In the time b4 I discovered ISO...

[brashquido]

...I ripped just about every DVD I could get my hands on using smart ripper (which has file mode only), and in most cases I ripped only the movie section. Back then however I was planning conversions to DivX, not DVD. Since I ripped these movies I've brought myself an A05, and am now wanting to put these movies to DVD-R instead.

I'm not what could be call savvy on DVD structure and authoring, on a scale of 1-10 I'd give myself a 2, I know what a IFO, BUP and VOB file is , and that's about it. To date I've only really experimented with IC7 and DVD2one as they seem to be the most user friendly. However I've found for DVD's of greater than about 5.5GB, you have to start making sacrifices with them in terms of either image quality, or content, and in the 6.5GB or larger DVD's I've been sacrificing both. I'm also a bit suspect on their IFO handling capability.

As I'm very keen on maintaining both image quality and full DVD contents (where applicable as some are only movie rips) I've been wanting to get into CCE/Scenarist conversions. The problem I'm having is DoItFast4U and DoCCE4U seem to be optimised for ISO conversions (something to do with ISO's having all sub channel data, is this right :confused: ) and I haven't been able to find a guide for doing file mode conversions. Is this just a matter of selecting hdd Demux in DoItFast4U and continue as normal?

I'm also am having trouble with seamless branching DVD's. I've ripped the Bourne Identity in ISO, and it seems to be a seamless branching DVD, at least this is my understanding as it lists 2 comma seperated numbers in the "Uses VOB-IDs:" section of the IFO as shown in image. Am I right in thinking this?

http://www.users.on.net/dominic.ryan/ifo.jpg

Also, the section of the DoItFast4U guide (http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/mpg/doitfast-guide.htm) I've been using branches off to what seems to be a very involved guide (http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/mpg/doitfast-guide.htm) for doing seamless branching with Scenarist. I've read through this guide and it seems a bit to heavy for the time I have available. Would demuxing by VOB ID in DoItFast4U also get the same results here?

Any help you could give me would be much appreciated.

[rottweiler]

Well, I can help you with your first problem.
I myself ripped a few DVDs to hdd, before I found out about the wonderful DIF4U/DCCE4U guides.

The easy thing I found to do was to use Nero and burn the data like a DVD on the Image Drive.
It will burn a 6-8GB image, and that can be used in Daemon Tools.
Now I don't think this will work if you just ripped the main movie.
But you should be able to create Video_TS files for them, in IFOedit or something, and then burn it.

Just select the virtual drive in Nero, and then burn like you would a normal DVD, I use DVD-ROM(UDF/ISO)
I have found that's the most compatible for me, but others might disagree.

Make sure to create a Video_TS and an AUDIO_TS folder.
then drop the files in the VIDEO_TS folder.
it'll be a lot more than 4.7GB, but Nero will still burn it, then just choose a file, and you have your image.

There might be another/easier way, but this worked great for me.

I tried using hdd demux in DoItFast4U, but it never worked right.
Although that was an older version, I don't know how the new one will handle it.

Hope this helped, and good luck.
Ted

[Doom9]

@brashquido: I wouldn't know that this movie were a seamless branching one. You didn't show us much of the IFO, so as long as no other PGC uses VOB IDs 1 & 2 you have no problem and can do it by PGC. Hopefully soon, we'll have a much more detaile description of when to do by VOB ID and when not, and also tools that automate the reathoring in even such a case.

[Doom9]

@brashquido: I wouldn't know that this movie were a seamless branching one. You didn't show us much of the IFO, so as long as no other PGC uses VOB IDs 1 & 2 you have no problem and can do it by PGC. Hopefully soon, we'll have a much more detaile description of when to do by VOB ID and when not, and also tools that automate the reathoring in even such a case.
And, ISO mode actually works much better, but if you absolutely must (note that if you still have the DVD it's simply stupid to not use ISO mode) you can check HDD demux, and then select your directory with the VOBs as project directory. And as for why we use ISO, 3 reasons: 1) You will always have your entire DVD source ready if something goes wrong.
2) you cannot accidentally delete an original file you'd still need
3) vobsub cannot handle subtitle streams demuxed during ripping.

[brashquido]

Thanks people :D

@rottweiler

Thanks for the Nero idea, it never occured to me. I'll give it a shot during the week, thanks.:)

@Doom9

The penny just dropped. For some reason I was thinking if a PGC used more than one VOB ID, that made it a seamless branching DVD. After reading your post it came clear it was the other way around, if a VOB ID was shared by more than one PGC, that makes it a seamless branching DVD. It makes so much more sense now, don't know why that didn't click before.