fatty
Member
Just got the 500GB Seagate Freagent External HDD and I'm now getting ready to back up a whole bunch of my home videos and mp3s and have a few questions:
1) Video
I currently have a bunch of home movies on MiniDV that I would like to back up to HDD and DVD. Right now I'm just using the "Import Video to Windows Media Player" option on Windows Vista and from there burning it to DVD. It converts each file to .avi and from there it creates a DVD (standard menu with preset chapters that can't be customized). Each 1hour MiniDV tapes takes up about 13GB of hard drive space. It works alright but I'd like to know if there is a better program (free or cheap) out there that I should be using. I'd like to:
a) Be able to just make a quick back up of the tape to hard drive and DVD
b) Have more flexibility in selecting Chapters on the DVD
c) Still be able to easily access the file for editing later with a better DVD authoring/editing program (I'm guessing saving in .avi will give me this function)
d) Have a reliable and high quality output - very important (I want to be able to back up the tape to the hard drive without dropped frames, digital artifacts, etc. and I want the DVD to be able to be played in most DVD players - I've had trouble with this in the past)
Dumb question but after I have these videos on DVD would I be able to rip them easily to the hard drive and edit them (just in case something happened to my .avi files on my external hard drive)?
2) Audio
I have an mp3 collection but it's not organized very well at all. I'm now ready to go through again and rip my CDs to MP3 and back them up. I currently use dMC Audio CD Input and it does a nice job of locating the album info off of the internet and then ripping to whichever bit rate I want. I'd like to find a program that is just as easy to use, but also looks for the album art (I just got a nano).
Any recommendations? I know some would probably recommend AAC instead of MP3 but I'd probably prefer to stick with the later since it is more heavily supported. What bitrate would you recommend? I'm thinking 192 Kbs and not going with a variable bit rate since I've had players in the past that have trouble with it.
Main thing is I'm looking for good reliable standards that I can use when going through this process before I start archiving all of this stuff.
Thanks for all the help, it is really appreciated.
1) Video
I currently have a bunch of home movies on MiniDV that I would like to back up to HDD and DVD. Right now I'm just using the "Import Video to Windows Media Player" option on Windows Vista and from there burning it to DVD. It converts each file to .avi and from there it creates a DVD (standard menu with preset chapters that can't be customized). Each 1hour MiniDV tapes takes up about 13GB of hard drive space. It works alright but I'd like to know if there is a better program (free or cheap) out there that I should be using. I'd like to:
a) Be able to just make a quick back up of the tape to hard drive and DVD
b) Have more flexibility in selecting Chapters on the DVD
c) Still be able to easily access the file for editing later with a better DVD authoring/editing program (I'm guessing saving in .avi will give me this function)
d) Have a reliable and high quality output - very important (I want to be able to back up the tape to the hard drive without dropped frames, digital artifacts, etc. and I want the DVD to be able to be played in most DVD players - I've had trouble with this in the past)
Dumb question but after I have these videos on DVD would I be able to rip them easily to the hard drive and edit them (just in case something happened to my .avi files on my external hard drive)?
2) Audio
I have an mp3 collection but it's not organized very well at all. I'm now ready to go through again and rip my CDs to MP3 and back them up. I currently use dMC Audio CD Input and it does a nice job of locating the album info off of the internet and then ripping to whichever bit rate I want. I'd like to find a program that is just as easy to use, but also looks for the album art (I just got a nano).
Any recommendations? I know some would probably recommend AAC instead of MP3 but I'd probably prefer to stick with the later since it is more heavily supported. What bitrate would you recommend? I'm thinking 192 Kbs and not going with a variable bit rate since I've had players in the past that have trouble with it.
Main thing is I'm looking for good reliable standards that I can use when going through this process before I start archiving all of this stuff.
Thanks for all the help, it is really appreciated.