Is the best quality video from VOBs?

[benvid]

I understand that a VOB is Mpeg2, so it's already compressed, but isn't it as close as you can get to the original? If you compress it again to AVI or whatever, aren't you losing quality?

So far, I haven't been impressed with anything other than the original VOBs. I've used xVid to compress to AVI and set it to 1gb and 2gb, but these newly compressed files don't look half as good as the VOBs played as Mpegs.

My goal is to back up my DVDs to HD and run them from the HD via USB, and even if I keep the files as VOBs, I can still fit about 100 DVDs on a 500GB drive. I'm thinking that it will be best not to convert them to some other file format or recompress them with xVid or Divx or anything.

Am I straight in my thinking, or am I mistaken about compression quality?

[manono]

Hi-

Am I straight in my thinking, or am I mistaken about compression quality?

Well, yes and no. If you know what you're doing an XviD can look darned close to the original DVD. By this I mean no resize (let the player do it later), low average quant, a high quality custom quantisation matrix, and maybe a few other things. And the same thing can be achieved with an X.264 for a somewhat smaller file size. But then you'll have to do some serious work, and you won't save all that much space as compared to the size of the original DVDs. So, since you have a large drive on which to store the movies, the best quality for next to no work is to leave them alone and just transfer the DVDs to the hard drive.

[jagabo]

The exception would be when there's something wrong with the DVD. If it has a color cast or a bad black level you can fix it while converting to Xvid and wind up with a video that looks better than the source DVD. I do this occasionally.

[Seeker47]

. . . and you won't save all that much space as compared to the size of the original DVDs. So, since you have a large drive on which to store the movies, the best quality for next to no work is to leave them alone and just transfer the DVDs to the hard drive.

Since I have zero interest in watching video (that is any longer than brief clips) on my phone -- or even on a decent size computer monitor -- and since, as you say, hefty storage is plentiful these days, I have always failed to perceive the value of DIVX, XVID, and the like. I don't know enough about h.264, but tend to think it would fall into the same category, even if the quality per size is indeed much better. Unless you have a demonstrated need to squeeze half a season's worth of 30-minute episodes onto one DVD5, I just don't get it. As far as I'm concerned, the VOBs will do just fine.

[benvid]

What about playback of multiple VOBs? Do I still need to combine them all into one VOB to get continuous playback? I'm using the Philips dvp-5992 from Costco and its USB port.

I've played with the CombiMovie utility that stitches them together - I wonder if it makes a difference.

[poisondeathray]

If you rip the DVD properly, it should still have the DVD structure intact (with menus etc...). You can then play it back with any number of DVD playback software normally.

For more information on DVD structure there is a "What is DVD" link in the upper left hand corner

[benvid]

I want to play it back using the new Philips DVD player, so I won't be using any software - not on a computer anyway.

If I stitch together the VOBs, I run into another problem - that the file will be larger than 4GB, which is over the fat32 format limit. The DVD player can only read from fat32 formatted drives.

I'll fool around with it tonight. Hopefully, it can play back multiple VOBs without a noticeable transition.

I also ran into the 32GB limitation when formatting the 500GB with fat32. I used fat32format DOS utility to get around that.

[bendixG15]

If you're in the video editing game, then you dump fat32 for NTFS and say good-bye to file size limitations.

[benvid]

I wish I could. The DVD Player only reads Fat32. I think the last time I formatted a drive for Fat32 was some time in the last century.

[usually_quiet]

If I stitch together the VOBs, I run into another problem - that the file will be larger than 4GB, which is over the fat32 format limit. The DVD player can only read from fat32 formatted drives.

I don't know whether the DVD player you have can read a proper DVD structure using the USB connection, but assuming it can, I would suggest that you don't stitch them together. Leave them as they are. Just rip the DVD's movie-related VOB's to a folder along with its menus and IFO's. The files sizes for IFO's and still menus are tiny compared to the movie/program VOB's. You don't save much room by deleting them, and they contain useful information for playback. If you happen to have some large motion menus, just rip the movie as a menu-less DVD, which I believe some rippers will allow you to do. If yours does not, I think DVD Shrink can be used to create one from a previously ripped DVD.

[redwudz]

I hate to differ with other posters, but using FAT32 and USB drives to a set top player seems to me the perfect place for Xvid/Divx. Sure it's a PITA to do the conversion and it takes a fair bit of time, but if your player works with them, you have a much more 'tidy' setup, just click and play.

High quality is another matter. But I will suffer with a bit of quality loss in exchange for the convenience and the quantity of video I can get with a bit lower quality. I even admit to watching 700MB Xvids at times.