Pinnacle InstantCopy 8 still one of the best?

[HeadRusch]

I visited a friends house who had tried to make a backup of one of his movies using some of the freeware tools (dunno whic one) of a DVD9 movie. After the first few minutes I saw plenty of macroblocking.

I suggested he look into InstantCopy by Pinnacle, because I remember that it was considered one of the best. Sure you had to buy it, but it seemed a small price to pay.

Now that I've read the forums a bit, I can see that alot of people advocate some other tools.....is Pinnacle still considered to be one of the best? He has a decent sized RPTV, and while I think Pinnacle can be very slow, I also recall that it produces some of the best results. Is this still true today?

[nufan292]

Well one of the reasons most people advocate DVDshrink over programs such as Instant Copy 8, is that its free, which makes a big difference to some.

[stiltman]

I visited a friends house who had tried to make a backup of one of his movies using some of the freeware tools (dunno whic one) of a DVD9 movie. After the first few minutes I saw plenty of macroblocking.

I suggested he look into InstantCopy by Pinnacle, because I remember that it was considered one of the best. Sure you had to buy it, but it seemed a small price to pay.

Now that I've read the forums a bit, I can see that alot of people advocate some other tools.....is Pinnacle still considered to be one of the best? He has a decent sized RPTV, and while I think Pinnacle can be very slow, I also recall that it produces some of the best results. Is this still true today?

I used to use it exclusively. Then I went to DVDRebuilder, it takes a lot longer, but I feel it gives better results.

If I were to use a transcoder now, I would use the new DVDShrink. In side by side tests (ddlooping) the new version of shrink came out slightly better than IC8. The new version is also faster than IC8

[Gurm]

DVD Shrink 3.2 ought to at least give IC8 a run for its money, if not come out a little better. But yes, prior to that IC8 was pretty much the best. Longer processing time, but better transcoding.

- Gurm

[HeadRusch]

You bring up an interesting point: Better is a subjective term.

For example, when my friend backed-up his dvd I saw lots of macroblocking in dark backgrounds. I pointed them out and suggested "Thats bad, you don't want that, you need better tools". Hence I suggested IC8.....because its the only tool I'd ever read about that consistantly did an excellent job on whatever you threw at it, particularly if you just backing up the movie and a single soundstream...but even with whole-disc backups......it was known to do an excellent job. Downside, it was $50 bucks and was slow.

Once we did a head-to-head comparison between a backup of Die another Day and my original, and simply couldn't tell the difference (movie-only backup with only 1 DD stream, not a full disc backup). Now Die another Day was a big movie.....I mean, the movie alone was in the neighborhood of 6.5gigs I think....and the backup IC8 made was indistinguishable from my original.......that was kinda freaky.

I was just curious if there was anything out there that did a significantly better job than IC8. Does DVDShrink pull out better visuals...?? Anyone ever do a screenshot comparison?? Is DVDRebuilder in a "whole nother league" or is it just a marginal improvement.

And lastly...are these improvements only noticible when you're blowing up a screenshot a dozen times, ie: the kind of stuff that gets completely lost when you're 8 feet back and watching the movie in real-time.......???
Thx!

[fritzi93]

Your last question is one of those hardy perennials, mow it down and it comes back again and again. :P You'll probably get the usual answers, e.g. depends on how much compression, size of TV, etc.

As to whether DVDRebuilder is better, yes it is. If you use it in CCE or QuEnc mode, that is. It's the difference between transcoding and re-encoding. If you use Rejig mode, well, that's just another transcoder, although a competent one.

I did a fair bit of testing before going to DVDRebuilder, so here are my opinions: IC8 doesn't have any noticeable advantage over DVDShrink until you get below, oh, say 75-80%. DVDShrink softens the picture ever so slightly, which can be a good thing. Rejig does not, and doesn't look as good at that level of compression. Quenc does better, but it's a little too sharp as well. CCE mode is definitely the best.

I still have DVDShrink, but have uninstalled IC, as it offers no advantage anymore and is too damn slow. JMHO

[Gurm]

As I said, IC offered much better results at compression ratios over 15%. (i.e.75-80% of the original for example). However, DVD Shrink has recently been reworked to provide similarly good results, so...

As for Rebuilder - when used with CCE it's an all-in-one RE-ENCODER, which means yes, a whole other level of quality.

- Gurm

[HeadRusch]

Yeesh....ok. So is this a fair statement: If the majority of your backups are in the greater-than-75% range, meaning you're not losing a ton of information, IC8 is still a viable transcoding solution....assuming you already own it. Moving to DVD Shrink would be more of a lateral move than a step in either direction (better or worse).

However, a move to Rebuilder and CCE, is a significantly better solution? I was checking out the old comparison of superbit titles versus standard non-superbit DVD's...where the screenshot comparisons were done. Is it a similar comparison along those lines between transcoding versus re-encoding? ie: re-encoding provides more of the originals detail versus transcoding which can often soften those minute-details due to reducing the bitrate....???

Q: Rebuilder, how long are we talking? 4, 5, 6 hours?

[Gurm]

Oh my machine (Athlon Mobile running at 2.2Ghz... so that's what, like a 3000+ or something?) it takes roughly 3 hours to do a disc. Expect 4 or more and be pleasantly surprised if it takes less.

As for the Superbit comparison... no.

Re-encoding CAN give you better results, because you can reduce the overall bitrate instead of just playing with the transform data.

HOWEVER, no program is going to make 50% re-encodes look GOOD, unless you're willing to drop resolutions. I learned that the hard way. I said to myself...

"This SVCD of Finding Nemo is two discs. That's 1400MB. It looks just fine. Why is it that given 3000MB of a 4400MB disc, MORE than double that amount, the CCE re-encode of Finding Nemo looks like crap?"

The answer is that at full resolution, lowering the bitrate 40% is just a BAD idea. That said, you CAN run multiple passes to smooth things out, but...

- Gurm

[HeadRusch]

Yeah, I understand what you mean talking about dropping bitrates and the like...the superbit vs regular comparison was just referenced to imply "Law of diminishing returns".

ie: To most people, showing them a superbit title versus a regular title (assuming the regular title wasn't a total dogsh*t encode in the first place), most people wont be able to tell the difference.

I was wondering if the implications between using IC8 with a 20% reduction (ie: IC8 showing 80% before transcoding) versus re-encoding with DVDRebuilder would be a similar situation. Most people wont notice the difference, unless you paused the screen and said "see this tiny blotch up in the upper left hand corner of the scene? See how in this version is less of a blotch??"...etc, etc.

[Gurm]

Depends. Many of us can tell what 20% transcoding looks like compared to a re-encode.

- Gurm