Ripping DVD films to ISO files

**Incadog** · August 28th, 2010, 08:56 AM

Hello all,

Just joined this forum and had lots of help browsing through.

I'm playing round with Boxee at the moment and looking to put a large part of my video library onto the local Apple TV box, rather than streaming. I've been converting using Handbrake with no issues whatsoever (other than the 5 hours or so it takes for each movie). I was having problems with music DVD's, presumably because of the encryption, so ripped one using Any DVD Cloner Platinum into an ISO file.
I have place this ISO file onto the Apple TV in the Movies directory, and whilst Boxee sees the file, when I press play it just jumps back to the Boxee movie list. Just to check the file itself is not corrupted I have opened it up with VLC and it plays fine on my local Windows XP machine.
I'm sure I've missed a trick somewhere but reading through other posts on here I can't see what and would appreciate some noob help.

Many thanks

**judgeschambers** · August 28th, 2010, 09:04 AM

I really don't have an answer for you at this point as there's not really any trick to it ;-). ISOs do play on the ATV through Boxee. I have over 200 ISO rips using AnyDVD, but I have them all stored on a network server. They worked on my ATV (sold it) and work on my PC installations of boxee.

Things to consider:
Was the ripped ISO somehow messed up?
Is the ATV OS not serving it up correctly since you have the file stored on the ATV itself?
Does it work if stored on another non-mac source?

Not sure. Put the ISO on a network PC, server, or NAS and see if boxee plays it that way. If not, then re-ISO it, takes only 10 minutes, and test again in those alt locations.

**maximusfacq** · August 28th, 2010, 12:26 PM

In my ATV experience with ISO files, it seemed like it was hit and miss for playback over the network. Some files play extremely well with no issue. Then another, ripped on the same drive, same settings, etc. would just be all choppy. Then of course, I ran into space concerns(vast collection). So, I opted for the H.264 mp4 standard. This allowed for much more consistent results in playback as well as allowing for use with every device I own (computers/portables/etc.). The newest version of Handbrake, released last Nov., allows for the integration of the 6-channel AC3 audio track as well as the old stereo track that was the de facto standard for H.246 mp4 files in the past. Files end up about 700MB-2GB in size and playback is a dream.

**judgeschambers** · August 28th, 2010, 07:00 PM

maximusfacq,

Good feedback. I'd not ever had an issue with my ATV, so I was really stretching for a possible cause.

Now it makes sense.

I really need to read up on the poster that gave a detailed setup of Handbrake for H264 .mkv and H264 .mp4 and start ripping them that way vs. using AGK and converting them to Xvid .AVI at 700-1000 mb. But that's another thread.