DVD Copy Suite (DCS)

[kolonel_71]

Here we go again. Another product on the market. Testing disc now, will let you all know.


DVD Copy Suite

Get it from

www.d-c-s.info (http://www.d-c-s.info)

[thop]

Interface looks very clean, various options, can de-select streams, allows for custom compression between 0-100% (or Fit to DVD), decrypts/transcodes on the fly, can also burn the transcoded DVD or write to an image.

... very slow! Progress bar moves 1% every 2 minutes on my XP2700+, on a 7200MB Disc (Family Guy Season 1 Disc 1).

update: progress bar after 10 minutes: 3% complete, 6% current. estimated remaining time is 6 hours !! the quality better be perfect! :)

ps. this should probably become a sticky.

[JonRead]

This has actually been debated about on the DVD95Copy forum. Some say it is ripped off code and others say it is legally purchased code, but it is certainly a modified version of DVD95Copy.

A bit like the software called "MakeDVD", a DVD2One cloned copy, but may be legally obtained code (but may be not too).

[thop]

Why is it so horribly slow then?

update: it appears the software has a crappy read engine .. i tried my other dvd drive and remaining time is "only" 1 hour now. if that's a dvd95copy clone than of the disc it goes :)

i'd really like to know though what engine it uses to burn dvd if that is ripped as well.

[TheJez]

Interesting, especially regarding this statement on their site:

THIS IS WHAT DCS DOES:

- Transcoding of complete DVD videos (needs approx. 30 minutes, depending on the size of the DVD)
- Movie Only-Copy (copies just the main movie of a DVD video - transcoding needs approx. 10 minutes, depending on the size)

[mrbass]

http://www.dvd-backup.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=659
Kinda like dvd2one which licensed their code to another company who renamed it under some other name. So what's the difference? Maybe it doesn't have that hardware id security thing.

[Toona]

well if it's legal and not a stolen ripoff then how is the quality? better worse than DVDshrink or DVD2One. Might have to try this one out!

[molman2003]

I was asked this question earlier in the week

see here

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?threadid=55553&goto=newpost

Apparantly it is very similar to dvd95copy

[DMagic1]

If this is legal then I'm glad to see it. DVD95Copys hardware reg system was causing a lot of paying customers headaches from what I've seen at its forum.

BTW, I'm trying the demo now on The World Is Not Enough.

Update*
The movie came out pretty good considering I keep all extras and resized them to 25, 30, and 50 %. Its about the quality I would expect from DVD95Copy. It took about the same amount of time(52mins) with other stuff running on my machine.

[kolonel_71]

Well, i have done 2 discs to harddrive, both looked awesome and took about an hour to rip, encode and copied to hard drive.

But when i try to open DVD file on hard drive, run them through PowerDVD i get the following message :

DVD Error

Error Code : 89030000
Unknown file format

Never had this before with other movies.

Any thoughts ??

[DMagic1]

Are the files in a VIDEO_TS folder? Not that it should matter, but you can try that.

[molman2003]

I installed it and tried it.
I ripped the featurette from crouching tiger and it created a VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS folder with the vob and ifo files in it.
Ran it through Power DVD and it said no disc in drive g!!

No ideas as to why it would do this.

I have now uninstalled it as I am v. happy with shrink

Steve

[mrbass]

Originally posted by kolonel_71

But when i try to open DVD file on hard drive, run them through PowerDVD i get the following message :

DVD Error

Error Code : 89030000
Unknown file format

Never had this before with other movies.

Any thoughts ??

yep definitely it's dvd95copy. That's one of the reasons amongst others I quit using it. You wanna get rid of it? Uninstall PowerDVD and when installing it again don't put any updates in for PowerDVD. I've never had that error in any other program I've used.

Having said the above dvd95copy is used by quite a few who are quite happy with it and get excellent results.

[DMagic1]

They have release an updated version 1.08.012 that has some fixes.

[DMagic1]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by kolonel_71

But when i try to open DVD file on hard drive, run them through PowerDVD i get the following message :

DVD Error

Error Code : 89030000
Unknown file format

Never had this before with other movies.

Any thoughts ??
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Originally posted by mrbass
yep definitely it's dvd95copy. That's one of the reasons amongst others I quit using it. You wanna get rid of it? Uninstall PowerDVD and when installing it again don't put any updates in for PowerDVD. I've never had that error in any other program I've used.

