Copying DVD's

[Samari]

Probably I stupid question but I wouldn't know :confused::
Q.When you copy a DVD or CD with you're PC is the quality reduced?

[inzaman]

I have backed up a couple of films, movie only, onto my hcpc hard drive with no compression and have not noticed any reduction in quality.

[Xusia Of Delos]

If you are using DVD shrink, then I guess there must be picture quality reduction due to the compression, but not to the point where it becomes unwatchable.

[Samari]

Thanks for the replies but I meant DVD onto a RW DVD not onto a PC.

[Fatti]

If you dvdshrink as Xusia mentioned, it will compress to allow everything to fit onto a 4.7GB (single-layer) disk. The amount of compression depends on what is on the original disk. If the original is single-layer you'll get a straight 1:1 copy. If it's dual-layer and packed to the hilt, it will compress, although you can remove subtitles and soundtracks to reduce the amount of compression.

[Samari]

Can you use Windows media player (9) to copy DVD's?

[Rob Pyatt]

with DVD Shrink, much depends on the settings that are used.

It is usually possivle to backup just the movie, with none of the extras, and not need to compress it at all. If you are selective about what you want to backup that is.

If you really must have all the different sound tracks and subtitle options, then the quality will be reduced accordingly. I suggest looking at the website where there are some good tutorials on this.

I usually back up just the film with its English 5.1 DD Soundtrack to avoid the annoying menu system on many DVDs, not to mention the dreaded "coming soon in theatres" trailers!

[Stuart Wright]

Can you use Windows media player (9) to copy DVD's?No, definitely not. Microsoft would not put this functionality in since it is illegal.

[Timmy C]

No, definitely not. Microsoft would not put this functionality in since it is illegal.

It's also illegal to copy a cd but Microsoft don't seem to have a problem with that. What's the difference?

Can anyone tell me the best software to get for dvd copying? I'm just about to get a new pc with a dvd burner and want to copy my entire collection but in needs to be 100% perfect sound and picture. I don't care about extras. Is this possible?

[Samari]

Aha I've found that my DVD copying software is called "Sonic My DVD".
Does anyone have info on how good this is and if it copiues the DVD's to the same quality they would be on the original?

[Fatti]

If you backup a dual-layer disk and want everything - soundtracks, extras etc and want it to be identical in terms of quality, then I would of thought you would need blank dual-layer disks and a burner capable of burning dual-layer disk. Otherwise, you will have to compress it to get everything onto a single-layer or span it across two single-layers.

[Indiana Jones]

It is physically impossible to do an exact 1:1 copy of a DVD9 disc to a 4.3Gb DVDr without quality lose, as soon as you go over the 4.3Gb mark the quality will have to suffer in order to fit everything onto the disc. There is no way around this unless you have a duel layer dvdr burning and even then the discs would only playback on the burner, standard dvd players cant read duel layer dvdr media yet.

I think your best bet would be to try out the latest version of DVD Shrink, it is an excellent free program which I have been using for along time. If you rip out all the extra soundtracks and set the extras to the lowest possible compression setting the main movie can come out looking near identical to the original, that is the best you will get im afraid.

[Stanleh]

Most films as long as they aint over 2 hours fit onto a dvd-r at near perfect quality as long as you dont use things like menus or extras etc. The best use for dvd-r in my opion is too save damaged disks, i have lost count of the amount of films i have borrowed or lent out and have been damaged and unwatchable. Yet for some reason if you copy that dvd most of the time it plays back fine without any of the problems the original had due to damage.

[nwgarratt]

Most films as long as they aint over 2 hours fit onto a dvd-r at near perfect quality as long as you dont use things like menus or extras etc.

That doesn't always happen. It depends on the average bitrate. The higher it is, the more compression is needed. I have seen 2 hour films require as much as 20-30% compression.

[Samari]

My DVD copier is a "+" type, what does this mean and is it worse than the "-" types?

[Indiana Jones]

That means it will only accept DVD+R/RW media and not DVD-R/RW media.

Personally I would say it is worse than DVD-R as the +R blanks costs more and they are not as compatible on older players.

[Jonesthegas]

Is there any software that will allow you to copy to a DVD-R but miss out subtitles, director's commentaries and unwanted sountracks so that it might fit onto one single sided disc without compression?

Martin

[Indiana Jones]

Yes, DVD Shrink will allow you to remove subtitles and soundtracks but even with them gone the film may not fit onto a dvdr without any compression but is always worth a try.

[Jonesthegas]

Thanks.

Does DVD Xcopy do the same?

Martin

[Indiana Jones]

It may but it wont change the outcome im afriad, if the film still needs compression even after the subtitles and extra soundtracks are removed you are better off using DVD Shrink with the Deep Analysis setting on.
Also, with DVDXCopy it places a warning message at the start of the DVD which cant be removed so another reason to use DVD Shrink :thumbsup:

[Samari]

Where can I buy DVDshrink from?

[Fatti]

It's free from HERE (http://www.dvdshrink.org/)

[muppetmick]

I use Clone dvd which I find very easy to use and can also remove subtitles/Menu's and other unwanted items.

Mick.

[inzaman]

With dvdshrink as well if you are only backing up to the hardrive you can specify no compression, this is what i do for movies only i.e no extras or menus etc.

