The Beginner's Guide to iPad Video Conversion on Mac

Then you just put into a shiny new IPAD and impressed by the beautiful display. There are several possible sources of content that you want to convert for viewing on the big screen, and the best tools for the job will often be determined by the type and source of this content.

The most common types of content include DVDs, downloaded digital video content (such as those downloaded from the internet) content recorded from a TV using a digital video recorder (DVR), digital video content standard and high definition video content. We will discuss each of these types of content in the trip and our recommended tools for each.

Contents

Part I - Understanding the formats compatible with IPAD

Part II - Conversion DVDs

Part III - Converting Standard Digital Video and HD Video Content

Part IV - Converting Recorded TV Content

Part I. Understanding the formats compatible with IPAD

You know that the 9.7-inch high-resolution screen makes IPAD perfect for watching video, but that does not mean that any video file playable on your IPAD. The IPAD supported video formats are:

H.264 video (up to 720p, 30 frames per second; Main Profile Level 3.1 with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio in. m4v,. Mp4 and. Mov file formats);

MPEG-4 video (up to 2.5 Mbps, 640 by 480 pixels, 30 frames per second, Simple Profile with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio in. m4v,. Mp4 and. Mov file formats ).

Part II. Converting DVDs

One of the most common sources of IPAD content will be DVDs. Although the legality of ripping content from DVDs varies in different jurisdictions, many countries outside the U.S. has no special restrictions on the conversion of DVDs you already own in other visible formats.

On the Mac platform, the most commonly used tools for DVD extraction MacTheRipper. MacTheRipper is a straightforward DVD ripping tool, it does not actually convert the video, just extract it from DVD. Using MacTheRipper is relatively simple: Just insert a DVD and start the program and you'll be presented with a main screen of MacTheRipper.

MacTheRipper standard full disc extraction, it will just extract ALL the content from the DVD. Extracting a title from the DVD as a particular file, you instead need to click on "Mode" tab and choose "Title - Chapter Extraction" from pull-down menu. The result of this operation will be in MPEG-2 format and can be seen through a software application that can be MPEG-2 playback or converted using one of the tools discussed further in Part III.

Fortunately, there are other end-to-end IPAD conversion solutions. DVD to IPAD Converter for Mac from iFunia is the second and better solution. It provides an integrated solution to preform the extraction of DVD content and conversion to an IPAD-ready format.

It iFunia DVD to IPAD Converter program comes with an intuitive user interface with 3 easy steps. You can simply insert a DVD and start the program, it will then read the inserted DVD or DVD folder, then select IPAD presets and output destination folder and click the Start button. It's so easy! You can learn the detailed step-by-step guide from iFunia's homepage.

Besides the ability to take content from a DVD directly to an IPAD-ready format, DVD iFunia to IPAD Converter for Mac also offers simple film editing, the ability to queue multiple tracks from a DVD, support to fine tune video and audio settings and the ability to extract soundtrack compatible with IPAD.

Part III. Converting Standard Digital Video and HD Video Content

Standard Digital Video Content refers to the various types of digital content that is stored on a computer, such as that produced from websites and even before extracted from DVDs to other non-IPAD-ready formats. HD Video Content does high definition video. The HD video generally refers to any video system of higher resolution than standard-definition video, most of them are on screen resolutions of 1280 * 720 (720p) or 1920 * 1080 (1080i or 1080p), and obtained from AVCHD and other HD digital camcorder.

There are many free tools for IPAD video conversion on Mac, like iSquint, VisualHub, MPEG Streamclip, etc. But iSquint and VisualHub has been discontinued and is no longer for sale, but MPEG Streamclip can not convert HD video content. Maybe you can convert HD video from most digital cameras through Apple's iMovie HD application included in iLife '06 or later. But iMovie does not give any further default presets for higher resolution IPAD also conversion times will be very slow as it uses the underlying Quicktime engine.

So far the best solution for HD and SD video converter to maybe IPAD IPAD Video Converter, still from iFunia Corp. It is designed specifically for Apple's new tablet offers standard presets for IPAD coding and simple video editing. For the average user, it is important IPAD Video Converter screen nice and clean, providing just the necessary basic functions. You can simply drag the contents you want converted, select your basic output options, and press the "Start" button.

Part IV. Converting Recorded TV content.

A second type of content that many users IPAD'd like to convert, is content recorded from broadcast television sources, such as over-the-air, cable or satellite programming. This content can come from digital video recording software installed directly on a Mac or from an external DVR like a Tivo and EyeTV allows the handling of either.

EyeTV is probably the most popular solution for recording television content on a Mac. Choosing a show from the online TV guide that will have the advantage of ensuring that information about a given admission for you and when you schedule a recording, you can tell EyeTV to export to an IPAD format immediately after it is finished recording. The converted video will also be automatically imported into iTunes with the correct name, description and display the tags filled in from the TV guide information, ready to be synced to your IPAD unit.