DVD jukebox

[leondz]

Hi,

I manage a slowly-growing archive of around 300 DVDs, containing data. As these DVDs are expensive and hard to replace, they are never loaned out, instead copying them to a network share for others to access. This works OK but is a labour-intensive.

It seems like a big jukebox that holds maybe 400-1000 DVDs would be a better solution, that could be browsed over the network, perhaps with an option to install a hard drive for caching.

I've found plenty of hardware that works like this for DVD (or Blu-ray) video playback, but very little for data access via a network share. Is there anything out there?

 

[taltamir]

It seems like a big jukebox that holds maybe 400-1000 DVDs would be a better solution

No, its a pretty insane solution. You would need expensive custom hardware and software.

instead copying them to a network share for others to access. This works OK but is a labour-intensive.

This is the sensible thing to do, make a disk image of each DVD and share it over the network.
How and why is this labor intensive though?

If you are going to get custom software & hardware it might as well be a simple script to automatically rip each disk inserted into a specific drive and then add it to the network share rather then a system where people make requests for a custom hardware jukebox that then locates the disk in question, pops it into a drive, reads it, and delivers the data over the network while keeping the disk. Far simpler, cheaper, and more practical.

Unless... do you mean to say that you are NOT ripping all the DVDs to a NAS, but rather each time someone wants something you start rooting through the disks, finding the right one, ripping it for this one occasion, putting it on NAS, and then deleting it when they are done? And you want a regular run of the mill jukebox to deliver YOU the DVD so you could then manually load and unload it to the NAS without having to search through boxes of stored disks? Because if that is what you are doing its pretty crazy, stop that!
Rip all the DVDs to a NAS as soon as you get them to a private NAS you own and when someone asks for a copy just copy paste it from your NAS to the shared NAS.

 

[leondz]

Why is it labour intensive? You try taking images of a few hundred DVDs and tell me how well it goes for you I have better things to do with my time than replicate and upload DVDs for other people, and they have better things to do than wait for this to happen.

We already have a NAS on the network, but the ripping part is the time-consuming part.

I've seen all-in-one hardware solutions that offer this kind of thing, but either in limited capacity, or for CDs only, or only for HDMI output. I'm just looking for an optical storage archive solution that fits these requirements better. Here's an example:

http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/05/bluedot-bdm-100s-dvd-cd-storage-and-retrieval-silo/

I don't care in which format the content is delivered - direct file access or an image are both OK. Something reliable and labour-saving is the key part.

 

[razel]

As labor intensive as it sounds, it actually won't be. Since it's a network share you can use more than one computer to read a DVD from and you can use more than one DVD drive per computer. With 3 drives that reduces your work to 100 times.

Also you are only reading those discs once, so reading 300 discs isn't a repeating task. So it sounds like you just scared yourself.

I once had to copy nearly 75 3.5" floppies that my mother used for her work onto a USB flash drive. They had two computers with floppy discs. Over the course of a month visiting my parents frequently while eating dinner, I got it done. Very minimal effort and I didn't even consider it work. It was free homecooked dinner.

 

[taltamir]

Why is it labour intensive? You try taking images of a few hundred DVDs and tell me how well it goes for you I have better things to do with my time than replicate and upload DVDs for other people, and they have better things to do than wait for this to happen.

We already have a NAS on the network, but the ripping part is the time-consuming part.

No it isn't, it takes 10 seconds to pop a DVD in and press "rip" on your software of choice, then the COMPUTER does work for ~15 minutes during which you are free to do other stuff. Then you swap to the next disk (another 10 seconds). 50 minutes of actual work to rip all 300 DVDs.
Once you ripped them all, thats it. You are never using those DVDs again. Share it (read only access for security) and that's it.

Also, I have personally taken my 600 CD collection and individually ripped the FILES from each and organized them appropriately, this was much more labor intensive then making CD images but it saved on HDD space and resulted in a far more organized result.

And you still haven't explained how your solution in any way REDUCES this labor.
The thing you linked for example, will let you find the right disk for ripping, but overall involves more work as you need to catalog them all as you insert them. It looks more work to properly catalog your disks in 3 of those devices (100 disks a device) then it is to catalog them in a folder on a NAS.
In any way conceivable your solutions simply add significant amount of labor rather then reducing it.

 

[leondz]

It reduces the labour because instead of putting each disk into my computer and interrupting work every five minutes to change disk, I just put the fresh batch of DVDs into a DVD changer, and they're automatically indexed by the existing setup (no manual cataloguing is required either now or with a changer).

It sounds more like you want to attack my requirements instead of help, which is noble, but I think we've reached the end of such an exercise's productivity!

 

[taltamir]

It sounds more like you want to attack my requirements instead of help, which is noble, but I think we've reached the end of such an exercise's productivity!

