Have you jumped onto the high definition movie train yet?

[Sharingan]

So Blu-ray has been the lone high definition video format for some time now (about 2 years). Have you taken the plunge into highdef video yet, or are you still hanging on to DVD/downloads?

Let's have some votes.

For me, it's been about a year since I first started buying Blu-rays, and I haven't stopped since. I did cease all DVD-purchasing, because frankly, going back to standard definition just ain't cutting it anymore.

I have 80+ Blu-rays now, and loving the format more and more.

[xpect]

Once you see HD movies it's hard to go back...


Just a correction Sharigan, Toshiba dropped HD-DVD in February 2008, so little over one year now. :)

[Stephen Coates]

I would, but I don't have a Blu ray player in my computer. I am tempted to get one though. Do you need a special hardare decoder for bluray like you do for DVD?

Using the computer would be necessary as my monitor is more than capable of displaying the HD resolutions, but I don't have an HDTV.

[Harrison]

You don't need a separate hardware decoder for HD video playback. However you do need a CPU powerful enough to cope with the playback data rate and a graphics card that can cope with it too.

If you are still using your old Pentium 3 system then it won't be able to playback full HD video from Blu-Ray.

It also depends on what type of HD file you are playing back. If it is a 720p resolution then a Pentium 4 with a reasonable graphics card can play it back. However, if you wanted to playback full HD 1080i/p resolution video then a single core CPU will struggle a bit unless it has a graphics card with HD playback support. Even the cheapest new ATI and nVidia cards now offer this feature.

A dual core CPU and a graphics card no less than 2 years old is recommended.

[xpect]

if you wanted to playback full HD 1080i/p resolution video then a single core CPU will struggle a bit unless it has a graphics card with HD playback support. Even the cheapest new ATI and nVidia cards now offer this feature.


With CoreAVC can play 1080p content in at least a AMD AthlonXP 2Ghz (real speed) single core processor. Was tested in my old computer 2 years ago. Not sure about P4 though.

But if you have a Dual Core processor you can play any HD content, or as said by Harrison any graphics card that supports it native.

[Shoonay]

I've tried a few on my PC, most of those were... erm... backup copies, if you know what I mean... :shades:

I try not to be a collector or view movies I've seen before, so, it just ain't my cup of coffee ;)
There are SO many good old movies and shows I missed, that I'll probably be occupied till the invention of a new laser TV technology that burns the movie frames directly on your eye balls, lol

PS: Don't forget to check those free movies done in free soft like Blender, the first one was Elephant's Dream (2005) (http://orange.blender.org/download), and then came out Big Buck Bunny (2007) (http://www.bigbuckbunny.org/index.php/download/). Great watch in 1920x1080. :cool:

[Teho]

Yep, ever since I got the PS3 and a 1080p TV two years ago I've all but stopped buying DVDs. I have 50+ blu-rays now, and most are great. I have to say the quality is very up and down, particularily releases of older movies don't turn out half as great as recent ones. For example I got the Godfather trilogy and Casino and while these do look better than their DVD counterparts they pale next to modern movies. I don't know why that is, they say that because all the old movies are shot on film it's easy to make high-definition copies. But in my experience it doesn't seem so. 2001 on the other hand shines in high definition, but I think that's more because the picture in that is all straight lines and flat shades throughout.

[Sharingan]

Just a correction Sharigan, Toshiba dropped HD-DVD in February 2008, so little over one year now. :)

Ah, right-o. Must've been spaced out when I made that post :thumbs:


But it's just like Teho said, the quality of older movies on Blu-ray tends to fluctuate, so sadly, you can't simply blind-buy anything in the store and expect it to be automatically great. Even more recent movies are sometimes hit-and-miss, which is a shame, since there simply isn't an excuse why they can't produce a good transfer out of a 2006 movie, for example.

That's where the Blu-ray review sites come in, I suppose.

[Harrison]

There is an easy answer to the reason for the random quality of Blu-Ray releases. Cost cutting.

