VideoReDo owner passed away, product ceased, seeking alternatives ?

[hydra3333]

Hello.

Per thread https://videoredo.net/msgBoard/index.php?threads/danr-has-passed-away.38024/#post-136239

The owner of VideoReDo has passed away and the main developer is seeking another job.
It seems certain that VideoReDo (VRD) will cease to operate and/or be re-installable in the very near future.

(1) I and probably many others use VRD's QSF (Quick Stream Fix) functionality to "clean" over-the-air TV captures such as mpeg2/mpeg4/hevc video in .TS containers and remove/fix what turns out to be quite frequent video/audio broadcast capture glitches to produce a clean video container file ready for other processing for example using ffmpeg/avisynth/vapoursynth.
Such "glitch cleaning" addresses audio sync loss etc and makes the video file reliably "readable" by other less fault-tolerant tools.

(2) VRD is great for joining video files and also wonderful for smart easy interactive editing which re-encodes video/audio around frame-accurate cut points where cuts may not necessarily be at i-frames.

Could someone please suggest tools or even links to suggestions for doing (1) and (2) ? Cost < AU$100 much preferred, being retired and all

Thanks

[october262]

Hello.

Per thread https://videoredo.net/msgBoard/index.php?threads/danr-has-passed-away.38024/#post-136239

The owner of VideoReDo has passed away and the main developer is seeking another job.
It seems certain that VideoReDo (VRD) will cease to operate and/or be re-installable in the very near future.

(1) I and probably many others use VRD's QSF (Quick Stream Fix) functionality to "clean" over-the-air TV captures such as mpeg2/mpeg4/hevc video in .TS containers and remove/fix what turns out to be quite frequent video/audio broadcast capture glitches to produce a clean video container file ready for other processing for example using ffmpeg/avisynth/vapoursynth.
Such "glitch cleaning" addresses audio sync loss etc and makes the video file reliably "readable" by other less fault-tolerant tools.

(2) VRD is great for joining video files and also wonderful for smart easy interactive editing which re-encodes video/audio around frame-accurate cut points where cuts may not necessarily be at i-frames.

Could someone please suggest tools or even links to suggestions for doing (1) and (2) ? Cost < AU$100 much preferred, being retired and all

Thanks

have you tried looking in the video editors section ?? - https://www.videohelp.com/software/sections/video-editors-basic
there's both paid and free versions of software.

[netmask56]

Hello.

Per thread https://videoredo.net/msgBoard/index.php?threads/danr-has-passed-away.38024/#post-136239

The owner of VideoReDo has passed away and the main developer is seeking another job.
It seems certain that VideoReDo (VRD) will cease to operate and/or be re-installable in the very near future.

(1) I and probably many others use VRD's QSF (Quick Stream Fix) functionality to "clean" over-the-air TV captures such as mpeg2/mpeg4/hevc video in .TS containers and remove/fix what turns out to be quite frequent video/audio broadcast capture glitches to produce a clean video container file ready for other processing for example using ffmpeg/avisynth/vapoursynth.
Such "glitch cleaning" addresses audio sync loss etc and makes the video file reliably "readable" by other less fault-tolerant tools.

(2) VRD is great for joining video files and also wonderful for smart easy interactive editing which re-encodes video/audio around frame-accurate cut points where cuts may not necessarily be at i-frames.

Could someone please suggest tools or even links to suggestions for doing (1) and (2) ? Cost < AU$100 much preferred, being retired and all

Thanks

TSDoctor is the only one I know of that repairs transmission errors like VRD.

[hydra3333]

TSDoctor is the only one I know of that repairs transmission errors like VRD.

Thanks !

I'm looking at its reviews etc now.
One says

This software does an outstanding job fixing problems in transport streams.
The only issue I have is the CLI is very limited in functionality. You cannot fully automate a task without a dialog box popping up after a repair.

Which frightens me a tad since I need to automate "inspect/repair" inside a batch job (perhaps its CLI then invoked from vbscript).

I wonder if you can tell me if the cli side of things is now more usable in that way, i.e. inside a batch job without any dialog box popping up and disrupting the batch job process ?

