Handbrake & MetaX - Preview

Handbrake has been available for quite a while now and is acknowledged as one of the best applications to allow you copy convert your DVDs into media files playable on your Mac, your Apple TV and you iPod or iPhone.

With the latest release, Handbrake is now capable of converting any video file, not just DVDs! Add in over 600 changes since the last release, performance increases, better video quality and a whole slew of new presets to make Handbrake easier to use, and you'll appreciate that the updated application is well worth of a re-visit.

Not only that, but Handbrake is open-source, GPL-licenced, multi-platform and also completely free! In this weeks show I take you through:

• Installing Handbrake and any supporting applications
• Converting a DVD to Apple TV format
• Converting TV Show DVDs to individual episodes

Although Handbrake will create stunning copies of your DVDs and video files, you also need to update the converted files with metadata. Extras like cover art, descriptions, titles, actors, dates, genres, chapter labels, etc, all help when transferring your physical video collection to an online library. Now you can enter all this information manually, but why not do it automatically? In this weeks show, I also look at a great application that will do it all for you by grabbing information from Amazon or tagChimp, and that's MetaX.

MetaX will search multiple information stores on the internet and allow you to choose the metadata you wish to tag your video files. Once you've assembled the information, MetaX will copy your original file, write the metadata to your video file and pass it along to iTunes for syncing with any of your devices. All with a single click! You can even setup Handbrake to pass any converted files directly into MetaX for tagging once completed.