Does anyone else do dvd backups just for fun?

[j123vt_99]

i just got a dvdr and find myself backing up a bunch of movies even though i will probably never watch them... i used to do this with vcds.. get all kinds of crazy title, back them up, make sure they were good copies, but never actually sit down and watch them... is it just me?

[indolikaa]

Hell no. The amount of material I've recorded off television that I'll probably never watch is staggering.

I have so much fun editing and authoring the stuff, I forget the purpose of the whole project is to watch it. I just author, burn, file, and move on to the next project.

[pacmania_2001]

You've reached breaking point.

It happened to a friend of mine when he first got cable internet. He would download any movie he could get his hand on just for the sake of downloading it even if it had like Barbara Streisand in it.

Very sad indeed.

[j123vt_99]

nice to know i'm not alone

[reboot]

Started with VCD. Went through at least 3 of those bulk 50 packs. Spent more on jewel cases than cdr's.
On to SVCD, same scenario. Collection of "backed up" videos grows exponentially.
3 weeks with a dvd burner has now doubled that and counting!
A rough guess would be 250 movies. Some on 2, 3, and even 4 disks (LOTR, Pirates of the Carribean Collectors).
Edit, Author, Burn, in a neverending cycle.
I've watched maybe 15

[Cobra]

I used convert the same movie several times to find the correct balance between encoding time and quality. I prefer quality over anything else, which is why it was fairly hard.

Got it now, and I converted all my DVDs to DivX using the knowledge I gained from doing this one movie over and over, and burned the resulting files to a stack of DVD-Rs to take to uni with me. Compact and it doesn't matter if it gets stolen! That saves on insurance, too.

Cobra

[indolikaa]

Started with VCD. Went through at least 3 of those bulk 50 packs. Spent more on jewel cases than cdr's.
On to SVCD, same scenario. Collection of "backed up" videos grows exponentially.
3 weeks with a dvd burner has now doubled that and counting!
A rough guess would be 250 movies. Some on 2, 3, and even 4 disks (LOTR, Pirates of the Carribean Collectors).
Edit, Author, Burn, in a neverending cycle.
I've watched maybe 15

I feel your pain.


Anybody here ever tried to author the original Star Wars trilogy in as many formats as you can think of?

Or how about six different burns of a movie, and the only difference is the artwork you printed on the disc?

And how about building a stunning solid-wood media center, finished with a colonial cherry stain, spending a few hundred dollars and many evenings to hold the hundreds of VCDs you'll probably never watch?

[curryman]

Oh, this all sounds so familiar.
trying to get that quality / time equation is what led me here.
now I never have anytime to do backups because i'm allways bloody talking to you lot.

[indolikaa]

That's another side effect of this hobby, isn't it?

[888888]

i just got a dvdr and find myself backing up a bunch of movies even though i will probably never watch them... i used to do this with vcds.. get all kinds of crazy title, back them up, make sure they were good copies, but never actually sit down and watch them... is it just me?

That is my life story. I am addicted to seeing that little bar go from left to right and finally to 100%. Burned successfully, ah nice.

I hate watching movies but I like burning them. TV is another matter.

[northcat_8]

Yea, I use to backup DVDs. But I don't have a very large collection. So it didn't take long to backup them up.

Now I just go rent them and pirate DVDs. It's a much wider selection at Blockbuster than what I would ever "buy" on my own.

I've even started a little side business, called Red Wing Rips, you can download the ripped ISOs from our server or you can rent the pirated DVD from me.

I'm kidding of course...(maybe, :P )...I know what you mean. I use to backup DVDs and while it was still new to me and challenging I kept doing it. I would say I probably made 10-12 backups and then the skill was mastered (at least good enough for me) and I moved on to more challenging things...actually that's a lie...I found the OT forum, enrolled in Dr. Khan's Newbie class and the rest of the story you probably already know.

[BobV]

Please excuse the question but I must ask: Females sometimes have uncontrolable urgers to reproduce.. if so where are you in your cycle?

[northcat_8]

I have constant PMS, I don't ever cycle...as for where I am in her cycle, well face first and tounge deep....usually.

[flaninacupboard]

WILL THAT SMILIE NEVER DIE!?!?!

They come in the door, and they're ripped before i even watch them. i was contemplating building a video serverm but then started counting the gigs. ouch. 40 something gigs per TV series. adds up quick if you want B5, TNG, DS9, TOS, and SG1!

