So now that DR. Divx is gone and DIVX is distributing this DIVX create bundle of useless utilities, I’m stuck with “Divx converter” to encode / re-encode my xvid/divx files so they play correctly on my DIVX friendly DVD player. DIVX Converter DOES let me do batch jobs, but I can only select from 4 quality output profiles… Home Theatre being the only one of interest! Sadly, that profile further degrades the sound quality and video quality, which is completely unneeded.
Who encodes DIVX here, and what program do you use? I can manage with the FREE virtualdub for doing single jobs, but not bath work. When I have 40+ files I want to do the exact same thing to, Vdub isn’t practical.
Help?! Apparently DR.Divx is coming back enventually under an open source FREE distribution, but no promises of what I’m looking for and who knows when it’ll even be released.
I do all my encoding on the G5, and generally just make standard DVDs, but if I’m making a bunch for the iBook for the road, I use mpeg4. Can your DVD player do mpeg4?
Yes it can. The thing is, all the files I’m working with are already in some form of XviD or DivX format… For some reason some of their audio and video stray out of sync when played on my player. Oddly enough, on each file a good 15 seconds of video is skipped within the first minute and then the video frame rate slows down to wait for the audio to sync back up. It’s very annoying, and my only surefire method of fixing this so far is to re-encode each file over again… Maybe becuase they were zipped, some info was scewed, I’m not sure. Regardless, the times are already compressed and just need to be re-encoded to fix the syncing.
Whats the compress of MPEG4 like? These are already compressed and they can’t afford to be expanded by much more than ~10% in order to still fit on a 4.7GB DVD.
I’m trying out a mickeymouse program called Auto Gordian Knot 2.2 which somehow combines Vdub, AviSynth, VOBSub, DIVX and XVID utils under 1 GUI, and allows batch, but it’s pretty annoying!
MPEG4?
edit- Oddly enough, this AGK2.2 thing seems to be doing a faster job than anything I’ve tried so far and I can still fir eup firefox and itunes without a delay. I don’t think it’s using nearly the resources as divx converter, yet it’s going 2 or 3 times the speed… Unless it’s on step 1 of 3 or something… Who knows. It’s a pretty weird program!
So what is it you’re trying to do? Take something you’ve downloaded and put it on a single 4.7 DVD?
If so, all I do is decode it and use standard DVD stuff (mpeg2). I use a program called “dvd2one” which is also available for Windows, I think.
You tell it how much space you have, and it makes it fit. I generally keep the DVD menus and extra features and stuff off 9 Gig DVDs, but you can just select the stuff you want and have higher quality.
I can do a 9gig DVD to a 4.7 DVD-R in about 30-40 minutes or so, including copying, decryption and compression. If there’s a problem with audio sync, it takes a bit longer, as I then do a dual-pass encoding.
If the goal is to watch on a DVD player, do you really need to use DivX/Xvid? Why not just author a standard DVD?
Here’s what I do:
acquire the video (either copy/decrypt an existing DVD or download a divx)
Create a 4.7 video_ts folder using either dvd2one (if it’s already a DVD), or something like “handbrake” (if it’s a divx)
Burn the video_ts folder onto UDF 4.7 DVD-R (I use Roxio Toast, but anything should be able to make a UDF volume).
Then it’s playable in any DVD player.
I can see the advantage of having a DVD player that plays the DivX/Xvid – you should be able to just skip step 2 and 3. But if it’s not working, and you have to do more encoding, just go for a standard DVD.
It’s not the length of time it takes to encode that would be the issues, just the amount of playtime per disc… I know and understand the process of decoding, shrinking and encoding/burning a dual layer DVD! I do it all the time… I’m using DIVX becuase it’s a better compression method and therfore allows more hours:minutes of playtime per DVD-R.
Like MP3 CDs vs a standard Audio CD. The quality may be the same, but the amount of playtime is about 10X longer using MP3. That’s the whole point of having a DIVX DVD player, MPEG2 is bloated.
I’m working with seasons of episodes, already downloaded and in DIVX or XVID, but for some reason a little screwed up. I just need them re-encoded to fix the issues they have… I’m not looking to compress them any further, or in another format, I just need them “repaired”.
I could use MPEG2, like you and Eso, but I would only be able to fit about 4-6 episodes per DVD if I use MPEG2. Using DIVX or XVID, all 22 episodes would fit on a standard 4.7GB DVD with lots of room to spare and the quality would be the same if not better because the format and encoding didn’t need to be altered fro the source files.
So, a program that will convert or encode a media file from XVID/DIVX to XVID/DIVX in batches is all I’m after. Dr.Divx was the way to go up until DIVX abandoned it and started distributing a very restrictive replacement called DIVX converter. Until the opensource FREE sourceforge project, Dr.Divx 2.0 is released, I dont’ know what to use. Even then, will Dr.Divx 2.0 satisfy my needs? The task at hand is pretty basic… Almost any encoding program can do it, including the Free 800Kb Vdub, but they don’t do batches!!! I can’t site here and every 45 minutes load up another file to be encoded… Encoding is for when I sleep!
Ok I get it now. You can have 4 or 5 (or more) movies per DVD instead of one. Or put a high quality divx on a 700meg CD-R… Makes sense.
So here’s a question: can you do what you want to do with a command-line program? like ffmpeg or something like that? If so, then you can just do a simple 1 or 2 line batch file to say… encode an entire folder of files.
I’m pretty certain ffmpeg has a windows version. It may even have batch stuff built-in (the Mac version does). If not, then you can do a simple .bat file .
On my G5, I use a program called “DVDbackup” to copy the video_ts and audio_ts folders off commercial DVDs. It removes the CSS encryption (and any macrovision stuff) at the same time.
Is there a simple program like that for Windows? I would like to try this on my new notebook.
DVD Decrypter will decode a rented DVD and dump it to an ISO containing the video_ts and audio_ts. Takes about 20 minutes on my XP3200+.
To shrink the DVD down to fit on a 4.7GB DVD, I use DVDShrink. Shrinking may or may not include removing credits, menus, subtitles, audio languages, etc. Depending on what you want. Both excellent, super easy to use programs. And they’re free.