How to Rip DVD to Plex Media Server

“Just purchased new WD my cloud pr2100. I can not figure out how to add a DVD movie to my Plex library. I’m about to go insane. Watched every YouTube video and can’t seem to figure out how to watch DVD movies on a NAS device via Plex. Every video I watched is way outdated I guess. If anyone has a guide on how to play DVD movies over Plex Media Server, that would be great. Any help would be appreciated.”

There are quite a great number of alike questions online, especially on the Plex forum. We all know that Plex could help us stream multimedia content from one NAS device to another for media playback. However, what about DVD movies? Can Plex Media Server directly stream DVD movies from your computer to Plex devices? How to stream DVD movies? The below content would show you effective solutions.

Part 1. Why rip DVD to Plex Media Server?
Part 2. 3 Best ways to rip DVD to Plex Media Server
Part 3. How to rip DVD to Plex Media Server with Leawo DVD Ripper?

Part 1.Why rip DVD to Plex Media Server?

Let’s firstly get into Plex Media Server to learn what it is. As a digital media player and organizational tool, Plex Media Server allows you to access the music, pictures, and videos stored on one computer with any other computer or compatible mobile device. You can install the Plex Media Server software on a Windows, Mac, or Linux computer, or even on compatible network-attached storage (NAS) device, then playback music, pictures, and videos stored on this device on any other internet-connected device capable of running the Plex app.

To stream music, videos and pictures from Plex Media Server to Plex-compatible devices, you need to:

Install Plex Media Server on the computer or network-attached server (NAS) device where you store your music, videos, and other media files.
Install the Plex app on your other computers, smartphones, tablets, television streaming devices, phones, and even game consoles.
Launch the app on your target device, and use it to stream your media files from Plex Media Server.

With Plex Media Server and Plex app, you could use any compatible device to watch movies, listen to music, and view pictures stored on your computer that's running Plex Media Server, access media files stored on your Plex Media Server computer remotely via the internet, and allow friends and family to access your movies, music, and pictures via the internet.
Obviously, if you want to directly stream DVD movies from a computer or device that has Plex Media Server built into devices that has a Plex app installed, you will be failed. You have to rip and convert DVD movies to videos that are accepted by Plex Media Server. Native video support of the Plex Media Server is typically (but not always) limited to the MP4 container, H.264 video encoding, and AAC audio. Content that is not natively supported will automatically be Direct Streamed or transcoded as needed by the Plex Media Server.

Part 2. 3 Best ways to rip DVD to Plex Media Server

As mentioned above, you have to rip and convert DVD to Plex Media Server supported videos (MP4 container, H.264 video, and AAC audio) for fluently streaming and sharing your DVD movies over Plex. The question now becomes what is the best way to rip DVD to Plex Media Server MP4 video. Here we have collected 3 best DVD ripper tools for you.
No. 1 Leawo DVD Ripper

As a professional DVD ripping software tool, Leawo DVD Ripper helps you decrypt, rip and convert DVD movies to video and audio files in over 180+ formats for various devices, like DVD movie to MP4 video, DVD to AVI, DVD to MKV, DVD to MOV, DVD to MP3, etc. The converted DVD movies could be played back on various media players and devices like iPhone, iPad, iPod, Android smartphone, Apple TV, etc. You could even rip and convert DVD to YouTube or other online video sharing sites. The parameter adjuster feature that enables people to adjust output video and audio parameters like video codec, bit rate, aspect ratio, frame rate, audio codec, channel, etc. makes it top among competitors. What’s more, Leawo DVD Ripper even enables people to edit DVD movies before converting, select subtitles and audio tracks, achieve movie-only ripping, etc.

No. 2 Handbrake

HandBrake is an open-source video transcoder available for Linux, Mac, and Windows. Everyone can use HandBrake to make videos for free. HandBrake takes videos you already have and makes new ones that work on your mobile phone, tablet, TV media player, game console, computer, or web browser—nearly anything that supports modern video formats. HandBrake works with most common video files and formats, including ones created by consumer and professional video cameras, mobile devices such as phones and tablets, game and computer screen recordings, and DVD and Blu-ray discs. You could use Handbrake to rip and convert DVD movies to Plex Media Server compatible MP4 videos for totally free. However, it should be noted that Handbrake has no access to encrypted DVD discs such as CSS-DVD discs. You have to turn to Leawo DVD Ripper or other DVD ripping software tools that enable disc decrypting.

No. 3 MakeMKV

MakeMKV is a free DVD ripper that can rip a DVD or Blu-ray disc to an MKV file. If not using a disc, DVD and Blu-ray files can also be loaded into MakeMKV to turn them into MKV files. Files such as ISO and BDMV are supported as well as folders containing IFO and DAT files. MakeMKV is available for Windows, Linux, and Mac users. The great thing about MakeMKV is that there is so little to think about. Fire up the program, analyze your disc, choose which of the track you would like to rip, indicate where the output file should be saved, and then hit the 'Make MKV' button. That's really all there is to it. There's no messing about, no complex configuration – just analyze, rip and go. Though MakeMKV couldn’t directly rip and convert DVD disc to Plex Media Server MP4 video, the Plex server would automatically transcode the MKV files for playback and streaming.

All these 3 DVD rippers mentioned above could help you decrypt, rip and convert DVD discs to Plex Media Server. Handbrake and MakeMKV are totally free to use, but Handbrake has no access to encrypted DVD discs while MakeMKV has no direct MP4 video output support. You could get a brief comparison between these 3 apps by visiting this page.

Part 3. How to rip DVD to Plex Media Server with Leawo DVD Ripper?

Since Leawo DVD Ripper has been considered as the best DVD to Plex Media Server converter tool, we would like to show you how to use Leawo DVD Ripper to rip and convert DVD movies for streaming via Plex Media Server.

Firstly, you need to download and install Leawo DVD Ripper on your computer. You could click the below buttons according to your computer system. Meanwhile, get source DVD movies ready for converting.

Step 1: Add source DVD movie
Launch Leawo Prof. Media and then open the “Convert” module (or click the “Blu-ray/DVD Ripper” option on the Home interface) to enter the “Convert” module. Then, click “Add Blu-ray/DVD” button to add either disc from disc drive or DVD movie from folder. You could also click the “Add iso file” to add DVD ISO image file.

Note: 3 different DVD content loading modes are available. Full Movie mode enables you to load all content in source DVD for converting, while Main Movie mode enables you to select one title for loading and converting. In Custom Mode, you will be able to select multiple titles for loading and converting. Just choose the mode and then determine which titles to load here.

Step 2: Choose output format
Click the drop-down box (named “MP4 Video” by default) right before the big green “Convert” button on the sub-menu bar, and choose “Change” to choose output format. You need to choose MP4 Video as output format since it’s the native video format supported by Plex Media Server from the “Format > Common Video” group.

Step 3: Adjust detailed settings
As mentioned above, Plex Media Server’s native video support is MP4 video, H.264 code and AAC audio. Therefore, it’s better for you to set output MP4 video to meet these requirements. After setting output format, open the drop-down button right before the big green “Convert” again and then choose “Edit” option to enter the “Profile Settings” panel, where you could adjust video and audio parameters of output format, including: video codec, quality, bit rate, frame rate, aspect ratio, channel, audio codec, resolution, etc.

Step 4: Set output directory
After setting output format and desciding the , click the big green “Convert” button on the sub-menu bar and then set output directory in the “Save to” box.

Step 5: Start to convert
After that, click the bottom “Convert” button on the pop-up sidebar. Leawo DVD Ripper would then start converting DVD movies to MP4 video for Plex Media Server. You could then view the entire converting process.