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First Impressions
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jayz
Newbie
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2. June 2005 @ 19:25 |
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I just finished backing up a 4.11GB down to 967MB and I must say the quality is pretty dam good on PC.
It was the the G3 Live in Concert DVD.
I liked the feature of all the menu's/chapters still present as if it was a DVD.
It took approx 2hrs on my machine to compress.
This is definately a plus for the filesharing community.
All that's missing now is a standalone DVD player compatible enough to play this format.
I will now convert the file back to DVD and report back with results.
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Senior Member
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2. June 2005 @ 22:03 |
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Your saying a regular dvd player wont play a .ratdvd? If so thats sucks ass, not much point in using for alot of ppl then. :(
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BobTammik
Junior Member
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2. June 2005 @ 22:32 |
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I have also just downloaded the program and compressed a DVD - very good quality playback. Took around 2 hours to compress the DVD by around 70%
I can see some applications for it such as file sharing and like the last writer would love to be able to put several compressed movies onto a DVD and play them in a stand alone. But - really impressed!
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Alien13
Suspended due to non-functional email address
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3. June 2005 @ 01:56 |
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What would be good is a sort of patch that u could burn to ne disc cd-r/rw dvd-r/rw etc and put it on the dvd player so it can play rat dvd format then i could fit around 2-3 movies on a disk.
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XIII2005
Newbie
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3. June 2005 @ 03:57 |
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Quote:
Your saying a regular dvd player wont play a .ratdvd? If so thats sucks ass, not much point in using for alot of ppl then. :(
How do you expect a new format to be compatable with a hardware stand alone DVD player ?
I think the whole point is you could be downloading a full DVD with
all its content and it will only be 1gb in size and not over 4gb,
if you want to put it on DVD RatDVD will convert it back for you.
I welcome this new edition to the other formats it does a good job,
have yet to use it to convert from RatDVD > DVD so will look forward
to someone posting their results.
XIII2005
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 3. June 2005 @ 03:58
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Scarpad
Suspended due to non-functional email address
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3. June 2005 @ 04:15 |
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Ok I did some tests last night and some more are ongoing. This is an interesting program. Here's what I did. I pulled an episode of Space 1999 off one of the disks. The Ep was about 2.5 Gigs. I chose this show becasue one it's film and two it's quite Large for TV on DVD. I also took Disk 1 of the Show "The Job" and did that. And Right Now I'm doing movie only of Criterion's Disk of "The Rock"
Impressions.
Disk one of "The Job" took about 4 Hours. This was on my Centrino Laptop.
I kept the default 95%. The Result 1.2 Gb. All menu's intact. Now I can only view this on my Laptop, but my Dell 700m has a pretty nice screen. And I compared it to the original. One person said his result was soft. I don't see that. Occasionally you do see some Macroblocking but overall this is a very nice result.
The single Episode of 1999 reduced down from 2.5 Gb to 450mb at 95%.
Once again very close to the original except to the macroblocking. I would say it looks like a very well encoded High bitrate Xvid, and probably comparable to Nero Digital's Cinema Template.
The Macroblocking may keep this from being usuable on my 96" Projector, but I'm hazarding a guess here that on my 30" Widescreen Samsung I'd be Hard Press to tell the difference. And Keep in mind this is the First release and you can do better than 95% if you'll accept hight file size.
The Negative aspect would definately be that for know you have to use WMP10. I'm hoping eventually more players will be compatible, I personally use Theatertek, but Hell I'd settle for Nero Showtime 2.
I can see this as very usable for someone that wants to encode either Single TV Eps or their entire Disks for a TV Server.
I'll report Back after I see what happens with "The Rock" and see how it looks via the Projector.....
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XIII2005
Newbie
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3. June 2005 @ 04:45 |
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Scarpad
Suspended due to non-functional email address
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3. June 2005 @ 05:26 |
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XIII2005
Newbie
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3. June 2005 @ 06:24 |
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@Scarpad
Yes the standard version is free !
