Teacher Needs Help

[so and so]

Hi, I teach English Language in Europe, and I bought a number of DVD's to help me teach. The problem is they take time to load, my laptop sometimes freezes on them, and I'm worried they may scratch. I'd like to have them all on my hard drive without taking up all my hard drive space. I'd also like to have some files with English subtitles, and some without, and, since they're mostly shorter songs and segments, I'd like to be able to cut and edit the movies to make montages for specific assignments.

My laptop is a HP with windows vista, and about 200 gigs. A great deal of space is already taken up by music and family photos/videos. I think I have about 30-40 gigs free. I want the smallest files possible without the video looking pixellated, and with decent sound quality.

I'm not a computer expert, but I know how to point and click. If anyone is feeling especially helpful, please let me know what programs I could download, how to use them, settings, steps, etc.

EDIT: I just want to add, none of this is for reproduction or profit. It's solely for educational purposes.

[dat720]

It's kinda hard to answer a question like that.....

You will need to first rip the DVD's to your Hard Drive, either making a exact backup of the file structure or using something like DVD Shrink or Decryptor to take only the parts you want.

Compressing the movies without pixelation all comes down to the codec you decide on, i would probably go with X264 with MP3 audio, keep the bitrate over 1000kbps or use constant quality encoding, maybe AVIDemux, would be your best bet seen's it sounds like you dont want anything too complicated, but keep in mind, video encoding is not straight forward, there are many factors to consider to get good result's.

If simple is your goal for montage you may want to try Windows Movie Maker, anything else that can do the same things is likely to cost you.

To give you step by step instructions would probably take up 5 or 10 pages of text, so your gunna have to do some leg work, there are many thousand's of guides on DVD ripping, start there (search these forums or google) then when you have some more specific questions post again!

[setarip_old]

Hi!The problem is they take time to load, my laptop sometimes freezes on them, and I'm worried they may scratch.A DVD takes only a matter of seconds to load. If you're worried about scratches, make duplicates of your purchased DVDs. If your laptop freezes when playing DVDs, you have potentially serious problems that you should address promptly, especially since you're relying on your laptop for your livelihood.A great deal of space is already taken up by music and family photos/videos. I think I have about 30-40 gigs free.Purchase an external drive - or a separate laptop for your livelihood...

[so and so]

thank you both for the advice. I don't have that much money to devote to this. If there's a really good walk through, could you post a link? It'd be a great help. Thanks again.

[setarip_old]

I don't have that much money to devote to this.You might then consider burning your "music and family photos/videos" to DVDs and removing them from your hard drive...

[dat720]

If there's a really good walk through, could you post a link?

For which question? you did ask about 4 of them!

[linyx]

If you are wanting simplicity use AutoGK, with DVD 43 if it is copy protected. AutoGK comes with excellent guides for very easy conversion.

[nevragain]

If you are wanting simplicity use AutoGK, with DVD 43 if it is copy protected. AutoGK comes with excellent guides for very easy conversion.

DVD43 is one program I would not recommend although it is free updates are infrequent and since it runs in the background and it can cause instability. DVD FAD HD is also free and had more updates but does not run in the backround.

[CWR03]

I don't have that much money to devote to this.
Since they're "teaching DVDs" there's likely no advanced copy protection. The cheapest (actually free) and easiest (in my opinion) method would be to rip the PGCs individually with DVD Decrypter in IFO mode, then encode them with AutoGK at a fixed, perhaps 75%, quality. You will end up with individual AVI files you can assemble into playlists if you like, and will take up a fraction of the space of the ful DVD on the hard drive.

I second moving the family videos and photos off of the drive, especially if you're storing them there. I'm sure it's fine of you have copies on your laptop to show them, but their hard drives are notoriously unpredictable and fragile and you risk losing them.

[smok3]

I bought a number of DVD's ... I'd like to have them all on my hard drive without taking up all my hard drive space. I'd also like to have some files with English subtitles, and some without, and, since they're mostly shorter songs and segments, I'd like to be able to cut and edit the movies to make montages for specific assignments.

That question is so incredibly broad that the answer must be: yes, doom9.org and forums are exactly about that.

[so and so]

thank you all for the tips, I'll look up these programs in a bit. Any links to a good download? And, I do have an external hardrive with all my family photos and films saved, but I like to keep them on my laptop to show them to family. I'm always traveling and such, and people want to see where I've been, and pics of my son.

[CWR03]

You can get AutoGK from the main doom9.net downloads page, or in the (Auto)GK sub-forum - you'll have to find DVD Decrypter via Google.