The computer hijinx are dreadful, but overall this show is still cool!

Clearly I’m need to invite some friends over and get them drunk.

Down by the deep and muddy Mississippi, something’s not right. A ghostly riverboat brings to light a new conspiracy for players to unravel in this all-new Midnight Mystery.

Mark Twain’s ghost has come to you seeking help from an evil that has been stalking him in the afterlife. Trace the steps in Twain’s past that led to a lifetime of anguish. Twain’s passion for literary history reignites a controversial debate about the true identity of Shakespeare; the age-old question resurrects a series of malevolent characters. After waking an unexpected evil, Twain sets about to rid his time of the darkness, but the plot only thickens. With Twain’s help, you have to unravel the connections to try and set history straight while dangerous forces loom.

Who wrote the works of Shakespeare? And just how did Mark Twain get caught up in a strange Elizabethan rivalry all those years later? Find out in this Midnight Mystery!

Midnight Mysteries: Devil on the Mississippi

A storm is brewing in Salem!!! Can you solve this Midnight Mystery?
Explore 10 adventurous missions in stunning HD in this intriguing hidden-object adventure game. The famed writer Nathaniel Hawthorne has died during a freak snow storm, and his ghost has come to you, asking for help. There’s more to this case than first appears, and only you can help free his spirit.
Optimized for the iPad, Salem Witch Trials features a cool zoom element that allows you to get up close with each setting. Travel back and forth in time from the scene of the author’s demise to the 17th century, where a town is going mad with rumors of witchcraft and a woman is facing accusations and the gallows. Explore the spooky terrain and structures of Salem village inside and out, interview ghosts, solve brain-teasing puzzles and collect hidden objects.
Search for collectible clovers in each scene to unlock unlimited hidden object mode! Scour scenes for ravens to use as hints along the way. Or, use your lantern to figure out the shape of the object you’re searching for.
Unravel the secrets of Salem’s accused witches and solve the mysterious death of Hawthorne in this Midnight Mystery!

Midnight Mysteries: Salem Witch Trials

What happens is this, CloneDVD Mobile starts and you select the source disc. As soon as it starts to read the contents the program hangs or crashes. It happens with every disc or ISO image. You can rip a disc with CloneDVD no problem, but DVD Mobile soils itself and locks up every time.

After months of dealing with the problem I found this article. I don’t know why it’s so hard to find, but it is. I had to implement steps 1, 3 and 5 to get CloneDVD Mobile working again. Like I said before, I got it working just in time to not use it. But here you go, here’s how to make CloneDVD Mobile work again.

This thread is a short-list of all actions known to resolve the "crash" issue, which can appear in one of several ways:
1. CloneDVD mobile simply closes the moment you select the VIDEO_TS folder
2. The selection works but Windows announces it has a problem and must close the program

We have been chasing after this problem for years and no matter what we do we can not duplicate it in our lab.
The error can occur on all Windows platforms but seems to be more prevalent on Windows 7.

Perform these actions to recover CloneDVD mobile for the DVD process:
1. If you have "RoboForm" running: CTRL-ALT-DEL, open Task Manager "processes", locate the process for "Roboform" and right click/end it.
For version 7 RoboForm we have feedback that you can add "CloneDVDMobile.exe" to the blacklist under "applications integration" under "options" in RoboForm and that fixes the problem.
2. For Windows 7: Shut down "Side bars" if they are active.
3. For Windows 7: Right click the CloneDVD mobile program icon and open "properties". Select "Compatibility" and set this for VISTA SP1.
Feedback tells us this setting may need to be XP service pack 3 mode but normally going back one version should work.
4. Also for Windows 7 if "3" does not help: Right click the shortcut icon on the Desktop, select "troubleshoot compatibility" and let Windows pick the better setting.
5. Stop any "Tablet" services (e.g. "Wacom"),"Tablet Input Services" running when you process with CloneDVD mobile
6. If the "must close" error occurs, Windows may offer to fix (cough, cough) it and offer a "compatibility" repair or "troubleshoot compatibility". Select that.
This often allows CloneDVD mobile to get off the system’s problem radar.

http://forum.slysoft.com/showthread.php?t=50518

But after all that, I’ve decided NOT to use CloneDVD Mobile to rip my DVDs to MP4 format. And there’s a couple of reasons despite the fact that the quality of the file is actually quite good with CloneDVD Mobile.

