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Blu Ray 1:1 streaming (1 Viewer)

dorito777

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I want to find out if it is possible to rip blu rays in 1:1 lossless format, with subtitles and everything, included to a PC or NAS (or something else) and be able to access them and stream them to a home theater system in the same lossless quality that a Blu Ray would play in and then also be able to use that same media library to stream the 1080p content to other TVs in the house and be able to handle any amount of transcoding?
 

Dave Upton

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This is possible, and doesn't require transcoding. You basically have to use software to rip (AnyDVD HD is the most popular) and then store on a NAS or PC's SMB share. From there, you just need a device that can play back blu-ray's codecs natively. The cheapest solution for this is a Kodi box (PC or android based).
 

dorito777

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Will I still be able to do this if I am building my own NAS/HTPC?

We were thinking of having the NAS/HTPC rack mounted and using Plex to stream to other TVs in the house. But the idea is that we want to be able to play the 1:1 blu ray rips to the home theater TV. Should we be using an NVIDIA shield using a Kodi client? We want to be able to build a large media library using blu rays rips (mostly) and some downloaded content. We want to be able to use subtitles and all of the bells and whistles like HDR or surround sound and push the movies/shows to the home theater (in the same rack). Then we also want to be able to stream the movies/shows to the other TVs in the house using PS4s and Plex apps as clients. The idea is that we don't mind if we have to transcode 2-3 streams at a time to the rest of the house, but we want to avoid transcoding at all on the home theater, so that it plays there in a lossless format. No pixelation, no delays, flawless quality as if I just put the blu ray into the machine itself. Hopefully this makes sense.

We already have a Shield. Right now we are trying to figure out if this is possible...and if it is (I am assuming it is)....what a good parts list would be for the NAS build would be....we want a rackmount chassis, hot swappable drives, running FreeNAS ideally and a ZFS configuration. Are we on the right path? And would someone recommend a solid parts list to accomplish this? I want this configuration to be a beast, so feel free to tell me some top of the line configurations to accomplish this and still have room for expansion and improvements in the future.
 

dorito777

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I did a bunch of research today and tried looking through specs and understand my requirements. Here is a parts list I came up with for this build:
  • ASRock Fatal1ty Gaming X299 Professional Gaming i9 LGA 2066 Intel X299 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
  • Intel Core i7-7820X Processor
  • iStarUSA D-380HN Black Aluminum 3U Rackmount Compact 8x 3.5" Bay Trayless Hotswap microATX Chassis
  • WD Red 4TB NAS Hard Disk Drive - 5400 RPM Class SATA 6 Gb/s 64MB Cache 3.5 Inch - WD40EFRX x8
  • SAMSUNG 16GB 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM ECC Registered DDR4 2666 (PC4 21300) Server Memory Model M393A2K40BB2-CTD x4

For the chassis, I like the 3U, trayless, hotswap design a lot. There were not a lot of options outside of this that I could find, or maybe Newegg just doesn't filter very well. I selected the processor based on its performance values on PassMark. It is a top contender for a PassMark benchmark, which should solidify me for any potential transcoding. I selected the WD 4TB HDDs for now and will upgrade them to 8TB as I grow my library. 8 of them, for now, at 4TB should be plenty of space to get me started with 1:1 blu ray rips. I selected the RAM based on speed (2666) and ECC/Registered.

The part I had the most trouble with was the motherboard. I wanted 10 SATA ports (for the 8 NAS drives and 1 for the OS SSD that I will add in running FreeNAS). I am not sure if that is necessary or not, but if it is, it really limited my options to a "gaming" MoBo. In doing so, I lost the ability for IPMI, which was a really intriguing feature considering I have a gaming PC already and would love to use it to maintain my Server completely. The other thing is that the processor is a 2066 socket and there were not any motherboards from a "server" selection that had IPMI that could support a 2066 socket. The highest I found was 2011, which, at best, would support a 4th generation CPU...which is probably going to limit me.

Am I on the right track? Is the parts list I have up there sufficient for my goals with wiggle room? Or does my setup not work at all? What should I swap out or use instead? Thanks!
 

Dave Upton

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My 5 cents. Don't waste time/money on plex or any transcoding solution. You're giving up picture quality, which is the whole point of ripping blu-rays and playing them back natively.

Invest in the right endpoints (Kodi players)like this: http://****/2eX5e0w and you can play anything back without transcoding. Then all you really need is a NAS.

You are on the right track in terms of the FreeNAS build, but your hardware selections don't really make sense given your goals. I'd adjust as follows:

Suggested drives: HGST NAS - these are my current fave, I run 8x4TB. https://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod...2146116&cm_re=HGST_NAS-_-22-146-116-_-Product
Suggested motherboard/CPU: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813182821 / https://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod...m_re=lga_1150_xeon-_-9SIA25V5MB6977-_-Product

Pick memory on the QVL for this motherboard, and you're good to go.
 

