I'm running DVDFab in order to obtain the dvdid files I need for my collection. I'm also aware it has a built in compression function that will shrink it down to either DVD5 or DVD9. I have two questions before I start using it on the rest of my DVD collection: 1) Is the DVD5 compression option in DVDFAB on the same level of quality that DVD Shrink would produce (which I've been using for years up till recently)? 2) I have ISO files that are already on my HDD. Can I use DVDFAB to shrink those to DVD5 size or will that only work for movies that DVDFAB rips originally?
Thanks. I found these ISO settings. However, I ran into another issue. I want to leave the DVD menus and other features about the disc untouched, yet I can't seem to tell DVDFAB not to do this. In Shrink you could choose what to keep and what to get ride of. Here the options in DVDFAB appear to be set but are not accessible. I have attached a screen shot of what I mean. How do I tell it not to remove anything like that in the above pic?
Personally you'd be better off using customize option to remove unwanted intro crap & outro as well as any legal nonsense not to mention previews of other movies useless languages,outtakes,deleted scenes,next up once that's done & before commencing compression go into fabs settings increase dvd 5 output to custom 4485mb last thing needs doing is drag n drop the video folder onto menu shrink this'll save anywhere between 0-800mb,all menu shrink does is remove animation crap any amount of stuff you don't really need goes towards improving quality on the dvd,then move the backup outside of the video folder & commence burn you can use fab to do so it works fine.However the draw back to doing what you want is the compression issue the more junk you have on the dvd the less quality you'll get for the movie,majority of dvd's have nothing you'd want to keep other than movie & at some later date you might want to start putting the movie into a mp4 format which i suspect won't work to well since you've already compressed the movie,just somth'n to think about
@ JST1946: I see. If it's not removing it by default, how would I get these options to be "un-grayed out" if there ever came a time I did want to remove a menu for some reason. Seems like it should be selected with a simply check box for off and on. Does that depend on the DVD to get it to be an active field? @ scorpNZ I think I may be one of the only people around that still enjoy preserving the DVD in it's original state. I enjoy all the disc extras and such. Does the compression of DVDFAB compare to that of Shrink? Also, the current engine in the settings is set to VSO. Should that be changed to DVDFAB?
To answer your first question directed at JST,full discs means full disc,you want any other or whatever you use customize VSO is fabs burning engine,the next paragraph is set from same window in where it says "writable media" set dvd5 output from it's std setting to customize by using drop down then type 4485,this will go towards decreasing amount of compression required,more compression = shitty looking movie the less compression the better shrink with whatever program you like so if your using fab use fab makes no diff
DVDFab DVD Copy - Main Movie: This option cuts out additional trailers, bonus footages and menus, therefore requiring less compression. If you select "Main Movie" option, only the movie part (the longest title) of the DVD will be copied. The output of Main Movie mode contains no menus. DVDFab DVD Copy - Full Disc: This is a quick and easy copy mode. You can copy all playable content of your original disc with just a click or two. Some features may be inactive depending on the content of the original DVD. It will apply compression (see the Quality % readout) if the content will not fit on the blank media size you have selected.
Yeah, it just seems weird having options available in a menu that you'll never use and are always grayed out. I mean, as you said, the whole reason your using the "FULL" menu as opposed to the "MAIN MOVIE" menu is you want a 1:1 copy of everything. Why put options that say things about removing menus in there if they will always be grayed out and never used. Why not just leave them off this menu. The only thing I can think of is this. Most DVD9's have to compressed down to about 50-60% quality to fit on a disk. If compression alone sometimes will not get them onto the DVD-R disk, maybe this menu is then active where you can remove a few additional things (like a menu for example). I had to do this in DVD Shrink once where I still couldn't get the original DVD compressed down enough so I had to remove all the menu audio. Is this possible?
You can use the customize split or split option for putting a DVD9 on 2 DVD5 discs. http://www.dvdfab.com/manual/dvd-copy You can also the next link to customize yor settings. http://www.dvdfab.com/manual/settings
Split option is best used for tv series where you fit 2eps on one disc & 2 eps on the other,splitting an actual movie or a tv dvd where there's the full length title as well as each episode will more than likely cut it in the wrong place,so for splitting a movie use shrink grayed out sections are irrelevant if you don't need them,it tells you in the screenshot what it's for including rearranging title playback order As for compression no lower than 80% Extra space can be saved (less compression better looking picture) by using menu shrink anything from 0-800mb can be removed,basically it removes the animation crap & leaves the buttons
Thanks for the info. I want to circle back to one of my original questions as I'm still no 100% sure I'm clear on it. Both DVD Shrink and DVDFAB seem to apply about the same amount of compression to get a DVD9 down to the size of a DVD5 (about 55-68% give or take based on what I've seen). Is there any difference in QUALITY of the finished product between the two apps? Does DVDFab use the same type of software/process to render its videos out? If I took snapshots from the same two DVDs (one done in Shrink and the other done in DVDFAB) would they be basically identical?
Can't tell the diff when compressing to 80%,going to 50-60% neither will look good if it's a dvd with menu etc,you'd be better to use shrink to cut front & end frames of main movie to reduce amount to be compressed & forget about menu crap which can be shrunk using menu shrink
Well, when I was really into building my DVD collection I always ripped the original DVD to the hard drive (which was around 7-8 Gigs per discs) and then shrunk them to DVD-R size with Shrink (keeping everything intact for a 1:1 copy). I was always happy with the quality that DVD Shrink produced as I could never really tell the difference, and if I could, it was negligible in my mind in order to get it down to that size. I'm just hoping that DVDFab uses technology that is at least as good as DVD Shrink in that regard. I'm about to start a large ripping project of all my discs and I'm willing to go back to Shrink of I thought I'd get the best results regarding quality. Anywhere I can look online that compares the quality of the compression between the two apps? If it's equal, then great, but I'd just like to know before I start such a huge project.
Well, when I was really into building my DVD collection I always ripped the original DVD to the hard drive (which was around 7-8 Gigs per discs) and then shrunk them to DVD-R size with Shrink (keeping everything intact for a 1:1 copy). I was always happy with the quality that DVD Shrink produced as I could never really tell the difference, and if I could, it was negligible in my mind in order to get it down to that size. I'm just hoping that DVDFab uses technology that is at least as good as DVD Shrink in that regard. I'm about to start a large ripping project of all my discs and I'm willing to go back to Shrink of I thought I'd get the best results regarding quality. Anywhere I can look online that compares the quality of the compression between the two apps? If it's equal, then great, but I'd just like to know before I start such a huge project.
Don't know of any comparison however since fab can do conversion to other formats i'd say they'd be both equal,the only issue i see with what you want to do is if the original becomes stuffed all that you'd have left is a highly compressed dvd version,which in turn would be an issue if you decide to convert all the movies to avi,mp4 or mkv,seriously think about splitting over two dvd's instead of just one
