DVD or SVCD?

[Metallo]

Hi,

I've got .avi files that are 688x384, 25.000fps (PAL)
Decompressor: DivX 6.0 Codec
Audio: AC3 48000Hz

I want to encode them to be played back on stand alone DVD but I have a doubt whether it is better in DVD format or SVCD.
Would the image quality suffer if encoded to 720x576?
The source is inferior in terms of pixels...

Obviously, SVCD would be fully exploited at 480 x 576 pixels.

Thanks for your advise.

Alex

[Nick]

DVD is my opinion.

Yes, upsizing is pretty pointless, but as SVCD doesn't support 16:9 AR you'd have to downsize and letterbox to 4:3. I think the extra bitrate you'd get on DVD, due to the larger capacity would more than outweigh any quality drop from upsizing.

Then there's the audio. If you use DVD, you can keep the AC3 stream from the AVI file. If you convert to SVCD, it has to be converted to MP2. To be standard compliant it also needs to be downsampled to 44100Hz (although most players will play 48k). All this costs audio quality.

The only way to be sure is do both and watch on your PC before choosing which one to burn to disc. But if you don't want the hassle of doing the job twice, I would suggest DVD.

[Metallo]

Nick,

Thanks for your reply.

My TV is 4:3, when encoding, shall do it 16:9 and then set my DVD Player to play it in 4:3 LB?

Thanks
Alex

[Nick]

I would.

But really it depends how long you plan to keep the DVD for. If the AVI's are footage you wish to archive long term then 16:9 is a bit better, since presumably a future TV purchase will be widescreen.