Converting movies to MP3:

If you are using MP3’s or other music files, you can skip to the next section.

An often asked question on internet forums is how to create a ring tone from a video file or DVD. For this purpose, we created a modified version of DVD Catalyst Free that converts whatever you add to it to an MP3 file. It works with DVDs, ISO, AVI, MKV, DIVX, XVID and more.

Download DVD Catalyst Free for MP3 by using the following link:

free download

It uses some files from DVD Catalyst 3, so you will need to download this as well. The free trial version is sufficient though:

(free trial download) or (purchase for $9.95)

After installation of both programs, make sure you run DVD Catalyst 3 once. The first time you run DVD Catalyst 3, it creates a folder which is used for settings, and this is the folder that DVD Catalyst Free for MP3 needs.

After that, start DVD Catalyst Free for MP3

DVD Catalyst Free is specifically designed to make things as easy as possible. Because of this, the program does not have any hidden features or options. It’s basically “what you see is what you get”

The options it does have:

Scan for DVDs. When the program is running when you insert a DVD, it will automatically recognize the DVD, otherwise, click on this button to have DVD Catalyst Free look for DVDs (real or mounted ISO’s with programs such as Daemontools). When it finds one (or more) DVD(s) it will access them briefly to obtain information about movies, tv episodes and special features.

Add video files. This will bring up a browse dialog that lets you select video files that are on your computer. You can select AVI, DIVX, MKV, MPEG and more video file types. DVD Catalyst Free for MP3 supports drag&drop as well, which (in our opinion) is a lot easier to use. Just drag your files, or even a folder filled with files onto the program and DVD Catalyst Free will sort out whatever files it finds that it can work with. If you want to convert a lot of video files, this is the way to go.

User Guide. This brings up the included (PDF) user guide of DVD Catalyst Free for MP3. It displays the full conversion process with screenshots, and also includes information on how to edit the created MP3 files afterwards to make the perfect ring tone. Because you are reading this, there is no real need for it at this point.

Select all. After scanning a DVD, DVD Catalyst Free automatically enables the longest video track on the DVD (usually the movie). If you want to convert every track on the DVD (special features or TV episodes for example) clicking this will enable all of them. After selecting a previously unselected track, it will be briefly scanned to determine if there are additional languages.

Select none. If you want to go through the entire track list yourself, or when you added a folder of files, you can remove the entire selection.

Audio Maximizer. This setting increases the audio quality (from 128kbps to 160kbps) and in addition, it increases the volume to a certain level. With this enabled, your ring tones will all have the same loudness.

For the purpose of this guide, we will create a ring tone from the classic “The Dukes of Hazzard” TV show.

*Start the program

*Insert your DVD (or add your video files with the button or drag them onto the program)

After scanning, the tracks that were found are displayed. This particular TV show DVD has a so-called “play-all” track that contains all the episodes. Since we just need the intro-song, which is found in every episode, we just select a single, shorter episode.

To make sure we pick an episode that actually has the song, we can click on the DVD image in front of the track name, which bring up a preview. (enable the checkmark first before clicking the preview)

With the track/file we want enabled, close the preview, and click on the blue arrow at the bottom right to start the conversion process.

After the conversion process is complete, Windows Explorer will open up in the location of where the file was saved.

Editing MP3 files (make MP3 files into ring tones) with Audacity:

To create your own MP3 ringtones, you will need, besides DVD Catalyst Free for MP3 to rip the sound for you, a sound editor. Programs like Sound Forge, or various movie editor programs are capable of
doing this, but they can be a bit expensive. To do it for free, you can use Audacity.

Audacity is an open-source, free sound-editor application that enables you to cut out portions from sound-files and apply various audio effects on it as well.

Visit this website:

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/windows

and download and install the following:

Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/Vista: Audacity installer (.exe file) – The latest version of the free Audacity audio editor (v1.2.6 at the time of writing this)

LAME MP3 encoder – Allows Audacity to export MP3 files. (follow directions on the page)

After installation of this, start Audacity with the shortcut on your desktop

Drag your audio file onto the program, or use the top menu (File > open)

It will import the file. Depending on how long your MP3 file is, this can take a minute or so.

After the import is complete, you are presented something that looks like the following:

The display shows the full file (40 minutes in our case) which is a little hard to work with. First thing we do is make it more manageable.

Because the intro song is close to the beginning of the show, we click in the middle of the graphical display. It will put a line there

now tap the spacebar on your keyboard, and it should start playing the audio. If you are certain the line is not at a point you want to keep, click on it, and drag your mouse to the right to select the right half.

Now hit the “Del” key on your keyboard to remove the selected portion.

Now click on the button (above the “15:00″ in the screenshot) and it will zoom to fit the left-over portion into full view.

And just repeat this process a couple of times for both left and right sides until you only have the portion you want left.

Once you get into a smaller portion of the file, you can easily spot certain parts. The higher the blue area is, the louder the song is at that point, and if there is a flat area, such as where the line is in the above screenshot, it indicates a quiet area. These are spots where it transitions from one scene to another for example.

When you have everything cut out what you don’t want, you end up with something like this:

Now click on File > export to MP3, or if your phone only accepts wav as a ring tone file, select that instead.

Now just transfer the created file to your phone and set it as a ring tone. Please follow the instructions in the user guide of your phone on how to do this.

download the mp3 for the sample displayed above here

Why stream?

Even though most devices have plenty of space available for video content, streaming your video collection provides you with access to your entire collection. No need to make sure you have replaced viewed content with new content. You can watch that one movie you thought of you might want to see again in a matter of seconds, rather than having to get home and put it on your device. And you save the free space on your device for other stuff.

What do you need?

*Video-player device with a web browser and either network (for at home) or Internet access.

*Windows-PC (Windows 2000/XP/Vista/7)

*Tools4Movies MP4 Streaming Server application

(download)

*Tools4Movies DVD Catalyst 3

(trial download) or (purchase for $9.95)

And of course video content.

Installation:

* Install and Run DVD Catalyst 3.

The MP4 Streaming Server uses a few files from DVD Catalyst 3, so for it to work, either the trial or the retail version of DVD Catalyst 3 needs to be installed.

After installing DVD Catalyst 3, start it once, so that it creates the settings folder on your computer.

* Video content.

If you do not have video content in MP4 format, this would be a good time to convert it. In DVD Catalyst 3, select your device, and add your video files or insert a DVD and click Go.

* Install and Run MP4 Streaming Server.

Getting it to work:

*Video content. (If you already have MP4 video files, you can skip to the next step.)

First we need to get some video content. For testing purposes, I often download trailers from the Apple website here:

http://trailers.apple.com/

Movie Trailers are a quick way to obtain some demo videos. If you pick the HD ones, you have perfect quality in the source video, and because of the 2-minute playlength, they convert quickly enough to make it easy to try different settings.

Just download a few trailers from the site, and convert them using DVD Catalyst 3 or any other video converter you use for your device. As long as it converts to H264 MP4 format, otherwise it will not work properly.

If you use DVD Catalyst 3, you can enable a “streaming setting” that will save some time later on. This setting can be found in the “Conversion” tab in “Global Settings”

This setting will enable a streaming “flag” in each MP4 video file that is created with DVD Catalyst 3. MP4 Streaming Server can do it to your existing video files, but if you use DVD Catalyst 3, it will do it automatically.

To convert your trailers with DVD Catalyst 3, follow the following steps:

1. Start the DVD Catalyst 3 program, select your device using the dropdowns on the left, and make the change in the screenshot above.

2. Drag your downloaded trailers onto the program.

3. Click “Go” to start the conversion process

4. After the conversion is complete, the folder where the files are saved will be opened. By default they are stored in your “My Video” folder

Leave this window open, and close DVD Catalyst 3. If you have Quicktime or VLC installed, you can verify the files to make sure they play.

MP4 Streaming Server:

By now you should have some MP4 video files.

Start the MP4 Streaming Server program.

If this is the first time you started it, it will offer to search for MP4 video files in some of the common locations on your computer. You can do this, or just click cancel to add them manually.

To add the files manually, go to the folder with the video files, and drag them onto the MP4 Streaming Server program.

IMPORTANT:

If you added files you converted previously with DVD Catalyst 3 or any other video conversion program, and did not have the streaming “flag” enabled, you have to enable this in the files to make sure they stream. if you do not perform this step, the files will download completely before they start playing on your computer or device.

Select the file(s) you added to the program.

(tip: leftclick on the first one, then hold down the shift key on your keyboard, and left-click on the bottom one. This will select all of them.)

Now click on the orange lightning bolt button next to the search box.

It will apply the streaming flag to the files you have selected. With trailers this process is pretty quick, but for movies the process can take a little longer.

With your video content in MP4 Streaming Server, and streaming-capable, you can organize the files into playlists and categories to make it easier for you to get to the content you want (create a playlist for a series of movies, another playlist for a season of a tv show episodes for example) How to do this is all explained in detail in the MP4 Streaming Server user guide, so we will not go into that in this how-to.

Once you have everything set-up, click on the green globe button at the bottom right.

(If you receive an error message about port in use, your computer is already running a webserver. You can change the port for MP4 Streaming Server by clicking on the streaming item on the left side of the program)

On the right side of the button, a link appears with a bunch of numbers.

If you click on it, it will open your web browser on your computer and will display the MP4 Streaming Server interface. If your portable device is connected to your home network (wireless router for example) open the web browser on your device and type the exact link in the top.

Just click/tap around to browse your collection.

And to watch the video, tapping on it should open the video player application and play the file while it is downloading.

This is all you need to make MP4 Streaming Server work on your home network.

Streaming files over the internet:

*Video quality:

This part is tricky. Besides some advanced configuration options that are needed to make this work, also the speed of your internet connection at home as well as the internet connection on your device (3G etc) affects the results.

Before you start with this, it is important to know the maximum quality you are capable to use for your streaming video files. The higher the quality of your video files, the more bandwidth is required to stream them. In addition, many people don’t realize that your internet connection has 2 speeds. one for downloading files from the internet and another one for uploading files to the internet. Even if you can download a high quality movie very fast, or watch 20 youtube clips at the same time in HD format, this does not automatically mean that your connection is good for streaming the best quality video.

Visit a speed-test website such as this one

http://www.dslreports.com/stest

A (flash8) test on our own internet connection gives us the following result:

Our download speed exceeds 5000Kbps, but our upload speed is only 900Kbps (and this is on a good day)

So we can watch high quality movies that are located on the internet that are encoded at 5000Kbps in realtime, but if we upload these movies, it will take more than 5x as long than it would take to download. So if we stream such a movie, it would take 5 times as long as the movie playlength for it to finish.

