TMPGEnc DVD Author 3 with DivX® Authoring is the perfect all-in-one DVD and DivX® authoring solution for any video enthusiast, whether you're a beginner or experienced videographer. TMPGEnc DVD Author 3 with DivX® Authoring offers new features and some great improvements over its predecessors, such as HDV capture, "DivX® ULTRA" authoring, multiple subtitle streams, and the ability to add even more types of source files to your DVD and DivX® projects. Of course, you can still cut-edit, create custom menus, and then burn your projects to DVD to show your friends and family!

The video output format for DVD is selectable from MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 video with resolutions 352x240, 352x480, 704x480 or 720x480 29.97 fps in NTSC or 352x288, 352x576, 704x576 or 720x576 25 fps in PAL. Aspect ratio is selectable from 4:3 16:9. Bitrate is selectable either CBR or VBR with a min/max selectable 1550/9400 Kb/s, a nice feature here is the disc capacity meter which shows the size of the project and the scale changes as the bitrate is adjusted enabling easy selection of maximum quality against disc usage.

The video output format for DivX® has 3 profile settings
Home Theater
16x16 to 720x576 infinitely variable
HDTV
16x16 to 1280x720 infinitely variable
None
16x16 to 1920x1080 infinitely variable
Pixel ratio is selectable from 1:1, 12:11, 10:11, 16:11, 40:33
Frame rate is selectable from 15, 19.98, 20, 23.976, 24, 25, 29.97 & 30 fps
Bitrate is VBR 1 pass or 2 pass with min/max 620/4950 Kb/s with advanced options for quality.

Track creation is the same for DivX® & DVD with the facility for a first play track (DVD only). Clips can be added as a combined track and encoded as one but must be encoded in the same format (Pixel size Aspect Ratio & Audio Tracks) or these can be different in separate tracks . It is not possible to mix DVD, DivX, NTSC & PAL in the same project for obvious reasons.

The clip edit facility makes it easy to edit individual clips and remove unwanted footage (cut-edit your projects at the frame level), chapter insertion is easy from the same menu and individual chapters can be selected to be included or not in the menu creation, clip linking of multiple files in the same track is possible with DVD creation resulting in seamless playback of the track (without this there can be a slight pause in playback at the change of clip)

Menu creation is the same as with previous TMPGEnc DVD creation with a choice of using a template, creating a custom menu or no menus, There are various options for autoplay & combinations of Top menus, Track menus, Motion menus & no menu. The simulation lets you view your masterpiece before outputting the final project.

Selecting the output gives various file creation and burning options and starting the output will give details of the output file and any warnings if the output file does not conform to the DVD or DivX® standard. DVD is outputted to the standard AUDIO_TS & VIDEO_TS folders and the file size can be selected as the standard DVD-R disc sizes, custom size or no limitations, warnings are given but the file structure can still be created.

DivX is outputted as .divx extension which is not always recognised with all players but changing this to .avi after creation enables compatibility (my KiSS 1600 reviewed earlier is one culprit).
The DivX® is outputted as a single file and can be a maximum of 4032 MB. All the tracks & menus are included in this one file. This file can only be played correctly in a "DivX ULTRA" compatible software or hardware player. So far the only software player I have found to correctly playback these files is DivX® Player 6.4. DVD Players that support "DivX ULTRA" are very limited at the present time so unless you have the appropriate hardware or software I recommend creating single track files without a menu.

The outputted files can be left as a file system, burnt to disc with the included burning software or burnt with your own preferred software (I prefer ImgBurn as my favorite burning software) & there are various post-production process actions that can be selected.

The TMPGEnc DVD authoring is my favorite DVD authoring software and and this version is no exception, the quality of the encoded video equals any other software I have used, AC3 5.1 pass-through is good with the 5.1 encoding left untouched, unfortunately DTS audio is not recognized and cannot be encoded, I would like to see AC3 5.1 audio encoding as an option in future releases.

DivX authoring is great at the higher compressions and the menu creation is a nice touch only to be marred by the limited playback software & hardware.