The number one thing that internoobs ask me about is downloading movies. I admit, I’m a bit of a leecher and watch plenty of movies thanks to rips. So I feel that if I share my knowledge of being able to watch crappy movies for free with some of you who aren’t aware how easy it is then I’ll have some friends on my waydown to hell.

The first thing you need is a DVD player that can play multiple formats, mainly .avi and DiVX, or an XBox 360. The next thing you’ll need is the ability to torrent, a torrent client and some way to get your rips to your media player such as a DVD burner or knowledge of how to stream media.

Once you’re ready to rock with the above then all it takes is knowing some of the more reputable websites that offer rips and a place to check the quality so you can be secure in knowing you’re wasting bandwith on a movie that is going to be playable. Also, knowing the formats of rips is an important step to understand what type of movie you’re downloading. So let’s start with that.

When a movie hits theatres it’s ripped immediately in CAM format. You want to avoid these at all costs, these are the crappy handheld cam rips and are in most cases unwatchable. Occasionally a gem will appear but it’s rare. While a movie is still in theatrical release sometimes a R5 or Workprint will appear. These are usually quite watchable but are dark and you’ll want to avoid action or horrors with these. On a big movie it’ll take a couple months after release but always before the movie hits DVD stands a DVDRIP will surface. These are the ones you want, basically watching the DVD itself but with a bit of pixelation. Here’s my current top 5 DVD rips to download.

5. The Bank Job
4. 10,000 BC
3. Cloverfield
2. Semi-Pro
1. Forbidden Kingdom