Welcome to <i><b>Dumping your own DVD/Blu-ray discs for personal enjoyment!</b></i>

We have:
-Playlist obfuscation
-“You are running low on disk space”
-Riplock
-Two variants of LG WH14NS40, one capable of ripping UHD discs, the other not
-Dolby Vision is a fuck
-Spending a significant amount of time on doom9 and MakeMKV forums
-Java? More likely than you think!
-UHD discs requiring certain drives that scalpers are essentially holding hostage
-Firmware fuckery (Libredrive)
-“Your MakeMKV BETA trial key has expired”
-Cinavia audio watermarking (lol)
-Broken on arrival data, requiring Fix-up tables (FUTs)
-An entire disc’s worth of episodes in a single title
-Episodes out of order
-Oops, your AACS Host Certificate has been revoked in the latest media key block version
-Triple-layer UHD discs are a fuck
-Whatever the hell they did with the Fringe S01 Blu-ray release
-Cheap re-prints of TV seasons on single-layer DVD with even more compression!
-Purchasing a MakeMKV license key
-An apathetic industry that doesn’t care whether your expensive UHD discs actually play properly or not

@maddy I only buy DVDs because, in the face of your achievements, I am an abject coward.

All I have:
- Entire show apparently having the same disc names except for one episode
- Entire show ripping all languages, correctly identified, and VLC still always playing German first.
- Occasionally the Vista-era EliteBook's optical drive occasionally not reading a disc on first try

Important to note that there was an official way to play UHD Blu-ray on (Windows) PCs, requiring an Intel CPU with SGX CPU extensions, a compatible UHD Blu-ray drive, and (usually) paid software capable of playback.

This method has been largely abandoned for years, leaving no ‘official’ way to playback UHD Blu-ray on a computer at all.

Set top box UHD players that cost hundreds of dollars regularly struggle to play a triple-layer disc without hitching. In my experience, you can reliably play UHD Blu-ray on Xbox One S/X and Series X consoles as well as the PS5, but you miss out on Dolby Vision.

Fuck the industry - dump and decrypt your discs. Enjoy them on your terms.

@_aD Pfft, nothing wrong with only buying DVDs. I just happen to be very particular. :p

Ah yes, good ol’ [series] Disc 1, Disc 1, Disc 1, Disc 4! I don’t play media in VLC much, though I figured it would default to system language, if available.
And hey, at least SATA Slimline DVD drives are relatively plentiful and cheap in case yours stops reading discs completely!

@maddy So now there are UHD bluray drives but no way to playback from them?

@luana AFAIK the official UHD Blu-ray drives (for playback) are no longer in production, but certain BD-XL (the disc type that UHD Blu-rays are based on) drives can be made to read and dump these discs with some firmware fuckery.

Even then, direct playback isn’t really a thing since I don’t think software like VLC knows how to handle these discs, even if they’re decrypted on-the-fly.

If you have a compatible drive, best course of action is to dump the disc, or at least dump the main title(s) to MKV with software like MakeMKV.

@maddy the weird thing about playlist obfuscation is it doesn't even prevent you ripping the disc it just makes a billion random files on it that only one of is actually the game

(assuming im thinking about the right thing anyway, idk)

@Li Yeah, and it’s really annoying when you don’t have an easy way to suss out which playlist is the real one. Lots of documentation online (doom9 and makemkv forums) for discs sold in the US, but that doesn’t always match up with releases sold in Canada.

Just really fucking annoying. There’s a Hunger Games title I have dumped, but I haven’t ripped to MKV yet because of this.

@maddy yeah, thats what i remembered too, i mounted the disc and its like 4tb used, but i can still rip it as a ISO .. .. bleh

@maddy

and then you downscale them to 1080p AV1 2500kb/s video + opus audio 160

@gabboman Nah, all original quality at the moment!

@gabboman But AV1 is very, very good!

@maddy ...I keep forgetting physical releases for movies/TV shows still exist, in my head it's all been subsumed into streaming services 💀

@maddy I’m still astounded that no one’s made an open-source version of MakeMKV, since it’s conceptually simpler than alternatives like Handbrake.

@maddy

I have decided that my space on my 4tb usb HDD should be enough, so im encoding everything. 1gb/hour is good enough in my opinion

I have even gone further and series at 2000 or 1750kb/s and 128 audio (storing all tracks).

Sorry but pluribus 40gb for 8 hours 1080p… is too much

Movies should be 5 or 10gb!

