Just burned my first DVD! But it takes 4Ever...

[MacVault]

I just burned my first iDVD project. It's two 46 minute video podcasts. iDVD makes it very easy, fun, and beautiful. However, I can't beleive how long it takes - even on this new C2D MacBook... to render the menu video assets, then to encode the main videos, then to burn the DVD. I mean who in their right mind would want to burn DVDs? Does it go that much faster on a souped up MacPro??? Does the GPU (or lack of) have anything to do with the encoding of the video? My iDVD process is running at about 130% CPU.

Fortunately (due to the C2D?) I can surf the web and do other things while it's encoding/burning, but I'm just suprised how long it takes.

Am I the only one who thinks it's slow? I can't imagine doing a dual layer DVD.

 

[72930]

The problem is that it is slow because it is slot loading...as long as you don't often burn big things, it is nice...but get an external drive if you do...

 

[cwedl]

Thats about average, it would be slightly faster on a mac pro.

 

[MacVault]

Most of the time to Burn the DVD was the time to encode it from a .mov file to the DVD format. Does this rely on the GPU? Is it possible to raise the priority level of the encode process so that it goes faster? Or will that heat up the MacBook too much???

 

[islandmonusvi]

A lot has to do with the resolution. Hi-res DVD format requires all your
memory and processor. If you plan on doing this often then get more memory
and spool to a clean drive partition specifically designed for this conversion.
The less the drive heads need to seek the faster the I/O writes.
Working in the background will degrade the drive performance significantly
if the data is on the same partition.

 

[eenu]

the drives in macs (slot loading ones) are a pile of crap! They are good for occasional use or watching DVDs but anything heavier and you need an external.

I put a normal sized DVD Burner in a USB2.0 enclosure and ripping and burning times are over halved.

 

[theBB]

I'd say ignore most of the comments here. When you are burning an iDVD project, you spend most of the time encoding. That has nothing to do with your DVD burner speed. I have 128MB dedicated graphics card and it still takes long, so I figure iDVD probably does not take advantage of the graphics card. Instead, it seems to be using the CPU. If that's the case, more RAM is probably the only thing you can add to your computer to speed things up. In your case, your graphics setup is sharing its RAM for its own memory needs, so that might be slowing you down a bit as well.

BTW, I think MPEG2 encoders are quite CPU intensive. I once burned a few DVDs on a fairly souped up Windows machine using Adobe Premier Pro. That took a long time, too. In the end, the process is much smoother with iMovie+iDVD, then Premier Pro + Nero. A few months after that project I switched to Mac.

 

[bowens]

Mine are the same way. The first one I did, I thought something was wrong. I stopped it twice. Then I just decided to leave it overnight and when I got up it was done. I have no idea how long it actually took, but from now on that's what I'm doing.

 

[Reaver]

The problem is that it is slow because it is slot loading...as long as you don't often burn big things, it is nice...but get an external drive if you do...

this is what I did with my MBP I have DL burner in a external box that I use for big jobs but other wise my MBP's slot drive works for veiwing and playing and even burning the occasional cd.

 

[illegalprelude]

the first time takes the most but lets say you needed to make 10 copies of that, the other 9 copies will now be much faster for you because it has done most of the rendering and conversions for you