That's just you being overly sensitive and taking everything personally. I am actually giving you valuable advice which could save you a lot of time, effort, and money. And if I am making a mistake due to wrong assumptions, then most likely you explained yourself wrong and by clarifying you could get more useful response from me or others here.

It reduces the labour because instead of putting each disk into my computer and interrupting work every five minutes to change disk, I just put the fresh batch of DVDs into a DVD changer, and they're automatically indexed by the existing setup (no manual cataloguing is required either now or with a changer).

How is it going to index.... wait when you say "archival" do you mean you are archiving commercial movies? As in "The Matrix" and "300" and so on?

 

[leondz]

As labor intensive as it sounds, it actually won't be. Since it's a network share you can use more than one computer to read a DVD from and you can use more than one DVD drive per computer. With 3 drives that reduces your work to 100 times.

Also you are only reading those discs once, so reading 300 discs isn't a repeating task. So it sounds like you just scared yourself.

I once had to copy nearly 75 3.5" floppies that my mother used for her work onto a USB flash drive. They had two computers with floppy discs. Over the course of a month visiting my parents frequently while eating dinner, I got it done. Very minimal effort and I didn't even consider it work. It was free homecooked dinner.

I've been doing it the current way for a few years. I'm often not at my desk, and so that creates some delays, but the current system is too labour-intensive, and I need to find a way of handing it over when I move away. Maybe I should ask one of the IT guys to copy all the DVDs though - you're right - it might be a solution. 3T of resilient storage isn't that much, and we could double that to handle a few years' of growth, too.

 

[leondz]

How is it going to index.... wait when you say "archival" do you mean you are archiving commercial movies? As in "The Matrix" and "300" and so on?

No, we're archiving expensive data (see first post)

 

[exdeath]

As much as I hate hard drives, they are superior to optical discs. The absolute best decision here is move those 300 DVDs onto a single 2 TB drive for $100 and it will be 1000 times faster than any optical disk drive or disc changer.

Then buy another one, or two, or three, and duplicate for backup and failure up time.

You also increase productivity by having all those DVD volumes accessible on the network as is on a dedicated share, without anybody have to copy them at 1 MB/sec off the optical disc on a use by use basis.

Make use of available labor resources to distribute the discs to multiple employees to rip and upload them and it will be finished in no time. It would be inefficient for you to sit there with one optical drive doing it one at a time.

If you are trying to avoid ripping 300 DVDs you are just postponing the inevitable. This is obviously data that is regularly accessed in a very inefficient way, and at some point, it simple needs to be done before it becomes insurmountable. What are you going to do in a few years when you need to rip and re-burn all of them due to shelf life issues with DVD-R media? Backups? Updates? Getting rid of the optical disc format will make life easier in the long run.

You're going to have to move forward at some point. Do it now while there are only 300 DVDs and the maintenance with new volumes is easy, rather than waiting until you have 600 DVDs. It will also make further handling of the data infinitely more convenient in every regard for the future. Dealing with a 2 TB HDD at 150 MB/sec >>>>>>>> dealing with 300 DVDS and an optical drive.

If you are still going to invest in a disc changer, it should only be an optical drive duplicator station with an automated robotic arm that you can stack all 300 discs and have it dump to a HDD autonomously. For the cost you would need for that 1000 disc data juke box, you could buy 10 or more duplicators, rip all 300 discs in a day, sell all but one duplicator to recoup costs, keep the 1 for future use.

 

[leondz]

Are you saying that a duplicator can be made to read six separate discs in one operation? That sounds wonderful!

 

[exdeath]

Are you saying that a duplicator can be made to read six separate discs in one operation? That sounds wonderful!

There are endless configurations, you'd have to research. I can't imagine there isn't a multi bay optical disk duplicator out there with with ability to duplicate to HDD. You would need one with the ability to skip burning the duplicates and just leave ISOs on the internal HDD to do what I suggested.

Depending on how sensitive the data is, and if you have more than one copy of your stack of DVDs, you might consider outsourcing the job to a media distribution and duplication company. Send them discs, HDD, and a check for a few $100 bucks and 3 days later get your discs and full HDD back.

Not to promote any particular company, but this was the first relevant link in Google results:

http://www.proactionmedia.com/mfDigital-ripstation.html

Equipment looks costly for one time use, but the same company providing the equipment should also provide in house services as well. Then again, I hope you expected multi thousand dollar prices for this kind of gear in the first place if you were looking at a company purchase of a 1000 disc network attached auto loader.

Finally, at the very least, it looks like these stations can also be configured as jukeboxes, satisfying your original needs in your first post for a jukebox device.

