How do I Reducing a 740Mb .avi to 700Mb?

[Andy442x]

I have downloaded a 740Mb Movie and it simply refuses to burn to a 700Mb CD. How do I re-encode the whole movie to save myself 40Mb?
There are NO credits on the film, so cutting them is not an option, and I do not want to use larger CD's (damned if i can find these so-called 90min CD's)
I have burnt to about 710Mb with no problems but do not wish to change my brand of CD's, I've got a stack of 100 to use up
Would lowering the audio quality be a viable option? or would I have to lower the quality down too far for it to be a good way of saving 40Mb?
Any help, tips or pointers would be most appreciated.....

p.s. I use Gordian Knot and Nandub if I do need to re-encode.

[khp]

About reducing audio quality. If we assume that the audio is 128 kbps, and you are willing to reencode at 96kbps, you get a size reduction of 240KB per minute of playtime, so to get at 30MB size reduction the movie would have to be just over 2 hours.

To reencode the video using divx simply load it into virtualdub (or nandub if that is your preference). Set the video to fast recompression, calculate the bitrate and configure the codec.

[Rooster6975]

You can also cut the distribution logos.

If I assume the film is literally 740 MBs (757,760 KBs or 775,946,240 bytes), you can't possibly fit that onto a 700 MBs CD. You can get at an absolute maximum 710 if you hold your breath. I try never to go over 725,000 KBs because otherwise the subsequent burn may be erroneous. I am giving you the figure in KBs because that is what Windows Explorer gives it as. Many people see 725,000 and call it a 725 MBs film which it is not. Technically, it is a 708 MBs file.

That said, I assume from your post that it is a full 740 MBs. You can re-encode the audio as suggested, that normally can save you as much as 20 MBs. Generally, I have found that DivX downloaded which are already that large have audio tracks at 96 KB. I wouldn't recommend going any lower or you may compromise sound quality.

You can cut off the distribution logos which appear at the beginning of the film. That will normally save you 10-20 MBs, obviously depending on the number of logos.

By the way, is this film 12 Monkeys? I remember that it was 775 million bytes. If it is, I suggest you find and order some 800 MBs CDs from the Internet. I tried everything I could think of to get that down to a 700 MB CD. Short of cutting out some chunks of the movie, I don't think you cand do it. There was only one logo in my version (if I remember correctly) and audio was already at 96 KB. In the end, I bit the bullet, bought a pack of 10 800 MB CDs, and eventually also bought the DVD. It's a good movie, worth the 20 euros I paid for it.

Good Luck,
Rooster.

[LouisCyphre]

I liked to offer an alternative:
If I have a movie file that does not fit on a 700MB-CDR I usually cut it in two parts. VirtualDub makes that pretty easy. Doing some simple math you can get a 700MB and in your case 40MB part. I burn the first one on a CD and add the second one to a less than 660MB movie I want to burn.
I can fit them together again later just as easily.
This is less work than reencoding so it might be an option you want to consider.

[Batman]

Using the rar or other compression format you may be able to reduce the file size to fit on a 700 mb cd.

[LouisCyphre]

Lossless compression ineffective

I believe that using lossless compression programs (Winzip,Winrar,Winace etc. )for movie files is not effective in general. For example, I tried to compress a 800+ MB copy of Sleepy Hollow with WinZip. After aeons of calculation, the file was shrunk by less than 1% of its original size.

[Batman]

I'm unsure if rar would help though. I saw a 700 mb rar file, that turned out to be a 726 mb avi file. It seems to save some space

[divxdude]

ive tried zipping big and small files with winzip and winrar using the maximum compression settings. for me this didnt do $hit, i got maby 1%-2% reduction in file size. ive seen some people zip huge files with a 25% reduction in files size, how they do it i have no clue. my guess they might tamper with the .ini file settings?

[khp]

You generally can't get more that a few percent, filesize reduction by zipping a divx encoded avi file, the same is true for all other lossless compression methods. This is because the divx codec internally preforms compression that is closely related to zipping.

[Andy442x]

I dont really want to compress the movie even if it is possible, I want to be able to watch it straight from CD on my TV....
It isn't 12 monkeys BTW, but I will have a look for that now
I have lowered the audio and it fits easily now, with barely any noticable consiquences !!!!
Thanks all for your help and advice, has been appreciated.