VCD for Dummies

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I have to make a rolling message board that will update our employees. The computer guy told me to get this software that I could make a jiffy presentation and burn it as a VCD to be able to play on a DVD player hooked up to a TV in our break room. I have the program, the dvd/cd/mp3 player and I have no clue how to start so I have three basic questions. 1 Is a VCD a formatt or is it a disc like a cd or cdrw (dont laugh) 2 If it is a different disc, can you burn it with a cd burner? 3 Once I know the answer to one and two I think I have bought the correct dvd player to run the disc, but just in case what would you suggest.

-- Renee Heath (renee,heath@trinityrail.com), July 28, 2004

Answers

VCD is a CD with MPEG-1 video on it, in a special directory structure. Other than that, the disc is a normal data disc that can be read by any CD drive, and you can burn them with any CD writer. Most (not all!) modern DVD players will play them. Check: http://www.videohelp.com/ for info on VCDs.

I'm not so sure about the message board, however. I am going to assume your program lets you make text slides and burn them as a slideshow on the VCD?

-- Bryan (gryps-innocens@gryphon.zzn.com), July 28, 2004.


I think your "computer guy" gave you a really bad suggestion. First of all, anything you burn will not be updateable. If you need to make changes, you have to burn a new copy. It sounds to me like you need something quite a bit more interactive than that. Maybe you just need to buy an electronic message board.

VCD is a very old format. It was the first digital video format for CD media. It has survived because it's very cheap to buy and fairly easy to make, but it's a low resolution format with a lot of limitations. Your presentation is going to have to be converted to VCD format. I see posts all the time asking "How do I convert Power Point to VCD?" and stuff like that. It can be done, but not very easily. In fact, I can't even tell you how to convert Power Point and similar programs to VCD, but a web search should be able to help.

VCD format can be burned to CD-R and CD-RW discs just like an audio CD. The site http://www.dvdrhelp.com has a lot of info on VCDs and how to make them and it might be of use to you.

-- Root (root@yahoo.moc), July 29, 2004.


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