I'm a bit confused.

I am ripping DVDs to my hard drive for later encoding to VCDs, SVCDs, DVDs,
etc. I also like to watch them directly in WinDVD (open file).

My question is this: Is there any way to simply "un-VOB" a DVD? All the
ripping guides look like this:

Step 1) Rip (I use SmartRipper to get the VOBs to my HD
Step 2) Frameserve (I use DVD2AVI to create a file that TMPGEnc can use)
Step 3) Encode (I use TMPGEnc to create an MPEG-2 file)

Since DVDs are ALREADY encoded as MPEG-2, isn't there a way to just extract
that encoding and save it as an MPG or M2P file? It sure seems like a waste
of time to decode (frameserve) the video to software that simply re-encodes
it. Something is *surely* getting lost in the translation, don't you think?

I thought about DVDXCopy, but doesn't it just copy "VOB-to-VOB"? I want to
simply extract MPEG-2 from my VOBs. I can later re-encode, if need be.

Any ideas?

FlyByKnight

I believe there is a setting in DVD Decrypter that will make one large VOB
file. Then just rename the VOB file to MPG.

Dean Wittke wrote:

Which will not work. A VOB file is not an mpeg file, although it does contain
one.

On 15-Jul-2003, "Dean Wittke" <dwittke@nospam.polymail.calpoly.edu> wrote:

I thought... "no way this is going to work"

I remember reading a while back that you couldn't just rename VOBs once they
are ripped to MPG and watch them.

I'm stunned! I must have been mistaken.

This is great! I use SmartRipper to tweak down into the scene that I want
and rip that VOB. If I need less than one scene, I can frame serve to
TMPGEnc. But most of the time, Just viewing the VOB will work great!

Many thanks!

FlyByKnight

It may or may not work depending on how the VOB file is structured. Again, a VOB
file is not an mpeg file. It's a container.

That said, you can use many software DVD players to view the straight VOB file.
I do it myself all the time without renaming anything. In Linux you can use Xine
or Mplayer to play VOB files.

Keith


FlyByKnight wrote:

On 15-Jul-2003, Keith Clark <clarkphotography@hotmail.com> wrote:

Yep. WinDVD had no problems viewing both the VOB and the renamed MPG.

Thanks, guys. This is what I was looking for.

FlyByKnight