Ripping, playing, and converting blu-rays: a tutorial

Here we’ll show you how to rip a blu-ray, play the rip, and then convert it for your iPod / iPhone / AppleTV / media player of choice.

You’ll need these softwares:

• Mac BlurayRipper Pro
• VLC
• Handbrake

So first, download and install them. VLC & Handbrake are free while MBRP has a free trial.

Start Mac Blurayripper Pro and insert the disc as requested. MBRP should start scanning it. Once it is done, you can click the disc name to edit it, to ensure it corresponds to the actual name of the disc you are ripping. You can choose the destination folder in the preferences pane. Now click start: the ripping process will take about 60-90 minutes depending on the speed of your blu-ray drive and also the speed your hard disk drive.

Once the rip is complete, open the destination folder and browser inside the rip, then inside BDMV, and then inside of a folder named STREAM which contains the actual video files of the ripped disc.

These video files are numbered files ending with a m2ts extension. By looking at the filesize, it should be easy to find which one is the main movie.

At this point, you can launch VLC and drag the main movie video file on it to start playing it (and use the audio menu to select audio tracks).

If you intend to convert the video to another format, launch Handbrake, click open and select the video file you want to convert. You can then choose a preset and start converting! (Just make sure the ‘Large file size’ checkbox is enabled )

(Click the image to see the full resolution).

As you can see, ripping, playing, and converting blu-rays on mac is quite easy!

Mac BlurayRipper Pro – First public version

Just a quickie to mention Mac BlurayRipper Pro have released their first public version! Trial is free!

Negative rumors about blu-ray on mac

According to MacBidouille, Apple is not wondering when to release blu-ray support, but wheter to support it at all or not. This does not bode well for blu-ray fans! This is, however, only a rumor at this point. To think Apple was proud to be among the firsts to include DVD writers (the superdrive) !

Mac mini’s HDMI port related to blu-ray ?

According to CrunchGear, the rumors surrounding the addition of a HDMI port on future mac minis might be related to the blu-ray specifications requiring such a port on blu-ray players. While that may be promising, it would be surprising if that was the case, as many PCs with blu-rays drive do not have such a port and can use software players fine without it.

State of Blu-ray support on Mac

As of today, it is possible to use a blu-ray drive on mac. Indeed, you can buy an external usb drive for around $150, and be able to read from the discs. However, there is currently no blu-ray player on Mac!

Toast 10 is able to burn to blu-ray media in data mode. Since the blank medias are still very expensive, this is not yet very useful.

If you wish to play blu-ray media, there is currently only two possibilities: MakeMKV, a software which decrypts and remux the video files into a format suitable for playing using VLC, or Mac BlurayRipper Pro which also decrypts but keep the same structure as the original. The result can also be played using VLC, but the advantage is that whenever a blu-ray player is available, you’ll be able to play with all the bells and whistles of the original disc (menus, etc).