Visit there site for more info on the different versions.
XIII2005
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jayz
Newbie
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3. June 2005 @ 07:40 |
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ok, just a followup on my first post.
I converted the ratDVD file back to DVD, strangely enough it took up to 3hrs to complete conversion.
The resultant file size was 2.68GB (original DVD size was 4.11GB).
Now the file size difference would largely be due to the fact that I chose the option for ratDVD to convert the original PCM & 5.1chan audio down to 192kbps 2chan AC3 in the first place.
-All menus/chapters were retained
-Audio remained at 192kbps 2chan ac3
The video did show macroblocking, but was not quite obvious until you look closely on the pc screen (I don't have a big screen tv so I don't know how obvious this would be).
It appears the video bitrate encoding is variable.
I would have preferred the encoding to make full use of the 4.3GB, by possibly increasing the bitrate on both the the video and audio.
Still this is early days and the software does have alot of potential.
I think I'll test it on a movie with alot of motion/action to see if the macroblocking is amplified. Then view it on a big screen tv.
I'm assuming the audio does not get re-encoded when converting from ratDVD back to DVD...anyone confirm?
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Scarpad
Suspended due to non-functional email address
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3. June 2005 @ 07:58 |
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Well that's my confusion here, I have'nt converted any back. But if the Program Compresses so that you can get smaller file sizes how can it restore what's No longer there, so how can it make an exact copy back
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razvi
Suspended due to non-functional email address
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3. June 2005 @ 08:37 |
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The DVD>ratDVD>DVD process does not provide an exact copy of the original movie, that's for sure. But the DVD menus work great, no issues here.
My tests:
LXG_SPECIAL_EDITION_DISC_1 (the first disc of the League of X Gentlemen, DVD Decrypted in 6.57 GB). Keep in mind that the resulting ratDVD file has all the original audio tracks, uncompressed, as this was my choice. Get rid of everything but the menus, subs and English 5.1 (converted to DD VS, actually), and the files should be about 1.30 GB smaller.
50 (lowest quality) >> 1.69 GB file, really bad quality, but watchable, even on a PC monitor;
95 (default quality) >> 2.22 GB file, lots of visible bad video;
150 (best quality) >> should be (*) 4.80 GB file, almost perfect :).
My PC does a lot of crunching, so the ratDVD softare runs at it's default Low priority or ocasionally at BelowNormal. The DVD>ratDVD process takes about 2-3h on my P4@2.8 256MB machine, but ratDVD>DVD is somewhat slower, 3h+.
(*) I think there is some size-related bug in this version: running ratDVD at quality 150, i got a 5+ GB file that is not playable in either ratDVD, WMP or ZoomPlayer. So I did one more try, without the extra audio, and got a playable file, sized below 4 GB. Add in those extras and it should be a 4.80 one.
Now, if anyone would be kind enough to tell me how to capture the same frame from all versions, in WMP and PowerDVD, i'd share some screenshots.
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Senior Member
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3. June 2005 @ 16:27 |
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the wierd thing with me is that I tried using ratDVD with Shark Tale and it crashed my pc twice, but Ill try it with another movie
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Alien13
Suspended due to non-functional email address
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3. June 2005 @ 16:54 |
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Since RatDVD came out ive used it on 3 movies dvd > ratdvd > dvd and came out pretty good.
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Moderator
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3. June 2005 @ 22:08 |
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Quote:
it crashed my pc twice
It's cause your pc sucks!!! lol
j/k :)
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Senior Member
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3. June 2005 @ 23:34 |
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Quote:
It's cause your pc sucks!!! lol
LOL Yeah Maybe!!!!!
