Firstly there was a mix up with yesterday's news where it said that FlasK v0.594 was just out when obviously that piece of news was reported on tuesday.

Anyway today I thought i'd give you an update on the 'mpeg tearing' issue. I have since found that you can somehow get round this codec bug if you set the keyframe to 1 in the DivX output dialogue box. I've tested this with all the movies I had problems with and all have re-encoded perfectly with no tearing what-so-ever. Now by setting the keyframe to 1 your file size is going to increase slightly but you'll also get a faster search time when you seek to a point of your movie during playback. Now i'm not quite sure if this is a fluke or not but so-far it seems to work great (btw. i'm using bitrate 2010). As usual, I would greatly appreciate some feedback on this ... let me know it this works for you). Send your results to me, Syncaio [syncaio@mail.com]

Software: cladDVD v1.43 update is out. These new versions are coming thick and fast ... hardly giving me time to test the last. You can get more information on the features of this new update here.

It's pretty early in the day so not much has happened yet but just to let you know that Oleg's Forum at flexion.org is back online (if a little slow). There's also a new release of AviEnc. You can also get the source code for FlasK v0.594 here.

Software: VobDec GUI v2.0 is out. This new version fixes a bug in the main movie detection, also the key search is now done in a hidden DOS window. Also out today is (MPEG2AVI/AC3DEC/vStrip) GUI v0.19j. This new release fixes the refreshing problem.

About FlaskMpegDeCSS: I did some testing and here's what I found out: It works fine on almost all movies VobDec can crack and on all unencrypted movies I tested it on. However there's a slight issue: When it doesn't find a key it goes on and on searching for keys and I don't know which vobs it scans. I ran the keysearch 6 times on Raw Deal and the key can be found in the 3rd vob (out of 8 vobs in total) when using VobDec but the modified Flask won't find it. So something must be wrong in the keysearch. 

Some instructions on its use: You have to authenticate the DVD Drive first - run a Software DVD player to do so (and you have to do it for every disk!). Then use DVD mode in Flask as described in the guide (the only thing you have to do is skip step 1) and select the largest .ifo file. Then Flask as you always did. 

Also: Now it's official: Broken Arrow (R2), Aliens (R2), Teaching Mrs Tingle (R2, Germany) and The man with a golden gun (R1) have a mastering error, the disk key changes with the layer-change and most software DVD players and some standalones can't play the 2nd layer. So if you have any problems with the disks mentioned return them and ask for a replacement.

Software: FlasK MPEG v0.594 has just been released which now fixes the annoying bug which made subtitles randomly disappear when encoding. This new release now comes with bbMPEG. Please note that for the time being you should specify the duration of the compile in the configuration dialog when using bbMPEG. Progress dialogs won't be accurate either when using bbMPEG. Hopefully this will be fixed in the next release. You can get more information from the official site.

Not a lot happening at the moment except that Oleg's forum at flexion.org seems to have been down now for two days with an 'Internal Server Error 500' message. Hopefully this will be fixed soon.

I also got an e-mail yesterday giving me more info about the 'mpeg tearing' issue. I mentioned that this usually happens when using FlasK, however I have since learned that it's not the problem of the compressor but a problem with the actual MPEG-4 codec. If you try encoding with the original Microsoft ASF encoder the same problem seems to occur in the official V3 and V2 codecs. The V1 codec seems to be fine though. Strange eh? ... anyway thanks to Andre for the info.

Software: there's a cladDVD v1.42 update which now decrypts video_ts.vob files. The 'rip main movie' and 'skip vob' routines have both been changed as it was possible for them to screw up.

Sorry I've had a really busy day today ... just to let you know that VobDec GUI v1.9e is out. This new version comes with a Virtual ListView control and also removes the need for comctl32.ocx. The comctl32.dll that comes with Internet Explorer 3 and above is enough. You can get more information here.

Just a quick note to let you know that my friend, Syncaio is going to be taking control of the site until I get some very important exams out of the way. Please forward any questions to him and he will be more than happy to help you out.

Software: CladDVD 1.4 was released earlier on today but had a nice little runtime error bug. This has since been fixed and you can download the updated version 1.41 here. Also released today is a beta of the DivX Player for BeOS 1.0 which only supports Mp3.

