Roger, I've recently started this process as well, and I understand how daunting it is. I've done about 70 discs so far, but I might stop and even delete some of the backups I've made already.

For me, it became a philosophical question: how much do I really need these DVDs? I looked at my collection of around 250 movies and realized the following: in the past three years, I would estimate that the number of times I've watched any of the films in my own collection comes to around 20. I'd bet a few of those viewings were also the same movie.

Once I thought about that, I decided that I could do without them. If I'm ever in the mood to watch Highlander or The Last Boy Scout, I'll just throw them in the Netflix queue. Sure, it's nicer to be able to watch them on the spot, but it's not worth it to me to keep Three Kings on a shelf literally collecting dust for years and years.

I did, however, rip several movies that I really love or that I just can't find anywhere (have any of you seen Gleaming the Cube? Well it's $45 on Amazon!).

For my rips, I decided that I just don't need the special features anymore, and I'm fine with just commentary tracks. So I decided to stick with making MKV files, which let me keep all those commentary tracks, while taking out the foreign language tracks. I first rip the DVD with DVD Decrypter, then convert them with Handbrake, which does an excellent job at compressing the video without losing too much quality.