AVStoDVD Support Thread

[manolito]

Some ideas for future releases of AVDtoDVD:

I just finished testing most of the free one-click DVD conversion software, and AVStoDVD (v. 2.1.2 alpha) was among my favorites. Still I would like to see some improvements .
(Please remember that I have never used the software before, so my findings kind of come from an outsider's perspective.)

1. The predefined automatic profiles take a while to get used to, but they are certainly helpful for beginners. But the high bitrate profile using QuEnc CBR should be modified. In this profile the Trellis option is always active. NOT GOOD!! In QuEnc the Trellis option mostly makes no sense at all, and the rare cases where it might acually help quality are those low bitrate encodes of complicated, hard to encode sources. Many people (including me) even think that Trellis is broken in libavcodec. To a lesser degree I also question the usefulness of the HQ option at average bit rates above 6000 kbps.

2. Luckily the automatic modes can be switched off individually for each file. For HC there is an advanced mode, but not for QuEnc. I would really like to be able to use the QuEnc VBR modes with 1 or 2 passes here and there.

3. I read that using Aften for AC3 audio conversions is already in the pipeline, so this is probably redundant.

4. The menue creating stuff using BatchMux is very nice. The only thing I miss is the option to not use thumbnails at all. Just setting width and height to 0 does not work. Maybe add a "Disable" option to the properties for thumbnails and the "Play All" button?


Alright, that's my wish list. Would make an already excellent program even better....

Cheers
manolito

[MrC]

Manolito, thanks for your review and suggestions. To answer I will use same numbering.

1. In QuEnc 0.75 Alpha, trellis quant is disabled and trellis checkbox is used to activate multithread encoding. It is written also in AVStoDVD help section...

2. I have forced QuEnc only for CBR encoding because I believe that HCenc is vastly superior as VBR encoder. What would be the improvement to have VBR encoding in QuEnc? From your experience, is there any movie situation in which QuEnc VBR would be preferred than HCenc VBR?

3. Will do

4. Do you mean having menues with labels only? Like FAVC menues? If I remember correctly, somebody else asked me the same feature sometimes ago... so, I will put in ToDo list

BTW, many many thanks for your suggestions. I hope you will keep on looking at AVStoDVD and help its development.



Bye

[rendez2k]

Originally Posted by MrC

4. Do you mean having menues with labels only? Like FAVC menues? If I remember correctly, somebody else asked me the same feature sometimes ago... so, I will put in ToDo list

It was me and yes please

[manolito]

Thanks MrC for looking into my suggestions!

1. In QuEnc 0.75 Alpha, trellis quant is disabled and trellis checkbox is used to activate multithread encoding. It is written also in AVStoDVD help section...

You got me !!! Usually I am the one always preaching "Read the f... manual"

2. I have forced QuEnc only for CBR encoding because I believe that HCenc is vastly superior as VBR encoder. What would be the improvement to have VBR encoding in QuEnc? From your experience, is there any movie situation in which QuEnc VBR would be preferred than HCenc VBR?

Oh yes! SPEEEEEED is the difference. I have always been a big fan of QuEnc's one-pass VBR mode. Used with the right matrix the quality is quite impressive. I do agree that HC does mostly deliver better quality than QuEnc, but on my old 1.1 GHz Pentium 3 the cost is about 6x higher encoding time.

BTW I discovered that it is possible to use custom quant matrices in QuEnc under AVStoDVD. Just run QuEnc before AVS2DVD, specify a matrix and close QuEnc. The matrix setting is retained and QuEnc actually uses this matrix under AVStoDVD. Nice!

4. Do you mean having menues with labels only? Like FAVC menues? If I remember correctly, somebody else asked me the same feature sometimes ago... so, I will put in ToDo list

Yes, exactly. But with the ability to move around the labels and modify fonts and colours (I did not find a way to do this in FAVC)

And another thing I forgot to mention in my previous post:
I tried to find a way to translate the user interface into German, but VB is not very friendly in this respect (a resource editor cannot be used here). Would you consider moving the string resources to a text file which can be easily translated?


