klinemj
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Post by klinemj on May 5, 2019 1:38:01 GMT -5
I'm looking to get into putting my DVD's and BluRays onto a NAS then streaming them instead of using the disks. Step #1 is getting a drive that will rip them.
I'd prefer an external drive as I'm likely to be changing my computers in the house within a year and don't want to put one internal at this point.
Any reco's? I was looking at the ASUS BW-16D1X-U. Thoughts on that one or others?
Mark
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Post by creimes on May 5, 2019 3:23:37 GMT -5
I have been using a LG for a number of years now, have no complaints and it works like a charm, it is of course now discontinued. LG doesn't seem to have any external ones so the Asus may be the best bet if you are in fact only wanting an external drive, otherwise you could buy any one of them and a external enclosure and install it into there yourself. THIS Pioneer looks interesting, even does UHD if you would ever need it but you would also be required to purchase a enclosure for it, also includes CyberLink PowerDVD 14 UHD-BD Software. Chad |
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on May 5, 2019 5:15:32 GMT -5
I have been using a LG for a number of years now, have no complaints and it works like a charm, it is of course now discontinued. LG doesn't seem to have any external ones so the Asus may be the best bet if you are in fact only wanting an external drive, otherwise you could buy any one of them and a external enclosure and install it into there yourself. THIS Pioneer looks interesting, even does UHD if you would ever need it but you would also be required to purchase a enclosure for it, also includes CyberLink PowerDVD 14 UHD-BD Software. Chad I also found this Pioneer. It also has that same software with it. I'm not sure about the clamshell lid...concerned it might be delicate. -->CLICK ON THIS TO SEE IT<--Mark |
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Post by doc1963 on May 5, 2019 9:01:38 GMT -5
I'm looking to get into putting my DVD's and BluRays onto a NAS then streaming them instead of using the disks. Step #1 is getting a drive that will rip them. I'd prefer an external drive as I'm likely to be changing my computers in the house within a year and don't want to put one internal at this point. Any reco's? I was looking at the ASUS BW-16D1X-U. Thoughts on that one or others? Mark A very popular drive is the ASUS BW-16D1HT (found HERE). I use this drive and couldn’t be more pleased with it. I have one mounted internally in my PC and one mounted in an external USB 3 enclosure attached to my Mac. The external enclosure that I use can be found HERE. Installing the drive into the external enclosure is simply a matter of turning a few screws, attaching two cables and giving up 5 minutes of your time. The benefits are a cost savings of about $40 (over a pre-enclosed drive) and a drive that can easily be made to be “UHD friendly” for ripping purposes. All drives currently promoted as “UHD compatible” do not mean for ripping. They can “play” a UHD Blu-ray (using their software), but to “rip” a UHD Blu-ray, the firmware must be downgraded. The ASUS BW-16D1HT firmware can be easily downgraded by using the software package and instructions found HERE. I’ve downgraded both of my drives using an older, more cumbersome method. This one has been modified to be much easier. If you don’t need UHD ripping capability, then the drive works perfectly fine for Blu-ray and DVD straight out of the box. Hope this helps...  |
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on May 5, 2019 9:49:38 GMT -5
I'm looking to get into putting my DVD's and BluRays onto a NAS then streaming them instead of using the disks. Step #1 is getting a drive that will rip them. I'd prefer an external drive as I'm likely to be changing my computers in the house within a year and don't want to put one internal at this point. Any reco's? I was looking at the ASUS BW-16D1X-U. Thoughts on that one or others? Mark A very popular drive is the ASUS BW-16D1HT (found HERE). I use this drive and couldn’t be more pleased with it. I have one mounted internally in my PC and one mounted in an external USB 3 enclosure attached to my Mac. The external enclosure that I use can be found HERE. Installing the drive into the external enclosure is simply a matter of turning a few screws, attaching two cables and giving up 5 minutes of your time. The benefits are a cost savings of about $40 (over a pre-enclosed drive) and a drive that can easily be made to be “UHD friendly” for ripping purposes. All drives currently promoted as “UHD compatible” do not mean for ripping. They can “play” a UHD Blu-ray (using their software), but to “rip” a UHD Blu-ray, the firmware must be downgraded. The ASUS BW-16D1HT firmware can be easily downgraded by using the software package and instructions found HERE. I’ve downgraded both of my drives using an older, more cumbersome method. This one has been modified to be much easier. If you don’t need UHD ripping capability, then the drive works perfectly fine for Blu-ray and DVD straight out of the box. Hope this helps... I think that's the same drive I found on Amazon but in a case on sale for $120. It looks like it can do UHD and everything else. Here's the -->LINK<-- (Or am I reading it wrong...?) Mark |
