Looking for lost cost / no frills DVD to Hard Drive solution

[doumat]

hi all

I have a number of music instructional DVDs I'd like to rip and store on my hard drive. I've looked through this forum and there are many options (as far as I can tell).

Would apprecicate your recommendations in something low cost and simple where I can rip a DVD to hard drive. Not particular about the file type.

Thanks
Doug

[guns1inger]

if they are not CSS protected you can just copy them with Windows Explorer.

If they are protected, but are older titles, DVD Decrypter

If they are newer titles, DVD Fab Decrypter.

This will leave them as DVDs, and take up a fair amount of space, however they will be playable using a software DVD player, with functioning menus etc.

Is this what you want ?

[doumat]

Guns1inger

Thanks for the reply. Thansk for the advice. I had assumed that when going from DVD to Hard Drive whatever software would compress somewhat as with instruction videos quality does not have to be perfect and if I could get a 4.7gig video down to 1-1.5 gig that would be better.

Thanks
doug

[daamon]

...with instruction videos quality does not have to be perfect and if I could get a 4.7gig video down to 1-1.5 gig that would be better.

Look into encoding to Divx or Xvid AVI - this is regularly done and there are free tools and associated guides out there. This will compress to a satisfactory file size, but still be watchable on a PC.

I haven't done this myself, so I can't recommend any specific tools or methods. A quick forum and / or guide search should do the trick.

P.S. Welcome to the forums.

[j1d10t]

You could always try DVD Shrink: https://www.videohelp.com/tools?tool=DVD_Shrink

[whitejremiah]

if you want to crunch down the filesize and retain menus, ratdvd may also be a choice.......though it's still got some issues, its probably about the best you can do while still retaining menus (till divx releases some sort of tool that makes it EASIER to make divx media files with menus and chapters, at least!!!)