Yet Another Product Recommendation Needed....

[Diggit2001]

Hello there. I recently got a D-Link DSM-520 media player that allows me to hook up my TV (a 52" DLP) to my home network and stream stuff from my PC to it. What I want to do now is rip my DVD collection to the hard drive of my PC so I can watch whatever I want without having to mess with the DVDs. I have done this with my entire CD collection and needless to say, it was a lot easier than ripping video. I have messed with a few products so far and have experienced several "oddities" like audio/video sync issues, aspect ratio changes and incomplete rips for whatever reason. I was out Googling for more information when I happened upon this website. I am hoping that one of you experts can recommend a product to me that will accomplish what I am trying to do.

Quality is very important to me and I would rather buy a bigger hard drive than watch crummy video. I have no problem paying for a product as long as it does a consistently good job, and as long as the price is reasonable (under a hundred bucks would be nice and under 50 would be even nicer) As far as video formats go, I do not really have a preference, and don't really know enough about them to make an educated guess. On D-Link's website, they mention that this box supports, "WMV9, MPEG 1, MPEG 2, MPEG 4, XviD with MP3, PCM and AVI (MPEG-4 layer only)" As long as the format I rip to plays with this box, I'll be a happy camper. Also, it's very important that the discs aspect ratio remain intact.

If anyone can point me in the right direction, I'd be forever grateful. Thanks in advance for your assistance.

-Chris

[redwudz]

I would pick a codec first. MPEG-4 codecs like Divx or Xvid are popular for small filesize and decent quality. Divx6 can use menus, if that is important. I use FairUse Wizard to rip from DVD and convert to Xvid, about 1500MB file size. These are stored on a video server and output to a video projector. AutoGK is also popular for conversions to Divx or Xvid. There are lots of other codecs, but those two are likely the most commonly used.

There are a few hardware MPEG-4 encoders, and if you had a lot of DVDs to convert, they may be worth looking into.

Or if you want the best quality, rip the DVD complete to the hard drives, but you would end up with a lot of ~7GB files. Optionally, use a program like DVD Shrink and reduce the size to ~4GB and retain the whole DVD.

None of these options cost much, so not a problem there.

But others should have their favorite methods, also.

And welcome to our forums.

[mike909]

Are you playing your videos over a home theatre setup? Reason I ask, is because you will need to keep the audio as is (no conversion). I know some of the variations of mpeg-4 use mp3 audio, but don't think you 'have' to convert it.
Best bet is try Divx/Xvid and see if your satisfied with the quality. The file size will be much smaller...as redwudz said. If you rip the dvd's without pulling out extras/2nd audio tracks etc. your going to have 6-8GB per dvd. Personally Ive found that pulling out everything except main movie and DD5.1 track yields more like 5-6GB per dvd.

[Diggit2001]

Thanks for the welcome, redwudz. I was reading little bits and pieces of stuff about video ripping all over the internet and was all confused until I happened upon this site. There definitely seems to be a lot of knowledgeable members here, so I'm sure I will look no further for future information.

About codecs, menus aren't really important to me so that's not really an issue. I have downloaded Divx stuff before from the web (legal stuff only of course ) and I've always thought the quality was pretty bad. Are these just bad rips or is it really possible to get good quality stuff with Divx?

I'm not sure exactly which codec to choose, so I guess I'll just have to experiment with a few to see which I like best. I was hoping there was a steadfast rule to all this, but I see it's gonna take some time.

I have only 20 or 30 DVDs at the moment, so I can't really justify a new hardware device to do the job.

You mention ripping the complete DVD to the hard drive. How exactly is this done? Which product is the best to accomplish this? Big files sizes are OK if the quality is best. I do already have Alcohol 120% and Nero 7 Ultra, but neither of them seem to rip any copy protected discs.

mike909, I am playing my stuff over a home theater setup. I have all of my components hooked up to my Pioneer receiver with a 5.1 speaker system, so sound quality is extremely important. I will play with Divx and Xvid to see which works best for me.

So, it looks like FairUse Wizard might be the best bet to accomplish the ripping?

Thanks for the help!