Depending on your expected growth and continued use of optical media at your company, it would be a wise investment in equipment. Otherwise you should circumvent the need for optical media entirely and go with a ripping/duplication service for the initial 300 disc bulk rip, then convert your current infrastructure to be NAS HDD based from here on out. This would be best from a data handling and productivity stand point for the future of the company: more compact, centralized to a single vastly higher performance storage device, trivial backups involving two or more HDDs at 150 MB/sec, cheap, convenient, simultaneous 24/7 real time access by all users, no media handling or transport, no redundant copying of GB of data over the network, etc.

But if working with bulk optical media is one of the primary roles of your company and it simply can't be avoided, purchasing a in house rip station/duplicator/jukebox device is going to be essential for managing that many optical discs. For starters, mission critical data that only exists on optical disc should be re-burned every 5 years or so due to the high error rate and relatively short archive life of organic and bonded optical media.

 

[leondz]

This is an amazing reply - thanks. It's far from core business at our organisation; the data provides starting points, and dealing with it just needs to be simple. All-online looks like a cheaper way to go, and you're right, the discs are of limited durability. Now all we need is a simple ripping solution for the initial and for subsequent uploads; fantastic - thanks for the extra edits - this is plenty to go on!!

As for data permanence, we can always re-order another set of data (the LDC http://www.ldc.upenn.edu/ deals with warehousing everything), and they'll replace faulty but not lost discs (look at the extra copy fees, e.g. http://www.ldc.upenn.edu/Catalog/CatalogEntry.jsp?catalogId=LDC2012S01). Anyway, that route is a pita for everybody concerned, making the on-line HDD solution look more attractive.

Thanks again!

 

[exdeath]

So the main hurdle is now limited to the initial rip.

Either find 10 volunteers to rip 30 discs each, or sent it to a media duplication company who can give a 1 day turn around on bulk ripping of 300 discs, and your biggest barrier becomes non existent.

 

[leondz]

Might go the volunteer way - I'm not sure any company will accept > $100k liability for the data - but minions are findable, always.

 

[KingFatty]

So, one option is to buy inexpensive DVD-ROM drives (unless they are just as expensive as DVD-RW drives) and load up your computer. Or, get a few computers if your workplace has spare workstations laying around, and fill them up with DVD drives.

I'm thinking from a cost perspective, it's cheaper to load up on DVD drives and use existing computers, instead of looking for a dedicated multi-drive duplication system.

Say you put 3 drives in your current computer, then use a spare computer with another 3 drives in it, you could rip 6 disks each round. The cost could be zero+labor if you have spare computers you can harvest the drives from. personally, I've bought DVD drives from a thrift store for this purpose, much cheaper.

 

[taltamir]

So the main hurdle is now limited to the initial rip.

Either find 10 volunteers to rip 30 discs each, or sent it to a media duplication company who can give a 1 day turn around on bulk ripping of 300 discs, and your biggest barrier becomes non existent.

Use child labor. Pay the neighbor's kid 50$ to do it and he will be elated.

Also http://dvdisaster.net/en/index.html if you must keep data on unreliable DVD-Rs

No, we're archiving expensive data (see first post)

Then the most likely place to find software that can auto index it is on the PC, not some specialized coaster.

 

[dayton967]

There are a few products that do exist that can be used for retrieving data off of optical drives.

Plasmon D Series supports DVD's, though may be end of life now.
Disc Group and HIE Electronics, have blu-ray based systems.

At dataarchivecorp dot com the HIE 1035 is about $12k that handles 35 discs with 2 drives. As you can see they aren't cheap, but you can automate all of the discs to be done over the period of time.

I do know personally with the Server Attached Plasmon series you can select the disc, insert into a drive, read the drive, eject and repeat the they are supported in Amanda, if I recall. And we had to recover thousands of DVD's worth of data to be processed.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Don't forget to PAR2 the images once they are ripped, on a stable non-overclocked PC!

 

[KingFatty]

I mean you can find DVD drives brand new for like $15.

Just splurge and blow like $60 and buy 4 additional DVD drives.

Then you can rip 5 DVDs simultaneously, so you won't have to babysit so much, and your labor will be flipping 5 discs at a time, so it's much easier. Your labor would actually feel more like ripping 60 DVDs by doing them 5 at a time like this.

Then throw away the extra DVD drives when you are done, or give them as gifts.

But if you have to swap out 300 DVDs using a single drive to do all the ripping, that's pretty lame. Hey maybe you can borrow other people's DVD drives temporarily to rip everything, community effort.

 

[Micrornd]

Why not just buy a DVD or BluRay jukebox and Be done with it.
Sony has made them for years and many are still available new and many more are available used.
Since they can be browsed across the network they should be shareable.
Is this something you have actually looked into?