Cheers
manolito

[wg]

DeVeDe(http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=142973) may be easy to use for a novice, but it has a known bug which produces significantly undersized encodings, this is the same for both the Linux & Windows versions(I have found even setting 5-10% oversize produces an output of between 1.8-2.3GB when used with a 7oomb quality XviD file from my own backup collection) It also only offers 1 pass encoding. As for DVD Flick I gave up on that about a year back, I found it incredibly buggy, & if you check the forum it still appears to be. Software selection is very subjective but AVStoDVD uses some of the best tools available, and is imho the leader in this particular field.

Keep it up MrC

[sharkatec]

Hello all and offcourse MrC,

i'm new here and found this thread and program just a few days ago. First of all,great work and effort MrC and all the others. i don't know if it will work what i'm trying to do but i'm trying as we speak. I have a blue-ray backup on my hdd. I've made a new single m2ts file with 1 videostream,1 audiostream and 1 subtitle. Now i've loaded it into AVStoDVD to see if it's managable to get a DL DVD out of a blue-ray backup with ac3 and a subtitle. Maybe has someone else tried it but from what ive been reading it's more about avi's. Forgive me if i didnt read it through all the many postings.

Maybe u can shine your light on this matter what i'm trying to do MrC.
Keep up the good work.

[rendez2k]

Originally Posted by sharkatec

Hello all and offcourse MrC,

i'm new here and found this thread and program just a few days ago. First of all,great work and effort MrC and all the others. i don't know if it will work what i'm trying to do but i'm trying as we speak. I have a blue-ray backup on my hdd. I've made a new single m2ts file with 1 videostream,1 audiostream and 1 subtitle. Now i've loaded it into AVStoDVD to see if it's managable to get a DL DVD out of a blue-ray backup with ac3 and a subtitle. Maybe has someone else tried it but from what ive been reading it's more about avi's. Forgive me if i didnt read it through all the many postings.

Maybe u can shine your light on this matter what i'm trying to do MrC.
Keep up the good work.

I'd say this is the wrong tool for the job - try RipBot264 (I assume you aren't trying to convert a BR to DVD format, rather back up a DL DVD in BR format?). This really is for avi -> DVD. It won't handle BR.

[sharkatec]

Originally Posted by rendez2k

I'd say this is the wrong tool for the job - try RipBot264 (I assume you aren't trying to convert a BR to DVD format, rather back up a DL DVD in BR format?). This really is for avi -> DVD. It won't handle BR.

no,i'm trying to make from a blue-ray backup a DVD,i've stripped the backup,so ive now a m2ts with just 1 videostream,1 audiostream and 1 subtitle. As of now,AVStoDVD is handling it and i don't know the outcome yet because it is still busy encoding,but AVStoDVD recognised the m2ts (mpeg2)file,it also recognised the ac3 audio and the ripped srt file.

The outcome is still not sure yet

[MrC]

Originally Posted by manolito

Oh yes! SPEEEEEED is the difference. I have always been a big fan of QuEnc's one-pass VBR mode. Used with the right matrix the quality is quite impressive. I do agree that HC does mostly deliver better quality than QuEnc, but on my old 1.1 GHz Pentium 3 the cost is about 6x higher encoding time.

What about adding an option to be able to pause process, prompt the user (a simple form with a textbox) to edit cli parameters (QuEnc, HCenc, maybe BatchMux) and then resume process? That should satisfy most advanced users needs.
And think seriously to upgrade your system: multicore cpus really do improve video encoding time.

Originally Posted by manolito

I tried to find a way to translate the user interface into German, but VB is not very friendly in this respect (a resource editor cannot be used here). Would you consider moving the string resources to a text file which can be easily translated?

Wow! Are you really willing to translate AVStoDVD?!? Great! I agree that VB is really unfriendly and my code is horrible, but the idea to have text files as languages resources is very intriguing. Absolutely to do, even if the wish list is so loooong...



Bye

[MrC]

Originally Posted by sharkatec

no,i'm trying to make from a blue-ray backup a DVD,i've stripped the backup,so ive now a m2ts with just 1 videostream,1 audiostream and 1 subtitle. As of now,AVStoDVD is handling it and i don't know the outcome yet because it is still busy encoding,but AVStoDVD recognised the m2ts (mpeg2)file,it also recognised the ac3 audio and the ripped srt file.

