| 1 |
Go and buy a DVD burner. I
know this step sound silly but is very necessary and I've had to
explain this before... |
| 2 |
Make sure your TV DVD player can
play Burned DVD's! Find a friend that has done this and borrow a
copied DVD. I've come across some very good players that crap out
during the movie (usually at the 1-hour and 20-minute mark). I've
also come across some fairly cheap ones that are very good. I
recommend this JVC from Stereo
Advantage. |
| 3 |
Once you're sure that you can watch
copied DVDs and you have a burner, get some media! I tend to use
DVD-R for my movies. I tend to have better luck with them.
The odd thing I also use DVD+RW (re-writable, but for movies that
you're not sure you want to keep but want to get back to whomever you
borrowed it from), which I also have very good luck with. Go
figures, but it works! Buy a 5 pack of all (DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW,
and DVD+RW) and give them a try. Depending on your dive you may
have to use all DVD-R/RW or DVD+R/RW as some drives only can burn to
the "-" or the "+" media. |
| 4 |
Download DvdShrink here or get
the most up to date version here and install
it. This How To is written based on the 3.2 version which is
downloaded from my site. |
| 5 |
Download Nero here if you don't have
it already, and yes, you do need to download and install all 3 or 4
files. DvdShrink works hand in hand with Nero, but not with any
other programs. This isn't to say that you can't use another
program, it just takes a couple of more steps. Also, I've been
told that even if you don't register Nero everything will still work
fine even after the demo trial of Nero expires! |
| 6 |
OK, now your finally ready to start a
DVD! Insert a store bought DVD, and when the AutoRun screen comes
up cancel it. |
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| 7 |
Start DvdShrink and choose Open
Disk, then choose whichever drive is your DVD drive. |
 
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| 8 |
DvdShrink will run a quick analysis of the
disc to try to figure out what is menus, the main movie, and extras. |
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| 9 |
After that is done you have some choices to
make. Do you preserve the whole disc or just the movie? I
very rarely copy the whole disc even if I have the space. Some
discs have so much other crap on them that the Compression Rate is very
low (100% is a movie that is not altered in anyway) and if it is low
enough the quality of the copy can be noticed. If you want as
little work as possible, just keep DvdShrink on the Full Disc
button. This will decrypt the whole disc and squeeze the files so
that they fit on a single layer 4.7 gigabyte disc (store bought DVDs
are dual layer discs holding approx. 9.4 gigabytes. Did you ever
notice the slight pause sometime in the movie? That is the player
changing between layers). Dual layer burners are out there and
are becoming fairly cheap, but as of this writing the media is still
pricey, and the format of the dual layer discs has yet to be determined
by the manufacturers. What all this means is if you buy a dual
layer burner and the adopted format is not the winner, it could be
useless (in regards to dual layer burning) within a few months. |
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10
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     Back to copying! If you don't
care about quality too much and want all the extras, just go with Full
Disc and skip to Step 12. If you crave quality, hate menus, and
rarely watch the extras (like me), click the Re-Author button.
Here you will see a Windows Explorer type interface broken down on the
right into menus, movies, and extras. To Re-Author a DVD, drag
the title(s) that you want on the copied DVD and place them under DVD
Structure on the left. If you see multiple titles under Main
Movies you can preview them. Usually the differences are
widescreen verse fullscreen and/or different angles. Just drag
(or double click) what you want off the original DVD and place under
Re-Authored DVD on the left. I sometimes grab some things I like
off the DVD like the DTS intros if they are very cool (Monsters Inc.
had a very cool DTS intro) or music video or bloopers,
etc...etc... You can put these before or after the movie
and the disc will play them in the order you choose. |
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11
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Once you get your movie picked and it appears
on the left side under Re-Author DVD, click on the Compression Setting
tab towards the right. Now towards the top you will see a Video
title, a drop down menu, and a scale (0-100%). This is your
Compression Setting, and as explained earlier, the lower the number the
lower the quality of the copy. A couple things you can do to
increase the quality are removing the checks from the Audio.
Audio takes up a lot of space and only the AC3 5.1-ch English is
required. If you don't have surround sound, don't worry, it will
still work on plain only TV speakers. Who the hell listens to the
Directors Comment during the movie anyways???? |
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Another thing that you can do to save space is
edit the movie itself! Say the movie has a long intro that is
nothing but credits and music, or the end credits are longer then the
movie. Cut them! Press the  button found on the left. Adjust the sliders so that
you get the beginning and ending that you want and click OK. Cutting
out 5 minutes of a 120 minute movie will save you about 5% of
time! Will that 5 minutes make the difference between a good
quality or a bad copy? Probably not, but it may make you feel
better!
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| 12 |
OK! Most of the work is done at this
point! Now all you have to do is some easy steps! First
click on the Backup DVD button and you will see a dialog box with 5
tabs. The first tab is Target Device, if you are going to use
DvdShrink to burn, you should have your burner selected. If you
want to burn later, choose the Hard Disk Folder option. Now you
will also see the Select Folder for Temp files... DvdShrink has
ALOT of work to do to copy a DVD, so no matter what you do it has to
place files on the hard drive. If you are storing multiple DVD's
on for hard drive (like if you are using re-writable DVDs and don't
want to go through all this again) make sure you use different folders
so that you don't overwrite any movies! Also, DvdShrink will NOT
delete these files itself! You need to delete these movies when
your are done manually (using Window Explorer). If you never do
you could fill your hard drive very fast! |
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| 13 |
The next tab is DVD Region. Not all
Spiderman DVDs sold around the world are the same. Manufactures
have split the world into 6 regions (North America, South America,
etc....) to prevent pirating when movies are released at different
times. Unless you have messed with your DVD player, it may only
play Region 1 disc, and possibly Region Free discs. I just set
all my discs to Region 1 only just so I don't have any problems, and no
problems if a lend out the copied movies. |
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14
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Next tab right is Quality Settings.
This one is easy. If your movie on the original disc is over 4.5
gig DvdShrink will automatically select the "Perform deep analysis..."
box. It does what is says: improves quality! It takes
longer but seems to be worth it. As far as Quality Enhancements,
I haven't seen too much difference in the option, so I leave it at the
default. |
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| 15 |
Second last tab, Options, is another easy
one! If you want to use your computer during the copy process,
make sure the Run in Low Priority Mode is checked. Otherwise
DvdShrink will use 98% of your CPU to get the job done faster. I
never check the Shutdown box, but that is just a personal opinion. |
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| 16 |
Finally! Burn setting! Easiest
one yet! Volume Label is the name of the DVD. Burn speed
can be tricky. If you seem to have problems playing copied or
burning DVDs, try lowering the burn speed to 1x (one speed). If
you don't have problems keep it maximum. |
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17
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After you click "OK" DvdShrink will
show a box which looks like quick analysis box. After the
analysis it will then decrypt and compress the files to fit on a single
disc and place the files on your hard drive. After this is done,
which could take as much as 4 hours it will eject the DVD and prompt
for a blank DVD. Insert the blank disc and walk away again.
Give it 15-30 minutes and your DVD is done! |
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18
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If your want to give your DVD a more
official look then a Sharpie as the cover, you can buy the DVD labels,
and scan the original disc or download the labels from different sites
here, then print them up for a
good looking copy! Nero also comes with a very easy to use
and well written program in its bundle called Nero Cover
Designer. You got it so you might as well use it! |