Better DVD Burning Software for Mac?: Off-topic discussion forum: Grassroots Motorsports Magazine

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Dec. 31, 2008 12:07 a.m. alex Reader

After...ahem...procuring some movies (all MST3K, at the girlfriend's behest) with BitTorrent, I'm stuck with transferring them to DVD. Okay, this OS has iDVD built in, should be a breeze, right? Wrong. After about 16 hours of rendering - first to convert from .wmv to something else, then to import into iMovie, then to import into iDVD, then to burn - I'm fed up. It's almost too much work pirating this stuff!

The problem is that all this iStuff is way too feature laden for my needs. There's gotta be quick 'n' dirty, convert 'n' burn, wham-bam software out there for Macs. I don't need no fancy menu animation or anything like that. What I need to hear is the words, 'In the not too distant future...' sung in the shortest order possible.

Whaddaya got for me?
Dec. 31, 2008 2:18 a.m. Tom Heath Production Editor

I dunno much about DVD conversions, but whenever I'm looking for a quick and dirty application, I look here -> versiontracker

They've got freeware/shareware apps to do just about everything.
Dec. 31, 2008 7:30 a.m. Tommy Suddard

I just use iDVD. You shouldn't have to use iMovie at all. You just drag and drop, it takes 5 mins.

If you still can't figure it out, check out the downloads section of apple.com. They have some good DVD software there.
Dec. 31, 2008 7:57 a.m. billy3esq Dork

If you're trying to just put the files you have (DiVX, I assume) on a DVD, the easiest way is to (1) use the finder to create a new burn folder on the desktop, (2) drag the files to the empty folder thereby creating shortcuts to the files in the burn folder, and (3) click burn and follow the prompts (which basically relate to putting in a blank disk). If your DVD player will play DiVX files, this is easiest. If it won't, you can buy one that will for $40 or so.

If you need to create an actual video DVD, I find FFMPEGX to be the best compromise between usability and feature set. The maker of iSquint (used for converting video to iPod suitable format) has a more fully featured video conversion program available for a nominal fee, but I've never used it. Based on my use of iSquint, I'd suspect that it's easier to use than FFMPEGX. Once you've created the data, you can use the Disk Utility to create a disk image and then burn the disk, or use iDVD, which works fine.

I also believe that Toast has the abilities to do everything you're talking about in one or two clicks, but it's a little more expensive and I don't think too highly of it's transcoding.

All of this will work with legal content, too.
Dec. 31, 2008 8:09 a.m. Black Stig Reader

Toast is pretty good if you just want to make a quick burn of something.

You can use Adobe software, but . . .yeah . . .you can buy a challenge car for the price of anything Adobe.

iDVD sounds like the best idea so far, there are freeware things but the above 3 are what I've used in the past.

-Dave
Dec. 31, 2008 8:26 a.m. Osterizer HalfDork

Vista's built in burning software is pretty good...

Keepin' the status quo.
Dec. 31, 2008 9:24 a.m. John Brown SuperDork

Charlie kills me ;)
Dec. 31, 2008 11:17 a.m. alex Reader

Tommy Suddard wrote:

I just use iDVD. You shouldn't have to use iMovie at all. You just drag and drop, it takes 5 mins.

If you still can't figure it out, check out the downloads section of apple.com. They have some good DVD software there.

See, that's what I get for following manufacturer's instructions. I hadn't used iDVD before, so I opened the tutorial, followed the steps they told me to do... What the hell was I thinking?

All right, I'll try these workarounds before I give up on this software entirely. I don't know whether my DVD player knows DiVX (unlikely), but that would sure save me some time.

And yeah, I've been burning on my Windoze work box until recently (on the clock no less - you know, just to compound the wrongness of the whole situation) and it was a drag 'n' drop affair. The Mac should be at least that easy, far as I can tell.

Thanks, y'all.
Dec. 31, 2008 11:28 a.m. carguy123 Dork

Mac is drag n drop too (first!). They only issue is the format you are draggin.

If that is the format you want then it's a no brainer, it's only if you are trying to change the format of the original that you have to convert it. That's the same no matter the platform.