hd-dvd to high def mp4/divx/mkv options?

[yoda313]

So I'm looking for a convenient all in one converter to take ripped evo files from a hd-dvd to either mp4, divx, mkv or whatever.

My destination is either my ps3 or xbox 360. I'd like to use it for both for max compatibility. I believe high def divx would be the best bet. I would also be burning to dvd - either single or dual layer - I have both options.

Is ripbot264 the best program for this? How straightforward is it?

I'd be willing to look into payware up to 50.00 usd for this project.

I do have corel dvd copy 6 but it doesn't seem to like evo files.

I used dvd fab decrypter and it actually recognized my xbox hd-dvd drive and ripped a movie. I also was able to demux it with evodemux.

Suggestions are welcome. Also I would settle for a ps3 only format if that is the "easiest" destination. Having 360 ability would be an added bonus. Please note I'm looking for 5.1 to be included also. Regarding the audio - is the ps3 able to incorporate dolby true hd in compressed file formats? Or does the audio need to be downconverted to standard ac3 5.1?

Thanks.

Also if there are any of the newer tmpgenc conversion suites that you'd recommend I'd consider them (again if around 50.00 usd).

EDIT - another question regarding resolution - I know bitrate is the real determination of file size. However for this purpose would it be better to convert the 1080p video to 720p? Would the added conversion time be worthwhile? Or can the 1080p be left intact and "simply" change the bitrate and file format?

[stanstan]

Check out https://forum.videohelp.com/topic361585.html for Blu-ray to AVI

[yoda313]

Thanks stanstan but I am not working with m2ts files here. These are evo files from hddvd.

[stanstan]

Oh right, sorry didn't read that properly.. I'll be writing a similar tutorial for that when I get it all figured out too.

[dbone1]

I have used ripbot for all my HD DVDs. I convert them to mkv using the Blu Ray (4.0) profile. I keep the original audio stream. For the Video I set to 2-Pass and lock the size to 8150MB. I also use the automatic crop selection and keep original size. Works like a charm every time, and I have done this on over 20 HD DVDs. I really like ripbot, but have also used Xvid4PSP in the past (www.winnydows.com)

EDIT - I just re read your post. Xbox/PS3 does not play mkvs unless you use transcoding software like tversity. Try using the mp4 option instead of the mkv option with Ripbot.

[yoda313]

@dbone1 - thank you.

So it looks like ripbot is worth getting into then? I'll have to download it and go through it a bit.

Regarding evos' - Which is the main movie file? Or does ripbot identify it in the folder for you?

Also for the mp4 option - how many settings are there in mp4? Does it have a seperate setting for 360 and ps3?

Thanks I'll have to look into these.

[deadrats]

So I'm looking for a convenient all in one converter to take ripped evo files from a hd-dvd to either mp4, divx, mkv or whatever.

My destination is either my ps3 or xbox 360. I'd like to use it for both for max compatibility. I believe high def divx would be the best bet. I would also be burning to dvd - either single or dual layer - I have both options.

Is ripbot264 the best program for this? How straightforward is it?

I'd be willing to look into payware up to 50.00 usd for this project.

I do have corel dvd copy 6 but it doesn't seem to like evo files.

I used dvd fab decrypter and it actually recognized my xbox hd-dvd drive and ripped a movie. I also was able to demux it with evodemux.

Suggestions are welcome. Also I would settle for a ps3 only format if that is the "easiest" destination. Having 360 ability would be an added bonus. Please note I'm looking for 5.1 to be included also. Regarding the audio - is the ps3 able to incorporate dolby true hd in compressed file formats? Or does the audio need to be downconverted to standard ac3 5.1?

Thanks.

Also if there are any of the newer tmpgenc conversion suites that you'd recommend I'd consider them (again if around 50.00 usd).

EDIT - another question regarding resolution - I know bitrate is the real determination of file size. However for this purpose would it be better to convert the 1080p video to 720p? Would the added conversion time be worthwhile? Or can the 1080p be left intact and "simply" change the bitrate and file format?

first things first, use tsmuxer to remux the evo into a ts (i've never had much luck remuxing into m2ts, too many seek issues).

second, i personally like keeping the highest quality audio stream available, most often it will be LCPM, but it depends on the application you use.

as for applications, the easiest way is to use mkv2vob, the settings are self explanitory.