So for our movies to stream properly, we will have to make sure that the total bitrate does not exceed our upload speed. The 900Kbps is the maximum our internet connection can handle, so both the audio AND the video together have to be that or less.

Besides the upload-speed of your internet connection at home, the download speed on your device also affects the playback performance of streaming video. Do a speed test on your device as well, when connected to the internet connection you want to use. If you run a test while connected to your wireless network at home, it will not give you an idea of how the performance is when you use 3G for playback on the road, so if you intend to use 3G or 4G for streaming, make sure you are connected to that before running the test.

After this test, compare the DOWNLOAD SPEED of your phone/device with the UPLOAD SPEED of your computer at home, and use the lowest value. If your connection at home uploads at 600Kbps and your phone can download at 400Kbps, use 400Kbps

As I mentioned, the speed test was done on a good day, so I recommend to be a little on the safe side.

I use earbuds for my own video playback, and like to have a good quality audio, so I use 128Kbps Stereo for my sound quality setting, this leaves 900-128=772Kbps for the video. To be on the safe side, I would pick 700Kbps, which gives a little room for internet fluctuation.

Another adjustment that we recommend to make is to reduce the screen resolution. Your video playback experience will be a lot more enjoyable when you use a lower resolution high quality file than a high resolution low quality file.

The Kbps quality setting basically means the amount of data that is to be used per second. The resolution and the framerate use this limitation to determine the quality per individual frame.

Regardless of the resolution of your video, if we take, for example, 600Kbps as a video quality bitrate, and your video is 30 frames per second, that leaves you with 20Kb per frame. The higher the resolution of your video, the less data is used per pixel, so a 640×480 file will look a lot sharper using these settings than a 1280×800 file.

We converted the Harry Potter trailer using it’s original resolution as well as half the original resolution for you to see the difference. For best results, play them full-screen on your computer.

High Resolution(1280×544)

Low Resolution(640×272)

Zipfile containing both (showing both files are nearly identical in filesize)

To enhance the video quality for slower internet speeds, you can use the following tips:

Screen size: As explained above. A small rule of thumb is to use a width of about the same as the video bitrate setting.

Conversion format: For high video bitrate settings, the difference between h264_ipod and h264_ipod_hq is not really noticable, but on low-bitrate settings, you will benefit from using it. If you use it you can increase the screen resolution a bit.

Video mode: Use 1-pass. With 2-pass you will achieve better quality video files, but the bitrate fluctuates throughout the file, resulting in stuttering playback. With 1-pass, the bitrate is the same from start to finish, resulting in a consistend video playback experience.

Sound quality and Audio mode. Especially for low-speed connections, this can help improve the quality quite a bit. Most conversion tools, including DVD Catalyst 3  use 128Kbps Stereo for audio for most of the devices. 128Kbps Stereo is 2 different audio channels, one for left, another for right. When we change this to 64Kbps Mono, it merges the left and right channel together, and when you play the video file, it will sound pretty much the same, except it misses certain effects like a car driving from one side to the other. The quality is nearly identical, but you gained 64Kbps you can use to enhance the video quality.

Lastly, and this is only if your device supports it (try it), the framerate. By lowering the framerate, each frame that is played gains extra data for the quality.

300Kbps at 30fps is 10Kb per frame

300Kbps at 15fps is 20Kb per frame

A lower framerate makes a movie look a little jumpy, depending on how low you adjust it, but going from 30 to 20 will boost the quality while still keeping the video playback smooth enough to watch.

*Making the connection:

(warning, this can get complicated!)

With the MP4 Streaming Server up and running, and video content in it that plays on your device over your network at home, we can now continue on setting up streaming over the internet.

If your computer is connected directly to the internet using a modem of some sorts (DSL/Cable etc)things might already work.

Visit this link on the computer running MP4 Streaming Server

http://www.whatismyip.com/

If the number displayed at the top of this website (Your IP Address Is: xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx) is the same number as what is displayed at the bottom of the Streaming Server program (http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:xx) youshould be set. Change the internet connection on your device to 3G (or whatever else it uses, as long as it is not the wireless connection you have at home) and in the web browser type in the link displayed by MP4 Streaming Server

If it works, you can skip the following, and scroll down to the Dynamic DNS section.

If MP4 Streaming Server displays something like http://192.x.x.x or 10.x.x.x your computer connects to the internet using a router of some sorts. In this case, we have to set up the router that if it receives a connection for the MP4 Streaming Server that it sends this to the computer that is running the program.

Unfortunately, most computers and routers are set up for an automatic IP adress, so when you restart your computer, it might have a different number in MP4 Streaming Server. For a router to be able to send your device to the proper computer for the videos, we have to make sure that the computer keeps the same adress.

Setting up a fixed IP on your computer.

First we need to get the current information our computer uses.

Click on Start > Run (or hold down the Windows-Key on your keyboard and tap the R key)

in the dialog that appears, type in cmd and click OK

In here, type in: ipconfig and tap the “Enter” key

In here, look for the number that is displayed at the bottom of the MP4 Streaming Server. In our case 192.168.1.89

IMPORTANT: This is most likely different on your computer. don’t use these values unless they are the same as yours.

Write down these 3 items:

IPv4 Address, Subnet Mask  and Default Gateway

Now, because your router gives out these kinds of numbers within a certain range, (1-100, 101-200) either add 100 to the last number or if it is higher than 150, substract 100 from it.

In our case, 192.168.1.89, we would add 100 so it would be 192.168.1.189. If you have 192.168.1.101, you could use 192.168.1.1 (-100) or 192.168.1.201 (+100)

You are free to use what you want, however, the number can not be the same as the number displayed for the “Default Gateway) (this rules out 192.168.1.1) and can not exceed 254

Once you have that, for safety, in the cmd box, type in

ping xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (the number you came up with after adding/substracting)

and click OK.

It should say something about unreachable or timed out. If it shows something else, change the number at the end by adding or substracting 10 from it (again, less than 254 and not the same as the Default Gateway)

and do the ping again.

Now, we have to make a change to the computer settings.

Go to your Windows Control Panel (Start > Control Panel or Start > Settings > Control Panel)

Then click on “Network status and tasks” (Windows 7/Vista) or “Network Connections” (2000/XP)

(7/Vista only, not needed for 2000/XP)

And click on Adapter settings

(2000/XP/Vista/7)

Rightclick on your network adapter and select properties

Double (left-)click on TCP-IP (2000/XP) or Internet Protocol Version 4 (Vista/7)

If there are already numbers displayed at “Use the following IP address, click Cancel, and you can skip the following steps, continue on from “Router setup“, otherwise continue.

Change the checkmark from Obtain automatically to Use the following, and put in the numbers you wrote down

IP Adress, the number you came up with above with the adding/substracting

Subnet mask, the same as the one you wrote down

Default Gateway, also the same as the one you wrote down

Preferred DNS server, the same as the Default Gateway.

In our case (Note, this is most likely different than yours)

And click OK.

IMPORTANT: If things go bad, go back here, and change the checkmarks to Automatic again.

Click OK out of the other window as well, so you get back to the “Network Connections”

While not always needed, we recommend to rightclick on the connection, then leftclick on “Disable”, wait a few seconds, then Rightclick on it again, and leftclick on “Enable”. This resets your network connection and forces it to use the settings we entered.

leave the Network Connections open (in case something went wrong you can easily get back to it) and start your web browser to see if you still have internet.Visit a website like CNN or something, just to make sure everything still works. If it does not work, one of the settings you entered is not correct. go back to the network connection, rightclick and select properties, and change the TCPMP / Internet Protocol v4 settings back to automatic. Then start over from the first cmd box in this guide.

If you have working internet with the change you just did, we can continue to

Router Setup:

(Warning: Complicated)

Due to the huge differences in router models and how to configure them, it is impossible to provide you with the full details on how to set up your specific router. Below should give you an idea on how and what needs to be configured, but you might have to refer to the userguide that came with your router.

Most routers are configured using a web-interface. Open your web browser, and at the top, type in

http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

where xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx is the number you wrote down earlier for the Default Gateway (in our case 192.168.1.1

And hit the Enter key. Then login if needed (usually the username is Admin and no password, or no username and admin as the password, if not, refer to the user guide of the router or obtain it from the person who set it up for you)

Then look for a tab called Port Forwarding or Advanced

You should see something along the lines of this:

The items might be blank in there.

In this screen, insert the following information:

Application: Can be anything, but putting in MP4SS might make it easier for future reference

Start: 80 (default port in MP4 Streaming Server. If you changed it, make sure its the same as what you have MP4 Streaming Server set to use)

End: 80 (same as above)

Protocol: Both (or TCP and UDP)

IP Address: xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (where xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx is the number you used in the network settings for your computer, 192.168.1.189 in our example)

And ofcourse, if there is a checkmark to enable it, it needs to be enabled.

After that, Apply and/or save the settings on your router. It should restart.

Now your MP4 Streaming Server should be accessible through the internet.

Make sure MP4 Streaming Server is running on your computer, and that the web-server portion is started (the green globe button and next to it the http:// link should be visible)

then on the same computer that runs the MP4 Streaming Server, visit the following website (again)

http://www.whatismyip.com/

Make sure your device is connected to the 3G or data network (not your home network) and open the web browser

At the top, type in:

http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

where xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx is the IP displayed on the whatismyip website.

If you changed the port from port 80 to something else, use http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:port as the link to visit (http://123.123.123.01:90 for example)

If everything was done correctly, you should see the MP4 Streaming Server website with your videos.

Dynamic DNS:

Unfortunately, unless your internet provider gives you a FIXED IP adress, the website number to access your videos will change when you restart your router. To make it easier to access your videos, and take care of the changing IP number, you can set up a Dynamic DNS. All the websites on the internet use an IP adress to make them accessible. For example, to go to Google, you could use http://209.85.225.99/ instead of http://www.google.com. www.google.com is a lot easier to remember than 209.85.225.99. the www.google.com is the Domain Name provided by DNS. When you type in www.google.com, your internet connection connects to a DNS server, and this DNS server performs a search for google.com and sends back the IP adress your computer needs to find the google website.

With a changing IP adress, it is hard to perform a search, because the IP adress in the DNS server might not be updated for 24 hours, so it will connect to the wrong website. Fortunately, there are websites like DynDNS which have their own DNS servers, which update more often.

DynDNS lets you register a website name for free, and with a small utility, it will keep the ip adress to your computer connected to the website name you selected. With a website name, it is a lot easier for you to access your video files.

