I have copied DVDs to an external drive and then played them successfully on the HDR Fox-T2. I use a Mac with the tools Ripit and Handbrake.
Ripit creates a more or less exact copy of the DVD, but also has compression capabilities.
Handbrake will not produce an exact copy but will compress a DVD, or a file created by Ripit, or various other video files.
The advantage of using both tools together for me is that multiple DVDs can be ripped then queued up for compression by Handrake.
If you search around you will find numerous suggestions as to the optimum compression settings for Handbrake. I think it really depends on your equipment and personal preferences - so some trial and error. Interestinlyg (although not sufficiently so for me to have taken the trouble to find out why) my customised Handbrake default settings specify MP4 as the output format, but depending on the format of the DVD I get either MP4 or MKV. I haven't had difficulty playing either format on the Humax.