Brand new at copying DVDs - need help.

Question

Hope that I am in the right forum. I'm brand new at using DVD copying since I've only had this computer for about a week. I've had problems in copying my home video DVDs on DVD+R discs which were created on a Sony DVD recorder. These are obviously not copy protected. I tried making a copy for a friend but ran into problems, phoned Apple and followed their instructions for copying and burning -R discs but that didn't work for me. On my follow up call, they suggested that the problem may be either the +R disc (rather than -R) or the fact that the discs were not burned on a computer but rather on the recorder. They suggested the use of other software. So I searched the web andI downloaded something called Mac the Ripper and using the dialog box in that program, do have the contents of one disc on my hard drive as far as I know. But I don't know how to copy (burn) onto a blank disc either using this same program or something else. In other words, what are my next step by step instructions to burn what I hope I have on the hard drive onto a blank disc - I still have +R discs left so I'll likely be using them. Thanks for any help.

Answer 1

From all the helpful information posted here, I have found out that copying DVDs is not quite as straightforward as I had hoped it would be using my new computer. I would have to purchase software which isn't supplied on my iMac such as Toast or Popcorn to do the job as far as I have found out from a number of sources. Toast is a bit more costly than I want to spend for just this one task although Popcorn is more reasonable. I am beginning to think that for the few DVDs that I really need to copy for my friend, the easiest route is to use my DVD recorder, transfer the contents of the DVD to the hard drive on my recorder (yes, the recorder does have a 160 GB HD) and then burn a blank DVD from the recorder's hard drive which is what I have done dozens of times in the past. Of course, it takes 2 hours to transfer the video from a DVD (assuming it has 2 hours of video on it) to the hard drive and then only about 4 - 7 minutes to burn the video onto a blank DVD from the HD of the recorder. Using the computer, I had hoped to reduce the time it takes for that first 2 hour step with the recorder. I'm not even sure if Popcorn would significantly reduce the time for transferring the video from the DVD onto the computer. I'll have to evaluate whether or not the cost of something like Popcorn is really worthwhile for me. Thank goodness, copying audio CDs is much more straightforward on the computer. Thanks for all the help.