Odd Reporting Of File Size.

[belak]

I seem to be having an issue. I read another post similar to this one but I don't believe it was the same problem. I've used Toast before and it worked just fine. Recently however, I've tried to burn a 2GB video to a 4.7GB DVD+R blank disc. As I said, normally there would be no problem, but Toast seems to think my simple 2GB video, is actually around 4 gigs. I'm lost. Why is Toast reporting the video to be so much bigger than it really is?

I have plenty of disc's to spare so I went ahead and tried to burn anyway and it let me. The problem is, usually when you look at the bottom of a disc closely, you can tell where the data stopped and it's almost near the edge of my disc. That would mean it took up nearly all of my disc. Something's not right if you ask me. Is my disc just a dud? Does the video have to be a certain file type? Is it a problem with my OS? I'm running Mac OS X Snow Leopard on a MacBook Pro.

 

Any help is much appreciated and also, I said I've used Toast before but I'm not exactly fluent in it so try not to get me too lost.

[theoldarchiver]

What format is your 2 GB video file? (container, video codec, resolution, etc.)

Are you trying to burn a standard definition DVD-Video disc?

 

What you see may be due to Toast wanting to convert your file to MPEG-2 for DVD-Video, which will often result in a larger file than your source file.

[belak]

Oh I see, yes, that makes sense. The file type is an .mp4 so Toast must be changing it to and MPEG-2 which is making it bigger. I'm also putting it on a standard DVD+R. Do I need to change my media type? Would it help to change some settings on Toast, like making the file a tad smaller but still keep it's quality and ability to be played on most DVD players? So now my question is, will it do the same for say, AVI or MKV files? Is there like a conversion calculator out there somewhere that would tell you these things? Haha. I record my lectures for class and the file types vary depending on what equipment I'm using.

 

I apologize for all the questions, I'm just trying to get things arranged so I know what settings and file sizes I'm working with every time I load up Toast. Also, thank you for the help so far. I completely understand Toast changing the file type and thus making it bigger. I just need to know if it will do so to all file types.

[theoldarchiver]

When burning as DVD-Video, Toast will re-encode everything that is not DVD compliant MPEG-2. MOV, AVI, MKV, MP4, M4V, all will be converted (if Toast can read them). The size of the source file doesn't matter much, as the converted size will only depend on the MPEG-2 settings (bitrate) and the duration. Variable bitrate can bring a bit of uncertainty in output size, but not that much.

 

Set the media type to 'DVD' for single layer DVD discs or to 'DVD DL' for dual layer discs. +R or -R doesn't influence the 'Space remaining' bar.