Ready to go Blu-Ray. Anything I should be aware of?

Some big hassles, particularly if added as a 2nd drive.
Do a google search, I have done but no solutions.
Sometimes works, sometimes not.
I have tried both Pioneer & LG.
Boots up with both drives showing, then after some time one or both drives "disappear". If not showing eject does not work.
May reappear on next boot, at 1st I thought the connectors may have been loose or bumped when replacing the drive caddy.
There have been several "fixes" suggested.
i.e. In System Preferences, untick "put disks to sleep when possible".
With the LG drives, they "search" for disks every few minutes (audible noise), leaving a disk in the drive cures this!
I now have my original apple optical drive plus Pioneer BDR-207, after several boots, seems to have settled down. However never sure unless you go to"about this Mac" to see if drives are still there - or try the eject key.
Mac Blu Ray player works OK when drive is visible.
Good Luck!

 

I have the LG internally. It never disappears.

I've never heard of "Mac Blu-Ray Player application", unless you mean that weird paid software that requires an Internet connection to play BDs.

My personal method to play BDs in both Windows and OS X is to stream from MakeMKV to VLC. Both free applications.

 

Bluray on Mac has never been very good. Is there a reason why you're specifically looking at Bluray? I've actually found iTunes 1080p content to be just as good. The surround audio isn't quite as good as Blurays, but if you're not using a surround sound system on your Mac Pro, that's not an issue.

(For reference, I have Bluray on my home theater and have started to prefer the iTunes 1080p content, both due to portability and convenience.)

 

I've upgraded my Blu-Ray drive to LG BH10LS38 since I moved to OS 10.8, I did have a Pioneer BDR-206 but it started the disappearing trick as described above after upgrading to Mountain Lion, but it did work without any issues with OS 10.7.

 

Blu-Ray has worked well on my MP 5,1. I've got a non-disappearing LG unit from OWC. BR plays fine on Windows 7 using various software.

Some of the movies I've purchased have never been played from their discs. I use makeMKV to make an MKV version with the sound options I want and then use Handbrake to make space-friendly m4v version. Both Windows and Mac versions of makeMKV and Handbrake work equally well.

Now if there was just a reliable OS X decoder. . .

 

I have the LG WH12LS30. It is not from OWC.

The method I use in both Windows and OS X has worked for every BD I've tried. It is a bit clunky to get things started, but it is reliable. Most people think MakeMKV is only for ripping, but you can actually play discs too.

Install MakeMKV and VLC software. MakeMKV is free while it is in beta. VLC is free.

Open the disc in MakeMKV. Select the largest chapter; that is the movie. Click the stream button. MakeMKV will give you a URL.

In VLC, use "open a network stream" or something like that. Enter the URL.

Voila, movie plays and you have full controls.

It's a pretty slow process the first couple of times but once you are used to it, it only takes a minute. As a bonus it skips all the commercials and whatnot, so it's actually faster to start the movie than a set top BD player.

You can also skip having VLC and the steps involving copy/paste of the URL. If you click directly on the link that MakeMKV offers, Safari will open and play the movie. Go into full screen mode. The only drawback is lack of controls.

 

I have the LG HL-DT-ST BD-RE WH14NS40 (from my Mac Pro system report) from MacSales (OWC), aka
Quantity: 1 LGEWH14NS40, $97.99 each
LG 14X Blu-ray Burner + Super-MultiDrive DVD/DVD DL/CDRW Reader & Writer

It works fine in ML, does not "disappear," nor click every few minutes as some have reported. I had purchased a Pioneer BDR-207, but it would hang my OSX 10.7 system when it went to sleep, after I used Toast, etc. I don't recommend that one.

I got the demo BluRay player: MacGo Mac Blu-Ray Player (www.macblurayplayer.com), and it works well enough, though the decoding of commercial BRD is a bit blocky (maybe interlacing artifacts, who knows, but the same BRDs work great in my Pioneer BDP-05FD and Playstation 3. But what you don't get is all the clever BluRay menus, pop ups, etc. Not even the chapter names. So it's OK to see if what you've burned in Toast look adequate, but it is NOT a regulation BluRay player that you might expect. I don't think such a beast exists for Mac.

 

Fair enough, but MakeMKV/VLC are very reliable. The review I've read for Mac Blu-Ray Player is terrible:

"The video itself looked fine when it played properly, but it stopped and started constantly, and often displayed with huge, ugly artifacts. And at times, the app would freeze completely and require a force quit."

Strangely, it also requires an Internet connection to play local media on a local computer. Ok, the Mac Pro isn't portable so you probably always have Internet, but will that company be around next year to ensure ongoing service? Next month? Tomorrow?

I just want to warn you. Do whatever you want.

 

Apple currently lets you store them or stream, which means you don't have to worry about downloading them.

If this were a home theater we're talking about, it would be one thing, but Mac Bluray support is still pretty abysmal. I'm don't think any Mac Bluray players even support menus yet. You're still going to have a subpar experience.

Any reason you're trying to watch these on a Mac Pro instead of a TV?

Edit: Man, does Mac Bluray Player look risky. Their page seems like a barely readable automated English translation.

 

Further info in response to PM:
Yes, I have tried both bays.
Initially I had 2 LG's (BH10LS30) as drive A & B.
Worked OK - but annoying seek sound every few minutes. Leaving a disc in each drive stopped that, but inconvenient.
Then I pulled the Pioneer from a PC & tried that as the B drive. I had the trouble I wrote of, but now has settled down OK. Resumed from sleep this morning with all drives OK. I do have the "put HDD's to sleep when able" unticked in energy saver, system preferences.
I had tried 2 Pioneers but had the "drive disappear" problem plus the Mac Pro wouldn't sleep.
So I will leave as is for a while to see how it goes.
BTW I have had the "unable to sleep" problem for some time, but troubleshooted it to a USB plugged in from my UPS, once that was removed it would sleep OK.
I have had the machine now for 3 weeks, have 2 512gb M4's plus 2 2TB HDDs.
The only unresolved issue I have now is the shutdown time, over 1 minute. Being the 1st Mac Pro I have owned, I am not sure if that is normal? (Using sleep allays that problem).
Probably an overkill, but have 24gb of Crucial ram (was a good deal at the time). I bought as a runout, even with the original ram shutdown is still slow.
I'm comparing that to my previous, an iMac with SSD.
Hope that all helps, do you have any input on the shutdown time??

Blu-Ray player has been OK for me:
http://www.macblurayplayer.com/index.htm

 

Sure, but what I'm saying is it doesn't sound like you have the technology to take advantage of Bluray. You don't have a large TV, and you don't have surround speakers. At least for sound, a Bluray is going to sound exactly the same as a DVD because you're going to end up with the exact same 2.1 mix-down.

But to each their own. I'm just saying, this seems like an awful lot of work for not much gain. Blurays are really targeted for 40 inch or larger displays, with 5.1 sound. Not stereo speakers.

 

It works perfectly for me with every BD I've ever tried. Picture and sound are great, no blocking or artifacts. Did you follow the steps I laid out? Did any of them not work or seem out of place? Did you pick the largest title to play? You can Google for MakeMKV blu-ray streaming to find instructions with screen shots.

I've never tried DVD because I'd just use Apple's DVD Player.

I've never heard of that either. I would really surprised if it played commercial BDs. OS X doesn't have the protected media path that makes all the DRM people happy with Windows BD playback.