Anyone Give up on Ripping Movies

Wicked1 · Dec 13, 2011

Ok so after the hours spent on Ripping all my movies with RipIt, then encoding for ATV using Handbrake, I am now left with several issues.

A bunch of external drives holding on to the Ripped DVD's taking up space.

Do I get rid of all the DVD's

With 750 + movies in our library, everyone is tired of the same movie so they would rather rent from On Demand, then watch the ones I encoded for ATV and ATV2

Has anyone just said the heck with it all and decided not to use their Mini as an HTPC and stop sharing libraries? I mean after all the hard work I endured now everyone is tired of all the movies and all my hard work is gone.

I am thinking of selling all but a small collection of DVD's keeping the Rips to the ones I own, and deleting all the rest because I am using nearly 7TB of disk space I would love to reclaim.

Oh not to mention the 7 or so I can not Rip or Encode, like

The Gameplan
The Year without a Santa Claus
All I want for Christmas
Gridiron Gange
Dan in real life

and a few others

Just curious if anyone has just decided to throw in the towel, or decided of some other way to store all the hard work, I know I own the DVD but encoding is so much faster when you already have the Rip, as apposed to ripping and starting all over. The biggest issue is now disk drives are going up in price, I bought a 2 TB external Seagate back in August for $99 and now the same drive is $159

bruinsrme · Dec 13, 2011

nope. still ripping.
biggest, great for ipad, phones and computers.
Having a nice TV and sound system I will only watch blu-rays.

GimmeSlack12 · Dec 13, 2011

You have to be realistic with yourself regarding how many of those 750 movies you'll actually watch. I'm assuming less than 50 of them. Delete them my friend and put the DVD's in a box somewhere. Ripping doesn't take that long or you could simply.... WATCH THE DVD!

I'm not trying to sound facetious, but I've long endured what you are dealing with and at the end of the day I just deleted a ton of my movies from my hard drives cause I will never watch of them (except stuff that I know I'll rewatch over and over again like The Matrix movies or Star Wars).

EDIT: I know it's painful to realize you spent so much time ripping movies only to delete them, but is the time spent more important? or getting your 7 Tb's back?

tktaylor1 · Dec 13, 2011

I have not given up because I'm not transporting 3 boxes of dvds to college when I could just take 1 hard drive.

MacDawg · Dec 13, 2011

There are very few movies I want to see more than once
Even then, a second viewing is really enough
A handful are worth keeping IMO

I have a Netflix account and I can always get a DVD or stream something

I only store a few

KeithJenner · Dec 13, 2011

Im confused.

How does 750 DVDs take up 7TB. An ATV rip will probably only take up 2-3gb on average (at the most). You seem to be averaging out at 10gb each.

However, to answer your question, no, I carried on and have finished (around 1,000 DVDs). I rarely watch live TV and prefer to watch things I know I like. A large collection means Im not watching the same things over again.

If you and your family would rather watch new stuff then you probably dont need the rips (or the DVDs), but that's for you to decide.

newagemac · Dec 13, 2011

I've pretty much decided I'm not buying OR storing any movies anymore. If it's not on Netflix or an iTunes rental I'm just not watching it.

Storage and backup of all that stuff takes up too much and is just too much of a hassle for something that I rarely use since if I have a couple of hours to spare for watching a movie, I pretty much always prefer to watch something I've never seen before.

So subscription or rental is all I care for these days.

Consultant · Dec 13, 2011

Haven't ripped movies for years.

tbayrgs · Dec 13, 2011

KeithJenner said:
Im confused.

How does 750 DVDs take up 7TB. An ATV rip will probably only take up 2-3gb on average (at the most). You seem to be averaging out at 10gb each.

However, to answer your question, no, I carried on and have finished (around 1,000 DVDs). I rarely watch live TV and prefer to watch things I know I like. A large collection means Im not watching the same things over again.

If you and your family would rather watch new stuff then you probably dont need the rips (or the DVDs), but that's for you to decide.

I believe the OP is actually storing all of the native DVD rips (source of his encodes) and based on my experience those average 4-8 GB each so I can see how he'd eat up a bunch of external storage.

To the OP--if you've actually encoded all of the rips, I'd either dump the original DVDs or erase the rips. Either way, you'd still have the ability to re-encode if needed. You just need to determine what's more valuable to you--the space in your home recovered by getting rid of the original DVDs or the space on your external HDDs.

KeithJenner · Dec 13, 2011

tbayrgs said:
I believe the OP is actually storing all of the native DVD rips (source of his encodes) and based on my experience those average 4-8 GB each so I can see how he'd eat up a bunch of external storage.

