Finally got fed up with my large collection of disks and uncompressed VIDEO_TS folders in my drives. The other day I burned a DVD and when I tried to play it the surface was already scratched, unreadable.

Have hundreds of disks in tubes, likely killing one another.

Would like to know what programs you guys use to convert your movies into easyly playable files with the highest quality.

If this doesn´t take the rest of my lifetime, I`ll do my CD collection next.

Disk storage is sort of expensive down here but I am considering 2+TB drives as part of the solution.

Methinks I`ll end up using one of these programs to play-keep track of my collection:
Right now my favorite player is VLC but I`m considering switching to Plex, JRiver Media or Kodi.

Thank you very much.

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I think you already know my opinions & my offer still stands if you make it north.

MakeMKV for ripping & plex for front-end.
makeMKV is about 4 clicks to get movie, subtitles & audio (ENG/ESP) into a single file. I have 2 drives & rip 2 movies at a time. Takes about 15 minutes to process DVDs. If you already have the files on computer, probably 5 minutes or so. Time required is all read-speed of optical or HDD, not processor/RAM intensive at all.
I do use mediacentermaster to rename the files/get metadata, but plex can do that for you. MCM downloads other things for me as well, makes sense to use it to rename/catalog all my video media.

I've tried Kodi multiple times since about 2008 - it just doesn't feel right for me. It's based on side-scrolling, which I hate, so it gets a couple strikes right off the bat for the interface. Otherwise, it works OK. It is less hardware intensive than plex (no server/client). It's free, so there's that. I recently had it on a Raspberry Pi2 & it worked ok - just didn't like the interface or not being able to update automatically. That spawned the 2nd Plex server that you have access to. It will be going offline soon, Mom's internet is just too slow to get use out of it. I'm going to put it at her house, but it won't be visible to the internet anymore.
VLC works fine for 'click & play' MPC-HC is what I use on a PC, just because of familiarity & have the install files on the same stick I use to install windows....
Plex/JRiver/Kodi are a '10-foot interface' or 3 meters in your case. much more remote friendly. Plex is the most complete, expandable & has the most features - it's also the most expensive. I use the sync function to put movies/TV shows on my phone for travel. Also have a kindle Fire that will have a bunch of kids shows on when my son gets old enough.

Hi there!

Absolutely, I`ve taken your offer. Haven`t touched my initial setup also for lack of time but it is certainly part of the big plan, hence the inclusion of Plex on the list.

My wife got hold of a Netflix account and has been watching a lot of series lately. Me, on the other hand, have been prevented from watching movies and are anxious to do some house cleaning. Too many DVD tubes and no immediate availability.

Will dl MakeMKV right away and see how fast-slow it works in my PC.

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Thanks for the info. What do you find is the best tool for ripping music CDs?

quote:

Originally posted by }BuLL:
Thanks for the info. What do you find is the best tool for ripping music CDs?

An Apple SuperDrive works for my needs. RIPS right into iTunes at various (selectable) quality formats. I suspect this would work with any external DVD drive and iTunes. Once in iTunes, you can move it around for archiving, etc.
 

quote:

Originally posted by }BuLL:
Thanks for the info. What do you find is the best tool for ripping music CDs?

I like dbPoweramp. Inexpensive and does a great job.

https://www.dbpoweramp.com/

Exact Audio Copy is good and free, but a bit more of a pain to use.

http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/

Another MakeMKV and Plex fan here.

quote:

Originally posted by 1gkek:
Another MakeMKV and Plex fan here.

I do use MakeMKV for ripping audio/video DVD's (such as an Eric Clapton Crossroads concert). I archive the .mkv file after using Handbrake to make a .mp4 copy for viewing.
 

Blu ray and DVD:
Makemkv to rip data.
Handbrake to convert to mp4.
VLC to view.

CD:
ITunes - But I haven't purchased/ripped a cd in ~10 years.

I use DVDFab.