as for divx hd, i would strongly recommend against it, for many reasons, not the least of which is the fact that encoding divx hd takes about as long as encoding hd vc-1, which is to say forever and a day. i have a phenom 9500 with 4 gigs of ddr 2 667 and to transcode from 1080p to 720p using mpeg-2 it takes about 2 hours, about 4 hours for h264 anywhere between 9 and 12 hours for vc-1 hd and/or divx hd.

furthermore, divx hd, while it produces pretty good quality, can't touch h264 and in fact divx has pretty much acknowledged as much by developing and releasing their own h264 codec (it's still in alpha, but it will be nice to have another h264 codec option).

as for resizing, i personally don't, after numerous experiments, i have concluded that for maximum quality keeping the movie at 1080p is the only way to go, i would even rather have a 1080p over a 720p even if the bitrate is the same, say about 10 mb/s.

and may the force be with you (i just couldn't resist, "yoda").

[deadrats]

Regarding evos' - Which is the main movie file?

the one that's about 25-30 gigs, seriously it's the only file that is over 1 gig and if i remember correctly it's actually named "main movie".

[dbone1]

@dbone1 - thank you.

So it looks like ripbot is worth getting into then? I'll have to download it and go through it a bit.

Regarding evos' - Which is the main movie file? Or does ripbot identify it in the folder for you?

Also for the mp4 option - how many settings are there in mp4? Does it have a seperate setting for 360 and ps3?

Thanks I'll have to look into these.

Ripbot will identify, just point it in the folder directory. A majority of times the EVO is broken into 2 files, but Ripbot knows which ones and will combine (if i recall the files usually start with a "p"). I have tried many options and for me Ripbot is by far the easiest. I don't think they have specific settings for Xbox vs. PS3. You should also take a look at Xvid4PSP which has a lot more settings that you can play around with. My goal is always to try and keep as much of the quality intact in a smaller size, which is why I usually do 8GB mkv files. I have a Quad Core and it takes me about 10 hours total to encode into the mkv based on my settings, so I usually run it overnight.

[yoda313]

@dbone1 and deadrats - thanks

regarding encoding time - so you have a quad core and it takes 10 hours? Is that a 1 pass encode? I have a dual core should I expect 20 hours? Or is that not an equal difference?

EDIT - I did reread your early info and saw it was a 2 pass encode. So if this is straight time would that mean a 1 pass would take 5 hours on a quad core and 10 hours on a dual core?

I appreciate the insights. What I'm trying to is to reencode the movies I do have in hd-dvd so i don't have to buy them again (about half of them I have the standard def dvds of so its not a total loss just annoying). I only have the xbox 360 hd-dvd add on drive so whenever that dies I don't want to have to rebuy them in bluray right away. Though I probably will eventually just not right now.

[deadrats]

regarding encoding time - so you have a quad core and it takes 10 hours? Is that a 1 pass encode? I have a dual core should I expect 20 hours? Or is that not an equal difference?

EDIT - I did reread your early info and saw it was a 2 pass encode. So if this is straight time would that mean a 1 pass would take 5 hours on a quad core and 10 hours on a dual core?

i also have a quad core (the 9500 phenom is the cheapest quad core amd makes).

encode times are greatly affected by a number of things, obviously bitrate is one of them, quality settings also will greatly influence encode times (if you use x264 and max out all the quality settings you can expect to measure encode times with an hour glass) and amazingly enough, the one that caught me by suprise the first time i realized, the target size also greatly influences encode times.

using the same amount of bitrate and the exact same quality settings (i personally always max out the quality settings), encoding at 720x480 can usually be done in almost real time, encoding at 720p usually results in less than half time and encoding at full 1080p means that the encode usually needs more time than i have patience (i just let it encode overnight and go to sleep).

these times are for single pass, variable/average bitrate, with all the settings maxed out. with a dual core i wouldn't even consider doing 2 pass encoding, i would probably stick with constant bitrate.

and like i said, stay away from divx (at least until their h264 codec is finished) and stay away from vc-1, my God you can't imagine how slow it is to encode 1080p in either of those 2 formats.

if you're going to be doing alot of encoding, you may want consider upgrading your pc just a bit, nothing crazy, but at least an intel penryn based quad core (like a q9550) or maybe one of the new phenom 2's as soon as they are released, or even a faster dual core.

oh, one last thing, just because an encode takes 5 hours on a quad core doesn't mean that it will take 10 hours on a dual core, not all applications scale linearly and alot depends on how efficient the application is in allocating and de-allocating ram, how well it handles thread maintanance to prevent locks and how well it handles I/O.

assuming your finances allow for it, and assuming you plan on doing alot of encoding, i would seriously consider getting a reasonably priced quad core setup if i were you, the time you save will be worth it in the long run.