-Chris

[redwudz]

I think what I would try first is RipIt4Me>DVD Shrink and then transfer it to your hard drive instead of burning. If you are just backing up the main movie with Shrink, along with the 5.1 sound track you should have what you want. It will be in DVD format, but any software player that accepts that will work, such as PowerDVD or others.

You can also use DVD Fab Decrypter for the initial rip. Both those programs work for the newest encryptions. DVD Shrink will handle 80% or more of existing DVDs by itself without them, so you might try it by itself first. You use the 'Re-author' mode and you should average 80% or better the quality of the original DVD, and 100% the audio quality. Lots of guides for Shrink. This will also be the fastest method. This will give you about 4.4GB files, but you can adjust that in Shrink.

If top quality audio is important, and you are interested in small filesize, you could use Divx or Xvid and preserve the 5.1 audio as mentioned by mike909. I mentioned FairUse because it's easy, but I don't think it will keep your 5.1 audio, though I haven't tried that. It does have a AC3 audio option.

Take a look at AutoGK, it may be able to do that. If not, it may take a little study to find the right method. Encoding to Divx or Xvid is easy enough, but working with the 5.1 audio and adding it back in is a little more complicated.

[Diggit2001]

I'm not worried about being able to play the movie on my computer. I just need to be able to stream it to my TV from the D-Link Media box. File size is not important. If the sound and video quality are DVD-like, I'm OK with a large file.

Man, there sure is a lot to this video ripping stuff. I guess I have a bunch of products to try out still.....

Thanks again for the assistance.

[mike909]

Just took a look at the D-Link product. You will be 'streaming' through wireless correct? If so, keep in mind you may run into bandwidth issues. I hope your wireless network in your house is 802.11G and not 802.11B. The actuall throughput on an 802.11B network is around 6-7Mbps. The Bitrate of a DVD can reach 9, though variable, most times around 7-9Mbps. Actuall throughput on a G network is 24-26Mbps, so shouldn't run into an issue there. Honestly though, with network issues (latency, interference etc.) I would not be surprised if the video stuttered every now and again...if streaming full res. dvd.
Just thought I'd throw that into the equation, since you dont have enough to worry about already.

[Diggit2001]

LOL. Thanks. Actually, I ran a CAT-5e line from the computer room down to the TV room for this purpose. I definitely wouldn't try to stream DVDs over the wireless network.

[Diggit2001]

OK, I have to wonder something. I've been testing a few different programs the last couple of nights, ripping to divx and xvid and trying to figure out which program/codec I like best. Once I do figure out what works for me, am I going to have consistent results on every DVD I rip or might I have to use a different program for other DVDs? This is quite a tedious process, to say the least and I'm just wondering.....

Thanks
-Chris

[redwudz]

Not an easy answer. If you wanted small filesize and best quality, then it would be a lot more work. If a DVD is fast action, it takes more bitrate to encode to a certain quality level. A DVD with very low motion scenes takes a lot less bitrate to look the same. This is true no matter what codec you use, MPEG or Xvid.

But most programs can compensate for most of that. Erring on the high side of the encoding settings will give you a decent quality without fine tuning. But you have to accept larger file sizes. If I use Xvid for an encode of a DVD file, I may let it use a filesize of 1500MB. Most Xvids from the net use 700MB filesize. Larger is better.

But as I mentioned, if you have the room, MPEG would be my first choice. DVD Shrink does a fair job of reducing a 7GB+ video to a 4.3GB DVD video and seems to me the best compromise for the average DVD. Some are bigger and I would not reduce them that much if it would alter the quality too much. If this is the problem, there are other programs that do better at reducing filesize without losing too much quality. But they will take more time.

The other thing to think about is, any time you transcode, such a Shrink does, or encode, such as Xvid or any other format change does, you lose quality. Xvid or other highly compressed formats can look very good. But they won't look as good as the original DVD. Smaller size = reduced quality, no matter which codec you use.

Then the last part of the equation is the time you or your computer would need to spend to do these conversions. If you had 200 DVDs to convert to Xvid, it would take a long time to encode each to a format like Xvid or Divx. If you wanted the very best quality for each, it would take a really long time.

Sorry, not an easy answer.

I settle for a compromise. I use Xvid at 1500MB and I'm happy with the ease of playing what ever I want with a few seconds to load the file. I still have my DVDs if I want the best quality. But I watch most Xivids or other formats on a 5X8 ft projection screen, and I am happy with the results. I have about 1TB of videos archived to my video server at present.

