I will never buy a movie from iTunes because of the DRM. You don't actually own the movies you purchase. Apple owns them and just lets you watch them whenever you want, but only on their branded products. It's a joke, and I'm no fool.
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Pros and Cons of buying movies in iTunes?
- Thread starter danpass
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The biggest con for me, as a Windows user, is that Itunes and Quicktime on Windows sucks. On both my laptops and my desktop, running XP, Vista and 7, I get poor visual quality marked by tons of vertical tearing on every video. All of my non-protected video plays back flawlessly in XBMC, VLC and WMP, but every single video plays poorly in Itunes.
Boo urns.
Boo urns.
I tend to agree. Time is money...it takes a LOT of time to fart around with the DVD box sets (for television seasons, for example) and Handbrake all that material to put on AppleTV or whatever. And, as you have noticed, the quality of iTMS encodes is superior to what you can achieve with Handbrake and a standard DVD; this is because Apple starts with a much higher quality, higher bitrate source.
My biggest beef is not being able to directly burn the TV Shows / Movies to a DVD. I have Macs, AppleTV's, iPod's, iPhones...but it would still be nice to burn a traditional DVD media. I understand why they (or, the studios) do not allow this but I really wish they'd get with the times.
Storage has never been a concern with me. Although I don't mess with the HD content either, I have only a select few encodes in HD. For 99% the extra time and hassle simply isn't worth it. Storage, however, is so darn cheap now it is probably the LEAST of my concerns.
Absolute rubbish, for a start iTMS content is of a lower resolution than standard DVD, most iTMS TV content is 640x480 and some is as low as 640x360. Where as a DVD is 720x576 for PAL or 720x480 for NTSC. iTMS content tends to suffer from banding in areas that should be a smooth color gradient. Using Handbrake your able to tweak the settings to produce an encode that is far better than what the iTMS sells.
iTMS starts with a much higher-bitrate source than standard DVD. I believe you are the first one to assert that Handbrake can do better quality...and maybe it could, given the SAME source
I can only tell you what I've found from my own experience, I've purchased alot of iTMS content and encoded alot of my own and frankly I'm shocked at the quality of some of the iTMS content. Even if a Handbrake encode is only from a DVD source, 99% of the time it still looks better then the stuff Apple is selling. If iTMS content is encoded from a better source why do they give us sub-DVD resolutions?
Take a look at this thread:-
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/877155/
Take a look at this thread:-
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/877155/
Pros
Cons
- Convenient
- Save on space (no packaging)
- Compatible across Apple devices
- Apple will be around for a long time (supported)
- Decent quality
Cons
- Only works with Apple devices
- Can be more expensive than DVD's
- Kind of a pain if you lose the file
- HD is kind of weak
- If you ever decide to leave the Apple eco-system, you're screwed
The rental seems to make more sense than purchase, because although it's still tied to Fair Play, it's not yours to keep anyway.
I think for purchase it would be good if Apple kept a record of your purchases backed up and allowed you to download unlimited times again. That would help people manage disk space better.
I also think HDMI out on the (Mac) notebooks would make a slight difference as people can play back rentals on their TV without needing a fiddly adaptor or an Apple TV.
I think for purchase it would be good if Apple kept a record of your purchases backed up and allowed you to download unlimited times again. That would help people manage disk space better.
I also think HDMI out on the (Mac) notebooks would make a slight difference as people can play back rentals on their TV without needing a fiddly adaptor or an Apple TV.
Apple should definitely keep a database. But I don't agree with the "unlimited times" to download again. There will always be someone to abuse it. Maybe charge $1 "laziness/stupidity fee" if you need to download again. Without some sort of option to re-download, I certainly would never "buy" DRM infested files from Apple.
It wasn't so long ago Apple was shipping Macs with 64/60GB Hard Disk Drives.
It's not stupidity, just convenience. If Apple wants to move people from physical media collections to virtual collections then they should make it easy. For Music it's not such a problem, but film quickly starts eating away at disk space.
