VideoVault 3 Review

July 22, 2005

Review:
Video Vault 3

Version:
3.0.0.0156

Review
Date: July
2005

Introduction:

Video Vault is an all in one program allowing you to
convert DVD's, VCD's, Tapes and downloaded movies to virtually any deice that
will allow playback. The simplicity of the program is that you don't need to
know anything about bitrates, codec's frame rates or anything else connected
with normal conversion programs. Here all you need to do is to simply select a
device form the list and Video Vault will do the rest. That is the theory of the
program at least. Let's see how it performs.

Company
Information:

X Software is a leading provider of DVD and Video
software and offers a broad suite of advanced digital video and audio multimedia
software products that enable users to store, edit, distribute and play digital
multimedia content on PCs, consumer electronics and other
devices.

X Software has international sales and support and our
customers and partners include retailers, distributors, manufacturers, OEMs and
end users from around the world.

Program
Overview:

Below are the main features of the
program.

⋅
Copy DVD
movies to any blank DVD disc

⋅
Import
your video from DVD's, VCD's, Tapes, Camcorders, and even Downloaded
files

⋅
Organize
your videos - including custom and preset thumbnails, genres and
categories

⋅
Export
your videos to DVD's, PDA's, Phones, Wireless Media Servers, and Personal Video
Players (PVPs/PMPs)

⋅
Store your
videos on an external hard drive and take them all with you Transfer dozens of
super-compressed videos to a laptop and watch them in the airport or
hotel

⋅
Create
custom DVD's for your In-Car DVD player with no annoying coming attractions or
Menus - and store multiple DVD movies on one DVD
disc!

Supported Devices:

⋅
Personal Video Players (PVP)
-
Apex, Archos, Creative, Epson, iRiver, Mobinote, MpAvio, RCA, Samsung, Zvue and
many more!

⋅
Media Servers
-
D-Link, Hauppage, Microsoft Media Centre
Edition

⋅
PDA's: Pocket PC & Palm Phones
- Microsoft
SmartPhone and Palm (Treo)
DVD's: All Single and Dual Layer DVD's
supported

Supported Video and Audio
Formats:

⋅
Video Formats
-
DIVX, WMV, ASF, MPEG1, MPEG2, MPEG4, DVD, SVCD, VCD, VOB, AVI,
MS-DVR

⋅
Audio Formats
-
WMA, MP3, MPEG1 Layer II, WAV, PCM, LPCM, AC3

In XXX Own
Words:

Video Vault is a "Rosetta Stone"
for the digital video age, enabling you to convert DVD's, VCD's, Tapes and
Downloaded videos to virtually any device including any blank DVD disc, Mobile
Phones, PDA's, Wireless Media Servers, and even the latest technology - Personal
Video Players. The amazing part is you don't need to know anything about codecs,
formats, bit rates, frame rates, or any other technical information, simply
select your device from a list and Video Vault does the rest! In one simple
interface you can move your videos off a myriad of consumer electronic devices,
store them to view on your computer, organize them, categorize them, then with
one-click, transfer them to almost any device with a
viewscreen!

Now lets take a look at the Software Requirements and
Software Installation

Test
Machines:

This product was
tested on two different machines.

Dee-27's Test Machine

⋅
M/Board Asus A8N-SLI
Deluxe

⋅
Processor '“ Athlon64 3500+ (Venice)

⋅
Ram '“ 1Gb Corsair TWINX 2CL DDR

⋅
Graphics Card '“ Leadtek Winfast 6600 TD (nVidia)

⋅
Sound '“ SoundBlaster Audigy 2

⋅
Hard Disk '“ 2X Maxtor 120Gb SATA

⋅
Optical drives used '“ NEC ND-3540A, Plextor PX-716

Womble's Test Machine

⋅
Processor '“ Pentium 4
2.53Ghz

⋅
Ram '“ 512Mb DDR

⋅
Graphics Card '“ ATi Radeon
9600

⋅
Sound '“ SoundMAX Integrated Digital
Audio

⋅
Hard Disk '“ Western Digital
20Gb

Software
Requirements:

The system
requirements for the program are as follows:

⋅
Operating System '“ Windows
XP

⋅
CPU '“ Pentium 3 1Ghz

⋅
Memory '“ 256Mb

⋅
Display '“ 1024 x 768
24-bit

⋅
Hard Drive '“ 20Gb
Free

⋅
Optical Drive -
DVD-Rom, DVD-Burner required to write to blank DVD's

⋅
Other '“ PVP, PDA, Smart/Mobile Phone,
Wireless/Wired Media Server

Software
Installation:

The software for
Video Vault is a small 20Mb in size. This then takes just a couple of minutes to
install onto your machine. During the installation you can see a separate window
pop up which then installs the Patin Couffin engine
onto your system. This is in fact made by a separate company called VSO Software
who are also behind a number of other programs including BlindWrite and
DivXToDVD.

Once installed
the program weighs in at just over the download size at
22mb.

Now
it's time for a quick Program Run
Through

Program Run
Through:

Here we will go
thought the main program.

The first screen
that will appear will be the splash screen. Here you can check out what version
of the software you are running.

