Just got a new laptop with a massive 320gb HDD, Because I will be taking it away with me when I go away with work I wouldnt mind burning a few of my DVDs onto it.

Ive done this before but always ended up with huge files. (Apparently) When you down load movies they are around 700-800mb and good enough quality for a laptop.

Anyone got any experience with this?

Also what will drain more battery life? DVD drive or HDD both playing movies?

when you download a film off the internet they are usually in the form of an avi file, (these are your 700-800mb files) when you burn them to disc you have to turn the avi format into a dvd format ( usually a .VOB file) i use convertX to do this and the movie then gets turned into 4/5 VOB files that total anywhere from 3.5-4.5 Gigabytes(depending on length of film and at what quality they are converted,these are the files that you burn onto dvd).

have you tried ripping a movie with WMP (windows media player). also i find one of the best media players out there is VLC media player, pretty much plays everything and its free. just google it.

hope this helps

[Edited on 29/11/08 by omega0684]

The problem im having is when I rip a DVD onto my computer the files are massive. What software do I need to compress the video down to around 800mb?

I didnt know you could use WMP for ripping DVDs. How do you do it?

Is there any software that will rip the DVD for me then compress it to a more friendly size?

just having a look for you, no one has ever asked me if i know of software to do it the opposite way round, give me 10 minutes and i'll post again for you

DVDfab Platinum 4 will covert any DVD to just about and file type and any size you want

I think you are looking for AutoGK

http://www.autogk.me.uk/

To turn the .vob files to avi

im downloading dvdfab platinum 5 now, i will check it out for you. its only 7 mb so if its any good i can e-mail to you if you want

Ive downloaded DVD Fab HD for free. But there arnt any options for size. Im converting one now, but it will be around 3.5gb. Will see what the format is when its done.

Im guessing the platinum version is the non freebie version. (Unless im looking in the wrong places!)

Yup. AutoGK will convert the 8Gb VOB files into something more useable....

I'd use DVDdecrypter to rip the VOBs and go from there....

I use DVD Fab 5 to rip DVDs. It's ace but some people claim the quality isn't as good as it could be. For me it's fine. I usually compress a DVD down to about 1Gb using xvid compression and mp3 sound wrapped in an avi and the end result is still easily good enough to watch on a decent TV. For laptop use you could go further.