Visit www.dyndns.com and register an account. (The free service is enough)

In the hostname area, you can select from a variety of main-domains, and just put something in front of it to make it your own. In above example, we selected:

tools4movies and kicks-ass.net, giving us the full domain name of http://tools4movies.kicks-ass.net

Click on Add to cart, and follow the instructions to create an account.

Use a real email address, because an activation email will be sent out.

After activation, visit this link:

https://www.dyndns.com/support/clients/#windows

and download and install the DynDNS updater.

Follow the instructions of the installer.

At one point during the install it will display the following:

Both options are quite handy to leave enabled. The tray icon is an icon next to your clock, which gives you a quick method of seeing if it is running or not.

The Start with Windows option means that when you restart your computer, it will automatically load the program.

At the next screen it offers to install something about Internet Guide.

I always disable these extra things during install. Many programs include toolbars or helpful plugins, but I always turn those off during install.

Finish the installer.

After the install is complete, run the updater, and it will ask for your account information.

Insert the information you used for creating your account. (note, it needs the name you typed in as part of your website.)

If you provided the correct username and password, it will display your information. Put a checkmark in the checkbox for your domain name and click on Apply.

You should now be able to access your MP4 Streaming Server by using the full domain name, http://tools4movies.kicks-ass.net in our example.

Good Luck

We were so excited about the new features in DVD Catalyst 3.90 that we took too much on our plates. During development, we added the new file-transfer code recently included in DVD Catalyst Free Plus, and besides inclusion of new device profiles, we modified 2-pass conversions so that the first pass would be faster, and we made some changes to the black bar removal process.

Unfortunately the last bit is causing problems for a lot of people. Even though we cannot replicate the problems ourselves in 3.90.2,  some people are still reporting complications.

As a result, we decided to pull 3.90, and go back to 3.86.2 untill we get everything resolved.

To “update” back to 3.86.2, click on the cat-eyes in DVD Catalyst 3.

We are sorry for the inconvenience.

You can purchase ($5.95) DVD Catalyst Free Plus for iPad hereAfter purchase, download the zip file from the link in your order confirmation and install the included install file.

After install, run the program.

Insert a DVD and click on the DVD button at the bottom left or drag video files/folders onto the program. DVD Catalyst Free Plus can convert almost any video file, including AVI, ISO, MKV, MP4. It does not convert Amazon or Apple iTunes purchase/rented video files or so-called Digital Copies found on some DVDs and Blurays.

In the screenshots, we used a 720p MOV trailer from Despicable Me. Info about the movie can be found here

To boost the audio quality and maximize the volume (all your conversions will have the same volume if you use this) enable the checkmark with the speaker. If you want the video title displayed during the first few seconds of the video, enable the title checkmark. For Black bar removal options, click on the mountain scene button to see the available options.

You can add as many video files as you want, and if you have multiple DVD drives, DVD Catalyst Free Plus will convert from all of them. When you have the content you want to convert listed in the program, click on the arrow-button at the bottom right to start the conversion.

After the conversion is complete, DVD Catalyst Free Plus will ask you to connect your iPad to your computer.

After you have connected the iPad (and iTunes has started up) click on OK

Click on “Copy” to have DVD Catalyst Free Plus import the video file(s) into iTunes and transfer them to your iPad.

To download the converted trailer, click here

After download, extract the MP4 file from the zip file, and transfer it to your iPad using iTunes.

Download DVD Catalyst Free for iPad here

Extract the zip file, and install the dcf_ipad_install.exe file

After install, run the program.

Insert a DVD and click on the DVD button at the bottom left or drag video files/folders onto the program. DVD Catalyst Free can convert almost any video file, including AVI, ISO, MKV, MP4. It does not convert Amazon or Apple iTunes purchase/rented video files or so-called Digital Copies found on some DVDs and Blurays.

In the screenshots, we used a 720p MOV trailer from Despicable Me. Info about the movie can be found here

If you want the title to be displayed at the beginning of the movie, you can enable the “title” checkmark. If you are converting a DVD, subtitle selection is available, and of course you can enable Closed Captions as well.

You can add as many video files as you want, and if you have multiple DVD drives, DVD Catalyst Free will convert from all of them. When you have the content you want to convert listed in the program, click on the arrow-button at the bottom right to start the conversion.

Depending on the length of your movie or the amount of video files you added, this can take a while (DVD Catalyst Free Plus and DVD Catalyst 3 are a bit faster with DVDs). After the conversion process is complete, the folder where the files are saved will be displayed. Just drag the files into Apple iTunes, and you can sync them to your iPad from there (DVD Catalyst Free Plus and DVD Catalyst 3 can do this automatically for you)

To download the converted trailer, click here

After download, extract the MP4 file from the zip file, and transfer it to your iPad using iTunes.

For information about DVD Catalyst Free Plus for iPad, please click here

Other solutions you might have ran into are so-called “guides” that explain to use multiple free programs such as Handbrake, Videora, DVDshrink, but these guides are far from easy. Multiple steps, involving using one program to backup the DVD to your harddrive (large filesize) or the need to install a non-free program such as AnyDVD (not always mentioned in a guide), changing settings in a different program to match the settings of your device, or for compatibility reasons, select a profile for a different device, settling for lower quality.DVD Catalyst Free for iPhone 4 is designed to eliminate the need for all that. It is a completely free DVD and video conversion application that does just what it needs to do. No need to install additional software, no need to follow a lengthy guide, a single click will handle everything for you.

Here is how it works:

Download and install DVD Catalyst Free for iPhone 4 by using the following link:

http://www.tools4movies.com/free/dcf_iphone4g_install.zip

After download, doubleclick on the file, and extract the installer, or if it displays the installer, just doubleclick that, and follow the instructions.

Just continue to follow the instructions until you reach the end of the install process.

At the end of the install, you can remove the checkmark for the “readme” because you are reading this step by step guide. The readme opens the included manual, which also includes a step by step guide as well as additional information about the program.

After the installation is complete, the program should start by itself, or if you removed the checkmark for that in the last step, look for the icon on your desktop and double-click that to start DVD Catalyst Free for iPhone 4G

You can insert a DVD, and the program will scan it, or if you already had a DVD in your DVD drive, click on at the bottom left to scan for DVD’s If you want to convert your video files (AVI, ISO, MPG, DIVX, MKV etc) you can just drag them onto the program, or click on the button at the bottom left to browse for them.

In this example, we will use a Red vs Blue DVD from the recently released box-set. link

After scanning of a DVD, the available tracks will display in the program. Things such as trailers will be filtered out, but some special features, as well as TV episodes if you insert a TV DVD will appear. Tracks that have a checkmark in front of them will be converted. If you have multiple DVD drives, or want to convert multiple movies, just add them all to the program before you continue.

Once you have all the items you want to convert in the program, click on the button to start the process.

Depending on the length of your video(s) and the amount of files/tracks you have added for the conversion, this can take a while. Although DVD Catalyst Free is slightly limited in conversion speed from DVDs (DVD Catalyst Free Plus and DVD Catalyst 3 are quite a bit faster with DVDs) video files and ISOs convert pretty fast. While many similar programs claim to be “faster”, please understand that DVD Catalyst Free (and our other products) use the high quality H264 video format for its video. The “faster” programs often use “MPEG4 SP” (or a variation thereof) as a video format which does convert faster, but produces lower quality video files.

Conversion speed is tied directly to your computer-speed. Multi-Core significantly speeds up conversions.

After the conversion is finished, DVD Catalyst Free will open the location on your computer where the files are stored, and all you need to do is add the files to the Apple iTunes library and transfer them to your iPhone 4.

If you would like faster conversions, or would like to use features such as black bar removal and the audio maximizer (make all your videos the same volume), you can upgrade to DVD Catalyst Free Plus for iPhone 4 by using the following link: click here ($5.95)

Or if you would like to upgrade to our flagship product, DVD Catalyst 3, which includes device profiles for 100’s of different devices and more features than all similar products combined, click here ($9.95 special)

The order process is through PayPal, and upon purchase, you will receive a download link by email within a matter of minutes.

Unless your device is some vague unknown brand, DVD Catalyst 3 is capable of creating video content for it. Usually selecting a profile for a similar device will produce the desired results, but you can further tweak your settings by clicking on “Modify”.

In general, you can perform the following steps to figure out what works best.

Most devices these days support H264 MPEG4 files. Start with the Apple > iPod Nano profile (not fast or HQ), don’t make any changes, start a conversion, and hit the skip button after a couple of minutes in the conversion. Transfer the small clip over to your device, and see if it plays.

If it plays, click on Modify, and change the screen resolution to the same as your device, or something slightly less. Note that some phones list the width and height in a reverse order (320×480) in their specifications. For video, the larger number is always in front (480×320). STart a conversion again, and see if the file works. If it does, you can adjust the video quality settings in “Modify” and see what works best for you. As a general rule of thumb, select something close to the width of your device screen as the video quality and go from there. for 800×480, 800Kbps is a good start, for 480×320, 480Kbps is acceptable.

If the iPod formatted file does not play and your device supports MPEG4 files, select Apple > iPod Nano (Fast) this uses the socalled MPEG4 SP compression technique. If it works, follow the steps above to make changes

If the device supports MPEG4, but doesnt recognize MP4 video files (some stand-alone DVD players with video file support), select the iPod Nano profile again, but in “Modify” change the conversion format to “divx5_mp3″ or “xvid_mp3″

If you experience issues, just send us an email using the “Email Us” button at the top of DVD Catalyst 3, and provide us with the device specifications or, preferably, a website link to it.

DVD Catalyst uses a “minimum playtime” filter to ignore things like trailers and advertisements on a DVD, but to make it as easy as possible to convert both movies and TV show DVDs, every track on the DVD that exceeds this play length will appear in the conversion list.

If you are converting a movie DVD, usually just disabling all the tracks except the longest one will get you just the movie, but if we take Top Gun for example, it can be a little confusing.

The Top Gun DVD in the screen shot shows 2 identical movie tracks. One is a standard 4:3 screen (full screen on older TV sets) and the other is the Wide-Screen version.

Unfortunately due to the official DVD standard, its not possible to detect which one is which during scanning of the DVD, because the resolution is actually identical. The full-screen version is 720×480, but the wide-screen version also has this resolution. It just has black padding added to it to fit that resolution. So to figure out which one you want to convert, you will have to use the “preview”

Left-Click once on the track you want to preview, and at the bottom, click on the “Preview” button to view your selection.

The first track clearly shows the black borders, so this is the Wide-Screen version of the movie.

The second track doesn’t have the black borders, so this is the “full-screen” version of the movie.