I feel I should address a little problem called 'mpeg tearing' which I believe many of you out there are experiencing when using FlasK. This is when a part of the video seems to drag through a good few 100 or so frames without refreshing itself. Sometimes it looks like the picture is scrambled for a few frames and other times it can look as if it's tearing through the video and leaving a semi-scrambled ghosting effect. Now here comes the strangest part ... if you go back and re-encode the section which screws up everything seems to look fine. At the moment I'm slightly stumped with this one as it only seems to happen every now and again. The only solution I can give you at present is to simply re-encode the section that's screwing up (maybe only 10 to 5000 frames) again with FlasK and 9 times out of 10 it'll encode perfectly. You can then cut out the scrambled sections and replace them with your new sections using VirtualDub. I'm sure cutting and pasting by specifying frames using the 'select range' function will be pretty straight forward for most of you by now, but for those of you who are a bit confused I'll put together a little guide over the next few days which will show you step by step. (btw. do this before you compress the audio to mp3 or divx/wma audio or you'll get a click or a pop as it changes frames to your new section. Please also note that this little method requires a good eye and precision to get the right frames. The best advice is to look for a change in camera angle and work from there). Please also note that tearing usually only happens a few times through a movie (...if at all) so it shouldn't take long to re-encode the section and glue it back together.

If any of you know more about how to fix the tearing in an encoded movie or have a more simple solution than the one suggested then please contact me as soon as possible.

Peace-out ...
- Syncaio [syncaio@mail.com]

The dream of all you who are brave enough to risk their DVD drives and disks has come true: FlaskMpeg with included VobDec code. Don't ask me how ripping will work now, file mode, DVD mode or whatever, about multiangles etc because I don't know and I don't have time to test. Besides I love my 6x region free DVD way too much to risk it just to shave a couple of minutes off the total conversion time. Also note that this program is completely unofficial and in no way associated with or supported by the author of FlaskMpeg

Another VobDec GUI release is also out, only a minor update since it contains a "missing" ocx file for those who don't have it installed.

I can't just not update my site.... I really should know better... 

Anyways... Get ready for DIVX, 2nd release. Can't believe anybody would be as stupid to try it again. 

Also, apparently Kinowelt is exchanging "Teaching Mrs. Tingle" disks that won't work on some players. So maybe it was just a mastering error after all - although more paranoid people like to think of it as another try of the MPAA to make disks unrippable, but since you can still rip 'em it looks rather pointless to me. So whenever you rip a movie, try to play the ripped vob files before encoding them, just to make sure. If they start to get scrambled suddenly, test the disk in some software player and if it doesn't work, return it.

Software: Yet another release of AviEnc bringing it out to v0.16

Talking about things I thought were never going to happen: You can now play DivX flicks on Linux boxes. That makes the most popular 3 operating systems DivX playback capable - check this page for the Mac codec, but DivX encoding will remain a PC domain. For how long?

Software: Try VobDec GUI 1.9c. We all hope it works now. 

Software: Damn... apparently the 1.9 series of the VobDec GUI is unusable till now. So keep your pre-1.9 versions till now or use CladDVD1.3 which now works in all Windows versions. Also a new DivXPlayer is out.

Software: Decided to make new rippacks before my "leave". They contain all new software as usual and VirtualDub 1.3d which is perfectly able to do DivX, but not the cracked Microsoft codec. So if you prefer non-DivX Mpeg4 codecs (both avi and asf for the matter) you have to use the old VirtualDub1.3c. 

Software: VobDec GUI 1.9 is out. Lots of news here so once again a must download - get the full changes at the official site. I've also added 2 other DivX/Media Players which make for a pretty good media player replacement: GDivX Player 1.6.5 and BSPlayer 0.41. Generally all the small DivX players seem to be more suitable to play DivX flicks trouble free especially on systems that have a slower CPU. Also out is a new version of AviEnc and new versions of CladDVD - now W2k capable. 

Do you have problems sleeping? Read Jack Valenti's - he's head of the MPAA for those who don't know - deposition on DeCSS... I haven't seen so many don't knows and don't recalls in a long time. Also very interesting is the MPAA's head of anti-piracy unit's deposition: In page 136, lines 10-20 you'll notice that if the MPAA is concerned FAIR USE DOES NOT EXIST. You can't even make a copy of a VHS movie you own. So much about the MPAA respecting the law, since the Copyright Act clearly states you can do so for your own use.

Despite the flu I just had to write this update: Exactly a year ago DIVX - the evil pay-per-view DVD scheme by Circuit City - ceased operations. If that wasn't some really good news. A couple months after that, finally Disney and Fox started regarding DVD as a serious medium and upped their DVD production. Those 2 studios had shows some really lackluster DVD support in the past and done anything to trick customers into the more studio friendly - and decidedly anti-customer - format.

Check out this article about the DeCSS case. Pay special attention to the section about "Schindler's List". Apparently Mr. MPAA doesn't know the law he lobbied for. He says it would be possible to make an analog copy... which is simply not true. VHS is protected by Macrovision and the DMCA makes it illegal to circumvent that - see page 11 of the DMCA for more info. You can also read the latest transcripts about the case at 2600. 

Software: New mpeg2avi GUI is out. Supports auto-shutdown, some statistics about the 1-2-3 mode, a few bug corrections, etc. Definitely worth downloading. Also I've upped a small tool enabling you to restore corrupt Avis - for instance a crashed Flask session. 

