I have used a lot of softwares, a lot of utilities on my computer. For these softwares, the more features they have, the bigger they become. Luckily, the coolest softwares are not always the biggest ones. Check out my top ten coolest utilities (not in order). Each one takes up less than 1 MB of space. Some of them are as small as 24 KB. What's more, they are all free !
AlwaysOnTopMaker (24KB) --Make a window be always on top
Asterisk Logger (25KB) --Show a password behind the asterisks.
DeskWin (107KB) -- Make 4 virtual desktops.
Unlocker (183KB) -- Unlock file that uses by other files.
Restoration (200KB) -- Undelete the deleted files.
FolderSize (309KB) -- Show the size of the folder, fast.
LClock (330KB) -- Tray clock with reminders.
Process Explorer (584KB) -- Show what processes running in the background.
Agent Ransack (792KB) -- Find files fast
ZSoft Uninstaller (887KB) -- Uninstall the existing programs.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
MP4 and Xvid
I have a lot of movies encoded with xvid and Divx. Theses formats can encode one movie to fit into 1 CD (700M) with acceptable quality (VCD / VHS quality). It was 4 years ago when I started using these formats to encode my movies. The tools I used at the time are DVDDecrypter to copy the DVD movie to a harddisk, Vidomi with Xvid/Divx and Lame mp3 to encode the movie and the audio, and finally Subrip to extract the subtitle. Each step must be done separately. The total processes normally take 4-5 hr for 1 encoded movie. The encoded movies can be played in my LG DVD player very well. But you can imagine how much hassle I have to overcome.
This is not the case any more in 2007.
With a lot of things have developed for the past years, the Xvid/Divx are kinds of dated now in 2007. Now movie lovers found better alternatives in MP4, movie format and AAC, audio format. I tried it and found MP4 gave me better quality i.e. less blocky images. I also used the lower bitrate of AAC to encode the audio like 96 Kbps, and I couldn't hear the difference compared to my normally used 128 Kbps of MP3. With 96 KBps of AAC and 1 CD (700M) of video encoded with MP4, I got better quality than encoding with XVid/Divx. These new formats also are supported in the new media portable player like iPod. The only downside is its still long encoded time. It will take 4 hr to encode one movie. However, you-set-it-and-forget-it procedure from a new tool I found makes it more attractive than the procedures I used to use.
The tool I mentioned is DVDFab platinum, and it will be only thing you need. It is very starightforward and easy to use. It can also rip a subtitle in VobSub format (sub/idx extensions). I yet haven't tried other tools that can encode movies in MP4/AAC formats, but I think no matter the tools you used, as long as you use the same settings, the quality of the encoded movies shouldn't be much different.
My last conclusion is next time when you want to backup your DVD, use MP4/AAC.
This is not the case any more in 2007.
With a lot of things have developed for the past years, the Xvid/Divx are kinds of dated now in 2007. Now movie lovers found better alternatives in MP4, movie format and AAC, audio format. I tried it and found MP4 gave me better quality i.e. less blocky images. I also used the lower bitrate of AAC to encode the audio like 96 Kbps, and I couldn't hear the difference compared to my normally used 128 Kbps of MP3. With 96 KBps of AAC and 1 CD (700M) of video encoded with MP4, I got better quality than encoding with XVid/Divx. These new formats also are supported in the new media portable player like iPod. The only downside is its still long encoded time. It will take 4 hr to encode one movie. However, you-set-it-and-forget-it procedure from a new tool I found makes it more attractive than the procedures I used to use.
The tool I mentioned is DVDFab platinum, and it will be only thing you need. It is very starightforward and easy to use. It can also rip a subtitle in VobSub format (sub/idx extensions). I yet haven't tried other tools that can encode movies in MP4/AAC formats, but I think no matter the tools you used, as long as you use the same settings, the quality of the encoded movies shouldn't be much different.
My last conclusion is next time when you want to backup your DVD, use MP4/AAC.
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