My newest Ubuntu endeavour has been backing up my DVD collection specifically for use with my Xbox 360. The traditional way of doing this under Windows would be using Dvd Shrink, Dvd Decryptor, Any DVD, DVD 43, or a number of other rippers then re-encoding the video using Handbrake. This is a simple task except that I don’t want to use Windows.

There are a number of DVD ripping applications for Ubuntu including K9Copy which is considered to be equivilant to DVD Shrink. In my experience using Acid Rip DVD Ripper, K9Copy, and DVD::Rip none of them consistantly worked with a variety of films. Often they would not see all video tracks or would not detect the disc in the drive. Instead of messing around and trying to get the specific applications to work I found a different way.

My solution to ripping DVDs for my Xbox 360 in Ubuntu was to install DVD Shrink using Wine and then install the native Linux Deb package of Handbrake. DVD Shrink allows me to select only the video track of the main feature and output it as a .vob file. I then use Handbrake to encode the .vob file to a .mp4 file using Handbrakes Xbox 360 preset. The only modification to the preset was to select the video tab and choose the bullet for quality and set it for 70.

All you have to do then is either copy the files to a FAT32 format external hard drive for the 360 or stream the files using a NAS or Windows Media Center PC.

Filed under: Linux, Video