archiving DVDs

[maxse]

Well I finally have my file server together. I have one 250gig drive so far for my movies. Now her eis the question. I currently have a lot of DVDs that I own. But I dont want to have each DVD take up 7 gigs on the drive. I am okay with just rpping out the movie. Before I would use DVDRebuilder for just the movie and compress with CCE. The file would fit on a single layered DVD and it would still be nice quality. Now my question is this. Since I am not archiving to backup DVDs, and will play this from a HTPC I dont need an MPEG-2. So will I be able to recieve better quality if i compress with XVID directly from the DVD as opposed to the method Ive used before? I also need to have the AC3 soundtrack off course...

If you guys are saying that its possible to have better quality with XVID than the CCE method I have used, than what can I expect the size of each DVD to be. Approx how many gigs per hour? Smaller then 4 I would imagine? I appreciate anyone who can help me out with this big decission. Thanks

[Teegedeck]

Yes, MPEG-4 (XviD) reaches a quality even or better compared to MPEG-2 (CCE) at a lower filesize. If fitting the movies on DVD isn't of concern to you, I'd encode at constant quantizer. I suggest using Didée's custom quantization matrix 'SixOfNine' at quantizer 4. As recommended in all cases, keep the defaults, use VHQ=4 and activate as many MPEG-4 ASP features as your PC can take without choking: adaptive quantization (more efficiency, i.e. not absolutely necessary in your case), trellis, quarterpel, even GMC if possible...

In order to keep the full 16:9 resolution of the DVD only crop the black bars off (completely), without resizing, until you reach horizontal and vertical resolutions that are at least multiples of 8, if not of 16, and use XviD's pixel-aspect-ratio setting. If you feel like living a little bit risky for some extra quality, use XviD 1.1 and activate VHQ for B-frames.

If you keep 1 AC3-track filesizes should be - let me make a blind guess - around 2.5 - 3 GB per movie.

[Blue_MiSfit]

just do a constant quant 2 encode with a high bitrate matrix, like sharktooth's new matricies (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=83125). I would reccommend eqm-v3uhr (his ultra high bitrate/q2 matrix).

Qpel... no adaptive quant, maybe or maybe not bframes... etc...

you will be smaller than the dvd, and quality will be amazing.

[Sharktooth]

I can confirm EQM V3UHR was made exactly for this purpose: high quality DVD backups.
My suggested settings are 3000+ bitrate (Max 1 cons. B-Frame) or constant quant2 encoding (with no B-Frames). Follow Blue_MiSfit and Teegedeck (sorry but UHR is really better than 6of9 for this kind of jobs, see the example below) suggestions.

Encoding test.
Settings: Single pass, Target Quant. 2, MSP 6, VHQ 4, GMC, QP, Chroma Opt, No B-frames, Trellis, CQM: 6of9 and EQM V3UHR.

Results:
6of9 - Frame type: P
http://ebola.gamersrevolt.it/temp/6of9.png
Blockiness in some dark areas.

EQM V3UHR - Frame type: P
http://ebola.gamersrevolt.it/temp/V3UHR.png
Picture is crystal clear

[maxse]

awesome,glad to hear its possible to do what I want. I wanted to have a filessize up to 3 gigs, so thats cool that it comes out to be just that. By the way I am a complete newb at this and Im at college now so Ill take a look at this further when I get home tonight. All of these settings youg guys suggested are easy to do right? I just need AutoGK? Thanks

[maxse]

any1?

[maxse]

My suggested settings are 3000+ bitrate (Max 1 cons. B-Frame) or constant quant2 encoding (with no B-Frames).

What really the difference between the two? And should I bother cropping the black bars? By the way the guide on AutoGK should tel lme how to use all this stuff right? Also if im gonna use bittrate 3000 is it gonna gimme a 2-3 gig files size? And wahts the difference of that and using quant2 with no B-frames? Thanks guys

[malkion]

If you're shooting for 3GB, just let xvid know your file size on the 2nd pass, do the 1st pass at whatever settings you like, keep the same settings on 2nd pass. 1st pass does a q2 encode, of course.

I don't think AutoGK allows you to choose the custom matrix. It has it's own.

Setting file size will let xvid encode at whatever bitrate necessary, 3000br sounds about right for 3 gigs with a matrix that starts at a coefficient 8, like Sharktooth's UHR.

Cropping black bars is up to you. There are pro's and con's to this you'll experience if you test both methods. And there are people who advocate either method. Prolly better to just crop it.

I wish there was a bitcalc that calcs for such large file sizes for DVD backups. With a constant q2 encode, there would be no bitrate cap, when you set it to 3000, xvid encodes at whatever quant necessary to keep the avg br around 3000. thats about the main difference.

