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How to rip DVD to iPhone & iPod Touch format with HandBrake (Windows & Mac)

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Related Tutorials:

How to Rip DVD and Convert Video on Mac OS X?
How to Convert DVD and Video to iPhone/iPhone 3G/iPhone 3Gs?
How to Convert DVD to iPod Touch/Nano/Classic on Mac?

No doubt you can purchase movies from the iTunes Store ready for iPhone/iPod Touch consumption, but if you already own the DVD, you don't want to waste your money on the same movie a second time. Instead, you can rip the DVD to a video file on your computer, move it into iTunes Library, and then sync it to your iPhone/iPod Touch. The program I'd like to recommend to do this is called HandBrake, and it's available for free on both Windows and Mac.

The following tutorial will show you how to rip DVD to iPhone/iPod Touch format using HandBrake. You can follow this guide to convert DVD to iPod Touch/iPhone whether you are using Windows OS or Mac OS X.

Let's take a look at how it works:

Step 1. Download HandBrake from http://handbrake.fr/?article=download according to your computer OS and install it.

HandBrake Windows Interface

rip DVD to iPod Touch/iPhone with HandBrake Windows

HandBrake Mac Interface

rip DVD to iPod Touch/iPhone with HandBrake Mac

Step 2. Insert a DVD and launch HandBrake. If HandBrake doesn't recognize the DVD as a source automatically, you may have to click "Browse" and direct HandBrake to your DVD drive.

Step 3. HandBrake will analyze the DVD and let you choose the title and chapters you want to rip for your iPhone/iPod Touch (in general, you'll want the first title and every chapter). You can get an idea of which title is the main DVD title by choosing the title duration that matches the movie's playtime.

Step 4. Click the "Presets" menu in Windows, or the "Presets" button on the top right of the HandBrake window on the Mac. You'll see several presets; choose the iPhone and iPod Touch preset.

Step 5. Now just click the "Encode Video" button (Windows) or Start button (Mac) and sit back while HandBrake rips the DVD to one big file. This can take a while, so you won't be able to rip a DVD on your way out the door to the airport. Make sure you plan ahead.

Step 6. When HandBrake finishes ripping the DVD, drag the file into iTunes for syncing to your iPod Touch/iPhone whenever you want to.

Summary

As I have tested, HandBrake worked great on Mac system. So, if you are using Mac OS, you can feel free to utilize HandBrake to help you rip DVD to iPod Touch/iPhone.

However, while testing on Windows, HandBrake did not do a good job. It takes nearly four hours to rip a movie with the length of 1 hour and 48 minutes. And, the output video for my iPod Touch is a little bit distorted. I've also noticed HandBrake Windows:

1. Cannot merge DVD chapters into as a single file. You will get sparate video files rather than a whole movie file.
2. Cannot preview the movie before encoding.
3. Cannot trim the movie segment.
4. Cannot extract sound tracks from DVD as audio file.
5. Only supports M4V, MP4, MKV, AVI, OGM output formats.
6. Cannot well customize profile for the output file.
7. Only supports a few mobile players like iPod Touch, iPhone, Apple TV, etc.

In conclusion, if you are using Windows OS, HandBrake may not be the perfect choice. Here, I'd like to recommend the DVD to iPhone Converter from Clone2Go. It can do what HandBrake cannot as listed from point 1 to point 7. Besides, the conversion speed is much faster. And this iPhone converter can help you convert video to iPhone, download YouTube and convert YouTube to iPhone, convert DVD, video and YouTube to iPod as well.

If you have any other questions, please feel free to contact us support@clone2go.com.