[indolikaa]

WILL THAT SMILIE NEVER DIE!?!?!

They come in the door, and they're ripped before i even watch them. i was contemplating building a video serverm but then started counting the gigs. ouch. 40 something gigs per TV series. adds up quick if you want B5, TNG, DS9, TOS, and SG1!

Money should NEVER stand between a man and his hobby.

[Capmaster]

WILL THAT SMILIE NEVER DIE!?!?!

They come in the door, and they're ripped before i even watch them. i was contemplating building a video serverm but then started counting the gigs. ouch. 40 something gigs per TV series. adds up quick if you want B5, TNG, DS9, TOS, and SG1!

The infamous "red grin". Here's another one for ya northie:

[flaninacupboard]

well considering i don't have a DVD player money is an issue right now. it'll be better next year, my loan is paid of fin november, should get a pay raise around april, and i'm just setting up a PC business on the side. hey, i could be using my OT hours to make money, right? after all, with no friends and only one hobby that i can't practice because i'm skint it makes sense.

i can dream about it and lay it out in my head though. TC by the TV with 100mbit line to the server in the attic. the TC will be controlled by a 12" touchscreen by the sofa. an AMD geode at 6watss will be nice and quiet, and if i boot of a flash card the system will be silent. sweet. so then i just need a PCI VGA card with DVI output and a TV with DVI input. that'll expensive. then of course i need to work out what media player and stuff i'll use - it should be quite an adventure! I want to install a system in my car (again, next year) but have some bits for that laying around.

Oh, and i want to go to I21 in August, which by the time ive got my ticket and food and a place to stay and fuel it's gonna cost the best part of £200.

To give you an idea I earn £630 a month.

[j123vt_99]

if you started a side business, how would one get access to it?

Yea, I use to backup DVDs. But I don't have a very large collection. So it didn't take long to backup them up.

Now I just go rent them and pirate DVDs. It's a much wider selection at Blockbuster than what I would ever "buy" on my own.

I've even started a little side business, called Red Wing Rips, you can download the ripped ISOs from our server or you can rent the pirated DVD from me.

I'm kidding of course...(maybe, :P )...I know what you mean. I use to backup DVDs and while it was still new to me and challenging I kept doing it. I would say I probably made 10-12 backups and then the skill was mastered (at least good enough for me) and I moved on to more challenging things...actually that's a lie...I found the OT forum, enrolled in Dr. Khan's Newbie class and the rest of the story you probably already know.

[northcat_8]

if you started a side business, how would one get access to it?

Yea, I use to backup DVDs. But I don't have a very large collection. So it didn't take long to backup them up.

Now I just go rent them and pirate DVDs. It's a much wider selection at Blockbuster than what I would ever "buy" on my own.

I've even started a little side business, called Red Wing Rips, you can download the ripped ISOs from our server or you can rent the pirated DVD from me.

I'm kidding of course...(maybe, :P )...I know what you mean. I use to backup DVDs and while it was still new to me and challenging I kept doing it. I would say I probably made 10-12 backups and then the skill was mastered (at least good enough for me) and I moved on to more challenging things...actually that's a lie...I found the OT forum, enrolled in Dr. Khan's Newbie class and the rest of the story you probably already know.

It's called sarcasm. I don't pirate DVDs or download music...I have much more efficient means of wasting my time.
Be gone with ye...newbie freebie troller.

[indolikaa]

AARRGGHH!! Matey.

[flaninacupboard]

Yarr!

[pyrohydra]

For fun?!

Absolutely.

Although not exactly DVD backups. I take shows off of my Tivo, cut out commercials, author, and burn. I must have at least 500 hours of recorded material on DVD-R that I haven't watched yet.

[SatStorm]

I have only few commercial DVDs to backup myself. Most of them, are cartoons and Music DVDs, I bought through internet the last 2 years.

I have a DVD player capable to play VCD and SVCD, since early 1999. I use it exclusivelly to watch my xVCDs / xSVCDs, I made myself from DVB transmissions. Mostly music videos

When I was a kid and all my post teen years, I use to work parallel to whatever I was doing as a DJ. When I first saw a VCD, somewhere in 1993, I thought: "What wonderfull would be to mix videos same way I mix the records" (I didn't use CDs, only vinyl records). After the army and my amazing Pentium 2 @ 233Mhz in summer 1998, I tried my first VCDs from material I use to capture with a Hauppauge winTV Cinema... An ISA card...
You don't know how it is to wait 4 hours for a 6 min VCD clip....