Also.. sadly I have to announce that during the next 1.5 month this site will be less updated than it was before and also e-mail responses will probably take a bit more time than usual. This doesn't mean I will retire from the scene but at the moment I have important things to do in my professional life and won't have much time left besides that. I'll have a nice surprise for all of you probably next week to make my temporary absence a bit more bearable.. stay tuned... And I promise you that once I'm fully back I'll have a couple of nice surprises in store for you!

Converted another 2 movies which I believed were unrippable - and unwatchable for that matter - see the special page about how to rip movies that have 2 keys on the main title. Also.. my hit counter has passed the 50'000 mark this week-end. All that in 2 months is not too shabby, don't you think. A big thank you to all of you!

As for movies which are still partway scrambled after decrypting with vobdec  I put up a special page.

Did 2 other movies which brings me up to a whopping 60 successful conversions. 

Remember that I promised you to tell why DeCSS is no longer available on this site? Well here goes: First of all I didn't want to attract unnecessary attention - offering DeCSS is like rolling the red carpet for MPAA lawyers trying to take your site down and second and even more important DeCSS fails on a growing number of movies. This site has suggested not to use DeCSS for 2 month now but there's still way too many people out there who just don't get it and it starts to annoy me big time... so I thought removing DeCSS from this site should prevent some of you from making the STUPID mistake of using DeCSS and then come screaming that there's green stuff all over the place. 

Software: CladDVD1.1a is out. Once again this is an external software.. and I haven't tested it.

Like to join DivX high motion and DivX low motion files? Here's how you have to do it: Make the hex changes as shown on this picture on any avi that you encoded in DivX high motion and join the files in VirtualDub. I didn't say the process was easy, especially finding the right places where to start and stop encoding in high motion and then joining at the right position is pretty hard, but it's nevertheless possible. However don't try this if your not an expert already!!!

Just updated the movie list... there's a whopping 58 movies that I've converted so far.. and I'm currently doing the 59th and if one of the Bond disks was not defective I'd already be up to 60. So if you have any problem on a movie that's listed among those 58 then you must be doing something wrong. In many cases it's because you simply didn't read the FAQ when running into problems... most common problem report I hear is that the movie is still scrambled after ripping and in 99% of the cases it's because DeCSS was used... 

Software: Mpeg2avi+1.2, it's sources and the FlaskMpeg 0.593 sources are available. Mpeg2avi+1.2 is based on vobdec+0.311 so chances are you don't need to upgrade if the old release worked fine for you.

Software: AviEnc 0.1 is a DirectShow filter for Graphedit which allows you to connect almost any file source to an avi compressor - imagine using the MPEG2 decoder of your favorite DVD player to make DivX... I've also found out that VirtualDub 1.3d actually works with DivX - only ASF input and MS V3 - so no hacked MS codecs can be used - are disabled. 

Updated the FAQ... definitely a MUST READ before you contact me and report a problem... because there's quite a number of mails I get every day that I wouldn't get if people had read the FAQ before... Interested in joining high-motion and low-motion avis? Stay tuned.

Software: VobDecGui1.8 is out now. Includes even better main movie detection, gets the key from the selected vobs and from each title when you rip more than just one title.

Software: A new VobDec GUI is available. It's called cladDVD and looks just a bit like DeCSS and according to the author should work better than any other GUI. I haven't tested it yet so I don't now if the hype is true so currently I'm only linking to the official homepage.  You might also be interested in AviSynth 0.25 which may become a replacement for VirtualDub - but again I haven't been able to test it so far.

Software: VobDec+0.311 is out. Now you'll get just one ac3 file per stream and small bugfixes for "The Matrix" R1

Guides: Again I've updated the bitrate&resolution guide. Now please don't ask me about these issues anymore... I really don't have anything more to say. Especially about bitrates... I've also updated the FlaskMpeg Guide again.

Software: RedZ DivXPlayer 0.05 is out and it finally works on my machine, too. 

I'm also proud to present my analysis of the DMCA... as far as I know the first article of this kind ever to appear on a site dedicated to backing up DVDs. The lecture of this article should illustrate why it's not illegal to back-up your DVDs to DivX and why the MPAA is wrong about their interpretation of the DMCA.

Guides: Important changes in the bitrate&resolution guide. All resolutions have changed to better fit the real aspect ratios of the movies. I've also added a bit of information about Audio codec selection in FlaskMpeg.  

Software: Another mpeg2avi/ac3dec/etc GUI is out. I haven't had time to test it but it looks certainly promising. A new version of the VobDecGUI is also out, fixing another run-time error.  

Furthermore I've finally run my whole site thru a spell-checker. Wow... that was an ugly experience. 

I've updated my movies list.. should be up-to-date again now. As you can see I've successfully encoded TWINE.. no problems with it at all.