Blu-ray prices go up following HD DVD's death

[MJPollard]

A little help please...

I am trying to remember what a person is called who attempts to dominate discussions or debates by talking more than anyone else, will not consider anyone else's point of view because they are certain that they, and only they, have all the answers, and when challenged in a logical fashion resorts to name calling in a feeble attempt to intimidate and belittle...

Ann Coulter?

[Scooter_NJ]

Rev. Wright!

[MJPollard]

Rev. Wright!

That works, too. Stupidity knows no racial, gender, political, or religious boundaries.

[fritzi93]

Well, the name-calling bit is called argumentum ad hominem. Sometimes a sign that one's argument is weak. Unnecessary in any case.

[edDV]

A little help please...

I am trying to remember what a person is called who attempts to dominate discussions or debates by talking more than anyone else, will not consider anyone else's point of view because they are certain that they, and only they, have all the answers, and when challenged in a logical fashion resorts to name calling in a feeble attempt to intimidate and belittle...

Ann Coulter?

Bill-Hill Clinton?

[Conquest10]

Bill-Hill Clinton?

ummm......



no.

[edDV]

Think more.

[SingSing]

This tread is going non-techice. Let me set it in a more techincal challanging direction.

Will BlueRay player with a gold plated HDMI connection do better than a Upscale DVD player with monster HDMI cable ?

[Scooter_NJ]

Your monitor/TV and audio reciever either sees 1's and 0' or it doesn't. I have never found any gold plated anything to improve connection.

[Video Head]

Monster Cable = overpriced upsell and a manufacturer's SPIFF to the sales person...

[edDV]

This tread is going non-techice. Let me set it in a more techincal challanging direction.

Will BlueRay player with a gold plated HDMI connection do better than a Upscale DVD player with monster HDMI cable ?

Open the BluRay player and see how many of the 50 or so connectors are gold plated. Other metals have adequate conductivity. Same with your HDTV. The HDMI standard assumed lowest common denominator connectors, not gold. To use the HDMI logo, the cable needs to meet minimal standards.

HDMI performance drops with cable length. But like any digital connection, it either works 100% or has flickering pixels or won't time sync at all.

[terjeber]

Reading is not your strong suit I gather. If a studio decides not to encode to the smallest common denominator it will get a better result on Blu since it will be able to stuff more picture information in there than was technically possible with HD DVD. Disney has done this on some of their releases I think. In other words, some of the Disney releases could not have been released on HD DVD because that format technically couldn't play movies with that good an encoding.

Please.

You need to take some lessons from rhegedus. He may be a bit fanboy-ish in his stance but he backs it up with real facts not outlandish claims like that. (just playing about the fanboy, Rob )

Thanks for your constructive criticism, sorta. You see, I am not quite sure what you mean about the "outlandish claims". In what you quote, I think the only "claim" that I make is that you can technically put a higher quality image on a Blu-Ray disk than you can on an HD DVD disk. Is this the "outlandish" claim? If it is, Blu-Ray has a 33% higher bandwidth than did HD DVD, which means you can move more bits from the disk to the decoder, 33% more. This allows for higher bitrate on Blu-Ray than would be theoretically possible with HD DVD. A higher bitrate normally means a better quality picture. The question would just be if 33% in that range (above 25Mbit/sec) would be noticeable.

[terjeber]

A little help please...

I am trying to remember what a person is called who attempts to dominate discussions or debates by talking more than anyone else, will not consider anyone else's point of view because they are certain that they, and only they, have all the answers, and when challenged in a logical fashion resorts to name calling in a feeble attempt to intimidate and belittle...

Funny, I am trying to remember what the what a person who attempts to "win" a discussion or debate without presenting any arguments or counter arguments is called

But hey, if you can show me how someone can distinguish between two identical items, not only "sorta" identical, but 100%, scientifically measurable identical, I am all ears.

[Video Head]

Funny, I am trying to remember what the what a person who attempts to "win" a discussion or debate without presenting any arguments or counter arguments is called

It's called: giving enough rope...

[edDV]

The question would just be if 33% in that range (above 25Mbit/sec) would be noticeable.

Maybe a bit on the most demanding displays buy 33% over 25Mb/s isn't as much a big deal for display as it is for edit processing with a recode. The master that dubbed that Bluray or HD DVD was 144Mb/s (min) to ~880Mb/s.

[videopoo]

I've been encoding with both Cinevision and CinemaCraft encoders on a daily basis for about a year now. I can say with certainty that the human eye can see no difference with those higher bitrate level - especially VC-1 or AVC. Although its nice to have the extra headroom when doing segments encodes, this extra space has no bearing on quality.....

[terjeber]

I've been encoding with both Cinevision and CinemaCraft encoders on a daily basis for about a year now. I can say with certainty that the human eye can see no difference with those higher bitrate level - especially VC-1 or AVC. Although its nice to have the extra headroom when doing segments encodes, this extra space has no bearing on quality.....