The outcome is still not sure yet

Keep us informed about the outcome. If you can, copy&paste here the log file or send it to me by email.



Bye

[manolito]

What about adding an option to be able to pause process, prompt the user (a simple form with a textbox) to edit cli parameters (QuEnc, HCenc, maybe BatchMux) and then resume process? That should satisfy most advanced users needs.

Sounds very good to me..

And think seriously to upgrade your system: multicore cpus really do improve video encoding time.

I know, I know... My system is ancient, but it is stable as a rock. I am the "Computer Doctor" for a couple of friends with much faster machines, but most of them have stability problems due to overheating in the summer, unreliable RAM etc...

Wow! Are you really willing to translate AVStoDVD?!? Great!

Absolutely! I have translated a lot of utilities into German in the past. The easiest way is when you can use standard resource files, because you can resize text boxes if the translated strings are longer than the original strings. But I believe VB does not support this.

Using indexed text files for the string resources is also workable, but then the translated strings cannot be longer than the original ones. Can be quite challenging if the target language is German...

And I absolutely refuse to do any translations using a hex editor on the executables...


Cheers
manolito

[sharkatec]

Originally Posted by MrC

Keep us informed about the outcome. If you can, copy&paste here the log file or send it to me by email.



Bye

well,the program just stopped when it was beginning with encoding the subs. The program have made 2 seperate files so far,1 mpeg videofile and 1 audiofile,but AVStoDVD stopped by itself and never got to author a DVD.
here's the logfile.

<23-11-2008 20:48:22>
START PROCESS
<>

<23-11-2008 20:48:22>
DVD SETTINGS
DVD Titles number: 1
DVD Video Standard: PAL
DVD Chapters Interval: 5 min
DVD Menu: No DVD Menu
DVD Size: 8100/8100 MB (100%)
DVD Output Setup: DVD Folder

Delete temp process files: Yes
Delete working files: Yes
Save Log file: Yes
Output Folder: C:\Downloads\test
<>

<23-11-2008 20:48:22>
TITLE 1 SOURCE FILES
Video: D:\Downloads\!RnE - 2008.11.17 15.41.43 - bd-tm1\bd-tm1\BDMV\STREAM\00000.m2ts
Info: VC-1 - 0 kbps - 1920x1080 - 16:9 - 23,976 fps - PPF - 2:16:10 hours - 196087 frames
Audio: D:\Downloads\!RnE - 2008.11.17 15.41.43 - bd-tm1\bd-tm1\BDMV\STREAM\00000.m2ts
Info: AC3 - 640 kbps - CBR - 48000Hz - 6ch - 2:16:18 hours
Subs: D:\Downloads\!RnE - 2008.11.17 15.41.43 - bd-tm1\test\test.srt
[MediaInfoLib - v0.7.7.6]
<>

<23-11-2008 20:48:22>
AVISYNTH SCRIPT
Video = DirectShowSource("D:\Downloads\!RnE - 2008.11.17 15.41.43 - bd-tm1\bd-tm1\BDMV\STREAM\00000.m2ts", convertfps=true, audio=false)
Video = Video.ConvertToYV12
#Using DGPulldown to upsize FPS
Video = Video.Lanczos4Resize(720,576)

Audio = GetChannel(DirectShowSource("D:\Downloads\!RnE - 2008.11.17 15.41.43 - bd-tm1\bd-tm1\BDMV\STREAM\00000.m2ts", video=false), 1, 3, 2, 5, 6, 4)

AudioDub(Video, Audio)
<>

<23-11-2008 20:48:22>
START VIDEO ENCODING OPERATIONS
Encoding Profile: QuEnc CBR 1-pass
Target Video FileSize: 7735 MB
QuEnc Parameters: -i "C:\Users\Manuel\AppData\Local\Temp\00000_0_Title_01.avs" -o "C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.m2v" -b 7942 -1 -hq -novbr -scene -trell -aspectratio 16:9 -nointerlaced -mpeg2mux noaudio -dc 10 -priority 5 -auto -close
<>

<24-11-2008 11:01:01>
END VIDEO ENCODING OPERATIONS
Created File: C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.m2v (7742,4 MB)
<>

