DVD9->DVD5, Best results?

[indijay]

Hello All,

After a long procrastination, now I am in a situation that I have to take backups of my DVDs. I checked through the guides listed on this website and came down to different programs I could use-
1. DVDShrink
2. DVD Fab Platinum
3. DVD Rebuilder
4. ReJig
5. CloneDVD2

My goal is to keep the DVD menu as it is and the main movie. Rest is not essential.
I don't care if the program is freeware or a shareware. If it needs, I am ready to pay for quality results with no too much of tweaking (or investment of my time)

Which of the above programs users think will do the job best? For convenience, I felt like CloneDVD2 is the easiest but I have no idea about the results.
I felt like DVDShrink doesn't let you keep the menu, is that correct? If yes, then its out of competition.
I couldn't figure out retaining menu with the other programs.

Comments from experts are welcome.
Many thanks in advance.

[lordsmurf]

DVD Shrink can keep everything, or just the movie.

I don't see the point in having a menu, if you only have one asset anyway. Menus were made to handle multiple assets.

[guns1inger]

Personal choice from that list ?

Rip with DVDFab HD Decrypter

Kill the unwanted material with VobBlanker (although I would just do a movie only rip and lose the menus myself)

Reduce the size with DVD Rebuilder using the HCEnc encoder

Burn with Imgburn

Done.

[Supreme2k]

No, DVDShrink absolutely lets you keep the menus. Only in Reauthor mode do you lose that functionality.

It also depends on the amount of re-compression you will be doing.

I've found that for over 20%, DVD-RB is the best for quality. If it is less than 15%, DVDShrink is great for quality and speed. In my experience, ReJig is somewhere in the middle.

I don't use the pay stuff, as the free programs do as good or better.

[lacywest]

I use AnyDVD .... and I use CloneDVD 2 .... to remove what I dont want ... trailers of no real use ... other languages ... etc.

Nice and simple to use. I bought AnyDVD and CloneDVD2 a few years ago ... $68 bucks ... DVD-RB cost me $10 bucks.

I then use DVD Rebuilder Pro with the CinemaCraft encoder to re-encode it to a smaller size.

For burning .... I even use CloneDVD 2 ... for that too.

Been doing it this way for years now ... no problems or complaints.

When I use DVD-RB Pro ... I set my passes to 4 pass or more [sometimes] ... I then let it run during the night ... I have more than one PC in my home. Someone here told me ... anything more than 4 passes is a waste ... but what the heck ... its going to be done when I get up in the morning ... regardless how many passes I set it too .... 9 passes is the max.

[guns1inger]

Shrink lets you keep the menus if you keep all the titles. You can replace them with still frames, even a black frame, but you will give up space to them. A 90 minute special feature replaced in Shrink by a black frame will still require around 220MB of space and will play for the same duration as the original. Better if you can kill the title completely instead.

[Supreme2k]

Aww, man. I knew you'd eventually post after me at some point, lacywest. All that we need now is for freebird to post

[freebird73717]

Can't let supreme down.

I use exactly what gunslinger listed.
dvdfabhddecrypter
vobblanker
rebuilder/hcenc
imgburn

Price of the programs...free. Knowing my kids won't screw up the originals...priceless!

[indijay]

Thank you guys for so quick replies.
Everyone mentions of the tools that they use but except lacywest nobody mentions about quality (if you have compared the quality with other methods/programs)
I tried to look for DVD-RB pro but couldn't find a link to download or buy. The author's website had some issues.
Finally, why do I want the menu, to jump to specific scene in the movie.

thanks everyone for inputs. If you have any comment on the quality of the output or comparison about output quality, please post, else I think I have enough answers to scratch my head and to decide upon my method of choice.

[fritzi93]

I've found that for over 20%, DVD-RB is the best for quality. If it is less than 15%, DVDShrink is great for quality and speed.

Supreme already summarized the differences in quality. (And let's not quibble about exact percentages).

If you want no quality loss, use a DL disc and make an exact copy. Next best is a re-encode (as with DVDRB). Then a transcode (DVDShrink, Rejig, Nero Recode, CloneDVD, etc.). Transcoding is considerably faster than re-encoding. DL discs have a higher failure rate (use Verbatims only) and compatibility concerns. Take your pick.

Personally, I use Guns' and Freebird's method. Good luck.

[simps]

The ultimate best quality way of doing DVD9->DVD5, is for advanced users, not a single click solution, and will provide the best possible video and audio outputs.

Ultimate DVD9->DVD5 for advanced users.

