Samsung Ships the First Blu-Ray Player

DigitalDame2 writes "PCMag.com reports that beginning June 25th, consumers will be able to purchase the first Blu-Ray player: the Samsung BD-P1000. The BD-P1000 is twice the price of the HD-A1 ($999.99 list), but supports full 1080p playback, something the first generation of HD-DVD players do not. It also up-converts conventional DVDs to 1080p to improve video quality and comes with HDMI, Component, S-video, and composite outputs. The BD-P1000 will be sold at more than 200 retail locations, including Best Buy, Tweeter, and Circuit City, and 10 Blu-Ray titles will be available as well."

Comments

Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[ackthpt]

Gosh! Only $999.99 list (or as we learned from The Price Is Right, the price you ask if you never plan to actually sell any, except to the most gullible or desperate, actual price will probably be about $700) I can wait.

When VCRs came out I bought a rather nice one for ~900$US. When CD's came out I bought a nifty CD player for about 700$US. I was a little more patient with DVDs but eventually got a DVD drive for a home computer and then a portable player (computer ~70$US, Portabl ~1000$US) As I'm pretty well past the point of being impressed with Eye Candy in cinema, I'll probably only get a Blu-Ray when there's significant offerings and most of the newer films I must have are only available via that channel.

No!

[rbarreira]

No, the PS3 had it first! Oh wait...

Re:No!

[SockPuppet_9_5]

I see the PS3 is on sale at a Euro website, Play.com for the low low price of 549.99 British Pounds. But that's delivered.

information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

how on earth are they getting away with making dvd's look better by 'upscaling' them?

are they using the "Zoom" "enhance" method that we've seen on movies for so long... or are they recreating information which did not exist on the dvd using some crazy AI?

those kids at samsung, what will they think of next!

Re:information which is not there..

[Awptimus Prime]

I have a SamSung upscaling DVD player with HDMI output. Quite honestly, any flat panel TV is going to already do this to display a 480p image on a 720p/1080 display, so there is no difference whether the scaler is enabled on the player or not.

This might do something if you have an old CRT hdtv, but I really don't see how there could be much improvement. It's kind of like taking a 128k mp3 file, opening it in some audio tools, then saving it at 256k. You can't ever get back the missing bits.

Re:information which is not there..

[Takumi2501]

Shh... you're not supposed to ask that. :P

Re:information which is not there..

[spectral]

You're right, you can't do that. However, you CAN take a jpeg which has lost some data, apply some intelligent filters to it and clean out the blockiness / random and color shifts in what should have been a solid color, and the interesting aliasing artifacts around what used to be straight lines, and smooth those over (for the color abruptness) and straighten out / dealias the lines (I don't want to say antialias).

It's not impossible, just difficult. Compare the ATI TV Wonder Elite (it's not the only one, but it's the one I'm familiar with) with devices that don't have comb filters, etc: http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/2351.

Disclaimer: I actually have no idea what the hell i'm talking about. I just read that review recently and was amazed, so I'm trying to sound like I know what I'm talking about.

Re:information which is not there..

[Namronorman]

Disclaimer: I actually have no idea what the hell i'm talking about. I just read that review recently and was amazed, so I'm trying to sound like I know what I'm talking about.

By any chance, have you stayed at a Holiday Express anytime lately?

Re:information which is not there..

[Jeremy Erwin]

The real news is that the first bluray player has been released. Upscaling DVD players have been available for a long, long time. But if you must always look upon the old with fresh eyes, here's an overview of one upscaler, Faroudja's DCDI

Re:information which is not there..

[Firehed]

By burning through some CPU time, I've got no problem doing things to make videos look arguably better than the original. It can be hit-or-miss sometimes, but applying a light sharpen and denoise filter, with a decent deinterlacing and then a smart upscaling can actually produce some decent results.

I would make the argument that the Creative X-Fi is effectively supposed to do that for MP3s, but not having used or heard one I can't say. In the end it's all intelligent guesswork being done by the decoder, and while it can't add in detail that wasn't there, it can still make it look better than the source when done right.

That said, I was in a Best Buy earlier today, and someone had cranked up some sharpening filter like no tomorrow. And it looked asstastic (and not of the pr0n variety). When done wrong, the results suck, but if done correctly, it can be pretty decent. Of course, I'm talking about upscaling lossless Xvid .avi files with ffdshow, not a standalone upscaling player.

On a semi-related note, I was browing the HD-DVD section today just for kicks, and every movie I looked at said it was 1080p. Is it safe to assume that there's just a first-gen player limitation, rather than everyone just assuming that we can't fit 1080p stuff on to 15GB (or 30GB, if DL)?

Re:information which is not there..

[Babbster]

On a semi-related note, I was browing the HD-DVD section today just for kicks, and every movie I looked at said it was 1080p. Is it safe to assume that there's just a first-gen player limitation, rather than everyone just assuming that we can't fit 1080p stuff on to 15GB (or 30GB, if DL)?

1080p moves can easily fit on HD-DVDs (even with extras included, though nearly all HD-DVD extras so far are the old 480i/p ones found on DVDs), and that's what most of the studios are doing. I suspect that the limitation to 1080i in the current Toshiba and RCA players is simply a matter of those companies deciding that a) not many people have 1080p displays (even most people with PCs max out at 1600x1200) and b) they could keep costs down by using slightly less capable internals. If the latter is true, then it's an excellent move since, until the PS3 comes out, there don't seem to be any Blu-Ray players on the immediate horizon which can compete with HD-DVD in terms of price.

Shorter answer (since I rambled): Yes, the 1080i limitation is a situation specific to the two currently available HD-DVD players and not a problem with the technology overall. :)

Re:information which is not there..

[Teddy Beartuzzi]

On a semi-related note, I was browing the HD-DVD section today just for kicks, and every movie I looked at said it was 1080p. Is it safe to assume that there's just a first-gen player limitation, rather than everyone just assuming that we can't fit 1080p stuff on to 15GB (or 30GB, if DL)?

The whole "but ìt's only 1080i" is a total red-herring. From the dvdtalk review:

"In the last couple of days, several technical issues have been put to rest, at least for me. The first was the common accusation that the initial HD DVD players like the Toshiba HD-A1 are deficient because they don't output "full 1080p" resolution, that they are "1080i only." I don't see this as a practical concern. All HD DVD and Blu-ray discs will encode film-sourced material in full 1920x1080 progressive scan resolution at 24 frames per second, which is the film industry standard.

Unfortunately many folks are confusing 1080i acquisition with 1080i transmission. The primary reason we get interlacing artifacts in a 480i, 576i, or 1080i signal is that the frame was originally captured in interlaced format, with the odd scan lines and even scan lines being recorded at two different moments in time. When you reassemble two fields that are offset in time, you get jaggies, moire patterns, barber pole effects, and line twitter. That is not true of either HD DVD or Blu-ray film transfers since the image is scanned progressively from a film frame that represents a single moment in time.

Therefore we would expect to see none of the common evidence of deinterlacing when watching HD DVD or Blu-ray movies that are being transmitted via 1080i. Our first look at HD DVD in 1080i confirms this expectation. After hours of viewing three different HD DVD movies there is simply no evidence of any artifact that might be attributed to the fact that the signal was transmitted in 1080i format. The picture is as clean, stable, and as artifact-free as it could be. There is no visible defect in the image that would be eliminated by switching to 1080p transmission."

Make your decision on HD-DVD vs Blu Ray, but don't do it based on this bogus 1080i issue.

Re:information which is not there..

[Firehed]

So, in that case, does blu-ray have anything going for it? Higher price, more restrictive, preinstalled rootkit, effectively unreleased, and no advantages with picture quality. Are they relying solely on the fact that the PS3 will have a blu-ray drive installed? Have they completely failed to realize that DVDs were successful because they had no competition, rather than because they had a large console launch that supported the media (and, may I add, supported it quite shittily)?

As an added bonus, some of the newer HD-DVD titles are flippers with 1080p on one side and 480p/480i on the other (I thought they said 480p, but that's obviously not the case if players don't support that). Plus, they've combined a buzz-acronym (HD) with an existing format that people are both familiar and generally fairly content with, rather than created a snappy name that does nothing to indicate what the hell it is to Joe Average (the fact that HD stands for High Density in this case, rather than high definition, is completely irrelavent).

Hasn't every Sony-backed format that had competition failed miserably due to an idiotic licensing scheme? Minidiscs had potential, Betamax was technologically superior (or so I've been told, I'm too young to know firsthand), and I'm sure there are dozens besides. Will this be any different?

