Which format gives best, backup copies (miniDV, or DVD)

23 Jul 2007 1:14 AM

lbbss

i just bought miniDV and the quality is not bad, but I was surprised
how poor the quality is when you burn it to dvd.   I hooked up my
camcorder to my dvd recorder and made a copy.   what about buying a
fire wire and saving it to my computer and then burn it to dvd? would
that give me a better copy?   What about returning this camcorder and
buying a dvd camcorder, would I get better quality when I make
copies?   Any ideas? thanks.

23 Jul 2007 1:10 PM

Jim

In article <1185153279.698720.196***@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com>,
lbbss <labi***@yahoo.com> wrote:

> i just bought miniDV and the quality is not bad, but I was surprised
> how poor the quality is when you burn it to dvd.   I hooked up my
> camcorder to my dvd recorder and made a copy.   what about buying a
> fire wire and saving it to my computer and then burn it to dvd? would
> that give me a better copy?   What about returning this camcorder and
> buying a dvd camcorder, would I get better quality when I make
> copies?   Any ideas? thanks.

The miniDv has a (near) faithful copy of the data. When you burn to DVD
(assuming you're using it as a video DVD and not a data DVD) the data
streams are converted to MPEG-2 which is compressed and loses data.

When you capture data from the camera via firewire you are capturing the
original data stream. If you then burn it to DVD, it will still suffer
the same losses.

Why not just make your backup to another miniDv tape. They are cheap
enough and maintain the original quality.

Buying a DVD camcorder would be a step backwards in quality.

--
Edo ergo sum

23 Jul 2007 4:08 PM

PTravel

"lbbss" <labi***@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1185153279.698720.196970@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
>i just bought miniDV and the quality is not bad, but I was surprised
> how poor the quality is when you burn it to dvd.   I hooked up my
> camcorder to my dvd recorder and made a copy.   what about buying a
> fire wire and saving it to my computer and then burn it to dvd? would
> that give me a better copy?   What about returning this camcorder and
> buying a dvd camcorder, would I get better quality when I make
> copies?   Any ideas? thanks.

1. DVD isn't a backup format -- every time you transcode from miniDV to DVD
you will lose signifcant quality.

2. To get the best DVD quality, capture the miniDV to the computer via the
Firewire cable as DV-coded-encoded AVI. Transcode using a standalone
software transcoder that has been tweaked as appropriate. Author and burn
the DVD on the computer.

This may be more trouble than it's worth to you.

Show quoteHide quote

>

24 Jul 2007 2:06 AM

lbbss

Show quote Hide quote

On Jul 23, 12:08 pm, "PTravel" <ptra***@travelersvideo.com> wrote:
> "lbbss" <labi***@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>
> news:1185153279.698720.196970@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
>
> >i just bought miniDV and the quality is not bad, but I was surprised
> > how poor the quality is when you burn it to dvd.   I hooked up my
> > camcorder to my dvd recorder and made a copy.   what about buying a
> > fire wire and saving it to my computer and then burn it to dvd? would
> > that give me a better copy?   What about returning this camcorder and
> > buying a dvd camcorder, would I get better quality when I make
> > copies?   Any ideas? thanks.
>
> 1. DVD isn't a backup format -- every time you transcode from miniDV to DVD
> you will lose signifcant quality.
>
> 2. To get the best DVD quality, capture the miniDV to the computer via the
> Firewire cable as DV-coded-encoded AVI. Transcode using a standalone
> software transcoder that has been tweaked as appropriate. Author and burn
> the DVD on the computer.
>
> This may be more trouble than it's worth to you.

How much trouble is that? 1 hours waisted for one tape?
How good will the quality of the copy be? Not sure what is a
Transcoder software, can you get it free, or is it an expensive
software. If you could explain it in lay-mans terms. Would the
copy be a Avi file on the dvd? Thanks.

24 Jul 2007 3:29 PM

PTravel

Show quote Hide quote

"lbbss" <labi***@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1185242805.765377.113860@n60g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
> On Jul 23, 12:08 pm, "PTravel" <ptra***@travelersvideo.com> wrote:
>> "lbbss" <labi***@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>>
>> news:1185153279.698720.196970@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
>>
>> >i just bought miniDV and the quality is not bad, but I was surprised
>> > how poor the quality is when you burn it to dvd.   I hooked up my
>> > camcorder to my dvd recorder and made a copy.   what about buying a
>> > fire wire and saving it to my computer and then burn it to dvd? would
>> > that give me a better copy?   What about returning this camcorder and
>> > buying a dvd camcorder, would I get better quality when I make
>> > copies?   Any ideas? thanks.
>>
>> 1. DVD isn't a backup format -- every time you transcode from miniDV to
>> DVD
>> you will lose signifcant quality.
>>
>> 2. To get the best DVD quality, capture the miniDV to the computer via
>> the
>> Firewire cable as DV-coded-encoded AVI. Transcode using a standalone
>> software transcoder that has been tweaked as appropriate. Author and
>> burn
>> the DVD on the computer.
>>
>> This may be more trouble than it's worth to you.
>
> How much trouble is that? 1 hours waisted for one tape?