To determine which one you should use for your device, look at your device screen. If it looks fairly square, the full-screen one would be the best one to go, if your screen is more rectangular, pick the wide-screen version. Blackberries with a permanent keyboard, Apple iPod Classic/Nano/Video are squarish, iPhone, PSP and most touch-screen devices are rectangular.

While the above might seem like making things more complicated, it actually makes things a lot easier in general. With the growing popularity of TV shows on DVD, With DVD Catalyst you just insert the DVD, wait for the scanning, and start the conversion. With ALL other DVD conversion tools, you will have to convert each episode one by one (convert an episode, start over in the program and convert the next) or manually add each episode to the conversion queue.

If we insert a DVD from Lost Season 3, after scanning, all the episodes are enabled, all you need to do is click Go. If you have multiple DVD drives, just fill them with DVD’s and with a single click you can start the conversion of an entire season.

There are a few tricks that you can use to make this easier though.

Automatic

DVD Catalyst 3 has a setting in the DVD tab in Global Settings called Automatic Movie/Episode recognition. This setting, when enabled before scanning a DVD, will have DVD Catalyst 3 look at the playlengths of each track it finds, and if it finds multiple tracks of the same length (TV show episodes are usually close to the same playtime) it will just enable the episodes. If it finds a long track, and a bunch of different playlength tracks, it will just enable the longest one (usually the movie)

Manual

Due to the large variety of different DVD structures, the automatic setting does not always work (it works with about 95% of the DVDs on the market)

You can manually enable/disable tracks for conversion by selecting one or more of them, and add/remove the checkmark below the list called “Enable selection for conversion”

Playlength filter

If you are converting all the content on a DVD, or only convert movies, you can adjust the playlength filter which is also located in the DVD tab in Global Settings (“Minimum playtime filter …”) Because this setting tells DVD Catalyst 3 to ignore ever DVD track that is shorter than the selected setting, you can lower it to convert trailers/special features or easter eggs, or if you increase it, it will ignore TV shows for example.

So, we created DVD Catalyst Free for Droid.

We released DVD Catalyst Free for Droid to make it easier for the average person. Sure, with the guides and individual apps, its possible to tweak every detail of your created video file, but if you dont want to spend your time on trying different things, and just put a darn movie on your Droid for free, there isn’t anything out there that can compete with DVD Catalyst Free.

DVD Catalyst Free for Droid does just what it is supposed to do. Make it easy for you to put movies on your Droid. Nothing more, nothing less; Just pop in a DVD, start the process. It’s that simple.

Here is how it works:

Download DVD Catalyst Free for Droid by using the following link:

http://www.tools4movies.com/free/dcf_droid_install.zip

extract the zipfile, and install the included dcf_droid_install.exe by double clicking on it.

(DVD Catalyst Free does not include any adware, spyware, toolbars or free web browsers. The installer has been scanned by www.virustotal.com, which uses 41 different virus- and spyware scanners, including Symantec and McAffee)

After install of DVD Catalyst Free for Droid, start the program by double-clicking on the paw-print icon on your desktop.

At this point, insert your DVD, and DVD Catalyst Free will scan it briefly for content. If you already had a DVD in your DVD drive, click on the left-most button at the bottom (light-blue DVD icon or eject and insert the DVD again. Make sure you close all other DVD software such as Media Player or Power DVD when you insert the DVD, as this would affect the scanning process and severely slow down the actual conversion.

By default, DVD Catalyst Free will enable only the DVD track with the longest playtime for conversion, which is usually the movie. If you are converting a TV episode, or would like the special features as well, enable the checkmarks for these and they will be converted as well.

When you have the content you want selected, click on the blue arrow button at the bottom right to start the process.

This can take a while.

DVD Catalyst Free is a bit slower with DVD conversions than our other (non-free) software. While DVD Catalyst Free is fully functional, we would appreciate it if you would purchase one of our other products, which is why DVD Catalyst Free Plus ($6) and DVD Catalyst 3 ($10) are quite a bit faster with DVD conversions. Don’t mistake the low price for something crappy or buggy. Unlike many of our competitors, we  don’t overcharge our customers, or over-advertise with affiliate systems that pay 75% of your money to the person who lured you into the purchase using some fake 5 Star review.

After the conversion is complete, DVD Catalyst Free will open up the file location of where it stored the file, all you have to do is copy it to your Droid’s memorycard, and thats it.

So why should you purchase DVD Catalyst Free Plus or DVD Catalyst 3?

As mentioned before, both DVD Catalyst Free Plus and DVD Catalyst 3 are quite a bit faster with DVD conversions. On most recent computers, the conversion speed can be 2-3x faster than DVD Catalyst Free, enabling you to convert a 2 hour movie in 45 minutes or so. While the Droid can handle a couple of different video formats, including MPEG4 and 3GP, DVD Catalyst Free, Free Plus and 3 all use the high quality H264 video format for Droid-optimized video. Many similar tools out there (and even a lot of the Handbrake guides) suggest to use standard MPEG4 (H264 is high-quality MPEG4) or even the low-quality 3gp for Droid conversion, but while you end up with faster conversions, the quality sucks or the files are really big (less movies on your Droid)

Besides the faster conversions, both Free Plus and 3 include options to remove black borders from your videos, so you can watch your movies on your Droid’s nice big display in full-screen.

DVD Catalyst Free Plus also includes automatic file-transfer, so after conversions, all you have to do is connect your Droid to your computer, and tap a single button to copy the file over. It really does not get easier than that.

DVD Catalyst 3 goes quite a bit further with support for 100’s of different devices and lots of industry-first and unique features that are actually useful. We use our own software for our own conversions, and as a result, when we run into something we would like it to do, we include it.

(This applies to DVD Catalyst as well as most other DVD and video file conversion tools)

* 99 Tracks / Scrambled Scenes. Some newer DVDs feature a non-DVD compliant protection system. This protection system (called ARCOSS) can affect playback on an actual DVD player, as well as cause complications for the conversion. The easiest way to figure out the proper track to use is to play the DVD on your DVD player. Start the movie, and then either on it’s LCD display or in the On Screen Display (OSD) look at the tracknumber displayed. When you start DVD Catalyst with the DVD, select the same track number, and your movie will convert fine.

* DVD protection. If you are having issues with a new-ish movie, its possible the DVD protection is causing complications. On this website, we have a “Problem DVD” section where we list DVD’s that we are aware of causing some complications. If your DVD is not listed, try an older DVD, and see if that works.

*Video file DRM. Movies such as Amazon’s Digital Downloads, iTunes rental/purchases and Digital Copies feature a DRM (protection system)  that requires activation. These files are tied to a single computer or a single (iTunes-) account, and devices that do not have the same capability can not play these files. Most conversion tools can not convert these files.

* DVD drive. In brand-computers such as Dell/Gateway/HP, cheaper-made DVD drives are often used, which can cause issues during conversion. Usually this only happens with dual-layer DVDs, at the point where the movie switches from the first layer to the second (halfway during the conversion) so I don’t think it applies to you, but if possible try a different DVD drive, or install DVD Catalyst on a different computer to see if that works better.

* Conflicting software. It is possible you have some software installed that is interfering with the conversion. Many video-related programs install so-called “helper” programs. These helper programs jump in when a certain video file type is being accessed on the computer, to improve quality, to detect information or to make it easier to import the video in an editting application. When the conversion is running and one of these helpers try and access the file, the conversion stops.
Programs such as Pinnacle Studio and Nero Showtime do this, but one of the most commonly used is the DIVX codec.
Please have a look in the DVD Catalyst manual at the bottom of page 77, where some information about some settings changes for the DIVX codec are explained with screenshots. If that doesnt help, try booting your computer in Windows Safe Mode, and try a conversion from there. In Safe mode, startup items and helper-apps are usually not loaded, so they do not interfere with the conversion.

* DVD Catalyst has a failsafe that kills the conversion if the conversion appears to be locked up. If you are using a slow computer, or, if a different program is accessing the DVD at the same time (a DVD player program for example) this could kick in to make sure no hardware damage is done.

You can find the download link for MKV2MP4 at the end of this article. Please read through the information provided to understand its capabilities and its limitations. MKV2MP4 is provided for free, as is, without any warranties or support. The software is Alpha, and possibly has (most likely will have) issues.

If you do not know what MKV files are, this tool is not for you.

While DVD Catalyst 3 (and other conversion tools) can convert MKV files to a format that can be played on your XBOX 360 or PS3, the conversion is usually a long process. For most MKV files, conversion is usually not entirely necessary. Often, the video format is in AVC/H264 format, which is fully compatible with MP4 files, however, due to the way the file formats themselves are created, you can not just simply rename an MKV file to MP4. This is where MKV2MP4 comes in. Rather than re-compressing the video to the same format, it just rips the video and audio parts of the MKV file, and then stitches them together into an MP4 file. Of course not as fast as just renaming the file, the format-change process of MKV2MP4 is actually quite fast, depending mainly on your harddrive speed. On a recent computer, you can *convert* a 2 hour MKV video file in about 20 minutes, while maintaining the actual original quality of the MKV file. By using a conversion tool, you will lose some quality in the conversion process, and it takes considerably more time.

This is all amazing, but whats the catch?

Quite simple, not all MKV files will convert to MP4 files that will play on your XBOX or PS3

Because the video and audio portions are not actually being converted using specific XBOX or PS3 compatible settings, you are at the mercy of the creator/creation tool used to create the file. If settings were used during the creation of the MKV file that are incompatible with your playback device, these settings will also find their way in the created MP4 file.

So why use it?

If the same program is used, or the file is created by the same company/person, they usually use the same settings for each file that is created. So, with a little trial and error, you can find out what works best. Of course you can use a conversion tool like DVD Catalyst 3 to fully convert each of your MKV files, but if you have a lot of files from one person/company, and these play fine on your XBOX or PS3 after running them through MKV2MP4, you can save yourself a LOT of time.

Pro:

Very fast. Your harddrive speed is the limiting factor.

No quality loss for video

Can split files into multiple parts to bypass file size limit of device.

Con:

Doesn’t work with every MKV file

Requires about 4x the file size of your MKV file in free space for proper processing of the file.

Have a look at the included guide or read below for the online version

1. Before you start

MKV2MP4 is an application intended to change the format of one video file type to another as quickly as possible. Many (not all) MKV video files already contain video and audio content that is compatible with devices such as the XBOX 360 and the PS3, however, because these devices are not capable of playback of MKV files, a format change is required. While any XBOX360 or PS3 converter can convert these files to the proper format, a recompression of both the video and the audio portion is performed, which in turn reduces the quality AND can be quite time consuming.

