Hey guys. I have few general "easy-to-answer" questions. Thanks i

[AirForceElite]

Hello Video Help forum. I am not a newbie to forums, I post on many other forums under this username, but this is my first post here. Nice to join such an awesome community websites.

Anyways, now to my issue.
In the past few months, I completely stopped playing video games, and now I am want to familiarize myself with the world of movies/videos/dvd/ripping/copying/encoding/etc.

1) I have a big collection of DVD movies. I never needed to back them up because in my family, nobody scratches the disks, so they are pretty much stored in a safe place. However, I will soon be buying a laptop that I plan to take with me to all places int he world, wether be it the airplanes, or some remote villages in God forgotten country, or on vacation in hotel, I want to have access to my movies at all times. Now, you probably would tell me to just make a copy of the DVD and just store it onb my computer's hard drive, and mount the image of the movie file every time I watch to watch. Good advice, but assuming that eachmovie is anywhere from 4.5GB to as big as 9GB, I can't really fit many movies in my future laptop's hard drive which will be eithwr 120 or 160GB. Or maybe you would tell me to just rip the DVD and make .AVI/divx m
ovie out of it, which essentially is anywhere from 600 to 900MB in size which is very manageable. The problem with this ripping is that AVI/Divx bugs me because I can notice the difference between DVD and .avi movie of it, and it bothers me to lose so much quality, especially in fact moving scenes where i can clearly see the pixelated sqaures.

So with that said above, would would you guys say is the best way of doing something that I want (keeping the file size as small as possible, while still retaining original video quality, or at least close to it.) Keep in mind that I don't care about the extra scenes of the DVD, or extra stuff that they usually fit the DVD's with. Like I said, I only want good video quality from original DVD, without extra stuff.

2) Using DVD to AVI/Divx ripping software, is it possible to keep quality near identical to DVD? I know most people try to keep it under 750MB for the purpose of burning it to CD, but I have no need for that because most my files will be on laptop Hard Drive, and i can go way over the "average" 750MB to achieve what I am looking for.

3) When downloading subtitles for .AVI movies, how do people know which one is correct one?
For example, I have .avi movie that has introduction clip in the begining of the actual movie. And when I download a subtitles, they will think that the promotional clip is the actual movie, so in essence, the subtitles will come out earlier than the audio will be? So how do you guys know which file is right for you, when there is tons of subtitles files for same movie, and tons of .avi movies with different file sizes/durations?

thanks a lot!

[Marvingj]

Try a Portable hardrive, also try anydvd.

[jagabo]

When you convert to Divx/Xvid AVI you don't have to reduce the files to CD size. I usually use VirtualDubMod and Xvid or Divx in Constant Quantizer mode. I pick the quality (quantizer) I want and encode in a single pass. The AVI file comes out to whatever size is necessary to maintain that quality. I typically get between 1 and 2 GB per movie at the quality levels I prefer.

If you want even smaller files you can use an MPEG 4 part 10 codec (aka AVC, h.264, x264). These can typically get the same quality as Xvid/Divx (MPEG 2 part 2) at about half the size. Encoding is slower and decoding takes more horsepower (you'll get less battery life out of your laptop).

[AirForceElite]

Try a Portable hardrive, also try anydvd.

well portable hard drive still doesn't solve my problem though.
first of all, it costs money, especially for the one with a lot of storage.
and second of all, i would need a lot of hard drives to store my movies into.
lets say, assuming that each DVD is 6GB in size on average, a 100GB portable hard drive would fit in it approximately 16 DVD's. Not to mention portable hard drives take space, and it is issue when travelling/airports, especially with the security that it is now.

And I looked up on Anydvd..what does descamble mean?

AnyDVD is a driver, which descrambles DVD-Movies and BluRay, HD DVD Movies automatically in the background. This DVD appears unprotected and region code free for all applications and the Windows operating system as well.

[jagabo]

The MPEG2 data on commercial DVDs is encrypted to prevent it being copied. Or more properly, to keep the files from being any use when copied off the DVD. AnyDVD (and DVD Decrypter, DVD Fab Decrypter) decrypt the DVD so you can do whatever you want with the files.

[AirForceElite]

The MPEG2 data on commercial DVDs is encrypted to prevent it being copied. Or more properly, to keep the files from being any use when copied off the DVD. AnyDVD (and DVD Decrypter, DVD Fab Decrypter) decrypt the DVD so you can do whatever you want with the files.

