Ripping blu-rays and playback

[dkane360]

So I would like to start ripping my blu-ray collection to put on a hard drive(s), and I wanted to get some feedback on my plan. I plan to get an external Asus Blu-ray drive that can rip MKV's using my Macbook Pro. Then I'll probably get an external 2TB drive to store them. To play them back is what I'm concerned with. When I rip the BR to an MKV, will it have DTSHD and DolbyTrueHD still on it? Or would it just be a 5.1/7.1 uncompressed PCM? I'll probably be using MakeMKV unless someone has a better alternative. Would you recommend getting one of the WDTV boxes to playback the MKV's? Would they bitstream the lossless codecs?

Thanks!

 

[jinjuku]

It is a bit of an involved process.

Check out this thread

Personally I just use MyMovies + AnyDVD to rip to ISO

 

[dkane360]

Thanks Jinjuku. None of that really applies though because thats all on windows 7 and using a htpc. It also keeps saying

The server is too busy at the moment. Please try again later.

lol. I can bootcamp windows 7 if I need to, but I'd rather not.

Does anyone know if the WDTV Live can bitsream DTSHD and Dolby TrueHD? I've seen a lot of people asking online, but no one seems to have a definitive answer.

Does anyone have experience with the Popcorn Hour A-200?

 

[dkane360]

Anybody have experience with Dune products? I'm considering the Dune HD Smart D1.
http://store.duneplayer.com/shop/item.aspx?itemid=12

 

[adk highlander]

Does anyone have experience with the Popcorn Hour A-200?

I just got the C-200 and so far I am very happy. I've just build a media server running Server 2003 with 4 2-TB drives in RAID 5. I've got around 6 TB of space. I'm using YAMJ as a jukebox for play back and the skins and graphics are amazing. I'm ripping my BR's to BDMV folders. Right now I'm using AnyDVD to rip the full disk and Clown BD to extract the movie only.

The A-200 would do all the playback that the C-200 does it just has less options for expansion.

 

[dkane360]

I just got the C-200 and so far I am very happy. I've just build a media server running Server 2003 with 4 2-TB drives in RAID 5. I've got around 6 TB of space. I'm using YAMJ as a jukebox for play back and the skins and graphics are amazing. I'm ripping my BR's to BDMV folders. Right now I'm using AnyDVD to rip the full disk and Clown BD to extract the movie only.

The A-200 would do all the playback that the C-200 does it just has less options for expansion.

Do you have any problem with audio skipping or delays? I'm trying to decide between the C-200 or A-200 and the Dune HD Smart D1.

 

[adk highlander]

Do you have any problem with audio skipping or delays? I'm trying to decide between the C-200 or A-200 and the Dune HD Smart D1.

I have not had any issues with playback. I've been watching movies from the server while ripping blu-rays on the server with not issues at all. I have a serious RAID card which helps tremendously for handling the load on the drives.

The only issue I have had at all was this morning when I booted up the c-200 I had an issue with the menu not filling the screen. I rebooted the unit (full power down) and it cleared up. I'm going to get an A-200 for pushing media to other rooms in the house.

 

[jeffsg4mac]

I have this program but I don't have a blu-ray drive so I have no idea how good it works.

http://www.macblurayripperpro.com/

 

[Red Barron]

It is a bit of an involved process.

Check out this thread

Personally I just use MyMovies + AnyDVD to rip to ISO

Thanks for the link. I have been trying to figure out how to make useable files for MyMovies on my media server. I can rip the silly things, but they either will not play or they play and have no audio.

 

[jinjuku]

Thanks for the link. I have been trying to figure out how to make useable files for MyMovies on my media server. I can rip the silly things, but they either will not play or they play and have no audio.

What OS (XP,Vista,Win7)? How much have you been tweaking it (if any)?

Does a straight up DVD play? I donated $50 to MyMovies and use AnyDVD-HD. This lets me go straight to ISO vs Folder.

If the DVD plays in Media Center just fine then it should play from Folder or ISO fine. Are we talking about DVD or BR?

 

[Red Barron]

What OS (XP,Vista,Win7)? How much have you been tweaking it (if any)?

Does a straight up DVD play? I donated $50 to MyMovies and use AnyDVD-HD. This lets me go straight to ISO vs Folder.

If the DVD plays in Media Center just fine then it should play from Folder or ISO fine. Are we talking about DVD or BR?

I am using Windows 7 64 bit.

I have tried quite a few things, the latest of which was installing AC3 Filter and Core AVC. I can now play 720 rips just fine on both PC's, but the 1080p to MKV rips either play too fast (on my quad core gaming PC) or too slow (on my Acer Aspire Revo R3610).

I have tons of hard drive space and don't mind using it if I have to rip to a large format, but I have no flippin' idea where to go next.

Edit to add: I can play the file fine if I use VLC on my gaming machine - I don't even have it installed on the HTPC since I try and keep that machine very clean. I can not play it the WMC on either machine.

 

[krzywica]

Do you have any problem with audio skipping or delays? I'm trying to decide between the C-200 or A-200 and the Dune HD Smart D1.

There are pluses and minuses to both options I guess. If you go with the dune you will spend a bit more for what you get and if you want to use a jukebox you are pretty much stuck with Zappiti which is easy to setup but limited as far as customizability (is that a word?). If you go with the PCH you will spend less money and have several jukebox options available. If you are doing a stand alone system with just a USB drive then I would look at UMC or Oversight as they are both dynamic jukeboxes that do not require a batch job to be run to update the data like YAMJ. They are however slower as the device has the do all the calculations in real time and less customizable. Let me know if you have any questions as I have extensive experience with many different media streamer devices.

