There's more discussion on this here:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=39795.msg271817#msg271817So... Here's a way to convert a DVD to a MKV, but retain full original quality, and still have access to the subtitles and chapters (if you want). There's a few steps, but it actually doesn't take that long, since you're not recompressing the video in any way. The longest step by far is ripping the actual DVD.
1. Decrypt the DVD using any preferred means. I suggest
DVDFab Decrypter in Main Movie mode. Other options are: RipIt4Me+DVD Decrypter, or AnyDVD+DVD Decrypter (
DVD Decrypter and RipIt4Me are available here and
AnyDVD is here).
2. Rip the subtitles out of the files using VSRip (
available as part of the guliverkli project here). This is simple. Open VS Rip. Click the
Load IFO button and browse and select the largest IFO file you got when you ripped the DVD (usually VTS_01_0.IFO). Then Click the
Save To button and pick somewhere to save them. I like to make a subfolder of the location where I ripped the DVD called "subs" and save them there. Then click next and it'll rip them for you.
An alternative to this process is to just download the subtitles from one of the SRT web sites out there. The nice thing about using a SRT instead is that the subtitles will be much higher quality. You can certainly mux the SRT file into your final MKV file as well, so it'll still be managed as one single file. You can download SRT files for a variety of languages from these sites:
http://www.opensubtitles.org/http://www.divxstation.com/http://www.divxsubtitles.net/http://www.subbiee.com/http://titles.box.sk/2a. If you want to, you can use
ChapterXtractor to create a chapters text file so that your MKV will still have the chapters included. Open ChapterXtractor and hit the Open IFO button and choose the same IFO you used in the previous step. It'll read the chapters out of the IFO file. Switch to the
Format tab and choose
OGG as your Preset. Then click Save Data and save it somewhere (I call mine
chapters.txt but that's irrelevant).
3. Open
DVD Shrink. First you have to set the option to prevent DVD Shrink from segmenting the VOBs. Go to
Edit --> Preferences --> Output Files tab. Uncheck
Split VOB Files into 1GB Sized Chunks. Then click OK. This only needs to be done once, as the setting is remembered from then on.
4. Click the Open Files button in DVD Shrink and choose the folder where you extracted the files in step 1. Make sure you are in "Full Disc" mode rather than Re-author (assuming that you ripped only the main movie in step 1).
5. Change the Video recompression setting from
Automatic to
No Compression.
6. Make sure to uncheck any sub-picture streams listed under Subpicture. MKVtoolnix doesn't like these in the source VOB files and doesn't work properly if they're there. You can also check any of the additional audio streams if you want to make sure you have access to them all in the MKV file.
7. Click the
Backup! button and choose
Hard Disk Folder as the backup target. Select an empty folder for the output files in the next box down (not the same place where you initially ripped the DVD). I usually make a "shrink" subfolder of my main rip folder and save them there. You can uncheck the
Create VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS box if you want, as you won't need those extra folders.
8. Wait for DVD Shrink to finish. This should only take a few minutes because you're not recompressing the video.
9. Open MKVmerge GUI (
available as part of the MKVtoolnix package here, scroll down for the windows version).
10. Drag drop the big VOB file created by DVD Shrink into the
Input Files box in mkvmerge, which will then recognize the streams in the VOB. Then, if you want the subtitles, drag the IDX file created by VSRip in step 2 into the Input Files box as well. If you're using SRT files instead of the IDX files ripped by VSRip, then just drag the SRT file(s) you downloaded in here and MKVmerge will recognize them. Lastly, if you extracted the Chapters in step 2a, switch to the Global tab and hit the browse button next to
Chapter File (middle of the dialog). Select your chapters.txt file (or whatever you called it) and hit Open.
11. Hit Start Muxing and wait for MKVmerge to do it's magic. This will take about 10 minutes or so for an average length movie on a reasonably powerful machine. When you're done, you'll have a MKV that includes a completely full quality copy of your DVD, including Chapters and Subtitles. MKVmerge will automatically save it to the same folder as the first input file you chose, so that's where it'll end up!