@gabboman I’m very much a data hoarder. Something like this is of little consequence to me.

@maddy

Wait, I think I actually have Fringe Season 1 Blu Ray.

I gave it to my stepdad, and years later he gave it back.

Do I want to ask?

@Mendie_Taoma It’s been a while since I bothered to tackle it, but from what I remember, there was one disc with multiple episodes merged into the same title, and the same episode appearing twice on the same disc under a different title with different audio and subtitle tracks (possibly episode with commentary?)

It’s a little cursed.

@hazelnoot Probably because nobody wants to (publicly) show their cards regarding AACS decryption and bypass - I’m sure that hole would get closed REAL quick.

You’d still need something like Handbrake to compress or convert the dumped MKV from the disc anyway. MakeMKV doesn’t do much of any real processing aside from optional conversion of LPCM tracks to FLAC, and a couple of other things.

@maddy

yeah AAAAH

@maddy also if u remux UHD BDs, u can inject the often superior Dolby Vision and HDR10+ metadata found on streaming services into the often superior video and audio streams found on physical media

@maddy
I agree with all of this...... But how does one successfully dump Blu Rays...

Sidenote - If you plan to backup a Blu-ray disc to ISO, make sure that your Blu-ray drive is not capable of bus encryption. Some discs request bus encryption to be enabled, which adds another layer of encryption.
Doesn’t matter if you have all the disc keys if you don’t have the key the drive used for bus encryption.

Anyway, if your BD drive is old enough, there’s a good chance it doesn’t support bus encryption, making this a moot point. Image to ISO, and then you can decrypt if you have the correct keys for your release. If you have no way of dumping keys yourself, try searching online for ‘keydb.cfg’.

If you have one of those old LG hybrid BD-ROM/HD DVD-ROM drives, it shouldn’t be capable of bus encryption.

@maddy
Does that work on Linux

All this to say, physical ownership doesn’t mean shit if you’re facing DRM and anti-features like the above.

The only way to guarantee access for the foreseeable future to the film/show you bought on disc is to dump and decrypt it, and back up the decrypted dump somewhere. If you like wasting money, you could even burn a decrypted copy of the disc to BD-R/BD-R DL!

@maddy meeeew!!!

@fps_test_2 Mrrowwww meowwwww meowwww meoewmomweowmewmewewmeowmew mrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrp

@maddy meeow meeewwww~ mrrrpp! meewwww~ meoooow~​~​~! mrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrp~​~​~! meeeww meoowwwwww! meooww!!!

@maddy I realised at one point that of given away the CDROM drive that I had originally sourced due to its excellent ability to rip. Unfortunately, but the time I realised it was too late to get it back. Not that I've bought many CDs since (age when I have, half the time they've been from indies anyway).

@maddy @fps_test_2 fof!

@maddy We did this a few years back and the flashbacks this post gave me.

@RamsHornStudios I’m so sorry.

@anyia Ahhhh, that’s a shame! I know I’ve given away or sent off to recycling far more of my old hardware than I’d have liked to, looking back.
I’m still on the hunt for some good ol’ Plextor drives.

@maddy so basically you cant play it on PC and fuck you your AACS certificate got revoked

@CauseOfBSOD You can’t officially play UHD Blu-ray on PC at all anymore (unless you have the right CPU, drive, and software, assuming the software is still supported), and it depends on whose host certificate you’re using.

Most folks (including me) use a host certificate that gets shared around online, and it works until a new AACS protection revokes it, and then someone finds another host certificate that isn’t revoked and shares it. Cat and mouse.

@maddy ah i see

host cert leaks -> host cert used -> host cert revoked -> cycle repeat

@CauseOfBSOD Yup! It’s really shitty because it works backwards - and what I mean by that is, once the host certificate is revoked for your drive, the drive stores that information and cannot decrypt any discs with that host cert, even if they’re the earliest Blu-ray releases.

At that point, you would need an un-revoked cert or software that doesn’t care/bypasses the issue (like MakeMKV, DVDFab, etc)

@maddy are you fucking kidding me it actually works like that?

@maddy that is disgusting

we should genocides whoever came up with DRM

@CauseOfBSOD Yup! A lot of the key processing stuff is built into the drives themselves and isn’t necessarily done on the software level.
Genuine playback software would be unaffected ‘cause they tend to have their own host certificate and such. They try to keep these host certificates very well protected.

