WMP or TVersity stream to DirecTV DVR and DVD ripping

masraum · 09-04-2011, 08:22 AM

Folks, I'd like to try ripping some DVDs so that I could stream them to my DirecTV HD DVRs from my PC. I understand that either Windows Media Player or TVersity should perform the streaming server part. I have WMP so that I can see files. I haven't really started to tinker with TVersity yet.

What I'd like to know is what is the best way to rip the DVDs to maintain quality. I understand that there may be some format requirements for them to work with DirecTV media share too. Don't some DVDs have some sort of copy protection to keep this from working? It doesn't seem to work very well, because you can download DVD and or Bluray copies of pretty much anything that exists.

Anyone got any pointers or gotten this to work?

Ultimately, if i can get this to work reasonably well, I'll build a small PC to act as a media server and rip all of our DVDs. My wife (and me) would LOVE to be able to watch movies without having to run up and down the stairs and swap disks etc...

Or, is there a cheap media server that can be bought that has everything bundled.

gr8fl4porsche · gr8fl4porsche's Garage

Don't know much about the Direct TV boxes but you need a good ripper to break the copyright protection. DVDFab is fantastic. Not free but worth every penny. The $50 is for 2 years of updates which are required as every couple months new anti-piracy techniques are released by the big studios.

You may need to convert the rip to a file type that the DTV likes.

gr8fl4porsche · gr8fl4porsche's Garage

Btw, we watch everything in my house through a media server.

masraum · 09-04-2011, 10:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gr8fl4porsche

Btw, we watch everything in my house through a media server.

So what do you use? A PC with an hdmi out or coax out? Are you able to stream from the one PC to multiple tvs?

gr8fl4porsche · gr8fl4porsche's Garage

I use TiVo HD boxes with 3rd party software called Pytivo. Then another piece of software called Stream BaBy Stream. Can stream to multiple tv's at the same time using separate TiVo boxes. All media is stored on my main PC. The TiVo boxes play just about any type of media file.

Only downside is a 1 gig buffer on the TiVo box. Typical movie pauses to rebuffer 4 times for 20 seconds each time ( around every 25 minutes or so).

masraum · 09-04-2011, 12:18 PM

OK, in case anyone is curious. I have DirecTV with the "Whole Home" DVR. I've got an HD DVR downstairs and an HD player in the bed room. I still haven't ripped all of my DVDs to disk, but I think that is the easy part (other than being time consuming and needing the not-free software).

I had downloaded TVersity, but that didn't work. I was doing some searching and found a recurring them that the new TVersity didn't work, so I downloaded the suggested older version from Jan 2010, TVersity ver 1_7_4_1. It seems to work fine, and with a separately downloaded and installed codec pack, it will even transcode many/most videos to the proper codec to play on the DirecTV tuners.

I can stream from my PC directly to either of the HD receivers. (I think it may have to be an HD receiver to work).

I'm still interested in other options, so don't stop if you've got some good info.

masraum · 09-04-2011, 02:54 PM

One note, besides the Tversity app streaming movies to the DirecTV boxes, it'll also stream music and photos. The main limitation that I can see is that it does not allow fastforward or rewind. You can play or pause the videos. Still, for the price (free) it seems to work really well.

masraum · 09-16-2011, 07:54 AM

Interest seems low, but just in case someone does a search...

Tversity is still working well using ver 1.7.4.

If I rip to MP4 format at 1024kbitrate for the video, the file sizes are about 700MB, but TVersity has to transcode real-time while it streams because the DirecTV boxes accept mpeg2 video by default. The transcoding causes my PC to spike it's CPU which causes some issues during playback. The video isn't smooth. It's watchable, but not good. And if you pause the video and restart it, it will crash.

I tried ripping to mpeg-2 format at 1024k bitrate and the quality was crap. I did some searching online and discovered that you had to rip at a much higher rate in mpeg-2 to get decent quality. If I rip at 3000k bitrate, I get a 2Gig file and decent quality. If I rip at 6000k bitrate it's better. Both seem to stream better because TVersity isn't having to transcode the stream.

As cheap as hard drive space is, 4 gigs per movie isn't that big a deal. For now, for my cheap setup, I'm going to keep using TVersity. It's mostly for my wife. When I want to watch something in HD, I'll be watching a Bluray, but this will be adequate for many/most movies.