u/NY_Webcast

Here's the scoop. I already have 2 lines with Mint Mobile. I have gotten totally disgusted with the constant price increases on Optimum internet (we have cable) here in North Jersey. I checked the download speed on the phones and thoughout the day (indoors) we get 400-600mbs download speed. I checked the coordinates and we are approximately 367 yards from the nearest T-Mobile tower. When the leaves are off the trees I can see the tower. I was thinking of getting the 5G Internet service though Mint since they seem to be shipping the older gateway that has the 4 antenna ports on the bottom. I already have a pretty robust WiFi network in (and out) of the house powered by TP-Link EAPs on my ethernet network. My idea was to order the 5G service and then connect the gateway to a MIMO antenna mounted just under the eaves directly facing the tower. If I put the gateway in a Faraday cage (I dont care about looks) would the antennas still function to recieve the 5G signal and would it help block the WiFi from the gateway itself. I don't care about double NAT since I don't do gaming - just internet and tv via Sling. Am I over thinking this or does this sound reasonable. Any insights would be sincerely appreciated.

https://preview.redd.it/k9uzosivmujh1.jpg?width=2832&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=22ced09376afba1cb2cc62495c59eaf7e13120e7

As a long time (and I mean back to 16mm in the pre-vhs days) collector, I found out over the years that the release of DVD was a big reason to kill off physical media. With the advent of VHS, the studios found a rich marketplace to cash in on their libraries. Tape was a wonderful medium. It degraded and home duplication, due to technical issues, Copyguard notwithstanding, was not a real worry. With outlets like Blockbuster, they could release movies at "rental pricing" of over $100 a tape. "Sell though" was targeted at older catalog titles or repriced recent titles. Laserdisc came along a couple of years later and never reached mass market penetration due to several issues including cost, availability and lack of recording capabilities. Then the bastard son of Laserdisc was born - DVD. Suddenly, a high quality, digital copy of a movie was being put in the public's hands. Circuit City tried to promote its Divex model for $4.99 movies that could be rewatched for a "rental" fee of about .99. That of course bombed, but it was an early attempt at the studios to regain control over their libraries. It is difficult for someone born after 1985 to imagine a world where consumers could only see a movie in a theater or in an edited version on one of the 3 networks once a year or so. As DVD penetration grew and spread, the studios realized they had let the genie out of the bottle. A Disney executive was once heard expressing concern over DVD. They imagined a customer walking into the flagship Disney Store on Fifth Avenue and asking for a DVD copy of "Song of the South". After being told the movie was not available, they could walk out the door and buy a bootleg copy of the same movie from a street vendor. Once a week, a gentleman named Victor would park outside the building I worked at in Manhattan and sell bootlegs out of his van. $5 for a movie still in theaters. These weren't camcorder jobs. These were copies of the DVDs that smaller theaters were using for presentations. Whether a big studio was concerned with Victor's sales isn't the point. Studios make money from their libraries. Having physical copies out in the world (in a pristine version) is just bad business. Streaming overcomes this problem. A studio can regain control over its intellectual property by forgoing a physical release and having titles behind a paywall. In a world seduced by digital convenience, physical media is an anathema. Ironically, the recent surge in interest in physical media has been partially motivated by the understanding that having a physical copy of a song or movie gives control over the content to the possessor not the IP owner.

Well, after over 40 years, I finally started to make some sense out of my collection of Laserdiscs. I started collectiing in 1984 and stopped the rabid purchasing back in '99. At that point I had been featured in the NY Times in an article on Laserdisc collectors. There really was no logic in the way things were "organized" Crate after crate of discs. The UPS driver had gotten so frustrated, he just left a blank pad of signature papers for me to mass sign. I would give my local mail carrier a heads up when an EMS shipment was coming in from Tokyo, It grew to a massive collection. That on top of old toys, Disneyana, then DVD/Blu Ray/4k. But the good news is I finally decided to accurately inventory *everything*. A cursury glance turned up several titles that werent on any of the random lists I had kept. I also have about 14 players ranging from a Magnavision to a Elite CLD-99. I'm going to be sorting everything alphabetically (including sealed dupicates). I've already configured the AV systems in the house to accomodate LD players so even the 14' projector in the great room can be used. I always enjoy state of the art tech, but sometimes there is something charming about watching someting in an obsolete or vintage format.