It's time to go Blu-ray

Ron-P

Seeing the boat load of cool Blu-ray titles coming early next year as soon as the year turns the corner I'm going to look into getting a player. The Panny is looking as the best choice right now but I have yet to see one in a store.

While HD-DVD is great their lack of titles is sucking hugely.

Just off the top of my head, these titles are out or coming soon that I want and that HD-DVD does not offer.

Black Hawk Down
House of Flying Daggers
Ultraviolet
Underworld: Evolution
Pearl Harbor
AvP
Flyboys
The Transporter
Kingdom of Heaven
F4
50 First Dates

...and those are just a few.

Lsi9

We need a universal player, bottom line...

cfrizz

On this I agree wholeheartedly! I would wait until a Uni comes out before jumping on the bandwagon.

This is what I did with my DVD player, I refused to get into a format war. I remember the Beta/VHS stupidity & vowed I would never particate until the dust settled.

Lsi9 wrote:

We need a universal player, bottom line...

sickicw

well if you have a list of movies you want to see, id say go for it. A universal player isn't going to come out for quite some time. If i am not mistaken, the playstation 3 has the best blu-ray player right now. I have a hd-dvd player, but only 3 movies for it. I use it mostly for CD playback. I am just waiting for some HD showes to start showing up on either format like sompronos, deadwood, or battlestar galactica.

scottvamp

WOW! What happened to "blu-ray is junk and will never survive" theory. And that was majority on this forum. Just enjoying my patience.:)
My VHS is in the shop right now. Hee Heee!!!!

sickicw

blu-ray had a pretty crappy start, and sony is good at publishing crappy movies using mpeg2 on 25G single disk, but the movies are getting better (some studios are using the newer video coeds and lossless audio compression on duel disks(50G)), but they still have a ways to go. There players are still more expensive, and they need to start cranking out more dual layer disks. Its hard to tell what is going to happen for a year or so.

scottvamp

I know exactly how its all going down. Just funny how people are so quick to judge new technology. Their are alot more pro's for Blu-Ray overall.
Another one of my speedy tech moments - their is a holograhic dvd type media in development that will hold a thousand time's more data than the current HD media. It never ends. People told me DVD would never make it when i bought the first unit on the market. OK!!!!
My dad's/family's first VCR was a Panasonic and weighted 38 lbs. With a price tag of $999.99. It had a wired remote with a pause/stop button for recording. SWEET!!!!!

millerman 3732

Ron-P wrote:

Seeing the boat load of cool Blu-ray titles coming early next year as soon as the year turns the corner I'm going to look into getting a player. The Panny is looking as the best choice right now but I have yet to see one in a store.

While HD-DVD is great their lack of titles is sucking hugely.

Just off the top of my head, these titles are out or coming soon that I want and that HD-DVD does not offer.

Black Hawk Down
House of Flying Daggers
Ultraviolet
Underworld: Evolution
Pearl Harbor
AvP
Flyboys
The Transporter
Kingdom of Heaven
F4
50 First Dates

...and those are just a few.

I'm with you the lack of HD DVD titles in the last month or so is really getting old and after the first of the year I'm going to be looking for a BR disc player myself and I really want to see Kingdom Of Heaven on BR and the family really loved Talladega Nights another BR only title.

ledhed

Ron-P wrote:

Black Hawk Down
House of Flying Daggers
Ultraviolet
Underworld: Evolution
Pearl Harbor
AvP
Flyboys
The Transporter
Kingdom of Heaven
F4
50 First Dates

...and those are just a few.

Your joking right?

millerman 3732

I've read over at AVS that while the movie sucked, Ultra Violet that is, the PQ and SQ are reference quality.

polkatese

what's wrong with UV, ledhed? the short segment on the BD demo at BB looks interesting! the colors and details are definitely top notch, don't know the storyline though...

nadams

polkatese wrote:

don't know the storyline though...

Then you haven't missed anything.

ledhed

It is the only movie I have left during. The only reason I stayed in the theater was to stay out of the Boston cold :eek:

Picture wise though, it is gorgeous thanks to all of its CG and I believe it was filmed in HiDef.

polkatese

got it. thanks for the heads-up.

venomclan

This war will bury them both. The best thing the consumer can do right now is just not buy anything. I refuse to build a library on a doomed format, whichever one it is, or boht. SD dvd is good enough for now imho.
Venom

scottvamp

Ultavoilet wasn't too bad.
Talladega Nights is what frightenings me. It is in REDNECK Reference quality. :eek::D

polksda

venomclan wrote:

This war will bury them both. The best thing the consumer can do right now is just not buy anything. I refuse to build a library on a doomed format, whichever one it is, or boht. SD dvd is good enough for now imho.
Venom

I go exactly the opposite direction. I bought both formats. Life is too short to wait on the sidelines. Also, I disagree that SD DVD is good enough. I had a Pioneer Elite 79-AVI feeding 480i via HDMI to a DVDO Iscan HD+ scaler, which is about as good as upconverted SD-DVD gets... and it still pales in comparison to real HD.

If you have a relatively large set/screen (50" or larger) that is well calibrated, it's no contest.

Both formats are capable of delivering pristine quality, although the mastering is still a bit inconsistent from title to title...

With Google Checkout's $20 off $50 purchase deal still going on at Buy.Com, and a judicious pairing of titles to just exceed $50, you can wind up with BR and HD-DVD titles at $15-17 each. Since the deal is usable an infinite number of times, you can build up a nice HD library in relatively short order...

