Can you post a photo of the tv screen showing the menu highlight problem for us to see.

Here are links to some videos that show the problem on the TV.
These are both very simple creations with no special effects

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9No6EjS9V7ZNkQ2QWFPcGdURTQ/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9No6EjS9V7ZZy1GbE5fTWRIZm8/view?usp=sharing

Thanks for looking.. let me know if you have any issues seeing the videos.

Viewed your videos with the menu problem. Never seen that before. Play that DVD from the menu using wmp and play it from the menu using vlc. If the menu plays fine on your laptop then I beleive the menu bitrate may be too high for your standalone DVD player. Try this quick test:
1. Create a new project with a video clip trimmed to 15 seconds.
2. Auto create chapters every 2 seconds.
3. Burn that to a rewriteable DVD disc using that menu with Enable hardware video encoding (Intel) checked.

In the past enable Hardware Acceleration reduces the menu bitrate on Blu-Ray created discs. Never tested it on DVD. Let us know this disc menu played properly on the pc and also from your standalone DVD player.

Thanks for the quick reply.
I assume you meant to say to trim the video to 12 seconds (hence divisible by 2 to create the 6 chapters).
I did that using the txt only menu that you saw in the links above. No change - issue is the same.
The DVD plays fine in wmp and VLC.

Also as a test I created similar DVDs using Corel DVD Movie Factory and with Sony's Movie Studio Platinum 13 and neither of these software packages exhibited this issue.
Unfortunately, Corel's product is too simplistic for me (free Lenovo oem product) and Sony' product (trial version) is too cumbersome.. lots of functionality, but not very intuitive.

I really like the extra capabilities and good user interface of Power Director.

I'll try the dvds in other folks systems.. but this project will ultimately end up in over a 100 libraries to be viewed by all their patrons so I need a dvd that is tolerant of a variety of dvd and tv systems.

Hi Ed -

That's a seriously whacky problem! Like tomasc, I've never seen or heard of it before.

It seems to be related to how the frames & masks are set on the menu buttons. It also seems to be a menu you've created yourself.

You say the menu displays correctly in VLC Media Player & WMP? Have you tried it in any other player/TV setups? Have you tried it with a different menu?

Could you upload the menus in question to DirectorZone? There may be someone here who can isolate the issue. It's either (a) the menu or (b) the way the DVD player/TV is reading it.

Cheers - Tony


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I agree.. this is a whacked issue..
I have tried other menus and the problem exists on those too.
I used the simple create menu option to eliminate all special effects from the test process.

I uploaded the simple text menu that is in the links above. It is at:
http://directorzone.cyberlink.com/detail/124812333

I guess I would agree that it is a combination of the way Power Director builds these menus combined with my TV/DVD.
My TV is a Samsung 32" 720p and my dvd player is a Sony dvd/vhs combo unit (yes.. us old folk still use vhs on occasion...)
So my stuff is a bit dated.. but not stone age..

I will check out these dvds on other systems and report back.. this will take a couple of days..

I just find it odd that the Corel and Sony products do not produce this issue on my equipment.. I would assume they all use similar technology to render the dvd menu on screen?

Well.. I will keep poking at this and support is still digging too.. I want to keep using PD, so I hope to find a fix/cause
Thanks again for the responses

Hi again -

Using your "Pete's Simple Text Menu" I burnt a small project and tested menu function on a couple of different systems. On both setups, the menu played *correctly in 5 different players - DVD & BR

* the highlight markers (yellow stars) were in alignment with the chapter/title labels

As you stated, there are no alignment issues using VLC Media Player (or a few others I tested).

Cheers - Tony


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Thanks Tony.. really appreciate you looking into this.
I ran around to some friends houses and tested my dvds in thier systems.
One older than mine (if you can believe that!).. one newer and one brand new system that was just bought for Christmas.
All three systems played exactly like the links I posted in this thread with the mis-alignment..
So.. I believe that the menus are fine.. I think PD is fine too.. there just has to something wonky about the way the dvd is cut.

So.. here is what we know..
The problem does not show in PD preview
The problem does not show when the dvd is played with VLC or WMP
The problem is not tied to a Menu construction
The problem is not tied to my dvd/tv combo
The problem is burned into the DVD (cant explain why VLC works though)
The problem is very consistent - I have burned about 15 dvds to test using various menus. All exhibit this issue on tv.
The problem has existed since day 1 of the PD install (just purchased last week).
The problem does not exist in Corel and Sony dvd builds
A full PD uninstall, including a file system cleanup and registry cleanup and then reinstall and patch of PD made no difference.

