I use usenetserver.com (works great), I know JayS uses newshosting.com (i did previously worked great), and quite a few folks I know use and like astraweb. All of them are good providers, go with the cheapest in my recommendation.
---------- Post added at 11:47 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:42 PM ----------
Quality is limitless, anything from full BDRips (30-50gig file sets) to DVD quality. I myself tend to stick to 1080P movies and HD quality TV. In general newsgroups are much safer, all traffic is done over SSL, it is not peer to peer and there are upload sharing ratios (which is where you get into serious shit on BT trackers)
The one issue is the nzb indexing sites (nzbmatrix, nzbs.org, etc) can get shut down but only one I know of too date was shutdown was newzbin and it ended up coming back. Hell the software that most of them run is open sores (newznab) so you can in theory run your own site.
Everything evane said, except for his typo about upload ratios. Just to be clear, you never upload with newsgroups (unless you’re one of the groups putting out the ripped content).
I still haven’t done any automation on movies. I’ve got a couple saved searches I run every few days and just grab anything that looks interesting.
These sites look absolutely awful as far as web design. I understand the whole BBS retro concept but come on.
I think WillyBean might have been referring to viruses? Perhaps. In which case SSL ain’t going to do shit. Use common sense, get a decent A/V, scan files beforehand.
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I am very ignorant on this subject. I have a few questions. There are a few music formats that I am interested in, SACD multichannel (5.1), BluRay Audio, and DVD-A. All in lossless if possible. I briefly searched and it seems that SACD is heavily protected, but it may be saved as DSD. Are these formats available?
As you can see the prices are out of control for the rare (dead) formats.
I would assume that the file size for the SACD and DVD-A albums to be around 3 to 4 gig if lossless.
Next question, what would be a cheap way for a dedicated computer to use for acquisition and playback? I would want discrete 6 channel out so all the DA conversion is done by the comp.