What is this and how do I set it up? (blu-rays!)

[javeryh]

Is this some sort of front-end for playing movies?  Can you just rip blu-rays onto a huge HDD?  This would be awesome!

[2600]

Windows Media Center 7.  I believe that is actually with the mymovies application with Windows Media Center.

Looks exactly like how I have mine set up with all my movies on a central server.

[javeryh]

So do you just rip the movies to your hard drive?  Is it hard to rip a blu-ray?  Is the computer connected to your TV via HDMI or something?  How many terrabytes do you need to hold a collection of blu-rays?

[Donkey_Kong]

  How many terrabytes do you need to hold a collection of blu-rays?

The biggest money can buy...x5 or maybe x10   

[2600]

So do you just rip the movies to your hard drive?  Is it hard to rip a blu-ray?  Is the computer connected to your TV via HDMI or something?  How many terrabytes do you need to hold a collection of blu-rays?

I rip them to my server's hard drive.  Ripping them isn't hard, but sometimes I have to upgrade the applications I use to the latest to rip a new dvd or blu-ray.  I use anydvd usually, sometimes dvdfab.  I have my media center pc connected via hdmi to my tv, but I'm going to put some other devices in some other rooms to play them back.  My server I think has 2 TBs for storage space currently.  Most of mine are DVDs and I probably only have ~15 blu-rays so far.  The mymovies app pretty much downloads all the covers and other info on the DVDs and blu-rays for me.  I used to used the media center as a dvr as well, but haven't been doing that recently.

[jamesjones626]

you can use dvdfab to rip dvd's and then use handbrake to convert them.   try xbmc, great prog to use on a htpc

[upprc04]

If you like the look of that, check out Media Browser.  I'm using that on my Windows 7 HTPC.  Haven't got in to ripping blurays though.  I'd need to probably stock up on a ton of storage and make a separate server machine.  Depending on how you rip Blurays it would definitely fill up a hard drive fast (about 50gigs per movie, if ripping iso), but you can convert the file to make it smaller

[2600]

I don't convert them.  I don't see the point in reducing the resolution or quality.  I rip the full thing into a folder.  I may look at taking out things like warnings or bonus content, but for now all dvds and blu-rays are full rips.

[jamesjones626]

I don't convert them.  I don't see the point in reducing the resolution or quality.  I rip the full thing into a folder.  I may look at taking out things like warnings or bonus content, but for now all dvds and blu-rays are full rips.

if you do it right you wont lose resolution or quality.

[2600]

I don't convert them.  I don't see the point in reducing the resolution or quality.  I rip the full thing into a folder.  I may look at taking out things like warnings or bonus content, but for now all dvds and blu-rays are full rips.

if you do it right you wont lose resolution or quality.

I disagree.  If you convert it to anything it has to loose quality. It's a lossy format, it has to loose quality.  Whether or not it is noticeable to you is a different story.  To me it isn't worth it plus having to deal with adding chapters in etc.

[javeryh]

Does anyone have a tutorial they could point to?  I've got about 50 DVDs that I could start with and a couple of blu-rays (although I'll have to get a blu-ray drive for the computer).  I'd also like to rip the ISOs just to keep the menus, etc. so when you load the movie it is just like you have the disc in there.  Man, this would be great for all of the kids movies...

[Generic Eric]

Does anyone have a tutorial they could point to?  I've got about 50 DVDs that I could start with and a couple of blu-rays (although I'll have to get a blu-ray drive for the computer).  I'd also like to rip the ISOs just to keep the menus, etc. so when you load the movie it is just like you have the disc in there.  Man, this would be great for all of the kids movies...

The biggest thing you'll have to keep in mind is that you'll need to try a method out and watch the movie to see if its up to your standards and your expectations.  I wouldn't suggest sitting down to do 50 DVDs before you found a method you like.  I'd suggest using your most action packed movie because the scene transitions will point out the compression artifacts.  Also keep this in mind for your movies in dark settings.  

