Posted by Peter H. Coffin on 10/24/06 13:27

On Tue, 24 Oct 2006 07:35:32 -0400, E Barry Bruyea wrote:
> I recently went to make a backup copy of a DVD I bought at a Garage
> Sale. It was a 'Two Sided' DVD of the remake (2003) of the movie
> 'Spartacus' and I ran it in DVDShrink to take out the extraneous
> stuff. I was going to put both sides on one Single layer DVD. I
> processed the first & second sides into separate folders and then
> began to combine them both, but was told the resulting file would be
> too big for a DVD. Each side was 1hr, 28 minutes after I'd elimited
> the extras; I've copied many DVD's that were 3 hours long, but when I
> checked the actual VOB files on the original disk, I found there were
> a total of 4 1gig & 1 378meg files for each 1hr & 28 minute side.
> I've not had that much experience backing up DVD's but I have to admit
> I haven't a clue as to why this one is so damn big.

I don't know the particulars of this disc, but a dual-sided disc can
also be dual layer on each side and contain 3-4 times the amount of
data that a single-layer, single-sided disc can. Which means the
"shrinkification" (which is actually a fast decode and recode at a
hopefully higher compression rate) just can't find enough data to remove
from the AV streams to make it all fit. Conceptually, it's kind of like
trying zip together a bunch of zipfiles. You don't end up saving much,
if anything.

And a personal comment: Dude, you bought this at a garage sale. It was
probably priced around a tenth of what it was new. Just watch it and
enjoy it, and get your pittance of pleasure out of it. If you like it a
lot, keep it out of the reach of children until they know how to handle
discs without wrecking it. You won't need "backups" then, until the disc
deteriorates from old age, and that will happen whether you watch this
one or your "backup". And your "backup" will probably deteriorate first
anyway.

--
Remember, a 12'x12'x18" raised floor can hold over a thousand gallons of
blood before it starts to seep up through the cracks.
-- Roger Burton West in the Monastery

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