The problem with allowing someone to re-download a movie is that as time passes Apple might lose the rights for distribution of that movie. Movies on the iTunes Store come and go and change in price and status (available for rent/purchase/SD/HD) and I'm pretty certain that Apple couldn't provide a second download unless they maintained the rights to do so from the distributor/studio. It's probably just as much or more of a business problem as it is a logistics issue for Apple. What I mean is that the distributor/studio could revoke Apple's rights to distribute the movie and then Apple would have no way to provide a second download.elppa said:
Although I think the cons outweigh the pros of online movies, One thing to consider is that with online movies you don't have to worry about DVD's getting scratch or broken... I have an almost 4-year-old who loves to climb and get into everything. You can't keep everything locked away and although punishing him is always a possibility, it doesn't always stop him.
I was anti-Blu Ray and other physical media for a couple of years. During that time, if I bought movies on iTunes (on those rare occasions when I bought movies at all). This year, I bought a Blu Ray player and some discs. Here are some disadvantages of iTunes.
1. You only get the downloadable copy. By contrast, you often get both physical and downloadable copies of a movie when you buy a Blu Ray.
2. You can buy used Blu Ray discs, but you can't buy used iTunes content.
3. You can sell your Blu Ray discs whenever you want, you can't ever sell your iTunes content.
4. A good, "smart" Blu Ray player is the same price or cheaper than the 3rd-generation Apple TV and much cheaper than the 4th-generation Apple TV.
5. Easier random-access on a disc than on iTunes. I like to start watching some movies halfway through the story, and that is easier to do on disc. For example, I think the way iTunes does scenes in "X-men: Days of Future Past" is frustrating because it is not sequential.
The big advantage of iTunes? Convenience. If I need to fly cross country, all I have to do is load a couple of iTunes movies on the iPad and go. And you can buy iTunes movies and have them in your possession quickly.
1. You only get the downloadable copy. By contrast, you often get both physical and downloadable copies of a movie when you buy a Blu Ray.
2. You can buy used Blu Ray discs, but you can't buy used iTunes content.
3. You can sell your Blu Ray discs whenever you want, you can't ever sell your iTunes content.
4. A good, "smart" Blu Ray player is the same price or cheaper than the 3rd-generation Apple TV and much cheaper than the 4th-generation Apple TV.
5. Easier random-access on a disc than on iTunes. I like to start watching some movies halfway through the story, and that is easier to do on disc. For example, I think the way iTunes does scenes in "X-men: Days of Future Past" is frustrating because it is not sequential.
The big advantage of iTunes? Convenience. If I need to fly cross country, all I have to do is load a couple of iTunes movies on the iPad and go. And you can buy iTunes movies and have them in your possession quickly.
Well, I haven't bought movies from iTunes yet but I don't mind about its con since it's very convenient. What I did often though is renting. There's a Movie of the Week for $.99 that I rent almost weekly. It's a great price and the selection is pretty good. You just can't beat this price.
And if I'm in the mood for a certain movie will I go out to buy Blu-Ray or go to Amazon to order the disc? Hell no. I just rent it on the spot.
And if I'm in the mood for a certain movie will I go out to buy Blu-Ray or go to Amazon to order the disc? Hell no. I just rent it on the spot.
But if you want to see a movie multiple times, it isn't cost effective to rent the movie repeatedly -- especially in HD.
My opinions, the ones in bold are what I consider the main pro and con:
Pros over blu-ray:
- Cloud access/can stream movie from anywhere whereas I don't always have my blu rays with me.
- No physical space required, I know some people like having a nice visual film and music collection but I hate clutter and having hundreds of films to store is just a pain for me, so digital content is usually preferable to me.
- Easily played on more devices than blu ray.
- New releases usually very slightly cheaper.
Cons over blu-ray:
- Major difference in quality
- Less extras (not really an extras person myself but it's important to a lot of people)
- Tied to an Apple account whereas anyone can use your blu ray.
Pros over blu-ray:
- Cloud access/can stream movie from anywhere whereas I don't always have my blu rays with me.
