ben_danger said:
this has been asked before, but i cant find the post.

is there any decent FREE software that i can use to convert a DVD to an editable file type, be it avi, mp4, quicktime etc?

does anyone find that when editing a downloaded avi on a mac that the sound doesnt work? both AE and FCP both seem to omit the music ive had to rely on youtube rips just to pull the mp3 of them.

for mac, mpeg streamclip is your friend, you can rip to many formats including DVCPRO50, uncompressed, or, if you have FCP ProRes. Fairmount and MacTheRipper can be used to handle the copy protection

EDIT: apparently it's windows too

http://www.squared5.com/

make sure to grab Perian

http://perian.org/

and the quicktime mpeg playback component as well