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And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music. -Frederick Nietzsche

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Ok, I have had my coffee, so you can all come out now!

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Jeremy Falcon

Years ago I ripped most of my purchased DVD collection, to VOB files in AUDIO_TS and VIDEO_TS folders, so if I were so inclined to re-burn them to DVD, these would be compatible with "regular" players.

They're taking quite a bit of room however (4.37GB for a full single-layer disc, twice for dual-layer), and I know the h.265 codec is a lot more efficient than the old MPEG-4 used by DVDs.

I know there's a lot of programs that probably can convert those, even though h.265 is really designed for higher-resolution videos. My problem is trust - can I trust that the conversion will be done correctly? What I mean by that, is that I've seen conversions where audio and video would slowly start to drift, so much that by the time a 2-hour movie ends, the audio is "off" by a few seconds with the video being played back. And I know the source is okay. Worse, if I quickly jump to various parts in the video, this is NOT apparent, so the only way I can really tell whether a converted video suffers from this is to watch it from start to finish.

Obviously I don't want to do that with a few hundred discs.

Has anyone done this sort of conversion before (specifically, with the h.265 codec), and can vouch that the program used does NOT introduce this sort of problem?

I don't really care about preserving menus, extras, subtitles, alternate audio tracks, etc. If I can end up with a single, much smaller .mkv or .mp4 file (over a set of 4+GB folders with multiple VOB files), I'll be happy.

The only one I've ever used is from Leawo.

"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson

"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons

"You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him." - James D. Miles

I have done similar conversions on quite a number of videos, after first copy them to hard disk the way you describe. I tried a few conversion programs, but most recommendations pointed to HandBrake. After trying it, I never looked back.

It does an excellent job. It can handle a great variety of input formats, and a great variety of output formats, including both H.264 and H.265. If your source has multiple soundtrack options, you can select which one to use, and if the output format support multiple sound tracks, you can select several. If your source has subtitle tracks, you can select one to be hardburned (merged into the image itself), or if the output format supports separate subtitle tracks, you can select which ones from the source to include.

HandBrake can convert resolutions, correct incorrect aspect ratios (as you often see e.g. on YouTube downloads), can mask off letterboxing edges. Arbitrary cropping - some movies digitized from analog video have a few 'nervous' scan lines at the bottom of the image. It can convert between a large selection of different video coding formats. For video conversion, you can adjust the quality/result size - and you'll be surprised by how low you can set the quality before anyone would notice any deterioration! (But make sure to use a quality setting significantly above the level where you notice artifacts!)

One 'disadvantage' is that HandBrake really knows to make use of your CPU - every full and HT core, for a long time at 90-95% load. I guess that is one of the reasons why conversion results are so good. But be prepared to go away and do something else (e.g. get a good night's sleep) if you have set up a work list for HandBrake to convert a couple dozen movies Smile | :)

Another 'disadvantage' is that HandBrake has so much functionality that the UI is bound to be somewhat complex. It isn't more complex than it must be to provide all its functionality, but you may feel somewhat bewildered the first few times you use it. There is a 'preview' facility for you to verify that you have picked up the right sound track and subtitle track, the the right cropping and aspect ratio correction etc. - use it liberally, especially until you feel that you have become an expert HandBrake user!

HandBrake does not handle any sort of copy protection, region protection etc., but once you have your DVD/BDs on the hard disk, those problems have been solved, e.g. by using a copy program bypassing such restrictions, or none of your DVDs are from 'foreign' regions.

A couple of final warnings: One of my primary uses of HandBrake is to bring my favorite movies to friends for watching with them, on a memory stick for their smart TV. At the current, lots of my friends have TVs that can display H.264 videos, but not H.265! So usually, I make H.264 copies to the memory stick I bring along (even though a 32 GB stick cannot hold the full quality of BD that makes use the full capacity of the disk).

Second point: Most of my friends' TV sets can interpret .srt subtitle files - but half of them take for granted that the .srt file is inn UTF8 format, the other half that it is ISO 8859-1 (aka. 'ANSI'). When you start watching the movie, to discover that non-ASCII characters come out wrong, it really is disturbing having to dig up some PC with a plain text editor that can read the file in the 'wrong' encoding and write it back in the 'right' encoding, before make a new attempt at playing the video with the .srt file. So when I expect anyone in the audience to have a need for subtitles, I let HandBrake create a file with hardburned subtitles, even though that means they cannot be turned off at play time. (Note: I also watch quite a few movies in other spoken languages than English!)

