I also find many of the downloads strive for smaller file size over quality. I want the opposite, as I don’t ever want to have to rip again, and I want them to look perfect.

Then why transcode them? Rip the remux direct from MakeMKV. As long as you’re transcoding them, it’s been my experience that there are much much much more knowledgable people than I when balancing quality/size.

Apparently, it seems my information might be outdated so I apologize. I’ve MakeMKV ripped from disc images before, but was under the mistaken impression that physical BD disks were unable to be easily ripped from.

I’d look at retired business machine, preferably something small like Lenovo or Dell SFF office pc, with 8th gen i3 at minimum. 8th gen is where the integrated gpu shines for this purpose. Install plex or Jellyfin. And if possible, stick to internal drives instead of external; one fewer thing to draw extra power. You could even do a second drive internally for backup.

Standard blu-ray most certainly is not limited to 720p.

I hear you on those concerns. You may find that ripping blu-rays, even if legal, has technical decrypting hurdles too high to clear. Just keep your option open is my suggestion.

Thirdly, the rips you’ll get from the alternative methods will likely be a better quality and/or smaller file size than a personal rip.

One thing you might consider is skipping buying the Blu-ray player and obtaining your movie rips alternatively. Only you know your appetite for risk, but so long as you’re only getting copies of the movies you own, I’d guess the risk is small. Besides, simply ripping your physical discs isn’t strictly legal everywhere, so that itself may have a small risk.

Put the money you save into a better machine.