Did someone manage to have Sage play a ratDVD?

[Franc]

I know the ratDVD format has been discussed before.
Don't want to go into the matter if quality is good enough etc etc.
I was just wondering if Sage will be able to play a ratDVD file by default or if not, if someone managed to make it play them somehow.

I am really looking for a way to store my DVDs on hard drive to be able to play them using Sage without having to browse through my pile of DVDs (which are NEVER in their cases and ALWAYS on the shelf I am not looking on).
That and the fact that my 2-year-old tends to make scratches on his Dora, Teletubbies, etc. DVDs.

Long story short: I want (most of) my DVDs 'online' to be able to play them instantly and ratDVD seems perfect for that.

Anyone?

[nielm]

For my (daughters) Dora DVD's, I use a program which (ahem) 'shrinks' 'dvd's (in re-author mode) to rip the individual episodes into separate folders with the dvd-files folders... This way I don't have to worry about navigating the menu when she wants a specific episode.

I used to use AutoGK for recompression of DVDs to an XVID AVI, but no longer bother - the space savings are not really worth the hassle now that HDDs are so cheap

(forum rules do not allow mention of programs which are against DCMA. Google for it )

[Franc]

Yeah I know I could do that but I'd like the idea of having an 'exact' copy of my DVDs online.
ISOs would of course be even better but I know Sage doesnt know how to handle them without me having to mount them first.

[Franc]

At least I got them to show up under imported videos now. I added .ratDVD to sage.properties and sageclient.properties

But when I play them they're 10 seconds long, but the screen stays black.
It shouldn't be so hard, should it? If MediaPlayer can play them?

[popechild]

You can "shrink" the dvd to your harddrive without losing the menus (in .vob format) if that's what you're worried about. In fact, I don't see anythink you're trying to do that you can't do when you "shrink" it.

I currently have all my dvds on the harddrive as main movie only, in original quality, but I'm pretty sure that when i was testing out different alternatives (size, quality, etc.) at the beginning that I did a few as full dvds with menu structure intact, and I could even do them with no quality loss (but at 8gb a piece or so).

Maybe I'm not understanding what you're having trouble accomplishing.

[Franc]

What do you mean by 'shrink' and how would I make Sage play those files?

My 'problem' is that I would like to archive my DVDs as rat files and be able to play them with Sage.

[nielm]

As you have discovered, Sage cannot play RatDVD files.

If you want subtitles, menus, alternate soundtacks, extras, etc, the only solution is to put the whole DVD on the hard disk in VOB/IFO files (effectively copying those files from the DVD to the HDD). There are several programs that can do this (google DVD backup, or go to www.doom9.org)

The program that can shrink DVDs can work the same as a DVD backup -- menus, subtitles. alternate languages, but the 'DVD' 'Shrink'ing program can reduce the size of the MPEG2 video data, with a associated loss of picture quality (it was designed to backup movies on 8Gb dual layer DVDs onto 4Gb single layer DVD-R's)

It cannot beat converting to an MPEG4 video, but I have yet to see a solution for MPEG4 video with DVD menus.

However, it is much more convinient to put the movie only on the HDD and use Sage's menus to select and play it... (no MPAA warnings, no adverts etc)

see also http://www.sage-community.org/index.cgi/wiki/DVD

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Franc

Yeah I know I could do that but I'd like the idea of having an 'exact' copy of my DVDs online.

As neilm mentioned the best way to do that is to rip DVDs in "file mode". Meaning you have an exact copy of the DVD structure on your HDD. I've got almost 300 DVDs "online" in this way right now.

[Franc]

Okay, let's say I do this.
How do I tell Sage to read the DVDs from hard drive rather than using a DVD in the drive?
I tried saying "No" to "DVD rom available" but it kept reading the DVD in the drive.

[nielm]

See the link I posted.

Basically Rip the DVD in File mode to the HDD, and put the resulting collection of VIDEO_TS/*.VOB, *.IFO etc files in a named folder in the video import directory eg:

C:\ImportVids\DVDs\Dora\Doras Christmas\Video_TS\*.VOB,*.IFO

(will show up in imported videos as DVDs\Dora\Doras Christmas)

You then play it back like any other imported video in the Media Library

If you already have ripped the DVDs into ISO's then you can mount them, copy the video_ts directory from the virtual DVD to the video import directory, then play it back in Sage.

[Franc]

Ah okay, I was looking in the wrong place then.
Will try that.