VHS to DVD

[sanjeevnuts]

I couldn't find a specific answer to this question.....
How many hours of video can fit on a 4.7 DVD-R that has the same quality as that of a VHS tape?

The reason I'm asking is because I'm converting my VHS tapes to DVD. Each tape is 3 hours (European PAL standard 180 mins tape).
Now if I use the *recommended* best bitrate of 8000, I have only about one hour of video on a disk. So I'll end up with 3 disks per tape.

Since the quality of material was VHS Quality to begin with, is there any merit in encoding it at 8000?

I do not want the final quality to be inferior to the tape, though. So if you guys still recommend 8000, so be it.

This is my setup: PAL VCR> ADVC50>WinDV>DV type 2 file>TMPGEnc 8000 CBR+Dolby 224>MPG file>TMPGEnc DVD Author>ISO Image>Imgburn>Final DVD

[JohnnyMalaria]

Well, VHS is as about as low quality as you can get.

A quick Google yielded this: http://www.stream-video.com/ which states VHS quality at 1Mbps.

Other sites suggest 1.2Mbps....

The best thing to do is try different bit rates and decide for yourself. A lot depends on the content of the video - lots of motion will require a higher bit rate than video that has little motion.

EDIT - Also, I'd think very carefully before committing all your VHS footage to DVD-R. The shelf-life of DVD-Rs is a lot less than we were all led to believe - perhaps as short as TWO years under the right (or wrong!) conditions.

[megamachine]

I second JohnnyMalaria's advice about gearing your encoding to the content. I recently did a DVD from VHS tapes that were mostly interviews and static content, and using 2mb/s MPG encoding with TMPGEnc fit 8 segments of 20-25 minutes each on one DVD5. However, one of the segments had some action in it and came out blocky. Best is to do some tests and see what works best for you.

[setarip_old]

@sanjeevnuts

Hi!

Capture and process with TMPGEnc set at "1/2DVD" (PAL 352x576)...