Re:information which is not there..

[Babbster]

So, in that case, does blu-ray have anything going for it?

Well, Blu-Ray does have something going for it: It has a size advantage of 10 GB (25GB versus 15GB) per layer over HD-DVD. The thing is, this advantage is deprecated somewhat in both the movie and gaming environments by the fact that 15GB/30GB (single-player/dual-layer) is typically more than enough space for this kind of pre-recorded material, as HD-DVD is proving by putting 1080p movies on their discs. Admittedly, this can be argued a bit by folks who would point out that full seasons of HD TV shows, for example, could fit on fewer Blu-Ray discs - but most people don't find the multiple-disc DVD releases too constricting in that regard.

Where Blu-Ray shines a little brighter in the capacity area is, of course, for PC storage use as a recordable medium. As it stands, even a dual-layer HD-DVD couldn't back up a full 40GB hard drive (which is pretty minimal these days), while a dual-layer Blu-Ray recordable could back up that same drive with 10GB to spare (or fewer depending on how much disc overhead there is, like on DVDs where dual-layer recordables are around 8.5GB instead of the pressed 9.4GB).

Re:information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

How is this modded insightful??? More like ignorant. HD DVD and BluRay are not "upconverted" movies. The print (film) is re-telecined at the proper resolution. Meaning instead of "scanning" the print at 480i(or p) they rescan at 1080p. Think of it as re-rendering the movie at a higher resolution. THIS IS NOT UPCONVERTING! Get a clue before you open your mouth.

Re:information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

I've got an X-Fi, and tried it out with my music collection (all ripped from CDs at 128kbps AAC by iTunes). The 24bit crystalizer is interesting, but I don't use it... some songs are better, some are worse. If it's a simple song (say, a rap with only a couple of beats etc) then it'll sound better (a bit more "alive", if you will), but if it has all sorts of different layers and vocals going on, it gets a bit confused and sounds "wrong". I think it's pretty good for a first try, I hope they improve on it in the future.

Oh, and the description for it in the options is-

"Enhances musical dynamics by emphasizing sharp percussive sounds and transients, creating a punchier and more dynamic listening experience."

Re:information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

Media coming from a film source will, indeed, start life at 24p (and both formats support 1080p/30, I believe).

That doesn't mean that everything is recorded in this format. I've been hoping that Blu-ray will stick to their promise to suppose 1080p/60 - and all players have to support this internally if disks are going to be able to use it without compatibility problems. Obviously you gain some image quality if your display is 1080p/60 but even if not, 1080p/60 is the best starting point for being able to target both 1080i and 720p displays without making a mess of either.

It's true that there's pretty much no 1080p content yet (and it's certainly not a viable broadcast standard). That doesn't mean there won't be content in this format when Blu-ray players become popular, though. Sony (of course) do have 1080p/60 capable television cameras, if you have $100K to stump up for one. If I were going to spend this kind of money on a next generation disk player, I'd be planning for some future-proofing.

Re:information which is not there..

[FatherOfONe]

I honestly don't know if what you say is correct or not, but I will say that me and 6 million other people will own a Blu Ray player in less than a year. Granted we may only play games on it, but we will own one.

Re:information which is not there..

[TerrellJacobs]

It's not just the people at Samsung making these new players. Everyone from Sony to the small no name electronics manufacturers (except for Toshiba) are behind this. The difference between regular DVD's and these new Blu Ray's discs are that the Blu ray has more space which means they can add more info on the disc. According to Pioneer's new site, you get 6 times the video and picture quality. I'll prob wait for pioneer's model. Its coming out a little later but it'll let you burn on to the disc (while you're watching it) and it hooks up with a wireless connection to the computer. http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/pna/v3/pg/top/ca t/article/0,,2076_310069741_310178603,00.html

Re:information which is not there..

[zeeroj]

Pioneer's model costs $1800. For god's sake, wait.

Re:information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

Sony's Betamax licensing (especially their stance against porn) sure didn't help, but VHS won in part because its bandwidth was low enough that it could fit an entire movie on one cassette.

Can't a NTSC DVD be either 480i60 or 480p24, with the player adding interlacing if needed for its coax and RF outputs?

Re:information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

That blurb doesn't explain how they can interlace progressive content without viewers being presented with the same old weaved frame crapfest. Do American HD displays accept 48i or 50i (as European models must) as well as 60i? Do HDMI or component video transmit 3:2 cadence flags that would let the display do inverse telecine correctly?

Re:information which is not there..

[Teddy Beartuzzi]

I'm certainly no expert, but it seemed fairly clear to me. The frames are on the disk intact. If you've got a progressive display, it takes the frames and sends them to the display untouched. If you've got an interlaced display, it takes the frame off the disk, sends the odd half, then the even half, your display merges them back together, shows the frame to you, then moves to the next frame. At no time is any frame mixed with a different frame.

Interlacing is a problem in other formats, because the frames are literally mixed together on the disk. Or so I understand.

Re:information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

The way it's usually done is 3:2 pulldown, which turns 24p frames Aa-Bb-Cc-Dd into 60i frames Aa-Bb-Bc-Cd-Dd at the output. In the display, your choices are:

Display interlaced frames as-is That kinda worked on a fuzzy phosphor-based raster display at the right framerate (scanline 2 smears over the fading image of the previous field on scanlines 1 and 3), but shown progressively now it looks like ass. Note that frame Cc is never shown intact, always mixed with frame Bb or Dd. Line doubler This expands each field into a full frame by interpolating the content of the missing scanlines using their neighbors, resulting in 60p content at half the vertical resolution of the original. Works better for non-film content, where you actually have (portions of) sixty distinct images per second you want to show. Inverse telecine This reassembles the interlaced fields back into the source frames they came from, resulting in the same 24p content you would have been given in a sane world. But it only works if the input signal can tell you which interlaced fields are from which frames (non-progressive MPEG-2 frames can, RF and composite and s-video cannot, don't know about component or HDMI yet). Otherwise you have to guess, which is indistinguishable from magic (though most displays try anyway) and if you guess wrong you make the artifacts even more intolerable. And if your display can't run at 24p (or maybe PAL's 25p, or some multiple), you have to duplicate frames to reach 30p, making an ugly stuttering effect.

Re:information which is not there..

[Anonymous Coward]

To answer my own question, logically a NTSC DVD always decodes to 480i60 fields. Any mix of stored fields and frames (which can be flagged to repeat a field, implementing 3:2 pulldown without duplicating a field on the disc) that adds up to 60i is allowed. Frames can be flagged "progressive" (fields are simultaneous) but that's just a hint for deinterlacing or scaling, and a lot of discs' flags were unwittingly mastered incorrectly because it didn't harm the interlaced output.

Wow...

[martinultima]

A thousand bucks, and there will only be ten titles when it first comes out? Now I can see why only obsessive early adopters would want something like this – quite honestly, I just don't see the point of getting a $1000 device that can only play 10 titles (no matter how high-definition the titles and/or the point may be).

Re:Wow...

[Umbral Blot]

I think the point is just so it can be out there, to help solidify the standard and raise consumer awareness. That way when titles do start being released in Blu-Ray you will at least know that they can be played, versus the other marketing strategy, where they realease a bunch of movies in Blu-Ray, but no player, which would be stupid.

Re:Wow...

[The Barking Dog]

When HD DVD debuted, there were only three titles, two of which were of rather dubious value to tech-heads. But Blu-Ray is debuting with The Fifth Element, and all good geeks will snap that one up!

Re:Wow...

[Billly Gates]

How many titles are there for HD-DVD?

If its alot greater than 10 I think we may have a winner for the next standard.

Re:Wow...

[rtaylor]

I just don't see the point of getting a $1000 device that can only play 10 titles (no matter how high-definition the titles and/or the point may be).

If it can play recorded BD-Roms I can easily see 5000 units being sold to advertising agencies for demo purposes. $1800 (burner plus player) is pretty cheap if it can help you maintain your contract list -- maintain only since your competitors had the same thought.

Re:Wow...

[fm6]

$1K is nothing. Early HDTV setups set their early adopters back ten times as much.

Also, remember that you don't buy expensive toys just to use them. You also buy them to shame all your friends and neighbors whose toys aren't as expensive as yours.

Re:Wow...

[bmecoli]

But Blu-Ray is debuting with The Fifth Element, and all good geeks will snap that one up!