[deadrats]

What I'm trying to is to reencode the movies I do have in hd-dvd so i don't have to buy them again (about half of them I have the standard def dvds of so its not a total loss just annoying). I only have the xbox 360 hd-dvd add on drive so whenever that dies I don't want to have to rebuy them in bluray right away. Though I probably will eventually just not right now.

i just realized something, before you do any re-encoding try tsmuxer, load your evo file (it will open it, just select all file types) and then choose the option that says "create blu-ray disk", and in a few minutes you should have a blu-ray compliant blu-ray structure that you can burn to a blu-ray dvd.

let us know how it comes out.

[yoda313]

@deadrats - thanks for the info. I am glad to know that the encode time isn't exactly 2:1.

Now regarding the muxing won't I run into file size issues? Lets say its 20gb and remuxed it to m2ts. I'd have to split that to three dual layers to keep original quality right?

Also I'm not quite ready to upgrade my pc again. I had upgraded from single core to dual core last winter. Also my amd mother board is not am2+ its am2 as far as I can remember. That would mean I'd have to buy a new motherboard and all likelihood purchase a standalone copy of VISTA.

In that regard I'd just order a new computer. Or actually finally commit to building my own from the ground up. But my dual core is still serviceable and I'm not ready to change just yet.

-----------------------------

Last night I got ripbot setup. I pointed it to one of the evos - there were two evo's at 11gb each. I picked the 1080p stream and it just hung. It didn't bomb out outrigt. However it seemed like it was thrashing and lasted for like twenty minutes.

I am wondering if the hd-dvd was not ripped properly. I had used dvdfab hd and I don't know if it did it right.

I have finally convinced myself to purchase anydvdhd this weekend. I'll install it and see how it does on the hd-dvd.

I will be using it for BLURAY as well. I like the idea of being able to convert to high def mp4 and to dvd as well as wmv for my zune. I don't know that I'll do that many conversions for the same movie.

Also I'd like to use anydvd so I don't have to run a ripper first, then do another conversion. Isn't anydvd supposed to run in the background so you can use another program? I'd like to use it with dvd corel copy 6 without ripping to the harddrive first. It'd save a little time and storage space.

[deadrats]

Now regarding the muxing won't I run into file size issues? Lets say its 20gb and remuxed it to m2ts. I'd have to split that to three dual layers to keep original quality right?

ah, i just realized, you don't have a blu-ray burner, you plan on burning the hi def movie to a standard dual layer dvd, correct?

if that's what you are trying to do then you only have one option, converting to AVCHD, which means 720p, h264, ac3 (or LCPM) and muxed into a mpeg-2 transport stream (.ts).

now for some bad news, for AVCHD i would only use one of the more pro-sumer solutions, say something like this:

http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/us/en/Product/1175714228541#versionTabview=tab0&tabview=tab0

you can download the demo and give it a try.

[deadrats]

I pointed it to one of the evos - there were two evo's at 11gb each. I picked the 1080p stream and it just hung. It didn't bomb out outrigt. However it seemed like it was thrashing and lasted for like twenty minutes.

I am wondering if the hd-dvd was not ripped properly. I had used dvdfab hd and I don't know if it did it right.

no, you didn't rip anything wrong, the fact of the matter is that it takes a ton of cpu horsepower to open a massive 1080p file, most likely with a bitrate of 20+ mb/s. even with my quad core and tons of ram and using the demo version of main concept's reference or tmpgenc, it can take a while to open such a massive file. also, some of those freeware/open source applications have some nasty bugs in them that cause them to hang

Also I'd like to use anydvd so I don't have to run a ripper first, then do another conversion. Isn't anydvd supposed to run in the background so you can use another program? I'd like to use it with dvd corel copy 6 without ripping to the harddrive first. It'd save a little time and storage space.

that's the way it's supposed to work.

i will tell you this, i always rip to the hdd first and work from there, first it's going to be faster and second i would never subject my optical drive to sustained reads of hours at a time, that's just crazy.

[yoda313]

@deadrats - yes I don't have a bluray burner. This is intended for data files on dvd - most likely dual layer to keep the quality somewhat bearable.

if that's what you are trying to do then you only have one option, converting to AVCHD, which means 720p, h264, ac3 (or LCPM) and muxed into a mpeg-2 transport stream (.ts).

now for some bad news, for AVCHD i would only use one of the more pro-sumer solutions, say something like this:

http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/us/en/Product/117571422854 ... bview=tab0

So would that mean the ps3 would be my only playback option for m2ts then? That would be ok I just want to make sure.

