DVD on Palm?

[Japking]

You can get VCDEasy (www.vcdeasy.org). There is a commercial version and a freeware version now, and the freeware version is still very well featured and not crippleware (it's just an older version).

Basically, VCDEasy is designed to create and even burn VCDs and SVCDs, but it can also disassemble a (S)VCD, which means convert or "rip" it to MPEG format (either MPEG1 or MPEG2 depending on if you're using VCDs or SVCDs). Then you can just grab the MPEG and throw it through Kinoma to play it on your Palm.

I recorded virtually all the SpongeBob Squarepants episodes to VCDs (using a PC-TV card and VCDEasy), and I've since used VCDEasy to rip some of the kids' favorite episodes back to MPEG1 format, and then bring them on a SD card in my T2 when we go on long shopping trips, or anywhere that may be trying their patience. As soon as I tap the play button in a store, their temper tantrums are SILENCED immediately. I'm a parent in heaven!

If you have any questions after getting VCDEasy, don't hesitate to email me directly or ask them here if you think it will help others to do the same thing.

[itsmeagian]

Hello
There's so many questions of this kind of thing, it may be best to write a guide and then create an FAQ sticky to put it in. That'll have to wait for now, but if you think it would be a good idea, then maybe we could pull together this information sometime and create such a thread...

Anyway, heres a few bits of info. Skip about two thirds of the way down for the encoding method. I'll mark clearly where it starts. This first bit is just info/detail.

There are three things to videos: (Skip these three things if you just wanna encode a video and not worry about the ins and outs.)
1) A container. This is like a pot in which you shove your video and audio. avi is not a codec, a common misconception. It is in fact a container. Container examples are: .avi (Audio-Visual Interleave) .ogm (Ogg Movie) .mka (Matroska) even a Palm .pdb file sometimes. On our Palms, the only relevant one are pdb and avi, until ogm support is added to MMPlayer.

2) A video codec. When you encode a video, you are compressing it with some codec, the exception of course being uncompressed video. (codec stands for compression decompression). Example of video codecs: MPEG 1/MPEG2 (usually .mpg) Windows Media Video (WMV). Then theres Cinepak, DV, MPEG4 and all sorts of others (these tend to be in an avi container and thus have the extension .avi)

NOTE: DivX, Xvid, libavcodec and others, are actually all different methods of enocoding to MPEG 4. Whichever of these you use, the video stream you create will be in MPEG 4 format, they just interpret the information fed to them in different ways, and so some are able to produce a more visually pleasing MPEG 4 file. (There are certain features that DivX etc "add" to the mpeg4 file they create however, such as b-frames, but basically they are all creating an MPEG 4 file. This is why if a player is compatible with DivX encoded movies, it can play XviD ones too, when it may not be compatible with MPEG 1/2......)

3) An Audio codec. Ogg vorbis is AWESOME. But it's akward. The lack of Vorbis direct show filters, prevents you from capturing from TV etc, directly to an Vorbis audio stream. Also note that you can't really have an ogg vorbis audio stream in an avi container, so if you wanna use Ogg, you need to use a container such as OGM or Matroska. Let me reiterate that OGM and Matroska are not compatible yet with any Palm players, so for the time being this rules out using ogg audio with our movies.
Other audio codecs are PCM Mp3 WMA etc etc....

VIDEO ENCODING BIT!

