Note: Backing up DVD to an image file is not recommended...

[markfilipak]

Howdy,

At this point I've backed up about 400 DVDs. I have a question regarding a section of the on-line help.

Rip to Image (http://docs.redfox.bz/manual/anydvd/systray.html)

Note
Backing up DVD to an image file is not recommended, using this option may result in transfering the “structural protection” along with the image, which would be undesirable.

Q1: Can you expound on this point a bit more?

Q2: I prefer to mount ISO images for daily playback. If an ISO is not recommended, what's the alternative? Or am I misunderstanding what is written?

Warm Regards,
Mark.

 

[Ch3vr0n]

1) Simple, structural protection (fake/duplicate VTS titles) cannot be removed on the fly like other protections present. If you were create an iso of discs with that SP, and you burn that image to disc, it can cause playback problems (not sure if this applies to software players too) in standalone players.

2) An ISO is fine, just don't make it with anydvd (for DVD's). Use CloneDVD's "ISO Image" function for that while you keep anydvd running. Anydvd will remove on-the-fly all the protections it can, while CloneDVD2 will properly reauthor the disc's structure and remove the fake titles, and drop the actual titleset in an ISO image. Alternatively, you can rip the DVD to folders first (at which point AnyDVD WILL remove the fake titles), which you can then feed into your iso creation program of choice (for example IMGBurn) to turn that folder rip into an iso. The latter is a bit more work.

 

[markfilipak]

1) Simple, structural protection (fake/duplicate VTS titles) cannot be removed on the fly like other protections present.

Yes, I've seen such cases, so I know of what you write.

If you were create an iso of discs with that SP, and you burn that image to disc, it can cause playback problems (not sure if this applies to software players too) in standalone players.

I back up DVDs (and BDs) and store the original DVDs. I then play the backups. I've not noticed any playback problems, however, I play them on a Home Theater PC, I don't burn copies. I don't attempt to play burned copies in a stand-alone player. What do you think of that?

2) An ISO is fine, just don't make it with anydvd (for DVD's).

I have made approximately 400 of them!

Use CloneDVD's "ISO Image" function for that while you keep anydvd running.

CloneDVD is a transcoder, is it not?

Anydvd will remove on-the-fly all the protections it can, while CloneDVD2 will properly reauthor the disc's structure and remove the fake titles, and drop the actual titleset in an ISO image.

Well, I'm really confused now. Does CloneDVD make ISOs? ...I guess that's a silly question -- if it has a "ISO Image" function, then I guess it makes ISOs, eh? But I don't need a transcoder, do I?

Alternatively, you can rip the DVD to folders first (at which point AnyDVD WILL remove the fake titles), which you can then feed into your iso creation program of choice (for example IMGBurn) to turn that folder rip into an iso. The latter is a bit more work.

You know, RedFox really, really needs a "How To" section. As it is now, it's like the story about the guy who wants to go to Paris.

I guy needs to get to Paris. He asks his auto mechanic neighbor how to get to Paris. The neighbor spreads all the parts of a car out of the floor of his garage. "There!" he says, "Now you have everything you need to get to Paris."

 

[James]

CloneDVD is a transcoder, is it not?

CloneDVD (or CloneBD) will not transcode, if you don't tell them to compress. Just saying.

You know, RedFox really, really needs a "How To" section. As it is now, it's like the story about the guy who wants to go to Paris.

It is very simple. Buy AnyDVD to decrypt anything. Buy CloneDVD for DVDs. Buy CloneBD for (UHD) Blu-ray discs.

 

[theosch]

Yes, I've seen such cases, so I know of what you write.I back up DVDs (and BDs) and store the original DVDs. I then play the backups. I've not noticed any playback problems, however, I play them on a Home Theater PC, I don't burn copies. I don't attempt to play burned copies in a stand-alone player. What do you think of that?I have made approximately 400 of them!CloneDVD is a transcoder, is it not?Well, I'm really confused now. Does CloneDVD make ISOs? ...I guess that's a silly question -- if it has a "ISO Image" function, then I guess it makes ISOs, eh? But I don't need a transcoder, do I?

You know, RedFox really, really needs a "How To" section. As it is now, it's like the story about the guy who wants to go to Paris.

I guy needs to get to Paris. He asks his auto mechanic neighbor how to get to Paris. The neighbor spreads all the parts of a car out of the floor of his garage. "There!" he says, "Now you have everything you need to get to Paris."

