DarkMatter
13th September 2002, 21:06
First off, if you actually know what you're doing skip this (or at least try not laugh while you're reading it because it really does work).
After a 21 hour marathon of reading, reading, reading some more, ripping, reading, editing, reading, and burning all I had to show was a back-ache, severe sleep deprivation, and a lovely set of 7 iridescent coasters and 2 wonky, incomplete DVD back-ups. Thoroughly convinced of my own incompetense but not willing to give up, I got up on Sunday to give it another go. As I was playing around with "Create IFOs", I started wondering; if this thing really does create ifo's all I'd need from the original source would be a title set. It didn't work at first and then I realized that the new VTS ifo was VTS_01_1.ifo and my VTS's were 04_1. After confiming it with Derrow (thanks!), I changed the VTS number to 01 and it worked! IfoEdit still crashed occasionally but if I close it between each step it is flawless. This method may be well known, but I read (and re-read) all the guides I could find, and none of them layed it out. So, in hopes there is at least 1 other person out there as clueless as I was (or am), here's what I did.
1. Rip the DVD in SR or DVD Decrypter in File mode. Include just the VOB's or alternately, you can include all the files (saves thinking about it).
2. Use a VOB viewing program (VOBrator works for me) to check the content of the VOB's. (Actually viewing each VOB is pretty much academic since obviously, the movie will be in the largest title set and if there are two 3.5GB+ title sets then they are just different formats of the same movie and IfoEdit tells us what format each title set is in. But, I've learned a lot by seeing what's actually in a VOB so I do it anyway.) Move only the VOB set with the main movie starting at VTS_0x_1 (VTS_0X_0 is going to be the firstplay/menu) to a separate folder of any name. Once you're sure you've got all the VOB's you want you can delete the original folder.
3. Change the name of all of the VOB sets in that folder from VTS_0x_1.vob to VTS_01_1.vob (if they aren't that already). Don't change the second number, just the set number. That is, keep the last number reading VTS_01_1.vob, VTS_01_2.vob, VTS_01_3.vob, etc. up to however many VOB's you've got.
4. Open IfoEdit. Hit "Create IFOs". Open the folder with your newly renamed VOB's. Select the first one (VTS_01_1), hit "Save". You need only do this for the first VOB in the folder. This will create a VIDEO_TS.ifo and a VTS_01_0.ifo in that folder. This will take a few minutes. When it's done, hit "Save" and then close IfoEdit (this prevents IfoEdit from crashing on my system).
5. Open IfoEdit. Open your newly created Ifo's (VIDEO_TS.ifo and VTS_01_0.ifo). Highlight the VTS_01_0.ifo. Hit "VOB Extras". Select
"Correct VOB-Unit (Navigation Pack) pointers in VOB-files" and "Correct IFO tables with new VOB-Unit information" also select "Adjust VOB-Unit pointers" and "Adjust Audio/Subp point" This insures,among other things, that FF and RW work on the finished disc (If you want you can choose "Remove Macrovision" and "Remove P-UOps"). Hit "OK". IfoEdit should start processing all of your VOB's. It takes about 5 minutes on my system. If it doesn't, make sure that you've changed your VTS set number to 01 (step 3).
6. Hit "Save" and exit (again, if I don't exit it crashes).
7. Open IfoEdit. Open the Ifo's you've just created. Highlight each one and hit "Get VTS Sectors". This will take no time, you'll
get varifications from IfoEdit immediately.
8. Hit "Save". If you can, check the function of your new set in IfoEdit's DVD player. If you can't (it crashes on my system) use another software player (I use PowerDVD). You can now burn the set with Image Tools and DVD Decrypter. I have had some problems with this set-up leaving off a couple of the last chapters on large files (>4 GB) so, I upgraded to the latest Nero (5599). If you're really paranoid or just really tired of increasing the size of your new coaster set like me, you can burn it to an RW (I quit after the 5th successful back-up).
9. You're done!
Thanks to Derrow and IfoEdit, you now have a clean consice back-up with no extraneous information to confuse you or your player. I've not had it not work except in the case of the files being too large to fit 1 DVD-R. In that case you can strip some streams and eliminate VOB id's of your new set as put forth in the guides. Or, if it doesn't fit and you want to keep with the idiot-proof theme like me or you don't want to lose the original streams and resolution, this method works equally well for splitting a large movie to 2 DVD-R's (at least it did a flawless split on LOTR). The only difference is that you rip only half the chapters (in IFO Mode in DVD Decrypter-I haven't tried it in SmartRipper) at a time to 2 separate folders. Change the name of your VOB's to remove the "PGC" to VTS_01_1 etc.( If you ripped in IFO mode, it includes Program Chains) Or, you can rip them all in file mode and devide the VOB's to two folders after the rip but I have found you get a cleaner split point ripping by chapter. Either way you devide the files you then just treat these two folders as independent movies, following the same above steps. I did keep an "extra" (The Making of...) from a movie that had some left over space on the DVD-R by renaming that VOB from VTS_05_1 to VTS_01_5 (I had 4 VOB's in the movie title set)and this simply made that extra the final chapters of the main movie. I'm sure this method will work for keeping the main menu and I'm trying that out now.
Huge thanks to Derrow for his program. I look forward to learning how to use it right!