MKV2MP4 was created to speed this process up, and to leave the video portion unmodified. It extracts the original video and audio portions from the MKV file, and then it merges these into an MP4 video file. A full conversion from MKV to MP4 can take up to 10-12 hours for a 2 hour movie, but with MKV2MP4, this process can take as little as 20 minutes, depending on the speed of your computer’s harddrive(s).

Important: Because the video portion is left UNMODIFIED, it depends on how the original MKV file was created. Both XVID and AVC video can be transfered into an MP4 file, however, if the settings for the creation of the video portion is done with incompatible settings, the resulting file will also not be completely compatible.

2. What does MKV2MP4 do?

MKV2MP4 performs the following steps to change an MKV video file into an MP4 file.

· First it extracts the video portion from the MKV file to an AVI (for XVID) or H264 (AVC) video-only file. If a different format is detected, it will convert it to a compatible format using the setting you selected. MKV can contain lots of different video formats, however MP4 not so much.

· Then it extracts the audio portion of the MKV file to a separate AAC (for aac audio) or AC3 (for AC3/E-AC3) file. If the audio is in a different format, it will be converted to AAC audio.

· If the original video portion was in H264 format, a small modification will be made to the header of the file to make sure the proper AVC Level ID is set.

· In the last step, both the video and the audio portion will be merged into a single MP4 file, or if enabled (and required for big files basically) the resulting file will be split into a few different parts.

3. What is MKV2MP4 NOT?

MKV2MP4 is not a converter. In the sense of the word, yes, it is, and while it does have conversion capabilities, it is not designed as a conversion tool for MKV files, DVD Catalyst 3 is designed for that, and does a better job of it with more options. MKV2MP4 is only intended to change MKV files to MP4 format, that’s it. It does not offer any configuration options other than the ones offered, and most importantly, it does not support subtitles.

4. System requirements

· DVD Catalyst 3 (with Boosterpack 2) needs to be installed and run at least once. Upon first-run, DVD Catalyst 3 installs a few files in the “Application Data” folder on your computer, which are used by MKV2MP4. Without these files, MKV2MP4 will not function (and not run). The trial version of DVD Catalyst is sufficient though.

· The processor speed does not affect much, however, the audio portion usually needs to be converted, and for that, it helps to have a faster system.

· Plenty of harddrive space. About 4x the size of the MKV file due to the need to extract the video and audio into separate streams, modify them if needed, and creating the resulting MP4 file.

· Fast harddrive (s). The faster the drive is, the faster the format change. Do not use an external drive for both the source location and the temporary/output locations. It works best by using an external drive for storage of your MKV’s and use an internal drive for both temporary and output.

5. Compatibility

Due to the various ways MKV files are created, compatibility is NOT guaranteed. Created MP4 files usually play on XBOX 360 and PS3, however, not all of them. In addition, the XBOX 360 for example, has a maximum file size limit of 4GB, so if you are changing a 9GB MKV file, you will have to enable the “split in parts option”.

6. Step by step

Using MKV2MP4 is quite simple. It has been designed to make things very easy, and to eliminate as much confusion as possible.

Start the program by using its shortcut.

Drag one or more MKV file(s) (or a folder containing them onto the program.

The files are briefly scanned, and the ones added will be shown in a list. For your convenience the playtime of each file is displayed after the filename.

Clicking on any file in the list will show its main properties, such as video and audio tracks, and what format and language they are in.

Now just click on Start to have MKV2MP4 perform the various steps involved for changing the files you added.

Below the progress bar, it shows the log, and what step is currently performed.

7. Log explained

To explain the log, we’ll use part of the log from the session used for the screenshots above.

5/10/2010 1:17:37 PM * Application started.

· First log entry is added when you start the program.

5/10/2010 1:17:46 PM * Checking 1 item

5/10/2010 1:17:48 PM * Found 1 MKV file

5/10/2010 1:17:48 PM * Scanning complete

· We added a file, and it was briefly accessed to provide MKV2MP4 with the details it needs to process the file.

5/10/2010 1:40:44 PM * Extracting video from Sample Video 2.mkv

· The video portion of the MKV file is being extracted to a separate file.

5/10/2010 1:40:49 PM * Changed AVC Level ID

· A small modification is made to the file to make it more compatible with XBOX 360 and PS3 devices. The “Level” is modified.

5/10/2010 1:40:49 PM * Extracting audio from Sample Video 2.mkv

· The audio portion of the MKV file is extracted. If the MKV has multiple audio streams, only the one that you selected is extracted to a separate audio file.

5/10/2010 1:40:51 PM * Deflating audio from Sample Video 2.mkv

· The audio file is deflated to an uncompressed WAV file.

5/10/2010 1:41:56 PM * Converting audio from Sample Video 2.mkv

· The uncompressed WAV file is converted to 160Kbps AAC Stereo audio

5/10/2010 1:43:19 PM * Creating sample video 2.mp4

· The slightly modified video only portion is merged (muxed) with the recompressed audio file into a single MP4 file.

5/10/2010 1:43:28 PM * Finished sample video 2.mp4

· File format change is complete

5/10/2010 1:43:29 PM * Completed *

· All the items you added have been processed.

8. Settings / Options explained

00001 – Sample Video 2.mkv – 0:24:30

File entry in the list. When you add MKV files to the program, it will be displayed here after scanning. If the number in the list (00001) looks like this *00001*, the video format is in an unsupported format (such as WMV) or the screensize of your original file is too large for it to work properly on an XBOX 360 or PS3. The file change will probably still work, (unsupported video formats trigger automatic conversion) however, it is likely the created MP4 file will not play on your device. If you enable the “Skip flagged files” checkmark, these files will be ignored.

1 H264 VIDEO ???

Video stream ID, video format and language. Some MKV’s have multiple video portions, which will be listed in the dropdown. It will also display either the language, or if the language for the video portion is not defined (which is usually the case) it will just display “???” instead of the language code. It is likely you will see the same for most of your MKV files.

Convert to H264 / Convert to XVID

MP4 files can contain H264 (AVC) video or XVID video while maintaining compatibility with the standard, however MKV has a lot more freedom in what it supports. You can include WMV video, FLV video and a lot more, without any compatibility issues with the MKV standard. Because of this, it is often needed to convert the unsupported video stream to one that can be used in an MP4 file. While many of the formats that do not work with MP4 automatically trigger a conversion of the format, if you want to convert a supported stream to a different supported format, enable the checkmark for this setting.

Keep in mind that this will take a lot longer, and will be slower than if you would use an actual conversion tool such as DVD Catalyst 3.

2 AUDIO AAC 1CH …

Similar to the video track dropdown, but for audio. Audio track ID, Audio format, amount of channels and language if specified.

Usually you will want to select the track with the most amount of channels. In the above example, the other 2 tracks are very likely commentary tracks.

Convert to AAC

Similar as the “Convert to” checkmark for video, but then for the audio portion. With this enabled (default) all the audio tracks processed will be converted to 160Kbps AAC Stereo audio. The XBOX360 does not like multi-channel audio in an MP4 video file, so this needs to be converted over. By removing this checkmark, both AC3 audio and AAC audio streams, regardless of the amount of channels will be kept unmodified (no conversion done) however, other formats, such as Ogg audio and DTS, both of which are not supported in MP4 files, will still be converted to the AAC Stereo audio format.

Temp Folder

Click on the location displayed (defaults to your “My Documents” folder) to change the location you want to use for temp files. The process requires quite a bit of file space (about 4x the filesize of your MKV video file) so make sure there is plenty of space available. For performance reasons, its best to select a different harddrive for your temp location than the one you have your original files stored on.

Output folder

Click on the location displayed (defaults to your “My Documents” folder) to change the location you want to use for MP4 files. Because the files are not or only slightly modified, you need to have at least the same amount of space available as your original MKV files. To speed up the process a bit, use a different drive than the one you use for your temporary files. Because the MP4 file is created from the temp files, you can use the same location as your original MKV files.

Skip flagged files

If during scanning of the original MKV file an unsupported video format is found, or if the screen size is larger than 1280×720, the file will be “flagged” in the list (*00001* instead of 00001) By enabling this checkmark, flagged files will be skipped completely. For unsupported video formats, an automatic conversion is triggered, but for MKVs with a higher resolution, you will have to use a conversion tool such as DVD Catalyst 3 to actually convert the files.

Clear temp files

After the change-process is finished for a file, the temporarily created files will automatically be deleted. If you want to keep them for a different purpose, remove the checkmark. The same filenames are used for each item, so if they are not removed and you process another file, they will be overwritten.

Split in X parts

The XBOX 360 cannot play video files larger than 4GB (unless they are WMV). If your MKV files are larger than 4GB, you will have to split them into multiple, smaller parts, so that they can be played by the XBOX360. (or if you use a USB stick that does not have enough room for the whole file) With the split checkmark enabled, the file will be split into portions during the creation of the MP4 file (at the same time, so it doesn’t slow things down). Files will end up being named like “my movie 0001.mp4” “my movie 0002.mp4” and so on.

Copy to Clipboard

This copies the current log to the clipboard memory, so you can use paste in an email or text-file for another use.

Start

This starts the format change process.

9. F.A.Q.

First off, MKV2MP4 is not an actual conversion tool. While it does perform various steps to make an MP4 file from an MKV file, it does not fully convert the file, so its quite possible the created video files DO NOT work on an XBOX 360 or PS3 system. It depends on numerous things, mainly the source of the MKV file and what settings were used by the original creator of the file. If your resulting MP4 file does not work on your player, you can use a conversion tool like DVD Catalyst 3 to actually convert the file to the proper format, however, this is of course a lot more time consuming.

Secondly, MKV2MP4 is an Alpha version, and is provided as a free download. While it works, issues can (and probably will) come up.

Lastly, this tool is intended for people who are familiar with MKV files. If you have no idea what MKV is or what it is used for, this tool is not for you.

Download MKV2MP4 using the following link:

www.tools4movies.com/mkv2mp4.zip

Please note that it requires DVD Catalyst 3 with Boosterpack 2 to be installed and run at least once.

You can download the latest DVD Catalyst 3 Trial version (including Boosterpack 2) by using the following link:

www.tools4movies.com/dc38tr.zip

If you are using an older version of DVD Catalyst 3 that does not include the Boosterpack, you can download the Boosterpack by using the following link:

www.tools4movies.com/dc3b.zip

To update DVD Catalyst 3 to the latest version, just click on the cat-eyes in the program.

Please read the included guide first before you start asking questions.

To use DVD Catalyst on an Apple computer or laptop, there are a few options to make things work.

Bootcamp.