I copy DVDs as ISO with AnyDVD.
Of course e.g. if strutural protection was on the original-DVD, using AnyDVD (alone) as copy to image, in the resulting ISO it is preserved.

So far never had playing issues, but drive took around 20-60 seconds more to initialize disc (when attempting to start playback such disc/ISO, e.g. with VLC) in some cases with structural protection.

If you copy the content over with AnyDVD+Windows-(File)-Explorer it will include the whole size of those multiple/duplicate pseudo entries.
But as ISO whether with CloneDVD or without it, there's no bloated size issue happening.

So far never had playing issues with ISOs even with structural protection made from AnyDVD alone.
If there could be issues, the same goes for original DVD-ROM.
If that was so tragic, I doubt the sellers would still include that structural thing on sold DVD+ROMs.

Keep in mind, if some time in the future you might transcode from the movie as ISO, you will have to rebuild,with AnyDVD (Mount ISO to virtuial drive, and then AnyDVD ->Rip to HDD) or using CloneDVD2.
You would have to remember/watch/check for the certain movie as ISO, you're transcoding that it still includes that structural thing, to reprepare it, to avoid issues when transcoding.

 

[markfilipak]

Won't someone tell me how to get to Paris?

 

[blank]

Won't someone tell me how to get to Paris?

Just use CloneDVD2 to backup DVDs to iso
or rip them with AnyDVD file-mode and make an iso of the ripped files with ImgBurn.

 

[James]

Won't someone tell me how to get to Paris?

I did.

 

[markfilipak]

Can you recommend what I should do with the 400 ISOs I've already created with AnyDVD HD?

PS: ...Actually, I think Theo has already answered this: Which is to do nothing -- keep my ISOs as they are.

 

[markfilipak]

Thanks for replying, Theo.

I copy DVDs as ISO with AnyDVD.

I understand. So you do what I have been doing, which is to use AnyDVD to make ISOs of DVDs.

Of course e.g. if strutural protection was on the original-DVD, using AnyDVD (alone) as copy to image, in the resulting ISO it is preserved.

I assume that means the ISO is larger than it needs to be due to the redundant files ...they are empty (bogus) VOBs, are they not? I don't care about that because, looking at the big picture, those empty VOBs make little real difference -- I would guess it to be less than 1%.

So far never had playing issues, but drive took around 20-60 seconds more to initialize disc (when attempting to start playback such disc/ISO, e.g. with VLC) in some cases with structural protection.

I don't care about an extra 20-60 seconds. I do care about making ISOs that are the most faithful to the original disc as possible, minus the protection and region coding.

If you copy the content over with AnyDVD+Windows-(File)-Explorer it will include the whole size of those multiple/duplicate pseudo entries.
But as ISO whether with CloneDVD or without it, there's no bloated size issue happening.

I don't know what you mean by "copy the content over". I'm making ISOs. I'm not copying the content over anything.

So far never had playing issues with ISOs even with structural protection made from AnyDVD alone.
If there could be issues, the same goes for original DVD-ROM.

I agree. So far, I've not had any playback issues that I know of.

If that was so tragic, I doubt the sellers would still include that structural thing on sold DVD+ROMs.

Well, the movie studios and the telecine labs do a lot of stupid things ...like ignoring Nyquist sampling requirements when converting analog (film) to digital.

Keep in mind, if some time in the future you might transcode from the movie as ISO, you will have to rebuild,with AnyDVD (Mount ISO to virtuial drive, and then AnyDVD ->Rip to HDD) or using CloneDVD2.

Yes, thank you, I understand that if I want to transcode, I need files on a hard disk, not an ISO.

You would have to remember/watch/check for the certain movie as ISO, you're transcoding that it still includes that structural thing, to reprepare it, to avoid issues when transcoding.

You know, some people transcode. I understand that. I do not transcode because transcoding injects an extra level of possible breakage, and because really big hard disks are cheap.

Thanks for your comments, Theo. Except for one phrase that I didn't understand, I'm satisfied that your experience and my experience are the same.

 

[James]

Can you recommend what I should do with the 400 ISOs I've already created with AnyDVD HD?

If you "only" intend to watch them - watch them and be happy.
As AnyDVD has mentioned in the warning dialog, which you certainly have seen 400 times now, there might be problems if you do something else. Look at files inside the images in Explorer, use 3rd party tools like CloneDVD, Shrink, Nero, ...

