Commercial DVDs contain two different kinds of copy protection (CSS and Macrovision) and Region Encoding. All of which can keep you from making a copy of them. Additionally, many commercial DVDs are dual-layered. To fit these DVDs onto a single recordable you’ll need to either remove some of the extra content or re-compress the movie, or both. This page addresses those issues and offers suggestions for software.

Note: I am not advocating movie piracy. The techniques described here are for the purpose of making copies of movies you already own. I use them, for example, to copy movies to my hard drive when I am going on a trip. Do not use the information here to make illegal copies.

Windows Solutions

DVD Ripping Software

DVD Shrink Great for backing up your DVDs to DVDRs, has the option to shrink down the quality and the extras, such as deleted scene, languages, and etc-etc so that it can fit on to a Single Layer DVDs

DVD Decrypter To backup your DVDs onto your HardDrive. But does not encode it. To do that, AutoGK is what I recommend.

DVD Encoder Software

AutoGK Encode .vob format to DVIX or XVID to make it a smaller file. Very nice freeware and easy to use. Does not rip DVDs.

MarkK from Carlsbad writes:

Doom9.net I’ve used the utilities on this site successfully. Lots of tools and resources.

Macintosh Solutions

DVD Ripping Software

DVD Backup - removes region lock and copy protection and copies all files to the hard drive, where they can be played with Apple’s DVD Player, or burned back to disc. Free.

HandBrake - removes region locking and copy protection, then re-encodes in MP4. Not suitable for burning disc, but excellent for copying movies to the hard drive. The re-encoded movies are much smaller than the original files. You can specify a target size or bitrate. Free.

- shrinks DVD files to fit onto a single disk. Copy just the movie or all the menus and extras. Windows version available, too. €49.99 shareware with a 30-day trial.

Mactheripper - shrinks DVD files to fit onto a single disk. Can customize what features you want and don’t. Removes all copy protection and is fast and free!

DVD Burning Software

Roxio Toast - commercial program required to burn DVDs. The Mac OS X burn utility will not work. $79.95


Roxio Popcorn
- commerical program required to burn movie DVDs only. For OSX and works great. Way better than Toast for burning movie DVDs. $49.95

Did anyone try to backup the “Lords Of Dogtown” DVD? I think there is a new Sony encryption on this one. The DVD structure is very complicated. It will play on settop players but will not decrypt with any DVDDecrypter software. This could be the end to backingup DVDs thanks to Sony’s new Arccos copy protection. Please check afterdawn web site for info.
afterdawn.com.

Linux Solutions