# Saving an mpeg as avi - will file be smaller?



## marie500 (May 6, 2002)

I'm trying to spilt an mpeg file. I have two programs. One program does it extremely fast (like less than a minute!) and VERY simply...except the audio doesn't match the video in the final product...so that's no good. The other program, Virtual Dub, is too complicated for me to understand. I've had it for months and still can't figure it out. (The Help menu assumes I know all sorts of terms and so many things that I just don't.) One thing I DO understand in the program is that it will let me save the mpeg as an avi (although it will have to run for hours & hours and possibly days! to get this done!) (Is that right?)

My question: will the resulting avi file it produces be smaller than the current 723,000kb mpeg it is now? If I can get it to the maximum amount of space allowed on a 700/80 min CD, I can burn it to CD without splitting it, which would be great since I'm not having any luck splitting it. But I don't want to spend all that time saving it as an avi without knowing why I'm even doing it.

It starts running the mpeg in suuuuuper slooo-mooo when it starts saving it as an avi and at that speed, it really could take days to finish running. (I always end the goings-on at that point, since I don't know if I'll even get a smaller file.)

_EDIT: Just wanted to add - I've been to video-making reference sites and forums to try and figure out what I should do , it's too advanced for me, can't understand the technical jargon._


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## Rache (Sep 30, 2002)

The avi will be larger (as it will be in uncompressed format - mpeg is very approx 90% compressed to avi). If you turn off all non-vital b/ground progs (incl av, firewall etc)your rendering time will greatly improve. Have you tried TMPGenc http://www.tmpgenc.net/e_main.html, or this is a free dv editor http://www.webattack.com/get/zweistein.shtml


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## marie500 (May 6, 2002)

The free SnapFiles one looks good, I'll give that one a try first. Thanks for the answer about the mpeg vs. avi size, you saved me heaps of time I would have spent on a wild goose chase.


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## Mulder_Lite (Sep 4, 2004)

What are you trying to do?


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## gotrootdude (Feb 19, 2003)

If you want it smaller..
convert it to a divx avi..

http://www.divx.com/divx/drdivx/


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## marie500 (May 6, 2002)

Sorry so delayed getting back - 
I had an mpeg file exceeding the size that would burn onto one CD, it was 723 MB. At first I just wanted to split it in two but Virtual Dub is too confusing for me, but I saw it would convert it to an avi which I thought could be smaller - it was the only command in Virtual Dub I understood. I finally got another video splitter program, one for simpletons (= me) that didn't distort the sound/video. (I tried out 5 programs, all told.) I finally managed to get the mpeg split.

Video help forums are beyond my understanding no matter how many times I read things on them. I got the easy-splitter program before I saw *gotrootdude's* divx link...but, I like how that linked page says even the "widest-eyed newbie" (again, = me!) can successfully do it. I will look at that some more, even re-do that mpeg to get it onto one CD. Thank you.


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## jbcalg (Oct 29, 2001)

in all likelihood you could have just burned the file to cd
it's not a data cd, you burn mpeg files (vcd, svcd) based on the length of time the file runs, not the file size

http://www.videohelp.com/faq#740

don't know which video sites you've visited, but http://www.videohelp.com/ has lots of info you may find useful


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## marie500 (May 6, 2002)

I have Easy CD Creator Platinum 5. Tried to burn it both as a data CD and as a "Video Impressions" CD. It's too big for the data CD as you know, and when I try using the Video Impressions, it freezes up and I'm not even sure it can be done. These are the instructions I used:
http://www.roxio.com/en/support/ecdc/videoCD_tutorial.jhtml

The instructions seem easy but I fail every time! 
It also seems the entire mpeg has to play frame-by-frame while it records/burns - can that possibly be right? It takes over two hours to play at normal speed.
Also, they confuse me by talking about "still images", and how long I want them to display - I just want the movie to burn, no still images are even involved. But half their video-recording instructions involve still images. I skipped over that part, but still, things freeze and, as I said, I've failed time and again.

Your link said: 
80 min CD
VCD/SVCD/XVCD mode
Mode2 Form2 = 2324 bytes/sector = 360 000 * 2324 = about 800 MB on a 80 min CD
...that's what I need alright. But I don't have a special VCD player, just a regular CD drive - is this ok? 
Still..I can't even get it to burn let alone get it to play!

_EDITED TO ADD: 
(I DO want to burn it to CD - only to be played on my computer, not on a separate player or anything like that.)
Also..Step 12 in the Roxio instructions is as far as I get, after doing that, everything locks up. I never reach Steps 13, 14, and 15._


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