 

[markfilipak]

James, I DO appreciate every contribution you make. And overall, AnyDVD is a very good application, but may I suggest that programmers do not make the best helpers or the best documentarians?

I'm a retired electronics hardware designer (chips, circuits, boards, and systems). If I explained things in the technical terms with which I think, no one would understand anything that I do. I am available to you and to other AnyDVD developers for perspective, review/authoring of technical documentation, and general housekeeping. I volunteer to do that because I've found that it's the best way for me to learn. I have found the best start is not at the user interface, but a definition of the data structures that a program utilizes. For the 'C' language, those can be found in '.h' files. In the various projects I have architected and run, the programmers who have worked for me have commented that they found my software architecture specifications were the best they'd ever seen, and that, as a consequence, my projects were the smoothest they'd experienced. My friends in Silcon Valley used to give me their fully tested programs and challenge me to break them. I almost always was able to break them in a couple of minutes. What you do with my offer to volunteer is up to you, of course, but my offer is there.

PS: The tools I use are IfoEdit (a lot!), VobEdit (a little), DVD Shrink (a little), and BDedit (almost not at all), and, of course, BDInfo.

 

[markfilipak]

If you "only" intend to watch them - watch them and be happy.

I'm assuming that you mean that, by making DVD ISOs via AnyDVD's "Rip to image..." function, I will have backup ISOs that can be watched without encountering some sort of unpleasant surprise (meaning: unmountable/unplayable) in the future. Am I correctly interpreting your response? Kindly be explicit without colorful expressions.

 

[testiles]

I'm assuming that you mean that, by making DVD ISOs via AnyDVD's "Rip to image..." function, I will have backup ISOs that can be watched without encountering some sort of unpleasant surprise (meaning: unmountable/unplayable) in the future. Am I correctly interpreting your response? Kindly be explicit without colorful expressions.

I think he means as long as you don't intend to burn the .iso's to disc and instead just watch them on your computer, you should be fine.


T

 

[markfilipak]

@testiles

Well, that's what I think, too. But James' response could be interpreted as "just stop worrying", which, of course, does not preclude some sort of unpleasant surprise in the future that makes all my efforts (400 ISOs so far) a wasted effort requiring a complete redo. Am I paranoid? You bet, especially in light of the warning posted when I make a DVD ISO.

Regarding that last point, my impression is that, if I do want to burn a DVD ISO to disc in the future -- I will probably never want to do that, but... -- I can,
1, mount the DVD ISO with AnyDVD running and with the virtual drive included in the scanned drive list, then
2, run CloneDVD against that mounted drive.

Can you confirm that? Have you done that? I could run an experiment, but right now I busy writing a huge, complicated javascript RegExp processor and I'm hoping you (or someone) can simply confirm it and put my mind at ease.

Thanks so much!

 

[Ch3vr0n]

It'll work, just mount the iso and run CloneDVD over it. It'll strip the bogus titles

 

[markfilipak]

@Ch3vr0n,
I assume you mean the bogus VOBs.

PS: Maybe they are bogus VIDEO_TS Title Sets. It's been quite a while since I've seen one.

At any rate, I guess this thread is pretty well exhasted. Bye! And thanks, All!

 

[testiles]

It'll work, just mount the iso and run CloneDVD over it. It'll strip the bogus titles

Thanks for confirming that.

I've always wondered if that were true.


I have a few DVD .iso's made from Rip-to-Image and now I know if I want to burn them, I should run them through CloneDVD first.

Just to be safe.


T

 

[theosch]

Thanks for confirming that.

I've always wondered if that were true.


I have a few DVD .iso's made from Rip-to-Image and now I know if I want to burn them, I should run them through CloneDVD first.

Just to be safe.


T

Well yes it's the optimal case using CloneDVD first.


By the way, the oversize-issue is just happening when you copy the files from a DVD-ROM with bogus titles using Windows-Explorer (AnyDVD of course needed in backround for decrypting CSS etc.),
so Windows-Explorer extracts all the IFO, VOB, BUP files + including the bogus title sets to a destination directory on HDD (as extracted form, like "unzipping" a file, in thise case from an ISO). So in this case copying with Windows-Explorer results in much more big files, and you'll have much bigger size than would actually fit on DVD-9 (2-layer DVDs),
Mainly The bogus titles are copies/multiple duplicates from a group of IFO, BUP, VOB files that (group of IFO, BUP, VOB files would actually alone, without those duplicates/links, already be sufficient for the whole DVD-movie, DVD-menu, subtitles, languages etc. Those multiple duplicates of course are under different files names (slighly varied), (because there cannot be two and not more files than one with the same name in the same directory (in this case VIDEO_TS folder).