Aah, I see. It would never have occurred to me to keep the DVD Rip. Once I have a M4V version then a copy of the original seems fairly superfluous. Given the quality of rips that Handbrake makes, it isn't even as if you are likely to need to go back and rip in higher quality.

To the OP, I'd get rid of those copies and free yourself a load of disk space, but you may have a reason for wanting to keep them. Your needs are obviously nothing like mine, so I'd best butt out for now.

madoka · Dec 13, 2011

I have several thousand DVDs. I ripped about 7 of them before I realized it's an impossible task. Since then, I've resigned myself to rebuying on itunes. Though I spend $4-$5000 per year on itunes purchases, it's worth my sanity.

Sol · Dec 13, 2011

Personally I hate navigating through all the different menus and warning screens in the typical DVD-Video just to watch a movie. Rips are a lot more convenient and with hard drive capacities being what they are today, you can have a library of files that look and sound exactly as good as the originals. Also the encoding speeds are faster than real-time on most, if not all, new computers so it is not the pain that it used to be.

As for renting instead of collecting, it depends on the movies. Alien and Aliens are worth owning and re-watching but the sequels and spinoffs are rentals at best. For permanent ownership, discs are preferable because for all we know the iTunes Store may not be with us tomorrow.

boltjames · Dec 13, 2011

Wicked1 said:
Has anyone just said the heck with it all and decided not to use their Mini as an HTPC and stop sharing libraries? I mean after all the hard work I endured now everyone is tired of all the movies and all my hard work is gone.

My friends and I did. After years of ripping our entire collections for personal use amongst ourselves and accumulating about 500 titles in compressed ATV format we realized something fundamentally different than owning 25,000 music titles:

You only really watch a great movie once a year, only watch an average movie once a decade, only watch a lame movie once.

So for the classics- Godfather, Goodfellas, Cinema Paradiso, Raging Bull, Jaws, Star Wars, you get the idea- we re-did perfect rips in 720p for ATV as those are the ones we always will want to see instantly on ATV each year or on an iPad on a flight somewhere. We deleted the rest and stopped trying.

BJ

fpnc · Dec 13, 2011

The only good reason I can see for ripping is for mobile access over 3G or for streaming over the internet it you happen to be somewhere away from home. While you can do a lot of the latter with Netflix I still like having unrestricted access to my own content from my Pogoplug Pro at home. Frankly, however, I've only re-encoded about 15% of my DVD collection so I'm not really that big on ripping.

ftaok · Dec 14, 2011

I only rip/encode DVDs for the kids. Our iTunes/aTV server is loaded with mostly Pixar, Disney, and PBS stuff.

There are a few movies that I loaded that I thought I might want to watch more than once. But I never do. I should just rip certain scenes from movies that I can watch over and over and over and ... (like the standoff scene between V and Creedy in V for Vendetta).

Ultimately, it's more of a hassle to rip/encode than it is to fire up OnDemand on the cable box. But with the kids stuff, I'm not hostage to whatever Comcast's selections are at the time.

vrDrew · Dec 14, 2011

I hate to bump my own posts, but a while back I wrote a series of articles discussing the whole concept of movie ownership, and whether or not its worth the hassle.

Short Answer: Ripping movies is a lot of work. Storing them takes up a lot of disc space. You rarely watch many of them more than once or twice. And who knows how long current movie formats will last before becoming obsolete.

There's no doubt having your own private "on-demand" library can wow your friends. But for daily practical use? I think you end up putting more time in front of the computer screen (waiting for Handbrake and RipIt to get finished) than you do in front of your TV screen enjoying the entertainment.

IMHO, between Netflix, the iTunes store, and a decent Blu-Ray/DVD player - I don't think ripping is worth the trouble and/or expense.

KeithJenner · Dec 14, 2011

I would actually tend to agree about Movies. In my collection, I only have about a dozen Movies (and My Son has quite a few).

The vast majority of my DVD Rips are of TV series, which are different in that they are not generally as readily available on demand (many are not available at all), and I think stand for more repeated viewing than Movies do.

I'd hate to be reliant on TV schedulers to watch my favourite comedy's or documentaries. A large ATV library means that the schedule fits in with me.

When it comes to it, I'm not really all that into Movies though, so other people will probably feel differently.