Well of course! Who wouldn't want to see Milla Jovovich's boobs in 1080p?

Re:Wow...

[Jherek Carnelian]

About 30 for HD-DVD http://www.deepdiscountdvd.com/format.cfm?classID= 1
and 25 within the next month for BLU-RAY http://www.deepdiscountdvd.com/format.cfm?classID= 2

Not that anyone in their right mind would purchase either since both formats are DRM - Defective Recorded Media.

Re:Wow...

[DigiShaman]

Bragging rights is a small part of it. People that buy into the first wave of technology are of two mindsets. Either they love/lust technology or it's for some self-gratification of being a part of the "elite in-crowd".

You check into the home audio/theater scene. The people are very eccentric and snobbish! It's almost a religious way of life to these people.

Re:Wow...

[ivan256]

The point is to extract the maximum amount of cash possible from the obsessive early adopters before coming out with more reasonably priced models.

Additionally, these early units usually contain all the bells and whistles in order to prove out every aspect of the technology. Later, cheaper models, often have expensive, but little used features dropped from the product.

Re:Wow...

[Anonymous Coward]

you mean she actually has boobs?

Re:Wow...

[Monkelectric]

There are also a lot of people to whom 1k really isn't any signifigant ammount of money. I don't hapen to be one of those people, but I know a few :)

Re:Wow...

[Rain7]

Yeah, because what are the chances that other movies get release in the next few months... oh wait.

Re:Wow...

[NanoGator]

"I just don't see the point of getting a $1000 device that can only play 10 titles (no matter how high-definition the titles and/or the point may be)."

Perhaps not. I have to ask, though: Have you ever pre-purchased something? Waited in line for hours to see a movie? Purchased any computer related hardware the day it was released? If the answer to any of these questions is 'yes', then you really shouldn't be throwing any stones. I know I'm guilty. Everybody has their obsessions, and some have the means to lavishly explore them.

Re:Wow...

[CastrTroy]

The fifth element? Seriously? It's not a bad movie, but definitely not something I'd buy a new player for. Maybe if they got LOTR or the original star wars trilogy. Maybe they should put out some new movies on Blu-Ray.

Re:Wow...

[redcane]

only noticeable in 1080p.

Re:Wow...

[Jeremy Erwin]

Some people really enjoy the idea of watching films in a theater (big screen, loud sounds-- up to 115 dB for the LFE, and superb picture and sound quality) but they can't stand the reality (overpriced popcorn, sticky floors, cell phones, hiring a babysitter). So they build their own theaters. What's wrong with that?

Besides, LOTR doesn't play locally, at least anymore.

Re:Wow...

[DigiShaman]

There's nothing wrong with it. Some people invest in a backyard swimming pool, others a home theater system. But I'm not talking about your average person. I'm talking about those that spend the big bucks on bleeding edge technologies. Again, there's nothing wrong it. However, I find such behavior to be highly impractical let alone cost effective.

Besides, first gen technologies tend to be riddled with bugs. Just hold out till a newer product revision is available. Less bugs, and a lower price.

Re:Wow...

[jeannie888]

wait a few month.. it will be down to $500

Re:Wow...

[Josuah]

Not that anyone in their right mind would purchase either since both formats are DRM - Defective Recorded Media.

I take it you also don't purchase DVD or VHS movies either then, as both of those have Macrovision, and DVD movies have both region coding and CSS. Or is it just that since there have been technological products that allow you to circumvent this issue, that it becomes a moot point in your mind?

Re:Wow...

[DrXym]

Why do you not consider DVD to contain DRM though? I can't play my DVDs anywhere. My PS2 doesn't play half my titles. Why? Because they're region 1 encoded and my PS2 is set to region 2. Only players which can be hacked, or software decoders like VLC are able to play all my content.

Re:Wow...

[Dion]

I don't know about him, but that's exactly how I feel, I don't mind DVD because CSS has been broken and I can circumvent all the DRM brokenness.

I'll never buy an AACS encumbered disk as long as I can't reliably play it on my Linux box.

Once someone manages to extract the player keys for a player I'll be happy to buy movies that were mastered before that.

Re:Wow...

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as DRM, you're right. It's not just high-end movie technology. DVD-Audio in particular should be easy on first appearance to decrypt and use freely but the one time that was done last year it quickly went underground beyond reach of most people. There's no major High Definition publishers, audio or video, that are DRM-free...yet :( Why would they suddenly go DRM free? Some of them even tried to screw with plain old stereo CD's! They're scared.

Re:Wow...

[h4ck7h3p14n37]

A thousand bucks, and there will only be ten titles when it first comes out?

And how many of those titles were filmed in high definition?

Re:Wow...

[Chandon Seldon]

If everyone does that, the new tech will sell poorly and never come down in price.

So, the real plan is for everyone but me to buy their 1080p 80" plasma TVs right now, along with BlueRay players & burners. The thing you all should especially buy is blank BD-Rs, because they cost $20 now and I want to buy them for a quarter.

Re:Wow...

[Jeremy Erwin]

I gather that you have a low opinion of 35 mm film?

Re:Wow...

[h4ck7h3p14n37]

Nope, 35mm film is fine by me. What I don't like is companies selling content on HD media without disclosing that the content was not originally created in HD. I'm assuming that many consumers will not realize that their Blu-Ray (or HD-DVD) movies are not really HD, but have simply been upconverted.

Re:Wow...

[Jeremy Erwin]

What I don't like is companies selling content on HD media without disclosing that the content was not originally created in HD

WARNING WARNING WARNING

Lawrence of Arabia predates HD. Even though it was originally filmed using 65mm film, a process that theoretically is capable of many thousands of lines of resolution, it's not HD, and predates digital cinema by many decades. If you're concerned about this, please return this Bluray disc for a refund, and check out the DVD instead, Sure, it's lower resolution. But then, who's to say that the original movie, which was intended to be projected onto a 50 foot screen contained any more details? You? You jest.

No, seriously. Maybe you should check out Episode II. Attack of the Clones. It even has Ewan McGregor pretending to be a young Alec Guinness. No Peter O'Toole, but it does have Ahmed Best.

WARNING WARNING WARNING

FIRST POST

[Anonymous Coward]

perhaps they didn't notice the huge sike in the DOW today, just like October 8, 1929. The big crash is coming, and they think people will be able to afford a $1000 DVD player!!!

SUCKASS

Samsung pppbpbpbbbbttt

[the eric conspiracy]

If it is like other Samsung video players the attention to details like black level etc. won't be that great. I'd wait on this one unless you have money to burn.

Re:Samsung pppbpbpbbbbttt

[krakelohm]

I think anyone that is considering this has money to burn.

Watch out

[Anonymous Coward]

Better remove those composite or s-video outputs. Joe Schmoe is likely to connect those to his HDTV (or even worse his old magnavox) and think he's getting high definition since the discs and player are "high-def". Of course even the component outputs can be utilized for standard def.

how about a poll?

[way2trivial]

Blu-ray
HD-DVD

WTF?

Cowboy Neal.

Re:how about a poll?

[Dr. Eggman]

A poll to end all format/console polls! HD DVD Blue Ray PS3 Xbox 360 w/HD DVD Wii w/ or w/o DVD dongle Cowboy Neal

Re:how about a poll?

[Dr. Eggman]

Wow. I really messed up. Lets just try this one more time:

A poll to end all format/console polls!

HD DVD
Blue Ray
PS3
Xbox 360 w/HD DVD
Wii w/ or w/o DVD dongle
Cowboy Neal

2x Price of HDDVD?

[Anonymous Coward]

Crikey - double the price of HD-DVD? Are they absolutely mad?

Re:2x Price of HDDVD?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, we're talking about Sony here. Ridiculously overpriced is a given (PS3 anyone?)

Re:2x Price of HDDVD?

[Manmademan]

actually, we're talking about Samsung. Sony's player was delayed until later this year- Price TBD. Sony bashing is in and all, I know- but at least get the manufacturer right.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'am an early adopter - of HD DVD that is. The player was out before, half the price, more titles, and doesn't use a Sony-format that's guaranteed to die like they always do.

1080p?

[sam1am]

Anyone know if that is 1080p/60 or just 1080p/24? Didn't see this specified on Samsung's website or in the user manual.

Re:1080p?

[Anonymous Coward]

1080p/111

Re:1080p?

[Anonymous Coward]

Capable of 1080p60.