 

[jinjuku]

I am using Windows 7 64 bit.

I have tried quite a few things, the latest of which was installing AC3 Filter and Core AVC. I can now play 720 rips just fine on both PC's, but the 1080p to MKV rips either play too fast (on my quad core gaming PC) or too slow (on my Acer Aspire Revo R3610).

I have tons of hard drive space and don't mind using it if I have to rip to a large format, but I have no flippin' idea where to go next.

Edit to add: I can play the file fine if I use VLC on my gaming machine - I don't even have it installed on the HTPC since I try and keep that machine very clean. I can not play it the WMC on either machine.

Sounds like a CODEC issue. Try installing the Demo version of Power DVD Ultra. Let me know if that will play back.

 

[Red Barron]

Sounds like a CODEC issue. Try installing the Demo version of Power DVD Ultra. Let me know if that will play back.

Just tried that (I had power dvd 8 already, but I installed 10 to be sure) and no change. It seems (on the game PC) to be playing at about 3x normal speed.

 

[jinjuku]

Just tried that (I had power dvd 8 already, but I installed 10 to be sure) and no change. It seems (on the game PC) to be playing at about 3x normal speed.

The one thing I have learned in messing around with this type of stuff is to make use of the system restore feature.

That is set a restore point before installing CODEC packs and the such.

I would check and see if you have a restore point that you can go back to prior to all the CODEC packs and such. After the restore point simply install Power DVD 10 and see what happens. It's the KISS theory here: Keep it simple Simon

 

[digicidal]

A little late to the party maybe...

I'm not sure about the playback capabilities in OSX... however all of the latest HD formats are now supported by the MKV container and are (under Windows at least) fully accessable via FFShow and a few others.

I'm not 100% sure of the conditions/settings for MakeMKV (haven't researched yet) but I would guess that the audio is either preserved in it's pure format or is converted to FLAC and then passed to your processor/receiver as an LPCM stream - there *might* even be an option to determine which method was used. But I'm not totally sure on that.

I've never bothered trying to use my Mac as a media frontend - I consider WMC (in Win7 at least) to be about the only piece of Microsoft software that even comes close to being worth the hassle of the OS. That plus I love MediaBrowser - even if it is pretty buggy... it's freakin' beautiful.

 

[dkane360]

I'm not sure about the playback capabilities in OSX... however all of the latest HD formats are now supported by the MKV container and are (under Windows at least) fully accessable via FFShow and a few others.

I'm not 100% sure of the conditions/settings for MakeMKV (haven't researched yet) but I would guess that the audio is either preserved in it's pure format or is converted to FLAC and then passed to your processor/receiver as an LPCM stream - there *might* even be an option to determine which method was used. But I'm not totally sure on that.

I've never bothered trying to use my Mac as a media frontend - I consider WMC (in Win7 at least) to be about the only piece of Microsoft software that even comes close to being worth the hassle of the OS. That plus I love MediaBrowser - even if it is pretty buggy... it's freakin' beautiful.

MakeMKV will let you rip the lossless audio, as well as any other audio format that the disc has. One thing I learned is that lossless is NOT the default setting on MakeMKV. After I rip it, I have full playback abilities of the blu-ray rip using vlc. I'm not planning on using my mac for playback though. I will be purchasing a Dune Smart H1 and installing a 2tb hard drive in it.

 

[digicidal]

That makes sense actually...

I'm sure lossless not being the default audio stream is intentional, although possibly counter-intuitive to users of this particular forum due to the intended audience of MakeMKV. Since by far most users are undoubtedly looking for a way to 'permanently borrow' a BD movie for playback on a PC which is unlikely to have a decent surround system connected - and to minimize the file size (although when you're encoding a 1080p video signal at 20-40GB+... size of the audio stream seems almost a rounding error).

Good to know however, since I'll need to check for it each time if I start ripping BD's for my HTPC. (I'll need to add a couple more 2TB drives for that to happen however).

 

[dkane360]

I'm sure lossless not being the default audio stream is intentional, although possibly counter-intuitive to users of this particular forum due to the intended audience of MakeMKV. Since by far most users are undoubtedly looking for a way to 'permanently borrow' a BD movie for playback on a PC which is unlikely to have a decent surround system connected - and to minimize the file size (although when you're encoding a 1080p video signal at 20-40GB+... size of the audio stream seems almost a rounding error).

Good to know however, since I'll need to check for it each time if I start ripping BD's for my HTPC. (I'll need to add a couple more 2TB drives for that to happen however).

Yea I'm starting with a 2tb drive, but that will quickly be expanding lol. I'll be going through and documenting the whole process once I pick up the dune if you would like to see it. I will probably start a new thread for it.

 

[digicidal]

I will be purchasing a Dune Smart H1 and installing a 2tb hard drive in it.

If it were possible to thank you 100X for that one line of text... I would. I nearly had to change my pants after reading about the Dune Smart Duo...

Please do post your thoughts on using the H1 and let me know because that looks like exactly what I've been searching for... Hi-res FLAC support, full 7.1 uncompressed handling from MKVs... as well as handling nearly EVERY subtitle format... I had to check for a pulse to make sure I hadn't died.

So the only thing left to make me sad - is if the interface is absolutely craptastic or it has lags, etc... if it's firmware is well written as well... I can say goodbye to having to deal with Windows 'issues' forever.