Interesting NTFS / FAT32 Problem Relating to VOBs

[colebert]

First, props to Derrow, Doom9, and Lightning for their great programs they are kind enough to offer the ripping scene without charge.

I have a problem I thought I'd share with everyone and get a little feedback on. It has to do with a problem I can only attribute to FAT32/NTFS.

Although this is my first post, I have burned about 50 backups and I did a search for similar posts so I wouldn't have to clutter up the board with redundant issues. I couldn't find any.

So here's my setup.

DVDDecrypter (3.1.2.0)
IFOEdit (0.92)
Nero (5.5.9.0)
Pioneer A04
Princo DVD-R media

Of course I have the three popular transcoders, DVDMaestro, Scenarist, Vobedit, etc etc for more complicated jobs, but I'm keeping it the variables low to find out the problem. Let's just assume that the job is a 1:1 backup w/o the need for transcoding.

I have three computers in my house. One is a PIII450, an Athlon 1200MHz, and a P4 1.7GHz. The PIII has a dvd reader that does about 8x, the Athlon has an HP9900 reader, and the the P4 just has the burner on it. The PIII and the Athlon have XP Home with FAT32. The P4 has XP Pro with NTFS and 10K SCSIs. They are all connected together on a 100Mbps network.

I have a 36G Cheetah 10K on the P4 which after you subtract all the porn leaves me about 14G free to hold DVD data as I back them up at 1X. How I back them up is I map the P4's drive as Z: on the athlon and the PIII. Then I run DVD decrptyer on the both computers with the target directory being on the P4. Then I run IFOEdit and prep it for burning. While I'm working/burning on the P4 i'm still ripping across the network.

Sometimes the Cheetah gets full while I'm waiting for the burn to complete. I have a "backup" of about 5 GIGs on the FAT32 Athlon I'll drop a rip into until I can free up the space on the P4 so I can send it over the network. So while its there on the Athlon waiting for the space on the P4 to free up, I'll run IFOedit and create new IFOs, correct the IFO tables, and correct the pointers in the VOB-unit navigation packs.

So once my burn is done I move it over to the P4. I'll open the IFO files once and correct the VTS Sectors just for safetys sake. Then burn it onto a DVD.

Now here's there problem. Backups I've put first onto the Athlon and corrected the IFO and VOBs in IFOEDIT will go crazy in my settop (Panasonic DVD-RV32) but play fine on all three of my DVD drives. What it does in the set top player is go to the first chaper, freeze, skip to the next chapter, freeze, skip to the next chapter, freeze, and so on until it gets to the end of the movie or permanantly freezes.

BUT, if I take the same VOBs and IFOs and correct the pointers, the IFO tables, and create the new IFOs in IFOEdit on my NTFS P4, then burn them, it plays like a champ.

I guess my theory is that VOBs ripped to a FAT32 file system, corrected and sent to an NTFS file system somehow messes the timing up and causes the set top player to reject the DVD. Once you run the IFOEDIT corrections on the VOBs in their new environment (file system) everything is fine.

Has anyone else ever had similar experiences? What do the forum experts think?

By the way, two of the DVDs that this happened to were Rocky I and Austin Powers I. I wondered if it might be bad media, but I put the same VOBs on a high quality memorex DVD-RW and the exact same thing happened. This leads me to believe the VOB data on the disc is screwy, not the discs themselves.

-Cole

[atreides93]

I think I've seen the same thing once. It happened when I was new to using Ifoedit, and I could have sworn I'd done a "get vts sectors" on the files already. All I did was move them around to a different partition. I have NTFS partitions and FAT32 partitions on the same drive. Anyway my copy had the same problem, it would play a few seconds of each chapter and skip to the next chapter.

all I did to fix it was re-run "get vts sectors" immediately before burning it to a dvd-r. so far, i've never seen that problem show up again.
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[mpucoder]

You lost me on where the files are and going, but - at any time do you operate over your LAN? I don't mean copying files, but using them as the output of IfoEdit? There are many known problems with MS file sharing, among them file position and device size being reported incorrectly.

[colebert]

I don't operate IFOEdit over my lan. I have a copy of IFOEdit on each computer and I run it on the Athlon when I have to put the VOBs there and most of the time on the P4 because thats where I have hte most space.

Basically if you just understand that I usually rip over the LAN but IFOEDIT on the same computer where the VOB files are, you can understand where the files are going.


method 1: ATHLON ==ripped over LAN==> P4 if enough space on P4
method 2: ATHLON ==> ATHLON if not enough space on P4

If i use method two, I move the files from the ATHLON to the P4 once the space has been freed, but i've already run IFOEDIT on the Athlon.


Thanks for the replies.

-Cole

[p3distxii]

So while you rip, you're sending the information across the LAN? What on earth possessed you to even try this? Why not use whichever computer you're going to burn on to do the ripping and save yourself some headaches.

I used to use Ifoedit in win98 (FAT32) and now I have switched to XP Pro (NTFS). I've always had success with both. Trying to send a file from FAT32 to NTFS should not be problematic, but let's face it--ifoedit, although good, can be quite buggy sometimes. I'd consider reorganizing the computers you use to just rip and burn without having to transfer any huge files across your LAN.

Good Luck

[colebert]

As you probably know, the A04 has a rediculously poor rip speed. The other computers aren't mine and I can't take the drives out of them. I have 100Mbps LAN speed which means that I can reach 8x rip speed without even saturating the network. Even while using both of my other computers at the same time to rip.


I agree that its not exactly the neatest way to do it, but it works and there's been no real down side except this problem which isn't a big deal if I don't put the files on the FAT32 drive first. In fact, theres been the upside of being able to rip two DVDs at once since that would be impossible using both IDEs on the same computer. (ok, maybe not imposible, but really slow).

Thanks for the input.


-Cole