Also onto anydvd - perhaps I'd use the background ripping for dvd applications only then - smaller encoding times and all.

And thanks for the info on the long load times. I'll have to be more patient then. I just started thinking it must have been something I did. But these are multigigabyte files so i guess that shouldn't be too suprising.

Edit - thanks for the link on the corel software. I actually already have Pinnacle Studio 12 however it is the basic version. I wonder if I could upgrade it to the high def model for less than the price of a new suite. That would be ideal.

EDIT 2 - Ok I have taken the plunge and I bought anydvdhd. I am currently ripping a different hd-dvd movie I own. I am going to try ripbot on a different movie and one that will be fully ripped properly this time. Hopefully this will make it go more smoothly. I'll also check out the pinnacle upgrade path for avchd options.

EDIT 3 - I ripped the hd-dvd and loaded it into ripbot. It must have taken about a half hour but after selecting the 1080p stream it finally let me choose the compression settings. I set it to profile 4 for bluray and consoles. I set it to mp4 and cq 18 (the lowest cq setting). Since I am doing cq does that mean I don't have the fixed file size option anymore? I did see that as a choice before opening the file. So I also set it to not resize so this should be a 1080p transfer. I also did aac 5.1 audio (at least I think that is what it is - it is the 384kpbs option for 5.1 in the audio selection).

I'll report back in the morning when I have more progress to go through. It currently says it is processing the audio and is at 8%. That is a good sign at least it hasn't choked yet. - just jumped to 16%! Yes....

EDIT 4 - well I had a power outage last night so my encode was stopped. I had it set to 1080p but it went up to 26 hour estimate so I cancelled that. I redid it for 720p at cq18 but unfortunately that was interrupted during the night. I will attempt to redo that at 720p. I'll let you know what I get.

EDIT 5 - Ok its churning away now. It is at something like 24% done for the video. It has a 11 hour estimate. if that holds I won't be able to work on it again until after work tomorrow night. I'm hoping this works well. I'll also be interested how this works on my bluray discs now that I do have anydvdhd for ripping.

EDIT 6 - It's up to 33% now. It still shows 10 hours left. I don't know when this will be finished. Hopefully it will come out ok.

EDIT 7 - I'm over 50% now and it is down under 9 hours. This is good. It is actually processing it and the time is reducing. I'm hopeful it will complete tonight. I should have enough time tomorrow before work to at least confirm if it finished processing. I won't be able to burn and test on the ps3 and xbox 360 until afterwork.

I do have a question about the cq rating. I assumed that 18 was the lowest quality setting. Was that incorrect? Is the 24 or 22 the lowest? I selected 18 on the assumption it would be the fastest option.

Also if I were to do this to convert to dvd or even smaller (ie zune 320x240 wmv) would it be faster or does converting from high def to any format naturally take a lot of time?

[ni9ht_5ta1k3r]

I've been trying to find the right encoding settings in Ripbot to make videos "PS3 compatible" and the PS3 seems to like it if it's either:

a) recoded as an AVCHD (as PS3 supports AVCHD....didn't find that in the manual(
b) as an mp4 file encoded at 720p + AAC 2.0.

[yoda313]

@ni9ht_Stalk3r - thanks for the feedback.

My first test was pretty successfule. I did it to mp4 avc with aac 5.1. However it was cq 18 and the file was 12gigs. I had to use avidemux to split 20 or so minutes out of it.

The native file played ok on the computer and looked very good with mpchc (mediaplayer classic home cinema). though of course seek time was slow on such a large file and jumping to the end of the movie was difficult.

Unfoturnately my split file stuttered on the ps3. I believe it was just a bad burned dvdr as after I copied it to the ps3 harddrive it played back smoothly but the audio seemed off sync. Also I was unable to get 5.1 off the aac track. I even selected aac output over fiberoptic but got nothing. My receiver can handle dolby digital and dts but it is pre-hdmi. I started a seperate thread on audio and I will be attempting to direct stream copy the audio to preserve the original audio so my receiver can process the 5.1 signal.

[deadrats]

@yoda:

I do have a question about the cq rating. I assumed that 18 was the lowest quality setting. Was that incorrect? Is the 24 or 22 the lowest? I selected 18 on the assumption it would be the fastest option.

the higher the number the lower the quality, also when you choose constant quality it's not possible to get a size estimate, that's why that option is greyed out.

i admire your patience, i personally don't go for those 12 hour encodes, i'm not too crazy with running my pc at full load for 12+ hours at a time.

