Hello,
I have a Blu-ray collection I’d like to digitize. I understand that ripping 4K discs involves extra steps, but if I’m only looking to back up standard HD Blu-rays, will any Blu-ray drive work?
I’m seeing a lot of no-name Blu-ray drives online for around $40, while others are priced closer to $300, but most of the well-known brands seem to be out of stock. What’s causing such a big price difference, and why are reputable models so hard to find right now?
I also noticed Best Buy sells an LG Blu-ray “rewriter”—does that mean it can only burn discs and not read them?
For context, I’m using a Mac. Any advice would be appreciated—thank you!
Will any blu ray drive work for HD?
Re: Will any blu ray drive work for HD?
AFAIK theoretically you can use any blu-ray drive to rip regular BD with MakeMKV. However there have been reports that recent version(s) are problematic with non-LibreDrive. (With that said there seems to be ways to work around the regression in addition to using an older version.)
Also I think non-LibreDrive are affected by AACS/MKB version bump. I don't exactly know the details, but I guess in the worst case e.g. inserting some new title to your drive could result in the drive no longer being able to rip older titles, not even those it was once able to rip -- until MakeMKV is updated to deal with the new version. (And even if that is true, it doesn't happen very often.)
I think probably all BD drives that are able to burn a BD is a "rewriter", because most if not all of them support writing to BD-RE in addition BD-R. I'm not aware of drives that can "only burn". (There are "BD Combo / DVD rewriter" that can only read BD and read/write DVD though.)
Also I think non-LibreDrive are affected by AACS/MKB version bump. I don't exactly know the details, but I guess in the worst case e.g. inserting some new title to your drive could result in the drive no longer being able to rip older titles, not even those it was once able to rip -- until MakeMKV is updated to deal with the new version. (And even if that is true, it doesn't happen very often.)
I think probably all BD drives that are able to burn a BD is a "rewriter", because most if not all of them support writing to BD-RE in addition BD-R. I'm not aware of drives that can "only burn". (There are "BD Combo / DVD rewriter" that can only read BD and read/write DVD though.)