Bit-rate to use?

[Guest]

I have a movie that is about 1.5 hour long. I use Nero to define scene
selection and burn the movie to DVD. How can I ensure that I am keeping
digital quality in the video? What bit rate should I use? Which perserves
quality more- a high or low bit rate?

The DVD is the typical size : 4.7g, however when I look at the size of my
AVI file on the computer, its ~8g, so I'm worried that I'm losing quality
when I burn the DVD b/c it compresses it or something in order to fit on the
DVD?

Any information/advice is greatly appreciated

 

[Bob [MVP]]

Typically the higher the bit rate, the higher the quality.
You have no choice but to re-encode the video to MPEG-2
when you burn a video DVD. That's what the DVD standard
specifies.

So if your DVD burning program allows you to specify a
bit rate, or quality setting, select the highest quality
that will fit on the DVD.

If the quality is not satisfactory, try another DVD
authoring/burning program. Most entry-level programs
are available as free trial downloads.

--
-Bob
_______________________________
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Media Center Edition
http://www.microsoft.com/ehome