After reading through so many threads and reports, I am still not entirly sure of the best ways to make backups of my DVD collection.

Firstly I do NOT have a DVD recordable drive. I have a Toshiba SD-R1002 (DVD Rewritable combo) and a Lite-On LTR-32123S. I aslo have InterVideo Win DVD 2000, CyberLink PowerDVD and DivX 5.0.2 Bundle installed, and a DVD Player for my TV.
I have seen advertisements of such software that can alegedly copy DVDs to CDR but these are generally american companies and require credit card payment as well as enormous postage costs!
Preferably I would like a method that can copy DVDs using either 1 or 2 free programs. I have read articles that involve using up to 5 different programs and can become very confusing.

I have heard that the following are often popular, but am unsure what they all do ar how to use them:
DVD Decoder
DUP-DVD
DVD Genie
SmartRipper
FlasKMPEG
DVDCopy
DVD2SCVD
DVD2AVI
DVDx

Please help!! Any help on the above or advice on using other similar programs would be much appreciated.

One last thing, does anybody know whether all the features on the original DVD are carried on to the copy (such as interviews, cut scenes and menus)

thankx v.much

This may be of some help to you.
To get the cut scenes and interviews you would have to rip them separately. As for the Menu's, cant be done as far as I know.
You may also want to look here and here.

thankx for all your help and the great links!

Glad I could be of assistance

if you want to do SVCD (on CD) DVD2SCVD is the easiest way, its almoast selfexplaining.
You will then get only the movie on a few CDs. If you do it the loooong way with muuuuch work you could get menus and extras to work, but its not worth the work, and the menus will not be the same, you have to make them yourself, only still menus.

If you have a DVD burnerits anouther thing you can get an exact copy (or an almoast exact copy if its a DVD9)

You do realize DivX 5.02 codec is the newest version right? And here's another variation of how to backup your DVD collection, DivX style. Got a lot of pictures, so anybody can do it.

Please consider that if you evetually do plump for a DVD writer, you may end up ditching your CD backups and re-doing them in DVD format anyway. DVD writers and media are so much more affordable now that my advice would be to save for a DVD writer first. Then you could have a look at the applications available to re-encode DVD9 titles so they'll fit onto DVD-R blanks.
One other aspect is that dual-layer blank discs are already available - albeit in limited and expensive supply. So have a think about investing in a writer capable of burning dual-layer blanks.

Regards,

TZ

I am trying to burn a home movie with dvdx platnum and after soon after hiting the start button the error "error reading primaryvolumediscriptor" or "error ifo" comes up. Has anyone had this problem or know what is causing it? Thanks.