I think my next test will be to build to an iso file and burn the dvd on another computer. all my testing so far has been done on a lenovo t520 laptop buring to the internal dvd drive. Maybe there is something wonky with the burn in my lenovo?

I'll post again when i have more info.
Thanks again for all the help.. it is forums like this that make me really want to stick with this software.

I've seen the issue before, it almost sounds like CL tried to address the issue in release v2408 with "Fixes the issue that menu content preview thumbnail is resized and out of position after modifying the menu" so probably make sure you are using the latest version.

The positioning of items in the menus are governed by a plus or minus distance from center, hence your observation that when higher or lower than center, more positioning error. I've looked over some old notes when I observed the issue and the best I could determine it had to do with inappropriate assessment of 4:3 and/or 16:9 aspect ratio for the highlight action, this caused the relative shift.

I don't know of a easy fix, you might try this as a test, being very consistent with 16:9 aspect ratio:
1) make sure project aspect ratio is set to 16:9 aspect ratio
2) import one of your media files, you've provided no indication what type of video files these are, make sure to right click on clip in the timeline and "Set Clip Attributes" > "Set Aspect Ratio" and make sure 16:9 is selected
3) define some chapters for this test
4) in "Create Disc" module make sure "Widescreen 16:9" is set as the format.
5) in the "Burn in 2D" select "Create a folder" and start burning
6) use Imgburn or the like to burn video folder of item 5 to a DVD disc
7) try DVD in your combo player and see what happens

If that works, maybe we can get somewhere then.

Jeff

Thanks Jeff.. I think you may be right about the format conflict between the highlighting and the menu.
all my recent tests have been with 6 pictures with a chapter at each.
Some tests have have used the default pics that load with CL initially and some tests with my own pics.

My initial project however was with 5 videos. I would put one on the timeline and then insert the others into position. Since my project was 16:9, I did not know that I had to check all my content as well. Anyway, after reading your post, I went back to each of the five videos and found that one of them was 4:3

However, I'm sorry to report that I still cannot produce a dvd that is properly aligned.

I took just one of my videos, confirmed it was 16:9 in the timeline as you suggested. then auto set 6 equal chapters.
Then in create disc I burned a couple of different menus to folders and then burned DVDs on a separate PC.
I had high hopes that this would work.. but it did not.. the misalignment is still there.

I also tried the six pics again and made sure that each of them was stretched to 16:9 in the timeline and no change there either.
Also tried the iso burn route and no change there either

My only question on your suggestion is regarding step 4.. in the Create Disc screen, it shows 16:9, grayed out, next to the preferences gear icon at the top of the screen... but I don't see any place where I can actually set the format as you imply. Am I overlooking a setting option on this screen?

Lastly.. I wonder if I corrupted my CL install by processing my original project that had a mix of 16:9 and 4:3 videos?

I may try another uninstall and test again... not sure..
Thanks

Ed -

You have one of the best people advising you there. Jeff knows more about PD's menus than the rest of us put together!

The setting I think Jeff was referring to is shown in the attached image.

I know this doesn't resolve the issue (I was hoping one of Jeff's suggestions might have worked too) but does this modification of your menu work better? http://directorzone.cyberlink.com/detail/124378749

All I did was select "Highlight Text", which means the misaligned stars are gone... now - if the text highlight isn't aligned we'll really be in a stew!

Cheers - Tony
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Thanks for the screen shot Tony, I had not seen this setting.. but I hope you make really good "Stew".. cause looks like I'll be in it a while longer... I tried your mod and still no change... the text highlight goes off same as the star.

But!... I believe we have a definitive answer now thanks to all you guys...
I looked at the format setting on the Create disc disc screen hoping that it was off.. but it was correct at 16:9.
So I started a new project, set it at 4:3, made sure that everything was set to 4:3 and burned the disc.. and woooo hoooo.. it worked perfectly! (I had tried a 4:3 burn a few days ago but I never looked at the format on the create disc screen).

Next.. I measured the distance center to center on the stars on #1 and #2 on the chapters screen.. it was 3 1/4 inches. (same as the text spacing)

Next I started a new 16:9 project.. hoping it would overwrite any bogus setting that might exist. I set everything to 16:9 and burned the disc.. fingers and toes crossed.. (got a charlie horse in my toe.. ouch).. and to my dismay the problem still exists.
Next I measured the text spacing between #1 and #2 on the chapters screen.. it was about 2 5/8 inches.. narrower than the 4:3 as expected.. and next since I could see just a bit of the star on #1, I calculated the distance center to center on the stars to be 3 1/4 inches which is the 4:3 spacing.

