DVD libraries - how to import to use with WMC Extenders/Xbox?

[jokah]

Hey all,

I do not wish to do anything illegal. So any advice would be of course for people with legal rights to discs, things they made, etc.

1st things first. My son has a library of 10 dvds he makes us drag in the car. However mopar in their infinite wisdom has the dvd player facing the rear.

So, first things first, How could I rip and import to itunes? I have seen piosts for a few programs that talk about ripping into MP4 files.


...So, would a program like DVD fab make one huge compilation/continuous movie? How would I have to select chapers/clips, make them and name them? Is there anything convenient to do it this way?



Second question is how do I import these on windows to be played on media center extenders? I have regedit to mod to allow DVD libraries, making VOB files, then creating images for the files.

I have also read to downconvert, or keep XML info in files, merged, wear a yellow hat and turn around in 3 small circles..





So being the home theater ppls, has anyone found things to work with extendrs, etc?

 

[39 Cent Stamp]

DVDFab makes quick work of ripping the DVD and making it available to itunes/Ipod. It eliminates the previews and puts you right at the movie. I recently purchased it so i could buy a DVD and play it on my laptop and my iphone for air travel. I decided to start buying DVD's again instead of renting/downloading via itunes because hotel internet connections are so slow and i can never get a movie to my phone in time for the flight. Now i just pop into the local Best Buy and get the latest movie and 30 minutes later its on my laptop, my iphone and i have the DVD incase i want to pop it in the DVD player at home.

I dont have any information about merging multiple movies into a single file. I dont think its likely that DVDFab offers this as a feature, i cant find it if it does. I cant help with media player because i haven't opened it on purpose since Windows ME edition.

 

[pete_c]

Are you looking to create a DVD / DiVx CD with multiple chapters / movies with a menu?

For a few years now I have been making "minis" for my HTC phone for when I am flying. I would just do as you mentioned above making a small 200-300 meg movie file. Lately been using BT stereo headset with my HTC phone and it works pretty well. I actually starting doing this a few years back with my Palm Treo then went to my HTC doing similiar. Most newer DVD players (mostly no name brands) will play DiVx files. I have a program that I have been using for years now (can't remember the name) that will take and merge MPG files. I have never tried to merge DiVx or MP4 files with it and will give it a try. A while back I won an IPOD with video playback and portable video glasses. I wanted to see if I could create a few MP4 files for it and it worked fine. Will try a merge and see what happens.

At this time I have purchased one MS media extender but have not tried it yet with my MS Media Center (Vista). I currently would prefer to use a player like a Mediagate to playback my content. Its just a little bit bigger than the Aopen Mini-PC that I am using for media center. I am just upgrading my "old" Mediagate to one that plays HD content.

Most recently I found MS Media Center a bit too slow and kludgy and have gone to a 3rd party application which is nice. It has provisions to utilize the Aopen TV Tuner but I haven't used it yet. It catalogs my movies by going to IMDB and lets me search thru the titles with cover pics much faster than MS Media Center.

A good source of information is vcd help dot com. I actually learned much about authoring my first DVD many years ago from named web site.

 

[DavidL]

"However mopar in their infinite wisdom has the dvd player facing the rear. "

Actually, that's your government to "blame". There are laws that prevent and OEM from showing video in a vehicle that is not in Park. State specific laws....some do, most don't allow.

 

[jokah]

i dont care about the display being from the rear. But they should have an option for a parent to pop a movie in, and press play to start it.

Vs load movie from rear, which i cn do just not safe when driving, then guess when the menu is up, and press Enter to hope it plays (play buttion will not start play).

 

[jokah]

thanks regarding the site, i will check it out.

The ripping to ipod option seems great. It does sound like it will take and make 1 long movie. Any way to break out chapters easily?

As far as dvd library to extenders, that will be handy. I want to retain the menus, etc, i just dont want to have my 1yr old grabbing dvds out and running around the house with them. it will be a surefire way to destroy.

I wish there was a means to make ISO files, and browse them without downconverting or anything. I understand I will get less per HD, but would rathe rjust leave original. Unfortunately due to DRM grey area, no one seems to be touching this?

 

[pete_c]

The old and new Mediagate players do play ISO files. The only thing that they don't have is RF output. They do have HDMI, S-Video, RCA, digital audio and analogue audio. You can rip a DVD and use chapters that are already there. If you want to author your own ISO you can just create a chapter index every 5 minutes or so. That is MPG2 compression though. I would tend to believe you can do the same with the documented DiVx formats out there as I believe over the years DiVx has created their own methodologies emulating DVD play. Again I would refer you to vcd help dot come as most likely there is someone there doing the same as you want to do.

So if you use a dual layered DVD and each 1.5 hour movie at decent compression uses about 700 megs you can fit a "few" movies on the dual layered DVD. Last year (and I believe its a trend now) bought a portable DVD player that plays many formats out there. The reason though that I purchased was that it had a USB and an SD slot. I have tested both memory slots to play movies decently. The R/W of SD cards is getting pretty quick. I have been playing with various OS's on my ASUS netbook booting the OS from SD cards and it works well. The ATOM processory / video on the ASUS netbook also has no issues streaming 720 HD video. Personally I don't burn movies anymore onto DVDs. Not worth the time or effort.

