Slashdot Mirror
v1.0 of HD-DVD Physical Specs Approved
Repran writes "The DVD Forum this week approved HD-DVD 1.0, a specification that will compete with Blu-Ray which is not yet approved for the future of the DVD disc format. This effectively gives manufacturers a green light to begin producing devices.
In related news Microsoft's VC-9 codec has been included in the official HD-DVD specs."
I can't imagine that a green light will be much help
in making Blu-Ray disks.
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
Great, first my VHS collection, now my DVD collection will become obsolete. At least know we know why George Lucas finally decided to release the original Star Wars DVDs this year. He had to make sure everyone had the chance to buy it before HD-DVD becomes standard. Then he'll release the ultra-super-special edition on HD-DVD later.
The ultimate goal of science is to unify all forces of nature to a single law that can be silk-screened onto a T-shirt.
By the sounds of the article Microsoft has submitted their VC-9 codec as an open standard, does that actually mean that OS encoders/decoders can be developed free from MS lawer related hassle, or are there still strings attached?
Indeed, just look at the minimum requirements for viewing Microsoft's High Definition Content Showcase. Presumably a set-top box will have custom hardware...
I hope these new players are backwards compatible with everything - DVD's, CD's, VCD's, etc. Otherwise I'm not buying it. The thing is, I like movies on DVD pretty much the way they are now - The Quality is great on my TV, and I can play movies on my laptop. I don't see myself playing these new formats on my powerbook any time soon - Unless they have a DVD layer on the disc too - now that would be cool.
Not that this has anything to do with the MPAA yet, this is the way things should be done. Once there is a decent standard in place, and there is a widespread enough install base of players that can paly these discs, the film industry will begin phasing over to this format for DVD releases, eventually phasing out the older format (or perhaps making it backwards compatible). Provided that pirates could (and eventually will) figure out how to rip these, would you really sit on kazaa waiting for a 30+GB movie download, just to avoid buying the DVD? Even with a great connection, it's just not worth the time / HDD space. I for one, would rather just buy the DVD.
New technology. It's sux but it's great.
and how soon was it before somebody said the P-word when another mass-storage article hit slashdot? 3 seconds? four?
I researched long and hard to find out if my current DVD player was most compatible with DVD+R or DVD-R. It's an Apex 500w model. Turns out it's not compatible with either standard, although some online reports conflict with my findings. I eventually had to buy a new dvd player to play anything that I burned in my Liteon DVD+/-RW drive.
I can't imagine that all these new standards will work with many existing DVD players. Everyone is always playing catch-up, although all DVD movies rented from Blockbuster will always work in older models. Just getting a new DVD writer for the latest and greatest standards will result in having to buy more electronics equipment for the house. Hell, even the current +R and -R standards haven't been hashed out.
--
Only click here if you are cool. You know who you are.
HD-DVD format uses a 405nm-wavelength blue-violet laser technology, in contrast to the 650nm-wavelength red laser technology used in traditional DVD formats. The rewritable Blu-ray disc, with a data transfer rate of 36Mbps, can hold up to 27GB of data on a single-sided single layer disc (compared to the traditional DVD's 4.7GB capacity), which amounts to about 12 hours of standard video or more than 2 hours of high-definition video.
AOD is pretty much the same, except it has a storage capacity of 20GB on a single-layer disc
The current story should read:
Repran writes "Extremetech reports that the DVD Forum this week approved HD-DVD 1.0, [...] In related news, an arstechnica story reports that Microsoft's VC-9 codec has been included in the official HD-DVD specs."
I think it's important to keep story sources in the headline. It's a matter of politeness, and gives the reader a immediate idea on who is saying what. For stories with a zillion links, I think it's generally OK to leave the names of the sources out if it would lead to excessive clutter.
Even more annoying is this story:
An anchor tag on "The University of Tokyo" should go to the University of Tokyo's website. The link should be anchored to "illusion of invisibility" or perhaps "Optical Camouflage."