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Post by creimes on May 5, 2019 9:49:56 GMT -5
I'm looking to get into putting my DVD's and BluRays onto a NAS then streaming them instead of using the disks. Step #1 is getting a drive that will rip them. I'd prefer an external drive as I'm likely to be changing my computers in the house within a year and don't want to put one internal at this point. Any reco's? I was looking at the ASUS BW-16D1X-U. Thoughts on that one or others? Mark A very popular drive is the ASUS BW-16D1HT (found HERE). I use this drive and couldn’t be more pleased with it. I have one mounted internally in my PC and one mounted in an external USB 3 enclosure attached to my Mac. The external enclosure that I use can be found HERE. Installing the drive into the external enclosure is simply a matter of turning a few screws, attaching two cables and giving up 5 minutes of your time. The benefits are a cost savings of about $40 (over a pre-enclosed drive) and a drive that can easily be made to be “UHD friendly” for ripping purposes. All drives currently promoted as “UHD compatible” do not mean for ripping. They can “play” a UHD Blu-ray (using their software), but to “rip” a UHD Blu-ray, the firmware must be downgraded. The ASUS BW-16D1HT firmware can be easily downgraded by using the software package and instructions found HERE. I’ve downgraded both of my drives using an older, more cumbersome method. This one has been modified to be much easier. If you don’t need UHD ripping capability, then the drive works perfectly fine for Blu-ray and DVD straight out of the box. Hope this helps... I was wondering if any of these UHD drives could actually rip the discs, now I know haha, with downloading these days anyhow and discs I rip are rentals. Chad |
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Post by doc1963 on May 5, 2019 10:10:18 GMT -5
A very popular drive is the ASUS BW-16D1HT (found HERE). I use this drive and couldn’t be more pleased with it. I have one mounted internally in my PC and one mounted in an external USB 3 enclosure attached to my Mac. The external enclosure that I use can be found HERE. Installing the drive into the external enclosure is simply a matter of turning a few screws, attaching two cables and giving up 5 minutes of your time. The benefits are a cost savings of about $40 (over a pre-enclosed drive) and a drive that can easily be made to be “UHD friendly” for ripping purposes. All drives currently promoted as “UHD compatible” do not mean for ripping. They can “play” a UHD Blu-ray (using their software), but to “rip” a UHD Blu-ray, the firmware must be downgraded. The ASUS BW-16D1HT firmware can be easily downgraded by using the software package and instructions found HERE. I’ve downgraded both of my drives using an older, more cumbersome method. This one has been modified to be much easier. If you don’t need UHD ripping capability, then the drive works perfectly fine for Blu-ray and DVD straight out of the box. Hope this helps... I think that's the same drive I found on Amazon but in a case on sale for $120. It looks like it can do UHD and everything else. Here's the -->LINK<-- (Or am I reading it wrong...?) Mark It is. I bought one and returned it for two reasons. First, the "open" button doesn't always engage the "open" button on the drive itself (it's still an internal drive mounted inside of an external enclosure) causing it to not open at all. It is a rather cheaply made plastic enclosure. Second, the shape of the enclosure is quite odd (you cannot set anything on top of it without sliding off) and the light is very bright and rather annoying. Considering the "sale" price of the ASUS BW-16D1X-U, the cost is a total wash between the two options, but the "metal" enclosure of the separates is MUCH better than the ASUS enclosure (IMO). But if none of that matters, then, yes, it's the same internal drive. |
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Post by doc1963 on May 5, 2019 10:11:48 GMT -5
