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How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 3:22 pm
by TheBigCheese
Hi guys

Before anyone says anything I have researched this before posting and all the questions and answers I can find are from around 2009 which is obviously no good for now.

Basically I have Freeview HD recordings that I would like to convert and archive in some cases and in others I would like to edit them first but I can't find anyway of being able to do it.

I used to be able to convert SD .wtv to DVR-MS and had more success that way but it won't convert HD .wtv files so I'm stuck with the files that take up the most room!

Does anyone have a way round this? I'll mention it again, it's not just the converting I want, I want to be able to edit the recordings as well.


Thanks very much! :D

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 10:49 pm
by lithium630
TheBigCheese wrote:Hi guys

Before anyone says anything I have researched this before posting and all the questions and answers I can find are from around 2009 which is obviously no good for now.

Basically I have Freeview HD recordings that I would like to convert and archive in some cases and in others I would like to edit them first but I can't find anyway of being able to do it.

I used to be able to convert SD .wtv to DVR-MS and had more success that way but it won't convert HD .wtv files so I'm stuck with the files that take up the most room!

Does anyone have a way round this? I'll mention it again, it's not just the converting I want, I want to be able to edit the recordings as well.


Thanks very much! :D
You can use Dvrmstoolbox to edit commercials and change the file format. It can be difficult to use but is very flexible. I personally would use VideoRedo and convert the mpeg2 WTV to h264 WTV. You'll get a much smaller file size and retain high quality. (I'm assuming freeview is mpeg2, not really sure). You can also edit WTV files with VideoRedo.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2011 9:06 am
by Pixelz
I don't thing DVR-MS format can support HD recordings, so you're limited to SD for conversion to DVR-MS.
However, for .wtv recordings, I've found the latest versions of VideoReDo enable conversion from .wtv to several formats including .mp4 and .mkv It's not free software, but there is a trial version that will let you confirm it meets your needs.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2011 1:42 pm
by makryger
Not sure what you guys are talking about... I've got plenty of DVR-MS files that are in the original HD format. WTV is just a slightly different container for the same data.

Here is how I got about editing my movies (for commercial cutting):
1) Right click on the wtv file, click "Convert to DVR-MS
2) Go to DVREdit, open the dvrms file, clip the film the way I want, then resave. (http://www.jeffreygriffin.com/downloads/)

You may also have some luck with Windows Live Movie Maker for re-encoding, although I've found that the audio ends up being out of sync when I have done that in the past. So I just stick to DVREdit.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2011 9:34 pm
by lithium630
makryger wrote:Not sure what you guys are talking about... I've got plenty of DVR-MS files that are in the original HD format. WTV is just a slightly different container for the same data.

Here is how I got about editing my movies (for commercial cutting):
1) Right click on the wtv file, click "Convert to DVR-MS
2) Go to DVREdit, open the dvrms file, clip the film the way I want, then resave. (http://www.jeffreygriffin.com/downloads/)

You may also have some luck with Windows Live Movie Maker for re-encoding, although I've found that the audio ends up being out of sync when I have done that in the past. So I just stick to DVREdit.

Yup. A lot of my original blu-ray rips are dvr-ms. It is not nearly as flexible as WTV but there are a lot more tools that work with it. Unlike WTV, dvr-ms can't handle h264 which may be where the confusion is.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 8:12 am
by CEHKIA
A program called VideoRedo should do what you want. I use it to edit HD DVR-MS and WTV files. It will save these files in other formats, also.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 5:52 pm
by Scallica
I have a program running in my system tray called WTV watcher. It monitors the Recorded TV folder and converts any new WTV files to DVR-MS, provided that they are not DRM'ed. Then, I use VideoRedo 3 to edit the files.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 11:27 pm
by CEHKIA
The version of VideoRedo (Version 4.20.6.619) I have will edit WTV SD and HS files directly.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2011 3:12 am
by Scallica
CEHKIA wrote:The version of VideoRedo (Version 4.20.6.619) I have will edit WTV SD and HS files directly.
Correct. However, to upgrade from V3 to the latest is $46, which in my opinion is exorbitant.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 11:44 am
by martinu
CEHKIA wrote:The version of VideoRedo (Version 4.20.6.619) I have will edit WTV SD and HS files directly.
One other piece of advice. From my testing with a free trial of the version of VideoReDo which can read WTV files, it seems to be much quicker to use the native "Convert WTV to DVR-MS" right-click action in Windows 7 than to read the WTV file into VideoReDo and then save it as DVR-MS (after perhaps making edits). Better to convert it using Windows and then edit and save the resulting DVR-MS, or else edit the WTV and save as WTV.

I've successfully converted high-definition WTV to DVR-MS - for example the sample Landscapes.wtv file which comes with Media Centre and which is 1280x720.

Re: How to recode/edit WTV & HD files?

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2011 1:05 pm
by mark1234
TheBigCheese wrote:I used to be able to convert SD .wtv to DVR-MS and had more success that way but it won't convert HD .wtv files so I'm stuck with the files that take up the most room!
The cause of this problem is that Freeview SD is broadcast in mpeg2, which will go into either a dvr-ms or wtv file. Freeview HD, however, is broadcast in h.264 and that will only go into a wtv file (in Media Centre land anyway). If Freeview HD was in mpeg2 then you'd have no problem being able to convert to dvr-ms, but it would use up more bandwidth during broadcast.