<24-11-2008 11:01:01>
START TRANSCODING OPERATIONS
ReJig Parameters: -size 7735 -o "C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.ReJig.m2v" -i "C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.m2v" -auto -close -quiet
<>

<24-11-2008 11:08:50>
END TRANSCODING OPERATIONS
Transcoding excuted on File: C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.m2v (3137 MB)
<>

<24-11-2008 11:13:48>
END PULLDOWN OPERATIONS
DGPulldown executed on File: C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.m2v (3137 MB)
<>

<24-11-2008 11:13:48>
OUTPUT VIDEO INFO:
Filename: 00000_0_Title_01
Filesize: 3289352430 Byte
Format: MPEG Video
Time: 2:16:18 hours
Compression: MPEG-2 Video
AvgBitRate: 3218
Resolution: 720x576
Aspect Ratio: 1.778
FPS: 25.000
Interlacement: PPF
Frames: 204447
<>

<24-11-2008 11:13:49>
START AUDIO ENCODING OPERATIONS
QuEnc (Audio) Parameters: -i "C:\Users\Manuel\AppData\Local\Temp\00000_0_Title_01.avs" -o "C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.ac3" -priority 5 -1 -nohq -novbr -mpeg2mux novideo -audiocodec AC3 -audiobitrate 192 -auto -close
<>

<24-11-2008 18:38:17>
END AUDIO ENCODING OPERATIONS
Created File: C:\Downloads\test\00000_0_Title_01.ac3 (187,2 MB)
<>

<24-11-2008 18:38:17>
START SUBS ENCODING OPERATIONS
SubtitleCreator Parameters: "C:\Users\Manuel\AppData\Local\Temp\00000_0_Title_01.srt" -p3 -i"C:\Program Files\AVStoDVD\SubtitleCreator\Examples\VTS_01_1.IFO"
<>

<24-11-2008 18:43:51>
PROCESS ABORTED DURING TITLE 1 SUBS ENCODING OPERATIONS.

CHECK LOG FILE <C:\DOWNLOADS\TEST\00000_0.LOG> FOR MORE INFO.
<>

<24-11-2008 18:43:51>
Log file created by AVStoDVD Release 2.1.1
<>

I'll try again to see if AVStoDVD going to the end next time.

[MysticE]

Decided it was time to road test AVStoDVD Using 2.1.1 (not the latest), by doing a few movies in hopes of helping the always gracious MrC improve his baby.

First some background. Most of the AVI/MKV's floating around are 25 fps which I convert to NTSC. The 'Trim' function is a nice touch, unfortunately you cannot use it correctly without a workaround, using the enclosed viewer to determine/change the end point.

For an x264 file I tried it says 219250 frames, yet the preview shows 262833. Due to the source being 25 fps but the final conversion being NTSC is at about 30 fps. I thought maybe right clicking the source from the main screen-> Preview title output, would yield the desired numbers vs. the Magnifier icon (original vs. final converted). It is the same though. Using Vdub 1.8.6 as the viewer shows the original source frames (219250), but there is no audio to help in picking a silent Start trim point (say to elimate a pop or extra logo). The workaround is to set my output to PAL, then I can pick the correct frame numbers to Start/End and hopefully I'll remember to set it back to NTSC before starting. To be truly useful the Trim function's frame count should match the Preview. In this case the Trim function should list 0 - 262833 as it's values. I wanted to remove over a minute of unneeded logos from the start and almost 7 minutes of unneeded stuff from the end.

Here are specs on the file I tried to convert:

Video
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L3.0
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames : 5 frames
Codec ID : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Duration : 2h 26mn
Nominal bit rate : 824 Kbps
Width : 720 pixels
Height : 432 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 2.454
Frame rate : 25.000 fps
Colorimetry : 4:2:0
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.106
Writing library : x264 core 65 r1028M 83baa7f
Encoding settings : cabac=1 / ref=5 / deblock=1:-1:-1 /

Video: MPEG4 Video (H264) 720x432 (265:108) 25.00fps [Video]
Audio: AAC 48000Hz 6ch [Audio]

A file of this length can really benefit from HCenc's 2 pass encoding. Note the AR, 2.45. For some reason it isn't being picked up. The preview shows it as full screen 16:9 with no bars. This happened on 2 files of this type that I've tried.

