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  1. Member
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    Hi all,

    I'm a total newb in regards to working with video files and it was difficult to make the subject line for this post to be specific enough.

    First I'll say what I'm trying to do for context, then I'll describe my problem. I'm ripping DVD TV episodes and movies to my HD so I can play around with cutting out clips to use in my own little clip shows and music shows for my own amusement. I've been reading a lot online and playing around with lots of different software programs as a beginner to find the quickest and easiest way to do this.

    What was working was using DVDFab HD Decrypter 4 to rip the DVD .vob files to my computer. After messing around with file conversions and bemoaning how agonizingly long it took, I tried a tip I read and simply made a copy of the .vob file on my HD and renamed the extension to .mpg. Then I could use a basic .mpg editor (MPG-VCR was working great for this) to cut out the clips I wanted to save as .mpg files. Once I had these smaller .mpg clip files I was able to load them into Windows Movie Maker for storyboard type editing and making into movie files. (The large renamed .mpg files wouldn't load directly into WMM.)

    The idea is basically to build a library of clips from movies and TV episodes that I can play around with to create my own little shows. Then I'd just delete the full files from my HD to save space. The above method was working great...except for...

    The problem I have run into is that when an episode is ripped to my HD, the final .vob file is behaving oddly. For one episode it was the second .vob file and for a couple of them three .vob files were created, the last ones being quite small, maybe 3-4 minutes of video. (These are generally 43-44 minute episodes.)

    When I try to load the final file (no matter if it's 2nd or 3rd) into any editor I get problems. In MPG-VCR it appears to load, but then it's just a split second of video, probably just one frame. If I try loading the .mpg file into something like VideoReDo or Windows Movie Maker I get a message about the file being corrupted or having out of sync time stamps. However, the episode will play in full by clicking on the .vob file and viewing in Windows Media Player, so the info has to be intact.

    So what's the problem and how can I fix it? (Trying a different ripping program didn't help, nor did using a background decrypter and just copying the file to my HD.) Does it have to do with "cheating" and not converting the files and simply renaming them to .mpg? If so, why do all the other .vob files in the rip work except the last one?

    Hopefully I've explained all this well enough. I'm just trying to do all this as cheaply and quickly as possible and having to learn all this stuff from scratch has been daunting! Thanks for any help!

    RD

    p.s. I ran across mention of MPG-Corrector and tried that, but it didn't help.
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  2. I'm a MEGA Super Moderator Baldrick's Avatar
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    You can use vob2mpg to join up splitted vobs from a dvd.
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  3. aBigMeanie aedipuss's Avatar
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    you can't get away with what you are doing if there is more than one vob. a vob is not the same as an mpg especially if episodes span more than one vob or have multiple audio tracks or subs. try it the longer way and take the time to do it right. use dvdfab to rip movie only to the hard drive. use something like dvdshrink to re-author it to video and one audio track only. use vob2mpeg to convert the vobs to one mpeg. that way all the time stamps and I-frames should stay correct and you should be able to cut out the parts you want.
    --
    "a lot of people are better dead" - prisoner KSC2-303
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  4. Member
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    Thanks for the quick replies. I tried using VOB2MPG but something is wrong. I downloaded the program, and it automatically downloaded the .net framework 2 or whatever it was I needed. But when I try to run VOB2MPG it doesn't open, instead that windows message comes up that the program has encountered a problem and needs to shut down. I've downloaded the file from two different places and uninstalled and reinstalled it a few times, but same thing every time. Any ideas?

    RD
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  5. Mod Neophyte Super Moderator redwudz's Avatar
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    It should work. Did you reboot after installing .net? Then after installing VOB2MPG, go to your 'Start>Programs>BadgerIT>VOB2MPG' then click on the program in the folder to launch. Your DVD needs to be decrypted and you need to save the output to a different folder or drive. Alternately, you can use DVD Decrypter to extract the MPEGs, but VOB2MPG is a lot easier.

    EDIT: Several other reasons not to rename VOBs to MPEGs. They can have multiple audio tracks, several subtitles, menu info and other 'stuff' in the VOB container. You can have a real mess if you don't use the proper tools to extract what you want. I can picture the MPEG ending up with the directors audio track in French with Spanish subtitles.

    You might want to take a look at 'WHAT IS' DVD to the upper left on this page for the DVD specification, format and structure.

    And welcome to our forums.
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  6. Member
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    Well I seem to be stuck. At first I thought I'd been an idiot and had forgotten to reboot my computer after installing the .net thingy and that was gonna be the obvious answer after reading that comment. I uninstalled VOB2MPG, rebooted, and installed again. Still no go. I still get that program has encountered a problem and needs to shut down message when I try to open it. So no clue what's wrong there.

    In the comments section for VOB2MPG I saw mention of VOBMerge so downloaded that and gave it a try. I used it to merge the two .vob files ripped from the DVD. But when I load the merged file into the editor all I get is a couple seconds of black screen, rather than the 2 GB of video the file supposedly contains. (The editor can load and edit .vob files, so it isn't even an issue of renaming a .vob file to .mpg.)

    The ripper I'm using appears to be able to rip without all the extra audio tracks and subtitles, etc. At least I chose those options and the .vob file I don't have any trouble with was easy to make clips from that were perfectly fine. So at least in my testing I didn't run into a director's commentary in Spanish being spoken over the video portion.

    Any more ideas from the fabulous minds out there? I hate being stuck when I feel like I'm almost at the end!

    RD
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    Progress! Looks like maybe the editor I was using was partly at fault. I just downloaded and tried Mpg2Cut2 and while it reported a problem with missing the first GOP header (whatever that is! heh) in the second .vob file that was ripped for the episode, it gave the option to jump forward to a better starting point. I was able to make a couple good test clips and import them into WMM. Loading the merged file (from VOBMerge) also worked.

    Mpg2Cut2 isn't pretty to work with, but does what I want it to. The annoying thing is the audio is out of sync with the video when playing in the editor, but it's matched up fine in the clips themselves.

    Thanks to everyone who provided help on this. I'm sure I still have a ways to go and will eventually get better tools, but at least I'm at a point now where I can actually start doing what I set out to do instead of spending all my time testing things!

    RD
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  8. Member
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    I had the same difficulty with VOB2MPG last week. Apparently a problem with .NET Framework 2.0 was responsible, though I don't know exactly what that problem was, or what caused it.

    I uninstalled .NET Framework 2.0 with Add/Remove Programs in the Control Panel, then re-installed from a fresh download and rebooted, and VOB2MPG was OK again. A few days later, I received an update (.NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1) from Microsoft, which you might also want. I tested to make sure that VOB2MPG is still OK with the update installed.
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