Windows DVD Maker on Windows 8?

Question

Something I really miss in Windows 8 is the Windows DVD Maker.

I tried to get it running on Windows 8 by copying the DVD Maker directory from Windows 7 over to Windows 8. When I run it, I get the following error:

I had hoped that this could be resolved by installing the Media Center add-on for Windows 8, but that did not have any effect.

Several forum posts have suggested installing a codec pack such as the K-Lite codec pack, but I have always had bad experiences with those. I did, however, try to install the Shark007 codec pack, but that didn't work either.

I also tried running the following commands (which did complete successfully, mind you) in an elevated command prompt, but they didn't change the outcome.

regsvr32 msmpeg2vdec.dll
regsvr32 msmpeg2adec.dll
regsvr32 msmpeg2enc.dll

I know there are other DVD making programs out there, some are even free, but the few I have tried do not compare to Windows DVD Maker's simplicity and beauty. Is there any way to make it work on Windows 8?

Answer 1

You'll have to use a third party codec and/or use a different DvD maker. On the codec pack, did you use the Win8 version? http://shark007.net/win8codecs.html

Scott Hanselman had that as a chief complaint a bit ago. http://www.hanselman.com/blog/HowToCreateADVDOnWindows8EvenThoughWindowsDVDMakerIsGoneDVDStyler.aspx

Due to license fees Microsoft removed MPEG-2 from Windows 8, but they are available as feature packs in either Win 8 Pro, or in the Media Player feature pack. For right now, the Media Feature pack is free, and should get you going:

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/feature-packs

If you want to go the 'hard' way using Microsoft components, there is still the MPEG-2 decoder as part of the Windows 8 SDK and the Media Foundation. So, you could download the SDK from here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/desktop/aa904949 and you should have the necessary DLLs registered (I have not validated this method yet; I'll check it out this evening unless you beat me to it).

Answer 2

After using the codec packs I'm not able to run the Windows DVD Maker on Windows 8. I think it due to not any support of MPEG-2 codecs in Windows 8 for Windows DVD Maker.

So if you want to use the simple tool as like Windows DVD Maker then I think you should have to give a try DVDStyler which is a free one.

Feature are listed on official site are:

create and burn DVD video with interactive menus
design your own DVD menu or select one from the list of ready to use menu templates v1.8.0
create photo slideshow
add multiple subtitle and audio tracks
support of AVI, MOV, MP4, MPEG, OGG, WMV and other file formats
support of MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX, Xvid, MP2, MP3, AC-3 and other audio and video formats
support of multi-core processor
use MPEG and VOB files without reencoding
put files with different audio/video format on one DVD (support of titleset)
user-friendly interface with support of drag & drop
flexible menu creation on the basis of scalable vector graphic
import of image file for background
place buttons, text, images and other graphic objects anywhere on the menu screen
change the font/color and other parameters of buttons and graphic objects
scale any button or graphic object
copy any menu object or whole menu
customize navigation using DVD scripting

It has a very simple user interface which will let you choose easily what you want.

Here you can set a menu for your DVD playback. You can change interface settings under Configuration>Settings.

You can set the properties for the DVD under DVD>options...

You can set here Disc label, Video Quality, aspect ratio, audio format etc.

You can save a project to burn it later and then open it under File menu. You have different option to add the DVD under DVD>add menu

File
File as chapter Titles from DVD
Menu
vmMenu
Tileset

Edit: After a lots of Googling I found myself helpless to run the Windows DVD Maker. And I reached on a conclusion that Microsoft has withdrawn the support of MPEG-2 encoders without media center. Now question arises why third party codec doesn't work?

Reason according to me: If third party encoder/decoder will support the media feature of Microsoft is providing then who will buy the media center. VLC and other third party players have inbuilt encoder/decoder to run the files. So Microsoft is making a mess with this thing. You have to live with it until someone don't find the hack for this.