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Format Conversion, Yet Again

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Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Thu Jan 30, 2020 3:05 pm

Hello to all of my old friends. It has, again, been a while.

I am fine. Actually nothing to report, which I guess is good news. Turned 73 this year, and Alice and I are celebrating our 51st wedding anniversary soon!

I have the same old question I have asked in the past, just updated. My problem is my 60-odd family DVDs that I created. With the popularity of the silver discs fading rapidly, I need to do something to move the family library into the future.

The last time I asked here, I ended up just putting all of the ISO image files on hard drives for each of my daughters, and also including VLC to play them on their PCs, and IMGBURN to burn a new DVD if/when then needed one.

But now my grandchildren are adults, and two have expressed a desire to keep the family library alive.

I see now there are lots of media players, USB drive in to HDMI out, for around $35 to $50. I would be great if anybody knows of one of these players that does support the ISO format INCLUDING HANDLING DVD MENUS.

If they don't handle the menus, then I can just convert to flat .mp4 (or better choice?) files. I will then give each grandchild one of the media players and a hard drive with the files.

So: does anybody know of a player that supports the ISO menu format, and if not what is the right type of file these days to convert to?

Thanks much, and I look forward to hearing from my old friends again :-)
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Peru » Thu Jan 30, 2020 7:36 pm

Hi Bobby,

It's good to hear that all is going well.
It must feel great that the grandchildren are showing an interest in your efforts to keep the family history alive.

I'm interested in hearing an answer to your question in hopes that my daughter might take an interest in our family history.
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Thu Jan 30, 2020 8:56 pm

Hi Peru. Good to hear from you.

The g’kids of course are major players in many of the DVDs. Although it took a while, their maturity is now showing through and they want to be a part of the process. Right now that is just a maintenance role which I will start be getting the images to them for safekeeping.

So for now it’s either finding a player that supports the ISO DVD format accompanied by a hard drive with the file’s as-is, or converting to flat files and just finally shedding the menus for good.

Looking for advice...
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Steve Grisetti » Fri Jan 31, 2020 7:44 am

Well, life continues to show us that, when it comes to technology, you really can't predict the future.

But you definitely should be safe converting them to MP4s. That way you can watch them on your computer, upload them to a site or stream them to your TV.
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby sidd finch » Fri Jan 31, 2020 9:30 am

I agree with Steve. In addition I would store on an SSD drive. If cost is not to much of an issue I would also suggest online storage with Google, Microsoft or something reputable.

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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Fri Jan 31, 2020 5:58 pm

Thanks all. After thinking today, I have decided to bite the bullet and say goodbye to the menus. Got a good conversion program to generate MP4’s. About $120 or so will get a media player box and drive for each recipient. Will check prices on SSD also.

Time and technology marches on!

I have oodles and terabytes of storage on Microsoft and already have the files uploaded.

I will keep you all I posted...
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Chuck Engels » Fri Jan 31, 2020 9:19 pm

Hey Bobby !! So good to see you visiting your old stomping grounds :)

Good decision to ditch the menus, I have gone completely with MP4s and flash drives. If you have the time you could make each chapter a separate movie, but maybe too much work ....

Glad to hear you are doing well, still in politics?

Congrats on the anniversary !!! My wife and I just celebrated our 40th last summer :) You are exactly 10 years ahead of me, hope I make it that far and beyond.
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Sat Feb 01, 2020 1:19 pm

Thanks Chuck, good to hear from you.

Making each chapter a separate .mp4 file would be somewhat difficult as I would have to open the project file for each DVD and I don't have any of the back levels of PE on my PC these days, and you know how difficult it was to open old projects in newer versions of PE. I am not sure it would be worth the effort.

Once all is packaged up, I may just enlist the grandkids to play the files and note at which time a chapter starts. I would then add the times to the master spreadsheet I have for all the projects.

I am now completely out of politics after losing for mayor. I was actually tempted to run again this past election as both candidates were, shall we say, not optimum! The cooler heads of my friends prevailed.

Congratulations on your anniversary also - 40 is great!

But our lives have certainly changed. 4 of my 5 grandkids are adults now - off to school, have their own lives and cars, etc. Oh, they call grandma and grandpa once in a while and they do love us, but we live different lives now. Funny, that's how it was with MY grandparents!
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Sun Feb 02, 2020 3:08 pm

Things are coming along. I am almost finished converting all the DVD images to .mp4. I asked the family about the loss of menus and they are all OK with it. A lot of the projects have section titles anyhow, so no real need for the menu.

I tested the .mp4 files on a thumb drive plugged into my (relatively new) TV and they played fine. All the files will fit on a 64GB thumb drive and that is how I intend to distribute them. The drives are getting cheaper - I see some for $6 on Amazon.

Now to get the grandkids interested in the process!
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Chuck Engels » Mon Feb 03, 2020 1:10 pm

Great progress Bobby, glad it is all working out.

We have 8 grandkids but none of them are out of high school yet. The youngest will be 3 in August so a big span between them all. There is still a possibility for more as our youngest child will only be 19 this month and not married yet. Even the older kids might have another one. The oldest is 37 today and the next oldest will be 36 at the end of the month !!, now that is scary, they are getting close to 40. One more in between that will probably never get married, she is 33.

Glad to hear you were wise and listened to your friends, politics is a crazy business from what I can tell from a distance. Every time I think about getting involved I slap myself...
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Wed Feb 05, 2020 5:33 pm

Thanks Chuck. I have one 13 year old grandkid but the rest range from 18 to 23, so I am about 10 years ahead of you.

My thumb drives are now written (got 5 64 GB from Amazon for $32 - cheap) and ready to mail out, so that phase of my work is pretty much done.

But this got me fired up a bit. I pulled the old Canon HV30 out of the case and it seems OK. I am recharging the batteries now.

I have about a half dozen miniDV tapes that are yet unscanned. But the HV30 is firewire out only, and PCs don't have firewire ports any more. Best way to get those tape scanned? Take to friend with MAC? Send out to service? Try to find some kind of adapter or firewire-to-USB converter?

Also, the latest PE version I have is 10. I see lots of more recent versions, including the latest 2020. Is this still an editor of choice, or have people moved on to something else? At least its grateful to see that Adobe is still in the game.

Thanks, Bob
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Peru » Wed Feb 05, 2020 7:11 pm

Bobby wrote: Try to find some kind of adapter or firewire-to-USB converter?

The USB to Firewire adapters don't work.

Bobby wrote: Also, the latest PE version I have is 10. I see lots of more recent versions, including the latest 2020. Is this still an editor of choice

If you are editing DV or HDV, version 10 will work OK for you if you like version 10.
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Wed Feb 05, 2020 8:28 pm

Thanks Peru
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Chuck Engels » Sat Feb 08, 2020 1:22 pm

My newest desktop and laptop both have Firewire connections :)
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Re: Format Conversion, Yet Again

Postby Bobby » Sat Feb 08, 2020 5:25 pm

Interesting Chuck - Windows machines? Where did you get the drivers?
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