Apple TV

[dangalf]

Not sure where to post this but here goes...

Am considering Apple TV as a way of playing music thru my home cinema set up.

I seem to recall WHF saying that you can rip DVDs to the Apple TV hard drive and download appropriate art work etc. In the most recent review (guide to new technology mag) they make no mention to it - is it still possible? also roughly how much space does a 2hr standard definition film take up? how do you go about ripping the DVD to the hard drive?

the idea is to put comedies on dvd onto the hard drive (e.g. peep show, family guy, stand up etc). i assume this can be done just as easily?

thanks all

 

[John Duncan]

dangalf:
Not sure where to post this but here goes...

Am considering Apple TV as a way of playing music thru my home cinema set up.

I seem to recall WHF saying that you can rip DVDs to the Apple TV hard drive and download appropriate art work etc. In the most recent review (guide to new technology mag) they make no mention to it - is it still possible? also roughly how much space does a 2hr standard definition film take up? how do you go about ripping the DVD to the hard drive?

the idea is to put comedies on dvd onto the hard drive (e.g. peep show, family guy, stand up etc). i assume this can be done just as easily?

thanks all

Ignoring the illegality of such an act for the time being...

If you want to use the native .VOB files from a DVD, it's not possible to do this with a vanilla Apple TV unless you download and install a hack, or - marginally easier - buy something like the ATVFlash hack bundle to enable the apple tv to recognise native DVD VOB files (inter alia).

You may however be able to use ripping software (again, totally illegally) to convert those videos to an iTunes-recognisable format, at which point you can sync your iTunes with the Apple TV as normal.

I've done both (for research purposes only, obviously) and found the quality of the first method quite a bit better than the second. For your purposes, however, the second may be perfectly sufficient.

 

[rob_981]

I have put a few films and tv programmes onto my Apple TV. There is software out there that enables you to rip dvds to your hard drive. Just google it. But as JD said, it is illegal, as DVDs have copy protection on them. I then use Videora (I think it's called) to convert films into a format playable on the Apple TV.

As far as size is concerned, it depends how high quality you want it. You can reduce the quality of the sound/picture to reduce the size. But typically, anything up to 1.2-1.5Gb per 2 hour film seems about right. But you can get them down to about 700-800Mb.

 

[dangalf]

thanks for the replies

must have got the wrong end of the stick when i read the review then. am guessing WHF meant you could download films etc thru itunes and get artwork etc that way - my mistake

thanks anyway guys

 

[John Duncan]

It's easy enough to do if statements like

"Launch Terminal - our first command is going to copy the Intel version of ssh daemon from our Mac to the ATV drive. If you are on an Intel Mac copy it from your sbin directory to the ATV's OSBoot/usr/sbin/ directory. If your browser causes the line to wrap be sure to enter it on one line in the Terminal"

don't faze you...

 

[landzw]

Just a question , how can it be illegal to rip your own films that you have paid for onto apple tv for your own pleasure?

That would mean all cd's you burn onto your mp3/ipod is illegal,

You can copy what you like and its for your own personal use and as long as you can prove you had paid for the item then theres nothing anyone can do about it ,

Technically those who have sold an item like an ipod or phone with a downloaded song could be prosecuted

 

[Andrew Everard]

This is a pretty accurate summary of how the law stands at the moment.

If they are your own films, and you paid to have them made, of course you can rip them; however, if it's a commercially-made film, covered by copyright, and you have used software to circumvent the copy-protection, then of course it's illegal.

 

[Anonymous]

Here in Norway it is legal to copy films for your own use and to rip them to your harddrive, but you cant copy and sell them or share them online obviously. Are you sure its illegal to copy for personal use in the UK?

 

[professorhat]

joestone:Here in Norway it is legal to copy films for your own use and to rip them to your harddrive, but you cant copy and sell them or share them online obviously. Are you sure its illegal to copy for personal use in the UK?

Yup - it's a stupid law (and one I doubt would ever be enforced) but it is definitely illegal to copy for personal use in the UK.

 

[John Duncan]

Yup. Didn't tell you that when they sold you your iPod, did they?

 

[Clare Newsome]

Well, yes and no - although technically illegal to make any copy of music here in UK, i've got it on record from lawyers at the IFPI that copying music you have bought/own for your personal use is fine. It's when you start sharing/distributing it that it becomes a potential police matter....

DVDs, however - as Andrew flags up - are a different matter entirely, thanks to their use of copyright software.

 

[landzw]

Hmmmm The great british way

 

[Andrew Everard]

Not much point grizzling - we can't endorse anything illegal, be it copyright violations or ways of getting satellite TV without paying the correct price for it.

 

[Anonymous]

So if you have some sort of portable video device like an ipod touch, cwon, psp, creative player or other such gizmo you cant copy films to it? Or does the law only come into effect when you make a full quality copy of the original movie?

 

[Anonymous]

professorhat:

joestone:Here in Norway it is legal to copy films for your own use and to rip them to your harddrive, but you cant copy and sell them or share them online obviously. Are you sure its illegal to copy for personal use in the UK?

Yup - it's a stupid law (and one I doubt would ever be enforced) but it is definitely illegal to copy for personal use in the UK.

I seem to recall that back when the world was black and white and people bought pre-recorded music on big black plastic discs covered in grooves, a judge ruled it was okay to make one copy, e.g. on cassette, of a pre-recorded piece of copyrighted material, so long as it was for your own personal use. Sure, the technology has changed, but surely the same principle applies?

 

[John Duncan]

Darren Heal:I seem to recall that back when the world was black and white and people bought pre-recorded music on big black plastic discs covered in grooves, a judge ruled it was okay to make one copy, e.g. on cassette, of a pre-recorded piece of copyrighted material, so long as it was for your own personal use.

An American judge, perhaps...

 

[landzw]

Going back to the question , yes you can download / rip dvd to you'r apple Tv , what O.S do you use? , I use a mac and i can convert any file to iTunes using emicsoft mp4 converter and then the content can be streamed to the Apple Tv .

The only downside is that you lose the 5.1 and you only have the standard stereo audio

 

[Anonymous]

There are basically two approaches you can take to this, I've used both,

1. Recode. On a Mac (which I use, sorry I don't know much about Windows). You can use VLC and Handbrake (just google them) to recode the DVD into an Apple TV compatible format. There is a preset in Handbrake you can use for this. And unlike stated above you won't loose the AC3 surround track, as the Apple TV can play it and Handbrake can pass this through. It won't handle DTS though and converting DTS to AC3 is a bit more complicated, but possible. Once the video is recoded you can use MetaX to append all the metadata, including the artwork and other movie info. Then just add the movie to iTunes and sync or stream as normal. You can get reasonable h264 quality with AC3 audio in 1.5-2Gb files, at least half the original.

2. Hack. You can hack the Apple TV in a couple of ways, from the complicated, (installing perian and NitoTV etc. so that other normally non-apple tv comaptible files will play) to the more complete, i.e. replacing the Front Row interface on the Apple TV with xbmc. This way you can just rip the DVD and play back the raw vob files. xbmc supports a number of scrapers to retrieve the movie info and artwork from places like imdb.

There are pros and cons to both approaches, 1 requires a lot of manual work and computer time to recode (depending on how quick your computer is). 2. is more efficient, but requires more setup.

Personally, my setup has my movies on a NAS drive and a linux media PC running xbmc in the living room hooked to it. Right now (until the HDMI over CAT5 kit arrives) I have an Apple TV running xbmc in the bedroom and it works great.

Neither are hugely complex and there's plenty of info on doing both on-line. If you need more help let me know.