[mythtv-users] RE: Archiving Shows to DVD

[Nick Rout]

On Fri, 29 Jul 2005 12:04:31 -0800 (AKDT)
John P. Mitchell wrote:

>    I am now doing the following with Linux which takes far less CPU time,
> but does take a fair amount of I/O time. Which of course assumes you
> have a Linux box.
> 
>    1. Demux/Cut MPEG2 content from MythTV with Java based ProjectX. You
> can download ProjectX from http://www.doom9.org/DigiTV/projectx.htm .
> This application not only has the ability to cut the MPEG (only on
> keyframes) without reencoding, but it appears to have fixed all of the
> audio sync problems for me. I have yet to tackle real long stuff but my
> kids two hour shows are fine.
> 
>    2. Re-multiplex audio/video streams with mplex

May i ask why one and two are needed? It seems all you are doing is
taking it apart and putting it back together again. (I know geeks like
to do that, but I always have a part left over). Seriously though is
there a particular reason? perhaps you need to demux in order to cut?

> 
>    3. Create DVD structures with dvdauthor

if you get sick of doing that, dvdstyler is good front end, and will
make the iso (with a pause to test in xine) as well.

> 
>    4. Create DVD ISO with mkisofs (not sure why others are using
> growisofs, mkisofs works fine for me).
> 
>    5. Copy DVD ISO to my Mac for burning (My Mac has the only DVD burner
> in the house.)
> 
>    I started using avidemux2 for step 1. but I had audio sync issues that
> I could not correct with a static audio skew. ProjectX seems to do some
> kind of correction, and in fact it says it is fixing frame ordering
> when I use it in the logs. Total time from transfer of the MPEG2 to my
> Linux box to a burned DVD is about 45 minutes. I even have a little
> shell script that takes care of most of the brain dead steps (mplex,
> dvdauthor, mkisofs, not the editing!). Currently with a max variable
> bit rate of 4.4Mbit (on my PVR-250), I get a little over two hours of
> content on one single layer DVD-R which plays on every settop DVD
> player I have tried so far (including some xboxes) with zero audio sync
> issues. This means three one hour episodes minus commercials on each
> DVD-R! Excellent! I started with the following HOW-TO and adapted as I
> stated above:
> http://www.mythtv.info/moin.cgi/ArchiveRecordingsToDvdHowTo . If you
> want all the gory tech details, then I will put together an HTML based
> HOW-TO and post it someplace.

Nick Rout