Once the program
has loaded you will be given the option of using Video Vault in evaluation mode,
purchasing a license on-line or entering your existing
license.

Here I have
chosen the 'Trial mode. A simply message will appear telling you the benefits of
purchasing a license.

Now we move onto
the program itself. The first time that you run the program you will be given
the option of setting your default video mode. This is so that you movies will
play on your standalone devices properly. Here I selected the PAL system as I
live in the United
Kingdom.

Finally we see
the programs main window. As you can see the main program controls are along the
left hand side of the window. These are the main functions of the program and
include:

⋅
Import Disc

⋅
Import File

⋅
Import Tape

⋅
Export To DVD

⋅
Export To PVP

⋅
Export To PDA

⋅
Export To File

⋅
BackUp DVD

As you can see
there are also some other controls on this main page to. The large area in the
middle will show thumbnails of the movies in your collection. The Movies To
Export window is used to place the movies that you want to export to your
attached device. The Export To DVD window is used to setup the options for your
exported movies that will be placed onto DVD. There is also a button that links
to the website for Video Vault and one for the options which we will look at
now.

The options allow
you to setup the temporary folders that Video Vault will use along with which
DVD burner to use if you have more than one. There is also a Vault Folder which
is where all of your movies will be stored and sorted form. This folder should
be located along with the temporary ones should be located on a hard drive with
a lot of free space.

The other options
are used to setup how Video Vault will function. The options include playing a
sound when operations are complete to resetting all of the changes made to the
options window.

The final option
here is the Add Device button. By clicking on this you will be brought to a
screen where you can add your other devices to the program so that you can copy
your movies onto them.

Time to
take a look at the Import Disc And Import Tape
functions

Import Disc:

Now let's take a
look at the import disc function.

This function
allows us to import a pre-authored DVD-Video disc into the
vault.

A single layer
DVD video was used for this test. The disc contained approximately 4.2 Gigabyte
of data. The target size was selected as 'Fit on a Single layer DVD blank
media".

Since the
DVD-Video was a single layer disc, no compression was necessary, and as we can
see from the screenshot below, this task took 12 minutes 14 seconds to
complete.

The movie that we
used here was on disc without copy protection. This is because Video Vault can't
decrypt CSS encryption. In order to import encrypted movies, you need to have a
3rd party decryptor program running in the background.

Time to
take a look at the Import File
function

Import File:

The import file
function can deal with many file formats. MPG, DivX, AVI and WMV are a few of
the file types supported.

For this task two
DivX files were selected with a combined size of approximately 900
Megabytes.

We can now select
an output format. For this test MPEG2 was used. After clicking on the start icon
the task was under way.

Each file was
processed in turn and the resulting files merged into a single file. As we can
see from the screenshot below the rendering took 53 minutes 24 seconds to
complete.

Import
Tape:

Unfortunately
neither computer used here had the correct hardware to complete this part of the
program. A video capture card was attempted to be found but was not successfully
located.

A TV Tuner card
was finally attempted to be used as this would give a close approximation to a
VCR input but unfortunately this proved to be unsuccessful as the program didn't
recognise the device.

Time to
take a look at the Export To DVD
function

Export To
DVD:

The imported
DVD-Video we did earlier was chosen for this task. At this point the imported
DVD-Video which had been stored as a MPEG2 file had to be converted back into a
DVD-Video compliant file set before it could be burned.

This was a
lengthy task even on a fast PC. The task took over 2 hours 30 minutes to
complete.

After the file
set was rendered some more processing was required, and as we can see from the
screenshot below this task took 58 minutes 51 seconds to complete.

The target device
for this test was to 'fit a single layer DVD media". At this point a single
layer blank '“R disc with the MID code of MCC03RG20 was inserted into the NEC
ND-3540A drive.

If we add the
time taken for the complete task to execute, it totals at over 3 hours. This is
quite a long time to wait, but in truth, quality results from quality
re-encoders have always taken time to produce quality
results.

The resulting
DVD-Video disc was played back on both my PC and my set top player. In both
cases the movie played without problems and the quality was
excellent.

Time to
take a look at the Export To PVP
function

Export To
PVP:

This type of
device is becoming ever more popular with new devices appearing almost on a
weekly basis. However, even if you don't have this type of device you can make
PVP compatible files with Video Vault.

For this test the
same two DivX files were used from before.

At this point you
are asked to select the target device. Since I don't have a PVP device, the
wizard reported that no PVP device could be found and gave me the option to
store the file in the Vault for later use.

Once the files
had been rendered a dialog box appears which gives you the option to view your
rendered file.

At this point the
only option was to view the file on the PC. This opens the file in the default
Windows media player. Once again the results were excellent. This file could now
be copied straight across to a PVP device once one was connected to the
computer.

Time to
take a look at the Export To PDA
function

Export To
PDA:

For this test a single file was selected from our
Vault, once again the file format was DivX and the file was 427 megabytes in
size.

As before I had no compatible PDA device and was
therefore given the opportunity to store the file in the Vault for later
use.

With only a single file to process the task completed
very quickly, taking just under 5 minutes to
complete.