The best way to run DVD Catalyst on a MAC is to use Bootcamp. Bootcamp is a tool on Apple computers that enables you to install a WIndows version next to (Snow) Leopard. After you install Windows on bootcamp, when you turn on your MAC, you have a choice between starting Windows or OS X. Once you are in Windows, you can install DVD Catalyst normally, and everything will work as it should.

Pro’s:

Fast conversions (faster than when you use DVD Catalyst on a Windows computer with similar specifications)

Cons:

When you start up in Windows mode, you don’t have access to your files in (Snow) Leopard

Virtual:

Besides bootcamp, you can use a PC emulator such as VM Ware Fusion, Parallels Desktop or VirtualBox. These programs create a “virtual” PC on your MAC that you can just run like any other MAC application, and you can install operating systems such as Windows and Linux in them. If you install Windows in a virtual computer, you can run and use DVD Catalyst. Unfortunately, while these virtual computers do have access to your MAC’s DVD drive, not everything is accessible. These programs do not properly redirect some of the security features of the drive, so playback/conversion of commercial DVDs, as well as playing some of the newer games (Ubisoft) that use DRM will not work properly. To convert DVDs with DVD Catalyst (or any other software) this way, even with programs such as AnyDVD, will not work properly because of this.

To make it work with a virtual computer, basically the DVD contents first needs to be copied over to your MAC’s harddrive using tools such as Mac the Ripper or MAC DVD Ripper Pro and then using the shared-drive setup of your VM Ware Fusion/Parallels/VirtualBox setup, you can convert these files using DVD Catalyst.

Pro’s:

No need to dual-boot. Just run the virtual Windows-computer as a program on your MAC. Both VM Ware Fusion as well as Parallels even make it look like it runs on the MAC itself.

Cons:

Does not work directly from protected (commercial) DVDs. DVDs need to be ripped to hard drive first, then made accessible to the virtual computer.

Slower. Besides the additional time required to copy the files from the DVD, the conversion runs in a virtual computer while (Snow) Leopard is also running, providing less computer power to the conversions.

Requires (besides Windows) third-party programs to run Windows (VM Ware Fusion and Parallels are not free) as well as copying the DVD.

Why is there no native version of DVD Catalyst for the MAC?

We (I) have been working on it, but due to the differences between Windows and OSX, it requires a major rewrite on our part. DVD Catalyst is a 1-man job (Its just me doing everything) and the development tools used to create DVD Catalyst are not available on the MAC. So to make a MAC version of DVD Catalyst, a different programming tool (and language) needs to be used to make things work. This is very time consuming, and while maintaining DVD Catalyst 3 for Windows at the same time is more time than there are hours in the day. A start was made on DVD Catalyst for the MAC, however, due to a lack of time, it has been put (and still is) on hold. No release date is known at this point.

DVD Catalyst 3 Installation

DVD Catalyst is a desktop application. It installs on computers running Microsoft Windows. Starting from Windows 2000 Professional, it works on any version, including Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 in 32bit as well as 64bit operating systems. One of the common issues with similar conversion software is the requirement of other software, such as video codecs or DVD player software, all of which can cause complications if an older version or a different brand of software is installed. DVD Catalyst uses its own conversion engine that includes all that is needed to perform its tasks. It can run on a clean install of Windows, even when no drivers are installed. It even works in Windows Safe Mode. Because of this, DVD Catalyst can convert and create file formats that might not even play on your computer. If you recorded a file with your phone, and it will not play on your computer, DVD Catalyst is capable to convert it to a format that will play.

After downloading either the trial version or the retail version of DVD Catalyst to your computer, double click on the Zip file to open it (Windows 2000 users will need to download WinZip or a similar application to extract it, Windows XP and higher automatically handles Zip files).

Once opened, you will see a file named dc382xxx.exe or something similar. Doubleclick on this file to install it. On WIndows Vista and Windows 7 you might receive a message from User Account Control asking permission to install it. Because you started the installation of a program, you want to click Yes to continue the install.

A brief splash screen is shown, while the installer loads.

Then the installer starts.

Click Next

Read the License Agreement, checkmark the “I accept” checkbox then click Next

At least the first item needs to be selected, the shortcuts are optional. Click Next

Change the installation folder if desired. Click Next

Change the Menu item name(folder name) in your Windows Start Menu if desired, then click Install.

The installer will copy the DVD Catalyst program files to your computer, and create the shortcuts to make it easy to start the program.

After the copy-process is complete, the installer offers to start the program as well as the Read me (User Manual).  Remove the checkmark for the Read me (because you are reading this guide instead) and click finish.

DVD Catalyst 3 First Run

Most similar converters use an easy to use, step by step (aka Wizard) interface for your DVD and video conversions. While this is very user friendly for the first 2 or 3 movies you convert, after that, you usually are pretty sure of what you want, so the click process to get through each individual step becomes more of a nuisance than that it provides any benefit. DVD Catalyst 3 was designed specifically to eliminate as many clicks as possible while retaining an easy to use interface.

When you first start DVD Catalyst 3, many of its features are set automatically to provide the best results. If you are new to DVD Catalyst 3, we recommend to leave all the options and features as they are, at least for the first conversions. Because there are so many options to play with, it is possible that by adjusting a few of these that you end up with bad looking files, or files that do not work at all. The default settings are specifically set to produce great quality without any fuss.

Especially for your first run, perform the following steps.

If the program is not running yet, start it by clicking on its icon.

On the left side there are 2 dropdowns.

The first one, which defaults to “Apple” contains a list of brand-names and device categories. Select the brand of your device (“Motorola” if you have a Droid,” Sony” if you have a PSP, “Blackberry” if you have a Storm for example) or the device category if the brand of your device is not listed (“Generic”, “Netbook” etc)

Based on your selection, the second dropdown (default Apple TV) will update with the profiles listed for your selected brand/type.

Select the profile for your device from this dropdown. If your device is not listed, you can select a similar model, or just send us an email and ask.

Selecting your profile will adjust all the required settings in DVD Catalyst 3 to produce great-looking video files that are compatible with your device.

Now insert your DVD, or add your video files.

DVDs as well as video files you add to DVD Catalyst will be scanned. Certain important information, such as screen size and duration is obtained from your added video content, which is automatically used by DVD Catalyst for the conversion. Depending on the DVD or the amount of video files you add, the scanning can take some time.

After scanning, DVD Catalyst lists the tracks and files that it has scanned.

DVD Catalyst, by default, lists movies as well as TV episodes. It filters out trailers and most special features by using a minimum duration of 10 minutes (adjustable in Global Settings). Anything shorter than this will be ignored. I most cases, DVD Catalyst will just show the video content you want, however, it is possible that you will end up with additional “tracks” if they are longer than 10 minutes.

At this point, just click the “Go” button on the right.

Depending on the speed of your computer, it can take a while for the conversion to complete.

Some DVDs are a bit more tricky than others due to the way the DVD was created. While most DVDs work just fine, if you receive a popup screen from DVD Catalyst that looks like this

At least for your first run, we recommend to click OK, close DVD Catalyst, insert a different DVD and start DVD Catalyst again. The DVD contains a DVD protection system that is not DVD compliant, and will most likely cause some issues with the conversion. This is not specific to just DVD Catalyst. Most other converters will have complications with these types of DVDs as well.

If you receive a message similar to this

It means the DVD has been flagged (by us) as a “Problem DVD” and additional information is available on our website in the Problem DVD section. (Star Trek 2009 actually converts just fine, just use track 21)

Basic adjustments

DVD Catalyst 3 is the most powerful conversion tool in its class. While there are many DVD conversion tools, none of them come even close to the amount of features and options you can play with. Lets start with the basic adjustments, the ones that are basically the minimum for a conversion tool to contain.

Because DVD Catalyst uses “profiles” for each supported device, selecting one of them will set the standard settings required for the created video files to be playable on your device. Settings such as screen resolution, video quality, audio quality and the video file format (DIVX, MPEG, AVC etc) are all set when you select a profile. The quality of the created video files with the default settings is optimized to provide good quality at a reasonable filesize, so for most users there is no need to change anything, however if you desire better quality or smaller file sizes, just click on the “Modify” button underneath the device profiles on the left

This will bring up the basic settings for the selected device profile.

*Player screensize: The resolution of your selected device. Depending on the selected device, this can be the physical resolution of your device, or the maximum resolution your device can handle for video playback. Setting this higher than your device resolution can result in unplayable files.

*Video Quality: This determines the video quality. Higher usually means better. Setting this too high (higher than 1500kbps for iPod devices for example) can result in unplayable files. The estimated filesize for each movie or TV show shown in DVD Catalyst automatically update when you change this.

* Video Mode: 1pass or 2pass. With one pass, the conversion will be performed once (faster) with 2pass, the file will be completely scanned during the first pass, and then it will be converted again with variable settings. The quality is better, however, it is possible that your device is not capable of playing the created video file properly.

* Sound Quality: 128Kbps is usually compared to CD quality, higher will sound better, but it also depends on the speakers/earbuds you are using for playback. Usually earbuds that come with your device are not of the greatest quality for audio playback.

* Audio Mode: If you only use the build-in speaker for audio playback, using Mono audio might be a good way to save some space on the file size.

* Conversion format: This is the video (and audio) format used to create the file. Changing this will most certainly result in compatibility issues with the video for the selected device profile. Unless you have a device that is not listed, it is not recommended to change this.

* Volume: This allows you to adjust the volume of the audio. Certain devices, such as the PSP, are quite soft when playing audio, so by adjusting this, you can get better results. As of version 3.80, DVD Catalyst 3 uses a “Volume Maximizer” which overrides this setting. The Maximizer increases the volume on every DVD and Video file that you convert as high as possible without causing sound distortion. This ensures that all your movies have the same volume. You can turn this off (and thus enable the manual volume adjustment) in Global Settings

* Framerate: This allows you to lower the framerate of the video. it will increase quality per frame, but the lower the value, the more the video will look like a slideshow.

* Add device: DVD Catalyst 3 is the ONLY conversion tool capable of converting DVDs and video files to multiple devices with a single click. While there are many “multi-device” conversion tools, they all require you to convert your content to one device first, and then start over with a different device selected. With DVD Catalyst 3, just click on “Add device” and then change it to whatever other device you want to create files for. If you want perfectly optimized videos for your Droid, your wife’s Blackberry and your son’s PSP, just select one, add another 2, and whatever you convert will be converted to all 3 devices with just one click.

* Save profile: If you often switch between different settings, maybe a specific setting for movies, and another for TV shows, just save your settings as individual profiles. They will be listed in DVD Catalyst, and you can switch between them easily. If you use the Multi-Device feature, all your devices will be saved in a single profile, again easy to switch between them.