Windows-Explorer will read every-pseudo-file-entry/bogus title whatever you call it, due to different name it can't overwrite when you select whole VIDEO_TS folder and will paste entire content, the data of all bogus title sets/links from those underdifferent names resulting in those multiple with read and pasted data to destination, resulting with bloated size.

AnyDVD-Rip-to-HDD, which (AnyDVD-Rip-to-HDD) would remove those bogus duplicates, not copying those duplicates over.

But when you create the ISO directly from the DVD-ROM with structural copy-protection with AnyDVD-Rip-To-image, it just needs to pass those bogus title sets/similar to link into the ISO 1:1 from original DVD+ROM, it'll pack them just like links, 1:1 as on original DVD-ROM, like so you won't have the bloated-size isuess.

I don't have the capability the explain better, other propaply will do that better


Here a few screenshots how structural copy protection, and how in Video_TS folder it looks like.



-


-
And screenshot with checksum as file comparison between several identical big files with same sizes and identical checksum:




Here DVD-ISO with structural copy protection mounted
ISO in virtual drive(Win-Explorer "Bereitstellen"/"Mount") =>You can checkAnyDVD status window here
Mounted ISO was ripped with AnyDVD-Rip-To-Image alone (without CloneDVD2) from a DVD9-ROM with those bogus title sets.
You can check that by screenshot that it is an mounted ISO, due to missing layer break display in AnyDVD status window.
[Edit]And also would be 50%/50% layer break here, because not taken any .dvd nor any .mds (media descriptor file => ImgBurn; Alcohol 120% ), moutning the ISO, so here mounting directly the ISO, but 50%/50% still also not displayed because ISO-image mounted via Windows-Explorer (Win 8.1), (not mounted by Alcohol 120% here nor Virtual Clone Drive where 50%/50% would be displayed if mounting directly the ISO isstead of using the corresponding mds or .dvd file)

And no bloated size issue, because the ISO was ripped directly from original DVD-ROM to image:



If I had first copied all files from DVD-ROM in VIDEO_TS folder with Windows-Explorer+AnyDVD to a directory, there would be the bloated size problem, rebuilding such destination folder to ISO with ImgBurn wouldn't help. That's why it's better to use CloneDVD2-rip-to-image function directly from original DVD-ROM, or alternatively use AnyDVD-rip-to-HDD (=folder destination, exctracted, but bogus title sets removed like in DVD-CloneDVD2-ISO-Image)directly from original DVD-ROM and rebuild that to ISO , or AnyDVD-Rip-to-Image (but also directly from original DVD-ROM):

The AnyDVD-Rip-To-Image from original-DVD-ROM which of course still includes those bogus titel sets, just mount it in virtual drive, and you can still remove those bogus title sets afterwards with CloneDVD2 or AnyDVD-Rip-to-HDD later: Tested that out no issues
That might be what you want markfilipak , if this this 1:1 method is really so important to you with still having the still remaining option to get a corrected image with CloneDVD2, AnyDVD-Rip-To_HDD for e.g. transcoding purpose.

@testiles
And burning and playing back such image as said before no relevant issues, but must be reprepared when trasncoding.

 

[markfilipak]

Thanks so much, Theo.

Your English is not too bad.
Your English is better than my French and Spanish, and way, way better than my German.

I understand everything now, thanks to you!

Copying files using Windows Explorer? Hmmm... Would anyone really do that? No matter... I make an ISO image via AnyDVD's 'Rip to image...' function. That image is ALMOST identical to the original disc (just small changes). It's good to know that, if I want to burn a DVD-R, I can always mount the ISO in Virtual CloneDrive, then run CloneDVD, select the virtual drive, and I'm good to go.

By the way, I don't use Windows Explorer. I use TotalCommander. I have seen bogus title sets via VLC, but apparently TotalCommander isn't fooled by them. The next time I encounter bogus title sets, I'll have to look at them via Windows Explorer to see the difference.

Thank you for all your great help. ...May you live for 1000 years!