Once again I was allowed to view the rendered file on
the PC, and once again, even although the file produced was 320x288 pixels the
quality was very good indeed.

This file could now be copied straight across to a PDA
device once one was connected to the
computer.

Time to take a look at the Export To File
function

Export To
File:

The export to file function allows output in many
different formats, and allows the files to be stored locally on the PC or
perhaps burned to a CDR or DVD for backup
purposes.

For this test our two DivX files were once again
chosen, but this time a higher quality setting was used (720x576
pixels).

Just as before each file is processed in turn, and
then merged into a single file

The task completed in a commendable 23 minutes 06
seconds.

The resulting file was once again opened in Media
player and proved to have been created with very good
quality.

Time to take a look at the Backup DVD
function

BackUp DVD:

So now we move on
to DVD Backup. This part of the program will simply take a movie from a disc and
then burn it back onto a second disc.

When you start
the program the following screen will be displayed if there is no disc in the
drive. Simply wait a few seconds if there is on in the drive or browse for in
using the interface provided.

Here it is worth
pointing out here that Video Vault can't remove CSS encryption. If you insert a
disc that has this on it then the following message will
appear.

To get around
this you either need to pick another DVD to backup or use a secondary program
such as DVDDecrypter to get the movie onto your hard disk.

Once the program
as scanned the disc it will bring up the details of the film in the main window.
Here you get to make your choices. You can backup the whole movie, parts of it
or make an exact copy of the disc including menus and all. If you only see one
entry for you movie then you can change this by selecting a different setting
from the drop down box at the bottom on the screen. This will give you more or
less options depending upon your choice.

The box contains
the following settings.

This will change
the options in the main window allowing you to backup the different parts of the
disc.

Once you have
selected you choice, here I went for the option to backup the Movie Only, you
need to hit the start button to begin the process of transferring the movie to
your hard drive. The window will show you how long the process has taken so far
and the estimated time of completion.

In this instance
it actually took about 19 minutes to copy the movie to the hard
drive.

Once the transfer
has been completed it will ask you to insert a Blank DVD into the drive. Here
you can cancel the process and just leave the movie on you disk. If however you
want to continue then insert a disk and wait for the program to recognise
it.

The movie will
now be burnt to the blank disk. Here as you can see the process took 7:57 giving
an overall time of about 27 minutes to make a copy of a
DVD.

The movie played
fine once copied and still looked as good as the original.

Once again though
this seemed a little slow. The process instead of coping the disc 'On The Fly"
from original to blank copied it into the vault and then onto a DVD. Obviously
'On The Fly" would be quicker at about 15 minutes. However the movie is now in
the program and can be exported to another device at a later stage with having
to re-rip it again.

Lets
now look at the Positives and
Negatives

Positives and Negatives:

While using this program a number of points both
positive and negative came up. These are listed below for easy
reference.

Positives:

⋅
Export to DVD produces great
quality video playback

⋅
Supports a myriad of
devices

⋅
On a fast PC the file import
and export completed in a very short time

⋅
File export produces very
good quality video playback

Negatives:

⋅
Program was to 'dark". Black
writing on a grey background is not the easiest to read

Conclusion:

This is quite an impressive program that allows you
to take nearly any format of movie and convert it into just about any other
format and place it onto a device of your choosing. Be that a DVD, PDA or even
just a file on your computer to watch and burn at a later
date.

Looking back at the original statement by
DVDXSoftware,

Well it is clear from playing with the software that
it can do this very successfully. The only major downside that we can see with
it at present is the time taken to render some of the more complicated tasks,
but this is more than made up for with the quality of the
results.

The only other slight annoyance was the colour of the
program. It felt to dark and the black on grey writing was not the easiest to
read at times. Maybe an option to change the colour via a skin or even just
changing the grey background to silver would help and brighten up the whole look
of the application.

To complete this review off, we submitted a few
questions to the developers of the software. Below are the questions and their
responses.

Are all video devices
supported automatically or will future updates be required when new devices come
to the market?

Yes, we can automatically update
the user's computer with new devices. The software checks the users Devices.ini
file against the server's, and if there are updates they are automatically
downloaded. (Tiny file)

Are there any thoughts
on adding a LightScribe or label feature to the program so that home created
movies can be given a proper
label?

No current
plans for this. Future perhaps.

As most video capable
device also supports pictures do you plan on releasing a photo and video
program?

Yes we are adding Music and
Photo capabilities to Video Vault right now. That will be the next major
update. At that point the name will change to "Media
Vault"

Final
Word:

This is certainly an all in one program for
transferring video. It has a very easy to understand interface that will not
confuse most beginners but allow them to do what they want with the
program.

Overall we both rated this software quite highly. At
first we were both a little unsure of it's purpose but once we had some time to
play with it we could see the benefits of it for people that have old tapes and
DVD's lying around but also have all the new high tech gizmos that could handle
these movies if they could simply get them onto
it.

The quality of the output files, regardless of the
format chosen were of extremely high quality and this is a testament to the
program itself.

Therefore, we feel that we can give this software the
Safe
Buy award from CDFreaks.