Is there a good way to backup and organize your dvd collection to a hard drive? What about then streaming it to your tv? Don’t they make anything like itunes for this? My kids are literally destroying our dvd’s and have already busted more than one home theater system!
I’ve looked into it a couple of times because some of my older DVDs are starting to get scratched. From what I can tell all of the virtual DVD players are either illegal or expensive ($10,000). There have been several law suits to shut down companies that have developed ways to store DVDs and play them back without the disk. On the other hand if your collection is small enough there are a couple of jukebox style devices that I have found but iirc the largest one was only about 100 DVDs.
EDIT: keep in mind that ripping your personally owned dvd’s is still technically illegal, even if for your own personal time-shifting reasons.
Man… it doesn’t seem like it should be illegal, I mean I can back up all of my cd’s no problem. I was thinking about the dvd jukebox thing, but… it would be so much easier to save/organize like I do with my music. I wonder why movies=illegal; music=legal?
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EDIT: keep in mind that ripping your personally owned dvd’s is still technically illegal, even if for your own personal time-shifting reasons.
Thanks for the info… I don’t know about the whole legal/illegal ripping process though…
From what I’ve read the movie industry is afraid of turning out like the music industry. I remember when CDs were like $20 not I can get new ones for half that. About the same time you could buy a new DVD for $20 now it’s still $20. They don’t want people to get to the point where the industry doesn’t control the media that is one of the big reasons for the push on digital copies when hard copies are purchased right now.
backing up DVD’s is illegal due to the fact that you have to bypass/crack the encryption to do the backup. This violates the DCMA, which has explicit language to make illegal the circumventing of copy protection. If audio cd’s were protected by some sort of copy-protection, it’d be illegal to copy those too! I agree the whole thing sounds ridiculous, but that’s how the law was paid for, er… written. [[snip]]
If you ask me, as long as you’re not selling illegal copies of your ripped discs (or ripping rentals), then you shouldn’t really have to worry about it. Ripping for time-shifting is the most innocuous use of circumventing the copy protection, and really should be covered under “fair use”, but case law still need to determine this.
There are plenty of backup software that would let you rip a DVD to a hard drive. In fact, there are plenty of DVDs that do not require any special ripping. You can just copy its contents to your hard drive, then play it using a standard media player. Of course, if you ever want to burn another disc with the contents the process is easy but it’s not a straight copy. Note that you’ll need a lot of hard drive space if you intend to back up a lot of DVDs. Presently, I play video content off of DVDs, blu-rays, flashdrives, and hard drives on my TVs and PCs.
I’ve removed a couple of links to media players and similar programs that can be used to rip from DVDs. Quoting from the registration agreement:
Excuse me, just a question - I get the convenience factor in wanting to copy DVDs to a hard drive as refers to handling of physical media (the discs themselves) vs. the “just push play” of a computer media player, but the references to “time shifting” are confusing. To me, “time shifting” occurs when you record a televised show (via DVR or VHS) to watch at a more convenient time than the time at which the broadcast occurred. How is ripping a DVD to a hard drive in any way “time shifting” when the original disc is presumably still in your possession and also capable of being played whenever you want? No snark intended, I’m just really curious about the usage.
I am not trying to be a jackass here, but how old are your kids?
If they have “destroyed” a home theater system, as well as several DVDs, maybe they are not old enough to use the home entertainment center or play the DVDs unsupervised.
If they are old enough to know better, maybe they need to learn that if you dont treat certain possessions with care, they may not last very long, and replacements might not be forthcoming.
My daughter is four and my son is two. I don’t know if you have any kids, but two year olds are curious and pretty much can get into anything. They love to watch movies though and can sing all the way through Mama Mia (over and over) :smack:
Well I checked out CNET. And they had a review on an LG 390 Blueray player, it looks like it has built in wi-fi and will stream netflix, youtube and media you have on your computer. Its a little pricey though, but it sounds like that may be a good way to go, especially now that you can get terabyte hard drives.
If anyone has any experience with this or something similar, I’d appreciate any input. Thanks!
I’ll make the requisite mention of a Playstation 3, which can also play Bluray, has built-in wifi, will stream Netflix and any other home media (with a tiny few format exceptions), and it’s $50 cheaper (according to the price of Cnet’s quote on the LG). And it’s also some sort of video-based gaming device the kids are into these days.
As stated before, ripping your DVDs (unlike your CDs) is illegal. The DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) made this so. CDs and most other media created before the DMCA aren’t covered (partly because they weren’t encrypted), which is why you can still rip your CDs.
I had a 3 yeard old break his favorite movie, and know whereof you speak. Those of you without children, consider yourselves blessed that YOUR toys aren’t damaged on an hourly basis.
That being said, the following programs will work to turn your DVD into a 4G iso that can be played back with VLC Media Viewer or burned to a blank:
DVD Shirnk, DVD Decrypter, ImgTool, and DVD Ghost
Don’t ask me where Google to Google get Google them. And PM me, don’t ask PM Me how PM Me they PM Me work.