Get magic dvd ripper and rip the main movie to an mpeg 2 file. At that point if you desire, you can convert them to dvr-ms with videoredo, but i believe that windows 7 will handle an mpg2 file just fine in an extender.
This is my current Media Center setup:
Intel Quad Core Q6700 on Windows 7 x64 RTM running on a 120gb SSD with a 2 TB raid-5 storage array (3x 1TB drives) and 4GB ram. I have 2x Xbox 360s I use as extenders as well. All are on a Gigabit Ethernet network throughout the house.
I have all my DVDs (~200 movies, and about 20 seasons worth of misc TV shows) ripped to my server and streamed to my Xbox 360s. This is how I rip my DVDs and other related notes:
o Note: Circumventing the copyright on a dvd is not legal in the US. I have heard of people using AnyDVD from slysoft.com to get around this [1].
o Use DVD Shrink 3.2 (free, search afterdawn.com [2]) to rip the movie only (no menus, etc) to disk in .vob format. There is a guide on how to do this here [3].
o Use VideoReDo [4] to combine the .vob files into DVR-MS which is Media Center’s preferred format. This format allows for pause and resume (from ANY media center client), fast forward and rewind with preview, and preserves dvd quality using this process. Also supports streaming 5.1 sound. Total file size is about 4-6 Gb.
o I put all the files in a folder structure like DVDs\<movie name> and have media center monitor the DVDs folder.
o The next step I do is to plug the barcodes from the dvds into “My Movies 2” to get the metadata [5]. Make sure it is set to use dvdid.xml as the storage for the metadata. My Movies 3 is coming out October 22nd to coincide with the official release of Windows 7. Ive taken a look at the new interface and performance metrics. Its significantly better perf-wise than the previous version and the built-in “Movie Library”. The newly designed UI is also a much needed improvement. I highly recommend this software over the built-in media center “Movie Library” software. According to the pre-release notes, you can upgrade from “My Movies 2” to “My Movies 3”, if you can’t wait. I removed the “Movie Library” tab on the menu and replaced it with the “My Movies” tab. Notes on how to do that here and here [7]. UPDATE: The beta builds are looking good, still a few bugs but getting there.
o There is a forum dedicated to the Media Center, and extenders here .
o A nice set-up I am working on if you are an iPhone / iTouch user… I am currently trying to set-up an app / plug-in called NControl. This app will allow you to control the Media Center on both a 360 extender and on the computer from your apple device. Isn’t fully compatible with 7MC yet (there is a known bug with large libraries) but the developer is actively working on it. Info on it here [9] and here [10]. Monitor these for future releases that fix the 7MC issues. UPDATE: Looks like the 10.5 release fixes the Library issue, there is still a 30 item limit on libraries though. The developer is working to update the AppStore program now. I got this version up and running last night and it looks good.
o Another nice feature in Windows 7 is to stream Media Center content across the internet with your Live account. Info on that here [11].
I am still working on preserving subtitles. The limitation seems to be with the VideoReDo software, not the DVR-MS format. Allegedly one of their future releases will allow a subtitle stream.
[1] SlySoft
[2] DVDShrink 3.2
[3] Copy DVD movie with DVDShrink.
[4] Video ReDo
[5] My Movies
Creating new start menu strips.
[7] Remove default start menu strips.
The Green Button
[9] NControl
[10] NControl forum on TheGreenButton.
[11] Stream DVR-MS over the internet.
The process may not be exactly one step, but I can rip a DVD to vob and then remux that to DVR-MS using video-redo in about 10-12 minutes TOTAL time, on my rig. Regardless of steps involved, for me after a lot of work with other formats like DVIX / XVID this is a way better solution. The result is a pristine copy of the original DVD (quality wise) and the FFW and RWD work flawlessly. Believe me, the wife likes the FFW and RWD functionality that "just works". I use DVDFab to rip to a single vob file then open that file in Video Redo and resave it as DVR-MS. Only takes a few minutes to rsave in the DVR-MS format since its not being re-encoded. Give it shot!
Jsunn, Your method seems to be the easiest most straightforward I have heard for this process. How does this work with discs that have subtitles (ie Kill Bill Vol 1/2)? I have had the worst time trying to get mkv/divx to work on the 360's through my house! Since Windows 7 is here (almost!) I am planning a reformat to clear all the bad codecs out and cleanup the system to do a final build. Will your method support "Forced Subtitles"? Thanks!
Are there options to Video Redo for converting from VOB to DVRMS or WTV?
oguime Are there options to Video Redo for converting from VOB to DVRMS or WTV?
Yes, in VideoReDo you open the VOB file and "Save As" a DVR-MS file.
Thanks bradleym,
And besides VideoREdo, are there other programs that can do it?
Is that really capable of creating DVRMS files? Are there other freeand fast ones?
does Trancode360 work with 7 - that is what I use for XP & Vista...
Why don't you just use video-redo to take the files from the DVD? Seems like you have an extra step and I can't figure out why...