Maybe both H.264/265 and ANSI/UTF8 issues with the smartTVs of my friends are related to Norway going all-digital TV distribution in 2008, 15 years ago: Lots of the digital TV sets are a few years old. In other countries, where digital TV arrived later, the average TV set may be a lot newer, and prepared for both H.265 and both text encodings.

Or, you may be completely unconcerned about subtitles, as all the movies you watch hav3e an English language soundtrack.

Religious freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make five.

trønderen wrote:
Most of my friends' TV sets can interpret .srt subtitle files

I prefer to include those as additional subtitle tracks in HandBrake when I do the conversion. It also lets you select the encoding (UTF-8 or a bunch of others).

Mircea

Thanks for the thorough discussion.

I'm somewhat familiar with Handbrake, although not all of its nooks and crannies. I was hoping that, once I found settings that worked well enough for a sample or two, I'd be able to just re-use those same settings for all my rips, consistently. But if I have to experiment with different settings for various files...it'll probably never get done.

I can't imagine it's safe to say there's a set of one-size-fits-all settings? In theory, it should be safe to consider all my rips were done in a consistent fashion.

I second trønderen's experience with HandBrake[^]. Getting started is a bit like old school photography: you convert a movie a few times fiddling with filters and bit rates until you get the result you want, just like you used to play with exposure and aperture until the right print came out.

Mircea

"a few hundred discs" wow that's quite a collection . i believe i would have difficulty identifying a fraction of that number i would consider collecting though i do not collect films rather instead music . i would inquire the titles in your collection but of course these text boxes are not large enough .

I'm more of a TV series DVD collector than movies. When one season of a show includes 5-7 discs, it quickly adds up.

A coworker of mine is counting his DVD collection by the thousands. Then he's moved onto Blu-ray (and UHD after that...)

amazing . i am currently enjoying "The Firm" series and am disappointed "Roadkill" w/ Hugh Laurie provided only 4 episodes . i must say i do not understand video collection as i do not receive the same pleasure upon subsequent viewing unlike music .

BernardIE5317 wrote:
i must say i do not understand video collection as i do not receive the same pleasure upon subsequent viewing unlike music .

It's a lot easier to play (and re-play) some music over and over as it's something you can do while doing other things, like mow the lawn or drive to work. Watching a movie or TV series requires more of a commitment (sit down and watch) so I understand where you're coming from.

I'm not saying I constantly rewatch old series repeatedly, but it's nice to have the ability to binge a series without worrying whether it'll actually be there on Netflix to stream when I feel like it. I'm also rather selective - anything I buy is something I've thoroughly enjoyed and would re-watch again, uninterrupted, with no commercial break, etc.

I would add that when a show can be streamed, you don’t know whether the content has been edited to remove an ‘offensive’ scene or some other reason.
I haven’t digitized my DVDs yet and have less than a hundred titles, but I like to have them on hand.
Thumbs Up | :thumbsup:

Time is the differentiation of eternity devised by man to measure the passage of human events.
- Manly P. Hall

Mark
Just another cog in the wheel

Great point.

Didn't someone point out recently that Trump's cameo in Home Alone was edited out in some broadcast of the movie a few weeks ago?

It's not the fact that he's no longer in the movie I'd object to. It's the principle behind it. In this case, it's beyond petty, and nobody needs that.

as for me i take my music listening seriously . i insist on rapt attention while listening to Yuja Wang or Chicago . otherwise though you are quite correct . i destroyed the tape player in my car some years ago as i insisted on playing Kronos Quartet "Pieces of Africa" on every trip . as for video i am fascinated by how the characters / authors will solve their problems . once i see how that occurs it is difficult for me to imagine viewing again as i then know what will occur .

I get that.

For a while, my "repeated go-to" movie was the Lord the Rings trilogy. I think it's one of those rare productions that deserved the awards it got. I must've seen each part a dozen times.

From there, my re-watch count drops precipitously. Smile | :)

[Edit]
Oh, and Band of Brothers. I must've gone through the series 6 times, and if only I had the time, I could absolutely picture myself watching it again.

modified 5-Jan-24 17:03pm.

BernardIE5317 wrote:
i must say i do not understand video collection as i do not receive the same pleasure upon subsequent viewing unlike music .

