I record 30 min B7W tv shows to cdr in Mpeg2 format with a bitrate of 6000000 bps. The quality is great and they play back on my pc at full screen with no breakup - these files blow svcd and vcd away. My problem - I'm trying to find a portable or stand alone player, with video and audio jacks that I can connect to a tv to play back the mpeg2 files. A dvd player won't work, because it's just a mpeg2 file and players like the Apex 600A won't play a stright mpeg2 file. Does anyone have any idea where I can get a player like this and the brand and model number? Thanks!

-- Doug Abbott (doug_abbott@hotmail.com), November 14, 2000

Answers

What you can do is, instead of buying a player buy a dual video controller like the G400 Matrox. Configure the second video port to TV-out (connect this to video-in of your TV). Everytime you play any format of video it will play full screen on your TV. Inregards to the sound, you can output the sound to any amplifiers or stereo you have. I hope this alternate solution gives you an idea.

Nelson

-- Nelson Ricamata (nelsonrica@hotmail.com), November 17, 2000.

No set-top player will play an mpeg file. You WILL have to use a computer. The configuration above sounds like it would work well. If you wait a few months you can just buy a dvd burner and get the same results and be able to play it on ANYTHING and not just 1 setup off your computer.

-- Jumping Jack (nospam@nospam.org), November 17, 2000.

I thank you both for the above answers, but you are both wrong. I found a DVD standalone player that plays both Mpeg1 and Mpeg 2 files from cdr or cdrw. The quality on the mpeg2 playback is great. When you put the cdr in the dvd player, a menu comes up on the tv and you select the file you want to play and hit enter. The video file plays perfect. The Dvd Player is the APEX AD 600. It plays mpeg1, mpeg2, svcd, and dvd fine. You don't need any special menus or encoding on the cdr's, just the mpeg file. I capture an mpeg2 file with my Dazzle DVC2 Creator, edit them and burn the file on to a cdr with Easy CD Creator and they play back perfectly. No need to make special menus like using Nero, I-Author, WinonCD, you just write the bare mpeg file to a cdr and it will playback on your tv using this player. Any questions email me. Regards Doug

-- Doug Abbott (doug_abbott@hotmail.com), November 30, 2000.

When using EZ creator do you burn the mpeg file as a data file? Do you do it in a mixed mode? Do you write the disk as finalized?

When you view the cd in windows and you say it is just an mpeg file, is that THE ONLY THING on the entire cd? The root on the cd says IE: d:/i_am_an_mpeg.mpg ?

Thankz

-- Ala (ala_bin@bin.org), November 30, 2000.

The player model in the above message should read APEX AD 660 (not the Apex 600). Don't know what happened there, must of hit wrong key when posting - not a typist. Any way The Apex AD 660 will play all types of Mpeg 1 and 2 files, plus svcd files and home encoded vob files. You can burn more than one mpeg2 file to a cdr or cdr-rw and the player's menu will show the files, on your tv screen in a menu and you can choose which video mpeg you want to play. Hope this clears everything up. Regards Doug

-- Doug Abbott (doug_abbott@hotmail.com), December 07, 2000.