Any film can be made to look good on Blu-Ray if enough money was given to get the job done properly. With older films as mentioned you can scan the frames directly from the original film, which has more than 3 times the resolution of 1080p Hi-Def so there are no problems there. The only issue you might get is that film tends to give a softer image, which can look slightly out of focus, and there is also the film grain to contend with. However both can be fixed these days with some post production effects processing. However to fix such issues for a whole film is quite time consuming and costly. Also colour grading is always needed when transferring a film to digital format, and that is a costly and specialist art.

An alternative much cheaper option which a lot of companies do is to just upscale their DVD releases and re-release them on Blu-Ray. This is very naughty as you could just run your DVDs on a DVD player with upscale technology. But they do it and get away with it often. Upscaling at the production end though will create a better end result than running upscaling on a DVD player at home, so it will still look better. But no where near as good as if a real true resolution copy was obtained from the orginal film reels.

Recent films however are now all films using digital hi-def cameras so there should be no excusses for a poor quality Blu-Ray release of them. However it does still depend on the budget and who is doing the disc.

Sound quality is also still an issue. Blu-Ray supports much better quality 7.1 channel audio then DVD did. However the minimum audio requirement for Blu-Ray is the same as DVD, so most of the time the discs just have the same 5.1 audio track as the DVD release.

[Sharingan]

Fortunately, sound quality has pretty much become a non-issue, since most major film studios now have Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD sound as standard.

[woody.cool]

In my opinion, DVD is good enough.
If I really want that 'cineame experience' ... I'll go down the cinema ;)

[Harrison]

Except, since the dawn of HD I've always thought the cinema image looks a bit fuzzy and soft. However I agree it is still the best place to enjoy a film.

Unless that is you want to relax and chill out with some snacks and a load of ice cold beers, and be in the sweet spot of a well setup surround sound system. ;)

[woody.cool]

at the end of the day, I love my films, but I don't have the room for a decent setup and really couldn't care less.
My old stereo widescreen CRT TV with my DVD player is good enough for me :)

[Cortona]

Blu-ray? I've only just got around to Bluetooth! (Next on my list is wireless connectivity.)

[woody.cool]

at the end of the day, I love my films, but I don't have the room for a decent setup and really couldn't care less.
My old stereo widescreen CRT TV with my DVD player is good enough for me :)
.... it also doesn't help that I have very little funds these days

[J T]

I'm currently still happy with upscaled DVDs running on our 37" Panny. Not that we watch many of those. However I would like 1080p plasma and a blu ray player..... but would we still just watch things through the V+ box?

Can't remember the last time we rented or bought a Disc

[Shoonay]

Erm... bump? ;)

http://img402.imageshack.us/img402/7383/hdvsnormal.th.jpg (http://img402.imageshack.us/i/hdvsnormal.jpg/)

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[Harrison]

I've still not got a Blu-Ray player yet. We do have an HDTV and SkyHD so are watching films in HD, along with many other things.

As was said before, I don't think currently I would buy or watch that much on Blu-Ray. I will eventually upgrade and buy specific films, but gone are the days when I even buy DVDs because they might look good. I tend to wait for them to be on TV now, or watch them at the cinema first, and then just buy my favourites.

[Phantom]

The leap from VHS to DVD was really huge, as we went from analog to digital. But from DVD to BluRay was not too much, because both are digital, so the differences are not the same as VHS to DVD, that's true.

But with BluRay, home-cinema experience goes far more. My only BluRay player is that of Sony's PS3, which do the job very well.

On the other hand, if you have a big 1080p TV-Set and DD surround system in your house, then BluRay it's definetely far beyond DVD, for movie maniacs like me. :)

To fully enjoy your BluRay experience you MUST have the appropriate equipment in your house, and now with the introduction of the new 3D TVs, you imagine where we are heading.

