BATCH conversion AutoGK and Fairuse Wizard

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

ok so i been doing a lot of research and playing around with 3 different programs that everyone on the net suggested. AVI.net, Fairuse Wizard and of course AutoGK.

doing episodic dvds.

AVI.net - i dont like so lets drop this program from the picture.

Im using DVDFab to rip into ISO for Fairuse Wizard. This program is very easy to use and i love the batch converting.

however, i seem to like the quality of AutoGK but heres my problem. i can't batch convert with AGK; I have to rip with dvd decrypter for the sound to sync plus i have to rip each episode.

Can someone shed some light on how to rip and convert in batch with AutoGK?

I've searched and searched but no help. just found out that there is a script for dvd decrypter but no one showed how to do it.
when i select a certain PGC in AGK it does the whole dvd.

i know i should be greatful for the coders and free software, but it would be great if AutoGK and Fairuse Wizard had a baby haha. because it would be nice if AutoGK can read ISO files and can batch each episode. fairuse also have a built in calculator that shows the the bitrate

Baldrick · Administrator Joined: 09 Aug 2000 Location: Sweden

Tried http://forum.videohelp.com/topic349758.html ?

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

thanks for the reply but for that batch program, cant i just add it to the job queue?

i still have to rip individual episodes to individual folders..

for fairuse wizard.. i just pick ISO, select 3 episodes according to time length and hit next. So easy, but for some reason i see more BOXes (pixels) jumping around compaired to AGK.. maybe AGK resolution is bigger?? im playing with that now to see if that helps..

stiltman · Hi Ladies Joined: 10 Jul 2003 Location: Studio 54

You can do it with Handbrake, but it can't see ISO files. Mount the ISO with one of the many virtual DVD programs or extract the ISOs

I also think Handbrake is faster and does a better job than FUW
_________________
tgpo famous MAC commercial, You be the judge?

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

heard about handbrake too, gonna give it a shot.. loving the GUI and open source already. thanks stiltman.. gonna compair

txporter · Member Joined: 27 Jan 2009 Location: United States

Handbrake is nearing it next release point and when the new version comes out it will no longer support AVI output. As it is now, 0.9.3 Handbrake AVI is very basic. Handbrake IS excellent for episodic DVDs but it's main schtick is x264. If you are ok with .mp4 files (H.264/x264) then Handbrake is the converter for you. If you want to stick with AVI, you could try XVID4PSP. I use XVID4PSP 5.036 still to convert episodic DVDs with captions rather than subs (Handbrakes doesn't handle .srt or captions yet....next version). XVID4PSP has more of a learning curve than Handbrake, but it is a great program. I am also starting to experiment with HDConvertToX which should also be able to do what you want.

edit: I rip everything to VIDEO_TS folders not ISO. Handbrake doesn't work with ISO like stiltman mentioned and I don't think XVID4PSP or HDC do either.

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

so i tried handbrake with x264.. fast but dont seem as good as Xvid for DVDs.. i heard they do a great job for HD tho. i guess it good for the speed tho. Still doing some comparing against AutoGK. Fairuse has now been drop from my list. hahah

Gonna try out xvid4psp and see how that goes. So far i like handbrake tho, but gonna stick with AutoGk quality til further notice.

why is handbrake taking out AVI support? thats weak..

txporter, let me know how HDCnverToX works out

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

so i compared handbrake and AutoGK, same size resolution, and file size.

handbrake with 160 was worst than AutoGK at 128. Not to metion, picture quility and AutoGK was better..

We just need AutoGK to do batch more like handbrake. So i dont have to use DVD Decrypter for each episode. Just load ISO or DVD folder and pick the episode, load to queue and encode..

stiltman · Hi Ladies Joined: 10 Jul 2003 Location: Studio 54

txporter · Member Joined: 27 Jan 2009 Location: United States

Umm...what exactly did you compare? There are tons of options from x264 encoding. Are you talking about xvid encoding? What do you mean by 160 and 128? Files size in MB or bitrate in kbps? There is a learning curve to encoding with x264, but it is more efficient encoder. Basically, at lower bitrates you can get better quality with x264 than with XVID. If you encode at higher bitrates, you will not notices as much difference between them (or no difference).