[ni9ht_5ta1k3r]

I guess I spoke too soon:

After doing the test with 720p @ 9mbps + AAC 2.0 on a 6:37 min video (The Dark Knight Prologue) which worked, I tried the same settings but with a 74 minute video (UK car show - Top Gear Polar Special) and that failed to play giving the 80028801 error.

So far the results of my tests are:

720p @ approx. 8mbps + AAC 5.1 (Gone Baby Gone) = ERROR
480p @ approx. 8-9mbps + AAC 2.0 (Bourne Ultimatum Supplement) = PLAYABLE
1080p @ 9mbps + AAC 2.0 (Top Gear Polar Special) = ERROR
720p @ 9mbps + AAC 2.0 (The Dark Knight Prologue) = PLAYABLE
720p @ 9mbps + AAC 2.0 (Top Gear Polar Special) = ERROR

All were 2-pass encodes within Ripbot264.

So I'm thinking it has partly to do with:

a) the encoding settings
b) the video's running time
c) the size of the final video file

At the moment I'm still trying to find out why anything over 1hr doesn't work but a 6:37 minute video works on my PS3. Even with the above 5 tests done I still don't have an answer as yet.

[yoda313]

@deadrats - thanks I did not know that. Now I do

I redid the encode at 2 pass for a target just under 8000mb. I will have to demux the audio from the hddvd and remux it to the mp4 so I can get 5.1 on my nonhdmi digital amp. I haven't checked in on it since I got back home today.


@ni9ht_5ta1k3r

How large are the files for over 1hr? It could be you have a bad disc.

Have you tried copying the funky video that is working to the ps3 harddrive? Assuming you have the free space to do this it would confirm if you have a disc that is acting up. Even if it plays funny it should still copy properly.

That's just a suggestion anyway.

Later on I'll report my success or lack there of of the video only conversion and the muxing I have yet to do.

EDIt - I used tsmuxer to extract the dolby stream from the hddvd. I'm now using mp4muxer to combine the video in the mp4 and the original audio. I'm hoping htis works and is in sync.

[ni9ht_5ta1k3r]

all my encodes (not the short clips) would fit onto a DVD-9 disc. I ran out of DVD-9s so I tried copying them to the PS3's HDD over my network (a bitch to do) and it still didn't work.

EDIT: Now I've been told by posters on Doom9 that it's because I've gone over MP4's official file size limit of 4gb so I will try that and reduce the filesize to 4gb and see where that gets me.

[ni9ht_5ta1k3r]

SUCCESS!!!!

I did at test and got a 74 minute video down to under 4gb (4092mb is the resulting filesize) and it played. So remember: MP4 < 4gb.

[yoda313]

Really? I can't believe that mp4 is limited to 4gb.

Is there an updated form of mp4 that doesn't have this issue?

FYI I did work on my stuff last night. I ended up using mp4muxer to extract the 264 video stream. I had already demuxed the original audio stream.

However I have not been able to get a successful mux. I tried tsmuxer to make a m2ts file but mediaplayerclassic home cinema won't play m2ts files so I wasn't able to find out if it worked or not. Also I didn't want to waste a dual layer on a file that might be a dud.

Should I try remuxing the 264 video stream and the dd+ ac3 file into m2ts? I guess I'm settled on only being able to play these on a ps3.

[ni9ht_5ta1k3r]

Well, technically it's not really as I can have mp4 files that are over 4gb and still work on the PC. Dunno why anything over 4gb doesn't work on the ps3.

[deadrats]

Well, technically it's not really as I can have mp4 files that are over 4gb and still work on the PC. Dunno why anything over 4gb doesn't work on the ps3.

it's simple really, the PS3 uses the FAT32 filesystem which has a 4gig file size limitation, no file, no matter was the OS is, on a FAT32 can be bigger than 4 gigs, that's why .divx is also limited to 4gigs, because devices that playback divx files also use the FAT32.

if they had used ntfs, ufs, ext3, ext4, rieserfs, pretty much any modern file system, then there wouldn't be any limitation.

of course this also means that any PS3 running linux, thereby functioning as a pc, also doesn't have the 4gig limitation.

the FAT32 was one of two mistakes sony made with the PS3, the other being not either including more ram or making the ram expandable by the end user.

