www.makemkv.com

Couple questions here that are kinda but not really related to eachother here, but I'll put them together in one post anyway.
I have had a handful of movies fail to rip due to Hash errors and whatnot "Signs of a failing drive" as the forums so aptly put, and I wanted to know if anyone has any suggestions for drives to get. I was trying to shop around but I see alot of talk about the whole Libredrive thing and I'm not really sure what it means but from what I can tell it pretty much just means the drive will work better and will allow ripping of 4ks/region locked content. If that's the case this is something that I will be needing in the future. So theres the first question, is my understanding (as basic as it is) correct?

I am using a LG WH16NS40, which I bought in 2020 and has some miles on it now. It has been working great up until last night (I had 3 fails in a row, which could be just bad luck and bad discs) but I think I would like to get another drive as a backup in case I do have some particularily tough rips. I have read that mine can be flashed to a Libre drive (not that I know how to do it as of now) so I believe I can theoretically get started on ripping stuff, but like I said, 3 fails aint very reassuring. Ive seen suggestions for mostly Pioneer drives so I would like some guidence in the right direction. Any suggestions?

What is LibreDrive?

Having a drive that supports LibreDrive is a requirement if you want to rip 4K discs. It also makes things easier in a bunch of corner cases with regular blu-rays and DVDs.

Pioneer drives are considered the best these days. Unfortunately, a while ago Pioneer released a firmware update that disables LibreDrive support for MakeMKV. Pioneer firmware update February 2023 The sellers on this forum still have access to Pioneer drives with the older, supported firmware so they're your best bet getting a Pioneer drive.

Before Pioneer drives were supported, the LG BU40N drive was held in high regard, but I think the consensus is that drive has been surpassed by Pioneer drives.

If you happen to live in Europe, the Verbatim 43888 has an older Pioneer drive inside it. It'll work out of the box with MakeMKV, but it isn't quite a good as Pioneer's newer (and more expensive) drives. This badly named thread sings the praises of the 43888: Verbatim 34888 is super