WinX DVD Ripper

Digiarty Software, one of the best known multimedia software developers claims that its WinX DVD Ripper is the very Best Fastest Free DVD Ripper to Convert and Rip DVD to MP4 AVI WMV MPEG MOV FLV.

WinX DVD Ripper is indeed considered high quality, totally free, DVD ripping software that can be useful for multiple purposes for all computer users. It can help you to backup DVD to hard drive for better protection and longer storage or convert to one of the multimedia formats, playable on portable devices, or compressed to save space on your Hard Drive, USB, or DVD.

This free DVD ripper is able to free rip DVD to MP4, WMV, AVI, FLV, MOV, MPEG, H.264 formats, and easily convert DVD to iPhone, iPod, Apple TV, Android phone, PSP, etc. with customized profile settings.

In support of all regular DVDs, this DVD ripper freeware can also convert and rip copy protected DVDs, so you can copy virtually any DVD, which is supposed to prevent from performing this operation for copyright purposes. It can remove DVD CSS, UOP, RCE, region code and even Sony ARccOS.

With only a few clicks, WinX Free DVD ripper delivers you excellent video/audio quality at super-fast speed through Hyper-threading and Super Encode Engine based on MMX- SSE & 3DNow. This free DVD ripping software contains no malware, adware, spyware or virus at all.

Developer’s website: http://www.winxdvd.com/dvd-ripper/

My personal experience is pretty positive with this utility. I am using its Platinum version, which has been given away for free couple of months ago, and now costs $35.95, but all the features I really need are those which are included in the free version, presented above. Developers noticed that the free version does not support the latest DVD protection from Disney X-project DRM adopted by Disney, Paramount and Warner, but I had no case, when I needed to break this lock for backup purposes.

Please use the software responsibly, and do not apply the tool to copy illegally the data, which is not allowed to be copied by the authors. However, I am not a computer police, so use your common sense and your own ethical framework.

QuickAudio - Free audio editing software for Windows

QuickAudio is freeware, full-featured audio editing software which lets you edit, play and record digital audio as well as convert between various popular audio formats. It has standard audio editing features, multiple undo, audio spectrum analysis as well as support for up to 24 VST different plugins. Zoom out to edit your whole waveform at once or zoom in to edit individual samples. Cut and paste between as many files as you like.

The software was developed by Canadian Sion Software, one of the software development leaders for the music related utilities.

Formats supported include: 

• Wave
• MP3
• Ogg Vorbis
• AIFF
• CDR

Editing operations include:

• Cut, Copy and Paste
• Change sample rate, bits per sample and channels
• Insert Space
• Amplify
• Silence
• Fade In
• Fade Out
• Normalize
• Compress
• Reverb
• Filters - Lift/Attenuate Musical Presence, Vocal Presence, Bass, Midrange, Treble
• Remove Noise
• Change Duration (without changing pitch)
• Change Pitch (without changing duration)
• Add up to 24 VST plugins for your own custom editing

Website: http://www.sionsoft.com/qaudio.html

Download the installation file from the Download tab on the top of the page.

3 Freeware utilities for Kindle users

If you are representing the new crowd of Ebook gadgets’ users, you might already face the necessity to convert the text format of the found texts to the particular format that will be accepted by your device properly. While each gadget has the list of the supported formats, not all of them are convenient to use on your device. For example, Kindle is reading PDF, but if the file is not prepared properly, you might find it unacceptable.

So, if you own Kindle, you need software to convert text file formats in the formats, supported by this device, preferably to the branded Kindle format – MOBI. In this post, we will present several freeware utilities to help you.

1. Calibre

Calibre is considered by many users as the only best software for Calibre, for some it is even the only software needed. Supporting major operation systems as Windows, Mac, and Linux, this features-reach, ambitious eBook management suite includes eBook format conversion, an eBook reader for any format, and online tagging and local organizing of eBook files. It also supports direct synchronization with Android, iOS, and most all eBook reading devices, including the Kindle.

For Kindle owners, Calibre is the easiest and most reliable way to convert almost any document format into a Kindle friendly format (such as .MOBI). It is also a great tool for tagging/downloading metadata to your eBook files as well as syncing them with the Kindle. It is especially great tool for those who mostly use external, non-Amazon sources to fill the gadget library.

Calibre supports the conversion of many input formats to many output formats. It can convert every input format in the following list, to every output format.

* Input Formats: CBZ, CBR, CBC, CHM, DJVU, EPUB, FB2, HTML, HTMLZ, LIT, LRF, MOBI, ODT, PDF, PRC, PDB, PML, RB, RTF, SNB, TCR, TXT, TXTZ

* Output Formats: EPUB, FB2, OEB, LIT, LRF, MOBI, HTMLZ, PDB, PML, RB, PDF, RTF, SNB, TCR, TXT, TXTZ

The conversion engine has lots of powerful features. It can rescale all font sizes, ensuring the output e-book is readable no matter what font sizes the input document uses. It can automatically detect/create book structure, like chapters and Table of Contents. It can insert the book metadata into a "Book Jacket" at the start of the book.

Website: http://calibre-ebook.com/

Direct Download Page: http://calibre-ebook.com/download

2. Hamster

This freeware Hamster software also can convert pretty much any eBook and document format into a Kindle friendly format such as .MOBI. It does not try to cover all the features, which Calibre offers, but the conversion part is done by this utility with high speed and quality.

The software is very user-friendly and can perform a job for multiple files on the go, applying drag-and-drop approach. Format selection can be done directly, or you can just chose your device type, and select the preferred output format for your operation.  

Website: http://ebook.hamstersoft.com/en/home

Direct Download Page: http://stuff.hamstersoft.com/launch/hamsterfreeebookconverter.exe

Note that once run, the installer will download installation data from the internet (approx 45 MB of data). The installer will ask if you also want to install Hamster Free Zip Archiver by default, so make sure to UNCHECK that if you do not want it.

3. Auto Kindle eBook Converter

The Auto Kindle eBook Converter is free open source utility, developed for the same purpose as the software, offered above, however, it covers much smaller list of the applicable formats, while doing that well. The input file formats supported are: PDF, Lit, and HTML files, while the output is a Kindle-friendly .MOBI format.

The software has almost no interface, it will ask you to point to the input files and will generate MOBI output files pretty fast.

Website: http://sourceforge.net/projects/autokindle/

Direct Downloading Page: http://sourceforge.net/projects/autokindle/files/latest/download?source=files

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Update 02-10-13:

Out of the three utilities mentioned in this post, I am using Calibre. It is the best and the only software you need for your Kindle. Software is in active development, and recently the new software version 0.9.18 was released. You can download it from the following link: http://status.calibre-ebook.com/dist/portable.

Highly recommended!