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Is it still worth owning DVD's? (1 Viewer)

Billy Fogerty

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I have over 700 dvd's . After renting from NetFlix for the last two years,I have wondered why I bought so many DVD's. Most I have never watched more than once or twice. And then the constant special editions and versions. Not to mention the expense after all these years. Now with HD, eventually they will be obsolete. And NetFlix has all the HD DVD's. Anyone else feel this way? Would love to hear your opinions.
 

Micah Cohen

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I personally am going to try to avoid rebuying everything and upgrading to HD. I'd like to never ever have to buy into a new format. I'd like to die with my DVD collection, just the way it is. I use Netflix to determine whether something is worth owning now, much more than I used to. But I still buy DVDs when I want to own a great film, I still love them, and I am determined not to rebuy my collection of classic and great films on some new format. When DVDs are considered "old school," I'm going to be "old school" with my DVD collection.

MC
 

Dave Scarpa

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To a Degree, I would definately say the coming of HD has slowed my new purchases, I still buy Older films, but mostly my purchases are TV series, I find of all DVD's these have the most rewatchability factor.
 

Brandon Conway

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I think once somebody gets over ~150 titles in their collection they need to be willing to look at it as more than just a collection and something along the lines of a personal media library. If one thinks of a home book library there are hundreds of titles that fill the shelves that are very rarely, if ever, re-read, but something about gathering them together and simply having the option to re-read those titles makes it worthwhile. The same is true, IMO, of a personal media library.
 

Frank@N

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Wow, this thread must have come through a time warp from 10 years in the future...

Seriously, my only partial regret is buying 4:3 encoded DVDs.

I'll be watching all my DVDs for years to come (maybe forever) and they are a constant source of amusement and enlightenment.
 
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seriously, if you own 700 dvd's and you only watched them once then I think you need a new hobby. The whole essence of buying dvd's is that you can watch them multiple times in a time of your choosing. I certainly should avoid buying any HD media because then you will have the same dissapointment a few years from now.
 

Radioman970

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Make a Top 50 list of your favorites and just upgrade those. Many movies can only look so good, so don't upgrade those.

- signed, Dr. Da. ;)
 

Stephen Orr

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Well, ever since I started renting from Netflix, my DVD purchases have gone way down to less that 1 every couple of months, and even then, I have to really want it. But seriously, I did not realize that Netflix is now renting HD DVD and BluRay... I may buy a new player sooner than later...
 

Jason_V

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DVD's as we know them won't be obsolete for many many years. The new players have been promised to be backward compatible, meaning that even with an HD player I can still play my Disney's Dinosaur 2 Disc set. So, no, it's not pointless for me. There are things I've seen and definately want; then there are things I'm mildly interested in. That's what Netflix is for.

As has been stated, I like having the option of putting in any title I own at any given time. I make it a habit of putting on things like the Planet of the Apes documentary while I'm doing a big cooking job. I don't know how many times I've seen it, but it's still fascinating.

I do prune my collection from time to time. Things that were great deals I bought because they had come recommended. The Shield Season 1, for one. Got it for $13 at Sam's, watched an episode and have had no interest in going back to it. So it's in the "get rid of" pile.
 

Max Leung

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For a time (the last year) I thought the same as the poster - but now I'm finding I am buying more DVDs than ever, despite having a zip.ca account (the Canadian equivalent of Netflix).

I've been collecting more anime and TV series than I ever thought I would - DeepDiscountDVD.com had a big sale a month ago and now I own "The Office (BBC)", Banner of the Stars 1 & 2, Grey's Anatomy, Battlestar Galactica, etc. I haven't been buying a lot of movies.

Admittedly, I probably won't watch the above more than once. However, I am also collecting the superb Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex series. This is probably the best Science Fiction show ever made - I've watched them several times over already. The replayability is just incredible - the show NEVER gets old. Superb plot and production values. If I were to rate the DVDs I own based on rewatchability, then Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex beats out Firefly, Babylon 5, BSG, Star Wars, Contact, 2001, Lost, and all the others as the best SF television show or movie of all time.
 

Douglas R

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Who has the time to watch 700 DVDs over and over? I have about the same number but there are several hundred which I haven't even got round to watching once yet. I think when you have a large collection it's all about having a personal film library, not just the viewing. Mind you, now that I am approaching 800 titles I have had to seriously re-appraise my priorities and am drastically cutting down on the DVDs I buy. I think there comes a time when you realise you simply have too many.
 

Jeff Ulmer

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I have all but given up buying DVDs. My collection is pretty large (I've reviewed over 550 titles alone), but like the OP, 99% of them have been viewed once, if at all. TV series are about the only thing I'm interested in buying these days, but even those are limited. There are still a few rare film titles that I want which aren't yet available on DVD, but for others I will hold out for the HD version. As for upgrading, the plan will be to limit those to films I know I will rewatch, which is still only a very small percentage of my current collection.
 

JoePassmore

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I agree to an extent with the poster's sentiments; even share with them a little, but a collector's mindset is hardly a practical one in my experience.
 

Manus

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I will only repurchase my absolute favourites and then only if they are quite recent. Dont forget that the new HD players can upsample the video on SD-Dvds to raise them close to HD level.

Even with 200 channels on tv there are still (far too many) occasions when there's nothing on that grabs me :) so I like the idea of a storage-based personal video media library like the one demonstrated here :

http://www.cinenow.com/uk/play-video-353.html

I would much rather organise my current collection like that than get involved with another format war too early . I like the idea of having not just 1000 films but having easy access to them.

~M~
 

TheLongshot

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A couple years ago I really slowed down in my purchases, particularly since I had a backlog that I'm still not caught up on. I've actually have been working on cleaning out the chaff in my collection just for space reasons. (Which is why even buying something because it is cheap isn't very worth it for me.)

I have been buying more TV shows on DVD, because it is easy to just slip in a 1/2 hour or an hour show during the week rather than a 2+ hour movie.

As others have said, NetFlix makes it easier to avoid buying DVDs, but there are always those movies that you'd like to have on hand just in case.

Jason
 

jim.vaccaro

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"Having is not so pleasing a thing, after all, as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true."

-Spock
 

Jonathan Peterson

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I too have slowed down with movie purchases. This is mainly due to me now owning my most wanted titles. These days I buy mostly TV sets. In about a year or so I will probably own all of those I want.

Since joining Netflix, I do rent a lot of movies and realize that once is enough with many movies. I also recently watched a demo of both HD and Blu Ray and thought they were okay but not worth the upgrade for us. Maybe if a winner is decided on in that war I will take the plunge but for the meantime I am happy with the current format. I am getting too old to keep rebuying the same films over and over.
 

AaronMan

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Why did you buy them? I love movies and some TV. I buy stuff that I really like and to have it available anytime I want to watch it. If I think I'm only going to watch it once, I will not buy it.

I also like to collect stuff. DVDs are a different medium than VHS in that they are more suitible for archiving. Buy it once and you own it forever. VHS wears out. Barring a weird defect or something, DVDs are very durable and the quality on the 100th viewing is just as good as the first.
 

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