A very popular drive is the ASUS BW-16D1HT (found HERE). I use this drive and couldn’t be more pleased with it. I have one mounted internally in my PC and one mounted in an external USB 3 enclosure attached to my Mac. The external enclosure that I use can be found HERE. Installing the drive into the external enclosure is simply a matter of turning a few screws, attaching two cables and giving up 5 minutes of your time. The benefits are a cost savings of about $40 (over a pre-enclosed drive) and a drive that can easily be made to be “UHD friendly” for ripping purposes. All drives currently promoted as “UHD compatible” do not mean for ripping. They can “play” a UHD Blu-ray (using their software), but to “rip” a UHD Blu-ray, the firmware must be downgraded. The ASUS BW-16D1HT firmware can be easily downgraded by using the software package and instructions found HERE. I’ve downgraded both of my drives using an older, more cumbersome method. This one has been modified to be much easier. If you don’t need UHD ripping capability, then the drive works perfectly fine for Blu-ray and DVD straight out of the box. Hope this helps... I was wondering if any of these UHD drives could actually rip the discs, now I know haha, with downloading these days anyhow and discs I rip are rentals. Chad Yup... Hollywood politics hard at work...  |
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Post by creimes on May 5, 2019 10:29:34 GMT -5
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stiehl11
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Post by stiehl11 on May 5, 2019 12:40:12 GMT -5
I have been using a LG for a number of years now, have no complaints and it works like a charm, it is of course now discontinued. LG doesn't seem to have any external ones so the Asus may be the best bet if you are in fact only wanting an external drive, otherwise you could buy any one of them and a external enclosure and install it into there yourself. THIS Pioneer looks interesting, even does UHD if you would ever need it but you would also be required to purchase a enclosure for it, also includes CyberLink PowerDVD 14 UHD-BD Software. Chad I also found this Pioneer. It also has that same software with it. I'm not sure about the clamshell lid...concerned it might be delicate. -->CLICK ON THIS TO SEE IT<--Mark That is the drive that replaced the drive that I've been using since 2015 and it hasn't given me a bit of trouble. I bought this when my internal drive wore out (that's how many discs I rip/use). |
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on May 5, 2019 13:47:39 GMT -5
I also found this Pioneer. It also has that same software with it. I'm not sure about the clamshell lid...concerned it might be delicate. -->CLICK ON THIS TO SEE IT<--Mark That is the drive that replaced the drive that I've been using since 2015 and it hasn't given me a bit of trouble. I bought this when my internal drive wore out (that's how many discs I rip/use). Have you tried ripping a UHD disk? Mark |
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stiehl11
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Post by stiehl11 on May 5, 2019 13:56:39 GMT -5
That is the drive that replaced the drive that I've been using since 2015 and it hasn't given me a bit of trouble. I bought this when my internal drive wore out (that's how many discs I rip/use). Have you tried ripping a UHD disk? Mark I haven't, yet. All I've done is BD and DVDs so far. Maybe I should try. |
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stiehl11
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Post by stiehl11 on May 5, 2019 14:14:16 GMT -5
That is the drive that replaced the drive that I've been using since 2015 and it hasn't given me a bit of trouble. I bought this when my internal drive wore out (that's how many discs I rip/use). Have you tried ripping a UHD disk? Mark It didn't care for the UHD disc that I put in it. I looked at firmware versions and none of the updates mention UHD. |
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Post by brubacca on May 5, 2019 14:32:08 GMT -5
The drive is the easy part. They confusion and pain comes in when you start talking about how to rip these disks and what formats/codecs to store them in.
I use MakeMKV to rip my Blue Rays, then Handbrake to encode them in the correct format for my FireTV. Then I just use Kodi pointed at the movie directort on my NAS. DVDs I only use MakeMKV because my NAS can handle the conversion for FireTV on the fly.
I worked with plex a bit, but because I am not streaming to many devices I went the Kodi Route. Also at the time Plex w/ FireTV couldn't do subtitles. Not sure if this is still the case.
My NAS couldn't handle the conversion of the Blue Rays on the fly. Although when I had an i5 based vortexbox it could.
