Audio
so the people with high end audio equipment should suffer at the expense of consumers who settle for sub par audio? I honestly do not understand why you do not realize that it would be better with lossless audio, and hence better on blu-ray. its not just me who realizes this.
I found it funny how you earlier chose to quote the highdefdigest review of Transformers as an example of the poor audio of HD DVD, while stopping the quote just prior to that review's next sentence: "That said, it is hard to imagine any film taking a Dolby Digital-Plus 5.1 Surround track to its zenith better than 'Transformers.'" You also failed to mention that same review actually gave the disc a five star rating for audio quality.
http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/1110/transformers.html
Apparently even after his initial expectation, the reviewer kept an open enough mind to actually listen to the audio, rather than just look at a specifications and assume he was right. That seems to be a rare quality these days.
I think that is what I find most frustrating about the constant mantra that blu is better because it is bigger. A larger capacity simply means it has the
potential to have higher quality, but the quality of the encode is actually more important. The thing that bothers me most was that Sony was talking up the importance of how blu had larger capacity even for the first 6 months of both systems, at a time when most HD DVDs were dual layer 30 GB discs and almost every blu-ray disc was a 25 GB disc, apparently counting on the population's inability to do very simple math (and it seems they were right, as people were talking even then about how blu-ray held more! Now that's good marketing!) And to add insult to injury, most of the their discs were MPEG2 while HD DVD were using MPEG4. If you check the early reviews you will see that Sony was over-promising and under-delivering for most of their early releases, while Warner was actually delivering quality releases. Sony have certainly improved their releases, as illustrated by the remastered "Fifth Element" which replaced the universally panned initial blu-ray release. A comparison review which illustrates the extreme importance of the encode as opposed to the kind of disc is at your previously mentioned highdefdigest.
http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/894/fifthelement_remastered.html
You seem to be very negative towards Warner, who I've personally found to have one of the more consistent track records for quality encodes. Have you checked out the "Blade Runner" release on either blu-ray or HD DVD? I thought it looked rather good, and every review I've read has raved about it.
http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/355/bladerunner.html
combo discs? how many combo discs do you actually have and are expected to be released in 2008? this is already been stated by others in the thread, but you are just a very short minded value shopper who buys and justifies the cheapest option even though its always the one thats needs to be fixed/repaired/upgraded the fastest. and this is again the case. you will end up paying more than me when you are forced to buy a blu-ray player, and I make more than you so its funny how that works out (not insulting, just pointing out the downsides of your value theory)
Actually, the combo discs are not even close to the cheapest option, so I'm not sure what you are thinking there. As much as I hate the flipper discs, I do like the ability to be able to play the SD version on the Macbook, but in Canada there is an even higher price premium for them. $40 for "Knocked Up"? Are they mad? My main concern, though, is the fragile nature of two exposed playing sides. If they are able to come out with a single sided combo disc similar to the combo SACD/CDs, it would be a much more appealing product.
And on the topic of fragile, that was my main initial concern with blu-ray... that the thinner protective layer would be a high risk to scratching and ruining the disc. However I must say that the TDK coating they are using does appear to work great and I have yet to see a scratched blu-ray disc. I wish they would use that coating for everything from CDs to DVDs to HD DVDs.
