ripping a DVD

[5/22/12] Believe it or not, I've never ripped a DVD.  I've never had a reason to do so as I believe in buying rather than copying DVDs (the rationale being that the people who created the movie deserve to be paid -- I guess that attitude comes from my long-ago aspirations of making money by creating software).

But now I'm thinking of ripping DVDs of TV shows I recorded from TV (hey they're generally not for sale anyway -- at a reasonable price anyway..).  So I can watch them on my computer.  And possibly uploading them to youtube (or whatever) so they can be viewed on the internet.

Here's one possible solution I might try: WinX DVD Ripper.

[6/10/12]
Here's a tutorial using Hand Brake.

And you can even do it with VLC!

[4/16/13] I tried VLC using this tutorial on youtube (created by a 12 year old).

It was only a like a 5 minute video (a bonus featurette on the Dog Whisperer Season 3 DVD set).  It worked.  The file was automatically saved to the videos folder.  It was a MPG file 300 MB in size.  That's quite big. I see some of my videos of hour shows that are smaller than that.

I assume there's a way to make it smaller.  (But don't see it.)

How about converting the VOB file to supported video format?  I found this utility called Convert VOB to AVI.  Looks simple enough.

OK, it's going.  The file I converting is 1.04 GB.  The created MP4 file turned out to be 556 MB.  But the file plays horribly in VLC.  Very blocky and stretched horizontally.  Actually playing a VOB file from VLC is also very blocky and choppy.  But playing the DVD is fine.  What gives?

Forget it.  Let's try ripping a DVD.  I note the VLC is also supposed to be able to rip a DVD (instead of recording it as above).  Let's try.  This tutorial looks fairly straightforward.  It's going, but it looks like it takes a long to rip the DVD as to play it.  Whereas I don't think that's the case with other software.

[4/27/13]  Hey VLC worked!  I ripped my first DVD, or part of it anyway.  The Dog Whisperer bonus features.  However it takes as long to rip as it does to play.  And it didn't do well with my Chop Socky DVD-R which I recorded on my DVD recorder.  Maybe I'll try another DVD-R or try another program.

[4/27/13] Here's a list of five DVD ripping tools.  Still want to try Hand Brake and I guess DVD Shrink since I've heard so many people use it (or used to use it).

[2/22/14] here's an easy guide using Handbrake [via Roy]