Jason's Log

The National Ignition Facility is Actually Cerebro

Reading an article today on the accomplishments of the National Ignition Facility, I was somehow struck by the similarity in the design of the NIF and the Cerebro chamber, featured in the X-Men movies. Putting the images side-by-side shows just how strikingly similar they are:

 

Hmm - controlled nuclear fusion or mutant detection. You be the judge!

HOWTO: Watch Blu-Ray Video on the Moto Droid

Update #1 [Sunday, Jan 24th, 9:08am]: I have been experimenting with various encodings and bitrates to try and determine what 'works best'. So far, there is what I've settled upon:

• Video size: 848x480
• Video bit rate: 1000
• Video frame rate: In Handbrake config use 'Same as original'
• Audio: 2 channel stereo
• Audio sample rate: 44.1kHz
• Audio bit rate: 96

Update #2 [Sunday, Jan 24th, 9:08am]: You really should be using the Act 1 Video Player for Android. No really, just go ahead and buy it from the Android marketplace. You WILL NOT be disappointed.

Update #3 [Saturday, Feb 13, 9:09am]: In the most recent batch of encodings, I have migrated away from using AVCWare Total Video Converter to convert the video. Instead, I have opted for a two step video conversion process that starts with MakeMKV to extract the video and audio tracks from the files decrypted by AnyDVD HD, followed by the ever trusty HandBrake to convert that video+audio MKV file into the final form.

Here are screenshots of my Handbrake configuration:

   

Original Post:

Not too long ago I made the upgrade to the Android 2.0 enabled Moto Droid on Verizon. I'd been using the HTC Titan (a.k.a. VX6800) for a while, but accidentally dropped it in the toilet a while back and decided it was time to move on.

In general, I've been thrilled with the Moto Droid and with the Android platform in general. One thing that I wanted to be able to do was watch episodes of the Band of Brothers series that I had previously purchased on Blu-Ray Disc. I just hadn't made the time to watch these at home, and decided that watching them on the Droid while at the gym would be perfect.

After a bit of snooping, tweaking and futzing I put together the following recipe that will allow you to rip and convert Blu-Ray vdieo into a format suitable for perfect playback on the Moto Droid. This will probably work on other Android devices, although video dimensions and bitrates may differ. Also note that this is not free (as in beer) or free (as in speech) - it will require that you purchase two pieces of commercial software.

My list of ingredients:

• Windows 7 64-bit on a Dell XPS M1730 laptop
• Plextor External USB Blu-Ray Drive (from Amazon.com, $160)
• AnyDVD HD by Slysoft (purchased direct for 53 EUR)
• AVCWare Total Video Converter (purchased direct for $50)

The AnyDVD HD application is used to remove the encryption (a.k.a. DRM) from the video files stored on the Blu-Ray disc, allowing the files to be accessed. The AVCWare Total Video Converter is then used to convert the original Blu-Ray video files (stored in a format called AVCHD) into format that can be played on the Moto Droid (MP4 file format with MPEG4 video encoding and AAC audio encoding).

One the following tools have been installed, the process is actually quite simple:

1. With AnyDVD HD running, insert the Blu-Ray disc. AnyDVD will take a few seconds to analyze the disc and apply the appropriate unlocking to disable the DRM/encryption on the video files.
2. Launch AVCWare Total Video Commander
3. Select the 'iPod Touch Widescreen' base profile - this is what you'll use to create a 'Moto Droid' conversion profile.
4. Edit the conversion profile
5. In the video settings section, set the video dimensions to 848x480, set the maximum bitrate to 1000.
6. In the audio settings section, set the bitrate to 96.
7. Leave all other settings as-is. Then save this conversion profile as 'Moto Droid'
8. Next, add each of the video files to the conversion queue. These files are normally stored on the Blu-Ray disc under DRIVE_LETTER\BDMV\STREAM\ and will have a file suffix of .mt2 or m2ts.
9. When seleting files to convert, it is best to view the list in 'Details' view so that you can see the file size. The main episode video files will be very large. The smaller files are usually trailers, promos and advertisements and can be skipped.
10. One the files have  been selected, configure the output directory and press the 'Convert' button.

Once the process completes, you will have a set of .mp4 files in the output directory. You can then transfer these files USB data connection to your Moto Droid's SD storage card. Once transferred, open the 'Gallery' application and look for 'Videos'. Your newly encoded videos should be visible. Select one, and enjoy the show!

New Scientist Magazine: Making it as hard as possible to buy their product

I really do enjoy many of the articles available on-line from the British science mag New Scientist. I have no desire to subscribe to a printed edition - I know I won't read the paper version, and don't want it. So I attempted to find an 'on-line only' subscription.

Nope. Nada. Nuthin. 

In order to gain unlimited access to the on-line articles, you must subscribe to the printed edition. So instead of allowing me to just pay them money for on-line access, they lose an on-line reader. Too bad. So sad.