Copying DVD's

[shanley]

I have a Packard Bell machine, and I want to copy a DVD I have, could anybody tell me how to do this?

[Skids]

You need DVD ripping software.

[scotsman55]

You could try DVD Shrink free from http://www.dvdshrink.info/downloads.php

[mattfox]

You mean you want to back up the DVDs that you already own, don't you  :)

You can use DVD Shrink on it's own but I personally prefer to use 2 progs: DVD Decrypter to copy to the hard-drive, then DVD Shrink to fit to a blank DVD. The reason you have to shrink is that commercial DVDs can be up to 9Gb in size, but blank DVDs are currently generally only 4.35 Gb. Therefore you have to "squash" the video to fit (this does lead to a slight loss in quality, but is less noticable on a TV than a monitor).

If you have a dual-layer DVD writer and have the compatible blank DVDs, then there is no need to use DVD Shrink.

You can find tutorials for all these things on the AfterDawn website (www.afterdawn.com)