Of course... There isn't any 1080p60 CONTENT. And there isn't going to be, except maybe technical demos, for quite a while. Nearly all films are shot at 24p and any decent HDTV will inverse-telecine back to 1080p24 from 1080i30 telecined frames. And any video-source material out there will be shot in either 720p or 1080i, so really, the 1080p60 is just an additional tick-box on the feature list at this point.
 
Heck, force 24 fps film to be output at 1080p60, and it could look WORSE than telecined 1080i30 because of cadence problems.

Re:1080p?

[sam1am]

All true. Wish I could mod you up, but clearly I've posted. Doh. Thanks for the info.

Anyways, while there is indeed no 1080p60 content now (well, none distributed), I think HDTV production may settle at some point in the next few years. So if tv show release were available on DVD in 1080p60, it could be useful.

But mostly, was just curious. Was surprised to not see this specified anywhere.

Re:1080p?

[OlivierB]

I thought that one of the drawbacks of HDMI (besides HDCP...) was that 1080p could only be achieved at 30fps, not 60 like you claim; the bandwith is insufficient for that much data.

The recent annoucement of HDMI v1.3 is supposed to address this amongst other things.

Re:1080p?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not true. 1080p/60 is an optional format as of the 1.0 spec.

The type A HDMI connector is limited to 165MHz pixel clock (at least before the 1.3 spec). That's the usual limit for single-link DVI (or at least, the defined frequency for the crossover to dual link). You can drive a 1920x1200 flat panel monitor at 60Hz (with reduced blanking) with plenty of slack in a single-link DVI connector. 1920x1080 should leave loads of room for the audio channel. (I don't have an EDID to hand to prove it though.)

Re:1080p?

[Keeper]

Just about every progressive HDTV out there (still) has an internal refresh rate of 60hz. You're going to get cadence problems with any 24fps source material, telecined or not.

Re:1080p?

[ywwg]

In my experience, 24fps played at 60fps looks much much better than 30i. The cadence is the same (3:2), it's just that it's for entire frames instead of individual fields. I hate working on shows in 1080i, it's much uglier than 720p no matter what the material.

Re:1080p?

[Trogre]

Unless you remaster your 24fps movie with the algorithms that Philips Natural Motion tellys use.

You know, the ones that detect motion and create intermediate frames to give you smooth 100Hz motion from a 50Hz (25fps) source. I own one of these beasts and the effect is postitively stunning. And that's done in real-time. If it can be done at the mastering stage the current problems associated with Natural Motion wouldn't exist.

Re:1080p?

[OlivierB]

Ok did not know that. I was under this belief because I had read something from Microsoft where they explained that 1080p games wheren't a reality because of HDMI limitations (besides CPU limitations) that restricted games to 30fps, whereas sport/racing games required 60 fps for smooth action.
Forgot to put the FUD filter on when reading their story; thanks for your input!

I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank you

[plasmacutter]

let's do the economics:

$999.99 for the player
$40? for the disks

only a few titles
LOTS of drm infesting it and making it not play full res

or i can just:

take the pc i already have.
open up a browser to TPB or Tspy
search "HR-HDTV"
torrent DL
watch full res HDTV quality encodes for $0-$25 (have to have dvd-r's right?)
and as a bonus, the last 720p movie i saw on xvid took up 3 gigs... you don't need blue-ray or hd-dvd.

thanks hollywood for drawing out the r&d and forcing the added costs of tons and tons of DRM! yet another reason to engage in piracy!

hmmm . . .

[Maradine]

It also up-converts conventional DVDs to 1080p to improve video quality and comes with HDMI, Component, S-video, and composite outputs.

You know, I've always wondered about this, so someone help me out here. Let's say I have a 1080p HDTV. As it's a discrete pixel device, not a CRT, it's got one native resolution, right? And when I plug my 480i/p DVD player into it to watch a movie, the TV is upsampling the signal to use all of the pixels on the display, right? So why is this a feature on the player? How does it improve image quality? Is it using a blingy-er algorithm than the TV would be using? Marketing fluff?

Re:hmmm . . .

[jbreckman]

I'm not sure about this, but I think it's that DVD players do it better than most TVs. I know my 720p TV does an awful upconversion by itself - but with an upconverting dvd player it looks MUCH better.

I've seen TVs that do it well though - it is just that some don't.

Unless you aren't happy with how it looks right now, its probably not worth the investment.

Re:hmmm . . .

[drinkypoo]

It probably IS using a "bling-ier" scaler algorithm than the TV. Blu-Ray deals with HD resolutions and [optionally] more advanced codecs when compared to DVD. MPEG4 at HD resolution takes a shitpot of processing power compared to a DVD - when playing a DVD, they probably have ample processing power left to do scaling in software. Not that I know if they're doing that, or if they have a hardware scaler in there...

Re:hmmm . . .

[fred fleenblat]

There aren't any good reviews or tests for scaler accuracy so it's nice to have one each in your TV, receiver and DVD player so you can pick the one you like best.

If you've assembled your system slowly over the years there is some chance that newer scaler chips are better than what you have now.

Personally, I'd rather have a good scaler in my monitor or receiver so I can benefit from it on all sources, not just DVD.

Re:hmmm . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it using a blingy-er algorithm than the TV would be using?

Yes.

Re:hmmm . . .

[llZENll]

Since no one specifies what algorithm they use the only way you really know is to do some viewing tests. Most likely since the device supports BluRay it has a pretty powerful scaler and will look better than your TV scaler.

Since the image is converted to digital it will be of better quality because it won't have to be converted to analog ever.

For example:

normal DVD player > converted to analog > analog signal over 480i connection > at tv > converted to digital 1080p > displayed

bluray player > conversion to 1080p > digital signal to tv > displayed

Re:hmmm . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the blingalizer in your DVD player is better that the one in the TV. As a bonus side effect, it also helps the picture quality when watching BET and MTV.

Re:hmmm . . .

[Eccles]

Assuming similar quality scalars, you're better off scaling once, from the original source data. Consider the extreme counter, upscaling from 480p to 481p, then with another device from 481p to 482p, ..., 1079p to 1080p; each scaling step introduces aliasing. Two steps may be small enough you don't notice, but theoretically one step should do better.

Re:hmmm . . .

[interiot]

The reason that some scalers are better than others is that, once you throw interlaced content into the mix, scaling gets a lot more complicated, and is sometimes just an educated guessing game.

The reason it's in the player is because it's easier to upgrade your player to have a decent scaler than it is to upgrade your TV to get a decent scaler (lots of $$ just for the new TV), or to buy a standalone scaler (standalone scalers aim for the top end of the market).

Ultimately though, you want a scaler that can work with many different inputs, so that your Dreamcast, DVD player, and your video recorder all look good. So having your best scaler be in the DVD player isn't optimal either. Fortunately, scalers in newer TV's are starting to get better (eg. with names like DCDi showing up more).

Re:hmmm . . .

[Xugumad]

DVD players that specifically come with upscaling as a feature, tend to do a better job than TVs, in my experience. I assume this is because they are working with the original data, and upscaling as they decode, rather than upscaling the decoded MPEG stream...

Re:hmmm . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

This was the answer I was going to give. MPEG is a bit like JPEG in that some areas are defined as gradiented triangles via some DCT thing. If these areas were made into 16x16 pixel blocks, and then those blocks were scaled to 128x128 they would look sorta crappy. But if the information were used to directly make a 128x128 block and then scale up some of the non-gradient info for that area it should look better.

Either way, you don't need no stinking blu-ray player to do this. Take your DVD, put it in a DVD-ROM drive and run an ATi or nVidia accellerated player, set the output accordingly and drive that TV directly from your graphics card's VGA/DVI/HDMI/Component outputs.

-Daniel

Re:hmmm . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

The short answer is the DVD is better at upscaling because it has access to more information than is included in the stream sent to the TV. Two parts of the long answer are:

First, the DVD player actually has somewhat more than 480 lines of information (or at least can, whether or not it does is a matter of encoding) so it may not need to upscale as much.

Second, the DVD can upscale as part of the native decompression, where it has information about dithering already in the image data. Not all upscaling players do this, but if you already know that pixel X is the average of pixels Y and Z you might choose Y or Z as a basis for upscaling rather than X, as Y and Z both contain "real" image data and X does not. But your TV upscaler would *not* know this, and therefore could not make the same choice.

Re:hmmm . . .

[vux984]

One advantage to having the scaler in the player is that you don't run into video lag if your running the audio and video to different devices.

