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mkral · Apr 12, 2003, 12:21 PM

I thought that I read somewhere recently that there is a way to copy DVD's to your HD, and use DVD Player to watch them. The advantage to this was longer battery life. However, now that I am in a position to actually use this, I cannot remember how it was done. Does anyone know if this is even possible in OS X?

Thanks,

Synotic · Apr 12, 2003, 12:27 PM

Originally posted by mkral:
I thought that I read somewhere recently that there is a way to copy DVD's to your HD, and use DVD Player to watch them. The advantage to this was longer battery life. However, now that I am in a position to actually use this, I cannot remember how it was done. Does anyone know if this is even possible in OS X?

Thanks,

Well you could copy the VIDEO_TS folder in the DVD to your HD and then from DVD Player choose "Play VIDEO_TS Folder" from the File menu.

mkral · Apr 12, 2003, 03:32 PM

thanks!

Eug · Apr 13, 2003, 01:01 AM

Originally posted by Synotic:
Well you could copy the VIDEO_TS folder in the DVD to your HD and then from DVD Player choose "Play VIDEO_TS Folder" from the File menu.

That won't work if it's an encrypted (ie. commercial) DVD.

You'll need DVD Backup to decrypt it.

I'mDaMac · Apr 13, 2003, 01:17 AM

You might want to try ripping the DVD to divx using forty-two and playing them with VLC. The quality is pretty good and VLC has a full-screen mode for free. This way the files stay relatively small (650 to 800MB).

Hozie · Apr 13, 2003, 07:09 AM

You might want to try ripping the DVD to divx using forty-two and playing them with VLC. The quality is pretty good and VLC has a full-screen mode for free. This way the files stay relatively small (650 to 800MB).

Maybe so, but you'll have to wait for hours before the encoding is done. I second Eug's suggestion of using DVD Backup to rip the DVD. It'll be 4gig+, but it'll only take 20 minutes....

mkral · Apr 13, 2003, 07:20 AM

OK I found the DVD Backup, but am having no luck trying to find either forty-two or divx. Any idea on a website?

Thanks again,

Weezer · Apr 13, 2003, 04:15 PM

Once you rip the dvd using dvd backup (or osex) you will end up with a .vob file. From that, you can either play that file straight using VLC (www.videolan.org) or you can reencode it using DivXray, forty-two, or a few other programs. Do a search of version tracker for all of the above programs. www.versiontracker.com

CheesePuff · Apr 13, 2003, 04:40 PM

I copy over the VIDEO_TS folder from the DVD to my hard drive on my PowerBook and use VLC to play the DVD.

Kenneth · Apr 13, 2003, 05:03 PM

DVDBackup should work fine but you will end up taking alot of space in your HD. eg. ~7GB for one movie.

pdot · Apr 13, 2003, 05:20 PM

You can use Disk Copy to make a disc image.

Eug · Apr 14, 2003, 09:33 AM

Once you rip the dvd using dvd backup (or osex) you will end up with a .vob file.

You get more than the .vob. You get the entire VIDEO_TS folder, complete with all the right supporting files. ie. You get an identical copy of the DVD, but without encryption +/- Macrovision.

I copy over the VIDEO_TS folder from the DVD to my hard drive on my PowerBook and use VLC to play the DVD.

You can use Disk Copy to make a disc image.

That won't work with an encrypted DVD. (Or, at least, it shouldn't.)

threestain · Apr 15, 2003, 10:43 AM

So what's the best software for ripping and encoding dvds to avi or similar?