[ProWo]

It seems certain that VideoReDo (VRD) will cease to operate and/or be re-installable in the very near future.

Why?

[hydra3333]

Well, per the thread posted at top, there were 2 people making VRD happen and after the sad event the remaining person posted this:

It's best to think of VideoReDo as a one person company. I have worked here for a very long time, but I strictly wrote code. DanR did 100% of the business stuff. And because his illness and ultimate death were so sudden he didn’t have time to give me the access or training I would need to take over. So at this point the business is basically dead. His wife might decide to sell it or hire someone else to run it, but even if she does it will likely take a significant amount of time for them to get up to speed. It would take me a while to get up to speed and I wrote 80%+ of the code.

Of interest in the above quote :- "So at this point the business is basically dead."

There is more information in other posts, including him applying for other jobs and also talking about a license server and an inability (not necessarily technical) to create any "permanent license key".

I'm hoping for the best but planning for the worst.

[hydra3333]

PS I downloaded a trial TS-Doctor installer and submitted it to virustotal and got a hit for "Malware-Cryptor.Win32.General.4" from an "uncommon" vendor.

I'd tend to ignore it, however there was a "Timeout" result noted from most of the major antivirus manufacturers which leaves one in a quandary on the basis of not enough reputable information available.

[ProWo]

No, I meant your installed version of Videoredo is still working or not?
And you think it will not work in the future?
What will change is that you will no longer get updates.
The current functionality will not change:

[Alwyn]

The current functionality will not change:

Info over on DigitalFAQ is that the licencing servers will stop working soon (if a long-term solution can't be found) and the program will then not run.

It is a great pity because VRD was/is a fantastic program and Dan did a great job developing/maintaining it. It will be a real shame if it runs out of puff.

[usually_quiet]

No, I meant your installed version of Videoredo is still working or not?
And you think it will not work in the future?
What will change is that you will no longer get updates.
The current functionality will not change:

From personal experience, if it becomes necessary to re-install VRD for some reason, the license key needs to be validated in order for the new installation to function.

[SaurusX]

The current functionality will not change:

Info over on DigitalFAQ is that the licencing servers will stop working soon (if a long-term solution can't be found) and the program will then not run.

There is a solution to the licensing servers going dark. I've been using it for years now.

[ProWo]

There is a solution to the licensing servers going dark. I've been using it for years now.

+1

[hydra3333]

From personal experience, if it becomes necessary to re-install VRD for some reason, the license key needs to be validated in order for the new installation to function.

There is a solution to the licensing servers going dark. I've been using it for years now.

I'm not into that.

[hydra3333]

More info was posted here, including a Nov 23 deadline for the site certs to expire.
https://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/video-capture/12978-videoredo-activation-servers.html#post86819

[usually_quiet]

I'm not into that.

I am uncomfortable with the idea of going in that direction myself.

I went over to DigitalFAQ to look around and saw that someone had suggested installing VRD in a virtual machine. However, I don't know enough about them to say if a VM can easily be moved from one computer to another and still work.

[hydra3333]

I went over to DigitalFAQ to look around and saw that someone had suggested installing VRD in a virtual machine. However, I don't know enough about them to say if a VM can easily be moved from one computer to another and still work.

At face value it sound like a good idea if you have the Win licensing sorted; the MS free dev kit vm has to be replaced every 3 months IIRC ?
Probably can't run the VM in a batch job though.

[Alwyn]

There is a solution to the licensing servers going dark. I've been using it for years now.

And the value of that comment would be what, exactly? What's the point of saying "I can do it" without telling us how?

[usually_quiet]

There is a solution to the licensing servers going dark. I've been using it for years now.

And the value of that comment would be what, exactly? What's the point of saying "I can do it" without telling us how?

I'll give you a clue. It's a solution that can't be discussed without violating VideoHelp's forum rules.

[netmask56]

TSDoctor is the only one I know of that repairs transmission errors like VRD.

Thanks !

I'm looking at its reviews etc now.
One says

This software does an outstanding job fixing problems in transport streams.
The only issue I have is the CLI is very limited in functionality. You cannot fully automate a task without a dialog box popping up after a repair.