This is a common problem with entry to mid-range home-theatre HD systems; where the DVD player might have an optical audio run to a surround capable amp, and then run the video to the hdtv (on DVI/HDMI/composite). The result is the video comes out a few nths of a second after the audio because the amp and tv get the signal in at the same time, but the amp immediately pushes it out to the speakers while the TV takes a few nths of a second to process the image before you get to see it on-screen, leading to annoying lip-sync issues. If the DVD was already poorly synced (and so many of those low budget DVD transfers *are* pretty marginal) the extra delay can make them almost unwatchable.

If you run both sound/video into your hdtv it works fine because the tv buffers the audio until the video signal is ready. But if you run the audio to your TV there's no real way to get it into your surround sound system. Few HDTVs have a digital audio pass-thru of any sort.

New higher end receivers have the ability to delay the audio allowing you to manually resync it, but this is a bit of a kludge and the receivers that can do it are usually total overkill for most small scale home theatre applications -- especially in the smallish living rooms in apartments/condos most urbanites have doubling as their "home theatre". :)

The other solution is to purchase audio delay hardware, but they aren't exactly cheap. (couple hundred plus)

Doing the video processing in the player bypasses the issue (assuming it syncs the audio output; almost all do -- but some of the early & budget progressive scan players don't. Also, its now surprise that newer HDTVs have faster processors so the lag is shrinking but its still a major problem today.

Re:hmmm . . .

[caudron]

the TV is upsampling the signal to use all of the pixels on the display, right? So why is this a feature on the player? How does it improve image quality? Is it using a blingy-er algorithm than the TV would be using? Marketing fluff?

Actually, that is precisely correct. Full motion image rescaling is a nontrivial task. The TV is rarely (though there are notable exceptions!) the best choice to do the scaling. You want the video to be rescaled before it hits the TV by something a bit more beefy and slickery than what the TV will through at it.

The claim here is that the player's scaler is going to be better than the TV's, but probably not as good as a dedicated scaler. I'm sure you can turn the player's scaler off if you want that done by other equipment.

Is their claim truthful? Who knows? Most likely is is better than the TV, but I've seen some good TV-based scaling.

My home theater setup? http://tom.digitalelite.com/caudroplex.html

Tom Caudron
http://tom.digitalelite.com/

Re:hmmm . . .

[AJWM]

In theory, the DVD player can do a better job of upsampling because it can grab data from before and after frames too to help with its interpolation. Hypothetically a TV could also do this but it would have to buffer the frames, and it'd be working off of the already-interpolated full frames (containing artifacts) rather than the raw data (well, raw compressed data) that the DVD has available.

Whether any DVD player actually does this, rather than just do some simple graphic interpolation per frame like the TV probably does, I don't know.

Re:hmmm . . .

[mmortal03]

Here is an example of some good upsampling: http://gear.ign.com/articles/701/701720p1.html

Really cool what they can get out of SD material.

Re:hmmm . . .

[Criffer]

Because the player has more information on how to upscale. It can use motion compensation data to more accurately predict subpixel movement, and extrapolate that into the newly created pixels. By the time the signal gets to the TV, it's a stream of flat images, which has a lot less data. A really good TV-based scaler could sample multiple frames in order to try to guess the changes in the image and calculate the interpixel data, but what's the point when the data is already there, encoded on the disc? It can also use the motion data to deinterlace; sending an interlaced signal to a progressive scan TV is just crap.

Of course, it may still be a crappy scaler on the player, but at least it has the option.

Re:hmmm . . .

[GWBasic]

To truly do good de-interlacing, you probably need a look-ahead buffer of a few fields. If such a buffer were implemented in a TV, it would cause de-synchronization and mess up video games. It's much easier to do the de-interlacing in the DVD player, because it can still output the video and audio in synch.

kinda makes the 600$ ps3 a deal

[ActionAL]

ps3 will play your bluray movies and run linux and play ps3,ps2, and psone video games! all way under the price of a standalone bluray movie player.

Re:kinda makes the 600$ ps3 a deal

[JL-b8]

Until it burns out in 3 weeks.

Re:kinda makes the 600$ ps3 a deal

[interiot]

On the other hand, it will have the usability of a PS2 DVD player and the bugs of first-gen disc format, so you'll have to buy a better Blu-ray player soon anyway.

Re:kinda makes the 600$ ps3 a deal

[NanoGator]

"ps3 will play your bluray movies and run linux and play ps3,ps2, and psone video games! all way under the price of a standalone bluray movie player."

By the time the PS3 has enough units in stores that you'll be able to actually purchase one (probably March of next year), how much will the BR players cost?

In any event, can't say I care much. The DVD on the PS2 was BY FAR the worst DVD player I've ever had, and I've purchased $30 cheapos from Walmart. I wouldn't even consider the PS3 if I were building an HD theater.

Re:kinda makes the 600$ ps3 a deal

[adam31]

I use my PS2 as my DVD player, and it works fine.

In fact, my major complaint is that the controller is wired, which won't be the case on the PS3. Compare a wireless controller that plays PS3/2/1 games and operates the CD/DVD/Blu-Ray drive versus the quantity and magnitude of your other remotes. Wireless controller wins in my book.

And more importantly, who actually wants more components in the entertainment system? If the PS3 weren't coming out so soon, I would buy a slimline just to cut down on space! If a PS3 can replace everything but the stereo, it has won my heart and wallet. And if it allows MP3s to be copied onto the hard-drive, and all I need is to supply a TV, receiver and speakers... $600 is acceptable.

Re:kinda makes the 600$ ps3 a deal

[Guppy06]

"ps3 will play your bluray movies"

All two of them

"run linux"

OSS, meet DRM!

"play ps3,ps2, and psone video games!"

But not PS2 or PS1 memory cards.

"all way under the price of a standalone bluray movie player.">

The "julianne fries" sales pitch only works if I want julianne fries.

Improve Quality?

[thedbp]

Is that even possible? Just like when you enlarge an image in Photoshop, all you're doing to approximating what pixels WOULD be there ... you're not adding any real new information to the image. How could this possibly improve a DVD image?

This is an honest question. I'd really like to know if they have some special fancy way to truly fill in the gaps of resolution.

Re:Improve Quality?

[Carthag]

They've licensed the technology from CSI. You even get a voice recognition feature that lets you say "zoom... enhance... enhance"

Re:Improve Quality?

[stevenm86]

It is possible to a certain extent with video this way because of the interlacing. With an interlaced image, only half of the lines are displayed, and each second 60 such half-frames are displayed (making for 30 full frames per second). If you get a good deinterlacing algorithm going, you can recover the extra lines thrugh motion approximation, etc. This gives you a noninterlaced image at a full vertical resolution. Nothing will improve the horizontal resolution however.

Re:Improve Quality?

[Citizen of Earth]

They've licensed the technology from CSI. You even get a voice recognition feature that lets you say "zoom... enhance... enhance"

The CSI guys do a lot more work than they need to. When they get a blurry photo of the killer, they just need to zoom in on a skin cell to the point that they can see the nucleotides of the perp's DNA.

Re:Improve Quality?

[tgd]

Photoshop has two dimensions to deal with, a video scaler has three. There is a LOT of useful information in how frames change over time that can be used to figure out not just how to sharpen a scaled image, but how to restore detail that was lost.

Re:Improve Quality?

[michaeldot]

Just like when you enlarge an image in Photoshop, all you're doing to approximating what pixels WOULD be there ... you're not adding any real new information to the image. How could this possibly improve a DVD image?

True, but there are varying qualities of interpolation. Photoshop's preferences have options for interpolation like "bilinear" and "bicubic" which imply progressively better mathematical methods of sampling the surrounding pixels to interpolate the missing pixels. The more samples and the better the algorithm, the better the interpolation.

Photoshop offered the choice because running a high quality bicubic algorithm on a slow CPU back in the day could take a fair amount of time on a large image.

So, if improved interpolator hardware can do something like a bicubic calculation every 30 frames per second, the quality of the interpolated image is going to improve.

Re:Improve Quality?

[Sycraft-fu]

It can to a limited degree. One way is simply that a bicubic upsample tends to look better than just larger pixels, or rather a nearest neighbour upsample. You can see it in photoshop if you upscale an impage using both methods. The bicubic resmapling produces a clearly superior image. So when you are making an image larger anyhow (by sending it to a large TV) it's to your advantage to use a good scaler.

