I changed my mind about High Definition DVDs today

[Looney]

Originally posted by: mchammer187

Originally posted by: Looney

Originally posted by: homestarmy

Originally posted by: EngenZerO
yep... i cant wait for MS to relase their hd-dvd addon w/1080p upscalling. not only will hd--dvds look great... the xbox will now upscale all my current dvds... so that makes the deal even sweeter.

down with blue-ray... long live hd-dvd!!!

Upscaling is completely pointless.

1. It is still a 480p source.
2. Your TV or whatever display device often already does this.
3. You can add resolution, but you do not gain any clarity, etc from it.

Upscaling isn't pointless. The Toshiba HD-DVD player upscales SD-DVDs better than dedicated $1000+ DVD players. Well, at least that's what i've been reading all over avsforum.

its not pointless but it certainly won't make dvds look anywhere near HD quality

its still 720x480 no matter how you "zoom" in on it

sure there are differences but imo the differences are going to be marginal at best

especially when compared to looking at a 480 P source vs. a 1080 p source

where the difference is night and day

Um of course. Otherwise why would we have HDTV if we can just upscale everything to be equal to it. But people that spent over $1k on an Onkyo DVD player are saying the HD-DVD player upscales better quality for only $500.

So playing SD-DVDs in an HD-DVD player will be better than your current DVD players. And SD-DVDs can be pretty good. It's not equal to it, i have the SD version of Underworld and the HD version of it, and the HD version is awesome (Kate Beckensale in HD omg). I've been waiting a LONG time for HD to finally take off, and now that it is. I have over 20HDTV channels, and some HD-DVD movies are around $20. And if you know where to look online as well, you can also download HD content.

 

[Looney]

Originally posted by: mchammer187

Originally posted by: Looney

Originally posted by: Kaido

Originally posted by: Ilmater

Originally posted by: Kaido
I stopped into Best Buy today and wandered around for a bit. On display was a 50" Pioneer Elite plasma 1080p television running a Blueray demo disc. Holy freaking gorgeous, batman! I've seen Bluray before but not on a set that nice. Now I see what all the buzz is about! Time to start saving for a PS3 lol.

Hey genius, the Xbox is going to support 1080p as well now. It's been all over the board all day. Also, Blu-Ray is not likely to do as well as HD-DVD. JMHO, but I think there's a good chance I'm right on that one.

Edit: Oh yeah, and as MrChad said, HD-DVDs will look better too.

"Hey genius"? Yeah Xbox will support 1080p but where's the Bluray player? Supposedly there's going to be an HD-DVD player available for the 360 but it's not there now...I was poking around the rest of the store and their current Bluray player is $999; the top end PS3 will be $599.

Oh well, I'll just have to be content with my 27" tube tv and future Wii

The Blu-ray player is $1000, the HD-DVD player is $500, AND has better PQ than Blu-Ray. Although supposedly the new Blu-Rays that are coming out are almost equal to HD-DVDs, Blu-Rays movies are still almost twice the price of HD-DVD movies.

And if you think a PS3 is going to have the same quality as a dedicated player, well, i think that's going to be unprecedented (console, whether it was back during the CDs or DVD days, have always played worst than dedicated players). And they would piss off all their hardware supporters as well.

And the PS3 isn't here yet either. By the time the PS3 comes out, the MS HD-DVD player will be out, and the second generation of HD-DVD standalone players.

can you tell me how the PQ is going to be any different?

they are still working from the same source : ie some sort of digital master copy or whatever

they are both 1920x1080 Progressive

so is one allocationg more space to the video than the other?

ie 1920x1080x32 vs 1920x1080x48

is one using some sort of lossy compression?

because imo it just doesnt make sense if either of those are the case but I havent delved deeply into the topic.

Then you haven't read up on it. MPEG2 is inferior to VC-1. This isn't news. http://www.highdefdigest.com/feature_blurayvshddvd_firstcomparison.html

Blu-ray = 0 | HD-DVD = 3

 

[Looney]

I should update that... Blu-ray has jumped ship and is using VC-1 as well now, so quality wise, they should be equal.
http://www.highdefdigest.com/feature_blurayvshddvd_roundtwo.html

Still, the fact that the HD-DVD players are half the price, as well as the movies themselves, makes them more attractive for me.

 

[jmgonzalez]

HD-DVD Player and 15 movies in my collection

I'll buy a Blu-ry once it hits $500 - ridiculous that they are finally getting to be close to/or at same level as HD-DVD, but having a price premium.

 

[Looney]

Originally posted by: jmgonzalez
HD-DVD Player and 15 movies in my collection

I'll buy a Blu-ry once it hits $500 - ridiculous that they are finally getting to be close to/or at same level as HD-DVD, but having a price premium.

The $20,000+ guys at avsforum thinks so too: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=715903&page=1&pp=30

 

[0roo0roo]

less than half the price. 390bucks at amazon. 360 with their visa.

 

[sdifox]

I have the Toshiba Qosmio G30 with 17" 1080P display, HD-DVD is just beautiful on it. Also looks good on the Optoma HD72 (720P) shooting 92"

 

[gsellis]

For the record, I am a HD-DVD proponent... BUT

Blu-Ray = HD-DVD on picture quality when using the right codec implementations with quality sourcing and conversion.

Kick out some 4k or 35mm source through VC1 or even H.264 (or correctly implemented HD MPEG2) and it will blow your mind away.

I can see a huge difference just in my editor from 1080i and SD. And even with SD video, using VC1 (aka WMV-HD) at SD rates, the colors are so much better than most MPEG encoders can produce. Red = red instead of pushing towards orange.

Just wait until you see a 4k projector (Sony's is about $100k) running 4k material (RED Cinema).

 

[Fingolfin269]

Originally posted by: Looney
I should update that... Blu-ray has jumped ship and is using VC-1 as well now, so quality wise, they should be equal.
http://www.highdefdigest.com/feature_blurayvshddvd_roundtwo.html

Still, the fact that the HD-DVD players are half the price, as well as the movies themselves, makes them more attractive for me.

But that's the problem with Blu-Ray. Sure it can do VC-1. But it can also do MPEG-2. How many manufacturers are going to go with VC-1 on Blu-Ray and how many are going to go the lazy route and use MPEG-2 when moving their older content over? The great thing about HD-DVD is that they do not have this option.

One other thing I love about HD-DVD is that I can go out and buy a movie with SD-DVD on one side and HD-DVD on the other. This allows me to future proof myself since I do not currently have a HD-DVD player.

 

[gsellis]

Just an update. I posted another link in Video for a 4K frame grab off the new RED Cinema camera. You can see it through this thread.