Converting from VOB to AVI or MPEG

[bananners.livejournal.com]

Does anybody know of a good, free or very low cost program for converting VOB files to AVI or MPEG? I've ripped DVDs using DVD Shrink, but they come out in VOB, which is not very useful. I tried using the DivX converter, but as far as I can tell it only converts to DivX, not AVI or MPEG. Any help would be SO appreciated. :)

EDIT: After trying a bunch of suggestions below, as well as ones from people on my flist, I found something that works for me. Thanks to all who offered help and suggestions!

Comments

[morgandawn.livejournal.com]

http://www.livejournal.com/users/permetaform/150126.html

[foxestacado.livejournal.com]

try perusing the help guides at http://www.livejournal.com/community/xf_fanfilm

[lemniskate.livejournal.com]

this is how I do it, using freeware.

http://www.livejournal.com/community/media_exchange/560.html

[scriggle.livejournal.com]

After using DivX converter, all you have to do is change the file extension from .divx to .avi

[bananners.livejournal.com]

Someone else gave me a similar suggestion, which was to change the VOB extention to MPEG, but I can't figure out how to do that. When I open the folder that contains the files, I can change the file name, but not the file extention. Would you mind telling me exactly how to change it? It seems like it's probably something obvious that I'm just not getting. :/

[scriggle.livejournal.com]

When I convert using DivX converter, I save the file to my hard drive. Then I right-click on the file name, select rename and change the extension. That always works for me.

[bananners.livejournal.com]

I tried that, but it still only lets me change the file name and not the file extention. Thanks for trying to help though. :)

[uluviel.livejournal.com]

Open the window, go to Tools -> Folder -> Display and then uncheck the box that says "Hide extension of known files" or something like that (my OS is in French so I'm not sure what the exact terms are in English).

A DivX file *is* an AVI file. AVI is a format that can be encoded using different codecs, such as DivX, XviD, Indeo, CinePak, etc.

Changing .vob to .mpeg does work, since DVDs are encoded with MPEG-2. But I think there is some information in vob that doesn't transfer to mpeg, because when I do the vob -> mpeg switch, my screen ratio always gets skewed to 1:1.

[bananners.livejournal.com]

That worked! Thank you SO much!!! :)))))

[moosemanmedia.livejournal.com]

FlaskMpeg.

[nsyncsjuju.livejournal.com]

i use DVDx