Why I hate this new fangled streaming

Cafe Society
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Sorry the long post, but there’s no way to summarize the folliowing into TL:DR

Ripping and Remuxing DVDs and Blu-Rays

DVDFab or AnyDVD for ripping (original definition, a 1:1 bit for bit copy of contents of the disc less copy protection) DVDs and Blu-Rays into ISO or disc structure. DVDFab is free for 30 days, after which the Blu-Ray ripping portion ends, but the DVD ripping portion remains free. AnyDVD is free for 21 days and not sure what functions, if any remains free.

Handbrake isn’t an option for ripping commercial discs because it doesn’t remove the copy protection on most U.S. releases. DVDFab and AnyDVD must be continually updated to defeat these continually changing protection schemes with the free version of DVDFab lagging months behind the paid version.

MakeMKV is free while in Beta, which it has been for the past ten years. The only advantage to paying for it, other than the warm fuzzies, is that you receive a permanent license key versus having to download a new key and version of the program every few months.

Because MakeMKV is always free, updates to defeat new copy protection schemes it takes longer (sometimes months later) to be updated.

More about ripping. As stated above, ripping is the process of making an exact copy of the contents of the disc without any compression or quality loss. You can rip to ISO, which is a container that contains an exact copy of the contents and structure of the original disc contents or to folders that retain the files in the structure on the disc.

While ISO is an exact image of the optical disc, few streaming programs (e.g. Plex) will stream and ISO. And other than standalone Blu-Ray players, few standalone or Smart TV media players will play a Blu-Ray ISO. Also, few software media players on your PC will play Blu-Ray ISOs correctly.

Which leads to MakeMKV. While MakeMKV does allow you to make an ISO from a Blu-Ray, but not DVD, it’s main function is to RIP and Remux (place into a container) a disc into invdividual MKV files. Note that MKV, MP4, AVI and many others are containers and not formats. When you RIP and Remux with MakeMKV, you’re taking the video from the disc, RIPs and exact copy of the video less copy protection and places into an MKV container as an exact copy of the original.

The catch is the MKV (and MP4) container can contain only one video, but multiple audio tracks and subtile, and no menu. So each video, main movie, trailers, extras on your disc will be a separate file.

While I believe Handbrake can remux a video from an MKV container to an MP4 container. It’s primary purpose is to reencode the already highly compressed video from the disc to another even more highly compressed video format, losing quality in the process.

Because MKV and MP4 are containers, just saying “I have an MKV or MP4” id meaningless since the video format contained inside can vary greatly. The primary reason to remux a video into an MP4 container, other than reencoding is that the MP4 container is more compatible than MKV.

On to storage and hard drives.

Make these your mantras:

All hard drives will fail. DOA, 10 seconds, 10 months, 10 years.

RAID in any configuration is NOT A BACKUP! RAID is meant to maintain the integrity data on the drives in the array. Yes, there’s a degree of “backup” in the sense that data can be restored if one or more (depending on configuration) drive fail, but delete a file or overwrite a file in a RAID and it’s just as gone as if you had a single drive.

There are no truly good or truly bad drives or manufacturers. For home use, more money buys you a longer warranty, but reliability of higher level drives like Pro and Enterprise drives is based on commercial installations where 24/7 use and reliability is necessary.

Backup, backup, backup. See Mantra #1. Follow the 3-2-1 Backup strategy. 3 copies of your data (main drive and two copies), 2 on different media (one on another hard drive, a second on optical disc, cloud or tape, but not SSDs or flash drives which are not archival), 1 offsite, either physically or cloud.

As for SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording), they’re not just for archival use or only to make drives cheaper. More about this below. SMR (imagine a how a shingled roof is built with overlapping shingles) was developed because density capacity on the drive platters (hence the term hard drive) has reached their limit. Currently the largest consumer purchasable drive is 18TB and it’s not SMR. However, the largest commercially available drive is 20TB and they are SMR because of drive form factor limitations.

Because of the nature of SMR drives, they have to erase and write the data on the overlapping shingled sectors, they’re slower on writes, but just as fast on non-shingled drives on read. This is the reason they may be considered archival drives, write rarely, read often. But for most users the write speed difference isn’t a major factor.

The write speed difference IS a factor when they’re used in a RAID configuration. To retain the integrity of the RAID array, the data on all drives must be checked and rebuilt (i.e. read, erased and rewritten). This is where SMR drives fail because the write speed is too slow. So SMR drives shouldn’t be used in a RAID.

Finally PHEW a RAID not a NAS and a NAS is not a RAID.

NAS is Network Attached Storage. That’s it. A drive or drives accessible by multiple devices on a network, now including access over the internet if desired. .

RAID (Redundant Array of Individual/Independant/Inexpensive Disks) is at least two disks in an enclosure which can be a NAS that is either striped (combined to increase speed) or mirrored. Striping and mirroring in various RAID configurations with an extra parity drive that can be used to restore corrupted data. Note that is for corrupted data only. As stated above, once you permanently delete a file or folder in a RAID, it’s gone just like on a single drive.

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Gold CDs have long ago been proven to be no more reliable than regular CDs. And M-Disc 1000 year life DVD and Blu-Rays are just 11 year old technology and unproven in real world conditions to definitively last any longer than regular discs.

The only proven long term data storage strategy is to backup often, verify your data and storage and transfer that data to new storage (not necessarily to the same media) every few years.

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All 8TB+ WD drives with the exception of their 20TB drive are not SMR. And 12TB+ Seagate drives are not SMR.

Hard drives were never promoted to last 20+ years. The longest current warranty on Enterprise drives is 5 years and that’s based on the manufacturer’s extensive research into the the expected under the harsh commercial use they’re designed for.