The other thing is that most new TVs (CRTs exempted) only work at one rez. No matter what signal you send them, they have to convert it to that rez. Well they often do a less than optimal job of that. So if your player does a better job, the image looks better. The player has the potential to do a better job as well, since it has access to more information. It can, for example, look ahead a few frames and use that information. The TV can't really, lest the audio get desync'd.

So you are right in that we aren't talking a major quality increase or anything, but it can look better than just outputting the DVD stream sraight.

Interestingly enough this is often not the case on CRTs. I find that the HDTV movies on cable, which are almost always just DVD upconverts, look ever so slightly worse than a pure 480p signal from my DVD player. However for an LCD it's unquestionably better to upconvert, since it has to anyhow. As a somewhat analogus situation, look at the difference between VGA and DVI-D on a computer LCD. With VGA, the LCD has to lock to the pixels at an arbitrary rate and upsample them itself. With DVI the graphics card handles it and sends native resolution. DVI ends up looking much better.

Re:Improve Quality?

[kumanopuusan]

I'd really like to know if they have some special fancy way to truly fill in the gaps of resolution.

Yeah, there are some pretty fancy ways of doing it. The most important thing to realize is that one frame of video looks pretty much like the next one (temporal redundancy), otherwise you wouldn't be able to process it into a moving image. Because of this, there is information about onscreen objects in many frames. You can use this additional data if your motion estimation algorithms are good enough to allow you to find it.

Re:Improve Quality?

[Jeremy Erwin]

CSI ripped off that technique from Bladerunner

1080p eh?

[skyman8081]

Now how about a proper 1080p TV then? There are HDTV's that have a 1080p display, but don't take 1080p inputs, and TVs that take 1080p but downscale it to 720p. Make up your mind!

Re:1080p eh?

[Praxx]

Now how about a proper 1080p TV then? There are HDTV's that have a 1080p display, but don't take 1080p inputs, and TVs that take 1080p but downscale it to 720p. Make up your mind!

That's why I bought HP's DLP TV ... 1080p inputs over HDMI, two HDMI inputs. People might argue that it isn't true 1080p (see Wobulation, but I own the TV, and every pixel looks perfect. Nothing's beats a 65" monitor at 1920x1080 ... I just wish I had two, so I could run dual monitors. ;-)

It's all about who does the scaling

[xswl0931]

Presumably the player does a better job of scaling than your display device. Nothing more. You could get a general video processor and output the native rate of your display.

Don't worry you can't see the difference

[llZENll]

There are only 5-10 tvs that will even display 1080p right now, not even the Sony SXBRs can (NOTE many TVs actually display 1080p, but only accept 1080i input, like the SXBR for example).

As can be seen on this chart 720p will do for for most people. The human eye can't resolve the extra detail in the picture from 8' on a 42" diagonal.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[rynoceris84]

The Tv you are referring to is actually called an "SXRD" tv and it is in Sony's "XBR" line of TV's. The model number for this TV is kdsr60xbr1. This TV currently only supports 1080p through firewire. There are not any TV's as of yet that are on the market that will support 1080p through HDMI. The new version of HDMI is now out and there are some new TV's coming out that will have the upgrade allowing them to support 1080p material through HDMI. Sony's current SXRD model will soon be replaced (Early-Mid July) by their new model with the upgraded HDMI inputs. Mitsubishi also has a DLP on the market right now that supports 1080p through firewire only as well. They have plans to release a new model in early August that will support the new HDMI standards allowing for 1080p. If you want anymore information on 1080p through HDMI check out this site... http://www.hdmi.org/manufacturer/specification.asp where you can download the latest specs on HDMI 1.2a. Hope this helps!

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[michaeldot]

I watch at 7' you insensitive clod!

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[vanyel]

The human eye can't resolve the extra detail in the picture from 8' on a 42" diagonal.

I'm in agreement with Lucas it looks like --- I like to sit about a screen width or so away from my 8' wide screen (and the 10' one I had in my previous house, and the 11' one a friend has). I do find I'm happy with 720p, but I'm looking forward to when 1080p projectors are affordable, and will want the content to feed it...

I also like the upconversion feature because it greatly simplifies your system to not have to deal with a bazillion different formats.

Unfortunately, I will not buy a player until I can get one that plays both formats. If they can't agree on one, then they'll have to support all of them, as far as I'm concerned.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[Spy Handler]

Dude, go look in last weekend's Fry's ad in the Sports page. They are selling Toshiba 54 inch DLP TVs with true 1080p display for $2499.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[Mr2001]

Dude, go look in last weekend's Fry's ad in the Sports page. They are selling Toshiba 54 inch DLP TVs with true 1080p display for $2499.

Hmm. Buy a giant DRM-riddled TV, or pay rent for 5 months? Decisions, decisions...

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[jeriqo]

"The human eye can't resolve the extra detail in the picture from 8' on a 42" diagonal."

Yeah, and the eye can't see more than ~10 FPS.. bullshit

25/30FPS is far too low, that is what should be inceased, not the resolution.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[Anonymous Coward]

720p will do for for most people.

Ah, that would be why no-one ever designed a computer monitor that was higher resolution than that then :-)

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[Keeper]

Sony's 2006 lineup of SXRD displays will take 1080p inputs. They're due to start hitting stores in July...

There is also no "SXBR" either.

There is SXRD, which is Sony's version of LCoS. Then there is the XBR line, which is generally Sony's "higher end video snob" label.

There is an XBR line with an SXRD based display though.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[pl1ght]

Um. Have you ever looked at one side by side? The difference my human eye can see was amazing. 1080p FTW. I plan on replacing my 720p/1080i set as soon as the 1080p models stop costing 4-6k =(

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[llZENll]

There is a huge difference between 10fps of video and 10fps of a computer game, which is what I think you are referring to. And I think the number is more like 20-30fps, it depends on the person, which is why the film industry chose 24fps long ago. The difference with film is motion is blurred, where in a computer game it is not (well in all but the newest games), so to achieve that effect of motion it takes a much higher framerate, I would guess 60-100fps.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[llZENll]

It depends on what size image you are looking at and how close you are, look at the chart I linked. Of course you are going to see a difference on a 60" set standing 4' away, which is what 90% of the people are doing when they go to BestBuy, they see a huge difference. But when you take that same set home and sit 15' away you aren't going to see any of that extra detail.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[Maxo-Texas]

Some human eyes can see up to 60fps but not much above there.

We get eye strain or the image seems every so mildly "jerky" up to about there.

I had a friend (who had very fast reflexes in every other way too) that would complain when he was getting under 60fps. It looked glass smooth to me after about 40 to 45 fps.

Re:Don't worry you can't see the difference

[Chandon Seldon]

Who sits 15' away from their TV? With my current 27" analogue TV the average viewing distance is 7'.

ugh not more upscaling

[ystar]

Upscaling to 1080p is about as good of a feature as hitting 'Fullscreen' on a 480p DVD playing on your widescreen 1900x1080 LCD monitor. Artificially simulating higher quality or sharper images is detrimental to the whole idea of experiencing what the filmmakers originally intended for you to see. Similarly if a film's supposed to be dark, don't crank the brightness up to 5000%. (The situation is of course different if you can't even see what's going on onscreen, but oftentimes that's a problem with the authoring and mastering). In any case, upscaling is a stupid feature to tout, especially juxtaposed to such a high price for a presumably intelligent bleeding-edge prosumer market.

Re:ugh not more upscaling

[pla]

Artificially simulating higher quality or sharper images is detrimental to the whole idea of experiencing what the filmmakers originally intended for you to see.

Ah, I see you work as some form of self-proclaimed "artist", horribly offended when we plebes "corrupt your vision"...


if a film's supposed to be dark, don't crank the brightness up to 5000%.

Stories that take place in the dark work well in books. I've enjoyed quite a few where the absence of light played a key role in the story.

Movies, however, use light to convey information to our light-receptive sensory organs, the "eyes".

If you want to write a book, do so. If you want to make a movie, do so. But don't pretend that 90 minutes of swirly-blackness-with-sound counts as the latter.


In any case, upscaling is a stupid feature to tout

I agree, but for a completely different reason.

"Why?", you might ask?

Because every 1080p TV on the market can already do the job (I can safely make that statement an absolute - You only have a half dozen choices to pick from, the rest either only do 1080i or advertise themselves as monitors rather than TVs).


especially juxtaposed to such a high price for a presumably intelligent bleeding-edge prosumer market.

Juxtaposed to such a high price? Ummm... You might want to look that word up in the near future.

