Burning movies from DVDs to external hard drive

[craighj]

Hello all

Not sure if this is the right forum, though I'm sure I will pointed in the right direction if it is not.

I have thousands of movies on DVDs and they take up a lot of space, hard to find what I'm looking for at any one time etc, etc.

So I thought the best way to solve this was to burn my DVD collection to external hard drives, play them back via my Mac or directly through my TV.

This issues is, technically how do I do this. That is in simple terms how do I go about burning them on to a hard drive and them get them to play back on my TV?

Help anyone?

Craighj

[Crossy]

Many different ways depending upon what you want to achieve.

This way creates .iso files that are complete images of your DVD so you lose nothing http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/13558/rip-and-convert-dvds-to-an-iso-image/ play the .iso with most DVD player software including VLC.

[Tywais]

Many different ways depending upon what you want to achieve.

This way creates .iso files that are complete images of your DVD so you lose nothing http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/13558/rip-and-convert-dvds-to-an-iso-image/ play the .iso with most DVD player software including VLC.

^^ that is the way to go as converting them to another format is time consuming and potentially lossy. Even so, expect to spend a fair amount of time converting to ISO. I use ImgBurn myself - free.

[wolf5370]

The fact that they take up a lot of room - does this mean you will discard them afterwards?

Burning them will usually mean loss of quality if you convert them to another format (some are lossless - but they file sizes will be huge compared) - this will probably give you OK results on a computer/laptop screen but crap on a large screen TV.

This can be simple as putting the disk in the DVD drive and copying out the VIDEO_TS directory - the files within are usually numbered (VTS_XX_YY.VOB - XX is the set number and YY is the clip order) for ordering, they can be played directly with VLC.

[wolf5370]

Many different ways depending upon what you want to achieve.

This way creates .iso files that are complete images of your DVD so you lose nothing http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/13558/rip-and-convert-dvds-to-an-iso-image/ play the .iso with most DVD player software including VLC.

^^ that is the way to go as converting them to another format is time consuming and potentially lossy. Even so, expect to spend a fair amount of time converting to ISO. I use ImgBurn myself - free.

This is a good way to go - using something like Daemon Tools Lite (free) will allow these to be mounted without re-burning to another disk first. (ISO is a back up format meant for interim use between burning one disk to another using a single DVD writer - Daemon Tools allows the ISO to be mounted in a virtual DVD player and read like it is a disk). Note: ISO files are usually quite large and do not compress the disk at all (good for quality but means unused spaces are also copied).

[Crossy]

VLC player will play .iso files without having to mount them

[ESCAPIS]

You did say you own a Mac, then perhaps, I can offer advice as I know absolutely nothing about windows pc.

First, it should be fair to warn you of the following:

1- it is an extremely slow process

2- not all the dvd will convert easily

3- depending on where you acquired your dvds, you might need more than one app.

The king and free app to d/l is Handbrake. It is capable of ripping lot of dvds

Go to macupdate.com, initiate a search and d/l it.

You might run into sone dvd that are heavily copy-protected. There are different apps/utilities for that.

Macupdate should suggest a few at the mention of the word drm.

Lastly, i hope you have the patience and time to take on such a herculean task.

There are of course alternatives, but I won't go into those publicly.

Good Luck

[craighj]

Thank you all.

As I mentioned, I simply have a few thousand DVDs in my collection. I guess close to 5,000 from most regions around the world.

Some time ago I started to take them out of their cases and build A4 booklets to try and organise them. However this still leaves challenges from a space and easy access point of view.

So I thought why not buy a few 2TB external hard drives and deal with this with technology. Unfortunately I just don't know how this all works technically.

I have a Macbook pro and I have a couple of 2TB external hard drives. Ideally I would like to be able to play them back using my LED large screen.

Craighj

[ESCAPIS]

As i said, ripping will be a long process.

Depending on your MacBook model and TV, you should be able to grab an HDMI cable. There are some dirt cheap ones sold in Fortune at Praram9 on level 3 (thai style).

Playing the dvds would be easiest, as the macbook would mirror the movie on your tv screen.

If you live in the bkk or pataya area i can come and help you initiate the process, if you like.

[Chicog]

A DVD is normally upwards of 4Gb, so expect your 2TB drive to hold less than 500 movies.

As an aside, I tried to be cheeky with Google and ask "What is 2TB divided by 4Gb" and the result is:

(2 US tablespoons) / (4 gigabytes) =

6.88562392 × 10^-15 m³ / Byte

[craighj]

Hi Escapis

I was guessing that the ripping process would take time, only an assumption based on the size of average DVD. I plan to do this over a period of time so I'm OK with that.

As you said I think playing them through the laptop and TV should be easy enough, it is really only the technical piece of how to / what way to put them onto the external hard drives. Ensuring that I can maintain quality and minimise size of the files.

There seems to be a number of opinions on what to use and how to go about it???

Craighj

[wolf5370]

VLC player will play .iso files without having to mount them

Really? Didn't know that - thanks

[wolf5370]

A DVD is normally upwards of 4Gb, so expect your 2TB drive to hold less than 500 movies.

As an aside, I tried to be cheeky with Google and ask "What is 2TB divided by 4Gb" and the result is:

(2 US tablespoons) / (4 gigabytes) =

6.88562392 × 10^-15 m³ / Byte

Wow now you can work out how many bytes it will take to fill a fish tank

[Tywais]

VLC player will play .iso files without having to mount them

Really? Didn't know that - thanks

Also not unusual for a dedicated media player to play isos directly. Even some DVD players with USB ports can.

[ESCAPIS]

Craig,

As someone already mentioned previously here, the average dvd is 4gb, so it won't take too long before your 2 TB drive are filled to capacity.

