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  1. I'm a Super Moderator johns0's Avatar
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    I remember when dvd players were $500 and dvdr blanks were $20 and people said they wouldnt buy them cause they were happy with their vcr and vhs quality movies.
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  2. Member Xylob the Destroyer's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by edDV
    For example, I'd consider replacing the Star Wars series...
    Again? Dammit...
    I got this on VHS, VHS, VHS, LaserDisc, DVD...
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  3. Member edDV's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Xylob the Destroyer
    Originally Posted by edDV
    For example, I'd consider replacing the Star Wars series...
    Again? Dammit...
    I got this on VHS, VHS, VHS, LaserDisc, DVD...
    Yep, I skipped VHS and laserdisc 'cause I saw DVD coming.

    I still think we should get an "upgrade" discount.
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  4. Video Restorer lordsmurf's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by johns0
    I remember when dvd players were $500 and dvdr blanks were $20 and people said they wouldnt buy them cause they were happy with their vcr and vhs quality movies.
    Those people were idiots. The advantages of DVD over VHS were major. Not so with BD over DVD, which is a marginal gain at best (and even then, it's mostly in theory -- surely not in practice).
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    I think we need a poll to see how many people see a marked improvement from dvd to hd-dvd/bluray. All this talk of how HD movies are terrible makes me suspect golden eyes syndrome

    I also only have a handful of movies so perhaps I haven't come across these hackjob transfers.
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    Every time i've complained about blu-ray quality people say it must be your HDTV. I'm glad to see i'm not Robinson Crusoe.

    In another thread someone told me what I was seeing was "film grain" and that it was exactly how the director intended it too look. My DVD version of Predator is FAR superior to the Blu-Ray version.. I think Predator is by far the best example of Blu-Ray at its worst.

    I agree some Blu-Ray titles look good. I think the size of my HDTV (32") is holding me back from getting the absolute best viewing experience. I was reading somewhere (cant remember where) an expert was saying that you need at least 55" screen to appreciate Blu-Ray.
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  7. Originally Posted by lordsmurf
    The advantages of DVD over VHS were major. Not so with BD over DVD, which is a marginal gain at best (and even then, it's mostly in theory -- surely not in practice).
    You're saying you cannot see a difference between 480 and 720/1080?? or are you saying Bluray movies are being encoded just as bad as the current DVDs?

    If the later, I can some what agree to the encoding. If you're saying it's just theory about the differences between 480/720/1080, then you are totally wacked. I have have a 42" and can see the diferences between all three. Granted, not much between 720/1080, but there are huge compared to 480
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    moving this to my post above...
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  9. Member rhegedus's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by lordsmurf
    Originally Posted by rhegedus
    Originally Posted by lordsmurf
    People can say "BD blows away DVD" all they want, but I have to wander if they also see UFOs, Elvis and wear tinfoil hats -- they're clearly seeing something that us normal folks do not.
    So we're all kooks? Is that the basis of your argument?
    You know I like you, but yes, your love affair with BD is a bit kooky. :P


    Originally Posted by lordsmurf
    I have a stack of BD here that aren't even released yet -- for review purposes (yes, legitimately, Fedex direct from the studios) -- and I almost hate that most of my reviews this month are at least partially negative, due to minimal improvements over DVD versions, or lackluster image quality. The disc has this little piece of paper inside that says something along the lines "this DVD is using the best technology available ... ultimate viewing experience .. be sure to update your player software or firmware .. " blah blah blah. I must have the beta copies or something, because I don't agree at all with the PR rhetoric. So rest assured I'm not talking about old BD from a few years ago or bargain-bin titles.
    Your experiences appear to be different to the majority of BD owners here.

    I've been buying 2 disks a month for the past year or so - some replaced DVDs but the newer ones were first time copies. All are stunning.

    There is some sloppy crap out there - Terminator 1 and Lethal Weapon 1 spring to mind - the trick is to read the reviews first:

    http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/

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  10. Member rhegedus's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by Browncoat
    I think the size of my HDTV (32") is holding me back from getting the absolute best viewing experience.
    You don't say!

    You'd have to sit less than 5-foot away to make it worthwhile.
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    One has to wonder why HDTVs are made any smaller than 55" then...
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    rhegedus Posted: May 09, 2009 02:05

    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Browncoat wrote:
    I think the size of my HDTV (32") is holding me back from getting the absolute best viewing experience.


    You don't say!
    Nice of you to laugh at my 32" TV.. I only recently upgraded from a 24"
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  13. Member rhegedus's Avatar
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    Not everyone has the room for a 55" TV...

    I suspect the reason why even 32" are HD is to keep production costs down - no point in having 2 separate production lines making 2 separate products.
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  14. Always Watching guns1inger's Avatar
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    Even on a 32" TV there is a marked difference between upscaled DVD and BluRay (with the exception of a few very poor titles). However if you think back to the early days of DVD, there were a lot of releases that were pretty poor - P&S instead of OAR, taken from 1" tape masters instead of scanned from negatives, flippers etc. Every new tech has it's teething problems.
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  15. Video Restorer lordsmurf's Avatar
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    BD has potential, we can agree on that -- but Sony has to give up its death grip on the tech --- and studios need to quit being so lazy about the products released.