I never liked the tendency to anchor irrelevant things to stories, but it's done often enough that it's confusing when it gets mixed up. Also, the submitter's diatribe should be left out, but that's another matter.
Or maybe I'm just getting old and crusty.
HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray. It's time for another format war. Consumers don't want this -- especially when regular DVD is "good enough" for most of them, and from their perspective, DVD is only a few years old. VHS got a couple decades of use before DVD showed up on the market, and when it did, the improvement in picture and sound quality (not to mention taking up less space) was enough to get consumers to adopt the format.
Now they expect consumers to shift again? No. It's too soon. And the fact that there's a format war on top of all that, will make both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray about as successful as SACD and DVD-A have been in replacing the good old audio CD -- i.e. not successful at all except for a handful of high-end enthusiasts.
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
you don't understand - the pr0n is as vital to us as air, water, food. you can think of it as the food buffer of the octospiders - when it's gone, we have but seconds to live. without it we are less than human, we are no better than an ape diddling himself in a jungle with a fruit for inspiration. anything which allows us to increase our pr0n buffer is much appreciated and worshipped as a glowing green vessel to the gods.
I also reply below your current threshold.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Movies, for the most part, are already "HD" or better in their original film formats. All that will be required to make true HD versions of these will be to go back to the reel and re-digitize them to 1080i or 720p, instead of to 480p.
Not all HD content is filmed with HD digital equipment, either. Alias, for example (which broadcasts at 720p) is filmed with, well, film.
35mm movie film is significantly better in effective resolution than 480p, and anything filmed that way will have little trouble making its way into the HD world.
One thing that really spooks me is that I've had enough trouble with fingerprints messing with dvds. The pits are too small. This is going to be worse, right?
I *really* hope they have the sense to put these in some sort of caddy. I know that won't be a popular idea here, but it really bugs me that the mere act of handling a disc puts it at risk. And since the movie industry won't let me make backups....
"Derp de derp."
...and better and faster peer-to-peer file sharing schemes to violate their copyrights.
...Playboy and the Spice Channel, both of which pride themselves on being vendors of classy porn.
I'd have thought "classy porn" was an oxymoron, but put in perspective I guess it's not!
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Magnetic media (like tape) are extremely reliable in the sense that I can slip a bit here, scratch a bit there but still hear or view the content with minimal distortion. They can also be 'overburned' by recording and playing at lower speeds.
Low density optical media (like CD) are also reasonable fault tolerant (with the built-in 8/13 and error checking) to the extent that radial scratches do not effect the content. There is also sufficient 'extra' space to permit overburning.
Medium density optical media (like DVD-R) are more stringent in terms of error checking. There is very little ECC and other error handling mechanisms and small scratches or smudges can really mess up the content. Also, there is no space for any overburning, the disks are 'maxed'
Now with these 25GB/110cm^2 disks, the disks are very error prone and I for one would be very careful of scratches or marks.
This plus the format of the data (MPEG-4) means that one small piece of data loss, I cannot view any frame till the next I frame (FYI, MPEG frames are I-full, P-delta and B-reverse delta. P and B depend on the prior/next frames and a typical sequence is IPBPBPBPBPBPBI and many videos have about 10 seconds or so between the I frames)
I think what upsets people is that someone upgrading from a VHS to a DVD to an HD-DVD copy of a movie pays just as much as someone who's buying the HD-DVD version as his first copy. That is, you aren't just paying for the improvement in the standard. You're paying for the improvements + any intellectual rights to view the movie. If you own the VHS and DVD versions as well, you've paid for those intellectual rights multiple times.
This flies in the face of the MPAA/RIAA's argument that filesharing is bad because when you buy a DVD/CD, you are purchasing intellectual rights to view/listen. If it's wrong for me to view/listen to the DVD/CD without buying a license, it's wrong for them to sell the same license to me multiple times in different formats. The software industry figured out this contradiction long ago and offers discounts for upgrade versions.