DaveF

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Plex, Kodi, and Emby are all cousins and aren't strictly transcoding software. They're library management server tools. They may not be the right solution for everyone, but they are meant to be used in conjunction with those streaming boxes.

As the OP has a Shield, I don't think there's any need to buy a new streaming box.
 

DaveF

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I did a bunch of research today and tried looking through specs and understand my requirements. Here is a parts list I came up with for this build:
  • ASRock Fatal1ty Gaming X299 Professional Gaming i9 LGA 2066 Intel X299 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
  • Intel Core i7-7820X Processor
  • iStarUSA D-380HN Black Aluminum 3U Rackmount Compact 8x 3.5" Bay Trayless Hotswap microATX Chassis
  • WD Red 4TB NAS Hard Disk Drive - 5400 RPM Class SATA 6 Gb/s 64MB Cache 3.5 Inch - WD40EFRX x8
  • SAMSUNG 16GB 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM ECC Registered DDR4 2666 (PC4 21300) Server Memory Model M393A2K40BB2-CTD x4
...

Am I on the right track? Is the parts list I have up there sufficient for my goals with wiggle room? Or does my setup not work at all? What should I swap out or use instead? Thanks!

This is overkill. If you're only ripping, an i3 is sufficient. If you are unsure what you'll be doing, an i5 is a good compromise. If you know you're playing UHD discs or plan on doing lots of transcoding or gaming, only then do you need an i7.

You don't need a top-shelf "gaming" motherboard. A competent MB with Intel integrated graphics will do you.

If you're doing uncompressed rips, figure 25GB per movie. A 4TB drive holds about 150 movies with no redundancy or backup. A consumer NAS box is easier but more expensive. Using RAID software on your PC is cheaper and more flexible but more complicated. (I use SnapRaid and DrivePool with 3x5TB drives.)
 

Dave Upton

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Plex, Kodi, and Emby are all cousins and aren't strictly transcoding software. They're library management server tools. They may not be the right solution for everyone, but they are meant to be used in conjunction with those streaming boxes.

As the OP has a Shield, I don't think there's any need to buy a new streaming box.
Plex's native playback method utilizes transcoding, while also offering vastly more limited video quality options than Kodi. It's great for what it is meant to be (accessing your media from 3rd party devices and when not at home). Inside your home, Kodi is clearly superior.

Plex is the easy button of media management/playback tools with excellent remote streaming features. Kodi is the undisputed champion at LAN based playback of audio and video at maximum quality and offers the finest control (bitstreaming, video calibration, filters, it goes on and on)

The OP's shield is fine for a single room, i'm simply suggesting the most cost effective method to scale to new rooms in his home if he wants to.
 

DaveF

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Plex's native playback method utilizes transcoding, while also offering vastly more limited video quality options than Kodi. It's great for what it is meant to be (accessing your media from 3rd party devices and when not at home). Inside your home, Kodi is clearly superior.

For local playback there's no transcoding. For network playback you can adjust the streaming options to dial up the bandwidth. I use Emby, but my impression is both allow for no transcoding assuming the playing box supports that.

In any case, Kodi is another flavor of media library server. I chose against it for Emby since Emby fit my goals best. But Kodi has its fans and it's merits. And I think the UI is much improved from when I used in last year.
 

dorito777

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Ok so let me try and address everyone's feedback. I do appreciate the help so far.

I am basically trying to accomplish 2 things. I want a configuration that would allow me to rip 1:1 lossless blu rays to a storage device. Custom built or premade, whatever. I want to be able to natively play this on a single home theater setup (HDMI to AV Receiver to 7.1 Surround Sound + 4k HDR flat screen). I want that to have a UI that allows me to select from my media library and for it to play perfectly...no transcoding, no delay, no lag, and all of the features (Dolby Surround Sound, etc). I want it to be exactly as if I put the disc in and played it directly.

The 2nd goal is to use the same ripped content and be able to access it in the other rooms of the house using Plex on the PS4. PS4 as a client will require some form of transcoding usually, so I wanted hardware to be able to handle 2-3 streams of transcoding basically.

Originally I was under the impression that a direct play native setup for ripped MKV blu rays was impossible without a server/client. So I was trying to find a good combination of Plex and Kodi to accomplish this and a solid HTPC/NAS combination build that would allow for both streams. So is this possible...and if so, what do I need? What kind of hardware should I aim for in a HTPC build and how does it all connect?

