Thrush

iTrader: (1)

A recent thread about LaserDiscs sparked me to start this thread after reading about different digital media types on Wikipedia (initially I was after info on LaserDiscs, and then started looking at other disc-media types and decided to read up on both BluRay and HD-DVD)

Anyway - seeing as there is an all out "war", likened to the BetaMax Vs VHS war of yesteryear , with these two formats, I was wondering what your views on it was?

Now I haven't seen any films on either format, nor do I have HDTV (call me dark ages ), so I really can't comment on picture/sound quality...

But reading up the specs it's a hard one to choose....

One on hand, BluRay wins with capacity : Over 9 hours of high-definition (HD) video on a 50GB disc. About 23 hours of standard-definition (SD) video on a 50GB disc, whilst TDK recently announced that they have created a working experimental Blu-ray disc capable of holding 200GB of data (six 33GB data layers).

Thats pretty impressive!

HD-DVD has a modest 15gb for a single layer disc, and 30gb for a dual layer disc, with doublel sided discs having 30gb single layer and 60gb dual layer.

Standard break down for comparrison between HD-DVD and BluRay would be 15 GB vs. 25 GB for single layer, 30 GB vs. 50 GB for dual layer (respectively)

But! Specs aside, the other thing to think about is compataility...

BluRay discs (from what I have read) would only work on BluRay players, on which HD-DVD and normal DVD would not play - so you would need to have two players : a BluRay player and a DVD player...

The idea for HD-DVD, since it is backed by the official DVD Forum, is that all HD-DVD players would be backward compliant, so that normal DVD's could still be played on the new HD DVD machines, and added to that, that new HD-DVD discs can also contain the normal DVD movie aswell as the HD-DVD encoded movie, meaning that if you buy a brand new HD-DVD disc, you can still watch the normal encoded version on your old DVD machine.....

Hmmm... That makes is tough! On one hand you have bigger capacity, but on the other hand you have fully bacward compliant discs playable on both machines!

One other thing worth noting about this "war" between HD-DVD and BluRay;

In the early 1990s two high density optical storage standards were being developed: one was the MultiMedia Compact Disc (MMCD), backed by Philips and Sony, and the other was the Super Density disc (SD), supported by Toshiba, Time-Warner, Matsushita Electric, Hitachi, Mitsubishi Electric, Pioneer, Thomson, and JVC. IBM's president, Lou Gerstner, acting as a matchmaker, led an effort to unite the two camps behind a single standard, anticipating a repeat of the costly format war between VHS and Betamax in the 1980s.

Philips and Sony abandoned their MMCD format and agreed upon Toshiba's SD format (not to be confused with secure digital cards) with two modifications that are both related to the servo tracking technology. The first one was the adoption of a pit geometry that allows "push-pull" tracking, a proprietary Philips/Sony technology. The second modification was the adoption of Philips' EFMPlus. EFMPlus, created by Kees Immink, who also designed EFM, is 6% less efficient than Toshiba's SD code, which resulted in a capacity of 4.7 GB as opposed to SD's original 5 GB. The great advantage of EFMPlus is its great resilience against disc damage such as scratches and fingerprints. The result was the DVD specification Version 1.5, announced in 1995 and finalized in September 1996. In May 1997, the DVD Consortium was replaced by the DVD Forum , which is open to all companies.

Now, HD DVD is promoted by Toshiba, NEC, Sanyo, Microsoft, and Intel, among others. In terms of major studios, HD DVD is currently exclusively backed by Universal Studios, and is non-exclusively backed by Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. Studio Canal, and The Weinstein Company, and is the official format backed by the DVD Forum. BluRay was delevoped outside the DVD Forum and as such was never considered for admittance(sp) - also BluRay will probably, initially at least, more expensive to produce.....

Thoughts?

Eagle

iTrader: (2)

betamax please


bloomin hard decision to be honest .. both have good overall results

UBster

Haven't got any really, anyone else?

Paul J

This is not correct, BluRay players will play normal dvds and most probably upscale them to near HD quality.

I believe Toshiba have also made a BR & HDDVD player combined already.

BTW, Blu-ray is the way forward!

EDIT:
BluRay will do DVD & upscale example:
Sony's First Blu-ray Disc Player

The BDP-S1 features 1080p (1920 x 1080) full HD-video output for brilliant HD imagery and upscaling of regular DVDs to 1080p output. It sports a sophisticated design and exceptional build quality with rigid beam construction, as well as finely tuned audio and video parts and circuits. The player offers HDMI output and advanced digital audio support, including MPEG-4 compression compatibility.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...&s=audio-video

slowpoke

microsoft are bringing out a hd-dvd add on for the 360 before xmas

-J-

Will Blu-Ray be supported by Sony ? And will Blu-Ray media play back through my HD TV? Im not all up with this new Tech stuff

frog

Wait until someone makes a player that supports both formats

imo, unless you are absolutely committed to getting on the HD bandwagon and prepared to loose some money, it's a 50/50.

I'll wait until the dust settles before needing an excuse to replace my entire DVD collection

Oh, and there's no need to get one of these babies unless you have a proper HDTV plasma or lcd, and by that I mean 1080p

BlueSmoke

I think the name HD-DVD confuses people. The HD in HD-DVD doesn't mean the same thing as it does with HDTV. HD TV is high definition. HD-DVD is High Density. Basically meaning more data can be stored on it, plus the other snazzy features documented above.