As for the bleeding-edge buyers - They make toys cheap for the rest of us a year or two later. Yeah, you and I would never blow a grand on an unnecessary first-gen product; but in a few years, when the price drops by 3/4ths and even cheesy daytime soaps have such clarity that you can see the ageing actors' wrinkles, we'll thank those suckers who paid the R&D costs for us. :-)

Re:ugh not more upscaling

[Jeremy Erwin]

Similarly if a film's supposed to be dark, don't crank the brightness up to 5000%.

Film has an incredible high contrast ratio. Blacks are dark as pitch, and whites are thousands of times brighter. Film isn't interlaced either.

(No, don't go home in turn the contrast controls way up. But a properly calibrated display, even one calibrated using THX's optimode, does add a lot to the movie.)

Composite output?

[fm6]

I wonder if anybody will actually use that. I can't imagine anybody spending that much money on the hardware, plus the extra cost of the disks, just to watch something at the same resolution as my $35 player offers.

Re:Composite output?

[AJWM]

It's handy if your high end digital screen is in the shop and you need to hook the player up to your old 27" analog temporarily. Especially if you've got a lot invested in HD/Blu discs that won't play on your old DVD player.

Beyond that, though, you've got a point.

Re:Composite output?

[fm6]

If my high-end digital screen was in the shop, I'd read a book or go for a walk. Then again, I'll probably never own a high-end digital screen.

But you remind me of a strange thing I did once. My 19" TV set was in the shop, it would be a week before they got around to it, and though replacing it wasn't a big deal, I wasn't going to spend the money until I was sure the old TV was well and truly dead. And yet there was a cliffhanging episode of St. Elsewhere on my VCR that I really wanted to see. So I plugged the composite output of my VCR into my Apple monitor, and watched the episode in green monochrome. A unique experience.

up-converts?

[Gothmolly]

So it takes an image or frame that is not 1080i and gimp-fus it up to 1080i, and that improves quality? Or just "scales to 1080i and doesn't suck too hard doing it"? Where do the extra pixels come from?

Re:up-converts?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup it magically inserts pixels for better image quality. No interpolation, no anti-aliasing, just extra data insertion :)
They should just do the same for regular DVDs so that I dont have to buy the more expensive HD/bluray media.

For the price of the thing, maybe they should just hollow out a big rear projection tv and pay the actors to step inside and perform the movie in real time for you.

Re:up-converts?

[Babbster]

Each HD-DVD and Blu-Ray player comes with magical fairie dust pre-installed (HD-DVD players use a lower grade of dust, explaining the $500 price differential). When the magical fairie dust mingles with the laser beam during playback, it creates a psychic connection to the mind of the director of the movie, which allows the players to then output what s/he actually saw during filming.

Unfortunately, there are still some problems with boom mikes, crew members and buffet tables being visible in some scenes because the director wasn't paying close enough attention to the action. But, it's okay since all of it is in 1080p.

Re:up-converts?

[Anonymous Coward]

Depends upon how it interpolates the pixels: there are many different algorithms for trying to figure out how interpolated pixels should be rendered.

Re:up-converts?

[Igmuth]

it creates a psychic connection to the mind of the director of the movie, which allows the players to then output what s/he actually saw during filming.

Ahh.. that must be Lucas' plan. Once that tech is released, all versions of starwars will look like what lucas thought he filmed all those years ago..

Re:up-converts?

[Keeper]

From the data that would normally be thrown away outputting a normal NTSC signal (dvds are encoded at 720x480 using non-square pixel aspect ratios).

Don't watch them all in one day..

[AWhiteFlame]

All 10 titles? You should -be- so lucky. Back in my day, we had -1- 240x180 AVI of a CGI dancing baby and we -liked- it. You young whippersnappers and your "1820q" and your "ePod" and your "skipe".

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[martinultima]

YOU LUCKY BASTARD! Back in my day, we had a half-finished 40x25 ANSI animation written in QBasic, and we liked that a hell of a lot more than you and your stupid dancing baby! Oh, and that new-fangled IBM PC contraption or whatever it's called? Mark my words, that thing'll never catch on!

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[AJWM]

40x25 animation? QBasic? Luxury!

Back in my day we flickered the segments of 7-segment numeric LED displays, and did it by punching in machine code on the hex keypad.

(I can hear the next one coming: "Keypads!? You had keypads?.... We had to short out the contacts wi' our tongue, and put wires on our eyballs to see anything..." Although making flip-books from punch cards is probably more realistic.)

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[Doppleganger]

Bah. Gimme the old days, when we scraped the pictures on a cave wall with charcoal, and then just ran by it really fast...

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, if only I was that lucky! But no, in my day, we hadn't yet evolved arms and legs, so we just had to kind of float around in the oceans until a couple of us started having mutant offspring! And you know what? IT WAS THE BEST DAMN THING IN ALL OF PANGAEA!

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[alexandrecc]

You guys are so lucky ! I remember the days, when I was an unicellular with a little flagella. My only goal was to move to the next glucose molecule after a long trip of 0,2 mm.

I was so happy when I received my first sun photon passing through my phospholipid membrane. That photon excited me so much that for the first time in my life, I broke into two parts and ... I had a new brother.

Thank god and the sun that I learned english after a couple years to share these old days with you.

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmph! I never needed any of those "flagella" or "membranes" or "photons" or any of that junk to be happy – I remember when I was just a single little carbon atom, and getting the odd extra subatomic particle was the greatest thing in the electron shells! And then, I got jammed into some stupid multi-cellular creature... *sigh* Let me tell you, it was nice while it lasted – no goals, no work, no nothing! Although, the nuclear forces from those other atoms did kind of tickle...

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[nytes]

You had particles?! We shoulda' been so lucky...

Re:Don't watch them all in one day..

[plover]

Oh, we used to DREAM of seven-segment LEDs. At least we would have, if they had been invented at that time. No, we had to punch our images into little dot pictures onto 80-column punch cards and shine a flashlight through the holes and onto the wall. (Never thought to do a flip-book.)

Of course that made it a big screen image, but it was a crappy-looking wall. :-)

Useless

[Mr. Freeman]

From TFA: "Yes, we are double the price of HD-DVD, but we are confident people will buy as many as we can build." Well if you only build like 50, then that's no problem now is it. Actually, I'm having doubts that people will buy even 50 of these. Who's going to spend $1000 to watch 10 different titles?

Re:Useless

[XMyth]

Yea, I can't believe they only plan on release 10 titles ever. That's just retarded. What are they thinking???

Re:Useless

[Anonymous Coward]

The people who can't get enough Milla Jovovich, that's who.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[DigiShaman]

Last time I was in Shanghai (september 2005), I found a DVD player for 85 Yuan. Do the conversion, and that's about 10 US dollars!!! That's CHEAPER then some no-name movie. As for the player itself, it was equivilent to an Apex Digital Inc brand. Not bad at all. Not feature rich either...

It really is a supply/demand issue of course. If BlueRay or HD-DVD becomes a pupular format, expect to see these players less that 100 bucks next year. Chinese brand of course.

What the fuck?

[SmallFurryCreature]

The filmmaker intended you to see the movie on the bigscreen projected through film. Not on some crappy mpeg DVD.

Also upscaling if done right can have an effect. No not much but it is like the difference between a interlaced video and a properly de-interlaced one.

Proper video filters can really improve the visuall quality of a movie. No it ain't the original anymore but with DVD you ain't got the original anyway.

But hey, you are obviously to smart to fall for this. You go right ahead and watch DVD's in their native resolution on your PC. At least you will have plenty of space left over to have a browser window open to post on slashdot. The rest of us just use video filters to help improve the image and watch it at the max resolution our monitors can handle.

Re:What the fuck?

[Gogo0]

I thought it was a joke post until he got to 'dont jack up the brightness 5000%'!

Sigh of relief sweeps Sony marketing HQ

[WasterDave]

"Thank god for that, the PS3 is starting to look halfway reasonable again".

Dave

I'll believe it when I see it (or reviews).

[MojoStan]

If there's one thing I've learned from these format wars (Blu-Ray vs HD DVD), it's that "announced" dates don't mean squat. HD DVD was supposed to launch in time for 2005's Christmas shopping season, but was actually released on April 18. The Sony PS3 was supposed to launch in March 2006, but won't be available until November (at the earliest). Sony says Blu-Ray-related technologies are the main reason for PS3's delay, but I'm not sure I believe it (November?).