OKAY- so you guys want video on your Palm?? Well it's a compromise between complexity, file size, and quality. If you want to keep it simple and you have a 1 GB SD card to put your 5 minute pop video on your Palm, you can use 200MB/ minute and have a lovely video at high frame rate etc. But most of us don't have the money to buy 1GB sd cards, and we want more than a 5 minute vid on our Palms. You want to put a least one full-length movie on you 256MB SD card.
This requires some effort but thankfully no-where near as much as it used to. (BTW, if you want to do it the classic way, (it's fun, trust me ) you need VirtualDub (VirtualDubMod+AC3 codec for vobs....)
Nowadays, we have programs that simplify the task:- mainly PocketDVDStudio and PocketDivXEncoder. I confess to having never tried the former, as PocketDivXEncoder (I'll refer to it as PDXE) is an excellent piece of software with all the features needed. I am here going to quickly list the method to get your video playing on your T3, with MMPlayer, encoded using PDXE.
First however let me just mention the other options. You can use Kinoma. This uses a stone-age codec (Cinepak is my memory serves me correctly). This does not mean you can't encode high-quality video with it- far from this, you can, but at a price. And the price is file-size. Bigger file, uses more memory, something which is, a least to me with my 256MB SD card, in short supply. I confess to not having recently tried TealMovie (I promise I will Paul!), but unless they use Xvid to encode video to mp4 and mp3 or something to encode audio, they will not be able to rival the file size vs quality that the following method will produce.
This is NOT to say that TealMovie and Kinoma don't have their uses. They do, for simplicity and speed, as well as clean, stable interfaces for playback on the Palm.

NOTE FOR DVD ENCODING.
I presume PocketDVDEncoder integrates the process of ripping video from DVD. PocketDivXEncoder does not:- it accepts the ripped files (vobs), but it does not actually rip them. You need another program to rip them. The ripping of DVDs, regardless of whether you own then, is a legal grey area, as it involves the cracking of CSS encryption (which is illegal). For this reason, please do not ask where to find such ripper programs here.

THIS IS THE RELEVANT BIT! THE ABOVE STUFF IS DETAIL THAT MOST WON'T BE INTERESTED IN.

PocketDivXEncoder Movie:

1) Download and open the latest version of PocketDivXEncoder (0.3.50 i think). http://divx.ppccool.com

2) On entry it will ask for a PDA type. DO NOT press T3. You can experiment later, but for now this just complicates the matter as it selects resolutions to large for the T3 to easily decode. For now press on the ipaq (labelled PDA). This automatically selects a 320x240 resolution. You can then watch as this size on your T3 or use the zoom function to make it nearly full screen.

3) Load you vid. PDXE is very good and accept videos input in almost any format (although I guess you must have the videos filter installed on your system). (With Vobs you need to load the first one, and the others will be automatically read and loaded.)

4) Press "Advanced Options". Check "Create an AVI file......." and check VHQ- nothing else needs checking.

5) Crop and cut clip are self explanitary, but be aware that unless it was added in the latest version (which I don't think it was) you cannot use "cut clip" on vobs.

6) Set Video an audio quality. Let me recommend Video Quality 8 to 12 (depending on file size you want and quality you want) and audio quality 2 to 3. But you can experiment yourself. To give you an idea, video quality 9 and audio quality 3 will be less than 2MB a minute, (and damn good quality compared to kinoma at 20+ MB/min). 2MB a min will give you a good 2 hours on a 256MB SD card. Many will find Video 6 and audio 2 acceptable (1.5MB/min) or even less.

7) Hit ENCODE! You should be pleasently suprised by the speed (much faster than VirtualDub etc, as it uses mencoder under the hood). Reencoding from DivX should be lightening fast, but encoding from MPEG2 (inc vobs) will be slow, due to a colour conversion (YUV-RGB).

Then you just need MMPlayer to playback. Using the above method, it is the only software you will need to buy, and it's not too expensive. www.mmplayer.com
I don't see the need to pay for PocketDVDStudio when you can do everything is does for free, (albeit with two programs instead of one if your using DVDs for a source.)

Sorry to ramble on but you should all know by now not to get me started on video encoding
Hope it made some sense even if it was really disjointed. I must find some time to organise it better and maybe even put it in a faq sticky. Do you think that would be worthwhile?
Take care all,
iiicRuled

P.S. Just tell me if you want certain things clarifying. I don't have the time right now to read it back and clarify things, and as I was being quick, I may have been unclear in places. Don't hesitate to ask me anything.

