Operation Manual

Chapter 6: Appendix
243
Video Formats & Qualities
When you burn video to disc, you must take into consideration not only
the quality you want to use, but also the TV format of the country or
region in which you want to watch the movie disc you burn. The section
below offers information on both of these topics, allowing you to burn
video discs that suit your playback capabilities.
TV Formats
The two TV formats (NTSC and PAL) have been adopted as standards by
television broadcasters around the world. The main difference between
the two formats is the number of frames per second they offer: 30 in
NTSC, and 25 in PAL. This difference means that a movie recorded in
NTSC format is unplayable by a PAL player and vice versa.
Fortunately, the question of whether to use PAL or NTSC television
format for your disc can be reduced to the following simple question:
• In which country or region do you plan to play this disc?
Since all countries use either the NTSC or PAL format, knowing the
location in which the disc will be played pretty much resolves this issue
for you. By selecting the desired country or region, the television format
is automatically set.
Note: Generally speaking, the United States, Japan, Canada, and Mexico use
NTSC, while Germany, Great Britain, South America, Australia, and most of
Western European and Asian countries use PAL.