resolution than standard VHS 320x240 lines. When I tried a 2 hour MPEG2 home video which was originally captured to my PC at something like 720 (no idea why I did this) and opened VSDC video editor and opened the file on the timeline at 320, and then saved it at 720, I noticed that the file size was smaller. When I dropped the file into Nero Video the video didn't exceed the 4.7GB limit. So it must mean that the resolution of the video was set too high (upscaled in a way) which resulted in the huge file size. No idea if this is true, but people have told me that it's best to capture analogue video at a higher resolution than the standard 320x240.
 
I am currently in the process of converting alot of home videos that where mostly filmed in HD 1920x1080p, with some being 720p in MPEG4 format. I've been using a variety of programs but nearly all of them seem to produce really large file sizes in the final ouputted file even when they've been compressed. I have also been using Nero Video converting some of MPEG4 files which have already been converted twice from their original MTS and MPEG4 files, but for some reason I can never be able to fill a complete 4GB disc even when the extra added file (which goes over the red line) is only about 500GB in size. For example I have just converted some files to a TS folder ready to burn to a DVD (which in Nero Video prior to converting, including the menus etc, was about 3GB), but when I tried to add an extra file to fill up the free space (probably about 1GB left), the extra file exceeded past 4GB to about 5GB, even though the file itself was 1.65GB, which is exceded 4GB but surely not to 5GB. So I just removed the extra video file and converted what I could add. When I checked the converted TS file, the outputted file size was only 1.76GB, which means I would've wasted alot of DVD space if I had burned the TS file to a DVD.

Anyone know why it does this?. And why should a compressed video be larger in file size than the original?. I could've trimmed the video down but I didn't want to lose any valuable footage, but I suppose the extra video I was trying to add was around 40mins long.

And also, does anyone know why an MP4 file I tried converting to DVD in MPEG2 format (TS folder) which was only 1.57GB exceeded to 5GB?. I know AVI files do this but I've never known MPEG4 files to do this. I guess it's to do with the codecs used. Is there anyway or converting these files to fit onto a disc without losing too much and resulting in too much compression?.
I routinely copy old mpeg (DVD) material, 1080 camcorder m2ts files and 1080 phone video (mp4) to DVD or usualy bluray discs using imgburn. I write as a data file so no reencoding needed and most DVD/bluray players recognise the discs.
 
I routinely copy old mpeg (DVD) material, 1080 camcorder m2ts files and 1080 phone video (mp4) to DVD or usualy bluray discs using imgburn. I write as a data file so no reencoding needed and most DVD/bluray players recognise the discs.
How do you do that exactly. I've opened up ImgBurn but the only video files it can open are DVD structure files (TS, BOB). How do you mean write as a data file?.
 
I select "find files" in imgburn and select the files I want to burn. This should work with any video file. The files are then burnt as a data file, so no authored structure on the disc just the standalone files. Most DVD and bluray players will recognise the files and play them. It's not pretty as you just get an icon and file name for each file.
 
I select "find files" in imgburn and select the files I want to burn. This should work with any video file. The files are then burnt as a data file, so no authored structure on the disc just the standalone files. Most DVD and bluray players will recognise the files and play them. It's not pretty as you just get an icon and file name for each file.
What if the file is too big, how will you know, does it tell you it's too large before being burned onto the disc?. So will the 2GB MPEG4 file I have (which according to programs like Nero says it is actually 9GB) will fit?. I've clicked on select a file but none of the files are supported, so do you have to select All files?.
 
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What if the file is too big, how will you know, does it tell you it's too large before being burned onto the disc?. So will the 2GB MPEG4 file I have (which according to programs like Nero says it is actually 9GB) will fit?. I've clicked on select a file but none of the files are supported, so do you have to select All files?.
I'm not really understanding the comment about about files not being supported, they're just treated as digital data so you should be able to burn anything (yes try ALL FILES to see everything available), but I think you would have to know the capacity of the disc, not sure what imgburn would do if the file sizes exceeded the destination capacity, although it's very clever so may warn you. It's not something i've encountered.
I used to use dvd shrink back in my dvd authoring days which did tell you if you exceeded the disc capacity. I just use bluray discs and mainly 1080 mp4 files these days so file size isn't such an issue (around 23GB useable on a bluray disc). If you can bear losing fancy menus I would just burn the unaltered files (suitably renamed) to disc. For the price of a bluray burner, a blu ray player and 50 bluray discs (£300 - £350 ish maybe) you wouldn't have to worry about file sizes. (i'm assuming you have a 1080 tv, you didn't mention how you watch your video.)
 
I'm not really understanding the comment about about files not being supported, they're just treated as digital data so you should be able to burn anything (yes try ALL FILES to see everything available), but I think you would have to know the capacity of the disc, not sure what imgburn would do if the file sizes exceeded the destination capacity, although it's very clever so may warn you. It's not something i've encountered.
I used to use dvd shrink back in my dvd authoring days which did tell you if you exceeded the disc capacity. I just use bluray discs and mainly 1080 mp4 files these days so file size isn't such an issue (around 23GB useable on a bluray disc). If you can bear losing fancy menus I would just burn the unaltered files (suitably renamed) to disc. For the price of a bluray burner, a blu ray player and 50 bluray discs (£300 - £350 ish maybe) you wouldn't have to worry about file sizes. (I'm assuming you have a 1080 tv, you didn't mention how you watch your video.)
I tried downloading DVD Shrink (used in the past I think) but it doesn't seem to be available anymore.

I'm still getting very large file sizes and I don't know why. I just edited a home video which is supposed to be 320x240 lines of resolution, although I think when I captured the footage months ago for some reason I captured the footage at 720. When I edited the video down to 30 seconds and then saved as an uncompressed AVI file, for some reason the outputted file was 752MB. I am aware that AVI takes up alot space being very large, but for a 30 second video it surely shouldn't be that large should it?.
 
I don't bother editing or converting any more. I just try to do the filming in short watchable chunks so I can just copy it straight to disc. No pretty interface or subtle fade ins/outs etc but the quality is as good as it can be.
 

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