How to play DVD files on hard drive

[rpg51]

I just switched to mac from windows. On my windows machine I was able to play DVDs (instructional videos mostly) that I transferred to an external hard drive. I found it to be extremely convenient to carry around a single external drive with all my DVDs instead of a pile of disks.

I cannot seem to play these files on my mac machine.

Any suggestions?

Frustrated but patient with the move to mac. Lots of little things like this I had grown accustomed to popping up as road blocks.

 

[TattooedMac]

Hi and welcome to the forums rpg51.

I dare say that your HD is formatted for Windows only . . . Being NTFS, where as if it was for Mac only it would be Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
Now for both a windows machine and a Mac OS Machine to read the HD, it needs to be formatted in FAT32.

What is your HD formatted as ?? I bet NTFS.

If you dl Perian - The swiss-army knife of QuickTime® components and Download Flip4Mac WMV Player for Mac - Play Windows Media in QuickTime Player. MacUpdate.com and then use your QT Player then you should be right to go.
If not post back and we will tale it another step.

Cheers

PS Both these downloads will dl to your Preference Pane in System Preferences so go there to see if they downloaded ok.

 

[rpg51]

No clue. But, I can report that I just managed to play several of the DVDs on the external disk on my mac. My mac does read the disc. Lots of stuff works in including some of the dvds.

Using "dvd player" if I go to file and browse to the folder on my external drive with the dvd files and select that folder it will run the movie - on some of them. Some it does not seem to work even though they all work fine on my windows machine. I notice that on the ones that do not work if I expand the folder the individual file names appear greyed out. On the ones that are working the individual files are not greyed out.

Does that provide a clue? Love to get this working. Thanks for replying.

 

[TattooedMac]

Well I'm not sure exactly what your DVD's are encoded with ?? Can you let that out of the bag. What file extension are they encoded in ?? Tell us that and it might save a whole lot of typing

Cheers

 

[rpg51]

looking at one of the folders - the folder names are VIDEO_TS and inside the folders there are files with different extensions - example VIDEO_TS.BUP and VIDEO_TS.IFO. I have never worked with these before so bear with me. It looks like actually these are folders. I am beginning to wonder if the DVD copies that are working are all ones where the name of the folder I select to play is VIDEO_TS and the ones that are not working I named the folder something different when I brought it over from the DVD to the HD - a name that reflects the title of the DVD. Could it be as simple as renaming the folders to VIDEO_TS? If so, how do I rename folder on this mac????

Thanks a million for the help. I'm far from expert.

 

[rpg51]

I did download the software and it is on my machine. Not getting there - probably me.

 

[Slydude]

If you renamed the VIDEO_TS folders to something else try changing the name back. That structure is needed for DVD players to recognize the folder as a DVD. That's true whether you are using hardware or DVD software to play back, You might find the Getting Down to Work section of ATPM 12.03 - How To: Performing a Video Extraction helpful.

To rename the files Try either of the techniques mentioned in Mac 101: A simple trick to rename files | TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

 

[rpg51]

Ok, here is what I have learned. I cannot rename the folder and files using the mac. But, if I use my windows machine and rename the folders and then mount the disk on my mac it all works fine. So it appears the issue will be solved by renaming the folders. Thanks for all your help folks.

 

[rpg51]

Related question -

I am now realizing that I am not able to rename files and folders I brought over from my windows machine. Is there a work around here? I would like to be able to rename files and folders I brought over from my windows machine.

This is probably off topic but--- its my thread so I'll take this privilege!

 

[Slydude]

That tells me that your PC drive is probably formatted as NTFS. To verify this single click the drive in the Finder and select Get Info from the File menu. When the next window appears look at the General section of the window. It may be necessary to click the triangle. It probably says NFT File System.

Macs can read NTFS but not write to it without a hack or third-party software. This will provide more info as will as links to appropriate software NTFS On Mac Tutorial You don't need each of the solutions mentioned. Pick the one that seems to best suit your needs. My personal favorite Paragon.

 

[rpg51]

Yup. NTFS.

I'll follow your leads. Thanks!

 

[rpg51]

Paragon it is. Works well so far.

While I have you one the line -

I am used to running "Download Helper" for Windows on my old machine and being able to download virtually any movie I can run in firefox, including but not only you tube videos. What is the best way to do the same thing on this machine. I am using Firefox for Mac.

 

[chas_m]

There's bound to be a similar extension to the one you used in FF on Windows that does that same thing with YouTube (et al) videos for the Mac version of FF.

 

[IvanLasston]

It is the exact same people making the exact same extension for Firefox on the Mac - called download helper on the Mac. Tools -> Add Ons -> Search DownloadHelper

If you install Perian you can use Preview to view the files(as Tattooed Mac pointed out). Or VLC to play just about any file.

 

[rpg51]

I downloaded that mac version. I am able to download video's but the conversions aren't happening and so I am unable to play the videos on my mac.

 

[rpg51]

I've got it working. Bit of a struggle but it appears all is well in the universe. Thank you all for a very helpful forum.