1) Rip with DVDFab HD Decrypter or AnyDVD
2) Use DGMPGDec to remove pulldown flags, demux original audio track, and frameserve to avisynth
3) Goldwave to uncompress orginal audio to .wav (if audio is to be encoded at all)
4) Sony Vegas to encode .wav to .ac3 (if audio is to be encoded at all)
5) Avisynth with proper settings (NTSC or PAL / interlaced or progressive, filters if needed, etc) to frameserve to encoder
6) VSFilter.dll with Avisynth + Virtualdub + Vobsub + Subtitle Workshop (if subtitles are needed)
7) Bitratecalc to calc bitrate
8) CCE or HCEnc VBR (2 or more pass) to encode 23.976fps (film only)
9) DGPulldown for 23.976->29.970 flags for NTSC or 23.976->25 flags for PAL
10) DVD Lab Pro for muxing, authoring and creating .img
11) Alcohol 120% for burning

This is not a single click solution, but it is the best of the best. It will garantee that you are encoding only 23.976fps instead of 29.97fps (or 25fps) too, and that will raise video quality, since there are more bits available per frame.

This way you can decide if you want NTSC or PAL very easily.

This way you also do hard codec subtitles, if you want to make it larger, or different colors or fonts, etc, and this means they will look much better on the TV.

Anyway, this is the advanced way of doing it, and the best possible way there is. I do 3h movies dvd9->dvd5 using that, and there is no way to tell the difference on a 42" tv.

[]'s
Simps

[guns1inger]

I just use the chapter skip button.

DVD Shrink does not re-encode video. It looks through the encoding that is there and tries to find data that can be removed without causing too much damage. The advantage to this technique is speed. The down side is that it only works if there is a reasonable amount of overhead in the original encoding. For small reductions (usually up to around 10%, but this can vary), Shrink can be a fast solution that produces reasonable results. I can Shrink a feature in a round 10 minutes on my system with Deep Analysis and AEC turned on. Rejig uses a similar principal.

DVD Rebuilder uses HCEnc, Rejig, Quenc or, if you have them, CCE or ProCoder. This gives you a range of options. Personally I find HCEnc to be fast enough and of sufficiently high quality that I am happy to use the free option. DVD RB re-encodes the video completely. This takes longer (around 40 minutes on my system), but produces much better results than Shrink in all cases. For small reductions, the differences are much smaller, and so the time difference does not warrant the use of DVD RB. But for larger reductions, DVD RB produces noticeably better results.

DVDFab and Clone DVD both re-encode as well. I have not tried Clone DVD, but the results I have seen from the work of others leads me to believe it's quality is not better than DVD RB with HCEnc. DVDFab doesn't impress me with any of it's re-encoding, be it DVD reduction or conversion to other formats. In it's present state I would only ever use it for ripping.

A final note : check the Tools section of this website for any programs you are considering. Our illustrious webmaster, Baldrick, hosts mirrors of many of the free tools, so you can download the latest versions directly, even if the author's site is down. You can find the Tools section in the menu to your left, or by clicking on any hyperlinked tool's name in a post.

@Simps - DVD Rebuilder already automates most of that process. Also, much of what you have posted in that list is way over the top, un-necessary in most cases, and totally over-complicated for most users and situations. I also wouldn't use Alchohol 120% to burn DVDs. Imgburn is still the best option by far.

[freebird73717]

Yep like fritzi said, a re-encode is always better than a transcode. Therefore best quality will be with dvdrebuilder using a good encoder like hcenc or cce.

[simps]

guns1inger,

Sure it is a bit too much for most of the users. But it is like I said, this is the ultimate way of doing it. Video and Audio are going to be the best possible, and when I do 3h movies, I can see a difference when doing by this ultimate method, and when by using dvd-rb. Don't get me wrong, dvd-rb is good, but it is not the best of the best. If you want 100% quality instead of, lets say 98%, then you need to go for something like what I wrote.

And if you are going to change something, like PAL->NTSC, some special filters, or re-encode audio, or try to do hardcoded subtitles with prefered sizes, colors, fonts, etc, then my method is about the only thing I would recomend. The difference will be larger, and more noticeble.

Also, on my way you have no restrictions. You can do pretty much whatever you want with video, audio, using any kind of programs and filters, not only the ones supported by dvd-rb. It is unlimited, no restrictions, so the advanced user can do anything he wants with no restrictions to the video or audio to try to improve it. I do know this is not what most of the people will do, but it is the most complete and best way of doing it by far.

Like I said, my way is unrestricted. The way I wrote, you can do xvid->dvd5, bluray->dvd5, anything->dvd5, or anything->anything. Just need to change a few steps. It is the complete correct way of thinking about re-encoding (demuxing video / audio, working with them apart, etc), and the best for the advanced user.

[]'s
Simps

[fritzi93]

HMM, I thought CloneDVD is a transcoder rather an encoder. I stand corrected.

