Yeah, sorry I didnt address your audio comment. I meant to say in my previous post that I deleted the audio tracks to try and isolate the issue and still, with the vid track only, I had the render problem, so I doubt it was just audio.
I’m trying exactly what you said and ripping the dvd from streamclip instead of handbrake. fingers crossed outcome — we’ll know in a couple min. Didn’t go straight to prores tho — exporting to DV-NTSC. I’ll try prores if this doesnt work.