One thing to keep in mind is that my GOAL is to be able to leverage 4k/HDR content one day on the home theater. I know you can't really rip UHD right now, but if it comes, I would like my home theater to be able to maintain that native lossless playback functionality.

Right now I have a server rack (hence the server chassis preference) and I have an NVIDIA Shield to use as a client if need be....I am mostly trying to determine the proper configuration and hardware parts list to get what I want out of the system...

Thanks!
 

DaveF

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Here's what I did:

I custom-built an i5-based HTPC, which is connected to my projector for full-quality playback. It's also the server for (real-time) transcoded streaming to AppleTV's and iPad's around the house. In practice, I use it as a direct-connect player but rarely use the streaming ability. I use Emby for my server / client software. Plex and Kodi would also work, but Emby is a better fit for me. The tradeoff is my theater client is also the server so I get the heat and noise from in my theater. Life has compromises and that was one I needed. This supports DVD and blu-ray (SD and HD) content. I don't have any 4k UHD material or players or displays; that's a future upgrade.

The general recommendation is to separate these functions:
1) Have a ripping / transcoding server such as your rack mount somewhere not in a viewing room
2) Have a NAS that stores all media processed by the server. This might be integrated into the (1) server, or for simplicity be a standalone box
3) Have silent, low-power streaming clients in the viewing rooms

The trick is to setup clients that support direct streaming of the MKV from the server / NAS. Dave Upton recommended the previous box using Kodi server / client. Some quick googling indicates that this might also work with Plex on your Shield but folks have had difficulties with direct streaming in the past. Plex on your PS4 might or might not support direct streaming (non-transcoded). You'll probably have to try it out and/or do some searching to see what it supports.
 

DaveF

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As for 4k UHD... I think you need a Kaby Lake 7th Gen i7, a UHD drive, and PowerDVD 17. I don't think there's any streaming capability for UHD discs. There's seems no likelihood of UHD being rippable in the near future. Which means that a PC built today may be obsolete when you're able to rip 4k media -- if ever that's possible.

And if you want 4k Netflix, you'd get that from a local streaming box, not from streaming from an i7 UHD server, I think.
I think it's better to build a lower cost HD-only HTPC and buy a standalone UHD player today.

But going the HTPC route is pure hobbyist / enthusiast so you may well want to build a UHD capable PC today for your fun and enjoyment. If so, I look forward to hearing about it!

It looks like you're knowledgeable about building PC's, but maybe new to the HTPC category. This is a decent website for getting ideas about different build approaches.
https://mediaexperience.com/updated-htpc-recommendations/

And I beg Dave and Ron's forgiveness for this, but I've got a detailed thread on building my HTPC on another forum. (It's not on HTF for historical reasons, and I'd like to bring it to HTF since we're now having such conversations here.)
 

dorito777

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Definitely good information. That is more-or-less the idea I was going for... The rack will be sitting in a closet behind the theater room, so I am hopeful the noise will not interfere. The client I have right now is an NVIDIA Shield for the home theater. The rest of the house will be PS4s or Rokus or something similar for each TV. I was planning on using Kodi as the client on the shield and pointing it at a Plex server on the HTPC. That way I can use Plex apps on the PS4s and Rokus and it will still transcode fine for those TVs.

So I would say that I have clients set up already, the part I need help with would be the HTPC/NAS setup. I have had people suggest splitting the NAS and Server and then some people recommend just building a single unit. I am not sure what the benefits are for each. I guess if I separated them, then I could do 2 different rack mount chassis and actually build each to be specific.

As an example, I could use one chassis and have a higher end MoBo to support better processors like the 2066 socket. And then in the server, I could focus on the HDD support and SATA connections. Does that seem logical?

So looking at my previous parts list, what would be a recommended build for them to be separated? And how do you do direct playback direct to the TV from the HTPC? I thought HTPC had trouble playing content directly and needed a server/client configuration. Or maybe that is just for 4k HDR content? I read that HTPC can't playback 4k or HDR content well at this point.
 

Dave Upton

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The major benefit to building a more powerful xeon based NAS/Plex server is that you can consolidate everything in one box to lower costs.

A NAS is just a file share - there's nothing special about it. One day, when Android based boxes like the one I linked become available with the chip onboard for UHD/HDR, you'll just need to play back mkv/iso files with that content inside natively through Kodi, it won't be a problem.

Now, as to what it would take to transcode UHD/HDR via Plex, we are way too early in the format to answer that question. It's quite possible you will be able to do that with a dedicated GPU down the road, so if you size your server case properly, you can leave room for a graphics card down the road to offload the UHD/HDR transcoding to once that becomes available.
 

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...

