DVD capacity

A DVD has approx 2 hours of Vid footage.

That can be changed with various compressions etc, but, essentially, a single layer 4.7g DVD can have 2 hours of video

I would say that the video on the 30 minute mini disks is not in DVD format but VideoCD or SuperVCD (SVCD) format.
They are far more efficient enabling one to put an hours video on an 80 min CD.
This can be transferred to computer and cut/ joined etc etc and then burnt to a CD for use in DVD player (if it plays VCD or SVCD).
converting from vcd to DVD format is not easy and why would you want to?
try going to video help this site may help you.
might also want to try DVD hacks
Techie

Hi 120,

I will assume you have purchased a Sony brand dvd recorder which is the same as mine.

Each disc holds a total of 1.44 GIG storage capacity. If you record in mpg2 format (standard), you will get approx 30minutes of video. If you record in mpg1 format (long play), you will get 60 minutes of video.

It doesn not matter which format you record in, the small disc still holds 1.44gig of fottage.

With a standard dvd disc being 4.7gig capacity, I would only recommend using no mor than 4.4 gig, as the outer edge of some disc's are a bit dodgy.

This will mean you can get 3 small recorder disc's of footage onto a single standard 4.7gig disc.

Hope this helps.

TonyG

Hi there,
I use dvdshrink
to compress files to fit on a disc. Well worth a try.
Cheers

Thanks all
It looks like I have some homework to do and lots of time behind the screen.

Cheers
120scruiser

I also use DVD Shrink - a great freeware program. If you are going to use it make sure that use set it to only burn to 4300MB, this will prevent you burning all the way to the end of the disk and thereby potentially loosing some of your data.

To do this - once you have downloaded the program, click on the 'Edit' button, go to 'Preferences' then select 'Custom' and set it for 4300MB.

If you want a good guide on how to use DVD Shrink go to www.afterdawn.com.

Karl