Conversion Time

[Fred Widdowson 0]

I thought this would be really simple. I plugged in my VHS, monitored the playback, put in a blank Memorex DVD and watched it all the way through the recording process but when it finished it has been 3 hours and counting and the "Finishing, This May Take Several Minutes," is still going. I also received a popup that there was trouble recording to the DVD.

 

So, what is the big secret that I'm missing here? How long is a DVD supposed to take to complete once its been recorded?

 

Thanks.

[myguggi 131]

I thought this would be really simple. I plugged in my VHS, monitored the playback, put in a blank Memorex DVD and watched it all the way through the recording process but when it finished it has been 3 hours and counting and the "Finishing, This May Take Several Minutes," is still going. I also received a popup that there was trouble recording to the DVD.

 

So, what is the big secret that I'm missing here? How long is a DVD supposed to take to complete once its been recorded?

 

Thanks.

 

The length of time depends on a lot of factors: your computer speed, amount of free space and fragmentation on your hard drive, the length of video you are recording, etc.

 

So, how long in time is the VHS video you are trying to record? A standard 4.7Gb DVD can only hold about 60 minutes of best quality video. Any longer and the video has to be compressed which will of course take more time.

 

Also Memorex DVDs are considered by many to be bottom of the barrel in quality. Maybe that is why you got the pop-up and of course that DVD is now just another coaster.

 

So, please supply some information on exactly what you are doing.

 

Most of us recommend to never burn directly to a DVD but to first capture to your hard drive and then later burn to the DVD.

[d_deweywright 116]

Well, the big secret, which most folks here will recommend, is to capture to your computer's hard drive first, and the put that on to the DVD, rather than trying to go directly to DVD, because if there's any glitch in the capture/record process (which apparently happened, by your comment about the popup message), you'll have to start all over.

 

As for why it's hung on the "Finishing..." step, I don't know.

 

Another option you have by going to the hard drive first, is to test-burn your project to an erasable DVD (+/-RW) before committing it to a write once DVD (+/-R). If that fails, you can reuse the disc.

[Fred Widdowson 0]

Yesterday the entire one hour process was completed but only 23 minutes showed on the video. Today, the error message about there being a problem showed up at varying intervals. So far, the only DVD that was worked has been the one with 23 minutes on it. I will try it again only this time to my hard drive first.

[myguggi 131]

Yesterday the entire one hour process was completed but only 23 minutes showed on the video. Today, the error message about there being a problem showed up at varying intervals. So far, the only DVD that was worked has been the one with 23 minutes on it. I will try it again only this time to my hard drive first.

Please post your system specs and the length of the VHS video you are trying to capture.