[Diggit2001]

Thanks for the detailed response.

I'm absolutely cool with big file sizes so it sounds like mpeg will be the way to go. Also, once I put in the hours to get the rip method down, I have no problem with how long future rips take. I will just start it before I go to bed or leave for work. It's just taking a butt-load of time right now ripping and re-ripping the same DVD with different products, to different formats and then trying to compare the quality. I am hoping that once I find the best product and the best format, I can make it work with every DVD in my collection so I don't have to go through the whole "testing" process again.

I guess if it were that easy, everyone would do it, right?

[thecoalman]

I'm absolutely cool with big file sizes so it sounds like mpeg will be the way to go.

I don't do a lot of ripping except for the occasional rips from my own DVD's so can't give you specifics but just thought I'd mention that you can rip them as is. Certainly faster (as in faster than real time) with no quality loss, only trouble is you are talking about really large files. Your only concern then is can the product rip it.......

[Diggit2001]

Yeah, I was wondering that. I assume you're referring to just the VOB files? After I ripped the disk with one of the applications, I was left with a bunch of files, including what I understand is the main movie files (VOBs). These are very large and the quality seems great. I guess these are just the raw files, the same as they are on the DVD, just without the copy protection? The D-Link box won't play these buggers so it looks like I will definitely have to rip them to a different format.

Thanks

[yoda313]

Yeah vobs are the actually movie files. You can use converters to transfer them to a different format.

There are programs like dvdx that can rip and convert at the same time - but i don't recommend that since your dvd drive is constantly being accessed. That was only necessary when hard drive space was at a premium. Now with 100's of gbs of space common you can easily rip to the harddrive and then do the processing on the computer afterwards.

You could do something like divx home theater quality. In the divx quality profile you can set portable, standard, and high def quality levels. If file size doesn't matter to you and you just need the files converted to a playable format then you can up the bitrate quite a bit. Something like a 1000 can look really good. Do a test run on a section of a movie and then way the balance of file size and quality to determine what settings you want.

Some here prefer xvid over divx but your dlink player might not like xvid and only play divx.

[thecoalman]

VOB's are just MPEG files with some extra data pertaining to the DVD. Try vob2mpg , i use it on my own discs but it won't work with protected discs. . the tols you are using probably have a way of doing it too...

[redwudz]

You could use the thecoalman's idea, along with DVD Shrink. Reauthor just the main movie and save to the hard drive, then use VOB2MPG to convert to a single ~4GB MPEG file. This will take a lot less time than converting to Xvid or Divx and most of the time, if you don't have to Shrink the main movie, you should have ~90% quality. If you want to reduce the file size to about half of that, then Divx or Xvid would give you similar quality, but they would take a lot more time. Try both methods.

[Timoleon]

Hi Diggit ---

Try using Nero Recode to convert your main movie over to mp4 --- experiment with a "cd size" output (about 700mb) or a "one-third DVD" output (about 1300 to 1500mb). If you have problems streaming this to your TV because of codec issues, take the Nero files and run them through mp4cam2avi (free) to make an avi/divx compatible file.

Nero takes 30 to 60 minutes to do, and the mp4cam2avi takes about 12 additional minutes. The quality is top-notch for the format. The author of Nero Recode is the same fellow who previously did DVD Shrink.

Good Luck!
Tim

[FulciLives]

Use RipIt4Me (which works in conjunction with DVD Decrypter and FixVTS) to get a DVD ripped to your HDD using MOVIE ONLY mode.

Then use autoGK and do a XviD using the original audio and set the TARGET QUALITY (IN PERCENTAGE) to something like 90 and see how that goes for you.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[FulciLives]

I have uploaded a short clip from the NTSC DVD of SUPERMAN RETURNS. This was made using autoGK and is an AVI file using XviD and the original 5.1 AC-3 audio.

I did this so that you can download it and get an idea of what this process will give you quality wise ... also you can test it with your hardware to see if it works A-OK or not.

Here is the link to the download: http://rapidshare.com/files/8699512/SR.AVI
File Name: SR.AVI
File Size: 67.1MB

Please note that the file size of the complete XviD file is about 1.61GB which ain't bad considering the resolution and length of the movie (this movie is 2 hours and 34 minutes) and the 5.1 AC-3 audio.