BTW, HCEnc is a damn good encoder, especially for lowish bitrates. I normally use CCE with DVDRB, but last night I ran a comparison on a Band of Brothers disc. Because of the bitrate and amount of action and dark scenes, CCE (at *defaults*!) is borderline for background artifacting. Raising flat part priority helps a lot. HCEnc, however, was just fine at default settings.

DVDRB with CCE did a 2-pass re-encode in an hour on my computer. HCEnc did it (2-pass) in a little over two hours.

[manono]

6) VSFilter.dll with Avisynth + Virtualdub + Vobsub + Subtitle Workshop (if subtitles are needed)

...or try to do hardcoded subtitles with prefered sizes, colors, fonts, etc, then my method is about the only thing I would recomend. The difference will be larger, and more noticeble.

This way you also do hard codec subtitles, if you want to make it larger, or different colors or fonts, etc, and this means they will look much better on the TV.

Anyone that mentiones hardcoded subtitles in the same breath as The ultimate best quality way of doing DVD9->DVD5 and it is the most complete and best way of doing it by far , well, anything else he has to say on the subject is also suspect. I redo subs myself quite a bit, but I sure as hell don't hardcode them when it's just as easy, with much better resulting quality for both the subs and for the video, to make them selectable. Some of the other things you said are suspect as well. For example, rather than using DVD Lab Pro for the authoring, why not keep the original menus, since you seem to be talking about converting retail DVDs?

...then my method is about the only thing I would recomend.

Use it yourself all you like, but don't put it out there so all the world can see that the Emperor has no clothes.

[simps]

manono,

I am not saying you should hard code subs. You should read it again. That was an example of one of the things you can do when you have an unrestricted complete method like the one I posted.

I am not obligating you to do it like I do. You do things your way, I do my way. If you don't like my way, you can post about it, and I will accept it or discuss it, this is part of the purpose of this forums.

Now, you don't come here and say ironic stuff like:

"Use it yourself all you like, but don't put it out there so all the world can see that the Emperor has no clothes."

That only makes you look patetic, like a guy that want some cyber-fight PSSSSS. Are you not happy with something? No girls for you? Not happy with life? I can't help you on that my friend, I am pretty happy here. I never attacked you, and you come here with this attitude? Like I said, that only makes you look patetic, and if you want to look like that, I can't help you either.

I am pretty fine with the fact that you don't like my method, or even if you think you have a better method. That is just ok. Now I won't accept you been disrespectful. Got it? Or should I paint it for you?

[manono]

Don't try and weasel out of it. You were quite clear about saying hardcoded subs were superior (they will look much better on the TV). I wouldn't ever have said anything except for the fact you were promoting your method as being the absolute best. It's not only not the best, but even DVD-Rebuilder (which I don't use) can do a better job than what you're doing. With its filter editor you can do most of the things you mention, including hardcoding the subs if you want to be so foolish. Its main drawback is no IVTC or any other kind of framerate change. In your other thread you were claiming to be a CCE and other MPEG-2 encoders expert. And that's nonsense also.

As for your off-topic comments, I'll just ignore them and let others make of them what they will.

[Pinstripes23]

3) Goldwave to uncompress orginal audio to .wav (if audio is to be encoded at all)

It's been awhile since I used goldwave but it can seperate 6 channel audio down to 6 seperate mono wavs or a 6 channel wav? Or do you downmix a down to 2 channel wav?

[simps]

I would say goldwave alone is just useful for downmixing audio to 2ch, for later creating an stereo file. (using different codecs or bitrates, etc)
You won't be able to deal much with more than 2 ch there.

For creation or re-encode of surround / multi channel audio, you can use Vegas, but really adobe audition is probably the best out there.

What people do to deal with 6ch audio, is this:

You use Besweet with BeLight to split an AC3 5.1 DD Surround file into 6 separate mono wave files and Goldwave to mix the mono Rifftrax audio into the wavC file you get from Besweet. (This is your Center channel audio.)
Then you open all six tracks in Vegas and re-encode it in 5.1 surround.

I would say audition would top that and give you much more options, but this way is good too.

[Pinstripes23]

Well I already have a method of dealing with 6 channel audio and seperating them into 6 mono wavs or one multichannel wav. I was just curious if a program I hadn't used in awhile is updated and can do the separation as you mention that it in your method for doing backups(and most dvd's have 6 channel audio). Cuz I know when I used it it could never do that. Although besweet can separate audio into mono wavs, the wavs don't stay true to the original. I usually use softencode if I have to separate them into mono wavs, which stays truer to the original.

