I thought I'd update this thread for anyone who's interested. First, if you've already volunteered, but haven't heard from me, send me a PM so I can make sure I have the correct email address. I've sent messages to everybody I have addresses for, and I haven't been getting bounced messages, but that doesn't always mean anything. I apologize for the long wait in getting instructions, but setting up the spreadsheets I'm using for data collection has been a major headache. Combine that with waiting to get back my copy of The Matrix for testing, and the very busy month I've had, and I don't feel like I've gotten much done. Fortunately, things are back on track now, and with any luck I'll be getting some data from testers within the next week.
If you've volunteered to help with PAL testing, I've decided to start with just NTSC. Nothing against PAL, but I'd like to have at least 2 movies done before my 30 day trial of CloneDVD2 runs out. After that, I'll try to get PAL testing done as quickly as possible. If you (or anyone reading this) would like a copy of the instructions I sent to NTSC testers, let me know and I'll send you a copy.
Since I'm working against the clock for my CloneDVD2 trial, I'd like to figure out what to use for the low bitrate movie. I'd prefer a long movie (The Green Mile has been suggested), but as long as it has a moderate bitrate, keeping additional audio tracks may still oversize it to the point where compression is required. Suggestions from anyone are welcome.
For anyone who's interested in the results so far. The first movie I'm testing (high bitrate) is The Matrix, using video title 1, English 5.1 AC3 audio, and English subtitles. The disc, once compressed, is about 88% the size of the original (as figured by Shrink), and the video comes to about 87% of the original. I'm considering running a second test with additional audio tracks so the compression will be higher. So far I've compressed it with DVD Rebuilder/CCE Basic, DVD Rebuilder/Rejig, DVD Shrink, and CloneDVD2. I haven't looked at any of the video yet, but judging from the SSIM results, I'm surprised to say that CloneDVD2 looks like the program to beat. It's impossible to say for sure since SSIM can't give you subjective proof, but CloneDVD2 seems to have the highest average quality, the least quality variance, and better numbers (similarity to the original) in problem areas. Also, unlike DVD Shrink and Rejig which only compress 2/3 of the frames, CloneDVD2 can modify any frame, and it seems to make many similar decisions to CCE regarding which frames to compress. Of course, this is without any visual inspection of the frames in question, or critical data from a couple of other programs I hope to see good results from, so at this point I can't draw any solid conclusions.
