HD versus BLURAY ?

Deadof_knight

1080p is 1080 p is it not so why would you pay 700.00 for a blu ray instead of say 250.00 for an HD dvd player?

MikeC78

That's the choice you make, seems like a no-brainer to me. If you want one format I'd go HD DVD, if you want all the movies you need both.

BTW, where can you find a HD DVD player for 250$?

Mike

Refefer

He's probably thinking of the HD-DVD add-on for the xbox 360.

MikeC78

Refefer wrote:

He's probably thinking of the HD-DVD add-on for the xbox 360.

I forgot about that one.

Mike

Deadof_knight

Well I did make one assumption the hd-960 is an upconverter not a true HD. The picture does look better than normal because of the upconversion going to the 1080p Samsung...... my bad

sickicw

Deadof_knight wrote:

1080p is 1080 p is it not

well no not really. There is 1080p24hz and there is 1080p 60hz, and then there is the way in which 1080p60 is outputed. This can be from converting a 1080p24hz signal directly to 1080p60hz, or some players convert 1080p 24hz to 1080i 60hz, and then convert that to 1080p 60hz.

cheddar

Deadof_knight wrote:

Well I did make one assumption the hd-960 is an upconverter not a true HD. The picture does look better than normal because of the upconversion going to the 1080p Samsung...... my bad

So if I read the gist of your thread right your real question is, "Why buy blu-ray (or HD-DVD) if you can get a 1080p upconverting player like the 960?"

That's a lot easier to answer than blu-ray vs. hd-dvd.

Upconverting players take a 480p signal and scale it up to 1080p resolution. That means that a program written into the hardware or software of the player has to take the available 480p information and "guess" where the pixels should be at 1080p.

There are some pretty good scalers that are pretty good at guessing so the picture looks hi-def like. But the reality is scaling always produces an inaccurate hi-def picture 'cause it only had 480p worth of data to work with. Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats have movies that are actually encoded in 1080p resolution. Every pixel is there in the source material so there's no "guessing" of what the pixels are and where they need to go. So you end up getting a picture that's as close to the original source as possible.

Now the reality is that there is always some amount of scaling involved. Most HDTVs currently on the market can't display 1080p. They are 1080i or 720p sets. But when you are downconverting from 1080p, the picture will still look accurate and sharp 'cause you are guessing from a too much information signal (1080p) instead of a too little information signal (480p).

Some people think the upconverted picture is good enough for them. But for people that want every pixel as accurately rendered as possible, they will want the new technology HD players.

Hope this helps.

MSALLA

I see Disney is now offering new DVD's in Blu-Ray. I thought Blu-Ray would go the way of Beta vcr tapes, but I may be wrong on that. I'm still holding out for a universal player.

PolkWannabie

It took a long time for Beta to disappear and I don't remember too many players that played both Beta and VHS along the way ...

MSALLA

PolkWannabie wrote:

It took a long time for Beta to disappear and I don't remember too many players that played both Beta and VHS along the way ...

Good point. But a Beta tape was smaller then th VHS. Bluray and HD are both just DVD's.

mwaarna

intersting website covering HD-DVD vs BluRay

http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/

bobman1235

Looks like the debate may be mostly over soon - LG is unveiling a combo player later this year :

LG Electronics (LG), a leader in consumer electronics and mobile communicati ons, announced that it will launch the world's first dual-format high-definition disc player, capable of playing both Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD content. The unit will be released in the United States in early 2007. Details will be provided at the 2007 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES), held January 8-11 in Las Vegas.

LG expects this technological breakthrough to end the confusion and inconvenience of competing high-definition disc formats for both content producers and consumers.

polkatese

wow. is that real? now it has potentially change people buying plan on HD Players. I would.

MikeC78

bobman1235 wrote:

Looks like the debate may be mostly over soon - LG is unveiling a combo player later this year :

I will believe it when I see it!

Mike

Ron-P

Very cool...if true. Rumors and more rumors of universal players have haunted the net since the talk of both formats yet none have ever gotten past the rumor stage. Hopefully this is true as it would help the hi-def format grow.

sickicw

I have a feeling we will hear about lots of new stuff next week from CES 07


EDIT: Here is some more news....

