[mythtv-users] video formats

Nick Rout nick.rout at gmail.com
Fri Jul 30 02:55:43 UTC 2010


On Fri, Jul 30, 2010 at 2:53 PM, Nick Rout <nick.rout at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 30, 2010 at 12:04 PM, Brian Wood <beww at beww.org> wrote:
>> On Thursday, July 29, 2010 05:37:37 pm Nick Rout wrote:
>>> On Fri, Jul 30, 2010 at 11:28 AM, Christopher Kerr
>>>
>>> <mythtv at theseekerr.com> wrote:
>>> > On Wed, Jul 28, 2010 at 10:15 PM, Tim Coote <tim+mythtv.org at coote.org> wrote:
>>> >> Hullo
>>> >>
>>> >> I've got a separated mythtv frontend/backend based on a couple of acer
>>> >> revo boxes + fedora 12 standard packages (mythtv 0.23). These devices
>>> >> don't have dvd drives, so I'm ripping on macs and pulling the files
>>> >> into the startup directory for mythvideo.  For some dvds I can just
>>> >> copy across the VIDEO_TS directory and all's well (once I installed the
>>> >> libdvdcss package, which was non-trivial to work out as a necessary
>>> >> component). For others this doesn't seem to work, so I'm ripping the
>>> >> dvds to mpeg ts encapsulated video stream using vlc, ignoring the dvd
>>> >> menu and just playing the video. However, when I rip like this, I get a
>>> >> 6GB file (clumsy to move around the house) and the forward / backward
>>> >> arrows just crash the internal video player.
>>> >>
>>> >> Should I be using a different encoding and/or encapsulation?  Or is this
>>> >> a known bug (I've seen something that may relate to left/right arrow in
>>> >> video playback.
>>> >>
>>> >> It would help me if I understood how to pull out small segments of a
>>> >> dvd, to run tests on, if that's possible, so that I don't spend a
>>> >> couple of hours ripping/transferring before I realise that I've got the
>>> >> wrong format. Is it possible to pull of bits of a dvd - I cannot seem
>>> >> to just transcode the VOB files, for instance, as these do not play
>>> >> back reliably.
>>> >
>>> > I think most of us are now using MakeMKV - just google it, it's a free
>>> > tool which can take a title from a DVD, ISO or VIDEO_TS folder and
>>> > remux it into an MKV which works perfectly in the internal player.
>>>
>>> Nice product but closed source and when they get out of beta I suspect
>>> you will have to pay for it. It may or may not be worth it.
>>>
>>> It must check home too as periodically I get a message "this version
>>> is out of date, you must update" or words to that effect.
>>>
>>> As far as just ripping a dvd, try:
>>>
>>> mplayer dvd://n -dumpstream -dumpfile mydvd.vob
>>>
>>> where n is the title you want to rip.
>>>
>>> Then you can use avidemux or handbrake to transcode if desired. I
>>> prefer h264 in a mkv, it comes out much much smaller.
>>
>>
>>
>> I confess I haven't been following this thread, but I just use handbrake to rip the main title from a DVD to an h264-
>> encoded MKV file, it even gets the chapters right.
>>
>> Did I miss some problem with doing that?
>
> No I just didn't know it would do it straight from the dvd, having the
> chapters is excellent.
>
>>
>> I looked at MakeMkv, but having to answer "yes" to something that looked like it was written by the Microsoft Legal Dept.
>> just went against the grain for a Linux application. I won't use it, especially as I have a working alternative.
>
> Yes, but useful for post dvd material (bluray etc).
>

PS makedvd does not do any transcoding. It decrypts, rips and
repackages to mkv. Even when it rips a dvd it encapsulates the mpeg2
video into an mkv container. Useful for bit perfect ripping to use
with storage groups, which won't do iso.


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