Hmmm...weird

How was I able to copy Borat DVD the other day?
I just pop'ed it in, and used DVD Shrink suggested by a friend and it copied it to hard drive, and that is it. And file plays back fine...so was it luck or something?

[jagabo]

DVD Shrink includes the decrypting code.

[jimmalenko]

Use AutoGK to do your DVD to XVID conversion.

You say that 4.5 - 9GB is wayyy too big, yet you don't get the quality at 750MB. Plus there's a 2GB file size limit on AVIs. This leaves you with a relatively small window to play with. AutoGK has presets for 896, 1120 or 1493MB (amongst others), which should give you pretty good quality whilst keeping the filesize low. And you can squeeze that little bit more bitrate out by using VBR MP3 for your audio.

As Marvingj suggested, portable hard drives are exceptionally cheap and can quickly add 320GB or more to any PC, not just your laptop.

[AirForceElite]

Use AutoGK to do your DVD to XVID conversion.

You say that 4.5 - 9GB is wayyy too big, yet you don't get the quality at 750MB. Plus there's a 2GB file size limit on AVIs. This leaves you with a relatively small window to play with. AutoGK has presets for 896, 1120 or 1493MB (amongst others), which should give you pretty good quality whilst keeping the filesize low. And you can squeeze that little bit more bitrate out by using VBR MP3 for your audio.

As Marvingj suggested, portable hard drives are exceptionally cheap and can quickly add 320GB or more to any PC, not just your laptop.

Well thank you jimmalenko.
Yes indeed 4.6+ GB is way to much for what I want to carry
and ~700MB leaves me with bad quality.

I will try AutoGK and play around its settings.
I will first encode the movie to make it 700MB size, and 1.5GB in size, and play them side by side on the exact same spot to see if there is any difference I can notice.
If i can't notice anything, I guess I will just stick to conventional 700MB size files, and live with pixels.

Can anyone answer 3rd question please?

[Cornucopia]

As was mentioned (but stuck in the middle and may not have been noticed), try a file encoded with h.264 (aka AVC). You should be able to get same quality as Xvid/DivX with 2/3 to 1/2 filesizes, or conversely get better quality with same filesizes as Xvid/DivX.

Only BIG downside is the extra encoding time (as h.264 is the most computer intensive).

Similarly for audio, try AAC-HC or some other hi-efficiency audio codec.

Scott

[jagabo]

Also, turn on the deblocking functions of Xvid/Divx for playback.

[AirForceElite]

Also, turn on the deblocking functions of Xvid/Divx for playback.

umm when do I have to do it?
when ripping from dvd or when playing on laptop? and where do i turn it on?

[jagabo]

Turn on the deblocking filter when playing Divx/Xvid videos.

Start -> All Programs -> Xvid -> Configure Decoder

Sgart -> All Programs -> Divx -> Divx Codec -> Decoder Configuration Utility

[AirForceElite]

Hey guys, while I am on this topic, I have another question.

When I use DVD Shrink to get rid of unwanted features and retain original quality at decent sizes (which is exactly what I want) what happens when:

(a) I get rid of a feature...such as movie preview for another film, and then later play on regular home DVD and choose to play that feature that I got rid of? Does the player tell me that it's notaccessible, or does it freeze? what happens?

(b) Is it possibly to not reduce video quality when using DVD Shrink? i can't remember exactly, since i only used it once, but is there a setting that i can adjust so that it doesn't touch video qiality at all, and just gets rid of the features?

(c) What is the difference between these, and is there any point in keeping 5.1 channel audio, if i plan to play this video on notebook speakers or headset. its 300MB i could save by not selecting it:

[jimmalenko]

Depends on how you get rid of them. The "crude" way is to use reauthor mode which means you lose your menus. The more elegant way is to replace the feature(s) with a still image, and keep your menus. However I seem to recall a discussion here about a caveat with that method too in relation to the still image playing for the same time as the replaced feature, and that VOBBlanker worked out to be a better tool to do that, but I'm pretty hazy on the specifics of it.

It really depends on the lengths you want to go to though - with DVDRemake you could even delete the button that points to the replaced feature so that it is not even selectable in the first place.

[rkr1958]

The more elegant way is to replace the feature(s) with a still image, and keep your menus. However I seem to recall a discussion here about a caveat with that method too in relation to the still image playing for the same time as the replaced feature, and that VOBBlanker worked out to be a better tool to do that, but I'm pretty hazy on the specifics of it.