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Senior Member
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4. June 2005 @ 07:05 |
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Only just got around to using this and apart from the time it takes it seems like a great bit of software. I found it was a little faster when i ripped the dvd onto my hdd 1st b4 encoding.
aye aye man
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 4. June 2005 @ 07:08
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OU812Ono
Member
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4. June 2005 @ 20:38 |
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I tried it with an Un-encrypted version of Anchorman I had on my HDD, and I experienced what Razvi did. I chose 150 quality and the 7.74 original got compressed to 5.5gb's, which neither WMP10 or Zoomplayer played. What a bummer after waiting 6+ hours to find out.
Anyone tried compressing video not from a dvd, I tried with a small slideshow I made for the family. Compressed nicely but I lost the audio from it. Could have something to do with the fact I used an mp3 before converting to .VOB,or maybe a finger-fart.
Gonna have another go at it, alot of potential IMHO.
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Moderator
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5. June 2005 @ 00:26 |
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Here's my first test:
PC:
P4 2.8GHz, 1GB PC2700, XP Pro SP2
Movie:
Meet the Fockers (7.77 GB original DVD rip)
Quality setting at 150. Process took just over 7 hours. File was 8.32GB !!! and the file wouldn't play.
Quality setting at default (95). Process took just under 5 hours. File was 1.85GB and would play. Picture quality looked good (but was viewing on a old 15" CRT).
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nn0ll
Inactive
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5. June 2005 @ 09:59 |
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Can anyone confirm that ratDVD is actually MPEG-1 video and AC3 audio at half the original resolution and only upscaled on playback - and all that in a big, zipped file?
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robtwilk
Member
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5. June 2005 @ 20:22 |
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I have very mixed feelings about the first release of this software. I tested several movies and the best result was far from perfect.
Res Evil 2 - Quality set at 100 > the movie was unwatchable - huge blocks, pauses, skipping, freezing, etc.
Res Evil 2 - Quality set at 150 > Media Player gave me an error and could not play the file.
After the Sunset - Quality set at 95 > the movie plays fine but the video quality is unimpressive, when you pause then play, the sound starts but the video stays paused for a few seconds.
After the Sunset - Quality set at 125 > the movie plays fine and the video quality is not bad, when you pause then play, the sound starts but the video stays paused for a few seconds. Same in all cases.
Takes so long to convert one movie, testing is tedious.
Anyone successful using other software DVD players? I have tried Win, Power, Roxio, and Nero.
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dinkel
Newbie
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6. June 2005 @ 15:08 |
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RatDVD outputs one file. First time I included everything when I ran radDVD. Took overnight default 95. Played in Win MediaPlayer 10. The sound played in K-Lite's mediaplayer, but not the vid. Even tho I turned off subtitles in setup and in Win MediaPlayer, they still appeared. The second time I ran ratDVD with just the menus, main movie and sound, but no subtitles. Took about 4 hours where shrink took far less time. Would like to be able to access the main menu half way thru movie so that chapters can be selected. Only can select chapters now at start up. Has anyone tried the output on a stand-alone player that can play windows media files or is WM10 not on the stand-alones yet? Interesting program and not bad if one needs to archive or scoot it across the internet.
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Staff Member
2 product reviews
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6. June 2005 @ 19:11 |
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Quote:
Can anyone confirm that ratDVD is actually MPEG-1 video and AC3 audio at half the original resolution and only upscaled on playback - and all that in a big, zipped file?
According to the FAQ on the website it's their own brand new video compression format and therefore can't possibly be MPEG-1.
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Igzorn
Newbie
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7. June 2005 @ 01:53 |
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Hi,
i have tested ratdvd at the DVD Shamanic Princess. But the quality ist not so good. The settinge are 95 Quality.
The program work with a constant Bit Rate. But a Vbr was better for the quality and the the files are smaller.
A littel question.
Why do the 2ch AC-3 sound not kompress to MP3?
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bkick
Newbie
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7. June 2005 @ 03:33 |
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Actually, if I understand the faq correctly, it uses constant quality, which means it is VBR.
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