One of the features that can be useful at times of bordem is that the Apple 3G iPhone plays back video (and at an impressive quality as well) and it has been my mission to learn how to properly rip my DVDs to MP4 format so that I can play them in my Apple 3G iPhone.
From a previous post of mine I had people mention that Handbrake is by far the best piece of software to rip DVDs to MP4 and allows you to choose many preset formats for video. Luckily they have an iPhone/iTouch preset which makes the process even all that much easier.
Though being on a windows machine the only other item that is required to ensure that Handbrake works properly is that you first decrypt the DVD to your computer using a program such as DVD Decrypter.
iTunes and Windows Vista
I have so far been able to rip 2 videos successfully to my iPhone but a few more have not been successful due to a weird issue I was having. The issue I was experiencing was that when I went to sync the movies to the iPhone my computer would randomly reboot itself. There was no ‘Blue Screen of Death’ or any other error displayed to the screen, it would just reboot. I thought it could be the movie file I was syncing via iTunes to my iPhone, such as a corrupt video file but I guess I was wrong.
Jeremy mentioned to me that there was an issue with the first release of Apple iTunes 8.0 for Windows and that users were experiencing ‘Blue Screen of Deaths’ when syncing their iPhone. According to the post he linked to me it made mention of removing iTunes as well as the Apple Mobile Device driver via the Control Panel in Windows Vista and reboot. Then you just download the most recent version of iTunes from Apple’s website and Voila! It should work without issues.
So I tried it. I removed iTunes and Apple Mobile Device driver, rebooted my machine. Downloaded the most recent version of iTunes (think it is 8.0.035 as of this post) and try doing a manual sync again. It worked. No reboots and now I am able to enjoy whatever DVD movie I rip to my iPhone without issues.
Though one thing I found is that I can only sync my iPhone to 1 computer which sucks since I have a couple of computers I could use to sync various files from but I guess that would be Mr.Jobs’ way of stopping people from sharing movie or audio files huh? I also cannot ‘explore’ it like I can with my iPod. Oh well, guess things on the inside are hidden a bit better too.
JasonSep 22, 2008 at 14:06:52
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Thanks Tyler. I haven’t experienced this with my Touch yet, but should I, I’ll reference this post. Thanks to Jeremy as well.
Tyler Ingram September 22nd, 2008 at 15:56:38[Link]
Hopefully you don’t experience it of course. Though for those who do find this helpful that’s great!
Guitar Hero 4Sep 26, 2008 at 06:56:01
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Great post. *Gasp* As if this hasn’t been dugg yet!
JerOct 21, 2008 at 20:58:16
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Has anyone had issues syncing mp4s to their iPhones after updating iTunes? My iTunes seems to say that since my DVDs aren’t rented from iTunes I have nothing to sync. And I can’t find any info on how to get around this… hopefully someone can help me or share the frustration.
Tyler IngramOct 22, 2008 at 07:14:13
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I haven’t used any MP4s yet though if I do try and sync them later I’ll get back to you if it works or not.
JerOct 22, 2008 at 08:16:14
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Thanks, I’d appreciate it!