How do you store your DVD's

[blur xc]

I store them in proper cases.

When properly inserted in the case, absolutely nothing is in contact with the data area of the disk.

If you use a sleeve, the disk is sliding in and out of a sleeve, with lots of contact to the data area.

It doesn't take special degrees to figure out which one is safer. One little piece of grit makes it's way into a sleeve, and the disc is ruined.


As far as I'm concerned, anybody who says it's safer to store DVD's in sleeves than in proper cases had to have gotten the idea, directly or indirectly, from somebody selling sleeves.

Now, IMO, the very best way to store your DVDs is to rip them, store the movies on your hard drive, and only pull the actual discs out of the case when you want to watch the bonus features.

+1 to that. We tried the sleeve thing several years ago. We ended up with a bunch of useless scratched disks. DVD's seem to me more sensitive to scratches and skipping than audio CD's... So, we dug out all the old cases, at leas the ones we could find and stuck them back in there.

I'm tyring to train my family (mostly the kids) that when a dvd comes out of the player it goes RIGHT BACK IN THE CASE! Even before the new disk goes in the DVD player. And hte case sits on top of the dvd player while you watch your show. There's no excuse for lost cases or disks in the wrong case... ever! 40 - 1 lashes!!!! J/k on that last part though- but loose disks (wii included) is a real pet pieve of mine...

BM

[gnomeuser]

you could just save them as an iso and view with vlc

That would work, but I was hoping for a way to get a contained format where I could rip out the information I might not want (trailers, menu animations, subtitles in strange languages) I don't know if much is to be gained from that but with my collection of some 400 DVDs I would end up having to buy several TB of storage to keep up with current rise in DVD buying (I have a problem.. I'll get help I promise). Also indexing ISO files in something like Banshee and being able to easily access the data would also seem hard (the already strange vob format + encryption, inside an ISO file - seems less direct than what might be desirable).

I'd really like to be able to present a generic presentation in Banshee and have this handled in a library. ISOs sound like the wrong fit but I admit I have been unable to find a suitable lossless method. I was hoping someone had thoughts that could go there directly, however if the iso trick does indeed work then at least one could reconvert from pristine ISOs once a a superior solution becomes available.

[Directive 4]

yea, all the menus and bonus features is the problem all right, sometimes more than half the data.

it's hard to know what to do.

i use dvd rip on the main title, with a high bpp (0.4~0.5) it's pretty similar to the original
to the point where i can't tell them apart in a blind taste test

[2hot6ft2]

i, for the life of me, cant figure out how to rip the dam dvd's. i have tried Acid rip and DVD rip and nada. I am freakin sick of having a bookcase of dvd's on display when I have a 500GB hard drive i would drop them onto but I can't figure it out. Lame.

Any advice?

I did a lot while I was using windows with DivX and several other tools.
In ubuntu I haven't done many yet but I did one the other day with dvd::rip and Avidemux to re-encode to AVI, I'm also plying with re-encoding by command line from section 2 of this guide:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1392026

And there's other tools like k3b can RIP a dvd (saw that option earlier while doing another project).

Many people use and recommend handbrake for ripping dvd's but it's not in the repositories and I haven't used it yet.
Here's the home page for it http://handbrake.fr/

If you want it you can add it from it's PPA like this:

Installing handbrake in 9.10
Open a terminal
Applications > Accessories > Terminal
and run these one at a time

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:handbrake-ubuntu/ppa

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install handbrake-gtk

There's also avidemux
Info from Synaptic Package Manager

Avidemux is a free video editor designed for simple cutting, filtering and
encoding tasks. It supports many file types, including AVI, DVD compatible
MPEG files, MP4 and ASF, using a variety of codecs. Tasks can be automated
using projects, job queue and powerful scripting capabilities.

You can install it either by searching for it in
System > Administration > Synaptic Package Manager
or by using

sudo apt-get install avidemux

[Crunchy the Headcrab]

Original cases. I like the cases.

[pricetech]

Stick to the cases, either original or purchased "slim" cases.

Personally I put all my DVDs right next to the furnace so they don't get cold and brittle.

[yester64]

Mm.. i personally like the sleeve solution. But i think they have to have a certain plastic sleeve inside. Paper is not that good.
But its more of a storage than regular use.
I store my dvd's on my harddrive (because i am lazy) and watch them on tv over xbox.
Ripping them down with handbrake is the best solution i think and getting stored in mp4 format.
Also i don't care really about specials and additional stuff they usually put on a dvd. I just want to see the movie and that pretty much all.
For me its the space and to be honest there are only a handful movies that have a special case which you want to keep.
If you have no space problem, then its not an issue i think.
But thats my take and i think everyone sees it somewhat different. I wished they would sell dvd's like cd in small cases.