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on May 5, 2019 15:02:05 GMT -5
Have you tried ripping a UHD disk? Mark It didn't care for the UHD disc that I put in it. I looked at firmware versions and none of the updates mention UHD. From what I've been reading, thanks to the guys here...somehow an upgrade to FW took away the option to rip UHD. There is a way, for certain players, to step back to the older FW and do it. That's likely why you are not seeing it mentioned in updates. Mark |
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on May 5, 2019 15:03:43 GMT -5
The drive is the easy part. They confusion and pain comes in when you start talking about how to rip these disks and what formats/codecs to store them in. I use MakeMKV to rip my Blue Rays, then Handbrake to encode them in the correct format for my FireTV. Then I just use Kodi pointed at the movie directort on my NAS. DVDs I only use MakeMKV because my NAS can handle the conversion for FireTV on the fly. I worked with plex a bit, but because I am not streaming to many devices I went the Kodi Route. Also at the time Plex w/ FireTV couldn't do subtitles. Not sure if this is still the case. My NAS couldn't handle the conversion of the Blue Rays on the fly. Although when I had an i5 based vortexbox it could. You pretty much lost me on a lot of that! FYI, from what I have read, one + of Plex is that it automatically figures out what format to use for each device you play back to. I might be wrong, but that's what I am wanting. Mark |
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Post by doc1963 on May 5, 2019 15:16:23 GMT -5
It didn't care for the UHD disc that I put in it. I looked at firmware versions and none of the updates mention UHD. From what I've been reading, thanks to the guys here...somehow an upgrade to FW took away the option to rip UHD. There is a way, for certain players, to step back to the older FW and do it. That's likely why you are not seeing it mentioned in updates. Mark That’s correct... and all due to Hollywood politics. Some drives (like my ASUS mentioned above) can have the firmware regressed to a previous version that allowed ripping of UHD discs. There are also several members over on AVS Forum and the MakeMKV forum who are selling “re-flashed” drives (with no significant markup) or will re-flash a drive for you if you’re not able (or willing) to do it yourself. Of course, all of that is meaningless if you’re never going to rip a 4K Blu-ray. But if it’s in your future, it’s something definitely worth considering now. Who knows what will come next... maybe drives that cannot have their firmware regressed (?). |
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Post by doc1963 on May 5, 2019 15:23:19 GMT -5
The drive is the easy part. They confusion and pain comes in when you start talking about how to rip these disks and what formats/codecs to store them in. I use MakeMKV to rip my Blue Rays, then Handbrake to encode them in the correct format for my FireTV. Then I just use Kodi pointed at the movie directort on my NAS. DVDs I only use MakeMKV because my NAS can handle the conversion for FireTV on the fly. I worked with plex a bit, but because I am not streaming to many devices I went the Kodi Route. Also at the time Plex w/ FireTV couldn't do subtitles. Not sure if this is still the case. My NAS couldn't handle the conversion of the Blue Rays on the fly. Although when I had an i5 based vortexbox it could. You pretty much lost me on a lot of that! FYI, from what I have read, one + of Plex is that it automatically figures out what format to use for each device you play back to. I might be wrong, but that's what I am wanting. Mark There’s many lower cost NAS appliances that cannot support Plex Server due to CPU limitations and, of those that can, many more that are not powerful enough to support the “on the fly” transcoding required for client devices that cannot decode the Blu-ray native encoding. In those cases, transcoding the original rip using an application like Handbrake is required. The transcoded files are then stored on your NAS. Hope that helps... |
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Post by wilburthegoose on May 5, 2019 15:25:36 GMT -5
For what it's worth, I ripped all my DVDs a few years ago, and I think it was a waste of time. Each disk took a fair amount of time, they take up a LOT of space, and I almost never use the ripped versions.
I've found it's a lot easier just to put all the discs into binders and look for the one I want. I have 4 large binders - DVD music/concerts, BluRay and 4K music/concerts, DVD movies, and BluRay/4K movies.
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Post by brubacca on May 5, 2019 15:45:13 GMT -5
Plex is an easy tool to use. On some systems you need to pay for Plex Pass to get the hardware assisted transcoding. Plex Pass goes on sale regularly for $80 or $90 for a lifetime subscription.
My biggest drawback was the whole subtitle thing with FireTV. I watch enough movies (like Black Panther) that if you can't see the subtitles you are missing a lot.
If you are building something like a FreeNAS with a good processor then software transcoding is probably fine. I also don't think that subtitles were an issue with Roku and other devices.
I also decided that full Blue-Ray Rips were going to take up more space. Since our ecosystem is FireTV, I just settled on encoding them in Handbrake which made the file much smaller. also good on the HD space and cost.
I even have the family able to use the Kodi app to select movies, which is a big win. I don't have all my movies encoded yet, because handbrake takes about 4 hours to tear down a blue ray for FireTv. I am planning on building a new Zen2 based Ryzen PC which I hope can get through Handbrake faster, I am looking at a new one with 8 cores/16 threads hopefully.
Once you get the drive settled, unless you already know what you are doing, we should discuss which ecosystem is best for your needs.
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