Digital Home Thoughts: Ripping Your DVDs the Quick, Easy and Free Way

The File
Browse to the encoded file, in this case 'Aliens.avi', found in DVDRip\Aliens. Try not to be stunned at the file size. My example file is 2.72GB. Remember, you asked for a good quality copy. Try fiddling with AutoGK's Output size settings to get a smaller file size. Now, just to be sure, play the file you just encoded. Make sure there's audio and that any subtitles are displaying correctly. Skip to the end of the file and make sure the credits are there. If everything's where it should be, great! If not, go back over AutoGK's settings and try it again. Try encoding the audio with a constant bitrate (CBR) of 128kbps if you're having audio problems. Sometimes I get a file that's just too big. My NASs are FAT32-only, which means they're stuck with a 4GB file-size ceiling. Sometimes I rip a movie that gives me a 4.5GB file size and they just can't be stored externally. :( These are the cases where I go back and choose a lower quality or resolution (width) and re-encode.

Once you've verified that you have a good file, you can safely delete the .ifo and .vob files. They're gigantic and you don't need them hanging around.

That's it! You've done it! You now have a portable .avi file that you can watch in comfort on your bed, on your deck or in the park on your laptop or Pocket PC. A little converting software can make it easily playable on a PSP, Zune or other Personal Media Player. So schedule up a few CPU cycles, sit back and relax.

Remember to use your new-found power wisely. :)

Damion Chaplin is a graphic artist and digital media connoisseur living in the San Francisco Bay Area with his lovely wife Lorri and the ship's cat Grimalkin (The Kitty). He doesn't like paying to do something in 1 minute that he can do for free in 2.