[MEncoder-users] Fixing broken MPEG files

[Eric Buist]

Hello,
I would like to know if MEncoder can be used to repair broken MPEG
files. Two days ago, my set-top DVD recorder mysteriously created a
non-working DVD+RW disk. I cannot figure out why, but no set-top DVD
player could read the disk, but the computer could. I tried to reburn
the disk with growisofs, then to recreate the .vob files with dvdauthor,
but dvdauthor asked me to remux the MPEG files. I did that with
MEncoder, using stream copy, so I could dvdauthor the MPEG files, but
the resulting DVD is still un readable by standalone players.
The command-line for this was mencoder -oac copy -ovc copy -of mpeg
-mpegopts format=dvd:tsaf -o t1.mpg dvd://1
I looked more carefully at the output of dvdauthor, and noticed that
there wre problems with some GOPs. Is it possible, with MEncoder or
another Linux tool, to repair the MPEG movie without reencoding it? I am
a bit upset that in fact, the problem could come from the DVDAuthor
version which comes with Ubuntu 8.04. In that latter case, I would not
be able to create DVD-Video anymore with Linux, unless I downgrade to
Ubuntu 7.10.
In addition, would I have more luck with DVD-RW instead of DVD+RW for my
standalone DVD recorder? I would really like to avoid trying multiple
types and brands of disks to get something reliable.
Eric