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My streaming fatigue got so bad I started collecting DVDs

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Re: My streaming fatigue got so bad I started collecting DVDs

#26

Post by ghaff »

tayjohno wrote: post #15
neocritter wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does Redbox compare? I always see their kiosks, but I never think to look. I'm also surprised and amused to learn it's owned by Chicken Soup for the Soul. Yes, that Chicken Soup for the Soul.

Most I've used have a very small selection, maybe 30 total options, but a lot of those can be out of stock. If you have any sort of criteria (like I'm often looking for movies we could watch with our kids) there might only be one or two choices. I'd compare it to showing up at a cinema and just hoping to find a show that looked interesting and happened to be starting soon.

Yeah. I use them now and then for a current movie. But between the limited selection and the fact that I'll probably have to hop in the car for a dedicated trip the next day to return the movie, I use them pretty rarely.

Re: My streaming fatigue got so bad I started collecting DVDs

#27

Post by jeffbee »

Same here! I canceled HBO/Max, Hulu, and Disney and now I just buy discs by the armload at the local used books and records stores. The prices range from 99¢ to $10. The trigger was I wanted to watch The Abyss, the longer edition, and it's just not available anywhere. The DVD version looks great and sounds amazing compared to the tragically bad downmixes I get from streaming. After a few months of doing this now I have dozens of great movies on disc.

Re: My streaming fatigue got so bad I started collecting DVDs

#28

Post by myrandomcomment »

I had a ton back in the day. Then I ripped everything. All neatly sorted on my NAS and can be watched via Infuse on the AppleTV. Last year on a whim I purchased an unlocked Sony UHD player to watch something that I could only find on DVD and was region locked to not my area. I also picked up a few UHD titles from https://www.criterion.com/

Since then the number of UHD disc has grown and I have slowly removed things from the NAS in favor of the glorious UHD versions. Have the shelf of disc has made family movie night more fun.

As an aside I did a little experiment. Same movie streamed (at max quality), the UHD disc on the Sony(UBP-X800M2) and same UHD on the PS5. Everyone could without fail pick out which was which.

Re: My streaming fatigue got so bad I started collecting DVDs

#29

Post by tayjohno »

onion2k wrote: post #22

$5 per disc I think you could happily watch a different movie every night for a year on Netflix if you were happy with 'bargain bin' quality films. $5/night would be an expensive way of doing the same thing. And that's before you start on TV series...

I am on the side of the author for this one. Especially when it comes to series that are complete, you can often find them for extremely discounted prices. For example Amazon is selling the complete "The Office" DVD set for about $30, and I'm sure you could find it for cheaper at something like a thrift store. That's about the same as 2.5 months of Peacock "Premium Plus" at $11.99.

I know different people consume media at different speeds, but it would take us much longer than 2.5 months to watch all that content. Therefore we could pay for 3 months of Peacock or pay Amazon for the box set. In our case, the math checks out in favor of buying the physical media.

Obviously the math changes depending on the user. Monthly subscriptions will always win out for people who are able to devote a significant amount of time to using the product (e.g. a movie every night).

Re: My streaming fatigue got so bad I started collecting DVDs

#30

Post by capitainenemo »

jeffbee wrote: post #27

Same here! I canceled HBO/Max, Hulu, and Disney and now I just buy discs by the armload at the local used books and records stores. The prices range from 99¢ to $10. The trigger was I wanted to watch The Abyss, the longer edition, and it's just not available anywhere. The DVD version looks great and sounds amazing compared to the tragically bad downmixes I get from streaming. After a few months of doing this now I ha…

Pretty cool. I'm hunting for alternatives to Netflix DVD. I've been checking out Café DVD as a possibility but haven't actually tried it - it might not have as large a catalog. Another thing I've been meaning to try, but haven't yet, is hooking up VLC to https://github.com/k4yt3x/video2x/wiki or similar, since, yeah, while DVD quality is pretty decent, for certain genres sometimes I do want a bit more luscious detail.
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