Mpeg to Avi (divx or xvid) coversion

[cnico88]

I want to watch couple of seasons of a show that I have on DVD on my EEE pc which doesn't have a media drive. I ripped the DVD to my computer using DVD decrypter and selected the files I want. There are about 4 episodes per DVD making all 4 files equal to 4GB. Since the EEE doesn't have much harddrive space and since resolution is only 800x440 I want to convert the original MPEG files to a smaller file say 300-400 per episode and maybe 1.2GB per DVD. I want to use Divx or Xvid for compression. (I don't care which). All the software that I tried so far, ImToo, Xilisoft, Xvideo converter and many others, both trials and freeware are very slow. It takes me 15 mins to rip the DVD with Decypter and then to convert just one episode it takes more than an hour. Obviously is not my computer because it's very fast, check the sig for specs. If you guys can help find a program either free or paid that can do this type of Mpeg to Avi (divx or xvid) fast. I need to rip seasons of this DVD and I am willing to spend a few extra bucks for something that just works fast. Thanks for the help.

[cnico88]

is it faster if I decrypt the movie first and then convert it to avi or find a program that does it all in one?