Remember the original DVD very nearly fills up a Dual Layer DVD (8GB or so).

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

P.S.
Click on the LINK to go to the rapidshare website. In the lower right corner lick on "FREE" which takes you to another webpage where a short countdown begins. When the countdown is done (usually 1 minute give or take) you then enter in the security code you see and then it will allow you to download the file.

rapidshare is a bit convoluted in this way but it is free and allows you to host a single file up to 100MB (actually you can host multiple files for free just so no one file is more than 100MB)

[Diggit2001]

Well first off, I gotta see Superman Returns. Looks like a pretty good movie. Thanks for going through the trouble of uploading it. Quality definitely isn't too shabby at all and it played great on the D-Link box.

I think I have found my preferred tools and stuff for the job. I am using RipIt4Me to rip the DVD to my hard drive and then I am using Nero Recode to rip to to mp4 format. I really like the way Recode lays out the settings and stuff. I was working with AutoGK, but for some reason, the divx file I was left with always had the French, Spanish, English and director commentary audio all playing at the same time. (I was testing with Return of the Jedi). Also, in the beginning of the movie, in the big scrolly intro part, it would run all the way though in English, then Spanish, then French. I'm sure I missed a setting somewhere along the line to not rip all that extra crap, but after spending the time to rip it twice and end up with the same results, I decided to follow Timoleon's advice and just give Recode a try. They really make it easy to change the quality of the rip and it worked like a champ on the first try. I am currently trying to find the perfect balance between file size/quality so there's still a little playing around left to do. The initial rip of ROTJ with RipIt4Me was about 7.2 GB and after ripping that with Recode to about 5 Mbps, it has left me with an mp4 file of about 4.3 GB.

I thank you all for your assistance. Happy Holidays!
-Chris

[FulciLives]

Well first off, I gotta see Superman Returns. Looks like a pretty good movie. Thanks for going through the trouble of uploading it. Quality definitely isn't too shabby at all and it played great on the D-Link box.

I think I have found my preferred tools and stuff for the job. I am using RipIt4Me to rip the DVD to my hard drive and then I am using Nero Recode to rip to to mp4 format. I really like the way Recode lays out the settings and stuff. I was working with AutoGK, but for some reason, the divx file I was left with always had the French, Spanish, English and director commentary audio all playing at the same time. (I was testing with Return of the Jedi). Also, in the beginning of the movie, in the big scrolly intro part, it would run all the way though in English, then Spanish, then French. I'm sure I missed a setting somewhere along the line to not rip all that extra crap, but after spending the time to rip it twice and end up with the same results, I decided to follow Timoleon's advice and just give Recode a try. They really make it easy to change the quality of the rip and it worked like a champ on the first try. I am currently trying to find the perfect balance between file size/quality so there's still a little playing around left to do. The initial rip of ROTJ with RipIt4Me was about 7.2 GB and after ripping that with Recode to about 5 Mbps, it has left me with an mp4 file of about 4.3 GB.

I thank you all for your assistance. Happy Holidays!
-Chris

Sounds like you didn't RIP that ROTJ DVD correctly but mutli-angle DVD stuff can be tricky.

I've never used Nero Recode but my understanding is that it is basically just another "flavor" of MPEG-4 ala DivX and XviD so with that in mind ... you used a bitrate that was MUCH higher than you needed to use.

However since I don't use Nero Recode I can't comment on how it allows you to select the quality level etc.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[bill1029]

Well, I am in the same boat. I just recently purchased the DSM-520 player as well.

A couple of considerations:

I've played dozens of raw VOB files with no issues. 5.1 audio is great and the video quality (using HDMI) is outstanding (does your unit have the FW version 1.02?)

I've tried Nero recode, and the video quality is a bit grainy (even in HD mode) and the audio does NOT work in 5.1 using the optical or coax audio.

So, that left me with the VOB files, since video and audio quality are HUGE in my book.

Now the big problem... Files greater than 4GB will get cut off at the 4GB point

I have several trouble tickets open with D-link about these issues, but I am not confident that they will be resolved anytime soon.

