Question Ripping 4k + Dolby vision or stick with 4K BDP

[Rick84]

Morning,

I'm making a few changes to my system and one of those changes is either a new 4K BDP, most likely the Panasonic 9000 or the pioneer lx500. Another option is to use the funds to purchase a hard drive and required kit to RIP movies from now on.

When it comes to ripping movies I'm a complete novice. My question is, when ripping a movie can you also rip the Dolby vision?

Rick.

 

[mjn]

I believe you can but best check the software features.

 

[Darren Heal]

A few months ago I thought about this and back then I convinced myself that neither 4K Blu-ray readers nor ripping software were available.
Now it appears they are, although most of the drive reviews on Amazon USA seem 50/50 between "bunch of crap" and "works great", so not sure the bugs have been wrung out there. Also, I read the firmware is being constantly updated by the 4K BD disk manufacturers to stop ripping (and thus the selling of knock-off discs by less scrupulously honest people such as ourselves), which means a reader might work for a few weeks, then a firmware update comes out and it's about as much use as a Sony Minidisc reader.
On the software side, DVDfab says it has ripping software, but I've no experience with their product.

Best advice? For now, wait. Buy the 4kBDs with the free regular BD included, rip the regular BD to your library and keep the 4KBD disc handy for movie nights.

 

[pRot3us]

A few months ago I thought about this and back then I convinced myself that neither 4K Blu-ray readers nor ripping software were available.
Now it appears they are, although most of the drive reviews on Amazon USA seem 50/50 between "bunch of crap" and "works great", so not sure the bugs have been wrung out there. Also, I read the firmware is being constantly updated by the 4K BD disk manufacturers to stop ripping (and thus the selling of knock-off discs by less scrupulously honest people such as ourselves), which means a reader might work for a few weeks, then a firmware update comes out and it's about as much use as a Sony Minidisc reader.
On the software side, DVDfab says it has ripping software, but I've no experience with their product.

Best advice? For now, wait. Buy the 4kBDs with the free regular BD included, rip the regular BD to your library and keep the 4KBD disc handy for movie nights.

Drives can't update firmware themselves, but most new drives have firmware that isn't UHD friendly. You can however update the firmware with a previous friendly version, I'm using this drive without any issues :

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00F0SQL6O/

As far as software, I'm using AnyDVD HD and makemkv.

 

[Darren Heal]

I've got makemkv, and that's what I've been using for the 300+ DVDs and 150+ regular blu-rays I've ripped so far. Haven't been able to get my version to rip 4K blu-rays, mainly, I suspect, because my drive (lg) won't read them.
Are you sure that drive will read 4K blu-rays or that makemkv will rip them?

 

[pRot3us]

The drive works fine once I rolled back the firmware, guide here.

 

[chrisloudon]

Hi Rick,

To answer your original question, yes you can rip all the goodies including Dolby Vision from a UHD disk BUT getting it playback on either a PC or hardware player is tricky or requires a compromise.

In short, only the Oppo players have been known to successfully play a full disk rip with DV intact and even then the player will more than likely require a jailbreak firmware to remove Cinavia if its not already been removed at time of rip and the rip itself needs a slight modification to allow it to play.

You can maintain the DV stream within both MKV and M2TS but there are no software players / filters / splitter that can cope so regular HDR is all you can get here on PC playback.

And lastly, you can mux the DV stream into an MP4 container and from what I have read, these files are perfectly playable over USB / SMB using the internal players of DV enabled TVs and UHD players however, MP4 doesn't support TrueHD / Atmos so you will need to choose between the best quality audio or best quality video.

Personally, while completely sold on HDR, I'm not so convinced about DV. Having watched all my disks at time of purchase in DV then again a few months later once ripped in regular HDR, I can't tell the difference. Now, I am not saying there isn't one, but I'm more than happy with good old HDR.

With regards to ripping and a bit of future proofing, rip the disk to ISO or BDMV to keep the full disk structure intact. You shouldn't have any playback problems across most devices and if DV becomes easier to playback from rips in the future, you'll have the movie in the original folder / file structure to work with.

Chris