AppleTV is the media box to use if you hate ads and value your privacy. Its Home Screen is just a grid of apps. No ads. None. It’s also way faster (CPU speed) compared to the competition.

Replacing a smart TV OS with a device made by Google or Amazon defeats the purpose. You’re still going to get ads plastered all over your Home Screen. And they still lag and stutter unless you pay a premium price for an 5 year old Nvidia shield. Either use an AppleTV or build your own HTPC.

I haven seen my LG OLED’s smart OS for years.

My LG OLED TV can be configured to load directly into a HDMI input. I keep it disconnected from wifi at all times. I never see the smartTV OS. It’s probably the best option because OLED panels are the best current display technology.

I use an AppleTV as an external media box for all my needs. But the same would apply for an Android box or HTPC setup etc.

I’ve been in similar situations while renting. I ran ethernet cables along skirting boards and around doorframes and hid them inside adhesive cable raceways.

There is a 16:9 “open matte” edition of blade runner 2049 floating around many torrent sites. Unfortunately it’s only 1080p SDR. But it does look great and is a neat way to rewatch the movie.

The Android market sort of split into cheap streaming sticks vs more expensive but niche boxes (like the Zidoo or Dune players). The former are meant for streaming but lack power. The latter are more capable players but often can’t stream from legit services due to DRM.

The Shield sits in this weird middle ground where it’s actually good for a variety of use cases….but unlikely to get an update due to small market demand.

Although I’d argue that unless you need atmos audio passthrough for Bluray rips…the AppleTV 4K is the best option these days. Super fast processor, no ads or bullshit in the OS, reliable frame rate matching, good track record of software updates and vendor support, and apps like Infuse which is a superb Plex and Jellyfin client. It’ll do 4K REMUX playback with lossless 7.1 audio, and the UI never lags…ever. Just a shame about no audio passthrough which prevents it from being an enthusiast player.

I’ve gone through the effort to build a 50terabyte media center. And am slowly filling it with tv shows, movies, and documentaries I like. It’s expensive and inconvenient. But still a fun hobby.

But the reason I do it is because I can have everything in one spot. Easily accessible. I control it. Never going back.

It decodes everything to 5.1/7.1 LPCM. So apps like Infuse or Plex it will play back lossless TrueHD or DTS, but the height metadata is lost.

It only supports Atmos for Dolby Digital Plus, used for streaming WEB-DLs.

Some of mine that suffer from this: Cowboy Bebop anime series, early seasons of Futurama. Many kids shows like Paw Patrol.

Agreed. AppleTV with Infuse blows away everything else I’ve tried in terms of responsiveness and stability. I spend less time fucking with it and more time just…using it. It’s almost worth it for the screensavers alone.

Get an Nvidia Shield if you need atmos passthrough for Bluray rips, otherwise I recommend the AppleTV in every other way.

I can respect wanting to go with a custom built PC setup if you have the time and interest. But that’s not for me.

Haha. What I mean is that some TV series have a different episode order on DVD/bluray than what they were originally broadcast in. “Firefly” is the classic example. The TV networks broadcast them out of order and the DVD order is the “correct” one and the order in which pirate TV packs will use. But by default many tools (which use TMDB.com) have the wrong metadata for the episodes.

For TMDB to end their stupid policy of setting broadcast episode order as the default. Any app that uses them for metadata to match files names ends up with wrong episodes because obviously nobody wants broadcast order.

The worst part is that even buying SG1 on Bluray gives a bad experience, because they fucked up the 5.1 audio.

So what did the pirates do? Combined the Bluray video with the better DVD 5.1 audio! Best of both worlds.

Are you using the Plex app or a third party app such as Infuse? Infuse can handle more codecs and things like image-based subtitles that I don’t think the Plex app can handle, which should reduce transcoding requirements.

It’s a shame that AppleTV doesnt support TrueHD atmos. That seems to be the one feature that the Shield stands apart on, although the new model Firestick now support it, too.

I tried Kodi on Firestick 4K and the whole experience is super clunky compared to the AppleTV.

AppleTV 4K + Infuse app.

Streaming from my local media server.

Depends what you consider “long term”. My suggestion would be a NAS unit with dual drive redundancy. And additional backup device as well. For consumer level stuff, Synology units with hyper backup are a good solution.

The best way to compare is to re-rip one of your already ripped DVDs. Use MakeMKV and play both back and see if you can tell the difference.

But if we are talking popular movie DVDs, then I’d just grab the Bluray copies from a torrent site. The quality will be far superior.

Oh nice. Didn’t know about this. Seems like an interesting solution!

The film uses an intentionally wide aspect ratio. It also has a lot of added film grain, also intentional. But the grain messes with low bitrate rips. Grab the 20gb+ 4K Web-DL rip to get it in the best possible quality.