Mr. McMac · Dec 14, 2011

I'm still a ripper. Mostly old classic horror movies, 50's and 60's TV shows..

ashman70 · Dec 14, 2011

I only rip dvd's when they are unavailable in any other format. I use DVD Fab to rip the DVD in my HD then use it again to convert it to an MKV file, usually to a file size around 1.5 to 2GB.

rayward · Dec 14, 2011

Sol said:
Personally I hate navigating through all the different menus and warning screens in the typical DVD-Video just to watch a movie. Rips are a lot more convenient and with hard drive capacities being what they are today, you can have a library of files that look and sound exactly as good as the originals. Also the encoding speeds are faster than real-time on most, if not all, new computers so it is not the pain that it used to be.

I am still ripping away too. I love the ease of scrolling through the ATV menus to select a movie, instead of having to think about what I have, finding it, and putting it in the player. Also, I have multiple ATVs, so all movies are available on all ATVs.

With my i7 iMac, I typically rip and code a new Blu Ray before watching it on Blu Ray! Partly because I don't always have time to watch a new disc straight away, so putting it into iTunes makes it much easier to find, but also because the PS3 I use as a Blu Ray player cranks up the fan shortly after starting a movie, so I have to listen to that whirring away while trying to watch the movie.

I rip new Blu Rays, throw the disc into the box in a closet with all the others, and days or weeks later when I have a chance to watch a movie I get a pleasant surprise when I see my new movie in the unwatched list.

From A Buick 8 · Dec 14, 2011

vrDrew said:
I hate to bump my own posts, but a while back I wrote a series of articles discussing the whole concept of movie ownership, and whether or not its worth the hassle.

Short Answer: Ripping movies is a lot of work. Storing them takes up a lot of disc space. You rarely watch many of them more than once or twice. And who knows how long current movie formats will last before becoming obsolete.

There's no doubt having your own private "on-demand" library can wow your friends. But for daily practical use? I think you end up putting more time in front of the computer screen (waiting for Handbrake and RipIt to get finished) than you do in front of your TV screen enjoying the entertainment.

IMHO, between Netflix, the iTunes store, and a decent Blu-Ray/DVD player - I don't think ripping is worth the trouble and/or expense.

But that is the key right "in your opinion" , in my opinion the time spent ripping and encoding is well worth the " at the tip of my fingers" convenience of having all of my movies and TV shows on the ATV.

Once I churned through my DVD collection the time spent adding the few I get from time to time is not much at all. I rewatch several of my movies and we live off the TV shows that we have.

KeithJenner · Dec 15, 2011

Sol said:
Personally I hate navigating through all the different menus and warning screens in the typical DVD-Video just to watch a movie

I think it shows the mentality of the Movie Industry that they don't see a problem with making people who have bought a DVD sit through videos telling them how important it is that they buy DVD's, rather than download.

It's the main reason why I started ripping them years ago. I personally didn't decide that as I was now watching ripped files on my computer, rather than the disks, I may as well just download, but I often wonder how many people did get pushed towards downloading this way.

imahawki · Dec 15, 2011

I'm still ripping. This is a matter of personality to me. Do you re-watch a decent amount of movies? (I do). Do you watch movies with others who might not live with you and haven't seen everything in your collection? (I do). Do you have kids who watch movies over and over? (I do). Do you have iPhones and iPads and like to take movies with you when you travel? (I do). Etc. etc.

paulrbeers · Dec 15, 2011

I have 1000 titles I've ripped. Right now they are in DVD/MPEG2 format for my current media streamers, but eventually I will convert them to M4V format (if I can find an easy way to do all of them at once). The reason for the conversion is to reduce the amount of space they are taking up on my server and so they are readily available to be loaded onto our iPads and iPhones.

Scarpad · Dec 15, 2011

I do a few movies, but for the most part I only rip my Huge TV Series Collection, mainly cause its easier to select an episode I want to watch on my ATV than to paw thru multiple disks. Plus if 'm ever gonna watch these in my Lifetime I do so alot when I'm out, on Lunch at work etc. SO ripping tv shows make sense to me, as does watching say 30 min chunks as opposed to 2 hours for a movie, on an Iphone

Anyone Give up on Ripping Movies

macrumors 68040

macrumors 604

macrumors 603

macrumors 6502a

Moderator emeritus

macrumors 65816

macrumors 68020

macrumors G5

macrumors 604

macrumors 65816

macrumors 6502a

macrumors 68000

macrumors 601

macrumors 68000

macrumors 603

macrumors 65816

macrumors 65816

Suspended

macrumors 6502a

macrumors 68000

macrumors 68040

macrumors 65816

macrumors 6502a

macrumors 68040

macrumors 68020

Our Staff