DVD Audio Streams

[doctorcherokee]

My apologies about these questione because they've probably been asked.

What audio streams should I rip from a DVD that I'm backing up? Shouldn't I just back up the BEST audio stream to save space? That is, AC3 DTS 5.1 or something good like that? (I'm using DVD Shrink.) Why would an "inferior" stream need to be included?

[2COOL]

I found this thread relevant.

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=77559&perpage=20&pagenumber=1

From what I can recall, DTS came around late into the game with the first DVD Specs was written. When DVDs started having DTS available, there was a requirement to have a PCM or Dolby audio present also to accompany it. I'm sure this is because early DVD players didn't have built-in decoders and some people didn't have an external decoder available. So far, I haven't seen a commercial DVD with DTS by itself. Normally, DTS takes up more space and since I don't have the obsession for it at this time, I just retain my the English AC3 and commentaries.

[killingspree]

hi,
well being from PAL country, i of course usually get 2 languages (minimum) along with sometimes dts tracks etc! i've also encountered a couple of disks (LOTR, REsident Evil Deluxe Edition) where you have 2x AC3 and 2x DTS!).
anyway, usually i end up discarding the DTS tracks alltogether and keep only the german end the english track, no commentaries! this usually leaves enough space for the video!

in the end i think it's totally up to you what tracks you keep, anyone will be just fine, for compatibility issues i wouldn't keep only a DTS track, since there's still a lot of standalones that do not support DTS and its quite annoying to get to play a DVD with DTS track on your computer (unless you want to spend a lot of money on WinDVD Platinum)

hth
steVe