02-15-2010, 04:44 PM

I have been beating my brains out over this. Even called Apple and offer no help. I have a Macbook running 10.5x. 2 gigs ram. I had all of my home movies put on DVD's. When I play them in my DVD player they look fine. if I rip the DVD then load in itunes and then sync to my appleTV it's blurry and blocky and looks horrible. I've tried Handbrake but it keeps freezing when I try two pass encoding. It never makes it past the first pass. The Apple tech told me to mount the DVD as a disk image and then import to imovie 09. It doesn't work. imovie will not recognize it. I've tried various other ripping software on trial basis and they all stink like wondershare, rip it, etc.

Can anyone please point me in the right direction here? It seems it should not be this difficult. I also have a bunch of DV on my HDD camcorder that I'd like to import and burn to a DVD. Same thing happens. I import to imovie, edit it and then burn a DVD using idvd and it looks horrible.

I'm very frustrated at this point and have done as much research on this subject as I can.

Thank you in advance. Also I'm not looking for a free solution. I'll gladly pay for software if it works.

02-15-2010, 05:36 PM

Sadly you are going to have a problem getting help with this here. It is against the law to circumvent the protection software on a DVD even if you own it. Thus what you are doing is not allowed to be discussed here. I'm surprised that Apple didn't tell you what you were doing was illegal to be honest.

Sorry, but I think you are going to have to search elsewhere for an answer. Also, any software that you buy that circumvents the protection is also violating the law.

02-15-2010, 05:43 PM

Originally Posted by DaFlake

Sadly you are going to have a problem getting help with this here. It is against the law to circumvent the protection software on a DVD even if you own it. Thus what you are doing is not allowed to be discussed here. I'm surprised that Apple didn't tell you what you were doing was illegal to be honest.

Sorry, but I think you are going to have to search elsewhere for an answer. Also, any software that you buy that circumvents the protection is also violating the law.

Not so. The OP is talking about HOME MOVIES that he had put onto dvd and that would not be a violation of the forum to talk about such.

To the OP when using hand brake to do the same thing with DVD's of my niece's and nephew's I found that if I used the Apple Universal preset to save them then I had a lot less of a problem. Give it a try and let us know how it goes.

Clay

02-15-2010, 05:59 PM

Oops! Thanks for that Clay, I read right past it.

I totally agree as well, the universal preset is pretty tight.

02-15-2010, 07:03 PM

Thank you Clay. As you said, these are all home movies. I tragically lost my wife of 17 years in 2008 and I'm trying to make a nice movie edited from all of my DVD's. I'm trying to put together clips from many DVD's to make one new movie that I can also watch on my Apple TV. I'll try the universal setting.

02-15-2010, 11:49 PM

Sorry for your loss, I hope that helps you out.

You might also look at DVD2One if handbrake continues not to work out for you.

02-16-2010, 12:15 AM

Since the DVDs don't have any copy protection, simply drag the VIDEO_TS folder to your desktop (if that won't work then rip the DVD using a program called MactheRipper), then point Handbrake to this folder. Select the appropriate preset (I personally like Apple Universal) and then let it do its thing.

Unless you absolutely need a specific file size, don't mess with any of the settings such as 2-pass encoding.

02-16-2010, 09:10 AM

Thanks. I ripped a DVD using handbrake last night with the Universal setting. It hung up at the end and instead of ripping the whole DVD, it started at the beginning 45 minutes into the movie. Even though Handbrake hung, it showed up on my desktop. I was able to import into itunes then I couldnt sync with my ATV. Kept saying it wasn't responding. Called Apple TV support and they said it was my wireless router. UGH!!!!! I reinstalled I-tunes and then it would sync. When I view the movie on my ATV it is clear. When I view the movie in itunes on my mac, it has lines and jagged edges.

So I did what KASH said and copied the Video TS folder to my desktop and then converted it. I also set it to de-interlace slow. I'll check it when I get home from work.

So if this works out, I want to try editing in Imovie 09 and then playing that on my ATV or Mac. I also have Final Cut Express but I can't figure out how to use it (I haven't spent much time on it).

Thanks in advance

02-16-2010, 10:20 AM

I'm very sorry to hear about your wife, that is a terrible loss.

A thought on your ripping the video, instead of de-interlace, you may want to use decomb - de-interlace performs the operation on every frame even if not needed where as decomb is a more "intelligent" de-interlacer just working on the areas that have interlacing issues. This helps preserve a higher quality image. See this wiki entry at handbrake for a better explanation: Decomb ? HandBrake - basically, use decomb, not deinterlace. Worst case you try it and don't like the results

02-16-2010, 11:32 AM

Nethfel, thanks for the kind words. It is a terrible loss. 39 years old on top of the world with everything we could want most importantly 4 healthy kids and a great marriage. I'd rather have 20 years (17 married) with a person I loved then a lifetime with someone I did not.

Anyway, I'll try the decomb option. I read the link you posted and it explained it well. I thought decomb was the default setting on handbrake. After seeing the examples, my video had the lines in the first example.

After I conquer this, my next mission will be how to edit the movie in Imovie 09 and then sent it to my apply TV without a ton of quality loss that I currently experience.

02-17-2010, 09:14 AM

OK I used handbrake to rip using deinterlace and then denoise. I used the apply universal preset. It doesn't seem that Handbrake finishes the conversion. It just sits there and says 100% complete and I see the file on my desk top but there is still a red progress bar on the icon in the dock that is not complete.

On my desktop is a M4v file that has an itunes logo on it. I can't open the file. If I use quicktime to open, it says it is not a movie file. I cannot import the file into itunes or drag it to my movie folder.

What the heck is going on here?! This is so frustrating and seems it should be so simple!!! I deleted and reinstalled handbrake and the result was the same. Any thoughts?

02-17-2010, 09:25 AM

Originally Posted by Audi R8

OK I used handbrake to rip using deinterlace and then denoise. I used the apply universal preset. It doesn't seem that Handbrake finishes the conversion. It just sits there and says 100% complete and I see the file on my desk top but there is still a red progress bar on the icon in the dock that is not complete.

On my desktop is a M4v file that has an itunes logo on it. I can't open the file. If I use quicktime to open, it says it is not a movie file. I cannot import the file into itunes or drag it to my movie folder.

What the heck is going on here?! This is so frustrating and seems it should be so simple!!! I deleted and reinstalled handbrake and the result was the same. Any thoughts?

I too am so sorry to hear of your loss. I hope I can help.

Have you tried just using the Apple TV preset in Handbrake when ripping your DVDs? I have converted DVDs before using Roxio Toast and have had similar results in the past. But it seems that when I use Handbrake with the AppleTV preset, I get much better results.

To be specific, click the Toggle Presets button in the toolbar. Then, in the slide out window that opens, choose Apple => AppleTV.

02-17-2010, 10:04 AM

Thank you. I will try that. The Apple TV setting actually worked the first time just needed Decombed. I'll run it again and try the decomb option using the ATV preset. I like the ATV but don't like how you have to sync it like an iphone. I wish you could just drag files directly to it like you do an ipod when its hooked to itunes.

02-18-2010, 01:39 PM

OK it worked!!!! Used the universal Apple setting using DeComb. Then I imported into Imovie 09 and pulled out the clip I wanted. Then I exported that as a a quicktime movie and uploaded to youtube. Picture looks good and I can even watch it in HD. Thanks everyone!

02-18-2010, 02:06 PM

Excellent, so glad we were able to help.