IC and Title Stripping - Read Here for Advanced Tips

[DVD Maniac]

I have been using IC since it was releassed and although it is an impressive tool - it is still not doing Title stripping correctly (even the latest release).

It must be said that success is really down to the standalone player you are using. I have an older Pioneer player that seems to accept "messy" structures time after time and play them with ease. Not so my Philips 880 which is just about the fussiest piece of kit I have ever bought.

Having read the various posts on this subject, many are claiming that IC does Title stripping OK and their player accepts and plays all IC results, title stripped or not. Well all I can say is you have the luxury of owning a forgiving player. For those like me who have a fussy player (or who have the foresight of thinking ahead to the time when they upgrade their kit to an unknown quantity) then read on.

I agree with MisterX on this subject - IC does not create compliant structures when Titles removed, period. Anyone who disagrees I can send them endless examples of failed results.

I recommend using MisterX's guide on how to deal with Titles that you do not want to keep. They cover just about every eventuality - well almost. A structure that still causes problems is the following -

Example -

Title Set 1 - PGC 1 - VOB1 (Unwanted Extra A)
- VOB2 (Wanted Extra B)
- PGC 2 - VOB3 (Unwanted Extra C)
- PGC 3 - VOB4 (Wanted extra D)

Title Set 2 - PGC 4 - VOB1 (Main Movie)

If you do an Ifoedit strip of vob's A and C you will get -

Title Set 1 - PGC 1 - VOB1 (Blank vob playback)
- VOB2 (Wanted Extra B)
- PGC 2 - VOB3 (Blank vob playback)
- PGC 3 - VOB4 (Wanted extra D)

Now try doing your IC process and it will give you an error of "Index out of range". Thats because it cannot find PGC 2 and the Title that the VIDEO_TS.IFO says should be there. PGC 1 is OK because there is still a valid vob entry in that PGC.

The solution to this is not straightforward, but here goes.

(a) If you have a PGC with multiple vob's like this, but one of the vob's is small and can be kept then keep it! You will then avoid the IC Index error.


(b) If you MUST remove all the vobs from the PGC becuase they are large and would compromise your quality then there more work to do -

1. Do your Ifoedit strip as required
2. Open up Ifoupdate and set the "Original" IFO to your source IFO (the one you had before stripping) , the "Authored" as the Ifoedit strip result. Make sure you backup up your original IFO
3. Set IfoUpdate to "Cell Mode" and process the IFO (no Get VTS yet)
4. Open up your Original IfO and look at the PGC overview - it should be unaltered.
5. Open up VTS_PGCITI and go to the PGC you have stripped. If it had multiple vob's change the number of Programs and Cells to "1" then go back to the overview (you should now just have a single entry in the PGC overview).
6. Go back to the VTS_PGCITI and make the following edits -

Playback time = 82

Cell Playback Block

Playback time = 82
Entry point sector = 0
VOBU end sector = 0
start sector of last VOBU = 0
last sector of this cell = 0

Cell position in VOB Block

Cell 1 has VOB ID = 1
Cell 1 has Cell ID = 1

7. Check the PGC summary and you should now have a single frame entry in the edited PGC linked to vob 1
8. Now replace your IFO's and BUP's in the stripped path with the ones you have just edited (make backups of those as well so you can go back if it does not work or you miss a step)
8. Finally do a Get VTS sectors

Your IC scan should now work fine as the PGC entry is still intact with a dummay single frame entry. You will probably find that IC still sees the ORIGINAL size of the deleted Titles despite the fact that they have been removed - just do your usual IC settings and all should work fine.

