Did I waste my money?

[rcguy1]

I've noticed some DVD players advertised to upconvert regular DVD's to 1080p resolution and cost anywhere from $50 /$90. Now if this is true who needs a Blu-ray or HD player for many more dollars. All that is needed is a 1080p HDTV and a recorder that upconverts to 1080P. Personally, I have a PS3 player, 1080p TV and really can't see much difference between viewing a Blu-ray DVD and a regular DVD. Did I waste my Money?

[Heywould3]

the difference betweet 1080P and 480p is massive. if you truely have a 1080P tv make sure taht you are using the hdmi cable. the other thing to keep in mind is that some tvs will upconvert an image to the tvs native resolution. so if you have a 1080 tv your set might be upconverting the dvd already. the picture on 1080P is so clear that you can see every detail even things you might not want to see. dvds are cear but lack detail and depth.

[Baldrick]

If you can't see much difference between 1080p blu-ray and 480p dvd you either have a too small tv or crappy tv (or you aren't that excited for 1080p as I am ). Upconverted dvds looks a bit better but far from real 1080p.

And please use a better topic subject that clearly describes the topic, just "Did I waste my money" can be about anything. CLick on edit on your first post to change it.

[ntscuser]

According to a friend who owns one of each type, his Blu-Ray and HD-DVD player do a much better job of upconverting regular DVDs than a (quite pricey) standard DVD player with built-in upconversion. I assume it is to do with the chipsets installed? You get more or less what you pay for.

[jman98]

Differences are subjective, but most people would see a difference between BluRay/HD-DVD and upconverted normal DVD. However, some people are less picky than others about video and audio, so what is intolerable for one person might be no big deal for another. Studies have shown that the majority of listeners can't tell the difference between 192 Kbps MP3 and the original recording, yet I worked with a guy who swore that he could tell a difference if the bit rate was lower than 224 Kbps and he personally considered 224 Kbps MP3 to be the low end of what he considered to be "listenable". If the bit rate was under 224, he wasn't interested in it. I say that only to illustrate how the only person who needs to be pleased is YOU and if you can't see a difference between BluRay/HD-DVD and upconverted DVD, then be happy with what you have.

I don't know how your PS3 is connected to your TV, but I can tell you that HD TVs are all about the connections and if you are using a low quality connection from the PS3 to the TV and watching BluRay on it, then yes, you certainly will be disappointed.

[rcguy1]

Yes I have a 2 HDMI cables connected - 1 for the PS3 and 1 for the cable box and a Sony SXRD 60 inch 1080p HDTV. I don't think my Sony HDTV qualifies as a small crappy tv.

[Baldrick]

Nope, a 60" sony HDTV is not that crappy. . I would guess that you are just less picky than me and others as jman98 mentions.

[rcguy1]

Maybe I didn't make my point clear. I think there is a major diference between HDTV and analog TV but not much difference between a Bu-ray and upconverterd DVD. I don't understand all the hopla about Blu-ray. Baldrick no offence taken -- you had no idea what sort of equipment I owned--my fault.

[Vegito72]

Give it a little time. Unfortunately the movie studios that encode these blu-ray discs are still using the mpeg2 encoder. *sigh*

Once you see blu-ray discs with the h.264 encoder used, you will see a major difference. There's also the chance of the original video not being an HD source and they are "Mastered" in high definition. Or you can get a 2.4:1 blu-ray movie which suck and you wont be able to tell a difference.

Upconverted DVDs will NEVER look as good as an HD disc. DVDs are capped at 480p and upconverting does NOT increase the resolution of the disc. It just smartly adds pixels to fill your pixel-happy HDTV right so that it's playing in the native resolution.

If you want to see a real difference, get a blu-ray movie that is fairly new. The chances of it being shot in HD and encoded in H.264 are higher.

[Speedy2]

[quote="Vegito72"]DVDs are capped at 480p and upconverting does NOT increase the resolution of the disc. It just smartly adds pixels to fill your pixel-happy HDTV right so that it's playing in the native resolution."

This is not completely true. With the current technology dvd's may be 480p but check out the following link
for a new blue-ray recorder that is able to record true HD on a regular DVD.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21095732/

[Vegito72]

This is not completely true. With the current technology dvd's may be 480p but check out the following link
for a new blue-ray recorder that is able to record true HD on a regular DVD.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21095732/

Yes, but you need a blu-ray player to play it. All that is doing is recording video in HD H.264 and burning it onto a DVD as a data disc. The blu-ray player just reads the data file and plays it back. The problem with that is the limitations of the DVD. Trust me, I've done it before with a PS3. A Movie in HD with a DVD, looked alright I guess.

[videopoo]

Give it a little time. Unfortunately the movie studios that encode these blu-ray discs are still using the mpeg2 encoder. *sigh*

Once you see blu-ray discs with the h.264 encoder used, you will see a major difference. There's also the chance of the original video not being an HD source and they are "Mastered" in high definition. Or you can get a 2.4:1 blu-ray movie which suck and you wont be able to tell a difference.

Actually it's about 50/50 at this point. Earlier on you just saw MPEG2. VC-1 and AVC makes a big difference though.

[rumplestiltskin]

BluRay & HD-DVD: Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus *

*Mountains are in labor, a ridiculous mouse will be brought forth. - Horace