Netbooks and DVD’s
A friend of mine recently sent me the following question:
“I’m heading overseas in a few weeks and was hoping to watch a few movies on my netbook (no DVD drive). Is it possible to put movies onto a USB flash drive and watch them that way?”
Short answer: yes, anthough there are easier/better ways to do it.
I’ll start with my method. On my main laptop, which has a DVD drive, I use 1 of many programs available online to back up movies I own to my hard drive. At the moment I’m using DVD Fab (Google it), which has many options as to how to save the movie. You can save just the movie itself, or, if you have a movie with some cool extras on the DVD, you can save the entire DVD into a folder.
Either way, once you copy the movie to your hard drive, you need to get it onto your netbook. This brings us back to your question. When copying the whole disc at full quality, it will take anywhere from 3 to 8 GB. So unless you have an 8GB USB key, the easiest way to do that is to use an external hard drive (more on that below).
Personally, before I travel, I like to choose a half dozen movies that I think I will enjoy and copy them to my netbook. I usually only watch 1 or 2 over the course of a trip, but I never know what I’ll be in the mood for.
You have several other options. You can buy an external USB DVD drive which will connect to the netbook and use it to play the movies from the DVD. The main drawback to this is the external drives use a lot of power compared to reading the movie off the hard drive. With the external drive you’ll probably only be able to play back 1 whole movie before your battery dies.
On a transatlantic flight, you will probably want to watch more than one. So unless you happen to be flying first class (or be on one of the very few airlines who provide power outlets in coach) you need to take power usage into account. The most effecient way to watch movies on a netbook is from its internal hard drive.
Lastly, you can buy a 2.5” USB portable hard drive and copy your movies onto it. From a power standpoint, this isn’t too different from the external DVD drive. The advantage is on a 500GB drive (less than $100) you can store around 100 movies, giving you a wider selection to have on your trip.
Side note: Make sure you don’t confuse the 2.5” external drives with the 3.5” ones. While they offer more storage for the same money, the 3.5” ones require a power outlet to function where the 2.5” ones get power directly from the USB outlet on your computer.
Of course, it is a best practice to always back up your main laptop (or any computer with irreplaceable data, music, or pictures). As a bonus, the USB hard drive provides a convenient place to do so.
Summary: As I said above, the USB hard drive is the easiest way to move the movies from your laptop to your netbook. Instead of 1 at a time (USB key) you can copy all of them at once.
Any questions, drop me a line.