Personally, I don't really care if you use x264 or XVID to encode your material. Use whatever you like. But I have no idea how you tried to encode your videos in Handbrake. Don't throw it away on the basis of one sample of encoding. MANY MANY people use x264 as their default encoder now....and not because it is worse than XVID.

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

well thats why im here.. thanks for the suggestions.. im just here to learn.. when i said 160 and 128 it was for the mp3 audio.. mybad for not being clear.

when i did x264 i used MKV containter. does it matter?

wat i was tryin to say was. i encoded one with AGK and i just basically took teh same resolution and input it into handbrake (372x384).

AGK came out with 128 for mp3 and handbrake i chose 160.

what i dont get is why is AGK better in picture and sound?

XVID from AGK seems best as for quility to file size (350mb) ratio for me.

stiltman · Hi Ladies Joined: 10 Jul 2003 Location: Studio 54

What is your goal?
File size?
Quality?
Is this for computer playback on a smaller screen or TV playback on a larger screen?

Personally, I care more about quality than file size. So I keep the video the same size as the original (ie. 720x480) and I keep the same audio stream. Set constant quality to what I think is best, and let it encode. If it takes a 7gb original to 2gb, fine. If it takes a 7gb original to 4gb, that's fine too.

Disclaimer:
What I find to be the best settings in no way means they are the best settings for you or anyone else.
_________________
tgpo famous MAC commercial, You be the judge?

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

my goal is to see what program does the best job in quality to file size ratio.

its just driving me nuts because one program would out perform the other and vis versa depending on the episode. I'm guessing because of video length and different resolution.

i can now see why u do a constant quality. For a while i was doing that with FUW, keeping everything close to 900kbits i believe

stiltman · Hi Ladies Joined: 10 Jul 2003 Location: Studio 54

Constant Quality doesn't have a set bitrate, thus not a set file size.
Constant Quality will ditermine the best birate for the fie being processed, thus giving a certain bitrate and file size.

To me, FUW and handbrake output almost the same exact quality given they are both setup the same. I like handbrake more because I think it's faster. Plus, I do not tweak the image size (ie. 720x480 to 702x384) So handbrake fits my needs.

Best thing to do, take some test clips and encode them both the with same settings in your apps. Then look at the results. Then tweak your settings until the trade off of quality matches what you want in file size.
_________________
tgpo famous MAC commercial, You be the judge?

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

thanks for the replies, this really helped me a lot.. didnt really play much with that xvid4psp yet either.

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

another question, does the container matter make a difference?

so i went back and played with handbrake a little more.
i chose avi container with h264 codec this time. 2pass with turbo first pass.

The time of conversion compared to AutoGK was ridiculously faster. The quility at a pause handbrake's h264 beat AGK's Xvid. When they're playing it seems like theres more pixels jumping around with h264 and i noticed horizontal lines on fast moving objects.

stiltman · Hi Ladies Joined: 10 Jul 2003 Location: Studio 54

avi vs mkv
http://www.matroska.org/technical/guides/faq/index.html
For me, it makes no difference (yet). I use mkv with my new h.264 encodes, so I know my avi files were encoded with h.263 (Xvid)

Forgive me if I wrong, but if you're using 2pass encoding, your setting bitrate or file size. If you're seeing stuff in your encodes that you do like, you will need to increase the bitrate or file size. This is another reason to use constant quality.
_________________
tgpo famous MAC commercial, You be the judge?

BR4INsick · Member Joined: 04 Nov 2009 Location: United States

yea, i did some more research, i guess it doesnt matter what container it is for my case since its lower quality with stereo mp3. MKV can hold more for surround sound and such from what i've read.

the only thing i dont like about handbrake is that it doesnt choose the best resolution according to file size like AGK. im mainly sticking with 672x384 resolution.

i did another test and for some reason i like the turbo first pass vid better, i guess it deblocks the quility just a bit and faster when encoding.

I think i will start using MKV container for h264 codec and AVI for Xvid so that i know the difference. Just incase i want to seperate my AVI Xvids for some standalone players.

thanks for the replies, before i made this thread i was mainly stuck on Xvids and AVI files. Now i've learned about x264 codecs and more about MKV containers.

* i do care for what file size they are in.