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Burning your backup
When DVD shrink has opened the disk or files on your HDD and you're ready to backup your DVD, you press the ?Backup? button in DVD Shrink, here you have some options to choose.
The "Backup DVD" screen, here you have five different tabs along the top. They are:
Target Device
DVD Region
Quality Settings
Options
Burn Settings
We will go through each tab, and explain the options.
First, the "Target Device" tab. This is where you can select the backup target.
There are three burning programs you can use:
DVD Shrink can automatically call a burning program to do the burning after that the encoding is done. There are three burning programs supported by DVD Shrink:
Nero Burning ROM 5.5 or higher
DVD Decrypter
CopyToDVD
Nero Burning ROM:
You need to have Nero installed. If you don't have the program - you can download a 30 day demo version at Neros webpage.
DVD Decrypter:
This is a freeware program and a very good burner. I suggest you use this program for your burnings.
A problem when you burn with DVD Shrink in automatic mode with the option 'Burn ISO with DVD Decrypter' is that there is no log file saved. If you should recieve a burning error - you will need that log file.
The best thing is to change the default setting in DVD Decrypter under 'Tools' -> 'Settings' -> 'Events' and enable the option 'On Exit - Save the Log'. Select a place where you want the log to be saved. You can also decide if you want the program to overwrite the old log file or just add it the one that exists.
If you want to change your burning speed from the default 'Max speed':
Start up DVD Decrypter
Press 'W'
Set the burning speed to what you want
Close the program
CopyToDVD:
This program will also work with DVD Shrink.
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If you want to burn at a later stage:
You can output the files to your hard disk if you want to burn them at a later stage. You have two options:
ISO file
Hard disk folder
ISO file
Select the name you want your ISO file to be named as and where you want it to be saved:
Hard disk folder
You can also select a directory where you want DVD Shrink to save the files on your computer.
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Second, is the "DVD Region" tab. Here you can select which region you would like, or make it region free. I make all mine "region free". You can also change the "Provider ID" here. Do not know what it is, so I just leave it alone. I have a couple of times erased what was there and put "Acme" there. It does not affect the back up in any way if you do change it.
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Third, is the "Quality Settings" tab. Here you can select if you would like DVD Shrink to perform a "Deep Analysis" before actually encoding the DVD to improve video quality and almost guarantee output size. It is highly recommended to put a check mark in that box! Also you can put a check mark in the A.E.C. box. A.E.C. stands for "Adaptive Error Compensation". This will also greatly improve video quality.
There are two different types of "Analysis" that DVD Shrink will perform. Quick Analysis (QA) & Deep Analysis (DA).
The first analysis that will happen on every DVD you open for the first time is known as a "Quick Analysis". (After you have already opened that particular DVD with DVD Shrink, it will no longer do the "Quick Analysis" on it. After the first time, it is stored in "C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\DVD Shrink" so that you do not have to perform a "QA" each time you insert the same DVD.
"Deep Analysis" looks at all the GOPs (Group Of Pictures), as "Quick" analysis is roughly 45 times quicker than the deep one, my guess would be that it looks at 45 time less GOPs. A GOP can contain up to 15 frames in PAL or 18 in the NTSC video format.
What does the "Quick Analysis" do?
It gathers information from the DVD, and then DVD Shrink makes a calculated estimation (Its not really an estimation, it may be off less than 1%) of the amount of compression it is going to use to shrink it down to fit on a standard single layer DVD-R. The time it takes to do a "QA" is generally around 30 seconds to 5 min depending on the size of the DVD.
What does the "Deep Analysis" do?
"Deep Analysis" does two important things:
It verifies that the output file size will NOT exceed the standard 4.37Gb limitation you have with a standard single layer DVD-R.
It greatly improves the output quality of the backup. What it does is analyzes each individual scene of the DVD, and decides how to allocate the bitrate (compress some scenes more than others.) so that the overall output quality will be better since DVD Shrink can apply the compression more accurately. (By no means am I implying that if you do the "DA", you wont have those artifacts or pixelation! I do a "DA" on every one of my backups.)
When using the "DA" feature, your backups will take considerably longer than before if you weren't using "DA". (Usually around 35 min up to an hour depending on the amount of compression that is going to be used and the CPU in your computer.)
NOTE: If the "Deep Analysis" button or option is grayed out (meaning it won't let you select it). It means 1 of 2 things. Either "DA" has already been done for this particular DVD or there would be no compression is required
DVD Shrink 3.2 Quality Enhancement:
Adaptive Error Compensation or "AEC" as it is more commonly known is a quality enhancement feature released in DVD Shrink 3.2.
Although at high compression 30%+ (70% or less on slider) using AEC will provide better output results but better results come at a price - Time. The AEC settings love using up your CPU's juice. If you have a slow computer then it may take you a substantial while longer to make a backup, although (in my opinion) it is worth the wait. If you do not use the AEC settings your backup will be completed a lot sooner and you will yield similar results to version 3.1.7.6.
So which one to pick?
Using AEC under any setting is better than not using it. Max Sharp is the fastest, while Max smooth is the slowest.
I have found the default AEC setting is fine for most DVD's.
Max smoothness can be good when having around 50% compression. It can reduce or stop the pulsing/pumping effect that can appear from using too much compression.
The AEC is not normally activated at it full effect until below 80% on the compression slider. Max smoothness is activated all the time when it is chosen.
Use this rule-of-thumb guide for the AEC setting on various compression levels:
90-99.9% - Max Sharp
80-90% - Default Sharp
65-80% - Smooth
<65% - Max Smooth
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Fourth, is the "Options" tab, here you can specify if you would like to "Run backup in low priority mode". Very useful if you multi-task while encoding a DVD. Or "Shutdown computer when DVD Shrink is complete" - that one is self explanatory, and if you want DVD Shrink to play a sound that you will be able to hear through you computer speakers - to let you know that DVD Shrink has completed the task of ripping the DVD and creating the file/s you choose.
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Fifth, is the "Burn Settings" tab, here you can select the "Volume Label" & "Burn Speed" & "Book Type" if the "Burn with Nero" is checked in the DVD Shrink preferences. If you do not have "Burn with Nero" checked in DVD Shrink's preferences, it will be grayed out.
Volume Label:
Here you can set a name for your disc.
Book Type DVD-ROM
If you are burning with +R/+RW media and your burner supports book type - also called bitsetting - you can select this option. It will fool your stand alone player that the burned disc is a DVD-ROM - which in some cases makes it more playable in your player. Especially with older players it can do the trick.
If you are using -R/-RW discs - make sure it's unchecked otherwise you can end up with a burning error/coaster.
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 28. March 2006 @ 06:06
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