First, it doesn’t allow you to specify your output options like File Size, specific bitrate, audio bitrate, etc. The slide is good, but that’s not enough control.

Second, CloneDVD Mobile isn’t very sophisticated, meaning, it rips a DVD and you move on to the next. What if I have a whole library of ISO images, this is going to take forever to rip one, sit and wait, rip the next.

Third, CloneDVD Mobile seems to be the bastard child of the Slysoft family. It has been updated in eons. New devices, new formats, new features, none of that seems to make it into CloneDVD Mobile. It looks and acts the same as it did four years ago and that’s not good enough. Yes it works, but it’s not keeping up with the times.

So that leaves me looking for other software to handle the project. I’ve decided on Xilisoft DVD Ripper. In actuality I bought the entire Xilisoft Media Toolkit Ultimate. I got the Video Converter Ultimate as a Giveaway of the Day and it’s been awesome. I’ve converted hundreds of files to MP4 for my iPad. I decided to get the upgrade and the Full Monty all at the same time.

I ended up getting DVD Ripper Ultimate because it supports batch conversions. You can open multiple ISO or DVD folders at the same time and have it convert them one after the other. Considering how many discs I have to get through, I can rip dozens of discs to the drive during the day and let them convert overnight.

Plus, DVD Ripper allows me to specify the file size, the bitrate, the audio rate, screen resolution, crop and other functions. Why do you need that? I don’t want an episode of The Simpsons that I plan to watch on my iPad coming out to 1.6GB. That’s just ridiculous.

The Suite was kind of expensive, but the whole bundle is on sale for Valentine’s Day. Considering the hundreds of discs I need to get through, it’s a small price to pay for the convenience. Additionally, for that price I get an upgraded Video Converter Ultimate as well as the DVD and Audio copy tools. I may not use them as frequently, but considering I got all 5 tools for less than two of the tools, that’s a pretty good bargain.

Don’t count Slysoft out just yet. I’m still going to use CloneDVD and AnyDVD to rip all the discs to the hard drive. Since I just have to rip them to a folder it takes about 5 minutes a disc. After that, DVD Ripper will churn away during the night turning them all into MP4s.

MP4 is the format I should be looking at, and then it hit me like a thunderbolt, I should be using Handbrake. But then I hit a dead end with that too. Handbrake hasn’t been updated in over a year. Handbrake is good, but with those sorts of cobwebs looming, it looks like the project might have been abandoned. I don’t want to back a dead horse here.

My grand project has hit a snag again. I have the format worked out, but now the software I thought I was going to use has me wondering. This is turning out to be a right pain in the ass.

I have CloneDVD Mobile, but that thing is having some serious compatibility issues with my machine. Apparently it doesn’t like my Wacom tablet, Roboform 7 and who knows what else. I’m thinking of something from Xilisoft, but I haven’t quite decided. Plus, is it me or are the products from Xilisoft and ImTOO based on the same code?

Any thoughts on DVDFab?

It still fermented fine and even after changing the airlock multiple times during the first couple of days there was plenty of fermentation. Who knows whether it was contaminated or not, but I pressed on and bottled it.

The carbonation was completely hit or miss. Some bottles were perfect and had a nice amount of fizz. Some were rather dead. There were faint traces of bubbles, but the beer looked flat.

The flavor wasn’t what I expected either. This is the beer that I thought had no ginger flavor while others say the ginger was a straight shot to the plums. Even though it was flat, when you chilled it down it was still quite nice. If you weren’t paying attention it looked like a chilled glass of Coke. When it worked it was pretty nice and even the bad ones were drinkable. I’m curious to see how this one turns out. This time it’s in a 6.5 gallon carboy with plenty of space to percolate. While it was steeping it had strong aromas of coffee and chocolate. I could smell the ginger, but I didn’t walk away with a big bouquet of it. It’s still the darkest beer I’ve made even though the alcohol content is only 4.0%.

It smelled good. It looked good. And it’s starting to show signs of fermentation. Here’s to hoping this beer turns out to be a lot more agreeable. I’m going to keep making this beer until I get it right.