Personally, I pull my drives from active use and move to them to backup status soon after the warranty period, whatever it is ends. That may mean I have 10 hard drives after 20 years, but it also means I have as many as 9 backups at that point.

LTO tape is a proven long term storage media, but calculations show that that the break even point for the drives and tapes only make sense for ~100TB plus of data. Yes, older LTO 5 and LTO 6 drives are cheap used, but they’re heavily used and prone to failure. Also, if you’re storing video, don’t count on the double compressed size of the tape for economy. Videos are already highly, highly compressed and don’t compress more well, if at all.

While commercially pressed DVDs and Blu-Rays have a longer probable lifespan than writable DVDs and Blu-Rays, they still a have finite span that may be nearing. Writable DVDs and Blu-Rays have a lifespan of perhaps a decade or two and there are numerous examples of both failing due to disc rot due to light, heat and humidity.

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I agree that we in Canada get the short end of the stick when it comes to Netflix and similar. My sister is a dedicated Netflix subscriber, but she has said more than once, “Why can’t I watch _____ on Netflix Canada? My friends in the US can get _____ on Netflix; why can’t I?” I’m not about to bore my sister with my knowledge about licensing and contracts, so I change the subject.

One thing I have discovered wolfpup, and other Canadians, is “CTV Throwback.” Whole seasons of old TV shows, totally free, as long as your IP address resolves to Canada. Nothing recent, but if you’re jonesing to watch shows you haven’t seen since they were first aired (I’m working my way through “Fantasy Island,” for example), it’s a good and free alternative to Netflix and similar.

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Great posts, Didi44. Very comprehensive.

I’ve got 600+ movies that I’ve ripped from DVD and BD (that I own) using MakeMKV and Handbrake to my Synology NAS. I don’t mind not having menus and extras that exist on the discs. And the only problem I’ve ever had with decryption on MakeMKV is Lionsgate BD titles. They are using a fiendish anti-copy scheme.

Regarding hard drives - I’ve had a new one fail 6 months from purchase, but Seagate replaced the 8TB drive for free. It only took a day or so to reconstruct the volume on the NAS. As long as they fail one at a time, I’m not complaining.

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All too often, I find fast-forwarding and/or rewinding tends to be clunky and glitch prone while streaming, sometimes locking up and forcing me to re-launch the movie/show. Not always, but often enough to be very irritating. DVDs are superior in this regard.

Also, I can’t stand the infernally annoying way on some services where I can’t pause movie or show without pop-ups showing thumbnails of actor bios and the like.

Also, FWIW, I like to re-watch shows or episodes I like. A lot.

I imagine this puts me in the ‘Luddite’ pigeonhole.

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Nah. Pausing and rewinding/fast forwarding is universally terrible on streaming services.

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I believe you’ve just indicated why streaming is so popular. There are a lot of things that aren’t ready available in physical format that are quickly available at your fingertips.

And the cost/convenience factor. I haven’t bought any Blu Rays in years because I can stream just about anything (not that I ever really rewatched much). That’s really worthwhile to me.

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I agree. I’ve gotten to like the DVR and remote control Comcast provided. If I miss a line of dialog, one button will rewind fifteen seconds and another button will fast-forward fifteen seconds, although I reprogrammed the second button to fast forward thirty seconds to making commercial skipping easier. If I try rewinding on a streaming show, half the time the stream freezes or locks up. Netflix seems to have the most reliable streams.

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I agree. I was happy watching the show as streaming.

but my complaint is, I no longer can. If I took the same pause, but owned the DVD of the show, I could go back and watch it now.

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Is this platform specific? On my Apple TV, I rarely if ever have trouble pausing or rewinding/fast forwarding. Except of course Hulu Live, which does not let you skip the commercials.

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Dropped by the thread to say this as well. justwatch.com is really helpful. For instance, Parks and Recreation is on Peacock TV for free. Thunderball is free on Pluto TV. You can probably get around the commercials if you want to.

I’m new to this, so I don’t know all the ins and outs of streaming, but there’s a lot of stuff out there in the streaming world. I have a box full of DVDs that I was saving to watch someday. But will there be a DVD player available when I want to watch them? It’s getting less likely all the time.

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There is some platform difference. Apple has more control over the app developers and requires more consistency with the FF/REW functionality. Other platforms don’t standardize that behavior, so there is more variation in how FF/REW works on non-Apple devices.

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The issue with the Apple TV is the remote is so terrible that rewinding or fast forwarding small amounts of time (like a what did they say sort of rewind) is an exercise in frustration.

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Blu ray is still used by videophiles and they play DVDs. With the streaming wars and the removal of ‘problematic’ episodes or scenes, I think they’ll be a market for the foreseeable future

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Dedicated standalone DVD players are becoming less available because all UHD and Blu-Ray players are backward compatible. Even after dedicated UHD and Blu-Ray players begin to become obsolete, PC DVD readers will still be widely available.

Until / if some other cheap alternative storage method comes along, optical disc readers will be around for a long time.

Floppy disks disappeared because of a combination of lower cost, bigger hard drives and Zip and Jaz Jaz drives which ironically were flawed technologies. By the time they were finally discontinued, writable CD technology and large hard drives were affordable.

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I dusted off my standalone DVD player from about 2005 a couple of years ago. I like watching old whodunnit mysteries or adventure stuff which are available online through non-streaming services. Back in those glory days of working in an office I would download them and do that process of making the files. Then when I got home burning it onto a blank disc is easy and takes about 10 minutes. I’d then be able to enjoy these films on the tv and it’s good when kids want to watch to. No one wants to gather round a laptop for two hours.

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Almost all of my audio cassette tapes from the 70’s and 80’s work just fine. Some are commercial tapes; some I recorded myself.