Copy DVD Video to Replay

[wpqueue]

Is anyone aware of a guide to storing DVD video on a DVArchive PC?

Thanks,
WPQueue

[MaxH]

I have a DVD player with the outputs hooked up to my Replay's inputs. I do a manual record, download the show to my DVA server, and I'm done. Once I start doing this more often, I'll probably set up a category "DVA", where I can record movies or move shows, and DVA will download and delete everything in that category overnight.

[MIS-Man]

Yeah - Max's way is the only real feasible way to do it.

[RFontenot]

There is another way that takes a lot less time, but is a little more complex:

1. Rip the DVD into a single VOB file using your favorite tool.
2. Demultiplex the MPEG-2 video and AC3 audio streams.
3. Transcode the AC3 audio to MP2 audio using BeSweet.
4. Multiplex the MPEG-2 video and MP2 audio streams using bbMPEG.
5. Use rtvconvert to change the new *.MPG file into an RTV5K *.MPG file.
6. Import the RTV5K *.MPG file into DVArchive.
7. Watch the movie on your RTV5K!

You'll need to do this using NTFS partitions. A DVD movie is often greater than 4GB in size, which is the max filesize for FAT32 partitions.

The first time I did this manually, it took me less than hour from start to finish to convert a 105 minute movie. The single longest task was ripping the movie. Every other step took about 5-7 minutes each on a 2.8Ghz P4. You could probably automate most of the tasks with batch files and complete everything in less than 30 minutes.


RF

[wpqueue]

Excellent advise all. I think I'll try both methods and see which works best for me.

Thanks again,
Wpqueue

[plyons10]

Originally posted by RFontenot
There is another way that takes a lot less time, but is a little more complex:


It's all about unattended time vs. attended time. The manual record takes all of 3 to 5 minutes of MY time, even if the whole process takes the full length of the movie.

I doubt the VOB conversion, etc. could possible take less of my time than that.

[RFontenot]

It's all about time, period. Recording manually will be the best, least complicated option for many people, but it takes the most time. If you want to archive a dozen DVD movies, you are talking about an hour of attended time, along with 24 hours or more of continuous recording, transferring, etc. The process would likely take a week or more of actual time.

The steps to convert a DVD to RTV MPG can be automated, so attended time is reduced to a mouse click, with a total processing time of around 30 minutes. My PC has dual hard and DVD-ROM drives, so I can process two DVD's simultaneously. So completely processing a dozen DVDs would take about 6 hours, something that could probably be done over a weekend.

While there is some loss in absolute audio quality by going from multichannel AC3 to 2-channel MP2, there is no loss in video quality.

Each method has it's advantages and disadvantages, though, so to each their own.

RF

[electric leftove]

My understanding is that wpqueue wants to store DVD video on a DVArchive PC.

Why not use the freeware product DVD Decryptor to rip the DVD directly to HDD on your PC? No need to use the RTV at all.

If you wish to burn the ripped movie to a DVD+-R use the freeware program DVD Shrink to re-author the movie and cut out the menus, directors cuts etc, and make it small enough to fit on a DVD+-R disk.

This process works great for me. I use an IDE to USB 2.0 dongle to store movies on loose hard disk drives. The dongle was $14 at compgeeks on the web. I keep the drives in a HDD storage box until I want to burn the movies to DVD.

Time: DVD Decryptor can rip a movie to HDD in 2 to 10 Minutes.
DVD Shrink is really fast -2 to 5 minutes.
An eight speed DVD burner usually takes about 7 minutes to record to DVD disk.

[RFontenot]

My understanding is that wpqueue wants to store DVD video on a DVArchive PC.

Why not use the freeware product DVD Decryptor to rip the DVD directly to HDD on your PC? No need to use the RTV at all.


I think wpqueue's objective is to store movies on a PC H/D and then be able to watch any movie at the push of a button from a networked RTV.

RF

[wpqueue]

You are correct. I want to store my DVDs on the DVArchive PC and view them via my networked 5040.

[Slack]

If pusbutton ease for movie viewing is your goal....
Then my advice is...

Get an xbox.
Mod it.
Network it.

Stream ripped DVDs with full Digital Surround (DTS too), 16:9 Anamorphic, progessive output. Subtitles in tact. All Audio tracks in tact. And your RTVs reamin free to record whatever would have been missed by the manual record (if anything).

I'm rapidly moving away from the DVArchive manul dump paradigm I used so heavily a while back.

Even modded another xbox for a 'floater' location.

[MaxH]

Slack, are you saying the XBMC will act like an HTPC for DVDs ripped to its HDD?? That would be so cool. For my TV shows on DVD, I'd rather not have to manually record each episode separately. For movies, I don't mind as much, although on some of them it would be nice to have the extras, too. Tell me more, like can the XBMC play the files if they're ripped to a remote networked machine?

I think I've found my next "project".