Seeking DVD Ripping Advice

So, with apologies for the very basic nature of the question...

- I'd like to copy commercial DVDs which I own onto my hard drive for archive/preservation purposes. I would be playing these back only on my own machine - don't need to convert to a format for use on, say, an iPad, though playing the movies back in iTunes (as opposed to through the iMac's DVD Player) would be convenient.

- If possible I'd like to preserve the DVD formatting (i.e. chapter breaks), though this is not essential.

- It IS essential to preserve the episode breaks in DVDs of TV shows.

I've done a bit of research, but the huge number of available programs has left me confused. All of them, of course, claim to be the 'best' and while I have no problem with buying the necessary software I'm reluctant to buy four or five different packages as I try out each one. It would obviously be better to have a single package that rips the DVD and converts it to a reasonably-sized format for playback on my iMac all in one go.

Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer.

dukebound85 said:

For an exact copy, I like Ripit. The file will open up in dvd player (~8gigs a movie with breaks, menues, etc)

For any and all conversions, I use handbreak (this will allow playback in itunes); (~1 gig a movie and no menues though can have chapter breaks)

Click to expand...

Thank you for the quick reply. The RipIt website says that their program can also compress into an iTunes format "with one click" - so why is it better to use Handbrake?