[Simon6776]

You'll also need something like DVD Decrypter, to get round the copy protection on the DVDs, or you'll get nowhere. There is a piece of software called DVD Fab, which rips, decrypts and burns in one package, but it won't compress, so you may be forced to use 2 blanks per film. DVD X Copy used to do it all, but I didn't think you could get it in that form any more, as they got into trouble and had to stop selling it.

[Indiana Jones]

You'll also need something like DVD Decrypter, to get round the copy protection on the DVDs, or you'll get nowhere.
With other conversion programs like Instant Copy maybe but not with DVD Shrink as it can rip and compress so it is all you need, well that and a burning program like RecordNow Max or Nero to burn the files to dvd once compressed.

[Simon6776]

Yeah, but Nero won't burn if the material is still copy protected, which is why you need to use DVD Decrypter as well. ;)

[Indiana Jones]

As DVD Shrink rips a DVD it removes the copy protection, if it didnt it wouldnt be able to convert, that is why programs like IC7 require you to use DVD Decrypter to remove the copy protection first but as DVD Shrink can remove copy protection you dont need to use DVD Decrypter. DVD Shrink can also remove the region coding or allow you to set it to a specific region so like I said above, DVD Shrink is all you need, no need for DVD Decrypter unless you want to use it to burn in which case you can tell DVD Shrink to use DVD Decrypter to burn the compressed files as soon as it is finished.

[AML]

I use Nero 6 for burning and DVD decrypter to.. well... decrypt DVDs to my hard drive.

Once decrypted, I burn the film to a DVD-R. (Bcoz its the chepest disks around.) Depending on the DVD I copy, the quality can be good.
In some cases when the film is only a few gb, say 3,5GB, it can always fit perfectly onto the DVD-R without loosing anything. So in esence this is a perfect copy.

But as some people mentioned, If the DVD/Film uses more than 4 gig, then the quality drops since its compressing everything to fit onto a smaller disk.

More recently 9gb (dual layer) disks have started to come out. So once i get me a new drive and new disks, ill be able to make a perfect copy of any movie on DVD!

Then the whole Blu-Ray HD-DVD fiasco will start, and it will be back to the drawing board. But hopefully, these new formats will be recordable from day one!

[Simon6776]

As DVD Shrink rips a DVD it removes the copy protection, if it didnt it wouldnt be able to convert, that is why programs like IC7 require you to use DVD Decrypter to remove the copy protection first but as DVD Shrink can remove copy protection you dont need to use DVD Decrypter. DVD Shrink can also remove the region coding or allow you to set it to a specific region so like I said above, DVD Shrink is all you need, no need for DVD Decrypter unless you want to use it to burn in which case you can tell DVD Shrink to use DVD Decrypter to burn the compressed files as soon as it is finished.
Fair enough. I stand corrected.

[Indiana Jones]

If you really want the best quality though you might want to search google for a program called DVD ReBuilder, be warned though it is not a compression program, it converts frame by frame the original so unless you have a pretty powerfull computer it can take upto 18 hours to complete a 2 hour film but the resulting quality will be far superior to anything DVD Shrink can produce so if you want maximum quality you should check it out.

[Xusia Of Delos]

I use DVD shrink in conjunction with DVD Region Free + CSS Free. Both the DVD ROM drive reading the source disc and the DVD+RW drive that burns the copy have region protection. DVD Region Free + CSS Free bypasses the region restriction of these RPC-2 drives.

[nwgarratt]

DVD Shrink 3.2 can actually be better than DVD Rebuilder on some DVD's. The Shrink 3.2 version set to sharp for LOTR ROTK was much better than Rebuilder.

It takes an average 5 hours to do a encode with Rebuilder.

[phelings]

If you use DVD Shrink you need a program to ensure your dvd drive is multi region as it won't read R1 discs in an R2 drive,but once you have installed DVD Region Free,why do you need CSS Free ,as the copy protection is removed by Shrink anyway.I use Shrink and Region Free without problem.Although DVD Decrypter is handy for converting +r discs to -r

[Xusia Of Delos]

CSS Free is not essential, It's just bundled with DVD Region Free.

[Marc]

if you want to make a 1:1 copy, i recommend a program called DVD Decrypter, it works superbly with DVD's of all types including ps2/xbox
www.dvddecrypter.com

[Indiana Jones]

DVD Decrypter works well on PS2 and xbox games as 99% of them are on a DVD5 (4.3Gb) which can be burned straight onto a DVDr without loosing anything but nowadays 99% of DVDs are on a DVD9 (5-7Gb) which cannot fit onto a DVDr without being compressed with a program like DVD Shrink so without a compression program, DVD Decrypter is only good for copying the DVD onto your hard drive and nothing more.

[Samari]

O.K thanks for the info it's been a big help :thumbsup:

[Marc]

DVD Decrypter works well on PS2 and xbox games as 99% of them are on a DVD5 (4.3Gb) which can be burned straight onto a DVDr without loosing anything but nowadays 99% of DVDs are on a DVD9 (5-7Gb) which cannot fit onto a DVDr without being compressed with a program like DVD Shrink so without a compression program, DVD Decrypter is only good for copying the DVD onto your hard drive and nothing more.you can burn it back to a dvd9 without any trouble though, dual layer burners only cost about £50-£60, although the discs still cost quite a bit

[Indiana Jones]

True you could do a 1:1 using duel layer media but I have read on a few forums that duel layer media will only work in the burner, standalone dvd players cant play them back yet so it seems a bit pointless to backup your discs onto a format which only works in a computer.