And I beg Dave and Ron's forgiveness for this, but I've got a detailed thread on building my HTPC on another forum. (It's not on HTF for historical reasons, and I'd like to bring it to HTF since we're now having such conversations here.)

Feel free to do so, we are no longer against HTPC/ripping discussions here. That's largely my doing, as I could care less if it irritates the studios. We are paying for our media - and should be free to use it however we wish.
 

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As for 4k UHD... I think you need a Kaby Lake 7th Gen i7, a UHD drive, and PowerDVD 17. I don't think there's any streaming capability for UHD discs. There's seems no likelihood of UHD being rippable in the near future. Which means that a PC built today may be obsolete when you're able to rip 4k media -- if ever that's possible.

Awhile ago I briefly read through various publicly available 4Kbluray information on the technical details.

The one case which might be crackable, would be if the decryption keys are on the discs (ie. simlar to bluray and dvd).

Another hypothetical case is the encryption keys being stored on an online server and not on the disc, which would be quite difficult to crack. (I don't know if any 4Kbluray discs do it this way). Essentially not much different in concept than how the old Circuit City DIVX system performed authentication. (Only obvious way to crack such a case, would be to fish around the computer's memory and find the decryption keys by hand for each disc).
 

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I don't know from beans on this topic. But my guess is that it's going to be moot. By the time 4K is rippable, streaming will be the de facto solution. For me, I've just assumed that my $2500 HD HTPC is a deadend interim solution that will be the blu-ray repository in three years, made obsolete by a $100 4k streaming box.
 

Dave Upton

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Definitely good information. That is more-or-less the idea I was going for... The rack will be sitting in a closet behind the theater room, so I am hopeful the noise will not interfere. The client I have right now is an NVIDIA Shield for the home theater. The rest of the house will be PS4s or Rokus or something similar for each TV. I was planning on using Kodi as the client on the shield and pointing it at a Plex server on the HTPC. That way I can use Plex apps on the PS4s and Rokus and it will still transcode fine for those TVs.

So I would say that I have clients set up already, the part I need help with would be the HTPC/NAS setup. I have had people suggest splitting the NAS and Server and then some people recommend just building a single unit. I am not sure what the benefits are for each. I guess if I separated them, then I could do 2 different rack mount chassis and actually build each to be specific.

As an example, I could use one chassis and have a higher end MoBo to support better processors like the 2066 socket. And then in the server, I could focus on the HDD support and SATA connections. Does that seem logical?

So looking at my previous parts list, what would be a recommended build for them to be separated? And how do you do direct playback direct to the TV from the HTPC? I thought HTPC had trouble playing content directly and needed a server/client configuration. Or maybe that is just for 4k HDR content? I read that HTPC can't playback 4k or HDR content well at this point.
4K/HDR can be played back on a PC with the latest gen Intel processor, or with any machine using a dedicated graphics card (GTX 1060 or higher) if not copy protected. It's really just about having the capacity to handle h.265 HEVC and an HDMI 2.0+ device that can send HDR metadata. You can build an HTPC, but for you a dedicated box with Kodi is both cheaper and more effective.

The box I linked above will play back anything you throw at it via Kodi, but doesn't have native HDR/UHD support.
 

dorito777

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Ok guys, you have given me a ton of really valuable information. I am actually starting to understand my limitations a bit more and I think I may have a better idea of what I should be doing. I think the issue was that I was trying to accomplish 2 very different things and I thought they would all be doable with a single solution. I was trying to provide a solid 1080p media library to every TV in the house and play it losslessly to my Home Theater. Ideally surround sound and all of the bells and whistles that are included. I want it to play FLAWLESSLY on that TV....no lag, no pixelation, and have a pretty UI to select them from the couch. The rest of the TVs, I want them to be flawless as well, but it isn't THAT big of a deal...only 2-3 streams at a time most and they would be leveraged by Rokus or PS4s, so Plex basically.

For 4K and HDR, maybe I should be breaking that piece out and just purchasing a 4K-UHD-HDR10-Dolby Vision, blah blah blah, player and purchase the discs directly. So for the unique cases in which I want to play 4k content, I would just need to pop the disc in, but for the majority of the content at 1080p, I would have access directly.

So let's say I did that, I still want it to be a robust system capable of handling the content. So would you recommend just building a single unit or still separating them out? Can someone recommend a parts list for the 2 separate units? I really like that NAS Chassis I found, but I would be interested in the parts list someone would recommend for this setup. I can grab the Intel Core i7-7820X that has a 20k passmark, almost. That should be more than sufficient for transcoding for any number of streams and have plenty of room to ensure it is flawless. If I put that in a HTPC, build a separate NAS with FreeNAS, what would be the ideal computer parts for the rest of it?
 

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