Sami

millerman 3732 wrote:

I've read over at AVS that while the movie sucked, Ultra Violet that is, the PQ and SQ are reference quality.

HD-DVD has it's equivalent, Aeon Flux.

polksda

Sami wrote:

HD-DVD has it's equivalent, Aeon Flux.

I'm going to disagree on the Aeon Flux versus Ultraviolet. Aeon Flux is very crisp and razor sharp. Ultraviolet, on the other hand, was filmed using a lot of filtering, resulting in a lot of "soft" shots with oversaturation of color. I did not like the PQ of Ultraviolet at all. If you're looking for something that has that HD "pop", this ain't it...

Sherardp

I'm waiting on a price drop on the blu ray players myself. Some features Im looking for as built in decoding, some kind of Lan Jack, most players dont have these features yet. A uni player would definitely be **** but again that wont be soon.

Ron-P

Your joking right?

Nope, love the film. Pure eye-candy at it's best. Oh, and I just bought the HD-DVD of Aeon Flux today along with The Hulk.

I refuse to build a library on a doomed format

Did you buy into VHS? How about SD-DVD? VHS is doomed and SD-DVD will be too, it's just a matter of time. Everything is going HD. But, like Polksda said...

Life is too short to wait on the sidelines

I am a huge movie buff and I want my movies in the best format possible and HD-DVD / Blu-ray is it. SD-DVD just isn't good enough anymore. Hey if both HD formats die I'll still have my players and films to watch.

Sami

polksda wrote:

I'm going to disagree on the Aeon Flux versus Ultraviolet. Aeon Flux is very crisp and razor sharp. Ultraviolet, on the other hand, was filmed using a lot of filtering, resulting in a lot of "soft" shots with oversaturation of color. I did not like the PQ of Ultraviolet at all. If you're looking for something that has that HD "pop", this ain't it...

I haven't seen Ultraviolet, I just took the word of the other poster, so I based it on Aeon Flux having one of the best PQ's I have seen. Of course the movie itself...well, you know.

shack

scottvamp wrote:

My dad's/family's first VCR was a Panasonic and weighted 38 lbs. With a price tag of $999.99. It had a wired remote with a pause/stop button for recording. SWEET!!!!!

We had that same VCR. A top loader and the thing lasted forever.

venomclan wrote:

The best thing the consumer can do right now is just not buy anything. I refuse to build a library on a doomed format, whichever one it is, or boht.

With close to 500 DVD and 200 VHS movies in my library whatever I get better be backward compatable. I currently have around 100 movies that I've not gotten around to watching yet. A new format is not a high priority right now.

sickicw wrote:

some studios are using the newer video coeds

Which machine do I need to get for these?

Schwingding

Don't do it. The lack of decoders for DTS-MA and other high resolution audio formats is inexcusable. And the picture is underwhelming for the most part. Titles vary in PQ in extremes, and if you're used to a good upconverting DVD picture you will see a slight, but not terribly impressive improvement.

I continue to experience far better HD picture quality from OTA HDTV broadcasts than I do from my blu-ray player.

You want to buy mine? I'll consider making you a deal with all of the titles I bought, too.

polksda

Schwingding wrote:

Don't do it. The lack of decoders for DTS-MA and other high resolution audio formats is inexcusable. And the picture is underwhelming for the most part. Titles vary in PQ in extremes, and if you're used to a good upconverting DVD picture you will see a slight, but not terribly impressive improvement.

I continue to experience far better HD picture quality from OTA HDTV broadcasts than I do from my blu-ray player.

You want to buy mine? I'll consider making you a deal with all of the titles I bought, too.

Not to sound like I'm defending Blu-Ray (I lean heavily towards HD-DVD), but what titles do you own? The encoding quality of most of the early Blu-Ray titles is extremely subpar, however with most of the recent releases they've gotten their act together. Ice Age 2, X-Men 3, and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, while not necessarily movies of Oscar calibre, have exceptional PQ. Supposedly Kingdom of Heaven and Black Hawk Down are absolute reference quality (I have them, but have not watched yet).

Also, the Samsung BR player (which I assume you have) has been getting some rather heavy knocks compared to other BR players that came after...

Schwingding

Top of my head:

Kingdom of Heaven
XMen:3
Gone in 60
Underworld:Evolution
Riddick
Into The Blue

Supposedly these are among the best titles according to the rating forum on AVSFORUM.

cfrizz

So tell me, how many of you have multiple copies of the same movie but in all of the different formats?

Schwingding

I wish I could tell you how many times I've bought Terminator 2. I know I've had it on VHS, laserdisc and DVD - a couple of times on DVD. Now I have it on Blu-Ray, too.

ND13

Schwingding wrote:

Top of my head:

Kingdom of Heaven
XMen:3
Gone in 60
Underworld:Evolution
Riddick
Into The Blue

Supposedly these are among the best titles according to the rating forum on AVSFORUM.

How much for the whole package(Sammy and flicks)??

And will any trades be considered??

Schwingding

ND13 wrote:

How much for the whole package(Sammy and flicks)??

And will any trades be considered??

This would have to be done offline. Let me think about it, look through my actual collection, and I'll bmail ya.

millerman 3732

scottvamp wrote:

Ultavoilet wasn't too bad.
Talladega Nights is what frightenings me. It is in REDNECK Reference quality. :eek::D

In my best Ricky Bobby voice ''If you ant first your last, because I'm just a big hairy American winning machine.'' Come one how could you watch that movie and not laugh, reference or not.