Till now, normal TVs have the ancient standard method of 3D, you know, those red-cyan glasses, which has nothing to do with the 3D you're watching at cinemas now. But with the new 3D TVs, you are gonna have a full cinema experience in your living-room, and that's cool (cause I hate cinemas).:D

[outlawal2]

I have made the jump to Blu-Ray and I love it! I will mention however, that I still buy DVD's for movies, documentaries etc. that don't really benefit from HD... (Generally I feel the Action, Sci-Fi, Fantasy type movies REALLY benefit from HD so I will buy all of those in Blu-Ray... But some of the more mundane dramas, comedies etc. that are just straightforward films with little to no special effects or action I continue to buy in DVD as they are considerably cheaper. And my wife enjoys various "Chick-flicks" and these we continue to buy in DVD as long as they are available too. (My wife's eyes are not as good as mine and she doesn't see much difference between the two formats)

And I see a HUGE difference, but not everything benefits from it so I pick and choose as long as we will have the choice.. (Probably not for too long)

I have also made the jump to a Blu-Ray burner for my PC and it is nice to save LOTS of data onto one disc, but much the same as when DVD's hit the market, burning can be a bit frustrating. I have had some issues with making coasters and am not certain I have ironed out all the problems... I haven't yet burned a 50 Gig dual layer disc as they are stupid expensive, but once the prices drop to reasonable levels I will burn all my apps to one and I also have all of my OSes saved along with often used drivers, service packs, documentation etc... Everything from Win98 through WIN7 along with Novell, Linux, Apple stuff... (You get the idea)

[Harrison]

It is the price of blank discs which has stopped me buying a Blu-Ray burner for the PC. The actual drivers are down to under £200 now and quite affordable, but with each blank disc cost quite a lot it isn't worth it currently. Dual Layer DVDs can hold over 9GB so they are fine for the moment, and have dropped in price recently to under £1 each.

I do however agree that HD does look a lot better than SD, and the difference between SD DVD and HD BR is very noticeable. However, I know many of the less popular films have just been upscaled for the format, so there is no point buying those as a decent DVD player with upscale and HDMI looks good as it is. But for the big films like Avatar, Star Wars, Alien, T2 etc BR is definitely the format to have them on.

I do however have a decent setup with Sony 5.1 DTS receiver and Eltax home cinema speakers, plus nice large sub, so the only thing missing is actually the BR player. I might get one later this year.

[Phantom]

The prices for BluRay are exactly the same as DVDs first appeared a decade ago. So wait 1-2 years, and you will buy blank BR disks in the price of DVDs and so on.:)

[Harrison]

Exactly, and it was the same for CD-Rs too in the beginning. I remember a single blank 650MB 2x CD-R costing £10.

I had to buy a CD-R when at university in 1996 for a multimedia project we were doing, and I remember sitting there with my fingers crossed waiting for the extremely slow process on a Mac with external Lacie burner to complete the process. But then by the end of 1998 I was buying packs of CD-Rs and burning them at home without any worries (although still many coasters back in those days as computers were definitely not as stable as they are now).

Actually, has anyone else noticed that with each new larger disc format the current computers seem to suddenly become a bit unstable and crash prone? When CD was first around you didn't dare breath on the keyboard, let alone touch the mouse, and had to disable screensaves and virus scanners to get the disc to burn successfully.

Then in 2001 the same was nearly as bad for the first DVD writers. Writing a DVD-R took over an hour and you just had to leave the system to get on with it and go and do something else. I don't think I had as many coasters with early DVD as I did with early CD, but it was still an unstable process.

And now with BR-R has anyone experienced similar unstable behaviour?

[outlawal2]

Yep, that is why I haven't tried a dual layer Blu Ray disk yet... Waiting for the software to catch up with the hardware in terms of stability... I think it is simply a buffering situation... Each new format adds HUGE amounts of data and the current buffering schemes that are incorporated in the software are insufficient to guarantee a perfect uninterrupted stream of data LONG ENOUGH to complete the huge write process... (Works OK for CD's and now DVD's, but not 25 or 50 Gig Blu-Rays) As you guys have said, each new format introduces huge amounts of data and instabilities because of it. A few years and the software will be sufficiently "smarter" and we won't have these issues..