So just because you want to get on the HD bandwagon, you don't have to buy one format or the other. They both support High Definition output.

BTW, the best format doesn't always win, as seen in the VHS/Betamax war.

frog

Quite, but a 15Gig DVD which isn't filled to the brim with high quality HD material will be a waste of money imo, no need to go blueray or whatever if you're only going to watch the same as you can get on DVD today. Unless you want all Lost Episodes or whatever on a single disk . Increasing capacity is all to do with higher quality sound (and more channels - 9.1, 11.1...) and picture, that's what drives capacity upwards in the home cinema market.

As an example, you can't get DTS on some movies unless you are prepared to loose the extras, or go for lower quality NTSC pictures, and that's because there isn't enough space on a DVD for a full PAL movie, extras and DD + DTS soundtracks.

I mentionned 1080p as being a minimum to really enjoy High Definition content, this will soon be superseeded by even higher resolutions which will only be realistic with High Density DVDs.

Now, if you're talking about pure data (e.g. computer) storage, that's another story.

Or, if recordable DVD's are anything to go by, both standards will survive and someone will eventually support both in one unit

Rab

Laserdisc all the way baby!

dojj

iTrader: (3)

i did a thing about this just the other week

basicly the hd looks like th ebetter bet because all the games consoles will suport it, and it's a 1/3 of the price of the blue ray stuff which is blue ray player only

the same film viewable on the normal dvd as well as hd dvd isn't striclty true, as they will put the normal film on one side and the hd version on the other side, this won't be much more expensive thoug, but you are looking at a lot of money to by a dedicated blue ray machine whereas just about everyone else wil be putting out hd compatiable players onto the market

adamS2RST

PS3 is supposed to be using blu ray technology isn't it? It'll be a cheap blu ray player whatever way you look at the price of it

BlueSmoke

I think we are on the same wavelength

flashpoint

As with all new technology
A lot depends on how much you want to spend at the end of the day. HD will no drought be cheaper than BluRay....


Steve

frog

Just what I tought

Cam

The big advantage to BluRay is it has the capacity to hold a movie in an uncompressed format so no nasty artifacts in the picture like you get with DVDs.

Thrush

iTrader: (1)

Cam - very few films these days tho have any (or noticeable) artifacts in them - and the idea of HD-DVD is that the quality of picture will be five times better than before, due to increased storage capacity of the disc, and the fact it will use a 405nm blue laser rather than a 605nm red laser (as current DVD's use) to read it, meaning a tighter "pinpoint" on the disc surface from the laser.... Audio is going to be 3 times better, and the majority of discs will support both DTS and 7.1 sound configs. HD-DVD is also designed specifically with 1080p HDTV resolution aswell...

dojj

iTrader: (3)

which is why hddvd is going to win and blueray is going to fail

Cam

You are joking right?

Thrush

iTrader: (1)

Sure there are some, but for the past couple of years, I have noticed barely any in the DVD's I have watched..... Seems the standards of DVd's are getting better as is the mastering....

Cam

CGI movies like new Star Wars are perfect but there are still 75% of new releases that suffer from the over use of edge enhancement.
When films are transferred to video in preparation for DVD encoding, they are commonly run through digital processes that attempt to clean up the picture. These processes include digital video noise reduction (DVNR) and image enhancement. Enhancement increases contrast (similar to the effect of the "sharpen" or "unsharp mask" filters in PhotoShop), but can tend to overdo areas of transition between light and dark or different colors, causing a "chiseled" look or a ringing effect like the haloes you see around streetlights when driving in the rain.

Video noise reduction is a good thing, when done well, since it can remove scratches, spots, and other defects from the original film. Enhancement, which is rarely done well, is a bad thing. The video may look sharper and clearer to the casual observer, but fine tonal details of the original picture are altered and lost.

Note that ringing can also be caused by the player and by the TV. Scan velocity modulation (SVM), for example, causes ringing.

Cam

Check the window frames in Don Corleones office at the beginning of the Godfather for a blatant case of over zealous use of edge enhancement. If you cant see it your display needs binning!

vikingboy

LOL! 650usd launch price....circa Ł450 quid at launch I would guess....thats cheap, NOT!
You can buy HD-DVD *NOW* for Ł300-ish, by the time ps3 ships (lucky if its this year in Japan IMHO) HDDVD will be <Ł200.

Sony need to get their thumbs out their arses if they still want to compete.

PS HD-DVD uses Microsofts JC-1 compression which is v clever, bluray is using mpeg4 whcih isnt in the same league. Also - bluray dual layer discs cant be made in any quantity yet hence why currrent titles are on single layer and use mpeg2 compression at hgh bit rate which looks quite frankly, utter shite

Cam

Link please

vikingboy

http://www.onsale.com/onsale/shop/de...no~7051330.asp

$429 = Ł229 + 17.5% + 5% + shipping = Ł300quid ish

get your movies from www.deepdiscountdvd.com or the usual DVD suppliers

These players are being sold pretty cheap in the US and can be imported very easily usualy for a quck phone call.

You can flip them on ebay for Ł500+ if you can be arsed too

Cam

The reason they are making a premium on fleabay is because non of the online dealers have stock.
I bought an HD-XA1 a while back and I'm loving it

Fraz

Initial reports on film quality is going HD-DVD's way, reviews say the visual difference is noticable which is worrying for Bluray

http://www.highdefdigest.com/feature...omparison.html