I guess that I am at the very other end of the line. If a movie isn't worth watchin twice (or more), it isn't worth my time at all. The concept of 'spoilers' (as something you don't want) makes no sense to me. Have you ever heard a music aficionado rejecting a work of music on the ground that he knows how the final chords of that piece sounds?

Books are the same - except that time hasn't allowed me to read all my books twice or more. With a handful of my books, I haven't read my own copy even once: I have read the copy of a friend or from the library, and decided it to a book I want to have available in my bookshelves so I can re-read it whenever I feel like. I can stand by my bookshelves reading the author and title on the back, recalling its contents from memory and smile, or shiver, or whatever the book as a whole provokes of feelings in me.

So I do with movies. Seeing the title, or cover photo of a BD/DVD box brings back a lot of the emotions I had when I watched the movie for the first time, and if time allows, I may sit down to watch that movie again. Even though I know how it ends. A couple movies I watch regularly, such as "Rare Exports Inc." - we play it every winter solstice, and every year I pick up some nice details of the story (/storytelling) that haven't discovered before. (If you don't know the movie, try to get hold of it for next Yule! A great Yule time horror comedy!)

Even if the 'story' is a mystery story, 'Who did it?', and you know that the butler is the culprit, that is not the point (if it is a good movie), but how the author / storyteller gradually builds up the suspense, up to the big finale. You can read/watch and enjoy it again and again, just like you can watch that painting on the wall again and again.

For those who like to read, my favorite short story to illustrate that gradual building of suspense, read Roald Dahl: Taste[^]. (He wrote a lot of stories with surprise endings like this one, "Taste" is the best of those!)

Religious freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make five.

Quote:
I can stand by my bookshelves reading the author and title on the back, recalling its contents from memory and smile, or shiver, or whatever the book as a whole provokes of feelings in me.

I like.
Sometimes I read too fast and mis details, so a second read is wanted.

apparently you have an appreciation / understanding of film i do not . though a few films i have re-watched to wit "2001 : A Space Odyssey" "Paths of Glory" "Lonely Are the Brave" "Blade Runner" "Dr. Strangelove" . perhaps a few others . it seems to be a matter of the "feelings" generated / experienced .

as for books i can re-read a book if i am fascinated by it . however even this is very limited to wit i have read "The Princess Bride" many times in particular the making of the six fingered sword a portion of the story which i consider to be the reason the English language was invented so that it can be told and of course the duel atop the Cliffs of Insanity also "Forever War" and finally "The Right Stuff" w/ exception of course my mathematics / physics text books which require multiple reads for proper comprehension so that i can learn how it turns out in the end .

thank you kindly for the suggestions . i will of course examine further .

Another +1 for Handbrake.
If you are converting mainly DVDs (480 lines) rather than BluRay discs you will get very good quality and lightning-fast, low-cpu, conversions if you have a graphics card with h264/h265 NVENC capability. If doing heavier-lifting encodes, it would appear that pure CPU gives better quality (last time I looked at the subject).
I currently use a GTX 960 which is quite economical to purchase second-hand.
Here is a side by side of a frame from a 480p VOB file (left, 20.7 MB) recoded to h265 (right, 5.5 MB) at a blistering 670 frames per second. No banding or noise in the blacks.
http://www.clumpton.com/uknwebimg/clipboard_2024-01-04_09-14-41.png[^]

So old that I did my first coding in octal via switches on a DEC PDP 8

I'll have a VM doing the encoding job, and I'm hoping I can just queue up a bunch of them using common settings. I can't say I really care much about encoding time; I care more about the output (I realize I'll lose the benefit of any sort of hardware acceleration by doing it in a VM).

Have you found a generic setting that works "well enough" for most MPEG-4 480p input?

If you're encoding to h265 a video bitrate of about a 1000 kb/s should be quite sufficient.
Profile: Main@L3.1@Main. YUV 4:2 Blush | :O

. 8 bit depth.
AC3 should do for your sound needs, though using the original mp2 for simple 2-channel audio tracks could save some time at the expense of slightly larger file size.

It should be possible (with VMWare) to assign a graphics card in pass-through mode to a VM (or even a GPU on a multiple GPU card). If you already have on-board graphics you could simply add an NVidia card for encoding via VM.

Hope this helps

So old that I did my first coding in octal via switches on a DEC PDP 8

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