To be honest, I’d get a Blu-ray drive for a computer, rip the discs, and use Jellyfin (or Plex, Emby, etc) to host them. Way more flexible since you can watch them from any device in your house, or on a phone/tablet/Chromecast when you’re not at home (assuming you have a good enough upload speed).
You don’t need a dedicated home server; you can just run Jellyfin or Plex on any Windows, Linux, MacOS or FreeBSD PC, as long as it’s turned on when you want to watch something.
I mean…if you want cheap, I’d just grab a PS3. Plus, if you make sure you buy the right model, you can easily mod it, and use it as a decent retro gaming machine. Dvd, bluray, cd, plus ps3 library, and if modded a shitton more.
I’m seeing them on ebay for $70ish. But to be fair, it’s a quick search, and I’m not paying attention to the model number. You’ll have to do your homework.
Pretty sure the moddable ones aren’t that cheap. Same with the ones that have PS2 support.
they’re all moddable, just some can do full custom firmware, others can only do HEN (like a tethered jailbreak). Sellers usually don’t distinguish tho from my experience.
I still use my PS3 for this. And that thing is built like a tank. It once had a heavy CRT TV fall on it during an earthquake. It got a small scratch.