# Help for slef confessed Noob looking for media solutions



## Stafman (Jul 15, 2011)

Hi All,

After a bit of googling, my head is now spinning. And I came across this forum which looked very helpful. If only I understood half of what you guys were talking about :-(

Will give a brief rundown of my situation, then what I am looking for and will appreciate any solutions offered. But remember, I'm a noob and I don't know what the acronyms all mean, so I appreciate yur patience in helping explain in laymans terms.

*Situation*
I have moved from Australia to USA. Prior to moving, I had built up a collection of 400 dvds. Most of which have region encoding meaning I can only watch on a Region free or Region 4 encoded dvd player. Also, my dvd's i presume are encoded for PAL, where as, it looks like American tv's are encoded to NTSC. (I have no idea how that affects my dvd's as they are still being shipped).

The house currently runs on a simple wireless router, so will likely need to do some cabling, so will be drilling holes and stuff (thats gonna be fun as I am the opposite of a handyman)

I think I am looking for a media solution that involves a hard drive (with growth) and a media server. I have tried reading the threads on here, but they refer to things such as Cat6/Cat5, NAS. And talk about using them but I don't know what the installation requirements are.

*Looking for*
1 - Storage Solution for DVD's that will work for all regions + PAL & NTSC encoded discs
2 - Network Solution to allow those saved DVD's to be played from multiple TV's
3 - Physical Storage solution for the resulting IT setup (ie, how the hell does one buy a server/computer cabinet that they know will fit their IT at home? Are these all standardised?
4 - User friendly input & output - ie it should be easy for my even less IT savvy girlfriend to buy a dvd, inset into drive, copy to hard drive, and then navigate with ease with a remote to choose and select a movie / tv show / music.
5 - Backup Solution - I saw reference to having backups that can be swapped out should one of multiple drives failed, but no idea how that works or what it entails in setting it up. Does it mean i need double storage? 

I am not looking for high end system. But looking for something that in the future, I can expand on easily with additional storage, upgraded tv's, surround sound etc. But I want to get the base right and go from there. I saw Kaliedescape and thought that looked perfect. Then I saw a review where they mention the price. 15-30k???? Are all solutions with a similar result going to cost this much?

I am definitely not looking for a solution where i build my own server with motherboards and installed drives. That would be beyond me and I am sure I could end up electrocuting myself when I plug a cable in backwards,

*What I Am willing to do*
I know I need to buy some new hardware. Thats okay. I am expecting it will end up costing 2-3k. If I am dreaming, please let me know.

Alternatively, can anyone recommend a professional (Northern Virginia area) who could come in and review / quote / install. I would like to know how it all works so i can play with and add to later, but if it is all above my head, I will just sit back and let them do it.


Anyway, its a bit lengthy, but any response would require a lot of patience and understanding to remember you are responding to a dummy. If you need more information, ask a question and I will do what I can to find the answer. Also, remember my vocabulary consists of router, component cables, DVD player, Computer, Remote. Anything else in the AV space will need a little bit more, or at the least, no acronyms so I can google to find out what the equipment is.

Thanks in advance for your help.


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## Stafman (Jul 15, 2011)

Oh, and all the DVD's were legally purchased from Australian equivalents of Walmart / Best Buy etc.


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## Guest (Jul 15, 2011)

A good number of HDTVs sold in the US support the PAL format. Maybe not all, but enough of them do.

As far as ripping your disk. Not sure what this forums status is on that, but just google DVD rip.

As for storage and play back. HTPCs are becoming more standard. I have a 2TB drive I haven't even begun to fill yet.

If you want to display to multiple TVs, I've seen HDMI repeaters, but every display device would need to be compatible with the output. Monoprice.com has them.


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