How to easily make a perfect copy of a DVD with free software

[nospamat]

Difficulty: If you were able to install Linux, you can do this.


Prerequisites

• An environment in which Linux binaries can run (e.g. a computer with Linux installed)
  
• The following programs and their dependencies installed:
  
  • K3b
    
  • dvdbackup
• Up to about 9 GB hard drive space for one DVD
  
• Copyright ownership of any encrypted copyrighted materials you will be copying (U.S.)
  

Instructions

On my hard drive, I'll use /home/dvds as my DVD storage directory.

1. On the command line:
   
   • cd /home/dvds
     
   • dvdbackup -M -i /dev/dvd -o .
2. Enjoy a segment of Stella while waiting for dvdbackup to finish.
   
3. Open K3b. In K3b:
   
   • Create a new DVD Video Project.
     
   • In the upper "file browser" pane, navigate to /home/dvds. dvdbackup will have created a new directory there. Enter it.
     
   • Replace the VIDEO_TS folder in the lower "project" pane with the VIDEO_TS in the upper pane.
     
   • Burn Project. The subsequent dialog box presents the option to burn to image only. Executing with that option will write an iso file to your hard drive, playable by VLC and others. In that case, you need another ≤9 GB free.
     
     Otherwise, once it's time to burn, K3b will tell you whether a spendy dual-layer DVD is needed.
4. Delete the directory dvdbackup created to reclaim the hard disk space it occupies.