My Personal Quick Startup Guide

[Jim1138]

My personal quick start guide for MakeMKV

I have mostly made MKVs of ISO files already ripped and decrypted. I also have a bunch of ISO filed personally made from digitized tapes. I assume ripping a DVD would be the same, but slower, and copy protection might defeat the program.

MakeMKV is easy to use, but the easy way is not obvious.

I'm assuming you want to make an MKV file of a DVD movie, without all the menus and special features.

DVDs usually have multiple files. Most often, the movie is the largest file, several GB.

Sometimes there will be more than one movie file. They might include a Pan and Scan version (angle), an alternate language soundtrack version, or a special feature you want to save. These will ususlly be several GB or several hundred Megabytes. There might also be more than one movie on a DVD.

Do not assume the DVD producer knew what they were were doing, even if it is released by a major studio. You have to control the output directory name and file name. The default may include garbage. Or the file names may be blank.


Setup:

1. click on View/Preferences
2. set the output directory
3. Make sure Expert Mode is selected

To convert a movie or other videos:

1. File/Open select the ISO file.
2. Check the output directory and edit it if nessary.
3. Uncheck unwanted files. If there are lots of files, right click on the file listing and uncheck all the files.
4. Check the files you want, usually just one multi GB file.
5. Click on each file you want converted and edit the name, if necessary. You can click on the DVD name and copy and paste to the file name. You can delete unnecessary numbers appended to the filename
6. If you select multiple files, make sure each has a unique name. The name is your choice. You can name a file something like Making of x, or Deleted Scenes of x
7.If it's a bunch of episodes you can make the episode name the filename. Just be sure that you can find it when you search in your media player. You might want to use showname_episodename.
8. Make sure the correct file in the list is checked and has the name you want.
9.Click Make MKV. Say yes to make folder.
10. Repeat for each ISO file.

[Woodstock]

Seems like a LOT of work for such a simple process. Maybe making ISO file is what is slowing you down so much.

For my DVD usage, I just put the disk in place, and fill in the blanks that are left (not all disks fill in every blank).

Mayhaps the "easy way" differs for many people... I know if I had to go through all the steps to your "easy" method, I would have given up long ago.