I create an iso of the disc to archive on NAS, then create an MP4 which also goes on NAS. Plex for serving up the MP4s.

thepiratebay.org

I use MakeMKV for ripping and Handbrake to convert to MP4 and Plex as the player. All are free, but some features are only in paid versions, which I really don't recommend, in the case of Plex.

Ripping a BD or DVD is about 30 minutes with my old laptop. Taking a BluRay rip to MP4 is ~2-2 1/2 days using ultra HD and Dolby audio setting, FWIW. But, it reduces the file size from ~36 GB to 5 GB.

If you use Plex as a media player, it's pretty sensitive to file naming protocols if you want data (synopsis/actors/year/artists) from IMDB, TVDB, Last.fm etc. I use mp3Tag for music and it also allows metadata tagging and embedding artwork on mp4 video. There is also Filebot for video file naming. Lots of help and FAQs available at Plex website.

I use the Plex app in a Roku TV for the actual player, although it's available in variously crappier forms for other devices like Fire Sticks. It is a fairly slick-looking player. If TVDB/IMDB/Last.fm can't find backgrounds and artist posters, you can always add them manually.

One last thing-if you use Plex as a player, look for Muvio app and add to Plex. You then will also have music videos to stream for whatever artist songs are out there.

I'm kind of obsessive-compulsive about this.

DVD first...

I use the Slysoft/ Redfox suite of products. Paid for the lifetime licenses. It works really well. Apps are AnyDVD (which removes DRM), and CloneDVD2 (which rips, can rip to ISO or playable file). I usually rip to ISO, as I can make playable files from that. CloneDVDMobile rips to a mobile-device-compatible format. It's all pretty painless. All my DVD stuff is paid software. Might be worth mentioning I only get DVDs, not Blu-Rays, although AnyDVD also can work with Blu-Rays.

I paid for the DVDFab suite, but it didn't work as well as the Slysoft/ Redfox stuff.

Music:

I use EAC to rip full uncompresssed WAV files. I then use LAME with the RazorLAME front end to rip to MP3. Tag&Rename puts in the metadata to the MP3s. Then I save both the WAV and MP3s. All the music stuff is free.


I've also used FormatFactory to convert between formats. It seems to be a good app to convert from almost anything to almost anything (audio, video, pics, etc.). But when I install it, I'm warned about malware/ etc. I don't think it's ever installed any, and on my latest computer build, I didn't reinstall it. Which reminds me, I have to post about that, as youse guys gave me advice on it.

My $0.02.....

quote:

Originally posted by Gear.Up:
I use DVDFab.

I create an iso of the disc to archive on NAS, then create an MP4 which also goes on NAS. Plex for serving up the MP4s.

Hey Gear.Up! Just wanted to say hello. I can't forget your hospitality.

To the OP, I don't know if they're the best but they're what I've settled on and they work for me:

DVD Ripper: WinX DVD Ripper Platinum
DVD copy to ISO: WinX DVD Copy Pro
CD copy and ripper: Express Burn (also from winx but free).

There were some pesky exercise DVDs that used call-outs of video modules and segments that I wanted to splice together. The DVD Ripper can only rip the individual segments. So I Debut Video Capture. I play the video on my computer and the video capture captures what's playing along with the sound.

If you're going to buy any one and they offer a package deal on related software, I recommend buying the package.

quote:

I use MakeMKV for ripping and Handbrake to convert to MP4 and Plex as the player.

That's what I do as well, except for me Handbrake is just to downsize the file. I prefer to leave them in mkv format. This is followed by FileBot to put them in the correct naming convention for Plex.

I'm using a fairly old iMac (about 9 years to be exact). It takes about 20 minutes on average to rip a movie and about 5 minutes or so to encode.

I use Mac DVD Ripper Pro to rip the movie then Handbrake to encode. Then I drop the movie in iTunes and share it out to the network. I can then watch movies from my AppleTV.