ASUS 12X Blu-Ray Burner $49.99 FS MIR BW-12B1ST/BLK/G/AS

Quote from Mummel : Keep in mind this is only a 4X DL reader. If you're ripping Blu Rays, its well worth the investment into a 8X reader.

It looks to me that this drive writes to bd-dl at 4x, but reads bd-rom at 8x. Wouldn't anything you would rip be a bd-rom and thus have 8x read? Could be wrong been awhile since I researched drives.

Quote from jmonica : I love comments like this. Copying discs is a bit dated? How could you possibly know how he plans on using the disc? Maybe he has a bluray player in his kids room and it's the only thing they are allowed to use? We all know there are many ways to get a video file from a computer to a display but stating that burning discs is a bit dated is ridiculous. "OMG don't do it. Burning discs is too old school. You're not hip and cool if you don't store your files on some other form of storage media other than those easily scratchable burned discs that people used to use way back in the day. Come on man..."

I'm glad that you liked my comment! Copying discs is a bit dated. It's as ridiculous as buying a CD and then making a copy of it. I'm sure that 5% of the population still uses CDs on a daily basis, but the other 95% use the portable, compact version known to most as MP3s. Maybe I've just been messing with this crap a little longer than some of you guys so I feel differently about it, but CDs to MP3s = DVDs/Blurays to MKVs. And how do I know how he intends to use them or for what reason; because he stated so. The reason that he gave is the exact reason why I started ripping and converting movies. It's so much more convenient scrolling through hundreds of movies rather than shuffling through piles discs. It is possible that he doesn't want his kids on computers (who am I to judge, but I think all kids should be on computers) so there's other alternatives to bluray players like western digital boxes that play media files. They often sell for less than a bluray player in case you wanted to go there.

And one last point to anyone who burns media as a way of "archiving"; I mentioned before that writable media usually scratches much easier than the originals, but it also ages (warps or rots) after just a few years. Just something to consider.

Quote from yoyobabyyo : I am with you on this one. A lot do not understand that HDD storage is NOT cheaper than burning it on a media disc (assuming each movie is ~25GB). I back up my BD movies because my nephews do scratch a couple of them up and so they can watch movies on another BD player in the house. It is also a lot more practical to bring a back up disc to a friend's place to watch movies or let them borrow that instead. Not everybody is equipped with an HTPC nor do they like having to turn on a computer just to watch a movie!

I have to use my MP3 analogy again, but how many people actually rip their CD collections in FLAC? Most are gonna rip them at a decent bitrate that sounds very close to the original like 192kbps. It's the same way with HD movie rips. I mentioned Handbrake before, but with bitrate settings like 4000kbps, a resolution reduction of 1280x720, and HD audio reduced to DTS, I end up with MKVs between 4 & 5GB. You would be hard pressed to see or hear the difference between the original. Likewise with DVD rips; I use audio passthrough (usually DD), full resolution, and a bitrate of 1700, the resulting file size is just a little over a gig per movie. It ends up being a little cheaper ripping them to drives for me, but the biggest thing is the convenience of having all my movies in one place and not having an unsightly pile of discs. And who isn't equipped with a "HTPC"? Sorry, but I have to call BS on that one. If you have a PC capable of ripping and burning blurays, then you most definitely have a PC capable of playing a video file.

Quote from Trailblazer : If you want to talk about rebates, why not talk about the *reason* that companies do them. I assume it's to sell my information along with the item I'm buying, a profile of sorts, to intertested parties that then use my information however they want. I'm still a sucker, and will continue to do rebates, but I don't whore myself for cheap. I only go for the expensive ones! Doesn't that somehow make me smarter(er)???

I assume it is because they can advertise a low after rebate price knowing that a large percentage of people either won't bother to file the MIR, will forget to do it, won't follow all of the directions correctly, and/or won't keep copies of their submission. On average, this allows the company to make much more per unit than the advertised price after MIR.

Quote from cu0ne : Hi SDers! Are there any free software that will play BD? Or what is a good software to buy? TY.

The only free software combo I've found that has played every disk I've tried without requiring you to rip the Blu-Ray first is Daum PotPlayer [softpedia.com] with DVDFab Passkey [dvdfab.com].

MakeMKV [makemkv.com] is a good free way to rip Blu-Rays to your PC. You can then play them back (with PotPlayer, VLC, etc.) &/or re-encode them to save space with another program (like Handbrake); you just have to re-download the newest version once every 60 days since it is technically a beta trial.

Quote from cdrptrks : The only free software combo I've found that has played every disk I've tried without requiring you to rip the Blu-Ray first is Daum PotPlayer [softpedia.com] with DVDFab Passkey [dvdfab.com].

