What's a Good Rez?

[Pareto Optimal]

What's a good rez to rip my DVDs to MKV? I primarily watch MKV on my laptop and 32" flat panel TV.

What do most people rip episodic TV shows to?

What would be a good rez?

What would be a good rez with consideration to keep file size down?

I've ripped to 720, 640 and 480. I maybe noticed some quality difference at 480.
The file size difference between them is considerable.

In playback on my laptop I've sometimes experienced colored pix-elation, silver pix-elation which looks like it's silver embossed or a green haze or fog for a short period of time. If I go back and playback the same section that had any of those effects, they're fine. These happened at 480 so I upped the rez to 720 and experienced the same. Does that mean it's not a problem with the rez? Is it a problem with my video or RAM? I'm on a 1st gen i5 2.67GHz with Nvidia graphics and 8GB RAM.

[redwudz]

For DVDs? Leave the resolution the same as the original. If you want smaller file size, re-encode at a lower bitrate (And lower quality).
And 'ripping' is usually defined as making an exact copy of the original DVD/BD.
Encoding is changing the resolution, format or other parameters of a video file.

What encoding program are you using to convert to MKV? I mostly use VidCoder.

[Pareto Optimal]

Thanks!
I'm using DVDFab.
I thought ripping was ripping any media from disc. It's ripped at whatever quality it was on the disc.
Encoding or re-encoding is changing the settings/quality/size/remuxing of the rip and converting is the container or output file type.

[_Al_]

Can you use snipping tool or video player snap shot to post an image to clarify your problem?

[Pareto Optimal]

DVDFab makes clips.
Are you asking for a clip of the artifacts? I can't reproduce those. They appeared at the very beginning of two MKV files of the same DVD concert of different resolutions and at maybe the same or in the same general area further into the MKV file. When I dragged back to replay those areas they played clean. Clicking around at random I clean areas and areas with artifacts. Playing the artifact area again always plays clean. Closing VLC and relaunching VLC and the MKV always plays clean. That was of a concert in a small club on a stage where everything was mostly black.

[Cornucopia]

@pareto, why create a 2nd thread?

We already told you: ripping is JUST copying media off of the disc 1:1 (and if necessary, decrypting in the process). Any time you stick the word "quality" in there, or "format" or "resolution", it's pretty clear you are also converting (aka re-encoding).
A true rip of a dvd or bd would still be the same rez, using the same codec(s), at the same quality, because it is basically just a file copy (with possible remux).
Dvdfab can both plain rip as well as rip & convert. Again, clearly you are ripping & converting. Dvdfab is fine at ripping. It is only so-so at converting, which is why it was asked what you used.

If you are asked about a clip to provide for this forum, what usually is being referred to is an edited short section of the original, not-yet-converted rip. Edit using a tool that supports trimming in a lossless/smart-rendering way. (Refer to previous posts and tutorials that describe how to do that and what tools to use, depending on the format).
That way, you can post a segment of your original source for true A/B comparison. All other postings would be confounded by other processes.
Again, you don't specify what you really want, even though you did mention "keep the file size down". Down to what? What do you consider acceptable.
Personally, I consider the ~8GB for a 2+hr SD dvd, or the ~35GB for a 2+hr HD bluray to be perfectly acceptable as-is, except if I need to export it for use in some mobile device.
And you have got to remember that those source files are themselves just ALREADY HIGHLY COMPRESSED distribution end formats. Probably 50-100:1. Don't expect miracles when you want to recompress them to, say, 300:1.

Scott