I will tend to agree with you on this one, on a noraml display, the extra 33% should make no difference in the majority of cases - I will not say that you can not find cases where the extra 33% would make a difference, but that is probably only theoretical. This is why most studios have tended to use the extra bandwidth for audio, not video.

Thanks for the info though. My discussion with "sanlyn" centers around the following sentiment expressed by him: "The quality differences are easily distinguishable. I am talking about BD's color problems, not lines of resolution."

What he is saying is that there is a significant, and easily distinguishable difference in quality between HD DVD (or Toshiba's HD DVD as he said it) and Blu-Ray. I pointed out the fact that from a movie quality standpoint that would be an absurd statement. Outside of the obvious hardware issues such as long and bad cables etc, the following items will impact picture quality:

Original material quality - For HD DVD and Blu-Ray, that will be the same
The encoding - Both formats use the same encoding, no difference
The decoding - Completely unrelated to format, but will differ within and across formats
The TV - Not particularly strongly tied to format either

In other words, there is not even a theoretical possibility that you could deliver better image quality on the HD DVD format than you can on Blu-Ray. There is a theoretical possibility, but as you point out, probably unnoticeable in the vast majority of cases, that Blu-Ray can deliver slightly better picture quality than HD DVD given the slightly higher bandwidth.

The reality is that the studios that delivered in both format tended to go with the same VC-1 encoding for both except from in the very beginning when releases on both formats were in sync. Since the data on the disk was identical, the picture quality difference would only come from factors unrelated to the format such as the decoding chip used, the cabling and the TV.

When an individual repeatedly states that two items that are identical are easily distinguishable he is either deluded or just plain lying to get attention.

[Video Head]

When an individual repeatedly states that two items that are identical are easily distinguishable he is either deluded or just plain lying to get attention.

http://www.amazon.com/How-Win-Friends-Influence-People/dp/0091906814

[robertazimmerman]

Personally, I am waiting for 4k. Sony can its 1080p players and park 'em where the sun don't shine.

[videopoo]

I will tend to agree with you on this one, on a noraml display, the extra 33% should make no difference in the majority of cases - I will not say that you can not find cases where the extra 33% would make a difference, but that is probably only theoretical. This is why most studios have tended to use the extra bandwidth for audio, not video.

Thanks for the info though. My discussion with "sanlyn" centers around the following sentiment expressed by him: "The quality differences are easily distinguishable. I am talking about BD's color problems, not lines of resolution."

What he is saying is that there is a significant, and easily distinguishable difference in quality between HD DVD (or Toshiba's HD DVD as he said it) and Blu-Ray. I pointed out the fact that from a movie quality standpoint that would be an absurd statement. Outside of the obvious hardware issues such as long and bad cables etc, the following items will impact picture quality:

Original material quality - For HD DVD and Blu-Ray, that will be the same
The encoding - Both formats use the same encoding, no difference
The decoding - Completely unrelated to format, but will differ within and across formats
The TV - Not particularly strongly tied to format either

In other words, there is not even a theoretical possibility that you could deliver better image quality on the HD DVD format than you can on Blu-Ray. There is a theoretical possibility, but as you point out, probably unnoticeable in the vast majority of cases, that Blu-Ray can deliver slightly better picture quality than HD DVD given the slightly higher bandwidth.

The reality is that the studios that delivered in both format tended to go with the same VC-1 encoding for both except from in the very beginning when releases on both formats were in sync. Since the data on the disk was identical, the picture quality difference would only come from factors unrelated to the format such as the decoding chip used, the cabling and the TV.

When an individual repeatedly states that two items that are identical are easily distinguishable he is either deluded or just plain lying to get attention.

Yes, in fact, we were outputting the same file for both BD and HD DVD on the same pass.

[Cole]

I have just read through this forum and I may be a little late to put in my two pennith, however...

I have got a 32" HD ready LCD and an up-scaling DVD player. An HD disc format (whatever it maybe) is not on my radar for a while yet purely for the reason of available content.

My video interest comes from the collecting of vintage British television; I recently did a search on Play.com to see what was available on HD content in the way of British television titles. One! On both HD-DVD and Blue-Ray, but One: 2005's Bleak House.

The trouble is UK television has only just started being recorded in HD and only a few programmes: Torchwood, Robin Hood, Silent Witness etc but the vast, vast, majority of television output was recorded in SD (and still is in the UK).

I am currently replacing all of my old Doctor Who VHS tapes with the new cleaned-up DVD releases. I can't see me forking out a third time for Hi-Definition versions especially as (as I currently understand it; please feel free to correct me) a HD release would only be up-scaled SD versions anyway. I currently have a DVD player already doing that. Can a 1960's B&W series really be improved upon in HD?

When the availability of real HD television titles appear then maybe I will move on; currently one or two titles isn't a viable investment.

[jagabo]

Yes, high def for vintage Doctor who would be pointless. It was shot on SD video tape. The BBC used to recycle video tapes so many early episodes are lost forever.

[SCDVD]

Personally, I am waiting for 4k. Sony can its 1080p players and park 'em where the sun don't shine.

