# iMac, iMovie, and iDVD: iCan't Hear My Movie **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 23, 2006, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/imac-imovie-and-idvd-icant-hear-my-movie/353806 "2006-04-23T00:03:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2006, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/imac-imovie-and-idvd-icant-hear-my-movie/353806/1 "2006-04-23T00:03:34Z")
I’m making a movie on my [iMac](http://www.apple.com/imac/), using iMovie and iDVD. When I burn a DVD, the sound gets all screwed up and distorted; I have to turn the TV way, way down for it to be at a manageable volume, and the sound is all garbled. The sound is fine in iMovie playback, and the volume settings are at the same level that I use for playing music in iTunes. To be more specific: It sounds as if the audio has been turned way up, re-recorded, and then turned back down; high and low tones have static around the edges, and in general it sounds really shoddy. I can hear it, but it’s far from the quality I hear in playback in iMovie. I’ve run into this problem with discs burned on other Macs as well. I did a search for older threads and found [this one](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=140529) from 2002, in which **Cartooniverse** said: > [@Cartooniverse](#): > > The audio sounds as though it’s garbled. Almost an underwater sound. You can discern most words but even clearly well modulated words have a garbled edge to them. Music is badly garbled. That’s a pretty good description of the problem I’m running into; unfortunately, the link provided by **NurseCarmen** in that thread appears to have been changed or something, as it just goes to the GQ main page now. I’ve tried Google and looked through the Apple support forums, but haven’t found a specific discussion of this issue; I’ll try there if no one here can help. Suggestions? ---
**Author:** ![xiix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/d6d6ee/32.png) [@xiix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xiix)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2006, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/imac-imovie-and-idvd-icant-hear-my-movie/353806/2 "2006-04-23T12:09:09Z")
with a thread title so brilliant, so one just hasta come along and give this guy a hand? alternatively, the [appleinsider.com](http://appleinsider.com) genius bar can solve most problems lickity-split. ---
**Author:** ![TPRg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@TPRg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TPRg)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2006, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/imac-imovie-and-idvd-icant-hear-my-movie/353806/3 "2006-04-23T16:57:04Z")
Does this problem continue even when you play the DVD on your imac? If not, it _could_ be your DVD player doesn’t like recorded DVDs. Recordable discs have a lower luminescence, and some older DVD players have trouble streaming data off them. If the problem persists on your imac… Gosh, it’s been a while since I’ve used iDVD, but it could be that you’re authoring your movies in imovie with an unacceptably high audio mix, and during the mpeg encoding process, the audio is automatically lowered to a level that won’t distort and damage your home theater speakers. That’s just a guess, since I’m not even sure if IDVD will do that, but that definitely would result with sound you’re describing. ---
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2006, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/imac-imovie-and-idvd-icant-hear-my-movie/353806/4 "2006-04-24T02:32:49Z")
> [@TPRg](#): > > Does this problem continue even when you play the DVD on your imac? If not, it _could_ be your DVD player doesn’t like recorded DVDs. :smack: Good call; having now tried it around the house, I see that the DVD plays fine on our other DVD player, my iMac, my laptop, and my wife’s laptop. Apparently, only that specific player is choking on it. Very curious. The DVD player on which it doesn’t work is a two-year-old Sony, while the player on which it _does_ work is a five-year-old Sony. I hope it plays properly on the players of the evaluating committees of the festivals I’m sending it to. Re. the audio mix in iDVD, I can’t find any setting along those lines that I could change. In iMovie, the sound on most clips is at the “normal” level, which is about 70% volume. None are set higher than that; only when fading out a sound clip did I lower it below that. Thanks for the suggestions, **TPRg**.