I'm considering the purchase of Sonic's DVDit! PE. In looking over its features, it seems to be the best bang for the buck (as a DVD authoring program within its price range of about $600).

Here's my system:

Dell Precision Workstation 420
Pentium III 733
512 MB DDRAM
2 hard disk drives both 7200rpm (1st is 10 GB, 2nd is 20 GB soon to be upgraded to 120 GB for video!)
Matrox G400
Windows XP Pro
Vegas Video 3 - as the video editing program
DVD burner: Sony's DRX-500UL (burns both -R/RW and +R/RW formats)


Camera: Canon's GL2 (newly purchased!)


Here are the questions:

1) Is this a solid program? Does it work in burning DVD's that can be played on a majority of DVD players?

2) Do you think it will work with the above software/hardware configuration (especially utilizing video files - MPEG1, MPEG2, AVI -from Vegas Video 3) (using Sony's DRX-500UL external DVD burner) ????

3) Suggestions for other DVD authoring software similar to DVDit PE??

Thank you for your time and attention!

Ted Fiebke, RN

I don't know whether Sonic's DVDit! PE includes an MPEG1/2
encoder, but if it doesn't it will not allow you to author
a DVD with AVI files! Only mpeg1 & 2 files that have been encoded
to the specs will be allowed then.

As to whether your disc will be playable in all DVD players has
nothing to do with the authoring application. The job of the
authoring application is to maken a DVD image that contains
the correct structures, data and information for it to be
recognized as a DVD-Video disc and be playable.

Your DVD burner, DVD media and players decice if your disc
will be playable. If you need to have a 100% compliant disc
you will need to have it pressed instead of burned!

More and more players will play DVD-R and DVD+R (I'm leaving
the rewritable formats out of here now), but not all. Certainly
not the "older" models!

Good luck.

Sonic's DVDit! PE does include an MPEG1/2encoder.

I am currently in the process of creating a "shorts" dvd with this software, that will be completed in about 2-3 weeks. I'll let you know the results of different dvd player testings.

- Nori

1) Vegas Video 4
2) DVD Architect

I actually might hold off until these products are for sale and see if they (especially DVD Architect) might meet my needs. . .

To be honest, this whole DVD authoring thing is quite un-nerving. There's a wide range of products in a wide range of cost . . . from < $100.00 to $30,000.00! !

I need to do much more research into I spend $$$ on this.

As always. . . any input is graciously appreciated!

Ted

I used to use DVDIt! SE 2.5.2 which I quickly dumped it for Ulead DVD Wrokshop. Workshop does not have as much as DVDIt! PE, but it is much more stable and less finicky about the input files. I had routine problmes with DVDIt! not liking the format of the MPEG files I created with TMPGEnc or even some AVI files. Also DVDIt! would get confused and think I have files int he project that were delted and sometimes duplicate the files int he project, this would result in a project that it wanted to create that was far larger that the DVD could hold. Ulead is in the middle of updating many of their apps, so I am hoping DVd Workshop 2.0 is coming soon!