I used Pdvdrsab to rip a DVD and ended up with a 5 Gb (approx) vob file but that is too big to burn to a dvd-r.
When i look at the menu in Pdvdrsab it appears as if I should be able to select an "existing mpg or vob to shrink" in order to make it small enough to burn. I think it is supposed to use "VAMPS".
However when i try this (on Tahr32) it creates a new vob that is 0 bytes. (ie does nothing even though it says completed).
Has anyone successfully done this?
If not, what method is best to shrink the vob size to fit on a burnable dvd please? I assume that I need to shrink the resolution from 720x576 to something like 640x512 (to maintain the aspect ratio) or else the vob will not shrink.
Any thoughts please?
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SUMMARY of results
Thanks everybody for a lot of suggestions and info.
This summary is a work in progress as I test each method:
My conclusion so far is that vamps is unreliable for shrinking media especially if the user is inexperienced, or the disc is scratched, or maybe also depending on how the media is structured across the disc. I could not get good integrity of the entire film when using vamps.
Successful methods:
NOTE: before doing any video processing set the Puppy up to have as much memory as possible, plenty of swap partition space and plenty of working room on disc.
(My preferred method of achieving this - especially on a RAM-challenged machine - is here )
I will post some working solutions below:
(In no particular order - be prepared to try anything):
Solution 1:
a) Copy the entire dvd film content (no menus or chapters) to one large vob file:
vobcopy /dev/sr0 --large-file
(Substitute a different value if your optical drive is not showing as sr0)
Links: here and here
b) Use ffmpeg to shrink the largefile:
ffmpeg -y -i input.vob -target pal-dvd -aspect 4:3 final.vob
(Change the "pal" to "ntsc if required and/or change the 4:3 parameter to 16:9 if it's a widescreen format)
Link: here
c) Put a blank dvd in the drive
Use pburn and select the "Burn Video" mode.
Choose the shrunken vob file from the step above.
Be patient.
Solution 2:
In situations where vobcopy (or similar) produces multiple vobs that need to be combined before DVD creation then I can use the merge script from wizard here
(with one slight modification - using only pburn for the final automatic author/burn rather than pdvdrsab)
Merge multiple vob to dvd:
-put vob files in a directory
-copy merge_video.sh to the directory and set permissions to executable
-edit merge_video.sh to match input vob file names
-open a terminal in the directory and type: ./merge_video.sh
-press enter and it will create a single dvd compatible output.mpg file
-use pdvdrsab to shrink output.mpg if required, pdvdrsab will name the output file to a .vob, rename it back to a .mpg
-use pburn to burn dvd
Solution 3:
