The Home Cinema Topic - How To Rip Your DVDs page1

At this point I am going to assume that you have a computer with a DVD drive available. If you have multiple laptops and computers capable of ripping DVD discs, I suggest using the one which has the best processor and one that you don't mind leaving on overnight while you sleep.

The following guide is for backing up your collection only. GRcade takes no responsibility for users copying their DVD collections and sharing them with friends, family and the internet.


Software Required:

• Gordian Knot - [Webpage] [Download Link]
• DVD Decrypter - [Webpage] [Download Link]
• Koepi's Codec Pack - [Webpage] [Download Link]

Install the Codec Pack first. Once installed a few setup changes are required. Once these are done however you should no longer need to change them. You'll find the newly installed program on your Start Menu under 'All Programs' then 'Xvid'. You will see a few items here, you are only interested in 'Configure Encoder', left click to run it.

At this point, it's easier for me to just to show you my settings for you to copy. I will explain some of them as I go along though when required. Note: Ignore the target sizes, as these will change each time you do a DVD rip.


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'Profile @ Level' should be changed to 'MPEG4 SP @ L5' and then click 'MORE' to the right of it.


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Everything on this new window should match the above image. When it does, ignore the 'Level' tab and skip to the 'Aspect Ratio' tab.


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Ensure that you are set to Square (default) as above. Don't change this unless you really know what you are doing… there's no need. Click OK.


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Back on to the previous window (above), make sure the 'Encoding Type' is set to 'TWOPASS - 2ND PASS'

The encoder effectively does a dummy run first to see which areas of the video need the highest bitrate. For example, high action scenes like a fire in a building would require a much higher bitrate in your final video, to prevent the picture breaking up into blocks. A fairly static scene, like a talk show with a plain background, won't need as many screen updates so the bitrate can be minimised. By doing the 2-pass encode, you ensure the areas of the video that need a high bitrate get enough by taking bitrate away from 'quieter' scenes. Ignore the target size, it will be changed for each encode.

As before click the 'MORE' button next to it.


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On the 2nd pass config, there should be nothing to change, unless your settings differ from the ones above. Ignore the filename dialog, this will change after every encode. Click OK.


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Back to the main window again, click 'ZONE OPTIONS...'


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Make sure they match, then click OK.


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Back to the main window, click the 'MORE' button in the 'Quality Preset' section nearly at the bottom.


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Check that you match what is above, then click the 'Quantization' tab and confirm your settings are as below.


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If they are, Click OK to return to front page.


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Back on the main window, click the 'OTHER OPTIONS...' button which is the middle of the bottom 3 buttons.


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You'll see that I've disabled the option to 'DISPLAY ENCODING STATUS'. This is a personal preference as it just opens another window up that has no real benefit, other than getting in the way. If you want to see it, check the box, if not disable it like I have.

The decoder tab has no effect on the encode process, so skip to the 3rd tab 'COMMON' which should match as below...


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XviD is now configured and shouldn't need touching again. Click OK and then OK again to close the encoder configuration.

Next up install Gordian Knot and DVD Decrypter which you downloaded earlier.

Open up Gordian Knot. This is the main program that will help you to rip the DVD's and encode them into a playable format.

Click the 6th tab titled 'PROGRAM PATHS'.


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This is optional but I really recommend pointing Gordian Knot to where you installed DVD Decrypter. The default install location is C:\program files\dvd decrypter\dvd decrypter.exe

Now that's done click the 1st tab 'RIPPING'.

You have 3 coloured box logos here. Click the top one which is a gold disc under 'RIP THE VOBS'


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DVD Decrypter loads and shows the content of one of your DVD drives. You can rip the content from physical discs, or even from a disc image you may have that has been mounted using Daemon Tools or similar drive emulators. Ripping from a disc image can be a lot faster.

If you click the Mode menu, you will see 3 main modes, File, IFO or ISO.

'ISO' mode allows you to burn .ISO images you may have to disc. It's no use for ripping at all, but can be handy if you've downloaded an image and want to burn it to DVD.

'FILE' mode will show you the contents of the disc in native format. You can extract this by clicking the green arrow. This can be useful if you want to copy a large disc and then use DVD Shrink or some other tool to then shrink that down and burn it on a smaller 4.7GB blank DVD-R.

Lastly 'IFO' mode is the one that we really want. Click that and the drive will spin up and load your DVD in IFO mode.


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IFO mode uses the index that's supplied on the disc to display it in a similar way to how it would show on your DVD player. You'll see that you can select different chapters etc. On this disc, there is just the 1 film that is approximately 1 hour 45 minutes long. If you are trying to backup a DVD containing TV episodes it is likely that there will be 3 or 4 episodes on the disc, you need to rip each episode separately otherwise it will end up as one long continuous file.


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To backup a TV episode or Film separate from the other extras and episodes, click the one that you want so it highlights blue. See above. Then click the 'STREAM PROCESSING' tab.


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Here you can choose which streams you want to include. For example, you can exclude the subtitles and any foreign language audio tracks. In this example, I'm going to extract only the Video along with the best English audio stream available. This avoids the decryption process having to do too much, which is quicker in theory.


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To do this, tick the 'ENABLE STREAM PROCESSING' box, then keep only the bits you want ticked.

Choose a suitable destination (see above) I keep a folder on my desktop named 'R' for rips. In there I keep folders for each disc, named properly so I know where things are. This one will be in a folder called 'LETHAL WEAPON'

When you have selected the right bits and a destination folder, click the play button which is a Disc logo with a big green arrow and then a Hard Disc logo.


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Now you just have to wait for a few minutes while the VOB files are extracted. A new set of VOBs will be created in your target folder containing just the selected content. You'll see from the screenshot that it could be quicker, but DVD reading isn't that fast. Making an ISO first and then mounting that as a virtual drive can be a lot quicker.

When that has finished you can remove your DVD disc if you have finished with it and then go back to Gordian Knot.

Back on the 'RIPPING' tab where you have the 3 coloured box logos, this time click the bottom one which is a piece of coloured film under 'PREPARE THE VOBS'. Clicking the icon in this section will open a program called DGIndex.


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Do not be afraid. Simply click 'FILE' then 'OPEN'. Add each VOB file in the extracted folder you created earlier one at a time as shown below. Each VOB will have a number at the end (see below, make sure these are in the correct order otherwise the story in your film will be all over the place!

A TV episode will likely only produce a single VOB file so you only need to open that one file.


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When all of the VOBs for that Film or TV episode have been added, click OK.


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Now click 'FILE' then 'SAVE PROJECT AND DEMUX VIDEO'

By default it will save it in the folder with all of your VOB files. It's best to save it in the default location.


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The process will begin above. Then it's just a matter of waiting while the VOBs are joined. It will likely last between 3-7 minutes.

Now the VOB files that you ripped from your DVD disc are joined up, go back to Gordian Knot and click the 'OPEN' button on the bottom left corner. Point it to the d2v file you just created.

You should now see a preview window appear.


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From the view menu choose 'RESIZED' and, if it's a bit big on your screen, also choose the '1/2 SIZE' option. There's also an 'ALWAYS ON TOP' option which you may also find useful. These are down to personal taste and you will find that you have a personal preference once you have ripped a few DVDs.

Now with that preview window left open, switch back to Gordian Knot and click on the Bitrate tab along the top.


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Ensure 'AVI' is selected as the container and then click 'Calculate Average Bitrate' in the Mode selection. It's widely accepted that you use the AVI container format and XviD codec for Standard Definition content (DVD) and then the MKV container format with the x264 codec for High Definition content (BluRay, HD DVD)

Check all the other settings are correct and match the picture above. Audio Bitrate should be 128kBit/s. Audio1 should be 'VBR MP3' and Codec must be 'XVID'.

Once these changes have been made, then you shouldn't need to change them again. Two things that you will have to change are Container Format and Codec (if you are switching to from backing up DVD and BluRay for example) and File Size (will depend on the runtime of your film/episode)

In the example above you will see my video length is just over 60 minutes and the output filesize is 700MB. Generally I stick to the guide below, but you are free to make the files larger/smaller if you are not happy with the quality that you get from the following:

• 0:30 - 350MB
• 1:00 - 700MB
• 1:30 - 900MB
• 2:00 - 1200MB
• 2:30 - 1500MB

Enter the value that you want into the 'TOTAL FILE SIZE' box on the right hand side.

Now that's done, let's move on to the Resolution tab.


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You will likely see that 'OTHER' has already been selected under 'Input Resolution'. This was set from your d2v file that you opened, so leave it as is; along with the 16:9 setting. These should never need to be changed.

For DVD I would normally use 640 x 352 or similar. This is much lower quality than the DVD itself, but helps keeps file sizes down. You are free to increase the resolution if you wish.

'W-Modul' and 'H-Modul' should always be set to 16 to ensure compatibility with playback devices.

Only after you've set the output resolution, move on to the cropping section. First click disable (if you've previously done a DVD rip then your last settings will be set still. If you're ripping a TV boxset however you may wish to skip this, as it should be the same settings required) then click the Pixel option. The 4 border boxs to the right should now be set to zero.

Remember that preview window we talked about at the beginning, when you loaded up your d2v file? You'll now need your preview window visible. 'ALWAYS ON TOP' may be sensible at this point if you're short on screen space.

You may see black lines around the sides of your image (you're looking at that preview window of your DVD rip). We need to get rid of these as they're not needed.

Firstly, whether there is any black or not, set the bottom crop setting to 4. If there is still any black at the bottom add some more but ensure at least 4 is set. This will remove some of the blurring that may occur at the bottom of your video file after encoding, it's simply chopped off.

Now add crop settings to each side as necessary to clean off all of the black borders. Scroll the slider along the timeline to see different parts of your DVD. Often the borders will vary in different parts of a film and especially in TV episodes.


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Shown above, my crop settings are now set to get rid of all the black. You will see, however, that there is an Aspect Error of -0.3%. Your Aspect Error should be 0.0% or, at most 0.1%. To get it right, you need to crop the sides to even out the cropping that you've already done. Sometimes you may need to add top/bottom crop to even out the sidecropping, it depends on the source material.

Essentially, add cropping on each side until the Aspect Error is minimal.

Now, skipping the Subtitles/Chapter tab (not required) go to the Options tab.


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Under 'XviD default codec settings', click 'FIRST PASS'.


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Your settings should be as above. 'Twopass – 1st pass' and all the other options as per the configuring section earlier on. Double check them to make sure. Click OK.

Do the same with the second pass options.


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This time you will see that the encoding type is 'Twopass – 2nd pass'. You must ensure all these settings are correct and the 1st and 2nd pass have the same settings. If they do not match then your 1st pass will not be optimising it and it may as well not happen. When confirmed click OK.

Almost finished! All options are now configured, so switch back to your video preview window. Double check that all of the black borders are gone and then click 'SAVE & ENCODE' which will be found on the bottom left of your preview window.

Another window pops up with more settings to change! Wahay! These settings do not save from one rip to the next, so you will have to change these on each job. Only two options should need changing though so it isn't a big deal, both 'SHARP BICUBIC' and 'KERNAL DEINTERLACE'.


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Check that everything matches up as the above image. Click the 'SAVE & ENCODE' button on this window.

You are now prompted to save another file, this time a .avs file. This will store all of the encoding settings required. Click 'SAVE'.


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Now you need to choose an audio file. You don't know it, but you did it earlier when using DGIndex to join and prepare the VOB files. It should be in the same folder as your .d2v file. Now you're beginning to realise why I keep them all in one place.

Click 'SELECT' for 'Audio Source File' and browse for the .mp3 file which has the same filename as your project. Click 'OPEN'.


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Make sure that the above matches what you have, the Audio Source File name obviously depends on what you are working on, so that will differ to the example above, as well as the top centre and right boxes with runtime information etc.

All good?.. Then click the 'XviD' tab.


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No need to check the XviD settings, you have checked the defaults, so just click 'ADD JOB TO ENCODING QUEUE'.


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Now you have got the project set up you can click either 'YES' to begin encoding, or 'NO' if you wish to set more projects up in a queue. For your first few DVD rips I recommend clicking 'YES', so do that now. I will explain about clicking 'NO' and setting up more rips at the end of the guide.

The different phases of encoding will now begin, starting with BESweet.exe which will sort out the audio for your final file. This is a short process and will likely last about 10-15 minutes. After that, the 1st pass XviD encode will kick in, then the 2nd pass; which will take a little longer than the first.

On a high spec machine, it should take about 1min to encode 1min of video, so expect at least an hour for a 60 minute video rip.

Once the encode is done, the video and audio files will be merged into your final AVI file. The output AVI file will be exactly the size you specified, or up to 1MB smaller.

Playback your output file and check for sync errors. Play sections of video about 2 minutes into the video, then somewhere in the middle, then a few mins from the end. If the audio syncs with the video then you are good.

You can now find your AVI file amongst the other files in the folder. Rename it the file following Recommended Folder Structure for Storage section just after this one. Remove your finished file from the ripping folder. This folder likely is between 10-12GB in size! If your video is okay then you can safely delete the unneeded files to free up space for more DVD ripping.

Now let's talk about queueing up jobs. Remember the prompt a short while ago asking if you wanted to begin encoding? I just talked about what happens if you click 'YES'. This time I will explain about the 'NO'.


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If you click 'NO', then you should get the above image. Do you see on the left side a box called 'Job'? and below that a tickbox titled 'Job1'? That's the project we have just set up, but haven't began encoding yet. To get through your piles of DVDs it's probably worth spending an hour or so in the evening, setting up some DVDs to encode overnight by doing what we did above, but clicking 'NO' to encode each time until you're ready. When you are ready to go, just click the 'START ENCODING' button and it will work through the list of jobs while you're sleeping.

Below is a table of what to expect a project to use in storage space (imagine you are going to sleep for 8 hours and all of the ripping and settings have been done)

8 hours encoding overnight:

• 4 Films (or 16x 30 minute TV episodes) can be encoded in 8 hours
• 40GB Hard Drive space required for all project files (VOBs, settings, finished AVI etc)

Preparation time (Rip DVD, Cropping etc) for encoding 8 hours overnight:

• 20 minutes per film. 4 films = 1 hour 20 minutes
• 7 minutes per 30 minute TV episode. 16 episodes = 1 hour 52 minutes

The most important thing is making sure you have enough hard drive space to save the encodes. You don't want to fill it up with VOB files etc and then not have space to save the finished AVI files.

And that's how to rip a DVD film or TV series that is playable on a wide variety of devices. Congratulations! Once you have done a few, you'll be able to rip a DVD without even looking at this guide. If you do get stuck or have any questions, then don't panic, just leave a reply to this topic and myself or someone else will be able to help you out.

Image Pack 3.2 http://www.mediafire.com/?hc1b5h9nhcbvb06

Movies

Below is a recommended folder layout for movies:

The year between brackets in the folder name is optional but I strongly recommend it. It will allow proper conflict resolution in cases where there are two movies with same/similar names (especially in this age or remakes and reboots!).

Any text between [brackets] will be ignored, you can use this for comments, versions, etc.


TV Series

Below is a recommended folder layout for TV Series:

In the case of TV Shows, the files need to be grouped in season folders inside each show's main folder. I recommend that the seasons be called 'Season 01', 'Season 02', etc. Please note 'Series' is no good for what we want to do.

Each episode should have 'SxxExx' at the begining of the file name. S stands for Season and E for Episode. Anything else is optional after that.


Music

Your music will probably span the most folders than any other kind of media.

I recommend that you have letter folders 'A', 'B', 'C' etc and '#' for non-lettered Artists.

Each album/single should have the year it was originally released at the beginning, so when you view them they will be in release order.

Below is a recommended folder layout for Music:

To keep the folder path down to a minimum then each track should be named like this:

If you've named and stored your movies and TV episodes in the format recommended earlier then your media computer will be able to access these websites and collect artwork, actors, genres, ratings and much more. Best of all you don't need to lift a finger!

The Movie Database - Link



This is where your computer goes to collect movie information.
It's possible to create a free account here and add/edit anything you like. Some of the movies that you have in your library may require you to add them, if you want your computer to collect the information itself.

The TV Database - Link



This is where your computer goes to collect TV information.
It's possible to create a free account here and add/edit anything you like. Some of the TV shows that you have in your library may require you to add them, if you want your computer to collect the information itself.

Media Browser - Link



Media Browser is a free, fully customisable plugin for Windows Media Center (Windows Vista & Windows 7 supported only)

It will collect information about your video files (Movies and Television) from the websites listed earlier (The Movie Database and The TV Database) which means you can browse the media by coverart as you would on your DVD rack previously. You can view video content by Title, Genre, Year etc. You can also pull up information such as an overview of the movie/episode, actors, release year, genre, age rating, score.

It is possible from here (for example) to click on an actor's name or genre and then be shown all movies/television featuring that actor or genre in your collection!

You are able to customise the Media Browser application using a variety of extra plugins (some free, some paid for) such as more themes, added trailer support, advanced coverart options, videogame emulator support etc.