Trouble is relative. miniDV transfers are done in real time. Software
transcoding can take a long time. I use a program called tmpgenc, which is
inexpensive but capable of producing the highest quality transcodes. On my
3 GHz P4 with 1 gig of RAM, transcoding a 2 hour video tweaked for the
highest quality output can take as much as 20-24 hours.

> How good will the quality of the copy be?

My DVDs approach the quality of commercial DVDs.

> Not sure what is a
> Transcoder software,

It converts DV-codec-encoded AVI to DVD-compliant mpeg2.

> can you get it free,

No, though most editing packages have the ability to author and burn DVDs
from the timeline and necessarily have built-in transcoding. None of them
(not even the more professional packages like Premiere Pro) will produce as
good a transcode as a standalone program.

> or is it an expensive
> software.

TMPgenc costs around $40.

> If you could explain it in lay-mans terms.

I've explained it in the rec.video and rec.video.desktop newsgroups many
times. Please do a google search. The process for taking video to DVD is
not exactly a secret.

> Would the
> copy be a Avi file on the dvd?

No. A DVD can only hold 22 minutes of DV-codec-encoded AVI and, of course,
it wouldn't play on a DVD player -- it would just be data storage.

As I said, DVD is not an archiving medium -- you don't store video on it,
you use it for distributing video to be viewed by others.

Show quoteHide quote

> Thanks.
>
>

24 Jul 2007 10:24 PM

Gene E. Bloch

On 7/24/2007, PTravel posted this:
Show quoteHide quote

> "lbbss" <labi***@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1185242805.765377.113860@n60g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>> On Jul 23, 12:08 pm, "PTravel" <ptra***@travelersvideo.com> wrote:
>>> "lbbss" <labi***@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>>>
>>> news:1185153279.698720.196970@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
>>>
>>> >i just bought miniDV and the quality is not bad, but I was surprised
>>> > how poor the quality is when you burn it to dvd.   I hooked up my
>>> > camcorder to my dvd recorder and made a copy.   what about buying a
>>> > fire wire and saving it to my computer and then burn it to dvd? would
>>> > that give me a better copy?   What about returning this camcorder and
>>> > buying a dvd camcorder, would I get better quality when I make
>>> > copies?   Any ideas? thanks.
>>>
>>> 1. DVD isn't a backup format -- every time you transcode from miniDV to
>>> DVD
>>> you will lose signifcant quality.
>>>
>>> 2. To get the best DVD quality, capture the miniDV to the computer via
>>> the
>>> Firewire cable as DV-coded-encoded AVI. Transcode using a standalone
>>> software transcoder that has been tweaked as appropriate. Author and burn
>>> the DVD on the computer.
>>>
>>> This may be more trouble than it's worth to you.
>>
>> How much trouble is that? 1 hours waisted for one tape?
>
> Trouble is relative. miniDV transfers are done in real time. Software
> transcoding can take a long time. I use a program called tmpgenc, which is
> inexpensive but capable of producing the highest quality transcodes. On my 3
> GHz P4 with 1 gig of RAM, transcoding a 2 hour video tweaked for the highest
> quality output can take as much as 20-24 hours.
>
>> How good will the quality of the copy be?
>
> My DVDs approach the quality of commercial DVDs.
>
>>   Not sure what is a
>> Transcoder software,
>
> It converts DV-codec-encoded AVI to DVD-compliant mpeg2.
>
>> can you get it free,
>
> No, though most editing packages have the ability to author and burn DVDs
> from the timeline and necessarily have built-in transcoding. None of them
> (not even the more professional packages like Premiere Pro) will produce as
> good a transcode as a standalone program.
>
>> or is it an expensive
>> software.
>
> TMPgenc costs around $40.
>
>>    If you could explain it in lay-mans terms.
>
> I've explained it in the rec.video and rec.video.desktop newsgroups many
> times. Please do a google search. The process for taking video to DVD is
> not exactly a secret.
>
>>    Would the
>> copy be a Avi file on the dvd?
>
> No. A DVD can only hold 22 minutes of DV-codec-encoded AVI and, of course,
> it wouldn't play on a DVD player -- it would just be data storage.
>
> As I said, DVD is not an archiving medium -- you don't store video on it, you
> use it for distributing video to be viewed by others.
>
>> Thanks.
>>
>>

PTravel, I suspect that the OP connected his camcorder to the recorder
via the analog connections. He also probably recorded in six hour mode
(just kidding on that part - maybe).

--
Gene E. Bloch (Gino)
letters617blochg3251
(replace the numbers by "at" and "dotcom")

26 Jul 2007 3:07 AM

lbbss

I had the camcorder connected with rca input to the dvd recorder.
Would it make a noticeable difference if I used svid connection for
copy quality?

26 Jul 2007 3:49 AM

Gene E. Bloch

On 7/25/2007, lbbss posted this:

> I had the camcorder connected with rca input to the dvd recorder.
> Would it make a noticeable difference if I used svid connection for
> copy quality?

You suppressed quoting of my reply, so here it is again:

"PTravel, I suspect that the OP connected his camcorder to the recorder
via the analog connections. He also probably recorded in six hour mode
(just kidding on that part - maybe)."

Looks like I was right (on the first half of my reply, at least).

You need to make digital transfers to retain quality.

--
Gene E. Bloch (Gino)
letters617blochg3251
(replace the numbers by "at" and "dotcom")