Which frightens me a tad since I need to automate "inspect/repair" inside a batch job (perhaps its CLI then invoked from vbscript).

I wonder if you can tell me if the cli side of things is now more usable in that way, i.e. inside a batch job without any dialog box popping up and disrupting the batch job process ?

I don't know about batch or CLI abilities, I've only used it in it's basic GUI configuration. I first bought it after ProjectX was no longer viable for anything other than standard definition transmissions.

[ron spencer]

I find it hard to believe that there is not a "registration free" version. The developer would not need to register to himself for development, so this has to be available somewhere. I stopped using it at V3. I never upgraded at V5 because of the online activation thing and not needing it anymore.

[hydra3333]

https://videoredo.net/msgBoard/index.php?threads/good-bye.38029/

Dan Haddix:

On Monday I start a new job. At that point I'm going to cease all involvement with VideoReDo.

There is still a chance that Dan's wife could sell the company and that VideoReDo could be revived in some form, but if that happens it will likely be without my involvement.

I have worked on VideoReDo for the past 16 years. It has been a fantastic chapter in my life. But I have to move on.

Thank you all for being loyal users and supporting this product that we put so much hard work into. I wish you all the best.

[netmask56]

PS I downloaded a trial TS-Doctor installer and submitted it to virustotal and got a hit for "Malware-Cryptor.Win32.General.4" from an "uncommon" vendor.

I'd tend to ignore it, however there was a "Timeout" result noted from most of the major antivirus manufacturers which leaves one in a quandary on the basis of not enough reputable information available.

I've been using it since v1! No viruses in all that time from any of the versions or updates. Yes the trial version is time limited. It's widely used in Europe. I use Windows Defender and Malwarebytes. So my guess is it's a false positive. Did yiu download it from their site or from here https://www.videohelp.com/software/TS-Doctor

[hydra3333]

I've been using it since v1! No viruses in all that time from any of the versions or updates. Yes the trial version is time limited. It's widely used in Europe. I use Windows Defender and Malwarebytes. So my guess is it's a false positive. Did you download it from their site or from here https://www.videohelp.com/software/TS-Doctor

Thanks !
I downloaded it from their their site.

edit: I just compared the two and they're byte identical

[usually_quiet]

Earlier today I downloaded the trial of TS-Doctor and the user manual to see if I could figure out to use the software. I didn't have a recording with transmission errors handy so I haven't tested TS-Doctor's ability to make a faulty stream playable. Other than that, I think TS-Doctor could work for me as a replacement for VideoReDo when I am finally forced to find one. I was able to edit a recording and TS-Doctor preserved the ATSC closed captions.

I didn't find TS-Doctor interface comfortable to use. (I am too accustomed to Video ReDo's user interface.) I particularly miss the letter that VideoReDo overlays on the video window to identify the frame type for every frame, not just the I frames.

[hydra3333]

Cool. That gives me confidence in it.

Did you happen to try the CLI in your perusal ?

[usually_quiet]

Cool. That gives me confidence in it.

Did you happen to try the CLI in your perusal ?

Sorry, I didn't try using the CLI. I process and edit any recordings that I want to save one by one, so I haven't tried automating anything.

[Tom Saurus]

It has been excellent software. The owner was a nice man. He offered me a good deal on upgrading but I never took him up on it. I have version four and it has worked well for me all these years since I bought it.

[hudsonf]

I just found out about the sad news of DanR passing away. I installed VideoRedo 5 on my computer today. I haven't been doing any video editing in awhile so I didn't install it on my new computer and I did a clean install of Windows 11 on the computer that VideoRedo was installed on. I used my key to activate and was offered a discount to upgrade to version 6. I kept getting a page not found error so I went to the VideoRedo forum and that's where I learned of Dan passing away.

[hydra3333]

Reference back to https://videoredo.net/msgBoard/index.php?threads/what-now.38039/page-2#post-136523

[Bwaak]

One more reason to never - as much as possible, anyway - use software that comes with strings (keys, servers) attached. This is why I switched from Photoshop to Affinity Photo.