Managing DVD Folders in the Video Library

[Grinder2112]

Hi all. This is my first posting to these forums, so I hope I'm not overlooking any social conventions. My question is looking for a sort of bird's eye view, rather than a specific problem. That has made a search for an answer in the wiki and forums difficult, as I do not have any good keywords to home in on the missing concepts.

Having installed the current GB-PVR on a Windows XP machine, I've begun the process of exploring usage scenarios to tweak the system's settings. Live TV and Recording are working well, but I'm now focusing on the Video Library.

The Video Library will be substantially populated by DVD rips. I've started by putting that rip into a folder, named after the title of the film, in a VIDEO_TS folder. folder.jpg and MyMovies.xml has been chucked into the top level of that folder to flesh out the details screen. When I go to the Video Library, I see the folder, and the corresponding *.dvd pseudofile when I drill down into that folder. When the *.dvd is highlighted, I see the appropriate thumbnail and metadata displayed in the right-hand side of the screen.

What I would prefer to see, though, is the thumbnail and metadata when I have the top-level folder selected, and be able to "play" it there instead of having to drill down.

Can the default Video Library be configured to do that? Should I even be using the default plug-in? (That's the bird's eye view I would like from the experts.)

I would prefer to keep the install as close to "stock" as possible to simplify self-help support and installation issues, but also want the video navigation to be descriptive and obvious to use. I'll quickly add that there may be other video files just tossed into the videos folder, at the same level as the dvd rip folders, as well.

Thanks for any guidance you can offer.

[axeman91]

I got round this one by converting my DVD rips to .iso files which are not in seperate folders. Thumbnails and metadata can then be stored using the same filename as the iso file and using daemon tools brings up the rip including the menus in exactly the same was as if you were playing the psuedo .dvd file

[Grinder2112]

Thanks for the tip. Do you know if Daemon Tools Lite will work? I've installed it and can mount (and play) a DVD with the included utility, but hitting it in gbpvr just gives me a black screen. I've tried DTLite.exe and DTLiteHelp.exe, but both give the same result.

Is there a free for personal use version of Daemon Tools that you would recommend?

[axeman91]

I'm using the lite version and it works fine. Having said that I vaguely remember having to put the settings into the config.XML file manually to get it to work

[hoborg]

Thanks for the tip. Do you know if Daemon Tools Lite will work? I've installed it and can mount (and play) a DVD with the included utility, but hitting it in gbpvr just gives me a black screen. I've tried DTLite.exe and DTLiteHelp.exe, but both give the same result.

Is there a free for personal use version of Daemon Tools that you would recommend?

Dtools lite is free.
You need to modify config.xml manually and correct patch to DTLite.exe file.
BTW, i was newer been able to make it working correctly, if i start iso form GB-PVR, windows popup message drive not ready. I increased waiting times in config.xml, but it is still the same. If this ocur, this will lockup this virtual device (it will stop working) until restart...

[hoborg]

BTW, dont you have simillar problem?

[axeman91]

I may have also had to disable the resum feature in config to get dvds to work properly, i dont remember exactly it was a long time ago! It is definitely disabled but i cant remember if that was what fixed it, i think it was.

[Grinder2112]

I've gotten Daemon Tools to seemingly work. I was suffering some problems with the GB-PVR install -- the situation where it keeps doing a repair install when you run the config utility -- and my Daemon Tools settings were not being saved.

After a clean reinstall of everything, I can get the Video Library to display my ISOs and metadata the way I want, and DTLite will mount and allow me to play those images. Additional problems with persistent subtitles and freezing have hopefully been resolved by selecting the ffdshow video renderer.

You need to modify config.xml manually and correct patch to DTLite.exe file

Are you referring to the path to DTLite.exe? If so, the config application seems to be able to set this properly once I mellowed out the repeated repair installations. BTW, that seems to have been triggered by deleting/moving the default start menu shortcuts. Go figure.