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HD DVD or Blu Ray?
- Thread starter Kalns
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So are you going to invest in building up your HD library to replace all your DVDs or only purchase HD on a go-forward basis?
From a storage perspective, people do care. The quality of Blu-ray discs have the potential to scale compared with the size limitations of HD-DVD. Imagine a VC-1 or AVC-encoded 50GB Blu-ray disc compared with a 30GB HD-DVD VC-1 disc.
Blu-ray and HD-DVD both support that same codecs. However, the majority of launch discs available today are encoded in VC-1 for HD-DVD and MPEG 2 for Blu-ray. There is nothing particularly bad about MPEG-2 encoding. It's just not as efficient.
Future Blu-ray releases are expected to use in VC-1 or AVC (h.264/mpeg4) encoding. Disney has already released several titles using AVC, which at least using the 25GB Blu-ray disc look much better than 25GB MPEG-2 encoded Blu-ray disc.
Keep in mind, the launch titles on both platforms were rushed to market. I would expect the quality of both formats to continue to improve with improvements in the manufacturing process.
Some Blu-ray manufacturers (JVC) have the capability to accomplish this. However, it has yet to be implemented.
The DVD Forum has announced that HD-DVD will soon support region coding. However, current shipping discs are not region locked.
In the end, it's all going to come down to movie studios. Currently HD-DVD only has Universal as an exclusive. Paramount, New Line and Warner Bros will support both formats. Disney, Sony and Fox will only support Blu-ray.
To be honest, I have a 360 with the HD-DVD add-on. I really hope HD-DVD wins out, but despite the negative press Blu-ray is a worthy contender and it would be ignorant of DVD Forum members to lose sight of that.
HD-DVD has the sales lead now, but as both formats mature, Sony ships more Playstation 3's and more information becomes available about the iHD interactivity layer we could be in for a long high definition format war.
To be honest, I have a 360 with the HD-DVD add-on. I really hope HD-DVD wins out, but despite the negative press Blu-ray is a worthy contender and it would be ignorant of DVD Forum members to lose sight of that.
HD-DVD has the sales lead now, but as both formats mature, Sony ships more Playstation 3's and more information becomes available about the iHD interactivity layer we could be in for a long high definition format war.
I agree that we really have no power over this, and should just yield to the omniscient power that is the porn industry.
I want HD DVD because of the numerous reasons mentioned on here. I just dont know if it i will happen because of the exclusive movies Blue Ray keeps getting. That is why were are buying this discs anyways, not because of storage or better quality between the formats.
Kinda sucks that so many are blue ray exclusive already... best go grab my towel to throw in soon... I really hate Sony too... (if I want storage disks, which I don't I'll wait for Holographic Disks).
I wonder what HD DVD could do to really win this if Blue Ray has 3 major studios as an exclusive.
Is the porn industry going for Blue Ray?
Kinda sucks that so many are blue ray exclusive already... best go grab my towel to throw in soon... I really hate Sony too... (if I want storage disks, which I don't I'll wait for Holographic Disks).
I wonder what HD DVD could do to really win this if Blue Ray has 3 major studios as an exclusive.
Is the porn industry going for Blue Ray?
So, as has been said before, it is all reliant on the porn industry.
As absurd as it sounds this will be a deciding factor.
Sounds like a good plan - replacing your entire library each time a new technology comes out would get a bit costly!
Although I guess it is a couple years until HVD becomes mainstream, so you'd still have some time to build up a HD-DVD/Blu-Ray collection...
Sounds like a good plan - replacing your entire library each time a new technology comes out would get a bit costly!
The question is though how much better can it really get?
Have you seen 1080p projected on a large 3 by 1.50 meter screen? It already looks absolutely gorgeous and I cannot really make out any imperfections. I don't know whether more would really make a difference, especially since most people don't even have that big of a screen.
For me, quality-wise, I wouldn't care about anything else. I too would rebuy a couple of my favorites on HD discs but then again I have such a screen and it really makes a difference.
You say that, but people have said the same thing every time a new generation of technology comes out.
Electronic companies and move houses will always find a new way of making us spend more money buying new technologies and restocking our movie collections.
I've got a Betamax Blu-Ray edition - otherwise known as the PS3. Works for meI think Betamax will win
I know what you're saying and I'm in the same boat. Even with TV - sure it's nice to watch sports in HD, but do I need to watch Family Guy in HD or re-runs of Card Sharks on Gameshow Network in HD? Nah, not a big deal to me. That being said...
I agree with this as well, as this has always definitely been the case in the past.
How much better can it really get? I don't know, but until media has the capability of being broadcast beyond the resolution of the human eye with processors which can process and effectively deliver that data as efficiently as our brain can, there will technically always be room for improvement.
Awesome format, I just hope it doesn't become the LaserDisc of this generation.
Yeah. Look at the alliance. There's no big names backing this format.
I mean, ooh, fear the power of Nippon Paint Company? Come on.
Awesome format, I just hope it doesn't become the LaserDisc of this generation.
Laserdisc ruled. My former manager has the complete original Star Wars trilogy on LaserDisc unopened - I told him he should sell the set on eBay, he'd probably make a little bit of money at least...
Slightly off topic here but I remember my cousin said to me about 8 years ago that we will have "discs that use a blue laser and hold about 20GB"
We were at a wedding when he told me.
Is he Jebus?
We were at a wedding when he told me.
Is he Jebus?
Slightly off topic here but I remember my cousin said to me about 8 years ago that we will have "discs that use a blue laser and hold about 20GB"
We were at a wedding when he told me.
Is he Jebus?
No, just one of his Prophets.
Slightly off topic here but I remember my cousin said to me about 8 years ago that we will have "discs that use a blue laser and hold about 20GB"
We were at a wedding when he told me.
Is he Jebus?
Well, if he knew his technology, he would have known even back then that a blue laser would have been a logical progression from the red lasers of the time. I knew this as well in university thanks to my physics and optoelectronics classes, it's just that at the time blue lasers weren't quite feasible yet.
As for the capacity, again, that's probably a fair guess on his part. I could probably safely predict that 8 years from now storage will be in the TBs via holographic storage and I bet I wouldn't be too far off the mark.
Neither. They'll both end up being replaced in a matter of years, anyway. Might as well skip over this brief battle and wait for the next thing.
I think Betamax will win
Nope, because the Betamax Bandit will use up all the Betamax tapes in order to kill all men.
Awesome format, I just hope it doesn't become the LaserDisc of this generation.
Lasrdisc ruled for over 20 years, it WAS THE HIGH QUALITY FORMAT.
Big success in the US and Japan, less so in Europe and the rest of the world.