Problem with DVDs from US.

[ZikO]

Hi

I bought a second series of LOST in a charity shop. It turned out the DVDs were issued in US and are restricted to Region 1 as well as DVDs are encoded in NTSC.

DVD Decrypter did the job but was utterly slow. DVD Shrink did not make it and asked me for a region change which I did not want to do. I eventually ended up using free version of DVDFab which has done good job.

Now I have fully ripped DVDs on HDD. I checked VOBs by VLC Media PLayer and they seem to be OK. I tried to convert every episode to x264 using MeGUI but I stuck in the middle. First, I used the File Indexer to generate d2v files. MeGUI did not report any problems at this stage and completed the job. However, when I tried to upload such a d2v file to AVS Script Generator, it crashed every time. I also tried to created d2v files using original DGIndex application but it doesn't render full movie. It cut an end of a movie by roughly 20%.

Any idea what else I can do? I have never had any such problem but I've never had to rip and convert Region 1, NTSC DVDs.

Thanks

[theewizard]

you have them ripped to the HHD
have you tried using vobtompeg (maybe use shrink first to get JUST the main movie from the ripped movie folder)
to join them to make one file
which you can then load into avs2dvd to create a PAL dvd

you don't want to recode to x264 if your going to use AVS to create DVDs

if you want MP4 files Dfab will do that directly, from the ripped folders, in h264 coding

[hech54]

Yes....re-rip them (or run them through DVDFab or DVDShrink again) to take Main Movie Only.....also removing any extra languages and subtitles that you don't need.

[ZikO]

Hi.

OK. Everything seems to work but I had to use DVDFab with MainMovie option and extract each episode separately into its own folder. Doing so for a couple of DVDs is a little bit tedious job but it's working. There is another option Customize but it is not for free.

A couple of things I noted.
. DVDShrink asks for region change for an internal drive when there is a region mismatch.
. DVDSrink somehow corrupted VOBs previously ripped by DVDFab (full mode) when I tried to re-rip / re-author DVDs from a folder to a folder to extract multiple episodes at once. I did not know I could actually use MainMovie option in DVDFab.

One suggestion regarding the DVDFab
. When using DVDFab to extract multiple episodes, one of its default options is to eject DVD after job is done. This is annoying because every time the job is finished, you have to insert DVD again and DVDFab starts to analyse the same disc again and again. To avoid it, I suggest to go to Common settings -> Read and tick "Do not eject source disc when task finishes" and extracting will become smooth

Thanks

[hech54]

A couple of things I noted.
. DVDShrink asks for region change for an internal drive when there is a region mismatch.
. DVDSrink somehow corrupted VOBs previously ripped by DVDFab (full mode) when I tried to re-rip / re-author DVDs from a folder to a folder to extract multiple episodes at once. I did not know I could actually use MainMovie option in DVDFab.

DVDShrink died in 2004. What do you expect?

[theewizard]

Shrink and dFab pass key, will copy the main movie off of almost any DVD, even the newest release
But it was not designed to batch copy and separate episodes on a series disc
So that becomes a DIY manual operation
It is still in my arsenal of ripping tools

[usually_quiet]

MakeMKV is another free DVD decrypter. It should be able to copy each individual episode to its own MKV file. If you are not a fan of MPEG-2 video in an MKV container, you can always convert them to something else.

[ZikO]

A couple of things I noted.
. DVDShrink asks for region change for an internal drive when there is a region mismatch.
. DVDSrink somehow corrupted VOBs previously ripped by DVDFab (full mode) when I tried to re-rip / re-author DVDs from a folder to a folder to extract multiple episodes at once. I did not know I could actually use MainMovie option in DVDFab.

DVDShrink died in 2004. What do you expect?

LOST 2nd series was issued in 2005 so I can understand DVDSrink would not hadnle it

I'll stick to DVDFab. So far so good, it has not disappointed me Just a question. Is DVDFab Passkey free to use or do I need to purchase it? Also how does it work because I did not have to buy anything and have already managed to rip DVDs.

Thanks

[Kerry56]

DVDFab comes with a free trial period. It should work for 30 days I believe, then you should still have access to the free section called DVDFab HD Decrypter, which will decrypt and rip movies, but will not compress them or convert to other formats. The free section lags behind on newer decryption updates, so it will not work well with many new releases.

DVDFab Passkey is not a free program, but it too comes with a trial period. There is a free version called Passkey Lite. It also lags on encryption updates.

Personally, I'd recommend MakeMKV over either of the free versions of Fab, but only if you can use MKV files instead of DVD-video. If you were ripping Blu-ray, it is possible to rip them with MakeMKV and keep the movie in Blu-ray format using the Backup mode.