[KaliW]

Tiz,

TMPGEnc is no longer freeware. However, there are plenty of freeware MPEG1 encoders available. I personally have the latest registered version of TMPGEnc, not because I like spending a lot of money though -- I bought the first non-free version a long time ago, and get free upgrades so I didn't pay anywhere near what it costs now. TMPGEnc will encode MPEG2 (better quality), which is why it (and 99% of all other encoders) are no longer free. But for Palm viewing purposes, MPEG1 should be fine. Maybe someone here can suggest a good, free MPEG1 encoder? I know there are plenty out there, but I haven't need to find one since I already had TMPGEnc.

Be prepared though -- none of what you're about to do is easy for a video newbie. Kinoma makes things VERY easy by being so automated. Most other video programs (especially encoders) are not easy and usually do not come with very good (if any) instructions.

One thing you could do is buy full version QuickTime. That will convert common video files (AVI, MPEG, etc.) to QuickTime MOV format, which Kinoma accepts without issue. I think the full version of QuickTime is only $29, so it's quite a good deal, especially if you're have a need for manipulating QT MOV files anyway (like I do with my digital camera taking those types of videos).

[shaggis]

Wow. I did not know this was going to be such a hot topic.
Well since it was asked this is my set up in my T3 and then I will give you How I convert DVD to AVI for the palm to use

T3:
-Running MMplayer V 0.2.12
-UltraII 512mb crd (Sandisk) They are getting cheaper
-Leave 25mb free (at least) on the ram memory *** important for setting the buffer on the MMplayer to 10mb each for audio and video

Using Pocket DVD

Set up is a sinch
1) pick crop , which is simple due to the fact that they show you how the crop looks against the movie (visualy)
2) Set video and audio output- I do 40Kbits/44Khz/stereo, but you can do the lowest and still get good sound with MMplayer (has eq and amp). I also pick frame rate of 20 ( i know high, but it works )
3) open dvd
4) pick resolutiom ( use full widescreen )464X224
5) with the slider given you can set quality versus Output size and bit rate (since it calculates it automaticaly ther is no guessing)
Start and in 2 1/2 hours you have a 2 hour movie (approx. 400mb)
Move the file to the SD card with a card reader/writer.

You can set, on the output setting, to turn your pc off once it finishes, which is great since I leave it overnight.

Even though MMPlayer will say that the bitrate is to high, press play. it will play w/o a problem.

I hope this helps people . You can try the freeware for Pocket DVD , but you can only do 8 minutes at a time but it will give you a good idea on how it will look

mas

[brandonkiser99]

iiiCRuled IS GOD.

[Jake it Up]

iiicRules, Pilot, mspadaro and PTL all great posts , I shall be keeping this information saved.

As iiicRules stated a Sticky on the information he supplied would be a good addition to the forum.

Thanks again all I shall be trying out the options mentioned when I get a memory card.

Tiz

[Sahil S]

Because I'm the type of person who always feels that I'm missing out on something if I don't try it , I downloaded PocketDivXEncoder and a trial version of MMPlayer to see what I was missing.

Basically, I have to say that for automated video conversion to a Palm acceptable resolution/format/whatever, PocketDivXEncoder is just incredible and VERY fast. Even on my MPEG1 and MPEG2 movies/video clips -- the conversion was as fast as 1.5 to 3 minutes!

The only caveat that I found was in the player. I don't know if it was just the trial version or some problem with my conversion using PDXE, but the video was VERY choppy during playback, to the point of not being realistically playable/enjoyable. I followed the recommended settings above for conversion, and even lowered the settings a bit to see if the problem is that I'm running it on a T2 instead of a T3 (which might still be the problem).

Does anyone have the above software working well on a T2? I really like the speed of the conversion with this setup rather than the much slower Kinoma. Although, the end-product of Kinoma seems to work much better on my T2 than MMPlayer.

