AutoGK: copy protection causes audio/subs to be out of sync?

[Chetwood]

At least that's the conclusion I've arrived at after browsing a lot posts here and several tests of my own. I've been ripping Weeds S2, Lost S2 and Scrubs S6 with DVDfab HD Decrypter and when I do a preview in DVD Shrink I can see that the eps do not start at 0:00:00 but at 4 or so seconds into the ep during which the screen is simply black. The problem is that encoding these eps in AutoGK results in audio and subs being out of sync since it apparently does not take those 4 seconds offset into account.

The only workaround I've found so far is to cut those 4 seconds manually in Shrink' reauthor mode before feeding each ep to AutoGK which results in audio/video being in sync but subtitles still off. Any better ideas? Thanks.

[setarip_old]

Hi!

As opposed to concluding that "copy protection causes audio/subs to be out of sync" under AutoGK, perhaps it might be that, as I've seen posted at many forums, many times DVDFab HD Decrypter doesn't seem to perform a "clean" rip.

You might want to try different ripping programs/methods and see if you get different/better results...

[Chetwood]

Well, since AutoGK still doesn't handle episodic discs correctly when they are stored as one clip in a PGC (can't imagine why btw, since they're always additionally listed as seperate ep) I thought this might be related. However, I've already tried it with AnyDVD and DVD Shrink with identical results which strikes me as odd. IMO this hints at the clips actually being stored that way on the disc, i.e. they are all in one clip with a pause of 4 seconds between each episode. Somehow the reference to the ep starting timecode gets lost in the process, probably because of the copy protection.

[setarip_old]

I'd suggest you test using RipIt4Me - it does a better job of "cleaning up"...

[CWR03]

Try ripping the episodes individually with DVD Decrypter in IFO mode. You should have no trouble ripping those disks without AnyDVD, with the possible exception of Lost S2.

[Sharktooth]

usually it can be fixed by ripping with DVDFAB HD Decrypter, then use DVDShrink to re-rip from the hard drive...

[Chetwood]

@CWR03
Weeds and Scrubs seem to have more than just CSS that's why DVDD alone would not work.

@Sharktooth
I'd initially used DVDfab HD Decrypter and then Shrink which is what did [b]not[b] work. But setarip reminded me of Ripit4me which I'd already pegged as being ineffective dealing with the new protections. Fortunately I was wrong and it did work! Contray to DVDfab Riptit4me extracts the eps with correct times i.e. they are 3-4 seconds shorter and all timings are correct. I guess I just gotta accept the ripping time of almost 50 mins per DVD, at least it works now.

I still wish Len0x would explain why AutoGK has trouble ripping eps that are in one PGC...

[setarip_old]

But setarip reminded me of Ripit4me...and it did work!You're quite welcome ;>}

[Chetwood]

Of course this solution has other issues: Ripit4me ripped the complete disc with all streams and menus, and I used DVD Shrink to rip each ep with only german and english streams which are all depicted in AutoGK. However, when AutoGK is done ripping with external subtitles I only get the first english stream, the other three are ignored though previously checked in AutoGK. As a workaround I can still extract them from the full disc but this weird.

[Chetwood]

Well, back to square one :(

While Ripit4me did work (sort of) for the DVDs mentioned above I'm now having trouble with my newly bought Scrubs S7 and Grey's Anatomy S4 (for my girlfriend, honestly). Trimming the black 3-4 seconds at the beginning of each episode with DVD Shrink works but now the external subs are too late. I've tried to rip them with VSrip straight from the DVD (using Anydvd in the background), then from my re-authored Shrink rip and with DVD Decrypter. In all cases the subs are too late but confusingly not by the 3-4 seconds I previously trimmed. Any suggestions on how to proceed are welcome. Resyncing subs is a PITA!

[manono]

Did you try CWR03's suggestion from earlier in the thread? If the episodes are all in the same PGC, then decrypt the chapters for each episode, deselecting the rest, putting each episode in its own folder. When decrypting, take note of any very short cells or chapters at the beginning that might throw off the audio and/or subs synch.
for my girlfriend, honestly
A likely story. :)

[Chetwood]

Did you try CWR03's suggestion from earlier in the thread?
Yes but to no avail, I've stripped all cells but one from the first chapter. Stripping one more and the DVD starts with chapter 2.

http://www.dvdshrink.info/chetwood/img/cells.png


So far I've ripped the complete DVD with RiptIt4me and latest versions of AnyDVD and DVDFab.

[manono]

What was the result? It looks like you got rid of that extra 4 seconds which you said threw off the audio and subs synch. The audio and subs still don't synch up with the video?

IDX/SUB external subs are pretty easy to resynch. Lemme know if you need instructions.

[Chetwood]

Audio is in sync but subs are still way off. Apart from me being bothered by having to resync them manually at all I find srt subs far easier to adjust with Subtitle Workshop than idx/subs with subresync but suggestions on how to improve my workfklow are always welcome.