Batch:

The main reason why we developed DVD Catalyst 3 was to make conversion of TV episode DVDs and numerous video files a lot easier. Just about any DVD conversion tool on the market requires you to convert each episode on a DVD one at a time, or you have to click through the whole interface for each episode to add the conversion of the episode to a conversion list. With DVD Catalyst 3, all the episodes on a DVD are recognized, and with a single click, the episodes will be converted. With video files, the principle is the same. With all other conversion tools, you have to select a video file, click through the program for each file. With DVD Catalyst, you can simply drag the files onto the program, drag a folder containing video files onto the program, or tell DVD Catalyst to look for video files in a recordings/download folder and it will convert whatever you want. If you want to convert 100 video files, just drag all of them onto the program, select your device profile, and click Go. It does not get easier than that.

If you have multiple DVD drives, just load them up with DVDs, and once you have your device selected, click Go, and let DVD Catalyst do it’s thing. Simple and fast.

Multi-Device enables you to queue up multiple devices (Multi-Device) in DVD Catalyst 3, and when you start the conversion, each item in the conversion queue will be converted for each device. With the trailers, I used 4 different device profiles, each with their own specific settings to produce the best results.

How does this work?

It’s pretty simple. You just start DVD Catalyst 3 as normal, and select your first device with the dropdowns on the right.

Click on Modify and make changes to the settings if you so desire.

At the right are 2 buttons.

Save profile lets you save your current selected settings as a profile, which enables you to select it easily.

Add Deviceis the one we use to add another device to the conversion.

Because with previous versions of DVD Catalyst 3, people often clicked this button without knowing its actual purpose, a warning screen has been added to it to make things a bit easier to understand.

Because we actually want to add a few different devices, click Yes to add one.

DVD Catalyst creates a copy of the currently selected device and its settings, and adds it as a new device, and some new options will become available.

On the right, a dropdown allows you to select the different devices you added. It automatically select the one it just added.

The “Convert per device” checkmark tells DVD Catalyst to convert each item for the first device first, then it starts over to convert each item for the second device and so on.

The “Convert per selection” checkmark tells DVD Catalyst to convert each item to the first device, then the second device, and then it continues with the next item.

For the Trailer conversion, we used Convert per selection. This way the different devices for the same item are grouped together, which gives a nice speed comparison for each device conversion.

10 Trailers, 4 devices, 1 click

With the added device selected, you can change your device choice in the dropdowns on the left, and change the options in “Modify” to reflect your needs.

Once complete, your device dropdown on the right might look like this:

Now, every DVD, Episode, Video File etc, will be converted to each individual device seperately.

To make things easier for you, DD Catalyst automatically creates folders with the device name in the selected output folder location. That way, you dont have to dig through the created video files to find the right ones for each device.

AVATAR takes us to a spectacular new world beyond our imagination, where a reluctant hero embarks on a journey of redemption and discovery, as he leads a heroic battle to save a civilization.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/avatar/hd/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/avatar.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/avatar.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/avatar.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/avatar.mp4

# 2. Edge of Darkness

“Edge of Darkness” is an emotionally charged thriller set at the intersection of politics and big business. Thomas Craven (Mel Gibson) is a veteran homicide detective for the Boston Police Department and a single father. When his only child, twenty-four year-old Emma (Bojana Novakovic), is murdered on the steps of his home, everyone assumes that he was the target. But he soon suspects otherwise, and embarks on a mission to find out about his daughter’s secret life and her killing. His investigation leads him into a dangerous, looking glass world of corporate cover-ups, government collusion and murder – and to shadowy government operative Darius Jedburgh (Ray Winstone), who has been sent in to clean up the evidence. Craven’s solitary search for answers about his daughter’s death transforms into an odyssey of emotional discovery and redemption.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/edgeofdarkness/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/edgeofdarkness.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/edgeofdarkness.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/edgeofdarkness.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/edgeofdarkness.mp4

# 3. When In Rome

An ambitious young New Yorker (KRISTEN BELL), disillusioned with romance, takes a whirlwind trip to Rome where she defiantly plucks magic coins from a fountain of love, inexplicably igniting the passion of those who threw them in: a sausage magnate (DANNY DEVITO), a street magician (JON HEDER), an adoring painter (WILL ARNETT) and a self-admiring model (DAX SHEPARD). But when a charming reporter (JOSH DUHAMEL) pursues her with equal zest, how will she know if his love is the real thing?

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/touchstone/wheninrome/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/wheninrome.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/wheninrome.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/wheninrome.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/wheninrome.mp4

# 4. The Tooth Fairy

Dwayne Johnson is “The Tooth Fairy,” also known as Derek Thompson, a hard-charging minor league hockey player whose nickname comes from his habit of separating opposing players from their bicuspids. When Derek discourages a youngster’s hopes, he’s sentenced to one week’s hard labor as a real tooth fairy, complete with the requisite tutu, wings and magic wand. At first, Derek “can’t handle the tooth” – bumbling and stumbling as he tries to furtively wing his way through strangers’ homes…doing what tooth fairies do. But as Derek slowly adapts to his new position, he begins to rediscover his own forgotten dreams.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/thetoothfairy/hd/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/thetoothfary.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/thetoothfary.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/thetoothfary.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/thetoothfary.mp4

# 5. The Book of Eli

In “The Book of Eli,” Denzel Washington stars as a lone warrior named Eli, who fights his way across the desolate wasteland of near-future America to realize his destiny and deliver the knowledge that can bring civilization back from the brink of destruction and save the future of humanity.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/thebookofeli/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/thebookofeli.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/thebookofeli.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/thebookofeli.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/thebookofeli.mp4

# 6. Legion

In the supernatural action thriller Legion, an out-of-the-way diner becomes the unlikely battleground for the survival of the human race. When God loses faith in Mankind, he sends his legion of angels to bring on the Apocalypse. Humanity’s only hope lies in a group of strangers trapped in a desert diner and the Archangel Michael (Paul Bettany). Legion also stars Dennis Quaid, Lucas Black, Tyrese Gibson, Kate Walsh, Adrianne Palicki, Charles S. Dutton and Willa Holland and is directed by Scott Stewart.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/sony_pictures/legion/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/legion.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/legion.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/legion.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/legion.mp4

# 7. The Lovely Bones

Based on the critically acclaimed best-selling novel by Alice Sebold, and directed by Oscar® winner Peter Jackson from a screenplay by Jackson & Fran Walsh & Philippa Boyens, “The Lovely Bones” centers on a young girl who has been murdered and watches over her family – and her killer – from heaven. She must weigh her desire for vengeance against her desire for her family to heal. Oscar® nominee Mark Wahlberg and Oscar® winners Rachel Weisz and Susan Sarandon star along with Stanley Tucci, Michael Imperioli and Oscar® nominee Saoirse Ronan.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/thelovelybones/hd/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/thelovelybones.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/thelovelybones.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/thelovelybones.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/thelovelybones.mp4

# 8. Sherlock Holmes

In a dynamic new portrayal of Arthur Conan Doyle’s most famous characters, “Sherlock Holmes” sends Holmes and his stalwart partner Watson on their latest challenge. Revealing fighting skills as lethal as his legendary intellect, Holmes will battle as never before to bring down a new nemesis and unravel a deadly plot that could destroy the country.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/sherlockholmes/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/sherlockholmes.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/sherlockholmes.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/sherlockholmes.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/sherlockholmes.mp4

# 9. Alvin and the Chipmunks: the Squeakquel

In the “Squeakquel,” pop sensations Alvin, Simon and Theodore end up in the care of Dave Seville’s twenty-something nephew Toby (Zachary Levi). The boys must put aside music superstardom to return to school, and are tasked with saving the school’s music program by winning the $25,000 prize in a battle of the bands. But the Chipmunks unexpectedly meet their match in three singing chipmunks known as “The Chipettes” – Brittany, Eleanor and Jeanette. Romantic and musical sparks are ignited when the Chipmunks and Chipettes square off.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/alvinandthechipmunksthesqueakquel/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/alvinandthechipmunks2.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/alvinandthechipmunks2.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/alvinandthechipmunks2.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/alvinandthechipmunks2.mp4

# 10. It’s Complicated

Writer/director Nancy Meyers (What Women Want, Something’s Gotta Give, The Holiday) directs Meryl Streep, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin in It’s Complicated, a comedy about love, divorce and everything in between. Jane (Streep) is the mother of three grown kids, owns a thriving Santa Barbara bakery/restaurant and has—after a decade of divorce—an amicable relationship with her ex-husband, attorney Jake (Baldwin). But when Jane and Jake find themselves out of town for their son’s college graduation, things start to get complicated. An innocent meal together turns into the unimaginable—an affair. With Jake remarried to the much younger Agness (Lake Bell), Jane is now, of all things, the other woman. Caught in the middle of their renewed romance is Adam (Martin), an architect hired to remodel Jane’s kitchen. Healing from a divorce of his own, Adam starts to fall for Jane, but soon realizes he’s become part of a love triangle. Should Jane and Jake move on with their lives, or is love truly lovelier the second time around? It’s…complicated.

Source: http://www.apple.com/trailers/universal/itscomplicated/

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/bold/itscomplicated.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/droid/itscomplicated.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/iphone/itscomplicated.mp4

http://www.tools4movies.com/boxoffice/nexus/itscomplicated.mp4

Converted with DVD Catalyst 3 v3.85 using MultiDevice

10 Trailers, 4 devices, 1 click

The time of renting VHS tapes is over. No longer do we need to rewind the tapes to be able to watch a movie, or pay a fee at the rental store because we forgot to rewind it when we were finished watching the movie. Technology has given us DVD and Bluray, disc-based systems that vaguely remind us of the “good old days”. However, the one thing still left with these formats is that we have to change discs when done, or to watch another movie.

Here is where devices such as HTPC and Media Center PC’s come in. These devices are full-blown computers, usually in a small or stylish design, created to match stereo equipment so they do not look out of place. These devices enable you to access movies stored on the device, in an amount only limited by the size of the build-in harddisk. With just the remote, you can skip through movies just like with DVDs and VHS tapes, but, the main advantage is that you never have to leave your seat to pick the next movie. Just select it and watch another one.

These computers have evolved over the years into devices such as DVR’s (TiVo) and more recently into “Media Tanks” such as the Apple TV, Popcorn Hour and the Western Digital HD Media Player.

For all these devices, HTPC, Media Center PC and Media Tanks, the one question remains on how to get video content on there. The Apple TV connects to the iTunes store as well as an iTunes installation on your computer, a DVR gets it’s content from either TV (recordings) or services such as Amazon UnBox (rental). Recently, even the XBOX360 received a major update enabling it to stream Netflix movies. However for the non-branded devices, getting content is more troublesome.

