audio sync when using mpa instead of ac3?

[atreides93]

Just curious...but I rarely use MPA anymore, I always convert my WAV's to AC3, but this one time I tried out a new dvd authoring program (dvd complete) so it forced me to use mpeg-2 format..which I did. The result seemed fine, but when I watched the DVD on my standalone sometimes the audio would get out of sync. Does AC3 sound have something that makes it less likely to lose sync during playback?

[TRILIGHT]

I know that AC3 uses timecodes but whether it does checking during playback, I am unsure. I would think that, regardless of the audio method, the muxing process for DVD would interleave it with the video such that it would not "arbitrarily" become out of sync. In other words, if it is out of sync at one spot, it should definitely still be out of sync at that same spot and not just drift in and out randomly. That being said, you might want to make absolutely certain it is fine to begin with. Are you able to take the same WAV file and use it as is for the audio and it's still in sync? What about when converted to AC3? Are you letting the authoring software do the MPA encoding or are you encoding it and then using it? Unfortunately, I can only give you suggestions to look at. MPEG audio is not supported here in the US.

[atreides93]

The DVD authoring program (Dazzle DVD complete) automatically converts PCM 48khz WAV files into mp2 files. In the help file, it says "we don't support AC3 files because only professionals can create AC3 files" hahah what jokers.

anyway, the interesting thing is, if I stop the standalone player and then push play again, its back in sync!!
I'm thinking maybe the player has problems playing it back and gets lost...kind of like a slow computer when you skip around in media player?

[TRILIGHT]

Best I could say would be to test it out on the computer or another standalone. It's either the authoring software making screwy files or the player is confusing itself without any external help. hehe ;)

[SVCD4Me]

It may have something to do with Dazzle programs. I own the Dazzle DVC II and had the same problems with MP2 audio drift when a movie was played on a stand alone (when viewing SVCD's). There is a registry entry to change for recording clips that is supposed to "lock" the audio to the video, but I don't know about producing DVD's after the fact.

Good luck.