Having said the above dvd95copy is used by quite a few who are quite happy with it and get excellent results.

Well it seems that error only comes up if you rip straight from the disk. It doesnt do that if you run from a dvd already decrypted to the HD.

[molman2003]

That would explain it

[DVD-BACKUP]

I can just confirm that DCS is using a LEGAL part of dvd95copy. But DCS is about a lot more than just transcoding, It is a full featured bit of kit, it rips transcodes and burns, Its not bad at all, and easy enough to use.
The main thing i wanted to clear up though was that it is legal :)

[DMagic1]

Yeah, it was confirmed awhile back to be Legal. Maybe no one in this forum posted the info so thanks. On that note, doesnt DCS get a sticky topic?

[Richk50]

Acording to Oxdeadbeef:
"I relied on the measurements of german magazine c't here. The comparison of DVD95Copy (1.5 Beta1) and DVDXcopy Xpress (2.0.0) showed exactly (!) the same bitrate and JND values for the 40 seconds test sequence they compared. They concluded that 321 Studios (Xcopy Xpress) probably bought a licence from DigiMedic (95Copy)."

DVD95Copy really gets around.

[DVD-BACKUP]

I can say with 100 % certainty that Digi did NOT sell or give any code to 321 studios, and he said as far as he knows, they havnt used any of his code, so i guess its a fluke that the results came out that way.

[Richk50]

Oxdeadbeef:
"DVD95Copy and DVDXCopy Xpress use the same engine. Both tools created JND values and bitrates slowly jumping between original quality/bitrate and very bad quality/bitrate."

If Digi sold their code, it's Possible they have a non disclosure agreement with DVDxCopy and can't publicly reveal it.
Don't you think that's more likely than coming out exactly the same using 2 different testing mechanisms for the 40 seconds of the test?
I guess anything is possible.

[DVD-BACKUP]

Well the info i got was in a private conversation, i truely beleave its not the same software.

[Richk50]

Sorry. I didn't mean to sound like I was questioning you. It might be they came up the same formula.

[DMagic1]

One problem I have noticed is that the preview feature doesnt work for me directly from the disk. I can preview the menus fine but not the main movie or extras. When I preview them the picture is all messed up and the sound is distored. If I transcode directly for the disk the picture is still messed up. None of these problem exist for me if I decrypt to the harddrive first. Anyone else have these problems?

Oh, I almost forgot. It will not preview anything unless I play a few seconds of the movie with my player first. So I think its a decrypting problem.

[DVD-BACKUP]

Yep thats right, he is fixing this bug though.

[DMagic1]

Good, I was wondering if it was just me. I hadnt seen anyone else mention it.

[DMagic1]

A new version is released. Version 1.08.026
The site hasn't updated the page with a list of changes but the link does go to that version and not 1.08.012.

Update:
It seems none of the older problems have been fixed. Direct from disk still doesnt work properly. I'd be interested in seeing what was fixed in this release.

[abatis]

On the issue of a 40 sec sequence having the saming properties between DVD95Copy and whatever,(ie., same engine) one sample does not mean anything statistically. It could be pure coincidence. Nine runs coming out the same - that would be significant. Do not be fooled by small data sets that are essentially meaniless.:)

[Richk50]

I've read that most transcoding algorithms are actually pretty simple and based on publicly available work. They probably came up with the same formula.

[0xdeadbeef]

I've read that most transcoding algorithms are actually pretty simple and based on publicly available work. They probably came up with the same formula.

This is nonsense. Using a stronger quantization is of course a (more or less) simple thing to do, but deciding _where_ to do this and how much without changing picture quality too much is a science in itself.
The idea to use some kind of pulse width modulation (bad, good, bad, good) instead of a proper algorithm might not be so unique (since DVD2One does something similair), but if two programs produce exactly the same JND and bitrate behaviour in a randomly selected selection of a randomly selected movie it is more than unlikely that this is a coincidence.

[XCPU]

Progress bar moves 5% every 3 minutes on my P3.3c, on a 10000rpm SCSI Disc with 80M SCSI ADAPTER.
Does it look good?

Total elapsed 44:42 to compresse a 7.5G dvd to 4.37G.

[DMagic1]

Yes, completion time is usually between 45-65 mins depending on the DVD.