This is where DVD Catalyst comes in. While in it’s early days it was designed to create video files for portable devices, with the newer versions, it is more than capable to fill up your media jukebox device with video content at great quality.

Here is how to get started.

Step 1. Video format.

The most important thing is to figure out what video formats your device supports. For full-blown HTPCs or Media Center systems, it usually does not matter. Because these devices are just your standard computer in a different box, you can always install some codecs to be able to play the video files you have. For the Media Tank devices, it’s a little different. These devices usually have their own operating system or firmware, and depending on what formats the manufacturer decided to provide support for, you will have to choose the format you need.

So, to make sure you pick the right format, visit either the website of the product you have, or look in the manual.

Below a list of common formats, in order of quality. The first format mentioned will provide the best possible quality, however, it will also convert slower.

MPEG4 AVC / H264 / x264. These formats are pretty much the same, but some companies use one term, other companies use the other term. This format is currently the video format with the best possible quality and compression, and is used for all of Apple’s iTunes video content, as well as Bluray, HD-DVD. Files in this format usually have the .MP4 file extension.

MPEG4 SP / DIVX / XVID. While there are differences, these formats are nearly the same in quality vs compression ratio. MPEG4 SP usually has .MP4 as a file extension, while DIVX / XVID have .AVI as a file extension. DIVX can also have .DIVX as a file extension, but more often than not it’s .AVI.

MPEG2. This is the format used for DVDs

MPEG1. This is the first MPEG version, and is used for VideoCD as well as video content on very limited devices.

For best quality, use the above order to determine the best choice for your device. MKV, a format growing in popularity, can contain different kinds of video formats, mainly H264 and XVID, but it is not limited to these. Devices that support MKV can usually play any other video format as well.

Step 2. Limitations to the settings.

Depending on the kind of device you use, there are of course limitations to what it can handle. Some devices support up to 1080i video, while other devices can barely handle 480i (Standard Definition, DVD) or 720i. In addition, the playback experience is also limited to the quality settings themselves. While most devices can handle 1500Kbps video or 5000kbps video, not all of them do. All of this information can be found in the specifications of your device, either online or in the manual. If you are using a computer (HTPC or Media Center) please keep in mind that the processor speed of the computer affects playback performance as well. Especially with H264/AVC/x264 video, a lot of processing power is needed for playback, and if you are using an older computer for playback (or an Intel Atom/Celeron-based system) you might experience issues during playback.

Step 3. DVD Catalyst 3 Settings

With the above information, we can set up DVD Catalyst to do the conversions.

Basically pick any format in DVD Catalyst 3, and click on “Modify”

Screen size: set this to the maximum of what your video player device can handle, or if your TV is smaller, use the screen resolution of your TV. DVD Catalyst does not “upscale” the video to that size, however, it is safer to set the resolution this way to avoid any playback issues.

Video format: pick the format determined in step 1.

For H264/AVC video, select “H264_IPOD” in the dropdown. This format is the most compatible. The other formats are for specific devices (such as PSP, XBOX) and are non-standard.

For DIVX you should select “DIVX5_MP3″. While DIVX is currently on version 7, most devices do not use any additional features it has to offer, or are not compatible. DIVX5 always works. If your device supports surround sound / DTC / AC3, you can select “DIVX5_COPY” for DVD conversions. This will keep the audio unmodified, retaining it’s multi-speaker setup.

For XVID you should select “XVID_MP3″.  If your device supports surround sound / DTC / AC3, you can select “XVID_COPY” for DVD conversions. This will keep the audio unmodified, retaining it’s multi-speaker setup.

For MPEG4 (SP) select “MPEG4_IPOD”

For MPEG2 you should select MPEG2_MP2″.  If your device supports surround sound / DTC / AC3, you can select “MPEG2_COPY” for DVD conversions. This will keep the audio unmodified, retaining it’s multi-speaker setup.

For MPEG1 you should select MPEG1_MP2″.  If your device supports surround sound / DTC / AC3, you can select “MPEG1_COPY” for DVD conversions. This will keep the audio unmodified, retaining it’s multi-speaker setup.

While H264 is the best video format, it might be more desirable to pick DIVX or XVID instead due to it’s capability of retaining the surround sound audio format.

Video Quality: This depends greatly on the selected video format, as well as the kind of video content you are converting. The kbps values mentioned provide reasonable quality, but quality can always be better. Quality depends on numerous things, including the kind of movie, as well as your own perception. Do note that with conversion, there will always be some quality loss, regardless of what program you use. Also the device that you use to play the files will have great impact on the quality as well.

DVDs. DVDs have a screen size of 720×480 (480i) . Even if you have set the screen size in DVD Catalyst to something higher, DVD Catalyst does not “upscale” by default (your video player does that) the screen size will be similar to that of the DVD. For H264 as a video format, you can get a good quality on about 1200kbps. If you use DIVX or XVID, you can use 1500kbps / 2000kbps to achieve the same quality, for MPEG2 it will be around 4000kbps, while for MPEG1 it will be more like 6000kbps.

HD content (Bluray rips, downloaded TV episodes in HD) This depends greatly on the screen size. for 1080i files (1920×1080) converted to the same size, I would suggest to tripple (x3) the values mentioned above. For 720i (1280×720) conversions on the same size, I would multiply the mentioned values by 1.5.

1-pass or 2-pass. This can greatly improve quality, however, it is dangerous as well. 2-pass conversions use a variable quality setting. For slow-changing scenes, the conversion will use a lower quality setting, while for fast changing scenes, the conversion will use a higher quality setting. The overall quality will be a lot better, but, if there is a fast scene, or a scene with a lot of changes (a simple ocean view with clattering waves) the quality can exceed the maximum the player can handle. When you view the movie, at these points, the movie appears to freeze or slow down a lot. If you view the same scenes on a file converted with 1-pass, you might see some artifacts, but at least the movie doesn’t freeze.

Audio Quality. This also depends on the device capabilities. If you use one of the _COPY profiles, because it does not modify the audio in any way, any changes (including volume) will not have any effect. Only the language selection will be used.

DVD Catalyst 3 has a few profiles already set up that can be used for these conversions. The Western Digital profiles will work just fine, or, you can pick the TiVo > to MPEG profiles as a base as well.

For all conversions, try a few small clips using your settings first to see how things look and play. Once you have found the settings you like, you can save them to a new profile, ready for quick selection whenever needed.

Note: the issues mentioned above (freezing on 2-pass for example) apply to ALL software that can be used to fill up your video jukebox, not just DVD Catalyst.

Requirements:

A Zune. ANy model, including the Zune HD, will work.

A Zune USB connection cable. The cable that came with your Zune to connect it to your computer.

A Computer running Windows XP/Windows Vista or Windows 7

Zune Software (www.zune.net) installed on your computer to be able to transfer files.

DVD drive (to be able to convert DVDs) or video files accessible on your computer (downloads, tv recordings etc)

Some recent version of DVD Catalyst (DVD Catalyst 3 or DVD Catalyst Free) installed on your computer.

IMPORTANT: THE ZUNE 30 PROFILE IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH THE BOOSTER PACK !

The boosterpack does work fine for all other Zune models. More info at the end of this page.

Step 1: Start DVD Catalyst

Use the dropdowns on the left side to select “Zune” and then pick your model. The Zune 30 uses WMV video, the other models, including the Zune HD, use H264/AVC video, which is better quality, but a lot slower for conversion on older computers. Note that the Zune30 profile not compatible with the Boosterpack.

Step 2: Add your videos to DVD Catalyst

For indication purposes, I just dragged some video file onto DVD Catalyst. Just drag and drop the video files you want to convert, or put a DVD in your computers DVD drive, and DVD Catalyst will find it.  Once you have some content added to convert, click on the Go button to start the process.

Depending on the amount of video files you have added, as well as the speed of your computer, it might take a while. Except for the Zune 30 format (which is super fast already) the video format used is multi-core-capable, so if you have a computer with a Dual Core (or more) it will be used to the fullest for faster conversions.

Once the conversion is complete, DVD Catalyst will open the folder where it stored the video files it created. Do not close this window, because we need it to transfer the files. Move it to the side if needed.

Step 4: Transferring the video to your Zune.

Connect your Zune to your computer.

The Zune software should automatically start when your Zune is detected. If it does not start after a few seconds, start it by clicking on it’s icon.

In the Zune software use the menu to select “Device” and then click on “Videos”

Now go back to the folder that DVD Catalyst opened after the conversion completed. If you did close it, it is by default located in “My Documents > My Video” (for windows XP) or the “Videos” folder (Windows Vista / Windows 7)

Move the 2 windows close to each other, then (left)click and hold the created video file, and drag it to empty area underneath the device name (Nermal in the screenshot below) and let go of the file.

You might have to click on the computer icon at the bottom left of the Zune software to change the view to the Zune, and then rightclick on it to start the sync process.

Now the video file should be available on your Zune.

IMPORTANT: THE ZUNE 30 PROFILE IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH THE BOOSTER PACK !

The Zune30 is quite picky in the format of video file that it accepts. Due to a bug in the conversion engine installed by the boosterpack, an incorrect video quality setting is reported to the Zune Software with created video files. The setting detected by the Zune Software is higher than what the Zune software allows to transfer, even though the actual quality setting of the video file is different. The original conversion engine of DVD Catalyst has a work-around applied specifically to eliminate this issue by reporting a lower quality setting, regardless of what the quality actually is, and this is allowed by the Zune software.

By installing the boosterpack, the work-around is not used in the conversion engine, resulting in that the Zune software will (attempt to) convert the created video file.

If you installed the boosterpack, you can disable it in “Global Settings”. The top title of DVD Catalyst should not have a + behind the 3 to ensure the boosterpack is not enabled.

This will have DVD Catalyst 3 connect to the www.tools4movies.com website, and check for the latest version. If the version on the website is different from the one you are using, it will offer to download the update.
Once the update is downloaded, just install it.

Because the update is not a full DVD Catalyst installer (the update is only 1mb, while the full installer is about 10mb) you should not uninstall DVD Catalyst 3 to install the update.

Because DVD Catalyst 3 does not use license keys (personal reasons) installing a (newer) trial version will not update DVD Catalyst 3 to a retail version. It will make it into a trial version, and you will have to use your original link to download the full version again.

For DVD Catalyst 2 users, the update process no longer works.

Because the dvdcatalyst.com domain has been STOLEN, the update process connects to a website we no longer have access to. 2.7 is the last DVD Catalyst 2 version.