im going to use dvdfab platinum but was wondering whats the best resolution/bitrate etc.. for the n800? i prefer the video to be smooth with no artifacts

there are quality settings in the nokia internet tablet video converter that say
better-640kbps , 400x240,27fps,96kbps audio
best- 860 kbps , 400x240,30fps,128 kbps audio

hope that helps..

is there a divx codec or something i can use for the n800 the avi file i made says codec not supported or something

The MPG4 codec seems to be working the best for me. I'm using PQDVD's iPod video converter program (www.pqdvd.com). I use the 320 x 240 video resolution setting (it automatically reduces it to 320 x 192 or similar for "widescreen" videos) and the MPG4 codec (it also supports h.264 but I haven't tried that yet, since Nokia's own video converter was using MPG4 I figured that was the best way to go). I'm setting my bitrate at 800.

The beauty of this is the speed - PQDVD can rip a movie straight from DVD and export it to the MP4 file in about 1/3 "real time" (i.e. an hour and 30 minute movie takes around 20-25 minutes to completly convert on my 3GHz P4 system). The quality is very good. It will also handle converting almost any video file you may have on your hard drive.

I'm using the 320 x 240 resolution for framerate considerations - the 480 x 368 "iPhone/iTouch" resolution was too much for the N800 to scale down, resulting in choppy framerates when encoded at 24 or 30 fps; but at 320 x 240 the framerates are nearly perfect and the N800 seems to do an excellent job of upconverting to the max vertical resolution of the file.

I had a lot of problems trying to get Handbrake to work and the Roxio converter/ripper with Easy Media Creator 10 suite was incredibly slow. The PQDVD converter does a great job and is really easy to use. I bought the Studio version a while back to make AVIs for my Palm Treo, and the "upgrade" fee for the iPod version (to get the h.264 and MPG4 codecs, basically) was only $16 so I did it for the ease of use

You can download free trials from their website to check it out (fully featured and will rip/encode anything but only 5 minutes worth - enough time to let you see how your files will work/look). Be sure to read the FAQ in regards to encrypted DVDs.

I know a lot of the folks here are Linix users and have a lot of other tools, but for us quick 'n dirty XP/Vista folks this is a handy converter.

JT

There is no need to pay for something that can be done for free. I find the best settings are to keep video at 30fps (29.997 actually) bit rate of 600kbps is a nice mix of size quality, and I use 400 x 240 for almost everything.