Yet ConvertXtoDVD3 has no problems setting the correct AR. I get:

Pad 0,66,0,66
DAR 238:97 (2.453)

Adding these pad values "Video = Video.AddBorders(0,66,0,66)" into the script now corrects the AR (seems correct to the eye). A "Vertical Resize" of 63%.

I really like the "Crop" function in how it adjusts in both directions by changing only the L/R values. To partial appease my bar hating girl friend I went with values of 32 L/R. This automatically changed the Borders to 48, narrowing the bars slightly. If I wanted to appease my grandma I could go to about a 112 L/R crop for the no bars look she craves.

Needless to say, after the fiddling, the end result was lovely.

Originally Posted by manolito

@ummus

This has always been one of the Nero messages you can safely ignore.
And as MrC said, IMGBurn is a much better burning software than Nero.

Cheers
manolito

I have not found this to be true, when Nero reports this, there is a problem, it is also so rare I can't remember when last I've seen it. I tend to use ImgBurn but other than the IFO/BUP 32K padding and the lack of an AUDIO_TS folder the burns seems the same. Nero Disc Quality scans also seem identical. Note I have no such messages when using Nero 7 on AVStoDVD's output.

[manolito]

DVD Video files reallocation failed.

This has always been one of the Nero messages you can safely ignore

I was getting this message all the time with Nero 6 when I fed it with the output of older versions of DVD-Rebuilder (free version). Just clicking "Ignore" always resulted in a DVD which worked perfectly in all my players. And I remember from the DVD-RB thread that others had this problem, too, and JDobbs always recommended to create an ISO first and then use IMGBurn. (Nero also did never complain about the ISO file).

I believe that this "reallocation" of files which Nero was trying to do is not strictly required by the DVD standard.


Cheers
manolito

[manolito]

@wg

DeVeDe(http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=142973) may be easy to use for a novice, but it has a known bug which produces significantly undersized encodings, this is the same for both the Linux & Windows versions(I have found even setting 5-10% oversize produces an output of between 1.8-2.3GB when used with a 7oomb quality XviD file from my own backup collection) It also only offers 1 pass encoding.

For my requirements the undersizing was not important because the total playing time would always be under 1 hour. The encoder bitrate would always max out, no way to fill the DVD completely. But out of curiosity I just tested it using a 150 min captured AVI, and the undersize was just 11% (Trellis and Rate Distortion turned off). Not that bad for a one-pass encode.

I also tried to convince DeVeDe that it should do a 2-pass encode, but no success. Adding "vpass=2" to -LAVCOPTS just resulted in an error message. Too bad...

Cheers
manolito

[MysticE]

Originally Posted by manolito

I was getting this message all the time with Nero 6 when I fed it with the output of older versions of DVD-Rebuilder (free version). Just clicking "Ignore" always resulted in a DVD which worked perfectly in all my players. And I remember from the DVD-RB thread that others had this problem, too, and JDobbs always recommended to create an ISO first and then use IMGBurn. (Nero also did never complain about the ISO file).

I believe that this "reallocation" of files which Nero was trying to do is not strictly required by the DVD standard.


Cheers
manolito

You have a point, but early versions of Rebuilder were a bit problematic. The way JDobbs totally deconstructed the DVD then rebuilt it took awhile to get right. There always seemed to be certain 'workarounds' for burning etc. Yes Nero can be a bit twitchy, but when it's on a stable (and not overloaded with every burning/converting program known to man) it can do many things quickly, easily and decently. The Nero bashing seems a little unwarranted at times and based on myths that are not always accurate. I have no problems now, burning Rebuilder's folder output with Nero. I would assume this is because Rebuilder has matured.

Regards,
ME

[manolito]

Far be it from me to engage in Nero bashing...

I have the latest update of Nero 6 installed, and I do actually use it sometimes.

You may be right about Rebuilder, but in this case ummus is talking about Muxman. If you have a VIDEO_TS folder which was created by Muxman without errors (I assume that this was the case here, ummus did not mention any problems reported by Muxman), then you can be 100% sure that this VIDEO_TS folder is DVD compliant. If a burning application throws an error message while trying to burn this folder, then this application is at fault. Period.