So, Jeff is correct.. my highlights are being produced at 4:3 format - regardless of my project or dvd settings.. nothing I have done yet has changed this.

Support is still working on it.. I gave them this thread address - hopefully they are watching...

Its New Years Eve here and my wife is giving me "the look" for spending time here now.. so Happy New Year to all and we'll pick this up next year!

I have replicated the problem on one of my standalone BD player. It is connected to a crt tv with composite video. I tested my previous dvd's and see no problem on any of them. They all modified for full thumbnails and some of them are from the directorzone and modified but they all work properly on this particular player. Text only menu appear to be the problem. Created a 7 chapter 15 sec. 16x9 dvd video with Pete's Simple Text Menu. See highlighting problems in the Play, Scenes, Chapter, and Navigation button. Unable to go to next scenes page. See attached video.

Decided to test Tony's Bar_11 text only menu. The highlighting of Play, Scenes, and Chapters are off. The navigation buttons highlight are right on and all chapters work and navigation works. Everything works in this menu. See attached video.

Decided to create a Blu-ray with the same Bar_11 menu. Highligting is right on and everything works in this menu.

Took all 3 test disc to my living room and played them on my Sony BD standalone connected to a big screen tv with a hdmi cable. All 3 test disc menu displayed and worked properly. There is no problem with any of the above discs. All Dvds and the BD are 16x9.

See that others have replied and Tony has a 'fixed' menu that I am burning now.

Good job tomasc!

Between your investigations and Jeff's findings, the issue is getting narrowed down.

... just don't know why I'm unable to replicate it here

Cheers - Tony
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Hi again - with everyone's help and input, I may (?) have figured out this issue.
I believe it is a bug in Cyberlink and I can now easily play "all" (yes all!) my dvd's showing either the misaligned highlight or show it correctly. Apologize for this long post... but I'd like to note all my observations for anyone that reads this.

tomasc's comments got me playing around with my dvd player.
It is an older Sony unit, but it is HDMI.. My tv is a Samsung 720p.
So I messed with cables.. connected via hdmi and a via composite.. and no change.
Then I was contemplating why vlc has always worked so I started researching progressive vs interlaced technologies.. and that led me to dig into my dvd player settings to see if it had a progressive setting or not and could it be turned on or off for testing.

Well.. my dvd player is progressive.. I could not find a place to turn it off.. but while poking around deep in the config settings of my dvd player, I found that it had a "TV" setting of 4:3. I switched that setting to 16:9.. and Voila!.. all dvds now play correctly!

So.. When I burn to 16:9, make sure my dvd player setting are set to 16:9 and play the dvd on my 16:9 TV... all is good.
You might say at this point in time.... so my dvd player was misconfigured... , I have been sending you all on a wild goose chase.. so that's it... and now this is the end of this story... but I think not..

I think that my dvd player misconfiguration was a good thing and I believe it shows a bug in the software.

We all know that when a 16:9 formatted movie is played on a 4:3 tv, it gets the letterbox effect with the black bars top and bottom.. but the movie plays fine.. and the scenes are all in alignment. The picture is still in a 16:9 format.

I believe that the issue here.. the CyberLink bug.. is that when a 16:9 PD production is played on a 4:3 TV, the video maintains it's 16:9 format.. but the highlight characters are displaying in the TV's 4:3 format.

I had tried my builds on three other TVs and they all showed the misalignment.. One of those TVs was an old 4:3 crt TV.. and based on my testing today.. I think the other two must have been playing in 4:3 as well. I'll try to confirm this, particularly with the brand new tv.

Tony... do you have a "TV" setting in your DVD player that you can switch to 4:3 to see if you can confirm my findings?

tamasc.. you mentioned that your existing dvds played ok on your crt tv.. were they built with PD13? I also tried the "Cinematic" menu that is in the Essential Pack and got this same misalignment.

I'll update support when they reply back. last note from them is that they escalated this issue.
I'll continue to post until this comes to a conclusion. I think this problem has limited scope.. but it is an important issue for me due to my distribution of this video to libraries..

Thanks again to all..