You will be waiting a long time. 4K isn't intended for the home consumer TV market. It's aimed at displacing film for big screen movie theater markets. This is a tough road though. Hollywood is joined at the hip with film. I suspect one reason is that the people in charge of production are afraid of something that they aren't familiar with. As a result, they feel threatened by it.

[Scooter_NJ]

Not as fearful as you might believe:

http://www.dcinematoday.com/

Interestingly, no projector in this realm I checked out has hdmi.

[SingSing]

In this week Sunday sales circulars from Sears and circuit city and ...:

Sony BDPS300 $399.00

Sharp BDHP20U $399.00

Samsung BDP1400 $399.00

It is damn obvious telling the consumer Sony want to price control the BD players.

So Sony thinks they won HD, and hey also won the right to empty our wallet ?

NOT.

Eventually, this will be the headline :

Sony won the Hi-Def DVD format war, then put the format out of bussiness.

[Cole]

In the UK we have a Hi-Fi chain called Richer Sounds who retail at some of the lowest prices in their high street shops. They are offering two Blue-Ray players currently:

Sony BDP3S300 @ £299.99

Samsung BDP1400 @ £229.95

It wasn't so long ago that the Sony Blue-Ray players were retailing at about £600 plus.

http://www.richersounds.com/productlist.php?cda=productlist&sgroup=HDDVD

[bbanderic]

In this week Sunday sales circulars from Sears and circuit city and ...:

Sony BDPS300 $399.00

Sharp BDHP20U $399.00

Samsung BDP1400 $399.00

It is damn obvious telling the consumer Sony want to price control the BD players.

So Sony thinks they won HD, and hey also won the right to empty our wallet ?

NOT.

Eventually, this will be the headline :

Sony won the Hi-Def DVD format war, then put the format out of bussiness.

This is nonsense, it's amazing how impatient people are about the hardware/software price reductions. And please, don't come back with..."Toshiba was selling their hardware for much cheaper"...that's why Toshiba lost $1.1b, they were practically giving their players away, hence one of the reasons they're no longer in the HD business. If they were to release a Blu-ray player today, do you actually think they would sell it for the same rock bottom price as their HD-DVD players? Highly doubtful.

Remember, those players that you have listed were much more expensive when they first hit the market. Yes, they were even cheaper last Christmas, but that was holiday time, of course there going to be on sale.

All you people bitching about the hardware prices, talk to me later this year when the new 2008 Blu-ray models are released, and at the end of the year when the natural progression of price cuts take effect.

[sanlyn]

My discussion with "sanlyn" centers around the following sentiment expressed by him: "The quality differences are easily distinguishable. I am talking about BD's color problems, not lines of resolution."

(sigh). Every time you talk about "image quality", terjeber, you keep mentioning "identical" numbers. I think you misconstrue my complaint about Blu-Ray. It doesn't have anythinmg to do with "better" numbers. If you can find some way to dsitinguish the absence of color casts by giving us some numbers, I'd have to agree with you on numbers alone. But I'm not talking about numbers.

Every Blu-Ray presentation I've seen has obvious chroma upsampling errors, as well as a generally green (or cyan), and often an overcompensating red color cast. It's not just a Blu-Ray problem; many SD-DVD and other DVD players that use certain decoder chips and certain decoder implentations have those same problems, and many encoder implementations can trigger them. Those who can't see it, or who don't care, have no problem spending their $$$ on those players, cables, discs, or whatever. I find those errors visually annoying. I'm sorry I can't put a number on that problem, but I do know that it can easily be corrected with the code used to implement decoder chips, and some of it goes away if you stay clear of some brands of cable. So far, I don't see Blu-Ray techs making those improvements. Toshiba avoided adressing some HD-DVD problems that kept me away from their technology as well.

When it comes to identical numbers, there's little argument. When it comes to implementation, well, there's room for disagreement. I don't know what kind of number you can assign to a higher-resolution / lower quality image, but it's not a number I want to pay for. When it comes to hardware, cable, etc., there's one sure thing I can say about numbers: the numbers "100111 10" and "1 0011 110" are not "identical" when seen by a decoder or a DAC. So, yes, color problems can be traced to hardware as well as technology.

[Midzuki]

As jagabo has already pointed out, these HD-DVD&&Blu-Ray related
threads really look like discussions/quarrels about religion.
Anyway, here goes my "uneducated guess" of the day:
HD-DVD lost the format war against Blu-Ray only because "HD-DVD" does not
sound "cool" --- if it had been named "Purple-Ray" for example, things might
have run quite differently.

[Video Head]

HD-DVD lost the format war against Blu-Ray only because "HD-DVD" does not
sound "cool" --- if it had been named "Purple-Ray" for example, things might
have run quite differently.

Let's see if Steve Jobbs buys the remnants of HD-DVD, renames it to i-DVD, puts an i-Pod and i-Phone docking bay in the player and sells 100's of millions of the units within months...and then sets-up an exclusive on-line store for the discs.