 

[DavidL]

Are you trying to figure out a way for a PC or iPhone accessed in the front of the car can select a movie to play for your kids in the rear of the vehicle?

So, I would assume you would plug the PC's video card, or a hardware extender into the aux Video Input to the factory DVD rear seat monitor?

So...
yes, copying of commercial DVDs (that have encryption on them) to a PC hard drive currently seems to be illegal but very popular....

AnyDVD PC software will do this for you with a "right click / save to hard drive". This can go to VOB files or to a single ISO.

Once on a PC hard drive:
SageTV software could run on the PC and the Sage HD200 hardware extender could physically be connected to the factory aux inputs. You would select your movie to watch on the PC in the front (or from home, for that matter if network connected).

TheaterTek software will render the movie as well but there aren't any hardware extender support.

MediaCenter OS can do this and have extenders that don't seem to be supported very well now a days.

 

[pete_c]

Are you trying to figure out a way for a PC or iPhone accessed in the front of the car can select a movie to play for your kids in the rear of the vehicle?

I do it today with an RDP or VNC wireless (BT or WLAN) from my phone to the PC. A company has just written a Windows Mobile ap that actually is a remote control and I believe it will work in a few ways (not sure about IR blasting but its feasible).
h++p://gbmsoftware.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=35&Itemid=26

So, I would assume you would plug the PC's video card, or a hardware extender into the aux Video Input to the factory DVD rear seat monitor?

With Dual video procs you can have a movie running off of the PC's analogue output and see the regular OS screen on the front display.
So...
yes, copying of commercial DVDs (that have encryption on them) to a PC hard drive currently seems to be illegal but very popular....

AnyDVD PC software will do this for you with a "right click / save to hard drive". This can go to VOB files or to a single ISO.

Why backup your DVD to a 4.X or 9.X Gig file when you can have similiar quality and sound at less than 1 Gig. The Microsoft Mobile movies are all around 200 megs and the quality is just fine for the dinky little mobile phone screen. Its kind of difficult though to see details in a movie though.

Once on a PC hard drive:
SageTV software could run on the PC and the Sage HD200 hardware extender could physically be connected to the factory aux inputs. You would select your movie to watch on the PC in the front (or from home, for that matter if network connected).

I don't watch much commercially broadcast TV but if it creates an easy to chose from DB with covers (like DVD profiler - great program - have had it for years). My current Vista favorite right now is Mediaportal - haven't tried Sage yet. Tried and didn't like: Windows Media Center, Xlobby, Freevo and Myth TV (but its been over the years and not sure what the Linux stuff looks like today).

TheaterTek software will render the movie as well but there aren't any hardware extender support.

MediaCenter OS can do this and have extenders that don't seem to be supported very well now a days.

I bought a Linksys Media Center Extender but haven't taken it out of the box yet. Smaller and faster is better. My Mediagate is the size of a large paperback. You can get smaller with an external HD - SD - USB memory for your video source. I took it on vacation with us a couple of months ago. Worked great for music, videos and inet streaming.

BTW and a bit off topic...I have a friend that works at GM. Years ago GM let him work out of his basement, near HQ though. He had a whole electrical design studio set up for the Corvette. He even put a wind tunnel in his basement. His niche though was electrical design. We spoke often years ago about the intelligent GM bus using BT, etc. One day I went to visit him as we had been discussing some mini pcs in a very small case for a car. While we sat BSing he machined a metal case and modified a small little MB to fit in a space which I needed it to fit. Actually he did two ...one for him and one for me.

 

[jokah]

Cool - well it solves my problem of getting movies ripped and onto an ipod for the little man, so now i just got to figure out what the best way to get a DVD library on a PC

I will look into sage, it seemed like that was for mor estreaming?

Vista MCE can be hacked to recognize VOB files and play like dvd's. The issue is that none of the extenders will recognize them. Is there really no clear solution simply because of DRM issues?

I had seen a REAL player that had the option to play on 4 devices. But I F'ing hate real.

 

[pete_c]

A lot of folks have written applications which will import DVD Profiler xml files. MediaPortal goes to IMDB and creates its own DB (think it uses mysql for it). Its easier for me to scan covers with descriptions using Mediaportal to watch movies than to just read the titles.

I don't know much about Sage. Today I stream music / internet radio content via TVersity and Squeezecenter to an old "Omnifi box" and an old "Roku box". You can stream any video, audio internet content on a number of software packages out there. IE - also like NeroMedia Home. I can stream recorded and live video today from my two "old" Tivo boxes. The roots of some of these publicly available media software is actually XBox.

BTW think I mentioned this before but you can buy a plan old media server (IE: Mediagate, Popcorn hour - they are priced similiar to the Linksys extender that I bought) and not have a HD inside of it but rather just stream the content from a server. This is kind of the ultimate in an extender other than watching TV - think though that someone wrote a plugin a while ago to be able to stream TiVo content on one of these boxes.

Thanks for the FYI regarding the MCE extenders. Will give it a try this weekend.