DVD -> XSVCD (by TMPGEnc) - what tools do I need?

[DRP]

I'm very new to DVD. I've only just bought my first DVD-ROM drive and I want to rip DVD movies and convert them to XSVCD for playing in my DVD player connected to my TV through the VCR without the Macrovision copy-protection hassles.

I'm very experienced with converting downloaded AVIs to XSVCD using TMPGEnc, so this part is not a problem. I have managed to flash my new DVD drive to remove the region protection and I've installed DVD Decrypter to do the ripping. This all works fine. Now what should I use to put the VOB files I get from DVD Decrypter into TMPGEnc to do the normal XSVCD encoding that I'm already very familiar with?

I would like to keep things as simple as possible with as few tools required as possible. I've tried DVDx following a guide on doom9, but it crashes everytime I load the IFO file of the movie into it so I can't follow the guide to completion.

I really want to use TMPGEnc for the conversion to XSVCD because I'm familiar with how it's settings work and I understand it quite well now.

Any help offered in this regard would be greatly appreciated

[Tommyknocker]

Use Virtual Dub mod to frameserve your VOBs into TMPGEnc.

[DRP]

I think I've found what I need in the shape of DVD2AVI. It sounds like just what I was looking for in being able to read VOB files and serve them to TMPGEnc for encoding.

Another question now though. I have used DVD2AVI to extract the audio tracks from the VOBs and I've got two files. One is AC3 and the other is DTS. The AC3 is half the filesize of the DTS. Which one do I want? Given that I'm making an XSVCD, obviously I am going to be converting to MP2 eventually anyway. So which one would be better to do the conversion from quality wise - AC3 or DTS?

Thanks.

[scottb721]

In DVD2AVI under Audio/Output Method , choose Decode to WAV instead.
This will give you a wave file of the audio that you simply load into TMPGE along with the d2v (video) file.

Others may be against it but I have found this method quite acceptable and very easy. Try it yourself.

[DRP]

In DVD2AVI under Audio/Output Method , choose Decode to WAV instead.
This will give you a wave file of the audio that you simply load into TMPGE along with the d2v (video) file.

Others may be against it but I have found this method quite acceptable and very easy. Try it yourself.

Thanks for your suggestion but I like GoldWave for doing the audio. It has a very nice little tool for maximising the volume to just below the point of clipping which I find very useful since every DVD I've ever come across so far has *incredibly* soft sound. Why is that? Why do they make DVDs with volume levels so low that you need to turn your amp up to a level where the amp noise actually becomes audible? It kinda defeats the point of having a supposedly superior format I woulda thought if you have to introduce a ton of EM noise just so you can hear it.

I haven't ripped a DVD yet where the audio couldn't take at least a 10dB increase in the volume without clipping.

Anyway, the GoldWave issue decided which audio track I used in the end. GW won't take a DTS file as input, but it will the AC3. AC3 it is then.

[DRP]

DVDDecrypter - DVD2AVI- TMPGEnc - VCDEasy (chapters) - NERO

This is pretty well exactly the procedure I use, except that more often than not I leave out the VCDEasy stage because my DVD player doesn't support chapters in SVCD and 9 times out of 10 I make SVCD rather than VCD.