I haven't done it in a while, I just used anydvd with imgburn.   Handbrake is good for making avi's. But if your looking for a guide, I'd start here:


http://www.tested.com/news/how-to-rip-dvds-to-play-on-any-devicefor-free/19/

http://www.tested.com/news/how-to-rip-a-blu-ray-movie-with-just-one-click/54/

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/the_last_dvd_and_bluray_ripping_guide_youll_ever_need

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/rip_dvds_playback_your_iphone_psp_xbox_360_ps3_appletv_or_any_h264enabled_player

Gigabytes are cheaper now than ever.  Buy a few Terabyte drives and do direct copies if you can afford the space.  

[javeryh]

Thanks for the links.  Once I go down this path and figure out how to set everything up, I'm definitely going to do 1:1 ISO rips so I can preserve the menus and all of the extras and everything.  HDDs are ridiculously cheap and you can get a 2TB drive for a little over $100 right now and they are only going to come down.  That's enough storage for 60+ movies with no compression!

[2600]

Thanks for the links.  Once I go down this path and figure out how to set everything up, I'm definitely going to do 1:1 ISO rips so I can preserve the menus and all of the extras and everything.  HDDs are ridiculously cheap and you can get a 2TB drive for a little over $100 right now and they are only going to come down.  That's enough storage for 60+ movies with no compression!

Just to be clear you don't have to make them ISOs to make them 1:1.  You'd have to hear from someone who stores them that way to hear the benefits of doing it that way, but I copy the folder structure 1:1 instead of making it an ISO.  At the time I started doing it this way, media center couldn't read ISO files by itself, I'm not sure if it can currently.

[newmanfamilyvlogs]

I've been building my media library at home and have been very pleased with Synology's products. I've got a 5-drive enclosure at work for doing network-wide backups (and some media serving) and another 1 drive enclosure at home for media and backup.

They have a built in http/ftp/nzb/emule/bittorrent client, and there are several Android/iPhone apps to manage downloads remotely.
Also supports DLNA for announcing to TVs and PS3s and whatever. I havn't played with this too much, but most things play fine over the network to my Samsung Galaxy Tab.

Here's a 4 bay:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822108066

Paired with 4 of these:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152245

So for around $700 you could have close to 8TB of networked storage, or close to 6TB with redundancy in the case of a single drive failure (swap it out and keep going). If a full Bluray is 56GB, and you went with the redundant storage setup, that's still over 100 movies.

[Donkey_Kong]

I've been building my media library at home and have been very pleased with Synology's products. I've got a 5-drive enclosure at work for doing network-wide backups (and some media serving) and another 1 drive enclosure at home for media and backup.

They have a built in http/ftp/nzb/emule/bittorrent client, and there are several Android/iPhone apps to manage downloads remotely.
Also supports DLNA for announcing to TVs and PS3s and whatever. I havn't played with this too much, but most things play fine over the network to my Samsung Galaxy Tab.

Here's a 4 bay:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822108066

Paired with 4 of these:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152245

So for around $700 you could have close to 8TB of networked storage, or close to 6TB with redundancy in the case of a single drive failure (swap it out and keep going). If a full Bluray is 56GB, and you went with the redundant storage setup, that's still over 100 movies.

That's pretty impressive, all around!

[newmanfamilyvlogs]

It gets even more impressive if you jump through some hoops and install Serviio on it:
http://pcloadletter.co.uk/2011/02/07/serviio-on-synology-nas-with-arm-cpu/

It's running a proper Linux distribution so you can do all sorts of crap with it.

Serviio is a TRANSCODING DLNA server which means if your device supports only MP2 video and MP3 audio in a VOB container, but all your source media is h.264/AAC in MKV containers, you can have the little box transcode it to your device in real time at playback. Same thing with audio. Rip all your CDs to FLAC and have it transcode to 320kbit MP3s to play back on your networked stereo, and 128kbit MP3s to stream on your networked TV.

[boykster]

Cool project.  I use XBMC on 2 small atom/ion based machines and have linux based storage array using more traditional hardware RAID cards.  If I was to do it again, that Synology box looks very appealing from a cost / scalability standpoint. 

I'm a big fan of XBMC because it is open source and very configurable, but the MCE solutions are pretty slick as well I have to say.  If you're made of money and don't want to tinker at all, check out Kaleidescape

http://www.kaleidescape.com/

but since most of us DON'T have unlimited budgets, MCE or XBMC are great approaches to getting a similar experience for a fraction of the cost.

[DrumAnBass]

+1 for XBMC as a front end; amazed at how good it is... http://xbmc.org/