[hillstones]

HottDogg, on 20 January 2010 - 12:00 PM, said:

I know the whole point of this is "CAN I DO THIS?" But if the goal is to have a Blu-ray copy in the living room and a digital copy for Apple devices, what about just Netflix'ing the movie in standard form and making the digital copy from the rental? Sounds like it would a whole lot easier that ripping the movie into a 31GB (Geez!) file and then have to do it all over again with yet another program.

I'll pass.

Because that is ILLEGAL. This is about making a digital copy of a disc that you purchased for your personal use. Not like you, that rent and steal movies. Hopefully the FBI will knock on your door.

[hillstones]

hayesk, on 20 January 2010 - 12:15 PM, said:

hillstones, on 20 January 2010 - 06:46 AM, said:

New Disney titles have the right idea because they include a Blu-Ray version, DVD version, and Digital Copy version.

They have almost the right idea. Unfortunately, those digital copies are only 480p. AppleTV outputs 720p and all Macs sold today are capable of playing at least 720p. I'm hoping the reason is that most computers don't have blu-ray drives so there's no practical way of getting them on to the computer, but I'm skeptical and think the reason is they're being stingy again.

Most people don't own an AppleTV, and would prefer to make a digital copy for their portable device.

[hillstones]

hayesk, on 20 January 2010 - 12:20 PM, said:

hillstones, on 20 January 2010 - 11:46 AM, said:

bastion, on 20 January 2010 - 10:44 AM, said:

It hasn't taken off, really. Adoption has been slower than other home media formats at similar points in their life cycle and at least a few of the major players are predicting it won't last long as a format. The licensing situation is improved but still has serious issues. I didn't expect it in 10.6 and I don't expect it in 10.7.

It didn't take long for you to spout off your BS rhetoric! We get it. You HATE Blu-Ray. But you are WRONG. Walk into any Best Buy and Blu-Ray titles are growing in HUGE numbers and many people are buying them. There are now more Blu-Ray players being sold than DVD players. So your BS quip about "major players" is dead-wrong. So sit back and enjoy your collection of Beta tapes.

You failed to disprove his point. The fact that you see a few line-ups and more shelves is irrelevant. The fact is people switched from VHS to DVD at a faster rate than DVD to Blu-ray. Your anecdotal evidence (oxymoron) doesn't change that. He is asserting that DVD sales took off faster in their day than blu-ray is today. He is also asserting that Blu-ray will go away in favour of an even better format sooner than blu-ray replaced DVD. Feel free to prove him wrong.

Bastion thinks BluRay is a major failure and has no adoption, he doesn't think anything better will come after it, he has never stated that. Read any of his posts. He has never asserted a better format will be created. It is not a "few line ups." Walk into Best Buy and the selection is now an even split between DVD and Blu Ray. Go shopping in stores or online and there are more Blu Ray players offered for sale than DVD players. DVD sales didn't take off during the first few years because players were still expensive. It took a few years before prices came down. Also, there wasn't a major format war hindering both high definition media formats. (Divx didn't count because that was intended as a rental format that failed quickly). So DVD never really had any equal competition against it. If there wasn't a format war at the beginning, either high def disc format would have taken off just as fast.

[bastion]

hillstones, on 20 January 2010 - 04:52 PM, said:

hayesk, on 20 January 2010 - 12:20 PM, said:

hillstones, on 20 January 2010 - 11:46 AM, said:

bastion, on 20 January 2010 - 10:44 AM, said:

It hasn't taken off, really. Adoption has been slower than other home media formats at similar points in their life cycle and at least a few of the major players are predicting it won't last long as a format. The licensing situation is improved but still has serious issues. I didn't expect it in 10.6 and I don't expect it in 10.7.

It didn't take long for you to spout off your BS rhetoric! We get it. You HATE Blu-Ray. But you are WRONG. Walk into any Best Buy and Blu-Ray titles are growing in HUGE numbers and many people are buying them. There are now more Blu-Ray players being sold than DVD players. So your BS quip about "major players" is dead-wrong. So sit back and enjoy your collection of Beta tapes.

You failed to disprove his point. The fact that you see a few line-ups and more shelves is irrelevant. The fact is people switched from VHS to DVD at a faster rate than DVD to Blu-ray. Your anecdotal evidence (oxymoron) doesn't change that. He is asserting that DVD sales took off faster in their day than blu-ray is today. He is also asserting that Blu-ray will go away in favour of an even better format sooner than blu-ray replaced DVD. Feel free to prove him wrong.