Until the next big format comes down the pike.. :p

[Harrison]

There is also the issue of the actual drives and their firmware. Early units for a new format are bound to not be as stable, and as these new technologies come down in price they can afford to add more ram for buffering on the drive itself, as well as develop better error correction and buffer underrun technology in the firmware, and then the software can utilise it to for better stability.

BTW< what software are you using to burn blu-ray?

[Phantom]

The newer version of Nero can write BRs?:unsure:

[outlawal2]

There is also the issue of the actual drives and their firmware. Early units for a new format are bound to not be as stable, and as these new technologies come down in price they can afford to add more ram for buffering on the drive itself, as well as develop better error correction and buffer underrun technology in the firmware, and then the software can utilise it to for better stability.

BTW< what software are you using to burn blu-ray?

I am using the latest Roxio Creator 10 I believe...

[Harrison]

I stopped using Roxio software years ago after loads of issues. Nero supports BR writing.

[Phantom]

Don't laugh, but I still using Nero 6.0. :)

[outlawal2]

I stopped using Roxio software years ago after loads of issues. Nero supports BR writing.

Interesting as I stopped using NERO for the same reason! I also never liked how Nero always felt like a mish-mash of apps just thrown together.. The overall feel was not to my liking and then I had a lot of issues and it soured me on it completely..

I remember the last Nero I bought I downloaded a trial version and liked it well enough to buy it so I did.. Then when I downloaded the full version, I had a HECK of a time getting the templates and such to download and even though I had bought the full version it still said Trial all over the place and when re-installing it I had to input the original trial key and then the full key repeatedly.. Anyway, I just always felt like it was Billy Bob's software written in some hillbilly's garage somewhere... Really unprofessional feeling to me..

And since I am on a roll picking on Nero I might as well gripe about Roxio... The latest version doesn't allow you to pick and choose what you want to load so you end up filling over a GIG of hard drive space for a burning application. I HATE the fact that they removed the ability to pick and choose what you load. I will say that it HAS been stable with everything except the Blu-Ray stuff so it gets kind of a thumbs up on that front, but still not perfect by any means..

I wish they would write a version similar to TOAST for the Mac... Simple, elegant and easy to use and doesn't take up a lot of space... But apparently the PC folks all want all-encompassing do everything in the world burning apps... Or at least the software companies seem to think so anyway..

[Buleste]

Has anyone tried Ashampoo Burning Studio 9? I know it has BR support. I use it for DVD's as I don't have anything to do with HD yet.

[Stephen Coates]

I am still interested in getting a Blu Ray player for my PC, since I am now able to play high definition video.

I think it will be sometime before I purchase Blu Ray recording facilities though. I don't even have a DVD recorder yet.

The only issue I have with videos currently is size. Even though I have a large, high resolution 4:3 screen, letterboxed 16:9 videos look tiny on it.

[Harrison]

There is also the fact about image quality of videos that goes against them.

The other day I decided there was little point keeping most of the video tapes I still had. Over 60 numbered tapes that I used to used for taping things off the TV, but I realised that I've not actually played any of them in what must be 5 years! Plus a load more with stickit notes on them saying what had been recorded.

So I quickly went though them all, and the first thing that struck me is how bad the images quality was. I must have got used to HD as it looked really low quality, flickery, blurred and saturated colour. Definitely wouldn't want to go back to that now.

I did however find some episodes of Dead Like Me and a few other things that I had recorded years ago but forgot to watch, so that was something. As for most of the tapes. Most are now in a landfill! I threw them all away, except for a handful that contained something I want to watch. But once I've watched those they will be going in the bin too.

Years ago I had this collecting habit of recording films and TV programs to keep. But I've now decided if I really like something that much I will just buy the TV series box set or film on DVD. Better quality, on a more permanent disc than a DVD-R or tape. It also makes Harddrive recorders great for things you just want to watch later. Much better than physical media.