- No physical space required, I know some people like having a nice visual film and music collection but I hate clutter and having hundreds of films to store is just a pain for me, so digital content is usually preferable to me.
- Easily played on more devices than blu ray.
- New releases usually very slightly cheaper.
Cons over blu-ray:
- Major difference in quality
- Less extras (not really an extras person myself but it's important to a lot of people)
- Tied to an Apple account whereas anyone can use your blu ray.
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If you go digital iTunes is the best out there for extras actually.
- every new movie has them
- they consistently add them to older movies
- the UI plays with a nice menu system like a disc
- they are even starting to get more commentaries
Their quantity and infrastructure for extras destroys how VUDU and Amazon do them.
- every new movie has them
- they consistently add them to older movies
- the UI plays with a nice menu system like a disc
- they are even starting to get more commentaries
Their quantity and infrastructure for extras destroys how VUDU and Amazon do them.
I love the quality of blu-ray, but I have been buying iTunes as of late for convenience sake. You can find really good eBay sellers who will sell you their iTunes code for dirt cheap. I bought Jurassic World for $4 yesterday.
That's true. I see it as a way to see for myself whether that movie is worth the purchase price since $.99 is kinda nothing. If I'm so impressed by it I'll buy Blu-Ray and rip.
That said, now there's a bunch of good comedy available on iTunes for rent for only $.99. Comedy fans don't miss it. I rented like 6-7 ones already.
I very much agree with this. Unless the price to own is close to the price to rent, you can rent a movie 3-4 times and come out on top.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
Could someone comment on the new Ping offering from Apple?
And how about the new iPod with Video?
Did you hear that Motorola might roll out a new cell phone with iTunes built in?
Did you hear that Macs might be going Intel instead of sticking with Power PC?
And what's this OS X rumored to replace OS 9?
All
More to point...
Pros:
And how about the new iPod with Video?
Did you hear that Motorola might roll out a new cell phone with iTunes built in?
Did you hear that Macs might be going Intel instead of sticking with Power PC?
And what's this OS X rumored to replace OS 9?
All
More to point...
Pros:
- Convenience
- Ready to run almost immediately on just about anything from Apple
- No ripping learning curve, time spent ripping, storage for rips
- It further enriches the God (for some of us) if we buy/rent from iTunes
- FairPlay DRM locks it to ONLY Apple playback hardware
- You don't own it/can't sell it/can't loan it/can't will it to someone else, etc
- If you don't store a local copy, any iTunes video can become unavailable to you at any time
- If your broadband connection is down and you don't store a local copy, you have no videos to watch
- Eats bandwidth toward monthly broadband caps
- Sometimes catches up with the pace of download, freezing the screen until more of the video downloads
- No modern audio codecs (Dolby Digital is a 1991 audio standard)
- Video quality is generally inferior to BR
- Generally more "extras" on discs for those that care about extras
- Pricing tends to be higher than BR, especially if one shops the used market (which doesn't trade off quality at all)
I stopped buying CDs a long time ago. In the last year, I have also finally stopped buying blu-rays.
Particularly now that I recently upgraded to a 1000Mbps line,
- I can have new releases downloaded in 5-8 minutes in HD without leaving the house
- Save on physical storage space
- Cheaper in some cases (actually all cases if you factor in time, gas, parking etc)
- Convenience of having a file ready to transfer to my iPad for when I travel
- Quality, while not as good as blu-ray, is certainly very close and good enough for me
- Can jump straight into movies. Don't need to fiddle around with discs and slow-to-start blu-ray discs
For me, there aren't any cons worth mentioning.
Particularly now that I recently upgraded to a 1000Mbps line,
- I can have new releases downloaded in 5-8 minutes in HD without leaving the house
- Save on physical storage space
- Cheaper in some cases (actually all cases if you factor in time, gas, parking etc)
- Convenience of having a file ready to transfer to my iPad for when I travel
- Quality, while not as good as blu-ray, is certainly very close and good enough for me
- Can jump straight into movies. Don't need to fiddle around with discs and slow-to-start blu-ray discs
For me, there aren't any cons worth mentioning.