[MackemX]

where's the rest of info DVD Maniac on how we fixed it? :D

did you press Post instead of Preview? :)

[DVD Maniac]

Yes - all there now

[MackemX]

couldn't have said better myself :D

[MackemX]

since you pointed out this IC error to me a few days ago DVD Maniac it has been puzzling me and after working out the problem between us I have now isolated the actual cause after a little bit of playing :D

I couldn't understand why you got the error yet I didn't when I remove VOB ID's and I've done over 40 DVD's with IC

I have now found out why IC reports the fault as my Ice Age DVD has the multiple PGC's in a titleset similar to your 007 DVD's and these PGC's have no entries under one second so all would need removing and create problems

basically if you remove all the VOB ID's from the last PGC in a VTS_0x_0.IFO you need to recreate a dummy entry afterwards, if you remove all VOB ID's from any other PGC then IC accepts it

so in the example shown by DVD Maniac, PGC3 must have an dummy cell inserted if all the VOB ID's are removed. Removal of PGC1 & PGC2 should not cause IC to report the 'List index out of bounds(x)' error. x seems to be the PGC thats wrong minus 1, but that's just a guess :)

I've added a guide to my others Ifoedit guides just in case anyone is remotely interested in using them using the info from DVDManiac :)

I was gonna take them down but I'll leave them for now for the benefit of the users who want to strip only certain parts but need guidance, until the other 3 programs can all eventually removing PGC's without causing problems or another one comes along

cheers DVDManiac :D and I appreciate the input/feedback from you regarding this problem cos if it wasn't for you then it would never have been sorted

[DVD Maniac]

Your revised guide explains the approach very clearly - hope others appreciate the effort.

One small point, my fussy Philips will still not like any Title Set with an empty PGC, regardless of whether its the end one or not. When the disc is inserted it seems to scan the entire DVD structure and hangs if it cannot locate all the Titles referred to in the VIDEO_TS.IFO. Its taken me ages to figure this out following a number of failed attempts. So even if I have a middle PGC with an empty entry that IC accepts - I will still have a disc that will not play on this player. Life's a bitch ain't it.

So for those who own Phillips DVDR880's (and probably other fussy players) I recommend that you use MisterX's revised guide for dummy PGC entries, but do it for all PGC's that end up empty after an Ifoedit strip.

Maybe one of these tools will get Title Stripping done properly, some day.....?

[MackemX]

good point DVD Maniac as I thought my Sony was a fusspot!

it seems your player is the Hyacinth 'Bucket' of the DVD Standalone world :D

I'll add your findings to the guide and let this be a warning to all those who will be buying a DVD recorder in the near future as I'm sure a few will, cos I'm looking to get one soon ;)

cheers bud

[hakko504]

That's 'Bouquet' ;)

I loved that show. (http://us.imdb.com/Details?0098837)

[MackemX]

yep, was a great program

updated the guide to include all PGC's removal I think :confused:, but surely there is an easier way to retain the program/cell entries

I've tried all sorts modding the IFO to find a simple answer but got no joy, I'm hoping an advanced user will post and say click this, this & this, sorted! :D (2COOL?)

[mcentee]

Mister X - great guides, but still tough to follow...

For ifoedit7 and ifoedit8, removing all the vob-ids in a PGC, am I right in thinking that now pgc_2 plays the first x frames of the original vob-id 1, ie the first 12 frames of pgc_1. Most of the time I might expectthe first few frames are normally blank/black, but you might notice a quick flash of something ?

[MackemX]

I've never seen anything when I changed it and yes that is correct it will play those 2 frames, but if it isnt in the build up to the main menu, you may never even get to play that Title

0.12secs is not that noticable if at all, and I'm sure you can get it smaller

I've normally used 64 instead of 82 as playback time and that produces a time of 00:00:00.00

so maybe DVD MANIAC or someone else with a simlar machine to his 'Bouquet' machine could try it and see what happens

IC accepts 64 but I don't know what happens until I process a DVD with these PGC's to see what happens when IC hits that point :confused: (back in 5 with an answer to IC crashing in not)

cheers

[DVD Maniac]

Did you come up with an easier fix for full PGC removal and fusspot players?

I'll just stick to the Ifoupdate method otherwise. I'm done with my 007's now - but I will almost certainly come across similar structures.


My new Moto -

Plan for the future because the future is probably already with you.