Audio disappears half way through slideshow

Question

Made a DVD with 11 slideshows (~1000 images total) spread over 3 menus. All slideshows were built in iDVD 5.0.1 using a media browser (from iPhoto). Travel 1 theme. No transitions. All slideshows set to loop. For audio, added a different single track to each slideshow. Used "Save as Image" option and then checked the resulting disk image in Apple DVD Player.
What happens: audio gets cut off (and never comes back) some way into a slideshow. For some slideshows it is close to 5 min. from the beginning, yet for other this happens only 2.5 min. after the slideshow starts.
What I tried: encoding settings "best performance" or "best quality"; reverting to QuickTime 7.0.1 from 7.0.3. This did not make any difference.
Any suggestions? Thanks.

Answer 1

Just a sad update. After extensive testing I did not find any solution to the problem. What I tested:
1. 10.4.3 or 10.4.2 (archive and install from 10.4.3) or 10.3.9 (fresh install).
2. QuickTime 7.0.1 or 7.0.3.
3. iTunes 4.9 or 5.0.1 or 6.0.
4. Different audio tracks for the slideshow in which audio disappears half-way.
5. Different formats of audio tracks - AIFF or AAC.
6. Tried increasing the length of the track to make it much longer than the length of the slideshow. I did this in GarageBand by creating 5 tracks using the same AAC file and then exporting the result back to iTunes.
7. iDVD encoding settings "Best Quality" or "Best Performance".
8. Creating PAL or NTSC DVD disk.
THE RESULT: The same as before. For some slideshows audio disappears during transition from slide 32 to 33, for others - from 51 to 52, yet for others - from slide 70 to 71.
What is odd: Redoing the DVD project in the same software setup gives different results - fewer or more slideshows may be affected than before. Therefore, the success rate is random and unpredictable.
WHAT I DID FIND: Out of 7 slideshows (of the total 11) that had problems with sound (during all my futile attempts) 6 contained images that were recently added to iPhoto - since the last time I was able to successfully make a perfect slideshow DVD (this was back in mid-August).
MY GUESS: This problem relates to the length of the DVD. If I make two DVDs under the same software setup, one with 11 slideshows, another with just 5, then the second will have only 1 or 2 slideshows with disappearing sound, while the first one may have up to 7.
For me this is a dead end. And I'll be waiting for iLife'06.