I burnt a dvd from a file I exported from quicktime using the share with apple and pc option. It was burnt directly from the finder. The dvd works perfectly on my mac, and also runs in my windows, but the sound in my windows pc is stammered.

Question

This is file I created in SnapzPro (which was saved as a Quicktime mov - Animation) of a Powerpoint Presentation.

Answer 1

Jon, how do I re-compress the Snapz data for dvd playback?
That depends on your specific work flow strategy. I normally perform the processing in two stages if editing is involved or in a single stage if I don't plan to trim, title, add a narration track, add special effects, and/or add filters to the Snapz Pro X captured screen data.
In the two-stage process you export the captured data to an intermediate low-compression, high-quality fomat. (This can be the default settings for Snaps Pro X or a more modern editing specific format like ProRes 422/Linear PCM depending on the codec components for which your system is configured and your personal editing preferences.) The Snapz Pro X intermediate file is then edited in the application of your choice and the results are re-compressed to your final target compression format.
In any case, whether you are re-compressing the data using QT 7 Pro, iMovie, GarageBand, MPEG Streamclip, Snapz Pro X, or similar third-party app that accesses the built-in OS X QT routines, the export process is essentially the same. Whether you use a "Movie to MPEG-4" or "Movie to QT Movie" export, you must export to a data rate limited, multi-pass H.264/AAC compression combination to take advantage of the "Optimize of CD/DVD" option. Specific data rate limits depend on the playback dimensions of the file you are creating, the minimum level of quality you will accept, and the playback speed of the hardware to be used. (I normally target 4X-8X settings for SD content but if you know the recipient has a higher rated optical drive and your content is HD, then you can use higher encode settings for improved quality.)
I captured the slideshow again in Snapz, and saved it as H264/AAC. Is this good enough?
If you did not specifically use the "Optimize for..." feature, then the file is automatically targeted for "Computer" playback which assumes playback is from an hard drive which has greater bandwidth/faster throughput than an optical media player. If the target display dimensions are resonably small, the the contextual nature of the H.264 video encoder may or may not be within the playback limitations of an optical drive usually depending on the encode matrix dimensions, graphic complexity of the source data, overall brightness of the scenes, and limitations you may have place on the target file—i.e., the larger the encoding dimensions, the faster the data date and the less likely the file will be compatible with optical drive playback without having to constantly interrupt playback to cache/rebuffer additional data. However, you can always tell the recipient that if this happens, he or she should simply copy the movie file from the CD/DVD to their hard drive for playback.
What now? Do I open it in Quicktime and use the "share for mac and pc", then right-click on it in the finder and "burn to disc?"
What you do next depends on how you plan to burn the file. The steps explained above allows you to create a file that is compatible with playback from an optical drive in a QT Player app but is not authored for playback from a commercial DVD Player. Your next step is to burn that file to an optical disc that can be read by your recipient's computer. I my case, I normally burn the disc using a hybrid (HFS Plus/ISO 9660) format which supports HFS Plus, ISO-9660, Rock Ridge, and Joliet with Rock Ridge file systems. How you do this is up to you. You can, for instance, use a third-party app like Toast or Dragon Burn to create a data disc; create/burn an image file with your Disk Utility app (this is a good option if you plan to burn several discs now and/or in the future); create a named "Burn" folder, drop the file to it, and press the burn button; or simply insert a blank optical media disc into you optical drive, change the default disc name to whatever you want, drop your file to the blank media's Finder window, and press the "Burn" button. (NOTE: Burn options may differ depending on the software installed on your system and/or the version of OS X under which you may be operating.)
Dont see any specs re playback from an optical disc drive? The slideshow is only 3 min long, and I want to avoid turning it into a video DVD using iDVD, iMovie etc, as the quality of the pictures and type degrades badly. Thanks for the help. Been struggling with this for weeks.
As noted above, this is an encode setting that only becomes active when you are targeting your H.264/AAC encode for multi-pass/data rate limited compression. When active, the "Optimize for..." pop-up allows you to select "computer" (targets playback from a hard drive), "CD/DVD" (targets playback from optical media), or "Streaming" (targets playback from a realtime streaming server) options. This option prevents data rate excursions from exceeding limits normally associated with each of the named types of playback. This option has nothing to do with the file system used to burn the media disc which determines which platforms/OS can read the disc and the file it contains.