@maddy (i mean digital restrictions malware, linux direct rendering manager devs are safe)

@maddy i think ill stick to online piracy, or dvds (which my wii can play back) thx

@maddy but surely, the humble memory viewer:

@maddy oh wait fucking SGX

@maddy like the only good thing this is used for is to add an additional layer of protection to signals servers

@CauseOfBSOD SGX is required for UHD, yes.
Even with regular Blu-ray playback, they tend to keep the host certs very well protected ‘cause revocation would mean that everyone using that software would need to get an update with a new host cert, or risk playback not working if a new enough disc is played.

@maddy oh and of course by "not working" you mean "permanently bricked"

@maddy as far as im concerned i want to pipe bomb whoever came up with this idea

@CauseOfBSOD Until host cert is updated with a non-revoked one, yeah. Part of the reason most Blu-ray players have updatable firmware is in the case a model has its keys/certs leaked, it can be updated with a more secure firmware and new keys/certs.

@maddy your honour this IS political violence

@CauseOfBSOD Also, all this bullshit is generally why computer Blu-ray drives have encrypted firmware.

@maddy but like for older blu ray discs as well it still wont play

@CauseOfBSOD Yeah, once your drive stores the revocation for the host cert you’re using, you can’t decrypt any BD through normal means.

@CauseOfBSOD But yeah, I’m glad yet another understands how annoying and bullshit this all is. Thank you for listening. 💜

@maddy @anyia have a Plextor bluray drive, it's singing on its last verse alas, open/close died years ago but I can still force it, for now it's chugging along. These days I pick up most every optical drive that appears in my local flea market. I should be set for life probably.

@noisytoot @maddy hmmmm idk actually

@bangskij @anyia I pick up every reasonably priced Blu-ray drive I see. I otherwise have more than enough DVD/CD drives for a lifetime (unless I come across some Plextor drives, of course).

I literally use all the spare 5.25” DVD drives I have to line the bottom of my plastic shelving, weighing it down.

@maddy @anyia 🙂 I use a couple of drives under my speakers to get them to the right height, the rest lives in the tech-closet

@maddy …not to mention the hardware you’d need to continually update because no one sells DVDs/Blu-Ray compatible systems anymore.

@CheetahFluff Yeah, that’s super annoying.

@maddy x1 and no higher speed than that or burning will fail.

@maddy I have a series I couldn't rip because, not only are all the episodes one big file, but it doesn't play start to end. First, each episode's intro and credits are reusing the same chapters. Then, each fade to black between scenes is a jump to another random chapter in the big video.
It was easier to find a copy

@maddy sorry what did they do to fringe

@maddy Easy mode: Get an external player, grab a USB capture device, record the disc that way, then use ffmpeg to further compress as needed. Bonus: you get to watch the movie.

@GabeMoralesVR You’d have to get more equipment (including an HDCP stripper) to have a worse (and incomplete) rip of the same disc. Would not recommend unless you just happen to have all the necessary equipment.

At least you wouldn’t have to deal with the playlist obfuscation bullshit that Lionsgate commonly uses on their Blu-ray discs.

@maddy An HDCP stripper is cheaper than the cost of MakeMKV

@GabeMoralesVR You don’t need to buy MakeMKV to use it if you really don’t want to.

@maddy Your own instructions includes a step telling people to buy MakeMKV

@GabeMoralesVR I’m not sure if you’re being intentionally obtuse, but these weren’t instructions. It was a joke post.

@maddy hey, that sounds a lot like me, except i'm dealing with ancient software from a decade or two ago

oh, wait

@maddy@thegayagenda.fans don’t pirate, just buy the disc and dump it they said

@Mair It’s certainly not for everyone, but somebody’s gotta do it!

…I just happen to have an obsession with optical media.

@Lunaphied The playlists for the episodes on each disc are a mess, and they’re not consistent between discs.

I’ve had the disc dumps sitting on my server for months ‘cause I haven’t had the energy to manually process them into suitable MKV files for my media server.

@maddy aaaaaaaa

@CheetahFluff @maddy so fucking rude, the sheer indignity

@Jes I imagine that’s not far from the truth.

@maddy @hazelnoot in fact, if you have MakeMKV installed, Handbrake can use it as a backend to read directly from a Blu-Ray disc.

@maddy this remind me I should really get into dumping my discs and not simply having a disc reader for decoration

@maddy @_aD pretty sure vlc defaults to whatever language and subtitle track comes first when multiple are available

@CauseOfBSOD @_aD Huh. It’s been so long since I’ve used it for anything but testing, so I just haven’t known.

@gkrnours I recommend it!