Anyway, in 2000, I was able to mix my VCDs with 2 DVD standalones and a self made mixing console. My dream became true.
But the disaster was just right in the corner: I found out this site...

Today, I have countless CVDs and DVDs, full of music videos and cartoons. Porn too. Do I watch them? Some of them yes. But most of them no: I have them only for archival reasons.

Testing and finding the correct setup for the perfect picture, is also a challenge. I really like the time I load those filters on Virtualdub to "cook" the perfect result. After all, encoding is not anymore the point: I "master" that years ago. Now the challenge is how to proccess video.

I'm sure the next step gonna be artistic: How to create my own video megamix for example, like MTV Europe use to do between 1998 and 1999. Advance DVD authoring also, is something I always like to do. You know, authoring that needs more than half of your disc for the effects etc...

The funny thing is that I don't back up DVDs. This activity, which is the basic reason of this hobby for most enthusiasts, is something I do only rarelly. Maybe because I don't watch much movies, maybe because I can receive and watch too many satellite movie channels (and PPV movie services), I never had the need to do it. If I switch on my DVB receiver, more than 60 movie channels, half of them PPV, are waiting for watching.

But I have to admit, that when I burn DVD-Rs with music videos, there are times I don't even test them on the standalone if they work. Stuff I have only to say that I have them, are untouched since the day I burn them.
There are things I gonna see only when I'll convert my CVDs to DVD-Rs, that's for sure. When this gonna happen? Soon I think, after all, unfortunatelly for me, most of my CD-Rs from 2000 - 2001 are Princo. And you know what this means...

[Cobra]

Has anyone ever watched the first ever VCD you ever made, and compared it to the most recent ones you did?

I did Jurassic Park III (yes, I know...) into VCD. It was blurry, blocky and had the "mosquito effect" all over it. I had to use a combination of a Mac and a PC to produce it, and I used to have to go from DVD --> DivX --> VCD since .d2v --> VCD seemed to yield really messed up video.

I also remember the transition from VCD to SVCD. What a difference! I honed my methods for both formats down as far as I could, even VCDs looked good to my friends.

It was only a few months ago I got my DVD burner, and two months ago I produced my first DVD. I'm still learning...

So, what were your first efforts like?

Cobra

[flaninacupboard]

awful. i let TMPGenc resample and encode the audio. i didn't know what aspect ratios were really all about (consequently my VCD's are anamorphic) my burning software wrote VCDs in mode 1 so i only got 700megs a disc, i used to encode a whole movie and then try and split in a good place - Basically, they sucked.

even my first DVD's were lame - backups were ok but TV caps had funny colours, horrible menus (i now don't bother. once a DVD has finished i want the disc to stop, and the player to turn itself off. i often watch stuff as im falling asleep so don't want the disc spinning all night long) multiplexing errors (had to encode in "chunks" and then merge them) etc etc etc.

Better now with my DVB receiver

[Doramius]

I think the next biggest hit from the TV networks will be a half hour show of watching a burn progress bar on different computer systems to see if it'll freeze up, not make it to 100%, or end up a big winner showing 'burn successful'. That show would draw in the ratings like J-Lo doing kegle exercises with marbles.

[flaninacupboard]

half hour? i've got a one speed dual layer burner! mine's feature length!!

Can you imagine the commentary

"welcome back ken"
"welcome back bruce"
"so, ken, tell us what happened during the break?"
"well bruce......"

[gitreel]

Hell yeah. 8)

[Doramius]

half hour? i've got a one speed dual layer burner! mine's feature length!!

Can you imagine the commentary

"welcome back ken"
"welcome back bruce"
"so, ken, tell us what happened during the break?"
"well bruce......"

"well bruce, we made it up to 50% and the screen froze for a moment. It might affect the outcome of his burn. But wait, He's just received the BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH! This totally throws him out of the finals, if he can't restart and work to get a good playable burn on a 8x or a 12x speed media and burner."
"Yes, Ken this may have a lasting affect on his authoring in the future. When will they ever learn to turn off their screen savers and anti-virus software when doing a burn?"

LOL

[dxj40c]

I "backed up" a lot of stuff during the learning process, but I wouldn't call it fun.
I love designing labels, so I have to restrain myself from printing on blanks. Is that crazy or what?