Does anyone know of a device that will do a realtime mpeg encode over firewire and save it to a hard drive?

We use DVDSP2 to author and encode most of our dvd's at work, but we also have a standalone dvd recorder ($350 Philips) that we use for quickie dubs. To me the standalone recorder is more convienent and makes a better looking encode than DVDSP set at around 7bps with a 2pass vbr.

So why is there no device (that i know of) that works like the cheap dvd recorder but saves the mpeg file to a hard drive? It's realtime, high quality mpeg video that you can then use in an authoring program (instead of having a crappy premade dvd recorder screen).

Anything like that out there for a reasonable price? I mean they make the dvd recorder for $350.00 for christ sake... and it works in real time... at darn good quality. Surely there's something... if not I can always hope for something at NAB.

*EDIT* It would appear that this is a cross post. Someone told me about a product from LaCie called the FastCoder that looks close to what I'm looking for. Thought you guys might want to check it out.
http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?pid=10498

-Ethan Cooper
NY Productions

what i would do if i were you is to rip the mpeg2 file out of the burned dvd vob files... real simple with the right software, and you can then import the mpeg2 file directly into your dvd authoring app... hopefully you'll have ac3 to work with in the vob's.

I have had the same question as you before. Turns out there are several encoders out there ranging in quality and price.

Everything from matrox, canopus, and pinnacle.

http://www.comprehensiveinc.com/compvideo/category.asp?catalog%5Fname=Valiant&category%5Fname=Analog+to+DV&Page=1

All of those that list DVD would work - those obviously are lower end.

ATI's video capture cards can also capture to Mpeg2. I know canopus has a very high quality ~$500 internal/external encoder.

Just depends on what your looking for.

Dan,

Interresting idea, but probably not one I'm going to look into.

-Ethan

ethan, i'm suggesting a low-cost solution that'll give you the exact same picture quality you have now with your phillips dvd recorder... because it IS the raw phillips dvd recorder mpeg2 footage, minus all the dvd menus.

i just want to make sure that you understand what i'm talking about here... no problem if it somehow doesn't fit into your workflow, just be clear that another mpeg2 hardware encoder may not give you as good a pq as you have right now.

some of the things to look for in analog hardware encoders is whether or not the inputs are time base corrected, and what kind of processing is done on the incoming footage... also what kind of leeway you have in setting the bitrate, and is dolby audio encoding included as well.

Dan,
know any good ripping software for the mac? I don't know of anything and thats why I was saying that the workflow you suggested wasn't for me. If you know of any good software for the mac let me know and I'll give it a try.

-Ethan

sorry, i'm pc-only, but i know that your mac ripping software is out there, 'cause i've heard of it being used... you'll have to google it up, or maybe look on www.videohelp.com?

MacTheRipper will rip DVDs. MPEG Streamclip will demux.
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/24055
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/22715
Both are free. Mpeg Streamclip may require the QT MP2 component, but if you have DVD SP it will be installed.