Which video conversion software?

Roverno · 17 Jan 2012 at 16:29

Ok so here is my little problem:

I currently have a 2TB external drive attached to my MacBookPro (dont hate

) and i use it to hold a bunch of films that are in .dvdmedia format. The Drive is formatted such that a windows PC cannot read it. They are about 6-8GB each.

What i need to do is compress the video files and move them to a drive that i can shove in my desktop PC in a RAID array to make sure my little films are safe.

Im watching on a 24" 1080 screen nearly all the time so i dont want to lose all the quality but does anybody know how much compression would be suitable?

I have no idea really how im going to go about doing this but hopefully there is some software that will help??

EDIT: UPDATE- Ok so soon i will have all my 250 or so films converted. But i would quite like some software to manage them. Id like to keep track mainly of the ones i have watched and the ones i haven't watched. Being able to see a little info and a picture beside a listing would be even better. I have no idea what is available but thought somebody here might.

Jay794 · 17 Jan 2012 at 16:36

.dvdmedia format?! never even heard of that, aren't 99.9% of films avi or mpeg format these days?

Roverno · 17 Jan 2012 at 16:43

Thats Macs for you... i seem to remember if i change the format to .avi it displays the audio and video TS files.

EDIT: Confirmed. Change the extension to .avi displays the TS files and and info file. I think this may be the key to useful functionality?

Roverno · 17 Jan 2012 at 18:41

I have found handbrake which can convert from my TS flies to mp4. As far as i know that isn't the best format for videos. it does also compress to about 6GB to 1GB which is good.

anyone any wiser on this topic?

alle · 17 Jan 2012 at 20:32

...Aimersoft video convertor ultimate.

Azuse05 · 17 Jan 2012 at 20:37

Random guess: 6-8GB is the size of a dvd (which comes in video/audio_ts folders when ripped) so perhaps something installed has simply renamed them to .dvdmedia?

Anyway, handbreak - particularly if your running an x64 mac - is the easiest/best way for mac transcoding. Set up your output folder and add jobs using either normal/hig pre-sets (high produces smaller files but takes longer) and make sure you have forced foreign audio subs on (but not burnt in). Finally change the container to mkv and run.

Every additional job added is automatically queued meaning overnight batch runs are a breeze to set up

.

Roverno · 17 Jan 2012 at 20:48

Azuse05 said:
Random guess: 6-8GB is the size of a dvd (which comes in video/audio_ts folders when ripped) so perhaps something installed has simply renamed them to .dvdmedia?

Anyway, handbreak - particularly if your running an x64 mac - is the easiest/best way for mac transcoding. Set up your output folder and add jobs using either normal/hig pre-sets (high produces smaller files but takes longer) and make sure you have forced foreign audio subs on (but not burnt in). Finally change the container to mkv and run.

Every additional job added is automatically queued meaning overnight batch runs are a breeze to set up .

Yep, the rename thing you suggested is correct.

I have tried using my PC for transcoding and it is pretty fast. Mac is 2.66ghz i7 but my pc is a 2500k. plus mac will be very loud on 100% fans when transcoding.

If i transfer all the films to a HDD that my PC can read, would you suggest a different piece of software?

Sorry also, why choose mkv over mp4? whats the benefit/difference? (i want to be able to play the films on my PC and mac)

Roverno · 19 Jan 2012 at 12:31

Ok so soon i will have all my 250 or so films converted. But i would quite like some software to manage them. Id like to keep track mainly of the ones i have watched and the ones i haven't watched. Being able to see a little info and a picture beside a listing would be even better. I have no idea what is available but thought somebody here might.