[dt2510]

i have a large collection of music CDs and music/concert DVDs (3000+ discs).
i started ripping my collection but im not really happy with the result. here's how i do ripping:

1) rip audio CD with EAC to WAV/CUE
2) decode HDCD encoded WAV with hdcd.exe to 24bit WAV
3) convert WAV to FLAC with replaygain

so i have 3 files for each disc: FLAC, CUE, JPG/PNG (artwork)

after i found out how to display multi-disc sets as one album, audio CD rips are ok now. i just have some naming issues, cause i have several albums in different versions (limited editions, remasters, import CDs). for those albums i added this info to the album name, but it would be nice to have a way to store info like "edition" or "release country".

some audio CDs also contain multimedia tracks. at the moment i just copy these files and create a (musicvideo) NFO file for each. so i have 3 files for each multimedia file: AVI/MPG/... (multimedia file), NFO, JPG/PNG (artwork)

this also works so far, but if there's more than one multimedia file on a CD or CD set, there are multiple albums displayed (with the same name) one for each file.

DVD ripping is a totally different thing. at the moment i rip DVDs to ISO and create a (movie) NFO file for the DVD. so i also have 3 files for each DVD: ISO, NFO, JPG/PNG (artwork)

i have no problems viewing these DVDs but there are some disadvantages:

- multi-disc DVD sets are displayed as multiple DVDs
- there's no way to display the DVD tracks (or chapters)

is there a way to rip a DVD (including subtitles, different audio streams, viewing angles) without video re-encoding and have the contents show up as individual tracks/chapters like a FLAC/CUE combo ? menus are not necessarily needed but it would be nice if there'd be a way to chose whether to access the contents directly via XBMC or displaying the DVD menu instead.

maybe MKV is the solution but i found no tutorial how to rip a DVD the way i want it.

any help would be appreciated

[jmarshall]

1. I'd recommend ripping CDs to separate tracks. There is no advantage in ripping to a single WAV file, other than making things cumbersome. Set the part of set tag (DISK_NUMBER I think it is in FLAC?) and you'll get around the CD1 / CD2 problem.

2. As for DVDs, there's no current way of displaying the chapters as a filelisting or anything within XBMC. A patch for this would be welcome. Going the ISO route is probably just as good as any other method. I don't know of a method that rips individual chapters, though I'm sure there is probably some program that could do this for you.

Cheers,
Jonathan

[dt2510]

hi jonathan,

thank you for your reply.
CD ripping isn't really the problem (even with CUE/FLAC). i already added the disc_number tag to my FLACs and they display fine.
the main problem are the CD extra contents (multimedia files) and the DVDs displaying seperate albums for each file/disc. maybe there's a solution in the future...

my biggest wish would be to have ALL CONTENTS belonging to one "item" in a single library. let me give you an example:

the "item": a boxed set with 2 CDs (multimedia tracks on disc 2) and 2 DVDs

if i click on the "item" the display should be like the following:

CD1 - Artist - Track 1
CD1 - Artist - Track 2
...
CD2 - Artist - Track 1
CD2 - Artist - Track 2
...
CD2 - Artist - Multimedia Track 1
CD2 - Artist - Multimedia Track 2
...
DVD1 - Artist - Track/Chapter 1
DVD1 - Artist - Track/Chapter 2
...
DVD2 - Artist - Track/Chapter 1
DVD2 - Artist - Track/Chapter 2
...

but i think it will take some time (if at all) until XBMC can do this

Stefan