My personal favorite DVD-to-Zune ripper: WinX DVD Ripper (free!)

[yipcanjo]

Since getting my Zune HD (32) a week ago, I've been on the hunt to find a good DVD-to-Zune software package.  There are a lot of good articles on this site, but I'm (personally) more fond of the one-step applications: pop in a movie, choose some settings, and then "rip".  No hassle, ya know?

Anyhow... here are my criteria for a "reasonable" solution:

1) One-step rip.  DVD straight to a file that is ready to load onto my Zune.
2) Must not "convert" when syncing with my Zune.  Ugh!
3) Must have decent-to-nice image quality.
4) Keeps everything in-sync (audio with video)
5) Reasonable file sizes
6) Can't take forever and a day to rip a movie!
7) Price.  Free is nice.

So, my searches led me to a lot of different solutions.  I've used Cucusoft's offering for awhile now, but it's a bit wacky... and I would get pauses from time to time.  No good.  Finally, I was browsing Dealnews and came across an offer for WinX DVD Ripper for "free".  They were actually referring to the Platinum version which isn't totally free, when you get down to it.  Still, their real "free" version looked promising, so I downloaded it.

http://www.winxdvd.com/dvd-ripper/download.htm

At about a 6 meg download, the program is fairly lightweight and straightforward.  Nice!

Having successfully ripped several movies with WinX DVD Ripper, I thought I'd share my steps (in case anyone cares)...

1) Download and install the WinX DVD Ripper.  Even works great on my Win7 64-bit box!

2) Launch the software



3) Click the DVD Disc icon to select your movie.





4) Select your options.  I choose MP4, "disable" Subtitle, Original Size and Keep Aspect Ratio, Video Quality "1100".  Note: that a Subtitle is selected by default.



5) Click START to convert.  Wait while the video is ripped and converted.  Your mileage will vary, but my quad-core AMD system ripped a 2:10hr movie in about an hour.  Not too bad.



6) When the process completes, you can copy the .mp4 file into a directory that your Zune software uses (if not already in there) and then Edit the file details with a better name, release year, etc.

This 2:10hr movie ended up at just over 1.1gigs in size.  You can bump the video size and/or video quality down a bit, if you'd like smaller file sizes.





7) Sync the movie to your Zune and enjoy!



Other notes:

The options selected should work fine for all 2nd generation Zunes and above.  The Zune 30 will likely require choosing the WMV tab and other options for quality.

Also note... I am in *no way* affiliated with WinX or any other company like 'em

Yip