Frustration Increasing

[Michael Patterson]

The Goal: To get a show off TIVO and edited as a high quality MPEG2,
suitable for DVD writing (and providing an excuse for a DVD writer).

Goal unattained.

Here's what I've managed to do so far:
1) downloaded a good ty stream using TivoApp. (file: X.ty)
2) Converted X.ty to audio and video streams using tyconvert (files: X.m2v,
X.m2a)
3) Converted audio to every format imaginable

The audio and video play fine separately.

So now, I come to the part where I need to crop the edges (green bar and
top-bar dots) and edit out commercials. Every direction has blocked my
progress.

Tmpegenc: Before the trial ran out, I tried many times to combine, edit, etc
the m2v and .wav files. Every time, it crashed. I even went so far as to
just try to have it make an MPEG2 out of the m2v file. crash.

DVD2AVI/VFAPIC/VirtualDub: Something in the DVD2AVI messes up the video to
the point of being unwatchable-- every time an object moves on the screen,
it seems to become "interlaced" and only every other line moves at full
speed. Very strange.

M-2 Edit: Finally managed to find a friend who would let me try this out. If
I used tivoapp to make an MPEG-2, M-2 edit would crash on startup. I tried
using it's MUX tool to combine the X.m2v with any of a variety of audio
files, and it would complain that the .m2v file didn't have audio every time
I hit "start" (ARGH! Why do you care if it has an audio stream??? That's
what MUX is for!) However, the .m2v would load fine into the editor.

Reading the on-line M-2 manual, it says that it only accepts MPEG1 and
MPEG-2 audio streams. I tried making an MPEG-1 audio stream with Tmpegenc,
and it still didn't accept it.

playitsam: haven't messed with it. Don't want to mess with information on
TIVO, since that's my master copy. Made some attempts to run it on my linux
box with no effect.

I'm about at my wit's end. I thought that getting the MPEG-2 stream to the
computer would be the hard part, and it seems to only be the beginning.

--Mike