+1^^^

Just found this combo as well. Works perfectly although there's some funkiness with banding in PotPlayer in .mkv's, but not in BluRay. Passkey is sweet. Thanks DVDFab!

Quote from RyanL : I have to use my MP3 analogy again, but how many people actually rip their CD collections in FLAC? Most are gonna rip them at a decent bitrate that sounds very close to the original like 192kbps. It's the same way with HD movie rips. I mentioned Handbrake before, but with bitrate settings like 4000kbps, a resolution reduction of 1280x720, and HD audio reduced to DTS, I end up with MKVs between 4 & 5GB. You would be hard pressed to see or hear the difference between the original. Likewise with DVD rips; I use audio passthrough (usually DD), full resolution, and a bitrate of 1700, the resulting file size is just a little over a gig per movie. It ends up being a little cheaper ripping them to drives for me, but the biggest thing is the convenience of having all my movies in one place and not having an unsightly pile of discs. And who isn't equipped with a "HTPC"? Sorry, but I have to call BS on that one. If you have a PC capable of ripping and burning blurays, then you most definitely have a PC capable of playing a video file.

What you do with YOUR media fits YOUR purposes, and not everybody else's. And I actually rip my CDs into FLAC/ALAC and stash my CDs away. As I said earlier, I prefer physical discs over a single video file for many reasons: 1) I can pop them into another BD player in the house or take them over to my friend's house when we have movie nights without having to worry about losing or scratching up the original 2) I do not have a PC dedicated to watching movies or listing to music. The only computer I have which I use for ripping and burning BD is a midtower which I keep in my room on a computer desk and not next to a TV 3) When you compare BD to HDD, it is cheaper when you compare $/GB 4) I know what I need to do to compress a movie into BD25 and. I like keeping original audio and subtitles. This is what I am happy with and I do not see why you need to try to persuade others that converting BDs to MKV is better than having a BD25 backup. And one more thing... if I wanted to be even more stingy, I can make a BD5 version and burn it on a DVD5 to play on a BD player. Not every BD player supports MKV.

Bottom line, you do whatever you want with your media but don't tell others how they should back up their media.

Quote from yoyobabyyo : What you do with YOUR media fits YOUR purposes, and not everybody else's. And I actually rip my CDs into FLAC/ALAC and stash my CDs away. As I said earlier, I prefer physical discs over a single video file for many reasons: 1) I can pop them into another BD player in the house or take them over to my friend's house when we have movie nights without having to worry about losing or scratching up the original 2) I do not have a PC dedicated to watching movies or listing to music. The only computer I have which I use for ripping and burning BD is a midtower which I keep in my room on a computer desk and not next to a TV 3) When you compare BD to HDD, it is cheaper when you compare $/GB 4) I know what I need to do to compress a movie into BD25 and. I like keeping original audio and subtitles. This is what I am happy with and I do not see why you need to try to persuade others that converting BDs to MKV is better than having a BD25 backup. And one more thing... if I wanted to be even more stingy, I can make a BD5 version and burn it on a DVD5 to play on a BD player. Not every BD player supports MKV. Bottom line, you do whatever you want with your media but don't tell others how they should back up their media.

Sorry if I came off as trying to tell people what to do; I'm just trying to explain that there is an easier/ more modern way of doing things. I used to burn a lot of media a few years back and got tired of it. You still end up with stacks of media so I don't see how you end up ahead. It certainly doesn't simplify things. If you want to argue about cost per burning, lets go there. For one, the software to burn is far from free. Plus BD burners usually cost more than just the BD-ROM readers. Then you have to hunt for deals on quality media (you end up paying just as much for the cheap stuff because you end up with coasters). Like I said, storage is cheap. There's been a few deals lately on larger drives (3 & 4TB). You can put quite a collection on a 4TB drive unless of course you're obsessive compulsive about keeping it in it's original format with extras, subtitles, etc (which most have little use for and if you keep the original discs anyway, you can always go back to revisit it later). And as I and others have mentioned, you can get all the software for ripping/converting and playback for free (DVDFab passkey, MakeMKV, Handbrake, VLC player, etc). Like I said, been there done that and ripping converting is a cheaper way to go in the long run.

I don't know if you said that one just have one PC to be contrary, but you don't have a laptop kicking around? It's as easy as plugging in a HDMI cable these days. Hell, even my parents have 3 PCs (more if you count laptops). They even have a couple of streaming media devices that have media playback capability.

You're also a minority if you rip CDs as FLAC (I knew that I would ruffle someone's feathers by mentioning FLAC). You either have some fairly high end gear if you can really hear a difference or have OCD. You're not going to hear the difference on a $1000 sound system. It's pretty much the same with audio tracks on a bluray; most people who say they can hear a difference between DTS and DTS-HD are full of crap. It's more of a placebo effect than anything else. Do a blind taste test and check out the results.