I've tried using Dr. Divx with great success, unfortunately to get an acceptable video quality, the final file size remains nearly the same as the original VOB file

[bill1029]

Oh... and I have a little more than 300 DVD's... but I will NOT sacrifice video quality at all for a reduced file size.

I plan to use several NAS units, but will need several TB's to keep these videos looking their best.

One of my concerns is that as the TV and projector quality improves, I do not want to begin noticing artifacts later on down the road. I'd really like to keep the original VOB file.

Oh... and ripping to One VOB seams to be the only way to prevent a two second pause or so when going to the next VOB if ripped to several VOB's...

[FulciLives]

The comments from bill1029 kinda helped to snap me to reality ...

It's a nice idea to have ALL of your movies ready-to-go from a "server" to any TV in your house etc. but let's face it ... movies take up a HUGE amount of space and the cost of implimenting this (massive HDD space) just doesn't seem to be very ... prudent ... if you know what I mean.

If you really don't want to mess with the DVD discs then you might want to consider buying a "jukebox" style DVD player.

For instance Pioneer makes the DV-F727 (MSRP $599.00 US Dollars) which is a DVD player that can hold 301 discs.

Sony makes the DVP-CX995V (MSRP $399.95 US Dollars) which is a DVD player that can hold 400 discs.

Although I like Pioneer products I have to admit that the Sony seems like the better deal here because it is cheaper yet holds more discs and also features HDMI upconversion ... a feature lacking in the Pioneer.

Now let's break this down ... the Sony is $399.95 US Dollars and holds 400 discs. We know that a single layer DVD disc is about 4.37GB and that a dual layer DVD disc is about 8.0GB so if all 400 discs are single layer we are talking 1,748GB but if all 400 discs are dual layer then we are talking 3,200GB.

As you can imagine the cost of the HDD space far surpasses that of the $399.95 Sony "jukebox" player.

Got more than 400 DVD discs? Just buy multiple Sony DVD players. At 400 discs per DVD player I doubt even the largest collection needs more than 2 or 3 at the most ... maybe 4? I mean 4 of these Sony units will hold 1,600 discs!

Many companies out there make "high-end" A/V switcher units (some with component and some with HDMI) so with the proper switcher you could easily hook up 3 or 4 of the Sony DVD players to a single TV input etc.

I guess my point is that this type of solution makes a bit more sense in terms of money and time than trying to RIP all your DVD's and store them on HDD discs for computer control and network distribution.

Tis a thought ...

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[redwudz]

I've got two of the Sony DVP-CX995V's, plus a 1.6TB video server that runs over a gigabit LAN to the HTPC and projector in the front room. Also a remote control component switcher for the HTPC and the DVD players. Lots of options for video.

The video server has the mixed videos on it, Xvid, Divx, WMV, RM or about anything else not on DVD. I use VLC and Zoom player pro on the HTPC for playback. The Sony players work very well and I see no reason to convert the DVDs to another format. Besides, it would take a really long time.

If there is any downside to the Sony players, it's that they are a little slow for selecting videos, it takes about 30 seconds for the DVD to start to play. And it's doesn't like all DVD brands. But TYs work well.

[bill1029]

It's kind'a funny that FulciLives mentions the sony player as an alternative, because I am actually trying to replace it

It's a great idea, but a bit poor in the implimentation; though absolutely NO complaints given the very low pricetag. HOWEVER... the player has a few flaws that have been driving me CRAZY... I use the HDMI to upconvert... it's worthless. My TV has a MUCH better upconversion within it; in fact the player seams to exhibit no video quality difference between the 480P and 720P. The 1080i is not even watchable for me due to the grainyness it adds. I've tried these settings with several movies including spiderman, monsters inc, and a few others, and have compared the motion scenes and still (paused) images. Not a big deal, but I assure you that the D-Link DSM-520 exhibits better video quality via the HDMI output. Streaming the raw VOB looks much better than the Sony changer, has dolby digital, and the ability to (or the upnp server's) catelogue music, and movies is a HUGE plus. Randomly playing MP3's by genre is not possible with the Sony, unless you take the time to set up a specific genre within a folder (and there are only 4 folders for video or audio). The menu system is MUCH better within the DSM-520 than the Sony player.