For me, the visual quality is negligible between 3k to 3.5k br and a constant q2 encode.

Feel free to critique my opinions, of course.

[maxse]

ok thanks man. I just downloaded the regular gordian knot. for Xvid 1.0 right? What should I do now? I just dled eqm-v3uhr, is there any way to import that into gordian knot or something? So ur saying I should do 2-pass right?

*EDIT* By the way should I use 2-pass or 1 pass?
Also if I dont want to specify the filesize just use quant 2. how do I do that on th second pass? It seems to either have me select a filesize or a bitrate.

Damn guys this is so confusing. GKnot has so many settings. Should I crop at all? And what is this compressability above .25? Or is all that overided by the cusotm matrix I loaded? HELP!

Also what resolution should I set it to? same as the original DVD 720X480???

[maxse]

damn guys I am having so much trouble with this. I just read the guide for GKnot I understand that. But i want to be able to use the custom matrices you guys suggested, to achieve optimum DVD backup quality. Can you guys guide me step-by-step like what resolution I should set them to, and that whole compressablility above .25 or something. And for some reason even when I see the Quant =2, I still have to either select a bitrate or filesize? I really need to do this ASAP so I would really apreciate your help. Thank you for your time.

[Teegedeck]

@Sharktooth: I'd be curious to learn about the filesizes produced by EQM V3UHR and SixOfNine here.

@maxse:

Spare yourself the complete resize- and aspect-ratio finding procedure. And the same goes for the whole video-bitrate/audio-bitrate calculation. You also don't use GKnot to save encoding-jobs.

You basically only use GKnot to open the d2v, crop the black barrs off to a resolution that is a mulitple of 8 or ideally 16 and then save those settings to an avs-script.

Again: After you've saved the d2v file with DVD2AVI, start GKnot, click the 'open' button at the bottom-left, open the d2v. Crop off the black barrs, choose 'save and encode' in the preview-window. Click the 'edit'-button at the lower right. Highlight and delete everything that follows the the line "crop(...)". Click 'save'.

Now, open the avs with VDubMod (basic handling explained in Doom9's guides) and configure XviD - set 'quantization type' to 'MPEG custom' which enables you to load custom matrices. And set 'Pixel Aspect Ratio' in the 'Aspect Ratio' tab to 16:9. I explained about the other settings in my first post.

Encoding type: Single pass
Target quantizer: 4.00 [if using SixOfNine, aiming at around 1 GB per hour]

I believe saving and muxing AC3 soundtracks are also explained in the guides.

[Sharktooth]

EQM V3UHR produces a larger filesize (about 1/5 - 1/4 more than 6of9) but since we're talking about fixed quantizers (Q2 or something...) the space is not a problem.

[Mnl]

Originally posted by maxse
I really need to do this ASAP so I would really apreciate your help. Thank you for your time.

If you are in such a hurry I don't think GK is the way to go if the program is new for you. If I were you I'd use AutoGK and just set the quality to 100% (or maximum quality (placed in the "predefined size" dropdown box)- the difference is that the maximum quality option doesn't use b-frames, which results in larger filesizes).

I'd recommend 100% quality over maximun quality, but that's just my opinion.

If some of your encodes end up being larger than 3 GB just encode the movie again, but this time select custom size 3000 MB.

I think you will achieve worse results on your own using regular GK if you are in such a hurry, and as of version 1.70 AutoGK uses Sharktooth's EQM v2 matrix, which isn't a half bad custom matrix.

[Teegedeck]

Originally posted by Sharktooth
EQM V3UHR produces a larger filesize (about 1/5 - 1/4 more than 6of9) but since we're talking about fixed quantizers (Q2 or something...) the space is not a problem.
Here on my end, EQM V3UHR quantizer 4 seems to produce quite exactly the same filesizes as SixOfNine quantizer 3. So I'd rather say it produces a 50% larger output. For a valid comparison I'd humbly suggest to either use a two-pass or compare, say, SixOfNine quant=3 against EQM V3UHR quant=4.

And space is an issue for maxse, actually. He is aiming for something around 3 GB per movie - or at least for a result that is reasonably smaller than the original DVD - and I don't see how you want to reach that with EQM V3UHR at quant=2. And without B-frames to boot.

BTW, it is a vast exaggeration to say that the upper PNG exhibits blockiness - if you use this word in its common meaning as used on the forum.

