DVD to DVDR with ReBuilder

[ChickenMan]

Backup your DVD's with DVD ReBuilder Pro
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For those that like the simplicity and ease of a One(or a few)-Click solution to backing up their DVD's and those that demand the best picture quality, then look no further than DVD ReBuilder. ReBuilder can backup a whole dual layer DVD (removeing unwanted Audio & Subtitle tracks) with the Main movie + Menus + Extras included or Main Movie + Menu only or simply Main Movie only. (last 2 options not availble in the freeware version of ReBuilder). The Menus are not re-encoded and just copied to the final encode as is. Subtitles take up a very small amount of room on a dvd but you can still remove the unwanted ones if needed. If you need to remove any of these other items, you need to run DVD Shrink, CloneDVD or similar to remove the unwanted Extras BEFORE you use ReBuilder. After encoding, it authors it all to a VIDEO_TS folder ready to burn.

It doesn't have as many options as DVD2One or Shrink, etc. but then its still in development, but almost there. It uses just about any version of Cinemacraft Encoder (CCE), including the cost effective Basic version, as the encoder for fast quality encoding. Best part is that ReBuilder is free. The Pro version with many extra features is available for a donation of just US$10 or more to the author. Thats what I use and the Graphics below are from that version, the free ver 0.93 may be slightly different.

ReBuilder can also use as its encoding engine ReJig (a fast freeware Transcoder), QuEnc, HC (best freeware MPEG2 encoder) or ProCoder. But this guide will only talk about using CCE as the encoder for both best quality and speed. If you cant affort CCE, then use HC as its free, similar quality to CCE but is slow at encoding. You can also use DVD Shrink or CloneDVD to pre-process the DVD to get rid of some Extras you don't need that are taking up a lot of room or to compress large Menus. See Note 1 below on how to use Shrink to strip out the unwanted stuff.

Rebuilder is still under almost daily development and is still Beta, though works perfect for me and 1000's of others. It now works with multi-angled dvd's as well (Pro version only). So consider this Tutorial as Beta also, although I have done many different types of DVD's with it with 100% success, that may not be true for everyone.

Still interested ? Then lets get started.



Software needed to be installed:

1. DVD Decrypter 3.5.4.0 ( from http://www.doom9.org/***********?/software.htm ) though for DVD's with Sony's latest ARCoss protection, you will need DVD Fab Decrypter instead.

2. DVD Rebuilder Installer v0.93 [this package contains all needed files except CCE] (from http://dvd-rb.dvd2go.org/modules.php...ownload&cid=14 )

3. Cinemacraft Encoder SP 2.50, SP 2.67 SP or Basic 2.69 (demo versions from http://www.doom9.org/software.htm or http://www.cinemacraft.com/eng/ccebasic.html )

4. DVD Shrink 3.2 for any pre-processing, see Note 2 below (from http://www.doom9.org/software.htm )



Installing the Software:


1. Install DVD Decrypter (or DVD Fab Decrypter).

2. Install CCE.

3. Install the DVD Rebuilder Installer package.

4. Install Shrink if needed.



Step 1: Ripping DVD to your HD.

1. With your DVD in a DVD-ROM (or DVD burner), run DVD Decrypter.

2. In the Mode tab, select File (or just press F). Hit Ctrl-A to select ALL files if they are not all selected.

3. Hit the large Decrypt button. It will now decrypt the DVD to your Hard Drive.



Step 2: Setting up ReBuilder.

1. Run Rebuilder.exe

2. Click on Mode and select CCE Mode. Click Mode again and select One Click Mode. If you don't care much for the Extras, then you can either select Steal Space from Extras and choice 10 or 25% or select Half-D1 and Half Space for Extras. Most Extras are normally quite low quality to start with so any further reduction could give unacceptable results.



3. Click on Options. For AVS Options, both ConvertToYUY2 and AudioDub should be ticked. Leave the Advanced Option alone.



4. Click on Options. For CCE Options, click on the version of CCE your using and click on One Pass VBR w/analysis. Leave the Advanced Settings at their defaults. I use CCE 2.50 SP as its substantially faster then later versions with same quality output.



