Just finished a 1 hr. 54 min. NTSC SD project that includes 12 menus.  Menu lengths range from 7 to 14 seconds. The project has three sequences and other video clips on the timeline.  After a short "Play First", the main DVD menu has four buttons.  Two of those buttons link to other menus via "Anchored Targets".  One of the linked menus has two buttons linking to sub-menus (one of those buttons links to three sub-menus and the other button links to six sub-menus.  The other linked menu off the main menu has eleven buttons linked to corresponding positions on the timeline via "Anchored Targets".  The first and second rows contain four buttons across and the third row contains 3 button across and a "Menu" button to return to the sub-menu. All menus and buttons worked perfectly in the AL DVD Preview module.

I set up the DVD Export to create an ISO image at 5000 Ave./6500 Max. VBR bitrate with 48 KHz 16 bit stereo Dolby Digital audio and selected the "Fit best possible quality on disc" radio button.  Then burned on TY DVD-R 8x disc at 4x on a 8x burner.

Results are really confusing me.  All buttons work perfectly on three separate laptop computers and my standalone Panasonic DVD player but the last three buttons on the bottom row of the last menu (the one with 11 buttons plus return to sub-menu button) do not play on my standalone Sony DVD player or on a cheap generic brand standalone DVD player.  I even tried burning at 2x but the results are the same.  My client wants maximum compatibility for all DVD players but it is not looking good for me!  Perhpas I should try eliminating the last row of three buttons on the last menu and adding them to a second page of that menu??  Any ideas?

 Thanks!

1. If you do not have a leadin video before the menu (that is, if the menu is the first thing on the timeline), put five seconds of black before the menu. That gives some players time to come up to speed before they read the menu.

2. Do NOT select "Fit best possible quality....". That over-rides your preset bitrates. Select "Follow Preset" instead. And go back and make sure that your presets are still where you put them originally. Liquid will change them if you use Fit best...

See if those two things fix the issue.

Thanks for the great advice Lew.  My project does have a leadin video before the menu that is about 15 seconds long so that should not be the issue.  I will try deselecting "Fit best possible quality..." but I am concerned that the burn will fail since the capacity bar is at 99% and is in red.  Do I need to lower my average and max bitrate even more before trying a burn?

Thanks!

How long is the video??

Total length (including menus) is 1 hr. 53 minutes.  Most of the content is fairly static - lots of pix with some pan and scan and relatively static interview shots.  Should I use lower average and max VBR?

Thanks.

Yes. You are going to need to be around 5000 max. With that length video, you might as well use the best quality setting rather than follow preset. Is there a particular brand of player the buttons don't work on? Are these animated buttons?

Some of the buttons do not work on my Sony DVD player.  They work perfectly on my Panasonic DVD player and on all four laptops at home.  The buttons are not animated.  No animation on any of the DVD menus.

Interestingly, I tried burning the ISO image on two other computers.  Using Sonic RecordNow at 4x on my ThinkPad laptop yielded the same result on the Sony player.  However burning it on my wife's HP laptop at 4x using Sonic Digital Media Plus v7 resulted in all buttons working properly on the Sony player.  So for now, it appears as though I have a work around that should make my client happy. If I ever need to have that much content on a DVD again, I just hope my wife still has her HP!

Thanks.

If it worked using the same ISO file but burned on a different machine, than this has nothing to do with Liquid but rather the burner and/or media. That Sony player could not read the burned DVD correctly. What brand of media are you using? I highly suggest you get some Taiyo Yuden discs, if you are not already using them. Also make sure you are using -R discs and not +R discs as some older players have difficulty with +R discs.

Thanks for all your help Lew!  I believe it is the burner on my edit machine as I have only ever used TY DVD-R discs.  I have never had problems with that burner on shorter video projects (up to 1 hour) burning with presets. It is very rare for me to work on projects longer than 1 hr so I should be OK just sticking with what I have.  I think it would be a real pain to have to change out the burner with a new one since my edit machine is a 3 year old laptop.  As I understand it, installing newer burners in older machines (especially laptops) can be problematic.  If it was really critical, I could purchase a highly rated external USB DVD burner.