Twice I was going to post but held off because of being busy on New Years eve to say the issue was solved for me but I found issues later. Looked into the bitrate issue. I created another test disc with the 'fixed' menu and see the same problem. Media info reported the bitrate as variable with no maximum given. Mediainfo also reported on an Arcsoft created disc menu (VIDEO_TS.VOB) that the bitrate is variable with a maximum of 9000Kbps today. May have to update mediainfo as it reported 35MBps last night when I had a lot of apps open and that seem to have cause a conflict on my pc with mediainfo. Opened PDVD to double check the bitrate info. Menu bitrate is seen as 0.29, 0.49, 0.51, and 0.31Mbps on that text only menu (VIDEO_TS.VOB) using PDVD information display.

Took the Digix BD standalone and connected it to my big screen using hdmi and see all 4 test disc menu display highlights, navigation and played properly with no problems at all just like the Sony. Unplugged it and hook it back to the 4x3 tv and see no problems with menu highlighting and all played properly. At this time, thought power off a few minutes then power on solved the problem until I read Ed1875 latest post about dvd player settings.

Found that my Digix settings were hdmi auto, 4x3 letterbox. My BD menus are now squished on the sides with no top and bottom black bars. Changing the player settings make no difference. Had to put in a previous 4x3 dvd to change it back. The BD menu and video now display correctly again and all 3 dvd test discs show the same menu highlighting problem again.

All my previous 4x3 dvd were created on my other computers using dvd complete, showtime, pinnacle studio, and others. I have created 16x9 BD, avchd, and but only few dvd using PD and those are what I give away to people who do not have a BD player. They all play properly on the Digix. I never created any 16x9 dvd with PD13 for personal use, only BD and avchd discs. They all have a menu with thumbnails, none are text only which has this menu highlighting problem.

Happen to have one rewriteable dvd left from an earlier 16x9 test created by an earlier version of PD. See the scenes menu screenshot. You'll reconize it as being from the directorzone. It has been modified for full thumbnails which are offset to allow long descriptive chapter names. See the heart shape highlight on the left thumbnail. The menu highlights correctly and plays properly on the Digix on 4x3 letterbox setting with correct top and bottom black bars. Only 16x9 text only menus in this test do not show highlighting correctly.

I do beleive that tech support should find a solution for the same 16x9 menus not highlighting correctly for mpeg-2 encoded DVD when the player is correctly set for a 4x3 television but the same menus highlight correctly for BD and avchd that are h.264 encoded on the same player. There is no problem on my Sony standalone player on a 16x9 tv. Could not test the Sony on my old 4x3 tv because it only has hdmi and no composite video output like most of the newer standalone BD players.

Ed1875 wrote: tamasc.. you mentioned that your existing dvds played ok on your crt tv.. were they built with PD13? I also tried the "Cinematic" menu that is in the Essential Pack and got this same misalignment.

I tried that "Cinematic" (thumbnail) menu last night and was surprised that the highlighting problem is there on a 16x9 dvd when played on my Digix. Created the same with PD12 and got the same highlight misalignment result. It has been updated to 3403. Obtain a 16x9 dvd that I had previously created with PD12 and see no menu highlighting problem. Checked the date and found that it was created with PD12 with update 2930. I had not seen this 16x9 menu highlighting problem on any earlier versions of PD as I do check them on the Digix before giving them away.

It seem that with with my Digix BD player correctly set to letterbox 4x3 then those dvd created with PD13 last update and PD12 last update has the 16x9 menu highlighting problem. It does not occur with PD11 or PD9. Looks like I won't be able to create a proper 16x9 dvd copy anymore for those still using a 4x3 crt tv. The same 16x9 menus show no 16x9 menu highlighting problem on the Digix with h.264 encoded Blu ray or avchd discs. Again, the Digix is left in the 4x3 letterbox setting. Unfortunately PD9 and PD11 can't use the project files from later versions of PD.

Created a 16x9 dvd with pinnacle studio. See no menu highlighting problem.

Cyberlink need to fix this 16x9 menu highlighting problem on dvd with PD as there are others still using dvd players with old 4x3 televisions. Let us know what tech support plan to do or if they supply a workaround or fix for this.

Thanks for all the work tomasc.. it sure is nice to have a confirmation.
I gave support the url to this thread. I hope they are monitoring it.
I will advise when I hear back from them.

Just a quick update.. Cyberlink support has reported back.
They have reproduced this issue in their lab and have engineers working on it.

Update: Support says they may post a beta patch to the forum (I assume this thread). Stay tuned.