VCD Help

[Dennis R. Cohen]

On 3/22/03 at 1:01 AM, Dwayne Bradley <dwayne_bradley at mac.com>
transmitted the following electronic message:

>
>I have made my first VCD and I cannot get it to play on my DVD player 
>which is supposed to be compatible with VCD (Sony DVP-NS300).  Here are 
>the steps that I did in creating the VCD:
>
>1. Created the rendered Quicktime movie (352 x 240; Sorenson video 
>compression - highest quality; Uncompressed 44.1 audio).
>
>2. Used ffmpegX to create the MPG file from the Quicktime file.  I used 
>the Quick Presets option for VCD (NTSC).  I do not know what all of the 
>individual options on the 4 tabs of the ffmpegX application really do 
>so that is why I used the Quick Presets option.
>
>3. Used Discribe from CharisMac Engineering to create the VCD from the 
>MPG movie in step 2.  I burned 1 disc at Max Speed and another disc at 
>1X speed.  I have an external Pioneer "superdrive" in a Firewire case 
>that I used for the burn.
>
>4. Attempted to play both discs on my Sony DVP-NS300 DVD player (VCD 
>compatible according to the player and VCDHelp.com).  The DVD player 
>tries to read the VCD (you can hear the drive making noises) but 
>eventually I get a NO DISC message from the player.  This happens with 
>both the Max Speed and 1X speed discs.
>
>5. At this point I thought that the discs were bad, so I downloaded the 
>trial version of MacVCD X and guess what; it plays BOTH DISCS on both 
>the internal DVD drive in my PowerBook G4 and in the external Pioneer 
>drive!
>
>I am at a loss right now.  Does anyone have any suggestions why my DVD 
>player will not play the discs?  Any help would be greatly appreciated.
>
>Thanks,

Being able to play VCDs is only half the requirement. The DVD Player
also needs to recognize CD-R media (or CD-RW, if that's what you use).

According to the compatibility charts, the DVP NS300 recognizes CD-RW
media, but not CD-R. That, by the way, was also a friend's experience
with his Sony DVD player.

Burn your VCD to CD-RW media and give it a try.

BTW, if Discribe is what you have, you're making this more difficult
than it needs to be. For writing VCDs (and SVCDs), Toast is a much
better choice.

--Dennis Cohen
  iLife Bible (May/June 2003)
  iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, & iDVD Bible
  MacOS X Bible