Bastion thinks BluRay is a major failure and has no adoption, he doesn't think anything better will come after it, he has never stated that. Read any of his posts. He has never asserted a better format will be created. It is not a "few line ups." Walk into Best Buy and the selection is now an even split between DVD and Blu Ray. Go shopping in stores or online and there are more Blu Ray players offered for sale than DVD players. DVD sales didn't take off during the first few years because players were still expensive. It took a few years before prices came down. Also, there wasn't a major format war hindering both high definition media formats. (Divx didn't count because that was intended as a rental format that failed quickly). So DVD never really had any equal competition against it. If there wasn't a format war at the beginning, either high def disc format would have taken off just as fast.

Thank you for putting words into my mouth and for ascribing to me beliefs that I have never expressed and do not hold.

I do not think BD is a major failure. I know, based on hard available data, that it has not seen consumer adoption as rapid as DVD did. Not even close. I've never expressed, that I recall, any personal prediction about what might supplant BD, but it's completely disingenuous for you to take the lack of expressed opinion on that as a positive statement that I believe nothing better will supplant it. That's nonsensical, unless you think I believe that people will forego home entertainment completely. Even if you account for the format war between BD and HD-DVD, BD isn't growing as fast as DVD did.

Last month: Blu-ray player sales have grown rapidly this year , but they still make up less than 12% of DVD player sales in western Europe, according to data released recently by the analysis company GfK Group. ... "Sales have been disappointing for the industry," said Richard Cooper, senior video analyst at the media analysis company Screen Digest.

Late summer, 2009: BDs will be found in 3.6 percent of PCs shipped this year—a number expected to rise to only 16.3 percent by 2013. ... “BDs won’t be replacing DVDs as the primary optical drive in PC systems through at least the year 2013,” said Michael Yang, iSuppli senior analyst for storage and mobile memory, in a statement.

October: Jim Bottoms, managing director of Futuresource, says that [BD adoption] it will never match the overall acceptance of DVD. ... “online is stronger, there is VOD expansion, etc.”

You don't have to be happy about it - and apparently you're so unhappy about it that you can't even look at it objectively - but you look like a fool every time you just mindlessly say it can't be true. If you have *data* that contradicts me, you're welcome - encouraged even - to share it. But you've done no such thing so far, instead choosing to "make your case" by citing unverifiable anecdotes, twisting my words and inventing whole new ones for me and, essentially, chanting "nuh-uh" any time verifiable information has been shown contradicting you.

BD is not being adopted as rapidly as DVD. That is a fact.
Highly-placed people at some home entertainment vendors believe that BD will be short-lived. That is a fact. You may disagree with their prognosis, but you can't rationally reject the fact that they've said so.
The licensing situation has improved - and improved substantially - since Steve laid out his preconditions for BD support in Mac OS X. However it is still, frankly, a bag of hurt. It sucks less, but it still sucks.
Steve indicated that 2 necessary conditions for support of BD in Mac OS X were that the format "take off" and that the licensing situation had to be improved. He did not indicate that those were sufficient conditions, but even if they were no *informed* person would say either has been met. Only zealots unencumbered by reality.

[aynrandgirl]

Help me out here: does MKV make an unencrypted bit-perfect copy, or a transcoded copy? I have a severe dislike of transcodes of the lossy codecs used in DVDs and BDs, because they are lossy themselves and I never want to make lossy copies of my media. That's why I only rip CDs to FLAC or ALAC, for example.

[Jon Seff]

aynrandgirl, on 20 January 2010 - 06:33 PM, said:

Help me out here: does MKV make an unencrypted bit-perfect copy, or a transcoded copy? I have a severe dislike of transcodes of the lossy codecs used in DVDs and BDs, because they are lossy themselves and I never want to make lossy copies of my media. That's why I only rip CDs to FLAC or ALAC, for example.

MKV is just a container, so it can contain whatever. But the MakeMKV app appears to simply decrypt BR discs and put the extracted content into an MKV...no transcoding on its part.

[migiman]

simple312, on 20 January 2010 - 08:14 AM, said:

funny how there is a story on how to rip a blu-ray.
APPLE I JUST WANT TO WATCH BLU-RAY ON MY MAC.

(sorry for the yelling)

I would be nice to be able to just watch bluray disks in say a mac mini htpc. vs getting another standalone player.

So would I. I think Jobs has a slight conflict of interest (in that
he is solidly in the movie download business via iTunes). If I'm
just renting, downloads are not a bad idea. I sometimes like a
movie enough that I actually would like own a copy, however. If
I like a film enough to want to buy a copy, downloads don't
make a lot sense to me (if your hard drive crashes, you probably
have to try and beg Apple to get your downloaded bits back).

Call me old fashioned, but I want the highest quality (and the
plastic disc) when I elect to own a copy of a film.

