Copying DVDs (for your own use, of course) is becoming increasingly difficult as manufacturers improve the security encoding on DVDs. AnyDVD however claims to be able to crack any DVD encryption code and judging by the number of downloads, Softonic users are certainly endorsing it too.

The beauty of AnyDVD is that it simply works in the background to automatically remove the copy protection of a DVD movie as soon as it's inserted into the drive. In this way, it can decrypt data without actually saving it to your hard-disk. You can watch the DVD at the same time or just insert a disk and let AnyDVD do its stuff. When you insert a disk, you are automatically prompted whether you want to decrypt it. When it has finished inspecting the disk, the program prompts you to backup the DVD using your preferred backup tool such as CloneDVD or Power DVD Copy.

The programme goes much further than this though. A handy bonus is that you can also remove the RPC region code, thereby making the movie region free and viewable on any DVD player. This is especially useful for those who buy many of their disks abroad or travel a lot. If you want to create a stripped-down version of a DVD, it can also remove unwanted movie features, including subtitles and extras for example. The programme also moves beyond decryption and allows you to control the speed of your DVD drive. This is useful if you’re having trouble playing a DVD properly or if the noise of your drive is causing annoyance. Finally, there’s also an option to display the frequency of your monitor for both NTSC and PAL displays although you probably won’t use this unless you’re having serious display issues.

The only drawback of AnyDVD is the number of daily updates that are released. Whilst this is obviously a good thing in terms of keeping it up-to-date with the latest encryption methods, the update alerts can be rather annoying and are prone to slowing your computer down.

However, this is a small price to pay for a programme that seems able to crack all but the toughest disks and for anyone who likes to create backups of their favourite DVDs, it’s an essential addition to your software collection.

Download AnyDVD HD 6.4.6.9 in Softonic

DVD protection is advancing at an ever increasing rate but unfortunately for the manufacturers, so are the ripping programs. If you’ve ever had problem’s copying one of your favourite DVD’s (just to make sure you’ve got a backup of course) then DVDFab could be what you’reve been looking for. It has proved popular a hit with thousands of Softonic users so far and there seems little prospect of its popularity waning.

DVDFab is an all-in-one DVD copying/converting/burning software. In just one or two steps, you can copy DVD’s to DVDR/PSP and even iPods. For such a powerful package, it only requires a mere 1.3MB of your hard drive hardrive so its not bulky like similar packages. However, note that this is the ‘lite’ version of the software; and the fully featured Express edition will probably weigh-in at somewhat more than this.

The conversion process itself couldn’t be easier. There are 5 DVD to DVD copy modes available - Full Disc, Main Movie, Split, Customize and Clone. To use any, its simply a matter of inserting your disk and Windows will ask you if you want to open it with DVDFab amongst other programs installed on your PC. In Full Disc mode, all movies, menus and trailers, are copied to a DVD in one click. In “Main Movie” mode, only the movie is copied with your specified audio. In “Split”’ mode, you can copy a DVD-9 onto two DVD-5 discs but also preserve the original menus on both discs. According to the developers, this rare little feature is apparently ideal for TV series DVD’s.

The handy “customize” mode allows you to personalize your DVD’s by recording such things as only your favourite scenes, removing adverts or selecting only certain audio tracks. Finally, “Clone”’ mode allows you to make exact 1:1 bit-to-bit copy of DVDs or even copy games disks such as PS2 DVD’s. There is also a DVD to Mobile option so you can reduce your favourite films to watch on your iPod or other favourite hand held device. Formats available include MPEG-4, DivX, XVID and Mp4.

DVDFab is a tough cookie – even those disks that refuse to be copied with other programmes can usually be cracked. The customise option allows you to get rid of pesky files that stand in your way and just rip the actual movie or essential files. It can also help in reconstituting recovering scratched or dirty disks that don’t play properly in your DVD player anymore. In addition, the ripping speed is remarkably fast. Depending on the size of disk, you can record a new one in less than 10 minutes although the average time is around 30 minutes.

One of the minor drawbacks to this ripper is that the inevitably heavy processing power needed to rip a disk often results in crashes. This will obviously be less of a problem on more powerful machines but on machines with old processors, using DVDFab may become impractical. Many user forums are however full of praise for DVDFab claiming that it can rip more disks and whatsmore, faster than comparable products such as DVD Shrink or ShrinkTo5. At the end of the day, most users consistently report they appreciate the simplicity and power of this rip-roaring ripper.