[ni9ht_5ta1k3r]

Well, technically it's not really as I can have mp4 files that are over 4gb and still work on the PC. Dunno why anything over 4gb doesn't work on the ps3.

it's simple really, the PS3 uses the FAT32 filesystem which has a 4gig file size limitation, no file, no matter was the OS is, on a FAT32 can be bigger than 4 gigs, that's why .divx is also limited to 4gigs, because devices that playback divx files also use the FAT32.

if they had used ntfs, ufs, ext3, ext4, rieserfs, pretty much any modern file system, then there wouldn't be any limitation.

of course this also means that any PS3 running linux, thereby functioning as a pc, also doesn't have the 4gig limitation.

the FAT32 was one of two mistakes sony made with the PS3, the other being not either including more ram or making the ram expandable by the end user.

No way does the PS3 use the FAT32 nor any consumer know formatting structures. If the PS3 did use FAT32 then I would be able to connect the PS3's HDD to a PC and read the contents of the drive: but you can't, the HDD doesn't even get recognised by a windows PC because windows doesn't have the drivers to recognise the format structure. Besides, I have videos on my PS3 that are over 4GB and that go into 8GB and they play fine (MPEG2-AC3). If the PS3 was using FAT32 then I wouldn't even be able to store videos over 4GB because of that limitation of FAT32 but the reality is I can and watch them in full.

The PS3 has to be using a proprietary formatting structure that's specific to the PS3. Sony is not that stupid!

EDIT: Have you tried to connect your PS3'S HDD to a PC and try to read it? cos if you're going with little info it doesn't help your theory.

[deadrats]

@ni9ht_5ta1k3r

yeah, you're probably right, i don't know what i am talking about...oh, wait, maybe i do:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_hardware

All models support USB memory devices; flash drives and external hard drives are both automatically recognized. However, they must be formatted with the FAT32 file system — the PS3 does not support the Microsoft-developed NTFS file system that is the standard in the Windows NT family.

http://www.ps3news.com/forums/playstation-3-news/ps3-hdd-file-system-details-direct-sony-92825.html

here's an answer directly from sony:

steve: no im refuring to the actual file system that the ps3 uses on its hdd as i was looking thru the various forumns and i came across a thread stated that divx would be playable on the ps3 via a update to the firmware .....but what file system does the ps3 use on its hdd
James : The hard drive is formatted in FAT32

http://www.cnet.com.au/games/ps3/0,239035763,339282375,00.htm

in a nutshell the PS3 definately uses the FAT32 filesystem, whether you like it or not.

[deadrats]

No way does the PS3 use the FAT32 nor any consumer know formatting structures. If the PS3 did use FAT32 then I would be able to connect the PS3's HDD to a PC and read the contents of the drive: but you can't, the HDD doesn't even get recognised by a windows PC because windows doesn't have the drivers to recognise the format structure. Besides, I have videos on my PS3 that are over 4GB and that go into 8GB and they play fine (MPEG2-AC3). If the PS3 was using FAT32 then I wouldn't even be able to store videos over 4GB because of that limitation of FAT32 but the reality is I can and watch them in full.

The PS3 has to be using a proprietary formatting structure that's specific to the PS3. Sony is not that stupid!

and just to address your above objections:

the reason you can't connect the PS3 hdd (actually never tried it, but i'll take your word for it) to a windows pc and read the contents has nothing to do with what file system is used, it has to do with the firmware that the hdd is equiped with, a pc's bios will not recognise the firmware that the PS3's hdd uses and will in all likelyhood report it as damaged (most likely it will fail SMART during bootup).

it's the same thing that happens if you try and use a video card from a mac on a pc, the hardware is exactly the same, the interface is exactly the same (PCI/PCI-E/PCI-X) but the bios on the video cards are different and designed to prevent cross use.

same thing happens if you try and use a SCSI drive from a sun workstation and it's similar to why you can't install OS X on a pc without either using an EFI module or jumping through hoops using a linux boot cd.

as for why you have file over 8gigs on your PS3, what most likely is happening is that the PS3 is simply storing the video's as 2 4gig chunks and simply reporting to the end user that it's stored as one contiguous 8gig file (<---it's actually very easy to program this), what it probably done is that a pointer byte is appended to the first chunk that points to the second chunk, and since a portion of the video files are always buffered to ram during playback, it appears seemless to you, as you view the file a few seconds ahead of the point in the movie is aleady in memory, when it gets to the pointer it buffers the second part of the file and you are none the wiser.

it's the same way a dvd is played back, if you look at the structure it's composed of a bunch of 1 gig VOB's but when you play it back with a dvd player it's seemless.

[ni9ht_5ta1k3r]

if you had posted the links before then I would have thought differently!