[simps]

True, besweet is just some mediocre transcoding tool. I personaly don't use besweet, I was just pointing out what most people do. My english is bad and sometimes I can't say what I really want to say. Adobe audition is the best tool to do this job but of course it cost a lot of $.

[lacywest]

I didn't mention the features of CloneDVD2 ... besides working great with AnyDVD.

You load the DVD Video and then you can choose to keep the menu ... small tick box at the top on the right.

As you choose the titles you want to keep the graph at the bottom will be displayed ... Red ... Yellow ... Green.

If after you have finished choosing what you want to keep and the indicator is well into the Green ... well what the heck you
might as well let CloneDVD2 do its job and even do the burning for you. Dont want to burn the DVD ... then store it in a Folder for later burning. Or have CloneDVD make an ISO file of the movie. And then burn the ISO file with Imgburn.

If the graph shows the indicator is in the yellow [the end result will not look so good if you use CloneDVD to burn it to a DVD.

Check the settings to the left of the colored graph ... choose DVD-9 or create a custom size. And when the quality is now in the Green .... let CloneDVD do the ripping to a folder. I then use DVD Rebuilder to do the shrinking by re-encoding the entire DVD video.

I do believe CloneDVD uses transcode for shrinking the size of the movie.

DVD Rebuilder does have settings that allow you to steal quality from the extra stuff you kept and have it go toward the main movie.

One thing I do all the time ... I do use CloneDVD to look at the DVD Disk and check out what the Disk contains ... main movie ... scenes behind the scenes .... trailers. CloneDVD has a small screen to the left that shows what each title contains ... makes it easy to decide what to keep and not keep.

Walt Disney DVD Disks ... are especially hard to rip ... gobs and gobs of stuff to look at and decide what to keep.

My decision to get AnyDVD and CloneDVD was based on trying to rip Madagascar [the first DVD] ... nothing that night I tried could do it ... but as soon as I bought AnyDVD and CloneDVD in a package deal for $68 bucks ... I have had no problems ripping any DVD movie since then.

[lordsmurf]

CloneDVD is a transcoder.

[src2206]

I have done few compression, and I think DVDRB+HCEnc work very well. I do not use shrink or any other mentioned, because all these are Transcoder and the transcoding results do not match in quality with encoders specially when you watch on a Big screen (I mean panel TVs).
For burning I would have loved to use ImgBurn, but the trouble is some DVDs burnt with ImgBurn does not play in my PHILIPS SAP. I have checked that the same VIDEO_TS folder when added to NERO gives me an warning that "DVD Files failed sorting, may not be playble"- I never found this warning in ImgBurn.

[fritzi93]

If discs burned with ImgBurn fail, I would suspect the problem is the discs themselves, the fault lies elsewhere than with ImgBurn. Anywhere else. And Nero is notorious for producing non-compliant DVD-Video discs, also for giving bogus warnings. Seriously.

It *is* possible that the file structure of your DVD-Video is invalid. FixVTS is useful for correcting that problem. The easiest double-check is to open the files in DVDShrink, it is very touchy as to valid structure. If it doesn't complain, all is well. Personally, I also let it re-map the files (no compression) and output an ISO for burning, the operation is very fast. It's been ages since I used Nero, but I believe it often offers to re-encode when it is unnecessary. [shrugs]

[src2206]

If discs burned with ImgBurn fail, I would suspect the problem is the discs themselves, the fault lies elsewhere than with ImgBurn.

There was no problems with the Discs, all were genuine Verbatim DVD-R (DVD5), and the burn quality was near 99.5%.
So surely the trouble was not with the discs. And I confirmed by burning a disc with ImgBurn for which NERO warned me, and the DVD froze after about playing 60/70%.

but I believe it often offers to re-encode when it is unnecessary.

NERO did not offer to re encode, just reallocation, failing which NERO warned me that the resultant disc may not playble, and I see at least for mt PHILIPS SAP it happens.

FixVTS is useful for correcting that problem. The easiest double-check is to open the files in DVDShrink, it is very touchy as to valid structure.

Yes, I did solve the problem using FixVTS, once NERO tells me that there is a problem.
I never knew about DVDShrink's this specific use, i shall surely try it ASAP- thanks for the tip.

[skaleton]

Personal choice from that list ?

Rip with DVDFab HD Decrypter

Kill the unwanted material with VobBlanker (although I would just do a movie only rip and lose the menus myself)

Reduce the size with DVD Rebuilder using the HCEnc encoder

Burn with Imgburn

Done.

Keeping menus is handy when there are multi languages, subtitles and commentaries that you want to keep.
If the menus are complex with motion clips and sound that are unnecesssary to the navigation, I use MenuShrink (free) before VobBlanker.
Then PgcEdit to kill the buttons leading to material removed with VobBlanker.