OK... with all that said.... yes; storage costs are a consideration; which is the main reason why this will be a slow conversion process. But I am looking at two things...

1 - I am a gadget freak... I am itching to get into the HD-DVD (or Blue-ray) but am not willing to shell out the 1K bones to get them. When the settled upon standard is realized.. I just have to buy a drive for the PC; thus reducing the costs greatly for a high def DVD player. HD Divx files have played flawlessly on the DSM; so I'll have to wait until HD-DVD to Divx solutions become easy...

2 - Storage costs will continue to drop. It's amazing to see what the capacities and prices have done within the last year. I'm just starting off slow, and thinking about adding the D-link NAS unit that allows for two SATA HD's... I'd like to find an NAS unit that holds 4 or 6 SATA HD's; as these can be upgraded a bit at a time.

Sorry for the long post... just getting excited talking to folks that actually know what their talking about !!!

[FulciLives]

I had a funny feeling that the Sony 400 disc DVD/CD player would be a "bad" upconversion DVD player but it still has component output for 480i which means you can use the scaler built-in the HDTV and in that case the quality should be fine ... and please don't rave on about how "superior" HDMI can be vs component.

Also I was talking about movies and not music. If you want to use a computer for music then that is fine but music is much different from movies. With movies you either need massive HDD space or a hell of a lot of time to compress everything down to DivX or XviD or whatever (so as to save on HDD space).

It just seems like a pipe dream with current technology in terms of money and time needed.

Also movies are a lot less conducive to on-demand in that a movie is 90 minutes or longer and made to be watched in one sitting whereas music can be as simple as a song that is 3 minutes long or whatever. In other words due to the length of a song it is much more conducive to streaming and programming what to hear by choice or by mix or whatever. Movies just don't fit that mold though.

Also let's boil it down ... make it simple as they say ...

If you can't spend the couple of minutes or so to find the DVD Video on the shelf and physically put it in a DVD player etc. then do you have 90+ minutes to watch the movie? Do you have the time to watch the movie but not the attention span for it LOL

I'm not trying to be "down" on anyone here ... just inject some reality.

For someone such as me who is entering middle age and working 40+ hours a week I'll just take the minute or two to find the DVD and put it in the DVD player and spend my very little free time watching the movie then spend all my free time archiving movies for when I have free time to watch them but oh wait! ... I don't have free time to watch the movies because I'm busy archiving them LOL

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[bill1029]

and please don't rave on about how "superior" HDMI can be vs component.

For someone such as me who is entering middle age and working 40+ hours a week I'll just take the minute or two to find the DVD and put it in the DVD player and spend my very little free time watching the movie then spend all my free time archiving stuff for when I have free time that I don't have because I'm busy archiving everything LOL

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

I agree with you 99%... As far as HDMI goes... I'm not that impressed... The ONLY advantage I've personally noticed isthat the audio can be played out of the TV speakers without running the audio cables... This is easier for the kids to set up so they don't have to worry about the reciever... I wouldn't even consider listening to the TV speakers...

I'm reaching the "middle-age" era myself; though it's certainly not about the time it takes to find/load a DVD... I'm just a gadget freak and would like to get this working to my satisfaction. THe media player was pretty cheap... and if I only ue it for my audio collection, then I'm quite satisfied.

Thanks for the input though...

[redwudz]

My Sony DVD players output via component, so no problems there. I just have a lot of DVDs and I got tired of searching though them to find what I wanted. That's my excuse.

Other than that, I like the video server idea. The computer is faster than the Sonys to find and start a video. But I'm thinking to convert all my DVDs would take more time than I want to spend. I bought a hardware Divx encoder and I'm planning to try that on my old VHS tape collection to at least preserve them as is. They aren't that great, mostly TV caps, but a lot of old movies I like. I plan to upgrade my video server with a couple of more 300GB drives and that will probably max out the available space and the power supply. I guess I could add a second server.

[Bardmaster]

I've found Xilisoft works well for a small file size (1.2GB for 2-hour movie) with good quality. However movies in letterbox format are a bit squished on the DSM-520.

I'm curious about the Nero Recode (Digital) option: DIGGIT2001 how did you get this to work with your DSM-520? I tried and created an mp4 file, but DSM-520 says its an invalid format.