We have a large collection of DVD Videos that we want to preserve from "ripping" wear which is the opposite of the burn operation, to put computer files on CD and DVD discs. Since there are several programs to do this, in this guide we will show you the best programs to rip DVDs on PC, so as to save your favorite movies on your computer's hard disk or SSD, ready to be viewed on PC or to be burned onto a DVD (for personal use only).
READ ALSO: How to Burn CDs and DVDs for free (Windows and Mac)
Best ripping program: WinX DVD Ripper
While the other programs described below are also excellent and valid, for this guide we have tried ripping DVD Videos with WinX DVD Ripper, which stands out for its functionality. ease of use and great speed of decoding.You can download this program in a free version from the official website.
In order to download your copy, click on the item Free Download the Fastest DVD Ripper, open the installer that will be downloaded then click Next in all windows, so as to complete the installation of the program on our computer. There are no strange windows or advertising windows: the installer asks only to accept the user license, so that he can immediately start using the software without any problem.
Now all we have to do is click on the program icon or search for its name in the Start menu, so that we can view the graphical interface.
We will have all the main buttons in the upper part of the window, the content management window in the left part (the wider one), the field where to enter the destination path (in the lower part), a small monitor for the side preview on the right, various configuration options just below the monitor and finally a large Run button, with which to start the ripping process.
To start, insert the DVD into our player or recorder, then click on Disc at the top; in the window that appears, make sure to select the right drive letter, then click OK . If we have an ISO image of the DVD, we can rip it by clicking on Image at the top, selecting the Browse button, browsing the PC folders in search of the image file and finally clicking OK .
If instead we have unzipped the contents of the DVD into a folder, we can use the Folder button, then indicate the folder to be used with the Browse button and the OK button.
Whatever the chosen path, the result will be the same: the contents of the DVD will be unpacked and the program will immediately ask us (in another window) in which format we want to convert the disc.
The most common conversion profiles can be found in General Profiles, from which we can choose MP4 Video, AVI Video, the specific conversion profiles for iPhone, iPad and Android plus other profiles (to be chosen according to the device on which we are going to see the movie). For each profile we can choose the quality of the conversion, by acting on the scroll button next to each profile: to convert the DVD into a high quality video file, we recommend that you always set the selector to HQ .
After choosing the conversion profile, we click OK to view all the titles and contents on the DVD, in the left part of the interface.
By default the first title is selected, which usually corresponds to the whole film. If we want to extract other contents, it is better to select them and start them in the reader on the right, so as to choose whether to integrate them or not.
If we want to customize some aspects of the conversion such as bitrate and number of audio channels, simply load the film into the program, choose a profile and, once we reach the interface, click on the small gear-shaped button, present at the top ( where the general information of the film is present).
A new window will open, where we can choose the audio and video bitrate plus other useful settings to adjust the video quality.
To change the length of the film, adjust the volume, add subtitles and so on, click on the Edit button next to the title and act on the various tabs that the program will offer us.
When ready we click Done to apply the change to the selected title, otherwise we use Apply to All to apply the changes to all the content extracted from the DVD.
Once the content or contents to be ripped have been prepared, make sure that in each of them there is audio in Italian (the word [Italian] must be present next to the chosen title, in the part reserved for the audio), we choose whether to add or not the subtitles ( Forced Subtitles must be present to get forced ones), we choose the folder where to save the ripped file in the Destination folder field at the bottom (we can help with the Browse and Open keys), then we click Run to start the conversion process.
The program will take several minutes (on average 10) to convert the entire disk, based on the CPU and GPU present in our system, the length of the film and the quality selected for the profile. To speed up the process, make sure that the items in the Hardware Accelerator are checked (they may vary depending on the system) and that the maximum number of cores integrated in our processor is selected in the CPU Core Use (to obtain good conversion times, we need at least 4 cores).
If we want to create a movie to watch on Chromecast, we can choose the Chromecast MP4 Video profile, present in the PC General Video category.
The ripped video will be perfectly compatible with the Chromecast, without the need for further conversions. The same video can also be used on Smart TVs without problems.
If instead we wanted to make a 1: 1 copy of the DVD without making any audio and video conversion, we can rely on the profiles in the DVD Backup category.
From here we can choose whether to copy without conversion only the track of the film or the entire disc, thus saving also the subtitles, the other languages present and the extras.
WinX DVD Ripper can be downloaded and used for free, but some of the more interesting functions will be disabled after the trial period; we can still continue to convert our videos but at a lower speed and with less codec available.
If we wanted to make the most of the power of WinX DVD Ripper, without limits, we can buy the Premium version for € 29.95.
Other programs to rip DVDs
As we have seen, WinX DVD Ripper is without a doubt the best DVD and Blu-ray ripping program to focus on.
If for some reason we are not satisfied, we can also try one of the other programs designed for ripping DVDs, so that we can find the one that we think best suits our needs.
MakeMKV
MakeMKV is an intuitive tool for ripping DVD and Blu-Ray films, which does not require any experience and with settings already configured to the best. You can also include the subtitles of a film in the copy, choose the language, deselect everything that is not necessary. Copying the DVD is very fast (usually no more than 10 minutes) and also does well with Blu-ray, with a time of 30 minutes to two hours depending on the length of the film and the extras included.HandBrake
HandBrake, to which I have dedicated a separate article, is known to be one of the best free programs to Convert videos and DVDs to MP4 or MKV on PC and Mac, also perfect for copying DVDs to PC quickly and easily, with the advantage to immediately convert to the preferred MP4 or MKV format. Having the profiles already set up for watching videos on various devices such as the iPhone or the Playstation, it is very easy to use and requires no special configuration.Freemake Video Converter
Freemake Video Converter is perhaps the best of the video converting programs, also excellent as a Windows DVD ripping tool. Freemake only requires you to insert the disc into your computer, select the DVD folder with Freemake, decide which format you want the copy to be saved on PC and start ripping. clone a DVD Video disc to a blank DVD or a comfortable ISO file, copying the entire structure. After inserting the disc to be copied into the PC CD-ROM, open it from CloneDVD, choose which chapters to include, the language and subtitles and start the ripping process until the DVD is copied to an ISO file on the PC or on a new DVD.DVDFab
DVDFab is a program I have already talked about to copy protected DVDs or compress them for 4.7 GB DVD5s . DVDFab is also capable of ripping a video to DVD by extracting only the audio, good, for example, for music concert videos.Conclusions
Using WinX DVD Ripper or one of its valid alternatives, we will have fantastic tools with which to copy the entire contents of a DVD to the PC, both as an ISO image and as a multimedia file, to be reproduced if necessary on the computer screen, on the Chromecast, on the Smart TV or on any other device.
If we want to extract the songs stored on an original Audio CD, we recommend you read our guide on how to extract music from an audio CD and convert it to MP3 (CD Ripping) .
If, on the other hand, we want to convert the ripped files to MKV to AVI or burn MKV to a DVD (so that we can keep multiple movies together), we recommend reading our guide on how to Convert MKV videos to AVI or burn MKV to DVD .
