How does it affect the audio tracks?

[Stace]

Guys,

I currently rip most of my movies with DVDDecrypter or DVDShrink (Re-Author, No Compression) and then re-encode with AGK, xvid, keeping the AC3 or DTS soundtrack.

Is anything done to the soundtrack whilst re-encoding (compression or anything)? There are some movies I just leave reauthored from DVDShrink because I'm not sure about the audio track. In other words I wouldn't 'AGK' something like star wars because I want to keep audio intact (it may already be and I'm just being paranoid!!).

If theres a way of re-encoding the movie and keeping the audio track 'true', can someone please tell me how. I would like to re-encode all of my dvd's because I'm very happy with the picture quality but am not sure about audio.

Does that make sense???

Thanks in Advance
Stace

[jggimi]

If your soundtrack is left in .ac3 or .dts format, it is unchanged. AGK will only transcode the audio if you select MP3 output.

[Stace]

Thanks for your response.

Thats what I was hoping but unless I'm hearing the placebo effect ;) it sounds a little compressed.

Am I doing something wrong down the line???

[chilled]

maybe its your ac3/dts decoder software.

if you want my opinion, I would NEVER keep a DTS audio if you are reecoding the video. DTS takes far too much space and if you keep DTS it means you dont mind space so you should not reencode a movie to mpeg4 (i.e. "AGK" it).
AC3 5.1 tracks are also too big IMHO if bitrate is something like 448. I suggest you encode audio separately to ac3 320 or, better, encode it to mp3 112 or 128 vbr (abr in fact). I think difference between 5.1 and 2.0 isnt that noticeable but the space saved really IS (for me, again).

take in consideration that you DVD is not the MASTER of the movie, it is an already compressed video. If you really want to backup movies at maximum quality, just dont AGK them. I easily notice differences between dvd video and resulting video, but hardly between original sound and resulting mp3.
If you need CBR sound then consider taking 160 or even 192 for maximum quality

[Stace]

What AC3/DTS Decoder Software would you recommend?

[Stace]

If I want the AC3/DTS track, should I select AC3 in the advanced settings or should I leave as auto?

[jggimi]

From the tutorial:Step 2: By default the first Audio track is chosen....If you go for more than 1 CD encode it will be included unchanged (not converted to MP3) with the video. However, if you are doing 1CD or less encode then it will be automatically converted to ABR MP3 (which is a form of VBR MP3) at 128 kbps....Advanced Settings (step 4) will allow you to select audio settings manually: whether always leave audio as original AC3/DTS or always convert to MP3....Another thing to remember is that if you are using "target quality" mode (step 3) then by default first audio will be left as AC3/DTS.

[chilled]

Im newbie to decoders, but I think ffdshow or ac3filter should do it

[Stace]

Thanks & Apologies
Stace