ripping single episodes off multi-episode discs

I feel I am missing something obvious, but I can't figure out how to rip a single episode off a multiple episode disc, so that a 4 episode DVD, for instance, can be ripped into 4 separate files, one per episode. Is there a guide that addresses this? If so, where can I find it?

I am trying that now, but still a little confused. The naming of the vobs is what is tripping me up, I think.

For example, on the disc I am working with just to figure out the system, I have three VTS files:

VTS_01
VTS_02
VTS_03

And under each file, there are five smaller files. I am assuming the actual episodes are in these files. They are (in VTS_01):

PGC 1 (00:43:50)
PGC 2 (00:43:50)
PGC 3 (00:43:51)
PGC 4 (00:43:47)
PGC 5 (02:55:20)

Now, it would seem to me that PGCs 1-4 are the actual episodes, as the time stamp seems to be about right for an hour-long TV episode when the commercials are edited out. But then, what is the nearly 3-hour long PGC 5? There are no bonus features on the disc in question. What about the PGCs under VTS_02 and VTS_03? Those are all about 30 seconds long, I think. Are those just menu files?

I'm just not sure how to tell what's what when looking at the file structure of the DVD. I swear I've seen one where everything was under VTS_01.

Manono:

Thank you very much. It seems safe to assume that usually the episodes will be in sequential order, as there appears to be no way to check them until after the rip is done, or at least that's the way I'm proceding.

It's true that the disc in question does have a "play all" option, so I think your idea about what the fifth part was is correct.

One last question: the last disc of the set had some bonus features on it, at least some of which were in VTS_02 (the episodes were in VTS_03 on this particular disc for no reason I can grasp at this particular moment) and again, the problem of figuring out which 3 or 5 minute segment was which was an issue, but what's more, none of the bonus features I ripped had an audio track. Do you have any idea why that would be?

Thank you for your help.

The extras definitely were supposed to have audio--some of them were deleted scenes, and there was a blooper reel. For some reason, ripping them the way I ripped the episode just didn't get the audio.

Actually, a bit discouraged now, as ripping, converting to XviD using autoGK and playing on my computer worked fine, but when I tried to play the file on my Philips 642, the color was weird--it was all multicolored verticle streaks. Still trying to hunt down the source of that particular difficulty, as both the DivX my husband made and other XviDs I have downloaded work fine on the Philips.

Thanks again, Manono. I hadn't gotten that far along when I set it up, I was just trying to get a feel for what process would work for me. Glad to know it wasn't some obscure, impossible to diagnose problem but rather my own stupidity at work.

The audio is in AC3, and I do have the AC3filter installed, but still no joy on the bonus features for some reason (maybe the audio is there, but just isn't being played when I test the ripped vob in PowerDVD, but that isn't the case with the episode vobs, and I don't want to spend the time encoding only to find out it isn't there.)

Originally Posted by manono

OK, lets try and get you some audio. You have the deleted scenes in their own folder, with a vob and an IFO, right? And when you play a vob (not the DVD, but one of the decrypted vobs), do you get audio?

No. When I load the decrypted vob into PowerDVD, there is no audio.

I'll assume the answer is yes. If so, then we know the audio is in the original decrypted Vob. So why didn't it make it into the AutoGK created AVI?

I haven't gotten that far with the bonus feature material, because if the audio isn't in the decrypted vob, I have to assume it won't be in the resulting encoded AVI. Obviously I am missing something in the ripping process, but I don't know what, I am doing the exact same thing as I am doing when I am using DVDdecrypter on the episode files, and those have audio.

Did you keep the log files? It creates logs at each step of the way. Something in the logs should give you a clue about what happened. Perhaps mistakenly you chose not to include the audio (not likely though). Perhaps for some reason AutoGK didn't find any audio. But all is not lost, even if you can't pinpoint the reason for the mysterious loss of the audio.

Like I said, I haven't gotten the the point of trying to encode the bonus material with AutoGK because I have not yet gotten a vob with sound in it to encode. This is pretty obviously a ripping issue, not an encoding one. But, again, it doesn't seem to make sense that the audio is there with the episode, and not there with the bonus material, when I am doing the exact same process with absolutely no alterations for both.

Edit: I reread what you said and you say there's no sound when playing the decrypted Vob. You didn't do anything in the Stream Processing Tab of DVD Decrypter, did you? You might decrypt it again and see if there's audio this time.

I didn't alter anything from the settings I used to decrypt the episode files.

Open the Vob for the deleted scene in DGIndex. Go File->Save Project. With any luck you'll get some sort of audio, AC3 most likely. If it's AC3 you want, then mux (multiplex=add it in) it into the AVI using VDubMod. If you want MP3, then use something like BeSweet (it has a preset for MP3 for AVI) or HeadAC3he, and then mux it into the AVI using VDubMod. If DGIndex produces audio for you, but you don't know what to do next, then come back and I or someone else can help. Either that or look around the Guides portion of this site for a guide. Good luck.

I will try that, providing there is any audio there for DGindex to save.

Again, thank you for your time and help and advice, it is greatly appreciated.

Edit: all right, I successfully saved and .ac3 from DGIndex and converted it to .mp3 and played it, so YAY there is sound in there somewhere. Don't know why it wasn't playing when I tried to watch the decrypted vob, or why I had to do with this way for the bonus features, but not for the regular episodes. Looks like I just may be in business. Thanks again for your help.

The bonus feature (in this case, it was a blooper reel) did convert just fine in AutoGK, so it looks like I'm in business. I didn't see any other audio tracks listed when I loaded it into AutoGK, but then I wasn't looking for them so maybe I missed them. Thank you again for taking the time to help we work out these wrinkles, I am tremendously grateful. I'll be doing an entire disc tonight, both extras and episodes, instead of just samples now that it looks like I've got things working.

On another, more logistical note, I found the post on here about doing batch decrypting with DVDdecrypter using a .bat file and command line mode, so that looks like it will help the process along. The only thing I worry about is what I have noticed in AutoGK that when you load in the IFO, it asks you exactly which PGC it should be dealing with, and I can easily foresee myself forgetting or mixing up which one is which. I'm thinking maybe the best way to try to avoid that is to include the VTSand/or PGC numbers in the name of the file folder to which you decrypt each vob. Either that, or I'll be writing it all down on little scraps of paper that will inevitably get lost or mixed up. Do you have any particular method for avoiding this problem?