The first step is to configure dvd::rip, it may look complicated at first but it is really quite easy.
Ok so, the only real tab you have to pay attention to is the Basic Settings, this is where you will tell it where to save all of its files to and what device to use to read the dvd. Ok, so in this case I am just using my dvd drive (only drive I have), and then I picked directories that have enough space for very large files (10gb + because the dvd is often 6 or 7 and then the encoded is usually 1.5), this is very important; make sure that you have enough space unless you want to have movies only partially ripped or not at all. You can also use the on the fly ripping technique, but I never have and can't tell you how well it works. Anyways thats all the real configuration you need, the defaults for the rest for me were fine.
Ok now it is time to start, I am backing up Finding Nemo so I called the Project Name FindingNemo (Spaces are never good in paths, I've always found it good to not have spaces when doing these things), this automatically fills in the directory for the vob, actual video files from the disc, avi, the encoded material, and tmp. These don't all have to be the same, but for the sake of simplicity, I am leaving them so. Ok so now, create the project and you can now either pick the dvd device that you want to rip from, or give it an image, today we will be ripping from a dvd so I just leave it as the dvd drive that you previously specified in the configuration. Ok good, time to actually rip the movie :-D
So, the first step is to read the dvd table of contents. If you have all of its dependencies installed (lsdvd in this case) it will read the table of contents and give you a list of available videos and audio tracks to pick from. Look for the one that is around the advertised run-time. So for Finding Nemo the correct selection is number 1, by the way it usually is title 1. Anyways, if you don't know you can use the "View Selected title/chapters" button to make sure that you've got the right video and audio track. Once again, it is most likely that the first audio track and the first video are going to be the movie and its soundtrack, but always make sure. Then click "Rip Selected title(s)/chapter(s)" and the progress bar down at the bottom will start giving you information about the rip. For instance, the progress bar above tells me that it is ripping title 1, its 5.22% done at 269.5 fps; it has been doing this for 35 seconds and is estimated to complete the rip in 10 minutes and 36 seconds.
Ok this is the configuration part of the rip, where you decide what you want to do with the vob files you just got. Well for me I need 640 x 400 resolution for my PMP so I'll just enter that in at the Zoom area and make it so that it isn't clipping anything. Feel free to play around with how you want your final file to look, using the "Generate preview images" you can see what the movie will look like.
Here's the hard part. Ok, so you have to tell dvd::rip what format the final file will be in, feel free to experiment, but I like the movies that result from the above configuration. The only thing that I'll say about this part is that it is important to make sure that the frame-rate is the same as the dvd frame-rate (the title that you ripped earlier) and that you can adjust how big you want the file simply by entering a number into "Target Size", remember bigger means better quality video. Thats pretty much it, now you just have to wait for a long time for it to be done. In the end, just go to the directory where you told it to put avis in the first place and the full video will be there.
