VOB's to DVD

How to take a "loose collection" of random VOB's - not structurally related . . . and make a DVD
NOTE:  the VOB's must be the same MPEG2 format (video and audio parameters must match)

• FAST DVD creation - convert videos to VOB's then use this method to create a DVD

• recreate a DVD that you have somehow corrupted the structure and/or lost some of the VOB's or IFO's but you still have some of the VOB's

• greatly compress a DVD by converting all the 720x480 VOB files to 352x480.  You can then take the new, small VOB's, join them, and recreate the IFO's.

• mix VOB files from multiple DVD's

• combine VOB's from 2 DVD's  .  .  .  essentially placing the content of two discs on one

In this example, there were 5 VOB files created with ConvertXtoDVD (formaerly Divx2DVD).  You will need VOBedit and IFOedit to do this.   Both are free tools (Google them).

The disc should play just fine and can have chapter breaks, (which you can create in Divx2DVD.

*** older version of Divx2DVD will only create one VOB at a time

*** you can use other programs as well to create the "loose" VOB files

Super-Compressed DVD's using this Method

- avg reduction is size is 60%

- the downside is that you do lose the menus, since this method deals only with the main video

An actual case - I took a 4.5 GB DVD with 5 VOB files, and converted it to a 1.8 GB DVD with just 2 VOB files.  The steps are:

1. use Video Redo to convert the VOB's to MPEG-2 at 720x480 - or in my case it was PAL at 720x576

2. use TMPGenc Express 3.0 to convert the MPG's to 352x480 MPEG-2 files - this also converted my PAL DVD files to NTSC !!!

3. converted the small MPEG-2 files back to VOB's using VideoRedo.  You now have 1 GB VOB's that are reduced to about 1/2 GB

4. join the 5 VOB's with VOBedit - and in my case I ended up with just two VOB's totaling 1.8 GB !!

5. use IFOedit to create IFO files

Now you can  .  .  .

• post it on the Internet in the new, small size !! 

• Or combine the 1.8 GB with VOB's from another 352x480 MPEG-2 converted DVD to get 2 DVD's on one disc !

How to do It

1)  Name the VOB's "exactly" as shown below

either Create VOB's - or use existing VOB's that you already have.  Let's say you have 3 clips, and they are named: VTS_01_1.VOB, VTS_02_1.VOB and VTS_03_1.VOB. 

place them in a folder and create an empty subfolder, name it "joined" (any name will work)

IMPORTANT - you MUST rename the files using this exact syntax !!  Use the following order and the following format for the names (abd make sure to use the double-zeros just before the final number):

• VTS_01_001.VOB

• VTS_01_002.VOB

• VTS_01_003.VOB

2)  Join the VOB's

- use VOBedit to create new VOB's that are properly "joined", so that the DVD will see them as a sequence of VOB's

• startup VOBedit

• click "Open" and select the first VOB file - VTS_01_001.VOB

• select -   "Edit/Join Clips"

• a dialog box will appear - specify a destination directory for the final VOB file-set - select the empty subfolder you created in Step 1

• another dialog box will appear - specify a starting VOB-ID as "1"
  NOTE:  usually you will enter here a '1' to let the TitleSet start with VOB-ID 1.  But if already have a TitleSet, and you want to create now a second, and later you want to append it to the first one, then you should choose a higher VOB-ID number.

• wait while the VOB's are joined structurally (they remain as separate files but are linked internally).  VobEdit takes the first VOB-ID in the first VOB file, and exchanges it with the first-VOB-ID that we've specified (which is "1") and for the next file, it uses "2", and so on.  So when this is finished, you will have one or more new VOB files named

• VTS_01_1.VOB

• VTS_01_2.VOB

•   "     "     "     "

•   "     "     "     "

• VTS_01_n.VOB.

3)  Use IFOedit to create the IFO and BUP Files

** make sure you have IfoEdit version 0.94 or later

VOBedit has created 3 new VOB files:

• VTS_02-1.VOB

• VTS_02_2.VOB

• VTS_02_2.VOB

• Start IfoEdit, and press the button 'Create IFOs':

• a dialog box will appear as follows:

*** both Top Radio Buttons are Selected
These other radio buttons are needed if you're having special VOB files
that, for example . . . contain picture-slideshows.

• leave the top two radio button selections as they are

• for "1st VOB of the title Set" - specify the first VOB file of our 3 VOB files, which is "VTS_02-1.VOB"
  check the box: 'Same as source'

• click "OK and the IFO and BUP files will be created

• IfoEdit scans now the VOB file(s) and collects all IFO-releated information:

• After it has finished collecting all needed information from the VOB file(s), it creates two new IFO files and 2 backup (BUP) files:

• VIDEO_TS.IFO

• VTS_01_0.IFO

4) Use IFOedit to check the VTS sectors and fix the VTS Sector numbering if errors are found

*** this step is optional since the Sectors should be OK and numbered correctly, but to be safe, go ahead and do it

• select the first IFO in the top pane - VIDEO_TS.IFO

• click "Get VTS Sectors"

• you will be asked if you want to process "all IFO files"  -  click "Yes"

• click "OK" to each of the corrections being made

• Repeat for each IFO file - for each file, you will see a new, identical named IFO entry appear below the original entries in the top pane - these are the new, "fixed" IFO's

• click on each new entry (NOT the old ones), and click "Save"  -  you will be asked if you want to create ea BUP file as well, click "Yes"

• DONE !!  You can now test and burn the DVD