Cheers
manolito

[MrC]

Originally Posted by manolito

Absolutely! I have translated a lot of utilities into German in the past. The easiest way is when you can use standard resource files, because you can resize text boxes if the translated strings are longer than the original strings. But I believe VB does not support this.

Using indexed text files for the string resources is also workable, but then the translated strings cannot be longer than the original ones. Can be quite challenging if the target language is German...

Let's see: we could use lang text files with labels and text boxes length (twips or pxs). Quite annoying for me to implement... but effective, I believe.

Originally Posted by sharkatec

well,the program just stopped when it was beginning with encoding the subs. The program have made 2 seperate files so far,1 mpeg videofile and 1 audiofile,but AVStoDVD stopped by itself and never got to author a DVD.

SRT subs broken? If you will, try load the SRT in SubtitleCreator (included in AVStoDVD package) and take a look if there are errors somewhere.

Originally Posted by MysticE

First some background. Most of the AVI/MKV's floating around are 25 fps which I convert to NTSC. The 'Trim' function is a nice touch, unfortunately you cannot use it correctly without a workaround, using the enclosed viewer to determine/change the end point.

For an x264 file I tried it says 219250 frames, yet the preview shows 262833. Due to the source being 25 fps but the final conversion being NTSC is at about 30 fps. I thought maybe right clicking the source from the main screen-> Preview title output, would yield the desired numbers vs. the Magnifier icon (original vs. final converted). It is the same though. Using Vdub 1.8.6 as the viewer shows the original source frames (219250), but there is no audio to help in picking a silent Start trim point (say to elimate a pop or extra logo). The workaround is to set my output to PAL, then I can pick the correct frame numbers to Start/End and hopefully I'll remember to set it back to NTSC before starting. To be truly useful the Trim function's frame count should match the Preview. In this case the Trim function should list 0 - 262833 as it's values. I wanted to remove over a minute of unneeded logos from the start and almost 7 minutes of unneeded stuff from the end.

You found a bug in total frame (and progress bar length) calculation in Clip Preview form when DGPulldown is used to upsize fps. Will fix it.

Originally Posted by MysticE

Note the AR, 2.45. For some reason it isn't being picked up. The preview shows it as full screen 16:9 with no bars. This happened on 2 files of this type that I've tried.

Good improvement point. I used to divide DARs in 2 families: if DAR > 1.77 then AspectRatio = 16:9 else AspectRatio = 4:3. Then I use only Horizontal and Vertical dimensions to define Crop/AddBorder.
It means that, so far, I have never correctly handled PAR different from 1... except AVI DV sources that have a special treatment.

MysticE: very good review!

Bye

[MrC]

AVStoDVD 2.1.2 Alpha build 081128 is out.

Change log from previous Alpha:

- Some bugs fixed (including Clip Preview frames count bug)
- Added 'Settings'/'Misc'/'Unload DirectShow ActiveMovie library at runtime' option (might prevent crashes caused by quartz.dll)
- Added 'Title Edit'/'Video'/'Auto BitRate Calculation'. When off video bitrate can be manually set
- Added 'Menu in Black' DVD Menu template
- Improved bitrate calculation routine
- Improved DVD Menu highlights movements definition routine
- Improved source files DAR (Display Aspect Ratio) identification and management
- Improved NSIS installer package features (added components page)

Any comments or bugs reports are welcomed.



Bye

[Richardw322]

I am using AVStoDVD 2.1.1, and ran into a problem. I was trying to change the frame for the thumbnail, and when I hit edit it opened the preview window. I selected the frame I wanted, and I don't know how to get back to the menu editor. If I hit exit it exits the whole program! Nothing else gets rid of the movie preview window! Is that part of the frame count bug in the prior post, MRC?

Also, I second the request for no thumbnail, and would like to see it extended to the movie title also. I found a JPG with the movie title in it (and it's really neat!) but if I use it I would end up with the movie title 3 times in the final menu!! The JPG one, the movie title, and the thumbnail title!!

BTW thanks for the great program, this is cosmetic stuff.