[George76]

BrianM, on 20 January 2010 - 10:39 AM, said:

and Apple pretty much yelled at the Blu-Ray consortium to simplify the licensing and rights issues at one of the Keynotes. I'm sure you've heard the Steve Jobs quote about "Blu-ray is just a bag of hurt. It's great to watch the movies, but the licensing of the tech is so complex, we're waiting till things settle down and Blu-ray takes off in the marketplace."

And you bought Jobs' BS line? It's so complex yet every other major hardware manufacturer has somehow managed to accomplish it (including Toshiba, whose HD DVD format lost the fight against Blu-Ray)? If the people at Apple are too stupid to figure out the Blu-Ray licensing process, what else they too stupid to figure out? It makes me nervous about buying another Apple product.

[MilSF1]

Jonathan,

This is a nice little intro article, but sorry to say that the definitive Blu-Ray rip-to-Mac "article" has already been written:

How-To: Automate DVD & Blu-Ray (Backup, Encoding & Tagging) for Mac OS X 10.6

--MilSF

[Steve_S]

George76, on 21 January 2010 - 05:31 AM, said:

And you bought Jobs' BS line? It's so complex yet every other major hardware manufacturer has somehow managed to accomplish it (including Toshiba, whose HD DVD format lost the fight against Blu-Ray)? If the people at Apple are too stupid to figure out the Blu-Ray licensing process, what else they too stupid to figure out? It makes me nervous about buying another Apple product.

Right, why should anyone listen to someone who's actually involved with the details of the Blu-Ray licensing issues? We have a resident expert, George76, here to set us straight. Thanks George... I look forward to reading your detailed comparison / contrast post regarding the differences between DVD and Blu-Ray licensing. Short of making that sort of detailed post, I'm afraid you're just blowing hot air.

Obviously, it's possible to license Blu-Ray, but at what cost? Just citing the obvious by stating that someone else has agreed to the terms doesn't make a compelling case as to why Apple should also. Your comments which suggest "Apple is too stupid to figure out the Blu-Ray licensing process" demonstrates your lack of understanding of the issue, while simultaneously exposing your negative disposition towards Apple. For example, do companies like Toshiba (as you've cited) compete in the exact same markets as Apple? No? Does Apple make stand alone DVD/Blu-Ray players? No? Is Toshiba in a position whereby they both sell computers and make authoring software and operating systems that might be impacted by these licenses? No? Then perhaps you're making bold comments on topics you're not prepared to discuss.

[Chris Breen]

MilSF1, on 21 January 2010 - 08:35 AM, said:

This is a nice little intro article, but sorry to say that the definitive Blu-Ray rip-to-Mac "article" has already been written:

You forgot to mention the "intensely complicated" aspect of the cited article. Geeks welcome. Everyone else, give Jon's article another go.

[George76]

Steve_S, on 21 January 2010 - 08:40 AM, said:

Right, why should anyone listen to someone who's actually involved with the details of the Blu-Ray licensing issues?

Because even old Jobs isn't really involved in the licensing issues. Jobs was speaking from the same position of a used car salesman. Sorry if you can't see past the BS. Apple doesn't WANT to license Blu-Ray. They have their own agenda (a little thing you might have heard of called the iTunes Store).

Quote

Obviously, it's possible to license Blu-Ray, but at what cost?

Jobs didn't mention the cost. He mentioned the complexity of it. If every other electronics manufacturer can accomplish, explain to me what is so complex about it? Toshiba wasn't even on board with Blu-Ray at all the first part of last year yet managed to accomplish it to get players out by the end of the year.

Quote

Your comments which suggest "Apple is too stupid to figure out the Blu-Ray licensing process" demonstrates your lack of understanding of the issue, while simultaneously exposing your negative disposition towards Apple.

No, it points out the fallacy of Jobs' BS comment about why Apple isn't providing Blu-Ray.

Quote

For example, do companies like Toshiba (as you've cited) compete in the exact same markets as Apple? No?

Yes, Toshiba does compete in the exact same markets. Toshiba produces computers, just like Apple. Toshiba produces home electronics, just like Apple makes the AppleTV.

Does Apple make stand alone DVD/Blu-Ray players? No?

No, they have what is essentially a competing format wrapped in the AppleTV hardware. What a weird coincidence that a company that makes a competing product fails to embrace the other option (Wow! That's just like Toshiba during the Blu-Ray/HD DVD format war! Amazing!).

Quote

Is Toshiba in a position whereby they both sell computers and make authoring software and operating systems that might be impacted by these licenses? No?