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Total_HD/Industry_Forecasts/Warner_to_Unveil_First_Blu-ray/HD_DVD_Hybrid_Discs_at_CES/413

steveinaz

I noticed the other day that Sears had quite a few Blu-ray DVD's on-hand.

goingganzo

not a big sony fan but i hope blu ray wins. it is the better format and has higher copasity. also it hass a better set of backers i would think about 65 % of the big movie and others

jhermance

Well i work at tweeter in we just today open up the Toshiba hd-a2 and put it out on the floor hooked up to a Samsung LNS4696D and it only puts video out at 1080i so to me it isn't worth it but the main reason for that is that HD DVD's are not all regulated to 1080p. Now on the other hand we have a Sony BDPS1 hooked up to a Pioneer Elite PROHD1 and it blows the hd dvd player out of the water. On top of them coming out with a unit that will play both they have also figured out that they can put both hd dvd and blu ray on the same disc. So i believe that is where everything will be going in the future.

Deadof_knight

Cheddar thanks for the reply I needed that... info

mutelight

jhermance wrote:

Well i work at tweeter in we just today open up the Toshiba hd-a2 and put it out on the floor hooked up to a Samsung LNS4696D and it only puts video out at 1080i so to me it isn't worth it but the main reason for that is that HD DVD's are not all regulated to 1080p. Now on the other hand we have a Sony BDPS1 hooked up to a Pioneer Elite PROHD1 and it blows the hd dvd player out of the water. On top of them coming out with a unit that will play both they have also figured out that they can put both hd dvd and blu ray on the same disc. So i believe that is where everything will be going in the future.

Every HD-DVD is 1080p resolution. Also almost every single HD-DVD utilizes the VC-1 codec whereas Blu-ray is a mixed bag. I am not saying that you don't think Blu-ray looks better but have you tried both formats on the same display? If anything you are experiencing a placebo effect.

cnjvh

I've compared both the Sony and Samsung blu-ray players with both the Toshiba A1 and and XA1 on about 20 different HD displays (everything from CRT to LCOS to Plasma to DLP) and have found the HD-DVD players to be superior on all displays. Not sure why, it just is (for me). 1080p and 1080i are of equal quality assuming the display is de-interlacing properly (not bobbing/weaving its way to 1080p).

polktiger

Ever notice that when you leave out the special punctuation of blu-ray to become bluray it looks a lot like blurry. This is appropriate for me becuase unless my glasses perscription is up to date, it doesn't matter what I am watching, nothing looks sharp.

fireshoes

mutelight wrote:

Every HD-DVD is 1080p resolution. Also almost every single HD-DVD utilizes the VC-1 codec whereas Blu-ray is a mixed bag. I am not saying that you don't think Blu-ray looks better but have you tried both formats on the same display? If anything you are experiencing a placebo effect.

Actually they say that Camp Cuddly Pines, the new HD DVD porno, is 720p. :cool:

Sami

jhermance wrote:

Well i work at tweeter in we just today open up the Toshiba hd-a2 and put it out on the floor hooked up to a Samsung LNS4696D and it only puts video out at 1080i so to me it isn't worth it

I don't think you fully understand what the 1080i60 output means if you say it isn't worth it. It is as good as 1080p with the current 1080p24 material we are getting.

Deadof_knight

And the fire still rages... but too hear all the opinions is by far the best thing to do after or before your trip to Best buy , they havent a clue what their talking about kinda like the reading cue cards ......

sickicw

Deadof_knight wrote:

And the fire still rages... but too hear all the opinions is by far the best thing to do after or before your trip to Best buy , they havent a clue what their talking about kinda like the reading cue cards ......

Or even better yet. Figure out the difference between "opinions" and "facts". Its pretty easy to do some research online and figure out the truth behind all this hd marketing and misinformation that one can get on forums.

The things that are most misunderstood, which are available online if one is willing to do some research are the difference between 1080p24hz, 1080p60hz, and 1080i60hz. Also, the new audio formats and how (where) they are decoded and how they are transmitted seems to be another important aspect of HD that most people don’t understand very well.

mutelight

fireshoes wrote:

Actually they say that Camp Cuddly Pines, the new HD DVD porno, is 720p. :cool:

Haha, OK fair enough.

cheddar

Deadof_knight wrote:

Cheddar thanks for the reply I needed that... info

No prob. Seemed everybody latched on to the blu-ray vs. hd-dvd debate without answering your original question. :cool:

danger boy

http://www.avrev.com/news/0107/17.hd_disc_volumes.shtml


this is the article

One of the big lessons from the SACD vs. DVD-Audio format war, which resulted in no winner, was the idea that major record labels expected consumer demand to magically materialize itself before they were willing to release a significant amount of their back catalogue music. While Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon turned out to be a really nifty title on SACD, the rest of the catalogue was never released to tempt people, who liked what they heard with Dark Side, to buy more software. The same can be said of the lackluster mix of Metallica’s Black Album on DVD-Audio. Never did audio enthusiasts or hardcore heavy metal fans get tempted to upgrade their audio systems to listen to the entire Metallica catalogue, because only one title was ever released. Ignoring the technical limitations and complications that plagued SACD and DVD-Audio, based around unfounded fears of piracy (the labels would be lucky if enough people wanted music in surround to try to steal it), it was a lack of both quality titles and depth of catalogue that made the high-resolution audio war an ugly battle without a winner.

HD DVD and Blu-ray are fighting a far more high-stakes battle in the world of HD video discs, yet the same lessons from the SACD and DVD-Audio battle remain relevant to whichever format emerges victorious. The need for large volumes of titles is essential right now in order to woo gamers (HD DVD on Xbox 360 and Blu-ray on PS3) to buy and/or rent movies on HD disc formats. Having enough volume of HD movies on store shelves and being promoted in the marketplace will tempt Costco-shopping housewives and soccer dads to pick up a new player to go with one of the 1.5 million flat HDTVs sold each month in the United States.

Right now, there simply isn’t enough content out on Blu-ray or HD DVD. There are about a hundred movies released on each format, many of which are truly excellent. However, there need to be thousands of titles on the market. Specifically, the newer a film is and the better the special effects are, the sooner it should be re-released on an HD disc format. While older movies should all be eventually released in HD formats, it’s the newer titles with more modern transfers and cinematography that look best on gleaming new 1080p HDTV sets. An easy way to get volumes of profitable and creatively important content on the street is for studios to release entire television series on HD disc formats. The Sopranos are coming back for their sixth and supposedly final season on April 8, 2007 – would serious fans consider buying Season One through Season Five on, say, Blu-ray if they were released a few months before the last season? How about a series like 24 on HD DVD? 24 has newly-shot, exciting content that people really need to follow in order to become fans, which makes it a really compelling title for potential release to boost the software available on movie store shelves.

Oddly, the Blu-ray camp has shied away from adult material at this stage of the format war, despite the huge revenues the industry generates from home video sales. Many AV industry veterans consider pornography to be the main factor that led VHS to win over Beta in their early ‘80s format war. Our sources say they saw a few HD DVD titles at the adult section of the recent CES show. All morals and convictions aside, if you are trying to win a video format war, you might want the pornographers on your side. Some (perhaps most) might play the role of dirty scumbags, but that doesn’t change the fact that they sell hell of a lot of home videos.

Lastly, have you noticed that none of the four remaining record labels have embraced HD DVD and/or Blu-ray? Having seen their domestic revenues slip from over $30,000,000,000 in the early ‘90s to a mere $11,000,000,000 today, you might expect to see the majors interested in selling their back catalogues on a copy-protected format, but the majors are busy trying to continue to sell music by the download instead of building value into a disc that could save the album-based business model for them. Fighting new technology is nothing new for the music business, as we have seen with every new audio format. Unfortunately for music enthusiasts and the bottom line at the record labels, they aren’t yet a part of what could be a big wave with HD disc formats.

The pipeline is going to open up with more and more content on HD DVD and Blu-ray, especially as players get better, cheaper and more reliable. As players hit $299 and lower, and as there are thousands of titles on HD DVD and Blu-ray respectively, mainstream America as well as the rest of the world will very likely embrace one or both of these new formats in a way that will replace the DVD as the preferred disc format for most consumers. Whatever the studios can do to get the tens of thousands of feature films, videos and television programs out of the vaults and onto store shelves will do wonders to keep people reaching for their wallets when it comes to investing in HD DVD and/or Blu-ray.

bembol

I own both (Toshiba HD-XA2 and Sony PS3 60GB) and have 40 HD DVD's and 7 BD's. I do prefer HD DVD, IMO they have proven to be the better format.

Here an interesting read (especially with the Codecs War) over at Hi-Def Digest's interview with Microsoft

http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/feature_microsofthddvdinterview.html