Download DVDFab HD Decrypter 5.0.9.0 in Softonic

Ripping CD's is increasingly difficult because of the protection that manufacturers place on the disks.

Now however, there are some programs strong enough to break that protection such as RipIt4Me. These encryption methods cannot be dealt with by most major DVD rippers and burners because they employ such encryption as ARccOS and RipGuard DVD techniques that totally immobilise programs such as DVD Shrink or DVD Decrypter. RipIt4Me is an incredibly powerful ripper which can handle just about any encryption. Of course, it should only be used for non commercial use - such as your own personal backups of your own commercial discs. The program is very simple to use with a "One Click" wizard to take you through the very simple ripping procedure which consists of little more than inserting a disc, browsing to a save location, and off you go. In it's latest incarnation, the program now has an automatic updater and an encryption decoder which detects whether the DVD appears to be protected or not. You'll see this displayed in the main window during the first step of the wizard.

This is a remarkably powerful ripping tool that can rip just about any copyrighted DVD (although not all) but only use it for your own backups.

Download RipIt4Me 1.7.1.0 in Softonic

A few years ago the task of ripping a DVD movie to your hard drive was so complicated that not everyone could do it. Nowadays it can get as easier as cicking on a button, which is just the way BitRipper works.

This tool is probably the easiest way to rip your favorite movies to your hard drive, provided they're not protected discs. Simply insert the disc into the DVD player, launch BitRipper and it'll automatically scan its contents and add them to a drop-down menu so that you can select exactly the sections you want to rip, if not the whole disc. Then just click on the "Start ripping" button and you're done! The DVD movie will start to be ripped to your hard drive on the fly, that is, without needing loads of space in your system.

This is probably the best method for average users, but if you prefer to be in control of everything when ripping a movie, you can also customize the program's settings by selecting codec (though only those which work with AVI files), aspect ratio, resolution and other technical details.

BitRipper is probably the easiest way to rip DVD movies to your hard drive, as long as it's not protected material.

Download bitRipper 1.31 in Softonic

DVD Ripper Wizard converts DVD to AVI, DVD to DIVX, DVD to Xvid with excellent image and sound. High ripping speed and separated chapter ripping makes DVD Ripper Wizard more powerful.

DVD Ripper Wizard is a DVD rip software can be free downloaded. DVD Ripper Wizard can convert DVD to Mpeg-2, DVD to AVI, DVD to DIVX, DVD to XVID. It is a DVD rip tool which enables you decrypt and copy a protected DVD to your PC's hard disk. Rip CSS protected DVDs

Download DVD Ripper Wizard 2.01 in Softonic

Some day your DVD movie disc may become damaged by a simple scratch. To avoid the disappointment of not being able to use the DVD anymore you may want to make a backup copy of your movie. Unfortunately if you try to backup DVD movies to VHS the quality will be hugely deteriorated because of the Macrovision protection purposely designed to prevent VHS recording.

EasyDivX uses DivX codec (MPEG-4) to make backup due to the fact that it results in a relatively high quality picture with a small filesize. This allows you to fit one DVD movie backup on to a single 80min/700Mb CD-R(W) disc.

EasyDivX supports:

• Original DVD movies PAL/NTSC
• Decrypting the DVD movie and copying it to the hard drive
• MP3 or AC3 audio
• Option to select the output size
• Audio normalizing
• Subtitle ripping (original VOB format)

Download Easydivx 0.8.2.0 in Softonic

If you want to edit DVD video files on your computer, the first obstacle you must overcome is copying the DVD files onto your hard drive.

Now DVDDecrypter can help you with this task, by providing you with easy means to rip the contents of your favourite DVD movies right onto your hard drive for further processing and editing.

Simply load the DVD movie in the computer's DVD drive and wait for DVDDecrypter to read the contents of the disc. You can then select all of them - or only those which you're interested in - and extract them directly on a selected folder of your hard drive.

Despite its simplicity DVDDecrypter includes interesting features such as support to decipher the CSS encryption algorithm, ability to remove the region code during the ripping process and support for multi-angle DVD movies.

The only drawback to this program is that it doesn't include any documentation and the support links inside the Help menu in the program don't work either. At least you can have a look at the step-by-step tutorial included in the developer's website.

DVDDecrypter is a compact yet powerful DVD ripping tool with which you can copy the contents of a DVD movie right onto your hard drive.

Download DVD Decrypter 3.5.4.0 in Softonic