Direct Show input --> MPEG output --> aspect ratio

[Quaoar]

I have been using VLC 0.7.0 under Windows ME to accept "direct show" input (television) and display it on my laptop. This works perfectly. If I write the input stream to disc as either MPEG1 or MPEG2 this works very well. The files play back on VLC with good quality.

However I have the impression that VLC does not define all the header fields in the MPEG container. For example the bit rate field seems to show zero, though this does not matter. What does matter is that the aspect ratio field appears to be either undefined or incorrect. In full screen mode other media players see an aspect ration of 1:1 when they play back MPEG files I have generated using VLC (I am recording 4:3 input).

Have I failed to set something up correctly or is this a "feature" of the current VLC release?