I've recently gotten biten by the movie sharing bug. I just have a few questions. I've only been looking for DVD-R releases as I would expect these have the best quality (and I've figured out how to rip and burn these). But, I've noticed a majority of releases are just avi files. Is the quality of one of these 700MB avi's or 2 SVCD's as good as a DVD-R rip? Can the avi's or SVCD images be converted and burned onto a DVD-R?

Sorry for being such a noob, just trying to get and idea of what path to follow. Don't want to waste a lot of time with a 4GB DVD-R release, if a 600-800 MB avi can be just as good.

Thanks for your time.

here is your answer...

the dvd-r is better than avi rips, you wonder why ppl prefer avi instead of dvd-r... its becouse its faster download and more easy to spread. when most ppl have 10mbit connections then all avi will dry out, but as all regular ppl are on crappy connections avi will be here for a long time...

you can transform avi to mpeg and burn them to dvd-r there are also applications that you can make menus and chapter + other stuff....

i prefer dvd-r over avi, it may take longer to download but its worth it, most ppl here dont want dvd-r but only avi since they are more easly spread....

gotcha...just making sure I wasn't missing something.

Thx for the reply

nobody has the bandwidth for dvdr thats the problem. Its just not applicable to most people's bandwidth to warrant release in that format.

The thing is with avi is that you only have 700mb to spread, which can easily be done with 128kb/s or 256kb/s upload within a week. With a dvdr, you will be sharing it for a long time and will be commited to that release for ages (4.5GB vs 700mb of comparable quality, 2cd is near dvd qualirt). DVDrs are just not feasible for modern bandwidth limitations, despite how convient they appear.

If your doing a release, consider your upload. If you don't have at least 500kb/s up, then I would not recommend a DVD-r release unless you plan to share it indefinitely. If you plan to share your files for a long time (ie. share and not take out of your shared folder for months, then by all means share a DVDr). On the other hand, a 700mb avi takes several weeks to spread and they offer great quality. A 2cd avi, can over near dvd quality at less than half the filesize. Sure with a dvd you have a great copy and all... but its using the old MPEG2 codec, and it still doesn't look like a DVD9 if it require re-encoding anyway.

For most people, me included, a DVDr release is totally infeasable.... we just do not have the bandwidth (and I'm sure d0c sure as hell won't release a dvdr anytime soon )
The feasability of a DVDr release is totally none existant most of the time

You can make a perfectly decent avi rip of 1cd big, infact you can make a near perfect copy at 2cds big (if that's your aim). Remember MPEG4 is a newer technology than MPEG2 and hence why you can make a DVDquality 2cd avi.

if you are doing a release, then I couldn't recommend more strongly an avi release (see gknot @ http://gknot.doom9.org ), I garantee, if you do a DVDr it will put you off for life, unless you have the bandwidth to waste of course.

Is there a preference for 1cd or 2cd rips?

The next step would be getting them into a format that is playable on my dvd player. Can you burn them onto cdr as SVCD, or do they have to be converted and burned onto DVD?

I assume there is a simple way, since everyone is using these.

I believe the rule of thumb is no more than is neccessary and/no less than garantees quality.

If you have a movie @ ~90mins or less, and without a decent audio track (ie. nothing that warrants AC3), you should aim for a 1cd.

MPEG4 until about a year ago, didn't have standalone compatability, but now you can buy dvd players with support built in if that's your poison, or the xbox plays everything. No re-encoding is required here, once you have made your rip, simply burn it as a file to DVDr (6+ films to a DVDr is sweet ) / CD and pop it in an mpeg4 compliant player.

However, if your dvd player doesn't support mpeg4, you must re-encode avi/mepg4 to mpeg2 and make it into a SVCD that way, or DVD. SVCD and DVD are pretty much the same thing. They are MPEG2, an older and inferior codec to MPEG4, which is capable of better quality at a smaller filesize (hence why MPEG4 xvid/divx are a heck of a lot more popular ).

I prefer Xvid rips over SVCDs for this reason, and normally would go for an xvid rip over an svcd if I had the choice. For a great Xvid ripping tool, you want to be using gknot:
http://gknot.doom9.org

If your daunted by a lot of parameters (but very easy mind), then go for Autoknot which is the dummies version as it were.

Remember format conversion is a very lossy process, with each re-encode, quality degrades substantially. This is the case for DVD9 -> DVD5, DVD -> avi, DVD-> SVCD, avi -> SVCD, avi/SVCD -> DVD. You should always attempt to avoid any form of re-encoding in this way, you get better quality ripping from DVD straight to your selected format.

So if you intend to watch something on an old standalone, then you'll acheive best quality / compression ratio from xVCD varients. The vast majority of people, go for avis since we can watch them on our pcs, via tv-out, on a standalonethat supports mpeg4, a projector, etc. DVDrs don't offer that much notable difference.

When making your own rips, then use DVD9->DVD5/r backup, it will be more convient. When downloading you'll find you hardly ever have the luxury of having the bandwidth, the space and the access to DVDr releases. Avi rips offer great quality and smaller filesize, and xVCDs offer something similar.

It all boils down to circumstance, if you are going to re-encode stuff to an old VCD format, then you'll probably get a better result after the encode if you just went for the DVDr in the first place.

I hate format conversion, both in codec type and in region type.

Thanks for the detailed explanation. It was very informative. I think I'll be looking for a standalone with support for mpeg4 Any suggestions?

As to the multiple files on one dvd, how do you select which one you want to watch? does it treat each one as a chapter or do you have to create a menu of some sort. This sounds very nice indeed.

get a modded xbox to play all your movies on..

burn about 6 .avi to a DVD-r and then the xbox has a menu that you chose which to play

Seems rather expensive just to play movies. I do all my gaming on my PC.

i used to use a standalone divx/xvid player but i run into so many problems with it not playing a lot of the files i bought an xbox ...expensive maybe but it doesn't have to be.....basic xbox and mod-chip fitted is about the same price as some of the more expensive divx players from what i've seen

to be fair, the newer standalones play a lot more than the first crop. As long as you get one that supports b-frames. Xbox is more expensive, and true... consoles suck for games, but you don't end up playing on them anyways

TV-out is a very good option too imo! If you got an ati card, quality is very nice.

ps. pc is the only thing you can play all the best games on, much better than those silly little boxes

i'd still rather have my xbox than my standalone and also my standalone wasn't one of the older ones but it still ran into trouble with Xvid rips of all kind

go go xbox, go go xbox!!..... i am gonna get one my self also.... so called divx players can kiss my maybe its expensive but remember you get to play games alot of them are spread on p2p/bt + emulate nes,snes,n64,sega(sms,md,cd,x32),ps1,mame,c64 & amiga and alots of more old systems, its a winner and easy to instal upgrades on... when windows cs will be done it can be used as a real cheap pc also

yeh id love 1, if anybody gets a good place in uk to get modded xbox and/or chips please post links or info, im very interested, xbox needs a price drop though

http://www.chipit.co.uk/


where i got mine from

Have any of you modded xbox owners come across any files you cant play?

If so, can you post a list?

I've had problems with:

The Beast Within
Jack Frost
Jack Frost 2

I haven't checked the Jack frosts for a while though, these could now be fixed.

everything has worked fine so far....