5. Click on Options. Click on Setup. The installer should have setup all the paths, if not, then browse to the folder of your CCE that your running and select either the EclCCE (for all demo versions and ver 2.50) or the executable ( retail versions except ver 2.50 and Basic) depending on what version your running. For Audio to be Removed, click on the Check All button and then unselect English or whatever language you wish to keep, then click Save. Do the same for the Subtitles. Click the Remove Diretors Comments and Remove all DTS box, as DTS audio tracks just take up way to much room. Change the Background colour if you don't like the default. Then click Done to save all the settings.



6. Its now setup and we are ready to go.



Step 3: Using ReBuilder.

1. Run ReBuilder. In the Source Path, browse to the VIDEO_TS folder that contains the DVD files you ripped to your hard drive using DVD Decrypter. For each Video Title Set, unselect any variations of the audio tracks you don't want, such as foreign languages and Directors Comments tracks, etc. Browse and point to a valid folder for its Working Path. This is where all the encoded files will be saved to. Browes and select an Output Path, this is where the final VIDEO_TS folder with its VOB files will be authored to. All ready, now hit the Backup DVD button.



2. Sit back and wait for it all to happen. It actually re-encode each Chapter separately so you see lots of small files being encoded. On my AMD 3200+ I encode in about 1/2 real time i.e. a 2hr movie takes me 1hr to encode and 15min author.

3. If you have more than 1 dvd to backup, it can be done in Batch mode. Setup for the 1st DVD as in Point 1 above, then before starting the encode, click on File and then Save Project. Setup for the 2nd dvd as above, and than save that project. Now click on File and select Batch Processing and again and select Shutdown At Batch Completion. In the new window, hit the Add button and load in the 1st saved project file, then the 2nd, 3rd etc. When all loaded in and your ready, click the Process button. You can now go to sleep, work or school while it all happens.



4. After it has done its work, check the playback of the files in the VIDEO_TS folder. WinDVD is excellent for this. Check that the Menus, Extras, movie can be selected and that they play okay and with Audio. If you have selected the wrong audio track, then in Mode, unselect the One Click Mode, select the correct audio track to keep for the VTS and hit the ReBuild button which will rebuild the final VIDEO_TS folder with the new selected audio track. Check the final mb size of the VIDEO_TS folder as it may now be to big to burn. If it is to big, then simply use DVD Shrink to reduce its size down. Typically it does a 98 to 99% reduction so really no quality will be lost.

5. If all is okay, just burn the VIDEO_TS folder with its contends and an empty AUDIO_TS folder using your favourite burning software. My favourite is ONES 2.0.300 or Nero 6.6.0.20 as they work EVERY time and the DVD's play back on every DVD Player I've tried them on. Fully described in the DVD to DVDR Tutorial.



NOTE1: Using ReBuilder to encode Main Movie only or with with some extras removed.

1. If the DVD contains large quantity of Extras (or even animated Menus) then the final quality of the movie will be somewhat degraded as there is just not enough room to fit it all on the DVDR. Since ReBuilder cant remove any of these nor compress them, we need to do some pre-processing to remove these. I find DVD Shrink can do all these for me.

2. Run Shrink and Open Files of the DVD you ripped to your HD with DVD Decrypter as above (or just Open Disc if you have not pre-ripped it). In the left window select Main Movie and on the right window set the Video to No Compression (we want ReBuilder to do any compression needed). In the left window, now open up the Extras. For the ones you don't want, select it and in the right Window set the Video to Still Image. The default picture says "This Video has been removed" or you could just load in a plain blank Black picture. The choice is yours. In the left window, click on Menus. If they are large, then set the Video to Custom Ratio and slide the slider to the left to shrink its size and lower its quality. Remember, ReBuilder does NOT encode the menus, so let Shrink do it for you.





3. When ready, click the Backup button. A warning window will say the DVD size is to big, so just click YES to continue. Select Backup Target to be Hard Disk Folder and select target DVD folder for output files and click Go.



4. In a few minutes you will have a new ripped DVD minus your Extras, a compressed Menu and unaltered Main Movie. Check that it all works fine by playing it with WinDVD or equivalent. If all is well, now use this as your source files for ReBuilder to encode.



ChickenMan (c)2005 - August 2005