How do I convert a VCD to MPEG?

[Gary King]

How do I convert a VCD file (AVSEQ01.DAT) to MPEG format? I have tried MANY ways, mostly found by searching Google 'convert vcd to mpeg', but ALL have failed. The video plays fine in VLC Player, but when I convert it, there are always problems.

Any suggestions? Any steps or instructions I should follow, that will work for me?

Thanks in advance! :)

[neuron2]

A VCD is already MPEG (MPEG-1). Please be more precise in stating your goal.

[Gary King]

Okay, I have a *.dat file. I want to make it into a file format that is much more compressed (it is currently 110 MB and about 10 minutes long), so I can upload it to the web. I'll probably want to upload it to http://video.google.com/

[neuron2]

You're still being imprecise. What do you mean by "much more compressed"? Half as big? A quarter as big? a tenth as big? Is size your only concern? It's going to look pretty cruddy if you make it dramatically smaller.

[Peter1234]

@Gary:
I think a VCD dat file can usually be converted to an mpeg file by changing the extention from dat to mpg. You can try that and see if it works. This will be mpeg1 not MP4, but it might get you started.

[vidhead]

there are 2 proper ways to convert dat to mpeg that i know of
1. vcdgear - http://www.vcdgear.com/ - donate/freeware
2. isobuster - http://www.isobuster.com/ - pay/shareware

[Kika]

.dat to MPEG1 also needs a remuxing, nothing more, nothing less. This can be done by TMPGEnc (MPEG Tools).
After that, the file can be used to do anything, also recoding or something else.

[Gary King]

.dat to MPEG1 also needs a remuxing, nothing more, nothing less. This can be done by TMPGEnc (MPEG Tools).
After that, the file can be used to do anything, also recoding or something else.
Thank you, this was the best-suited solution :)

Now, how do I encode the file to MPEG4? Also, I used GSpot to check the current encoding, but it states 'Unknown'.

[Kika]

Try VirtualDubMOD. This tool is able open MPEG1 and transcode it to MPEG4. Even TMPGEnc is able to open an MPEG1-File and save it as an MPEG4 AVI (Files -> Save as AVI file).
There are a lot of solutions for transcoding Videos. ;)

[Gary King]

Exactly, there are too many solutions. It's sometimes hard to find the one that best suits, the one that best works, etc.

But so far, I'm absolutely LOVING TMPGEnc (I used it before, but forgot the name.) Before you suggested this program, I spent several hours figuring out which program to use, and many (half a dozen) didn't work, either.

[Kika]

Yeah, TMPGEnc 2.5x is one of the most underestimated tools ever. ;)

[SeeMoreDigital]

I must admit I was quite a fan of the VCD (and MPEG-1) format before MPEG-2/DVD....

Anyway I use VCDgear (as mentioned by VidHead)...

http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/4195/vcdgear8yz.png

... to extract the MPEG-1 video and associated audio stream out of the .DAT container to the .MPG container.

Works a charm!

[Xeno86]

I use CDXA2MPEG from VCDimager package. Easiest but command line only ;) And of course it's opensouce/GPL.
It should be attached below.

E:\VCDImager>cdxa2mpeg
usage: cdxa2mpg infile [outfile]

description:
Converts a Video CD RIFF CDXA file to plain mpeg streams

copyright:
Copyright (C) 2001 Herbert Valerio Riedel <hvr@gnu.org>
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions. There is NO
warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

E:\VCDImager>