Your memory is correct, if you replace a title (e.g., an extra) with a still image in DVDShrink then that title, which is now a still image with no audio, will have a playing time that's the same length as the original title. If you want to keep your original menus (as jimmalenko suggested), I'd recommend using VOBBlanker to blank out those titles (e.g., extras) that you don't want.

If you don't want to keep the menus then you can use DVDShrink in reauthor mode, to pull out and author a DVD with no menus. You can also select the languages and subtitles you wish to keep. Subtitles are small so keeping them doesn't take up much space. However, if you wish to reduce space then removing all but one or two of the languages can free up needed space for the video.

[Squash]

@AirForceElite:

About question (c) above, you currently have the entire disc selected, so the window on the right is showing all of the audio tracks on the disc.

If you open the "Main Movie" section and click on "Title 1", the right window will change to reflect the tracks on the main movie only. You can listen to each track individually by pressing the play button in the lower left window, then right clicking on the video as it plays. A menu will pop up. If you mouse over the "Audio" entry, another menu will pop up listing each available track. Click on each to hear it and decide which you want to keep.

I'm guessing that the 20MB Unspecified audio track is probably in the Extras, maybe the audio to some music videos, given the nature of the DVD. But I'm probably wrong.

Before you throw away the 5.1, make sure that the remaining 2-ch track is actually the same audio. It may be a 2nd commentary track, unlabelled as such. I found this out the hard way. Don't let it happen to you.

[AirForceElite]

I don't want to make a new thread because of this, so i'll just ask here.

Why does DVDShrink not let you just remove some things completely?

I know i can totally remove features in Re-Author mode, but if i do that, it also lose the nice looking menus and stuff...and DVD plays right from the begining as if it was some .avi file.
So basically i have 2 choises: either re-author it and get rid of useless features but also lose nice looking menus...or use Full Back up mode and keep all the DVD menus and all that stuff without being able to remove extra videos/languages. Basically, I want to keep DVD "structure" ...as in the main menu, the subtitle menu, scene selection

Is there any way I can remove some of the features (extra languages, extra videos, etc) but still keeping the DVD structure (such as scene selections, language selections, animations, and all that stuff)

[jimmalenko]

Extra languages, yes. Just untick them.

For extra videos, I'd suggest you look at VOBBlanker.

[Ruut]

When converting from DVD to AVI I normally use AutoGK: set Custom filesize to 10 MB for each minute, asuming the sound will be converted to MP3; for full AC-3 add about 20% to the filesize.
That way I'm getting results which cannot be distinguised from the original.

Please also note that according to the AutoGK-guide the DVD needs to be decrypted by DVD-decrypter: there you can choose which stream(s) you want converted: no need to use DVD shrink.

[AirForceElite]

by the way, i abandoned the idea of DVD to AVI completly

i decided to just use DVD shrink and make DVD9 to DVD5 and burn the movie that way.

-I don't have to worry about file size...since I will not be carrying it on portable hard drive
-I don't have to convert each .avi i want to play it on standalone non-divx player, that many of my friends/relatives still have
-I can keep the extra features i want, such as subtitles, extra languages

I don't know why I didn't think of this option before...its the best one for me. Especially since I have a DVD burner that I have yet to use...so this will be a good addition.

[Ruut]

Yes, agreed: that's a simple solution, BUT I'm not sure if you'll be happy with the result.....

Anyway: Good luck!

[AirForceElite]

Yes, agreed: that's a simple solution, BUT I'm not sure if you'll be happy with the result.....

Anyway: Good luck!

why not?

DVD9 movie shrinked to fit in DVD5 disk, the quality loss i noticed is much smaller as opposed to DVD to highest quality .AVI movie.

DVD9-->DVD5 = i can almost not tell the difference
DVD9--->AVI = i see lot of pixels, especially in close up shots, and when camera is moving it gets really bad.

[SingSing]

As was mentioned (but stuck in the middle and may not have been noticed), try a file encoded with h.264 (aka AVC). You should be able to get same quality as Xvid/DivX with 2/3 to 1/2 filesizes, or conversely get better quality with same filesizes as Xvid/DivX.
Scott

Is there a freeware encode that we can tried ?

[Cornucopia]

MeGUI w/ x.264 codec, probably SUPER also.
You also probably want to have MP4Box/YAMB.

Scott