Okay, not a computer newbie to say the least, but never burned a DVD. Just got the wife a laptop with a burner and running into the old "copyright protected" issue in trying to back up one of our DVD's. The computer has Nero Smart Start loaded and that is about as far as I got. Did some searches through the forum, but can't really find the answer I'm looking for. Would I be able to use this Nero software with some of software to decrypt the copyright code. Also, am I save in assuming that the size of the movie is based off of looking at the properties in Windows Explorer properties of the drive that is holding the movie? Thanks for any help that anyone can offer to my inept atttempt at backing up a DVD.
Here is some beginner info you might find useful. It mentions some software and how it works. Nero is a good recording suite. In fact a favorite of mine. There are guides at the Nero website. Info for beginners: (I'll mention a few popular programs, but there are others of these types.) Backing up factory DVD movies has 3 basic steps and a few things to remember. The steps are 1)Decrypt/deCSS; 2)Encode/Transcode (Fit to the target disc, shrink when necessary); and 3)Burn. You can have one program that does it all, some programs do a couple of the steps and some only do one step or one step at a time. Decrypting can be done with driver type decrypters like AnyDVD or with apps such as DVD Decrypter or DVD Shrink. DVD Decrypter is used to decrypt and rip files to the (HD) hard drive. If DVD Decrypter is going to be used as a burner, 2 important things have to be remembered. 1)Use the ISO read mode to decrypt and 2)the file size has to be below 4.37 (GB) gigabytes. If the file is above 4.37GB, DVD Decrypter cannot burn the ISO file to a 4.7GB disc. [Note: 4.7 is a retail designation for a disc; the actual size of a 4.7 disc that a computer reads is 4.37GB.] File size is important to know. DVD Shrink can be used to decrypt and rip to the HD. Normally though, Shrink is used to decrypt a disc, using a temporary file, and transcoding the file in preparation to be burned. Nero isn't part of Shrink, but is the default app that Shrink uses to burn automatically. Shrink can also use DVD Decrypter in ISO burn mode and CopytoDVD can also be used. I suggest Nero, as DVD Shrink is already set to use it. There are a number of transcoding programs, browsing the forums can get a lot of info on those. It's already been mentioned what they do. Just remember, simply speaking, this step is to prep the file for burning. There are a number of apps on the market now. Due to laws, most of the popular recording programs now are trancoding and burning programs. These recording programs have to have a decrypter. With a driver type decrypter the program runs as though it was one of the older ripper programs that did everything. With the manual type decrypters the files are ripped to the HD and the file then has to be opened by the recording program. Burner or recording programs are either incorporated into programs or are separate in recording suites. I mentioned Nero as it is a favorite on many forums and a favorite of mine. There are others.
You're welcome. Glad you got it going. Out of curiosity, what program or programs did you end up using? Once the process is explained, the basic procedure isn't all that difficult. When or if you decided to get into editing or involved encoding, then things get more interesting. Good luck.
Brobear, I used the Shrink, pretty straight forward process, then it picked up my Nero for the burning process. Another newbie question that maybe you can answer, couldn't find anything in the guides about this. After burning, then testing on computer to view the finished product, I then decided to try on DVD player hooked up to our TV. Basically, getting a Disk Read error from the DVD. I'm wondering if the quality of DVD I used had something to do with it?? Or burn speed ( I believe it was set to 4X, although have 8X burner). Or, burned DVD's won't work on TV DVD, which doesn't make sense to me. For the most part, I want to back up DVD's of the kid's movies, since they tend to trash them in no time, have no concept of money, ect... Thanks again for you help.
stones3, The first thing is you need to make sure your media is compatable with your stand alone player ie. what formats does your player support some will play -R's and other +R's only while some will play everything you throw in them. Also a lot of people have trouble if they burn @ faster speeds so just before you hit ok when backing up in DVD Shrink click on the tab all the way to the right that says burn settings and try burning at x2 and see how that works my guess is if you didn't change this before it is probably burning at the fastest speed possible. It can also be the media you are using what brand of media are you using and are they -r or +r?? This info would help greatly. The way way you are backing up your DVD's is probably the easiest and fastest way to do it, and will work fine 99% of the time, but there will come a time when you can't read a original to your hard drive and for this you could use DVD Decrypter. Just thought I would let you know that. I back my DVD's up the same exact way you do and have over 500 back up's to date. I did however have to do 2 of them using Decrypter. So if you ever run into the problem of not being able to rip the original disk try using Decrypter. Just a little piece of advise I figured you might want to know.. Good luck
bbmayo... aka brobear? Don't think so. LOL @stones3 The compatibility issue is the most likely one. The standalone player has to support the media being inserted. bbmayo covered that fairly well. My in-laws have a player that plays only factory discs. I have one that plays only +/- R. I just bought one that will play everything thrown at it, including audio CDs and RW media. I'm wondering about Pepperoni Pizza... naah. LOL Burn speeds can cause errors at the higher speeds. I burn at 4X all the time, except for games. Faster burners can be controlled by using the slower speed media. That is unless you have a burner that burns slower media at higher speeds (just have to know your specs). Nero, luckily, has a speed control you can set. If you read the manuals you already know about Decrypter. What they don't say is that running AnyDVD in the background all the time will sometimes help Shrink and DVD Decrypter. So, if you want to make an investment for the best, get a copy of AnyDVD and learn how to use it. Pretty easy, most of the time you leave it alone and it works by itself. bbmayo was also right about using good media. Not that it would cause the current problem; but, what brand and speed media are you using and what brand and model burner do you have? Media has to be really defective to not even be recognized. Usually you get a jerky video and skips with poor quality media.