[conkiler]

Hello Pilot:
I also have a Zire 71 which I love (besides the T3). I will try it with my MMPlayer an d Pocket DVD and I will let you know. I will also post the set ups on both the palm and the pc.

Just make sure that you have the latest MMPlayer. I used to have the same problems with the older versions.
I dont have PocketDivXEncoder so like i said above will use pocket DVD.

mas

[dmb a???]

Okay, at last I got something I can work with -- an error message. It says that my framerate is too high so it cannot play the file in real time.

I've tested it with the PocketDivXEncoder quality set at the absolute lowest for video and audio, cannot really find a way to specifically set the framerate unless I change it via TMPGEnc prior to running it through PocketDivXEncoder. That's an extra step (and time) that I don't really care to do.

What am I missing? I'm pretty affluent with video software, but PocketDivXEncoder doesn't seem to offer many advanced options for tweaking the video settings.

If I have to encode twice to properly lower the framerate, I'm definitely leaning toward continuing with Kinoma again, as it would be about the same conversion time....

[reeka]

Yes you've hit on it, it's the frame rate. But don't fear, you can set frame rate manually in PocketDivXEncoder. Just hit the "Advanced Options" button, tick "Framerate" and then a box will appear to allow manual entry of framerate. Don't worry, this is not a problem with you PDA, it just can't cope. I would never expect 25fps on a T2.
Bitrate will not have a huge amont of effect on the processor strain, so it's not really necessary to lower bitrate for a T2. However, if you are using less frames, that's less data, so feel free to lower it a bit. (NOTE: Half the framerate does not mean it needs half the bitrate!!! I can explain, but you probably know why or don't care..!) Try video quality 5 and audio quality 1. Crop any black bars etc off using PDXE "crop", as this will reduce strain on processor.

Now as to the frame rate, you need to halve whatever you are using. Don't pick a random framerate as this causes serious difficulties- the encoder then has to predict and construct frames, and you just don't wanna go there!! It would take hours to encode for a start. I guess your vid is 25fps, so just enter 12.5 in the box. If your vids are NTSC (like 30fps) then try 15fps, although I fear this may be too much for your pda still. 10fps is the next best thing but that is quite low.....
Hopefully your vids will be 25fps, and you should find 12.5fps quite watchable. I'm afraid that as my guide was tailored to the T3, I didn't mention the other difference between the old and new codecs. You will by now have realised that although new codecs can provide much more effective compression, they also require much more processing power to decode

I'm hoping that with half the frame rate, the video will play. If not there are a couple of other possibilities. One is increase the buffer in the options (make sure you have plenty of free space). The second is reduce the resolution of your video (i.e. 320x180 [16:9 Widescreen] needs much less processing power than 320x240 [4x3 PAL]) to playback. But the aspect ratio you want to encode to depends on your source. The only other option is to overclock your processor. There is a small element of risk to this, however. I'm sure if your PDA was under warranty overclocking would void it for a start. But the fact is the TT/T2 have a Texas Instruments OMAP 1510 175Mhz Processor in them. Oh no they don't, it's 144Mhz, I hear you say. Well yes and no. The processor is by nature 175Mhz, but Palm chose to underclock it to 144Mhz, for whatever reason (I guess to save battery life). Therefore, theroetically it should be quite safe to overclock to 175Mhz. Please beware that you are overclocking at your own risk though! Only do it if needed- I have never overclocked my T3. I did however run my 20Mhz IIIc at 33Mhz+...... Ah those were the days.....
iiicRuled

P.S.


Well yea, but even if you did have to (which you don't!) you'd end up with vids 10+ times the size for the same quality in Kinoma. You could carry a whole library of SpongeBob with you too keep the kids happy on that 512MB SD card of yours! With the above settings your videos would total 174Kbps which is 1.305 MB/Min. If a SpongeBob episode was 15 Mins (just a guess, I don't watch!) that's less than 20MB an episode. You could have 25 episodes on your card!!