Burning DVD's

cadetcadet
Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
Hi there,



I'm a bit of a noobie towards Macs, as you will probably be able to tell by this question. I am considering purchasing a Macbook, but being a university student, funds are always tight, so I might only be able to afford the base one with only the Combo Drive.



What I want to know is, what are the formats that a program like iMovie and its projects can save as? I want to know if I can save an iMovie project, transfer it to my Windows desktop and burn it onto DVD from there, since the Macbook will not have DVD burning obviously. Will there be any issues arising with this?



Regards.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 3
    jrollerjroller Posts: 80member
    I can understand your dilemma. Obviously, getting a Mac with a "Superdrive" would be ideal, but if you can't you do have options.



    (As a side note: Regardless of whether or not you go with a superdrive model or not, you should look on the Apple site for the refurbished models. You can get those sometimes heavily discounted from retail and they are just fine. That way you might be better able to afford more machine for the money. Compare what you find there to the student discount price which you would also qualify for. Here are some good links:



    Apple Store Refurbs



    Education Discount



    Now to answer your question:



    Looking at the options in iMovie I see an option for Windows Media Format and well as several other formats that would be cross-platform. That said, I have QuickTime Pro ($30 from Apple) which has more options available than basic QT, so I do not know if WMV format would be available to those who do not have QT Pro. Nonetheless, rest assured there would be formats that will work fine on Windows.



    Your DVD program will likely want MPEG-2 anyway, which basic QT will do.
  • Reply 2 of 3
    mr. memr. me Posts: 3,221member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jroller View Post


    ...



    Your DVD program will likely want MPEG-2 anyway, which basic QT will do.



    iDVD converts other formats to MPEG-2 as this is the standard format for DVDs. Its preferred input format is .mov, which is the default output format of iMovie. However, iDVD should accept any QuickTime-compatible format provided you have the proper QuickTime codec. The likely reason that you see Windows Media as an acceptable format is that you probably have Flip4Mac installed.
  • Reply 3 of 3
    onlookeronlooker Posts: 5,252member
    Cadet the answer is no. If your going to do all kinds of crap to get just a video format over to your windows machine your far better off just doing it all on the windows machine. There is really no point in using iMovie at all. You can convert to these formats in windows. The killer app here is iDVD, and for that you need a superdrive. The superdrive will save your ass. Just get one, and eat the cost.
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