    I'm sorry, but it takes more than extra pixels on screen to make it look better than a DVD. In fact, some errors can make the BD look worse than a DVD, if not addressed properly.

    Only shot-in-HD productions tend to look good, they are hack-jobbing older prints for the most part. Then again, DVD versions of shot-in-HD is pretty nice too. It reminds me of the Super Nintendo in its latter days, when RARE started to push the tech to its limits, and some games looked almost as good as the new N64 games. DVD is now being pushed to its limits, and BD is being used at its minimums.
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  16. Always Watching guns1inger's Avatar
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    New releases like Dark Knight simply have no equal on DVD, and new restorations such as 2001 and Casablanca are showing what can be done with the format. I still see a lot of very lazy DVD releases of major product, not to mention a lot of cynical release tactics from the studios.

    As for Sony . . . . that's a whole other issue.
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  17. Member yoda313's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by eddv
    Blu-Ray is like tobacco, once you hook them, many will replace old favorite discs and switch buying habits.
    I'd tend to agree with this. However I am not there quite yet.

    Case in point - I still only have four Bluray movies. This past winter I bought DARK KNIGHT, INDY 4, and CLONE WARS on plain old dvd because I still can't come to grips with $25 and $30 bluray discs.

    I can see the difference on blurays even on a my modest 32" 1366x768 westinghouse. However it's not enough to justify the extra 10-15 bucks a pop nor is it worth rebuying some "lesser" movies that I have on dvd.

    However I will say this - I'll re-buy LOTR and especially STAR WARS the moment it hits BLURAY - or at least as soon as I can. Movies like those need all the extra bitrate they can muster to shine to their fullest potential.
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  18. Interesting thread. I intend to get BD player this Autumn in time for the BD release of LOTR. Perhaps prices will be reasonable by then. But the talk of how downloads will supersede blu-ray has me curious.

    I did an unprofessional comparison. I DL'ed a one minute 720p sample clip of WALL_E. (From mvlib, any comments on that service would be welcome). Got it at about 260 KB/sec over Comcast, fast enough to be acceptable to me. Then extracted the same clip from DVD. File size of the .mkv and the .mpg are about the same at ~43MB.

    The file info of the DL'ed sample:

    General
    Complete name : G:\WALL_E_Video_Preview.mkv
    Format : Matroska
    File size : 43.2 MiB
    Duration : 1mn 0s
    Overall bit rate : 5 965 Kbps
    Encoded date : UTC 2008-11-11 15:54:34
    Writing application : mkvmerge v2.2.0 ('Turn It On Again') built on Mar 4 2008 12:58:26
    Writing library : libebml v0.7.7 + libmatroska v0.8.1

    Video
    Format : AVC
    Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
    Format profile : High@L4.1
    Format settings, CABAC : Yes
    Format settings, ReFrames : 5 frames
    Muxing mode : Container profile=Unknown@4.1
    Codec ID : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
    Duration : 1mn 0s
    Bit rate : 4 183 Kbps
    Width : 1 280 pixels
    Height : 528 pixels
    Display aspect ratio : 2.424
    Frame rate : 23.976 fps
    Resolution : 24 bits
    Colorimetry : 4:2:0
    Scan type : Progressive

    Audio
    Format : DTS
    Format/Info : Digital Theater Systems
    Format profile : ES
    Codec ID : A_DTS
    Duration : 1mn 0s
    Bit rate mode : Constant
    Bit rate : 1 536 Kbps
    Channel(s) : 6 channels
    Channel positions : Front: L C R, Surround: L R, LFE
    Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
    Resolution : 24 bits
    Language : English

    Text
    Format : UTF-8
    Codec ID : S_TEXT/UTF8
    Codec ID/Info : UTF-8 Plain Text
    Language : English

    I chose WALL_E because it looks damn good as upconverted DVD. (MY HTPC plays DVDs at about par with my cheap Philips upconverting player).

    Played them both repeatedly over my HTPC to a 42" 720p plasma, viewing distance about 2 meters. Yeah, the difference is immediately apparent to me. The wife? Not so much, I had to train her what to look for.

    The price to DL the whole movie is $5 bucks, either 720p or 1080p. (File size of the 1080p sample was ~ 80 MB, BTW). I'm thinking the 720p versions of movies would be a viable option for me, once I get a set-top that can play AVC at full resolution from DVD. Please pardon my ignorance, but I presume such players exist? Haven't got around to looking into players yet. I'd like to be able to play such files on both the HTPC and on another TV as well, using a set-top.

    Speaking of the other TV, we also have a 47" 1080p 120 Hz set. To tell the truth, at normal viewing distances, playing 1080i OTA content there's not much discernible difference between the two TVs.

