How to Compress MPG

[playtec]

Hi,
First time user so apologies in advance for my lack of knowledge.

I have 23 episodes of a tv show on VCD that I have converted from dat to mpg onto my HDD.
I am trying to make 1 single DVD-R of all episodes but the best I can fit is 10 episodes per DVD-R, making it 3 discs.
Is there anyway I can compress the MPG's smaller to fit onto 1 DVD-R?
Any help (in as simple terms as possible) would be greatly appreciated.
Even If I can only get them down to 2 DVD-R would still be acceptable.
Thanks in advance.
Apologies if this is in the wrong area.

[FlipNautix]

The only way to shrink any file, whether it's mpeg or avi, you have to alter the bitrate, but re-encoding it using whatever encoder you'd like (like virtualdub or tmpgenc, etc).

However, the less the bitrate, the worse the quality, so try using a bitrate calculator which are all over the net.

I suggest you use 2 DVD-Rs if you're trying to fit 23 episodes. 23 episodes on 1 DVD-R is sure to have brutal results.

[playtec]

I know this is probably one of the lamest and stupidest questions I could ask... but, how do I alter the bitrate and re encode?
I used VCD Gear to convert the .dat files to my hard drive as .mpg
I have TMPGenc and Virtualdub as most people on here talk about but which do I use and how do I use it?
Sorry for the lamicity of my knowledge.
Thanks in advance.

[divxdude]

Originally posted by playtec
I know this is probably one of the lamest and stupidest questions I could ask... but, how do I alter the bitrate and re encode?
I used VCD Gear to convert the .dat files to my hard drive as .mpg
I have TMPGenc and Virtualdub as most people on here talk about but which do I use and how do I use it?
Sorry for the lamicity of my knowledge.
Thanks in advance.

None of your questions are lame or stupid.

You can try this:
Decompress the MPG files and reencode themw ith TMPG at a lower birate, say VCD. if there already VCD i wouldnt go much lower than that level of quality.

Another alternative:
Decompress all the episodes to RAW AVI. and recode them to DivX with VirtualDubMod.

But i take it you want to put these in your household DVD player and watch them on the boob tube. if this is the case diregard the second solution.

hope this helps. Cheers mate!

[sfheath]

I've not worked with VCD yet. Are your episodes 20 minutes each? About 8 hours.
Assuming VCD to be roughly a quarter of DVD (stress roughly) equates to 2 hours DVD quality.
Does VirtualDubMod not accept dat files directly?

[divxdude]

a half hour VCD episode should roughly run 150-200MB at a decent birate.

[playtec]

Thanks for your help.
I managed to piece together how to do what I wanted with the advice I could find and understand (no offence, im just thick) and a lot of playing around. glad I have a dvd/rw
I converted the mpg's (average 426MB each) to avi's using Virtuadub and got them to an average of 150MB, then I made a template of my own in TMPGenc and converted the AVI's back to a MPG-1 that would import into TMPGenc DVD author (GOP structure and frame rate etc), these re done MPGs were all around 330MB at 1024 bit rate.
I managed to fit 13 episodes onto 1 DVD-R and the other 10 onto another DVD-R, the quality is not much different from the VCD episodes as they (when I found out how to check) turned out to be at a bit rate of 1159 and were almost perfect picture (could only tell they were VCD coz I knew, everyone else thought they were DVD by the clear quality).
Thanks for your help, I appreciate it.