The term ripping, is often confused with converting.

Let me explain, ripping means reading/copying the contents of a dvd.

After that, comes converting.

Converting involves reducing/compressing those 4gb into something more manageable.

The average medium quality film after it gets ripped and converted ranges from about 700mb to well over 2gb.

The key question you need to ask yourself is how much of a good quality you need your ripped dvd to be? Moreover, what is the resolution your tv is capable of showing?

You don't want to rip to a higher resolution if your tv cannot display it , it would mean a waste of your HD real estate.

On the other hand you don't want to rip too much and get the moiré effect that result from low resolution.

There are commercial applications that you can buy that takes the guesswork out and rip dvds into it thinks is a reasonable output.

If cost is of a concern to you, then follow my earlier advice and get Handbrake. It is free, powerful and will rip some very difficult dvds.

Let me know, if you need help.

[craighj]

Hi Escapis

Thanks.

I know that DVD's average around 4gb and at that size my couple of 2tb hard drive won't last too long.

The confusing part for me is exactly what you have mentioned, what is the best (simple easy to use, one touch if possible) software to get to rip and convert. Do I need to have a number of applications to do this? While i have a basic understanding in a lot of things, I have little to no knowledge about getting my DVDs onto hard drives.

Craighj

[ESCAPIS]

Craig, one more thing, I forgot to mention, there are several free apps for the mac that catalogue, index, and show a synopsis alongside the movie poster of the ripped dvd. Two of them i recommend: Plex and XBMC. Both have a free iphone remote apps that let you control them from your iphone if you own one.

[ESCAPIS]

Craig

You need mainly one app. If you want a free one it is Handbrake, already gave you instructions on how to get it.

If you want a paid one, then Mac X DVD ripper Pro.

[craighj]

Thanks again for all your advice and help, I do appreciate it!

Of the apps you mentioned, which in your opinion is the best?

At the end of the day, I guess the best thing to do is get on and try it. The only way to find out.

Craighj

[ESCAPIS]

Download Handbrake since it is free.

Explore it and see if it makes sense to you.

Should you need help with it, let me know, message me privately.

I teied sending tou a private message, but you seem to have turned private messages off in the site settings

[craighj]

Thanks, good advice.

Hmmm, I don't believe I have. Not been to my settings for some time. I'll check.

Thanks again.

[Nana Cowboy]

Just copy the video_ts files to the hard drives and play with VLC player

damn multiple posts, sorry. but yes as said use an HDMI cable to play from puter to TV

Edited July 18, 2013 by Nana Cowboy

[Nana Cowboy]

double post

just copy those video ts files to folders with movie titles for ease of organization and access. it's worth the hard drive cost. converting is a nightmare

Edited July 18, 2013 by Nana Cowboy

[IMHO]

The fastest way in OSX is a shell command like this:

$ dd if=/dev/disk2 of=mydisk.iso

That will convert your DVD's to an ISO files in about 20-30 minutes, depending on how fast your Mac & it's optical drive is.

The problem the way I see it is the 30K Baht (20TB) of cheap drives you're going to need aren't really all that reliable as long-term storage, and to get 20TB of reliable long term storage means going for a RAID controller plus at least 15x2TB drives, or 10x3TB drives, or 8x 4TB drives, which is going to cost at least 80K Baht.

[craighj]

Thanks again for all the advice.

Not sure what a "shell" command is?

Anyway, as mentioned best to get on an try one of the apps mentioned by Escapis andalso try the process.

Craighj

[Jiu-Jitsu]

Craig,

As someone already mentioned previously here, the average dvd is 4gb, so it won't take too long before your 2 TB drive are filled to capacity.

The term ripping, is often confused with converting.

Let me explain, ripping means reading/copying the contents of a dvd.

After that, comes converting.

Converting involves reducing/compressing those 4gb into something more manageable.

The average medium quality film after it gets ripped and converted ranges from about 700mb to well over 2gb.

The key question you need to ask yourself is how much of a good quality you need your ripped dvd to be? Moreover, what is the resolution your tv is capable of showing?

You don't want to rip to a higher resolution if your tv cannot display it , it would mean a waste of your HD real estate.

On the other hand you don't want to rip too much and get the moiré effect that result from low resolution.

There are commercial applications that you can buy that takes the guesswork out and rip dvds into it thinks is a reasonable output.

If cost is of a concern to you, then follow my earlier advice and get Handbrake. It is free, powerful and will rip some very difficult dvds.

Let me know, if you need help.

DVD Video isn't HD anyway. 720 x 576 at best.

[astral]

Moved to main tech section

[cacruden]

The easiest way on a mac, and the least efficient space-wise, is to do an exact copy from the DVD to the hard drive (max size around 8GB). You can do this using the simplest to use programs called "ripit" you just enter the name and then hit the button (not compress unless you want it compressed like DVDs sold at pantip plaza). It will then copy the DVD to disc using that filename with the extension ".dvdmedia". Any directory using that extension on a mac will be look to "DVD Player" like a DVD, and it will play exactly the same way as you stuck it in the DVD drive.

The other means is to use Handbrake to encode to m4v (mp4), but if your a newbie the rips you do at the beginning will likely not be that great due to settings to make sure the rip is "de-interlaced" (a lot of films are encoded on DVD to changed to go from 24 frames to 30 frames - which look ok on the old cathode-ray TVs but not so good on LCD).... basically this has to be reversed. There are guides on what settings have to be set in Handbrake if you search online for "handbrake" "detelecine" (settings in handbrake relate to setting "Detelecine" to default and "Decomb" to default.