[Sharktooth]

@Teegedeck: Well i posted just ONE frame... i assure you there is blockiness in 6of9 encode.
The encode size was 6.32Mb for 6of9 vs 7.98Mb for V3UHR (if i remember correctly).
However we're not "fighting" for what's the best matrix and maxse didn't show the appropriate knowledge to do a "manual" encode and use custom matrices.
So i think Mnl suggestion will be more than good for him (for now).

[smok3]

250/4 = 62 dvd-like movies on disk, yeah, i would keep that as mpeg2, why:
- it is really easy to use dvdshrink (less work, less time wasted)
- it is really easy to stay compatible with any dvdish standalone player
- ac3 - mpeg2 mux is standard for dvd and dvd itself is a standard
- you could have problems with interlaced or badly telecined stuff and mpeg4 - again time wasted to think about how to resolve the mess.
- your networked computers will need less cpu cicles to decode the stuff .

ok, so you say you wanna fit more movies?
- get another hd, it will still be cheaper than all the time wasted.

(but of course, if you feel like being experimental then gknot and xvid are two amazing applications.)

[maxse]

thanks teegedeck and every1 else. I am going to follow teeegedeck's advice on hwo to set this up. I actually do have some time, because I feel once I gifure this out, I wont have a problem later on. I just un-installed Gordian-Knot. Im dling VDubMod as we speak. Im not going to bother cropping off the bars because Im not sure I know how to do that well yet.

So is it safe to say that I will only need DVDDecrypter to rip just the movie, and then just VDubMod and the divx codec configured as above to do my rips?

I dont want to use DVDShrink it produces horrible quality especially if I am going to use it on a prjector. I use CCE right now, but decided I can save some space by converting to Xvid directly.

[Teegedeck]

Have you noticed that GKnot actually was part of my 'how-to'? ;)

BTW, I hope you have read the guides I mentioned?

[maxse]

teegedeck, ll read the guides tonight on the VDubMod. I noticed u did say Gordian is necessary but only to crop off the bars right? Im not quite sure how to do that, and I dont really understand what it means? I mean I have a 4:3 TV so wouldnt I get those bars anyway? Thanks again by the way

[Teegedeck]

http://www.doom9.org/guides.htm :)

BTW, if you watch the results on a TV-set you won't notice fine differences in quality, anyway.

[PiXuS]

@Teegeedeck & Sharktooth

I believe it is all a question of compromise. I myself tried many differents CQM recently. If my memory serves me right, I tried SixOfNine, SixOfNine-HVS, Soulhunter V3, Sharktooth's EQM V3-UHR, HVS-Best, HVS-Better and MPEG (at least those). *MY* experience has been that, indeed EQM V3-UHR is the best matrix when looking for high fidelity towards the original MPEG-2 encode.

Though, it sure does come at a price. The file size was much bigger than with SixOfNine (50% more is a lot when we are talking about GB).

Next in terms of quality was SixOfNine @ q=3. The filesize was really competitive compared to the other matrices and the picture quality, by far, better (than the other matrices, not compared to EQM v3-UHR). I mainly used the beginning of the movie The Pianist (R1) and SixOfNine (apart from EQM v3-UHR) was the only one not producing ghosting around the pianist arm when he was doing what he does best (which is play piano).

Edit: fixed a typo (the one I saw ;) )

[Sharktooth]

Now you know what i mean with ULTRA HIGH BITRATE :D

[Didée]

Note my silence.

[Sharktooth]

Sure V3UHR has a higher saturation point than 6of9.
That means a constant Q2 encode will always be bigger (but with better quality) than a 6of9 encode.
6of9 is a really good matrix and it is really competitive when we talk about final file size while V3UHR is better for achieving the "ultimate" quality at the cost of some more disk space (more data = more quality).

[Teegedeck]

This is not the place to discuss how much loss of efficiency would outweigh a gain in quality.

The objective here was an around 50% better efficiency/smaller filesize than MPEG-2 - for playback on a TV-set, as we've learned recently - and this job could be done with XviD's 'standard' MPEG-quantization at quant=3 just fine. No need for custom matrices at all. That's that.

[Didée]

http://img100.exs.cx/img100/7530/non_sense.png

[Teegedeck]

Ahem. I said 'no more discussion about which matrix is better or worse'. :rolleyes: Otherwise it's lapsy-time! (gratuitious Monty Python quote, very probably incorrect. But I mean it.) I can split the matrix discussion into a new thread if you ask for it, but no more of it here, please!

[maxse]

teegedeck im sorry I havent had time yet to play around with this. But I dont just need it to look good on my SDTV because Im going ot be getting a fornt projector in the near future so I dont want to be stuck with all these converted files that dont look as good as the DVDs on a projector.