Can anyone give me some advice re. server storage and optional hardware for replacing or digitally s (1 Viewer)

I was speaking with my handyman the other day, and he mentioned that he'd worked on a client's home who had some sort of entertainment system which held thousands of DVD's inside a network-based computer drive that was connected to all of the televisions in their home. This got me thinking... I currently own somewhere in the realm of 2,000 DVD's, give or take (most likely give!) and storage is becoming a major dillemma. I've long since ditched all the plastic cases and have resorted to binder sotrage. I've spent hundreds of dollars on binders and my limited shelf space is now being severely compromised. Beyond which, it is extremely inconvenient to have to flip through hundreds upon hundreds of pages whenever I want to watch a movie. It's a horrible system that I currently use and I am desperate for a change towards efficiency! I have spent hours Googling hardware solutions akin to what my handyman described, and have come up with very little. As mentioned, I have a large library! At least 2000 plastic discs, if not more... If such a storage system existed, wherein all discs could be inserted into some (assumably monster sized!) bit of hardware, and organized/categorized digitally by title, genre, etc. I would spring for it at any cost! I am doubtful that any such a thing exists that could possibly accommodate such an abundant collection of DVDs however... My next though, is some kind of digital storage that would allow me to rip and ideally dispose of ALL discs, without compromising any A/V quality. I've never ripped a DVD and I imagine it would be a daunting task to do so and upload thousands of movie files, extras, etc. to a server... but it's an option I'd potentially be willing to explore. What I'd like to know is, what would seem the most convenient, accessible, efficient, and integrated piece of hardware for my given situation (keeping in mind that space in my single bedroom apartment is limited!) and would there be any concern for the protection of data once uploaded (could there be any risk of deletion) and would there be any potential compromise to my storage data if I were to ditch the source material ie. the discs themselves... I'm thinking in terms of digital copyright protection laws or whatever. I really have no clue about any of this or where to start? So to summarize... I want to get rid of every last physical DVD that I own, but still be able to access all films on any device in my home (television, laptop, etc). If there were some sort of mega multi-disc drive which I could feed these DVDs into to store and feed to playback devices (DVD/BluRay player and TV) that would be my ideal choice! I have a LOT of meda however... if costs were reasonable and the units were fairly streamlined in size, I'd even consider owning two if that would solve the issue of accommodating such a vast collection. If this is not realistic, I'd like some advice on digital servers where I could store exact digital replicas of every last encoded space of each of my DVDs at full resolution and without any potential A/V glitches in playback, and without having to keep the physical discs as backup. Could you please offer advice and suggestions? Thanks so much!!

I have found what would seem ideal for a smaller collection - KALEIDECSCAPE DV700 DISC VAULT - however it only stores a maximum of 320 DVDs which is less than a quarter of the amount of discs that I'm dealing with, and it retails for around 5k! Does something just like this exist with larger storage capacity?? If there were a similar Disc Vault which could accommodate 2,000 DVDs I'd purchase it instantly! (fingers crossed that the forum collective could point me towards such a unit)

What you're asking for is fairly common, most people who do this rip their DVDs/BRs to a HT PC, or to a NAS device. It's not very expensive, you just have to get enough storage. As you mentioned you also have to rip each disc. The problem of course is that ripping discs is illegal in the US, since you have to break disc encryption to rip the disc. As you've found, hardware solutions are very expensive, but if you are willing to spend that kind of money you may get lucky. I think I've seena few posts about such devices, so if you haven't yet, do a search.

Thank you. I was shocked to see that the unit I mentioned above (Kaleidescape) retails for something like 20k; that is outrageous!! I've been trying to search the forum for similar devices for ripping DVDs but have not had any luck or success with results. Do you have any links that could steer me in the right direction? Thanks again. PS - What exactly is Drobo and has anyone heard of it before? Is it just a storage server? What about organizing a digital database of DVD titles for easy filtering and searching through a large collection?

What if I used a Samsung SE-506AB/TSBD 6X USB2.0 External Slim Blu-ray Writer Drive to rip all of my DVDs to a Drobo 5 or 8 Bay and then bought an Apple TV to feed to m HDTV? Would this allow me to rip **lossless** DVD's (menu, content and all) without sacrificing A/V quality and be able to organize and playback on my television?

Drobo is a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device. It only provides storage. It could also be a DLNA server, but since you want to recreated the disc playback experience you will also need an ISO player, and you won't be able to use DLNA for ISO playback. Given that, and the fact that you only have one room, you don't *need* a NAS, you only need local storage on a PC. Yes, you can rip lossless. This forum take a very strict view of discussing the ripping process, so we can't go there. I hate to do this, but you may want to visit the AVS -> Networking, Media Servers & Content Streamers forum. They have some how-to's and such.

Thank you Al, so what I really need is a lossless media ripper, external hd for storage, and media jukebox to keep everything organized... is there any hardware that offers all of the above in one easy-to-use unit? Thanks for the tip on AVS, I'll poke my head around there as well.