Set default MKV size in DVDfab for a 4.37GB DVD disc?

[iamkatpeeler]

Ok, I have been using dvdfab to rip my BR's to around a 5g MKV which I keep on my external HD's for backup...and Im happy with this. BUT recently I was going to try to burn my backed up BR to a blank dvd which is a single layer 4.7G. So I tried to "redo" my BR movie to make it smaller..BUT when I ran my MKV thu tsmuxer to output AVCHD it grew in size and was still to big for the disk.

So my question is, does anyone suggest what size I need to have as a default on DVDFab so when I open the MKV up it will still fit a 4.7g blank dvd??....Thanx

[redwudz]

iamkatpeeler, As per our rules, I changed your title to be more descriptive of your subject.

A DVD-5 is actually 4.37GB, not 4.7GB. Just to clarify, you want to create a BD>AVCHD for playback on a Blu-ray player using a DVD-5 disc?

Not sure how to do that with DVDfab. I use RipBot and it does have presets for AVCHD and DVD-5 discs. I convert my BDs to MKVs of about 7.9GB, sized to fit on dual layer DVD media. Squeezing them down to 4.37GB will lose quite a bit of the quality. But to each his own.

One of our members that uses DVDfab should have some better suggestions.

[fritzi93]

1) You'd be better off using DVDFab to copy to hard drive only. Then use BDRB (or one of the many other programs that use X264 Encoder, e.g. RipBot) to re-encode and output to MKV. The quality is better, but suit yourself.

2) There's more authoring "overhead" required for AVCHD (BD files on a DVDR) than for MKV. It's on the order of 260 MB. I just repackaged an AVCHD to MKV to refresh my memory. In addition, you should stay away from the edge of the disc in the interest of reliability, so add a little more overhead, say 125 MB at least.

3) You'll need to set a custom output size to be sure your MKVs can be remuxed later to AVCHD and fit to a single-layer disc. A target size of 4,300,000,000 bytes or less would be about right. Just so there's no confusion because of how bytes are calculated (1024 bytes is a KB), you'd enter a custom output size of about 4,100 MB, or 4.0 GB.

Good luck.

[hech54]

Ok, I have been using dvdfab to rip my BR's to around a 5g MKV which I keep on my external HD's for backup...and Im happy with this. BUT recently I was going to try to burn my backed up BR to a blank dvd which is a single layer 4.7G. So I tried to "redo" my BR movie to make it smaller..BUT when I ran my MKV thu tsmuxer to output AVCHD it grew in size and was still to big for the disk.

So my question is, does anyone suggest what size I need to have as a default on DVDFab so when I open the MKV up it will still fit a 4.7g blank dvd??....Thanx

I have a feeling this is going to be yet another "It Doesn't Work Like That" thread. Just burning something to a DVD does not make it a DVD that is playable in a DVD player.

[iamkatpeeler]

1) You'd be better off using DVDFab to copy to hard drive only. Then use BDRB (or one of the many other programs that use X264 Encoder, e.g. RipBot) to re-encode and output to MKV. The quality is better, but suit yourself.

Didnt realize the quality would be better. Even for a small rip?? I have used BDRB before but how is this better than letting DVDFab do it all??
2) There's more authoring "overhead" required for AVCHD (BD files on a DVDR) than for MKV. It's on the order of 260 MB. I just repackaged an AVCHD to MKV to refresh my memory. In addition, you should stay away from the edge of the disc in the interest of reliability, so add a little more overhead, say 125 MB at least.


I want some "breathing room" thanx.

3) You'll need to set a custom output size to be sure your MKVs can be remuxed later to AVCHD and fit to a single-layer disc. A target size of 4,300,000,000 bytes or less would be about right. Just so there's no confusion because of how bytes are calculated (1024 bytes is a KB), you'd enter a custom output size of about 4,100 MB, or 4.0 GB.

This answers my question...Thanx

Good luck.

Thank your for changing my thread name, I dont know what I was thinking.

What I am trying to accomplish is backing up my BR collection and shrinking them to save space on a HTPC/Media server for the house. And 4g's isnt that bad of video quality. Its a little better than your average HD channel on a Sat provider. I would like to find ONE video container that works well with a HTPC and can be burned on a blank DVD that a average BR player can recognize. I chose AVCHD but if anyone can suggest a better one I will give it a try.....

[fritzi93]

If what you want is AVCHD, just copy the Blu-Ray to hard drive with DVDFab and run BDRB with size set to BD5, standard output, therefore you'd be certain your AVCHD will fit to disc. Then at any time you could repackage the AVCHD to MKV with HDConvertToX or whatever, making sure in settings that it copies all streams without re-encoding. Putting the streams in an MKV container doesn't take long if you don't re-encode the streams. That would save you all the calculations.

But if you want to use DVDFab first to re-encode to MKV, then proceed as above.

Good luck.

[iamkatpeeler]

I would like to keep using DVDFab....Its simple and it seems to encode pretty quick for me. When I was using MAKEMKV + BDRebuilder I was getting out of sync audio or getting the wrong audo track or now audio at all....Pretty much wasting my time....I just hate to using two different programs or steps to do what I want to do but it seems I dont have a choice in the matter.....I need to stop and see what all containers a "Popcornhour", standard BR player and a PS3 recognizes and find one that will do it all and go with that...I know it sounds confusing

[fritzi93]

I'd be willing to bet that the problem was with MakeMKV. (Just tried the current version a couple days ago and got out-of-sync audio).

For widest compatibility on Blu-ray players and the PS3, your best option is BD25, then AVCHD. Anyway, DBDFab's re-encoding is a lot better than it used to be, not equal to X264 encoder, but if that's what you want to use...