Toshiba (Dell would be a better example, not sure Toshiba has a Blu-Ray equipped PC yet), as a computer manufacturer ends up with the same licensing issues Apple does when it comes to putting Blu-Ray in a computer. Why is it that Dell can somehow make it work? Either some department at Apple is too incompetent or Apple just doesn't want to do it in the first place. It's that simple.

This post has been edited by George76: 21 January 2010 - 09:32 AM

[iedsri]

[quote name='thej' date='20 January 2010 - 11:53 AM' timestamp='1264017193' post='786660']
[quote name='Jon Seff' date='20 January 2010 - 09:07 AM' timestamp='1264007256' post='786600']
[quote name='Aueua' date='20 January 2010 - 06:36 AM' timestamp='1263998189' post='786541']
Interesting article, thank you!

Why haven't you used HandBrake to transcode the 30+ GB MKV file?
HB is 64 bits (VideoMonkey 32 bit only) and if you get the latest SVN (developer build) from their forum, it seems to handle MKVs pretty well...

Cheers!
Aueua
[/quote]

Good point...in the past I've had trouble with HandBrake and non-DVD files (as in, a lot of crashes). But the 0.9.4 version seems to be more stable in that regard, and I'm giving it a try converting the MKV to Apple TV format.
[/quote]


AAAAHHHHHH !!!!
You DO NOT HAVE TO TRANSCODE !!!!

Try this:
-Rip disc with MakeMKV
-Open either SimpleMovieX or Quicktime 7 Pro(Perian must be installed for both in order to open the MKV)
SimpleMovieX
-Open the MKV file to change
-Choose Save As
-Choose the file container that you want to use (MOV, MP4, etc)
Quicktime Pro (QT 7 Player)
-Open the MKV file to change
-Press CMD-J to edit the tracks
-Make any change such as deleting a track you don't want. Like a subtitle track.
-Choose Save As
-Choose the file container that you want to use (MOV, MP4, etc)

In both cases, your MKV file is saved in the new file container (MOV, etc) WITHOUT TRANSCODING.
Every time you transcode you WILL lose some quality. It is not necessary in this case and it is easy to do.

SimpleMovieX is a simple yet fantastic video editor and can be found here: http://simplemoviex.com/
The author is expecting to release a substantially revised version 4.0 "really soon now".

TheJ

[iedsri]

thej, on 20 January 2010 - 11:53 AM, said:

Jon Seff, on 20 January 2010 - 09:07 AM, said:

Aueua, on 20 January 2010 - 06:36 AM, said:

Interesting article, thank you!

Why haven't you used HandBrake to transcode the 30+ GB MKV file?
HB is 64 bits (VideoMonkey 32 bit only) and if you get the latest SVN (developer build) from their forum, it seems to handle MKVs pretty well...

Cheers!
Aueua

Good point...in the past I've had trouble with HandBrake and non-DVD files (as in, a lot of crashes). But the 0.9.4 version seems to be more stable in that regard, and I'm giving it a try converting the MKV to Apple TV format.

AAAAHHHHHH !!!!
You DO NOT HAVE TO TRANSCODE !!!!

Try this:
-Rip disc with MakeMKV
-Open either SimpleMovieX or Quicktime 7 Pro(Perian must be installed for both in order to open the MKV)
SimpleMovieX
-Open the MKV file to change
-Choose Save As
-Choose the file container that you want to use (MOV, MP4, etc)
Quicktime Pro (QT 7 Player)
-Open the MKV file to change
-Press CMD-J to edit the tracks
-Make any change such as deleting a track you don't want. Like a subtitle track.
-Choose Save As
-Choose the file container that you want to use (MOV, MP4, etc)

In both cases, your MKV file is saved in the new file container (MOV, etc) WITHOUT TRANSCODING.
Every time you transcode you WILL lose some quality. It is not necessary in this case and it is easy to do.

SimpleMovieX is a simple yet fantastic video editor and can be found here: http://simplemoviex.com/
The author is expecting to release a substantially revised version 4.0 "really soon now".

TheJ

TheJ's post sounded very promising, so I immediately downloaded MakeMKV to try it out. I ripped a simple DVD movie in MakeMKV, then saved it as an .mkv file.

I then tried using QuickTime Pro (QT 7 Player, version 7.6.3) to read it - but it played back only the audio (the picture remained black).

I checked the file for problems by loading it in VLC -- the .mkv file played perfectly.

Since my aim is to have the file in a format which any Mac or PC can easily play in any standard copy of QuickTime 7, TheJ's suggestion doesn't seem to work.

If QT Pro 7 can't even play a standard NTSC-sourced DVD file in .mkv format, how could it possibly play back an ATSC-sourced 1080p HD file in the same format?

Is there some step involved in saving the MakeMKV file that I missed?

Thanks.