[weaver4]

Sometimes there is so much garbage not related to the video in the *.vob files that it is almost impossible to rip properly in a standard file copy mode. So I made a batch file up the uses mplayer to actually play/stream a file from a DVD to a new vob file. I call it RipMyDVD.bat and here is the content.

C:\Tools\Mplayer\mplayer dvd://%1 -dvd-device g: -v -dumpstream -dumpfile "c:\Rips\%2"

%1 is the title you want to rip (normally 1)
%2 is the filename you want to rip it to
-dvd-device g: -- g: is your DVD drive letter, replace this letter with yours.

So from the command line you execute it like this: RipMyDVD 1 mymovie.vob

To find out the title number you can run pgc.net which can be found here: http://www.clonead.co.uk/ . Just pick the longest title and you should be OK.

A word of warning the mymovie.vob file can be very large, up to 7G+ so you need to do this on a NTFS; FAT32 won't cut it. Once you have the vob file you can encode it with xvid, divx or x264.

good luck.

[manono]

Apart from me being bothered by having to resync them manually at all...
But who are you mad at here? Surely not AutoGK? As far as I know, the same problem will occur with any DVD2AVI program you use. I don't do TV series DVDs so I don't see this particular problem.
...I find srt subs far easier to adjust with Subtitle Workshop
Except for the fact that you have to take the time to do the OCR, and then usually fix any mistakes you made. This takes time. Maybe you already know the method, but here's how you fix the IDX to adjust for the delay. Open the IDX and write in the delay before the timestamps begin. Since not all players will honor the delay when done like that, it's a good idea to open the edited IDX in SubResynch and save it again to have all the timestamps reflect the delay. Below you'll see the before and after with a positive 4 second delay used as an example.

[Chetwood]

If I'm mad at anything it's the darn industry that still thinks they can stop me from doing whatever I want with the content I paid for by adding pointless copy protections. I'm saying pointless cause eventually I succeeded in ripping those DVDs to my media center, because of these problems it only took longer.

Still there's some problems with AutoGK (or rather the tools it uses) as well, cause playing back a single ep ripped with DVD Shrink (and AnyDVD in the background) in PowerDVD results in synced audio and subs! There seems to be some messed up info left in the IFOs throwing AutoGK off, that is giving me a hard time.

Problem is, I haven't yet managed to read the proper offset from the original files. So I'm doing OCR (which is actually less work than expected since a lot of DVDs use the same Arial font) simply to find that offset (which also means I do not need to proofread them). Being able to shift subs by 100ms steps in Subtitle Workshop makes it easy to see instant results compared to having to save them first in subresync, especially as only one stream is saved despite both streams in the file being adjusted.

[manono]

Being able to shift subs by 100ms steps in Subtitle Workshop makes it easy to see instant results compared to having to save them first in subresync, especially as only one stream is saved despite both streams in the file being adjusted.
Using Media Player Classic (Home Cinema), it works to show the delay with it still written in, so you can easily make the small incremental changes you describe before finally saving the results in SubResynch when you get it the way you like. This can prove useful when you prefer the sub font, size, placement, color, etc., of the IDX/SUB over the generic settings of an SRT file. I don't have a sub file to test with 2 languages on it so I don't know what the problem might be with a second language, but I think it can easily be overcome. Maybe you only have to "turn on" that second stream.

[Chetwood]

Haven't checked on the Home Cinema version in a while so where is this setting? Play > Decrease Rate? Cause when I do that my computer (XP SP3) completely resets and I'm back to the POST message which is reproducable. There's also no way to "turn on" the second stream in Subresync: you can easily switch between all streams in the opened file and adjust the timings separately but when you save the file only the stream currently selected has it's new timings saved with the others at their original timing. Seems to be a bug.

[manono]

Haven't checked on the Home Cinema version in a while so where is this setting?
I meant that when using MPCHC to play the video with subs using Direct VobSub, it honors the delay as written into the IDX. So you can easily make the slight adjustments in the IDX until you get it just right when testing using MPC, and when it's right save the IDX/SUB in SubResynch. The only reason I mentioned that particular player is because it's my default player and it also honors the delays written into the IDX (like the pic on the left several posts up). I'm sure other players can do the same thing.
...but when you save the file only the stream currently selected has it's new timings saved with the others at their original timing. Seems to be a bug.
Right, and you might have to save the IDX/SUB twice, once for one language and then open the saved one and save it for the second language. But I still don't have any multiple language IDX/SUB with which to test.

[Chetwood]

Ok, I was hoping the delay would be displayed as overlay or something (+100 ms). Considering Subresync I actually do do have to save the idx/sub twice to different filenames since saving to the same file doesn't work cause the file is already open. Which means this is another one in a long list of workarounds that's disrupting my regular workflow (rip single eps with DVDD -> encode in AutoGK). I really do hope AnyDVD/DVDFab is getting better at fixing ifos messed up by current copy protections to save me from all this extra work. After all, ripping stuff to my Media PC is supposed to be a matter of convenience. With that much of a hassle I might as well play DJ instead and watch my originals...