    Anyway, I don't really see myself having much use for a Blu-ray burner.

    Comments would be welcome.
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  19. Member yoda313's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by fritzi93
    playing 1080p OTA content
    Correct me if I'm wrong but at least in the US isn't Over the Air maxed at 1080i????

    Also aren't all of the cable/satellite broadcasts also maxed at 1080i?

    I guess there can be some on demand content from fios or cable that is 1080p but I thought the cable/sat/fios companies aren't willing/able to pump 1080p content yet?
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  20. Member ntscuser's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by videobread
    I'll go Blu-ray when blanks are below $0.50 each and printable.
    Blanks for backing up to AVCHD already are.
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  21. Originally Posted by yoda313
    Originally Posted by fritzi93
    playing 1080p OTA content
    Correct me if I'm wrong but at least in the US isn't Over the Air maxed at 1080i????

    Also aren't all of the cable/satellite broadcasts also maxed at 1080i?

    I guess there can be some on demand content from fios or cable that is 1080p but I thought the cable/sat/fios companies aren't willing/able to pump 1080p content yet?
    Yeah, wrote that without thinking. 1080i, thanks for noticing.

    [EDIT] Fixed it.
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  22. Member yoda313's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by ntscuser
    Blanks for backing up to AVCHD already are.
    I think the op was referring to backups without any conversions beyond ripping/burning.
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  23. Member ntscuser's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by yoda313
    Originally Posted by fritzi93
    playing 1080p OTA content
    Correct me if I'm wrong but at least in the US isn't Over the Air maxed at 1080i????
    It's not full 1080x1960 either, more like 1080x1388.

    Originally Posted by yoda313
    Originally Posted by ntscuser
    Blanks for backing up to AVCHD already are.
    I think the op was referring to backups without any conversions beyond ripping/burning.
    Where's the fun in that? Hell, I'm too mean to backup DVD to DL
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  24. Perhaps a more "honest" interpretation of the Blu-ray data saga:

    http://www.betanews.com/article/Bluray-sales-skyrocket-provided-you-lower-the-sky/1241718885
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  25. Member edDV's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by yoda313
    Originally Posted by fritzi93
    playing 1080p OTA content
    Correct me if I'm wrong but at least in the US isn't Over the Air maxed at 1080i????

    Also aren't all of the cable/satellite broadcasts also maxed at 1080i?

    I guess there can be some on demand content from fios or cable that is 1080p but I thought the cable/sat/fios companies aren't willing/able to pump 1080p content yet?
    1920x1080p @23.976 is a valad ATSC format and ATSC TV tuners are requried to tune it. No TV station has yet chosen to broadcast 24p since it takes all the channel bandwith. 1280x720p @23.976 fps is also supported. A station could broadcast 2 or even three 1280x720p/23.976 movies in 19Mb/s. It would be an interesting marketing plan.

    As for cable and fios, I haven't seen a set top box yet that supports 1080p out.
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  26. Member yoda313's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by eddv
    No TV station has yet chosen to broadcast 24p since it takes all the channel bandwith
    So I guess its theoretically possible but economically impractical right now.

    Originally Posted by eddv
    As for cable and fios, I haven't seen a set top box yet that supports 1080p out.
    That's kind of what I figured.... I'm guessing satellite is the same.
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  27. Member edDV's Avatar
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    An ASTC station could run a 480i "must carry" primary and then carry two 1280x720p/23.976 movie subchannels with very good quality. The movies could have multiple language tracks and subtitles.

    It seems like a good business plan to me. Maybe even a network.
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  28. The momentum seems to be shifting in a big way toward these DOWNLOAD modes of video delivery:

    1. http://www.apple.com/appletv/ (Apple iTunes)

    2. http://www.vudu.com/ (Vudu 1080p)

    3. http://www.netflix.com/ (Netflix video downloads)

    4. http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/videos/catalog.aspx?d=1 (Xbox 360 Movies)

    5. http://www.amazon.com (Amazon Video On Demand)

    6. http://www.us.playstation.com/PSN#fbid:ep-Fgovp-rs (Sony Playstation Network)

    ...ETC...

    ...and consumers will continue to use a combination of standard DVDs and there will be some Blu-ray uptake, but Blu-ray and physical media will increasingly find it difficult to dominate as physical media dominated in the past.
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  29. Originally Posted by edDV
    An ASTC station could run a 480i "must carry" primary and then carry two 1280x720p/23.976 movie subchannels with very good quality. The movies could have multiple language tracks and subtitles.

    It seems like a good business plan to me. Maybe even a network.

    Most if not all, allocate 14mb to their primary and then divide up the rest. They also use VBR on their channels. Marketing wise, it would be a bad move to do SD on their primary when all their syndication is being advertized as HD
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    Originally Posted by lordsmurf
    ......... DVD is now being pushed to its limits, and BD is being used at its minimums.

    Lordsmurf has said a lot of things in this thread that makes sense to me but his above comment is both simple and as true as can be. Well, at least it is to me.

    Tony
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