Certainly, if someone who actually knows what they're doing would like to interject some wisdom or correct me, by-all-means, do so.
Good luck:)
After a 21 hour marathon of reading, reading, reading some more, ripping, reading, editing, reading, and burning all I had to show was a back-ache, severe sleep deprivation, and a lovely set of 7 iridescent coasters and 2 wonky, incomplete DVD back-ups. Thoroughly convinced of my own incompetense but not willing to give up, I got up on Sunday to give it another go. As I was playing around with "Create IFOs", I started wondering; if this thing really does create ifo's all I'd need from the original source would be a title set. It didn't work at first and then I realized that the new VTS ifo was VTS_01_1.ifo and my VTS's were 04_1. After confiming it with Derrow (thanks!), I changed the VTS number to 01 and it worked! IfoEdit still crashed occasionally but if I close it between each step it is flawless. This method may be well known, but I read (and re-read) all the guides I could find, and none of them layed it out. So, in hopes there is at least 1 other person out there as clueless as I was (or am), here's what I did.
1. Rip the DVD in SR or DVD Decrypter in File mode. Include just the VOB's or alternately, you can include all the files (saves thinking about it).
2. Use a VOB viewing program (VOBrator works for me) to check the content of the VOB's. (Actually viewing each VOB is pretty much academic since obviously, the movie will be in the largest title set and if there are two 3.5GB+ title sets then they are just different formats of the same movie and IfoEdit tells us what format each title set is in. But, I've learned a lot by seeing what's actually in a VOB so I do it anyway.) Move only the VOB set with the main movie starting at VTS_0x_1 (VTS_0X_0 is going to be the firstplay/menu) to a separate folder of any name. Once you're sure you've got all the VOB's you want you can delete the original folder.
3. Change the name of all of the VOB sets in that folder from VTS_0x_1.vob to VTS_01_1.vob (if they aren't that already). Don't change the second number, just the set number. That is, keep the last number reading VTS_01_1.vob, VTS_01_2.vob, VTS_01_3.vob, etc. up to however many VOB's you've got.
4. Open IfoEdit. Hit "Create IFOs". Open the folder with your newly renamed VOB's. Select the first one (VTS_01_1), hit "Save". You need only do this for the first VOB in the folder. This will create a VIDEO_TS.ifo and a VTS_01_0.ifo in that folder. This will take a few minutes. When it's done, hit "Save" and then close IfoEdit (this prevents IfoEdit from crashing on my system).
5. Open IfoEdit. Open your newly created Ifo's (VIDEO_TS.ifo and VTS_01_0.ifo). Highlight the VTS_01_0.ifo. Hit "VOB Extras". Select
"Correct VOB-Unit (Navigation Pack) pointers in VOB-files" and "Correct IFO tables with new VOB-Unit information" also select "Adjust VOB-Unit pointers" and "Adjust Audio/Subp point" This insures,among other things, that FF and RW work on the finished disc (If you want you can choose "Remove Macrovision" and "Remove P-UOps"). Hit "OK". IfoEdit should start processing all of your VOB's. It takes about 5 minutes on my system. If it doesn't, make sure that you've changed your VTS set number to 01 (step 3).
6. Hit "Save" and exit (again, if I don't exit it crashes).
7. Open IfoEdit. Open the Ifo's you've just created. Highlight each one and hit "Get VTS Sectors". This will take no time, you'll
get varifications from IfoEdit immediately.
8. Hit "Save". If you can, check the function of your new set in IfoEdit's DVD player. If you can't (it crashes on my system) use another software player (I use PowerDVD). You can now burn the set with Image Tools and DVD Decrypter. I have had some problems with this set-up leaving off a couple of the last chapters on large files (>4 GB) so, I upgraded to the latest Nero (5599). If you're really paranoid or just really tired of increasing the size of your new coaster set like me, you can burn it to an RW (I quit after the 5th successful back-up).
9. You're done!
Thanks to Derrow and IfoEdit, you now have a clean consice back-up with no extraneous information to confuse you or your player. I've not had it not work except in the case of the files being too large to fit 1 DVD-R. In that case you can strip some streams and eliminate VOB id's of your new set as put forth in the guides. Or, if it doesn't fit and you want to keep with the idiot-proof theme like me or you don't want to lose the original streams and resolution, this method works equally well for splitting a large movie to 2 DVD-R's (at least it did a flawless split on LOTR). The only difference is that you rip only half the chapters (in IFO Mode in DVD Decrypter-I haven't tried it in SmartRipper) at a time to 2 separate folders. Change the name of your VOB's to remove the "PGC" to VTS_01_1 etc.( If you ripped in IFO mode, it includes Program Chains) Or, you can rip them all in file mode and devide the VOB's to two folders after the rip but I have found you get a cleaner split point ripping by chapter. Either way you devide the files you then just treat these two folders as independent movies, following the same above steps. I did keep an "extra" (The Making of...) from a movie that had some left over space on the DVD-R by renaming that VOB from VTS_05_1 to VTS_01_5 (I had 4 VOB's in the movie title set)and this simply made that extra the final chapters of the main movie. I'm sure this method will work for keeping the main menu and I'm trying that out now.
Huge thanks to Derrow for his program. I look forward to learning how to use it right!
Certainly, if someone who actually knows what they're doing would like to interject some wisdom or correct me, by-all-means, do so.
Good luck:)