DVDFab continuously letting me down

[bereid]

Greetings,

I frequently rip DVD and BD media to ISO files, and then convert them to MKV, with H264 compression, for storage on my server, and subsequent streaming to my media player(s).

AnyDVD does a flawless job of extracting the desired info (from both DVD & BD), and producing ISO image files (Well done SlySoft!) For converting/compressing the ISO, and saving the result to an MKV file, I would like to be able to depend on DVDFab, since I purchased lifetime licenses for both their DVD and BD rippers, and because when DVDFab works, it is very fast, and produces good results. BUT, with each new version of the software, something that didn't work properly in the previous version, may or may not work in the new version, and more disturbingly, things that worked properly in the previous version are FREQUENTLY broken in the new version. I'm not sure what sort of testing is being done before software updates are released, but their process is pitifully flawed.

When DVDFab fails me while trying to convert DVDs, I routinely fall back to Handbrake, which is very reliable, and produces good results, but is MUCH slower than DVDFab, and thus not an optimal solution for my purposes.

What's worse is that when DVDFab lets me down with a BD conversion, the only fallback solution I have been aware of is MakeMKV, which does no compression, and therefore produces MKV files that are unacceptably large for my purposes.

I would really appreciate any suggestions for software that can do as good a job as DVDFab's DVD/BD rippers, but is robust and reliable, which DVDFab absolutely is not.

Thank you very much for any advice!

[Kerry56]

Try VidCoder. It is basically a different gui for Handbrake and the X264 encoder. When making an mkv, go to the Video tab and change the Preset to Very Fast and see if this fits your expectations on both quality and speed.

[bereid]

Thank you for the VidCoder tip; I will check it out. But I haven't had success using Handbrake to convert ISOs ripped from BDs (only from DVDs). I recall trying once, after being led to think it was possible, but I had no success. Do you know if Handbrake can do this, and if so, can you provide any tips?

Thanks again

[Noahtuck]

I used to be a big fan of DVDFab, but they lost me quite sometime ago.

Anyways, DVDFab is a good ripper, end of story.

Do you want fast or do you want good ?
It is kind of like asking, I want a car that will do 8 seconds in the quarter mile but I want it to get 50mpg city......

Handbrake is what I have always used.
You can either rip to a folder structure instead of an ISO or image, I usually either rip to a folder structure or extract the contents of the ISO then use handbrake.

You might be able to mount the ISO you ripped then use handbrake to convert from that.

But I haven't had success using Handbrake to convert ISOs ripped from BDs (only from DVDs)

And I did not know handbrake could convert from a DVD ISO ?!?!
I see no where on my version that allows you to open an ISO, regardless if it is a DVD or BLURAY.....

[Kerry56]

Thank you for the VidCoder tip; I will check it out. But I haven't had success using Handbrake to convert ISOs ripped from BDs (only from DVDs). I recall trying once, after being led to think it was possible, but I had no success. Do you know if Handbrake can do this, and if so, can you provide any tips?

Thanks again

Sorry, I didn't get into enough specifics when working with ISO files. I have always mounted ISO files when working with them in the past. I used Slysoft's free program, called Virtual Clone Drive. Lately I just rip as files.

But a mounted ISO will work just fine as input into Handbrake or VidCoder.

[bereid]

Hello Noahtuck,

Here is how I use Handbrake to convert a DVD .iso file to MKV: I launch Handbrake, select the 'high profile' preset, then select the MKV output type. Then, using the Windows Explorer, I drag the .iso file to the Handbrake window, then choose any custom options, such as video quality, output file path, etc., and then start encoding.

That process seems to break down if the .iso file was ripped from a BD rather than a DVD.

[Steve(MS)]

bereid, generally speaking, ISO files are unfriendly to processing if they aren't mounted.