At this year's CES, it was announced that Blu-Ray would be released in May 23, but it has been delayed until June 25. As TFA says, Sony and Pioneer announced set-top Blu-Ray players for that June 25 launch date, but have delayed their players until August and September. After those delays, I am very surprised to see TFA saying that Samsung is now "shipping" their Blu-Ray players to retailers.

I'll believe it when I see it. If stores start selling a relatively bug-free Blu-Ray player on June 25, then I'll eat a dual-layer DVD (not literally).

Re:I'll believe it when I see it (or reviews).

[Anonymous Coward]

I currently work at a Best Buy retail store as a Full-Time Customer Specialist in the Home Theater Department. Our store has already received a large shipment of the new Samsung Blu-Ray Dvd Players. We should have them available in the coming weeks to purchase. But just so you know that they really DO exist... I have seen them!

Re:I'll believe it when I see it (or reviews).

[lovswr]

Well start eating. http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=68 8422

Re:I'll believe it when I see it (or reviews).

[MojoStan]

Well start eating. http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=68 8422

That's fantastic (the fact that it is shipping to retailers). I won't "eat" until the reviews (and brave early buyers at avsforum) confirm that "it works" without any overly annoying bugs. I'll prepare a Taiyo Yuden disc, just in case.

Re:I'll believe it when I see it (or reviews).

[nklnch]

"The Sony PS3 was supposed to launch in March 2006"

When the PS3 was announced at E3 2005, Sony claimed a "Spring" 2006 release and didn't specify which region. Spring ranges from March-June, but they never said March.

So what?

[JustNiz]

>> It also up-converts conventional DVDs to 1080p to improve video quality and comes with HDMI, Component, S-video, and composite outputs.

Uh.. yeah.. so does my Oppo DVD player that cost about $150.

Re:So what?

[Jeremy Erwin]

The oppo, (which is regarded as one of the best upsampling DVD players) doesn't play bluray disks. Although an upscaled image can look very good indeed, a true HD image looks even better. Moreover, even the best DVDs suffer from compression artifacts.

The Oppo, btw, lists for $199, not $150. I suppose you can get a refurbed item cheaper, but then it's a matter of "who do you trust more, the manufacturer or the refurbisher?"

Re:So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually there is a new Oppo player with HDMI selling for $150 new. Check their website...

Re:So what?

[Gogo0]

The new oppo that was just released is $150.

Great deal, especially considering that it seems to be exactly the same insides as the previous version and includes USB and card readers on the face.

Re:So what?

[Jeremy Erwin]

The upscaling chip is different. The 971 uses a Genesis FLI2310/Faroudja. The 970 uses a mediatek 1392.

From a review

The 970HD was tested with 480i and 720p output over HDMI to a Panasonic AE900 720p LCD projector and over component at 480p to a Mitsubishi RPTV. Both displays have been professionally calibrated.

A full range of video adjustments are available, including saturation, hue and even three gamma settings. For testing purposes, all controls were in their "0" or "Off" positions.

The 970HD was subjected to the usual barrage of test disk patterns, including those from DVE, Faroudja, HQV and Avia Pro. Fortunately, the Mediatek chip provides motion adaptive deinterlacing, so it did well with the Faroudja pendulum and flag-waving tests. It was not so fortunate with the HQV "Jaggies" tests for directional interpolation and filtering, but in fairness, there are few players that can fully pass those tests (the 971H being one of them), especially those priced similarly to the 970HD. The 970HD flew through the Avia Pro layer change test, as was expected since fast layer changes are an advantage of the Mediatek chip. The 970HD also passes below black over both HDMI and component.

As mentioned earlier, there was no evidence of any Y/C delay problems and no ringing or other sharpness issues at the default player settings. PAL to NTSC conversion appears to be on a par with the 971H, which is quite good. However, it does not do 2:2 cadence, so if you have a lot of PAL disks, you should look to a different player.

All in all, the test disk performance of the 970HD was only a step below that of the 971H and with most DVDs and displays, the difference would be negligible.

On the other hand, with some specific displays, the Oppo 971 macroblocks. I haven't had this problem. Some say the chipset is buggy. Others claim that proper display calibration will get rid of the problem. And the 970 decodes SACD, in addition to DVD-Audio.

How do you make 480p into 1080p?

[cjmnews]

The pixels are not there to begin with, so how is the upconverting making it 1080p?

Isn't it interpolating the 480p DVD pixels to generate enough pixels to fill 1080p? So is that really 1080p?

Sure there's enough pixels to fill 1080p, but since the source was originally 480p, it doesn't sound like true 1080p.

Probably better to get a Bluray title and have native 1080p on the disk.

Re:How do you make 480p into 1080p?

[DigiShaman]

Say you've got an LCD monitor with a native pixel resolution of 1080x760, but you want a desktop resolution of 640x480. You can do it two ways.

1. Use a native 640x480 screen. This will only fill up the center portion of your monitor and will result in a black frame around the border. Simple reason is that your monitor has more pixel area than what your desktop resolution is set to.

2. Stretch the 640x480 picture to 1080x760 which will use up the entire screen. Due to the interpolation (approximation), you end up with a blurry/un-sharp image. This process is called "up converting". Also known as up scaling.

Re:How do you make 480p into 1080p?

[Doppler00]

I'm pretty sure that upconverting is a bit more complicated then that. I believe they use a series of sophisticated algorithms to create detail that isn't there. Think of it as interpolation. However, there are still significant limitations and you'll never get the detail you would get from a 1080p signal. Maybe they meant that it's upconverting from 1080i to 1080p? That wouldn't be so bad.

Re:How do you make 480p into 1080p?

[kryptkpr]

It's not *that* much more complicated; high-quality scalers just use filters with multiple horizontal and vertical tap coefficients.

Think of it as rotating through sets of filters (which map a single destination pixel to a number of 'weighed' source pixels) as the image progresses vertically, as opposed to using an identical filter to get every destination scanline.

This is done so that you don't get stuff like ugly line-aliasing artifacts, where the exact same source line created multiple exact-same destination lines beside one another.. this looks terrible. By changing filters on every line, we can make sure that even if the same source line is chosen for two destination lines, they won't look exactly the same. It gives kind of an "illusion" that you're creating detail.. really, you're just extracting detail from the original image in multiple ways and presenting it all together.

High-quality deinterlacers though (such as those required to go from 1080i to 1080p), are a whole different beast.. they do really look across time, figure out what's moving, and attempt to fill in missing details. More info here..

Re:How do you make 480p into 1080p?

[DigiShaman]

Have you checked out TrimensionDNM? It was developed by Philips and currently implimented in WinDVD7. The resaults are simply awsome! Totally breathtaking! It's as though all video was shot in 60 FPS or higher. It makes video so lifelike, it's as though I'm watching someone/s from a one-way mirror. It's kinda spooky...in an invasive manor. I really don't know else to explain it.

quoting the Intervideo website

TrimensionDNM is a software implementation of the motion compensated frame rate converter that is known as Digital Natural Motion. This is a very successful feature that is currently used in high end TV sets.

A standard PC monitor displays images with a rate of 60 to 100 images per second. Films are however recorded at 24 images per second. When this film material such as a DVD is displayed on a PC monitor, the frame rate has to be converted, for instance from 24 to 60 frames per second. In this case, the frame rate of the monitor is 2.5 times higher than that of the film. Without TrimensionDNM, each image is shown twice or three times, which is known as 2:3 pulldown.

Due to this repetition, smoothly moving objects will appear to be shaking, which is often referred to as motion judder. Visually this is perceived as trembling, a loss of sharpness or as double images. TrimensionDNM solves this fundamental problem by replacing the repeated images by motion compensated images in which moving objects are at the correct place.

You can check out the demo available from Philips website.

Price differential

[Doomstalk]

Yeesh, just look at that price! Unless they can drop its cost in a rapid fashion, the Blu-Ray format is almost certain to fail. Even earlier adopters, who usually see price as no object, are likely to balk at a price like that. A quick search on Froogle finds the Toshiba HD-A1 player for $620, a little less than 2/3rds the price. Technologically inferior or no, that's a hell of a price differential to overcome.

The Playstation 3 is likely to bring prices down, but honestly I think Sony put Blu-Ray tech into the system too soon. DVD was nearing critical mass in 2000, and the Playstation 2's arrival just hammered it home. HD formats, on the othr hand, aren't likely to explode for another couple years- at which point the PS3 will have sank or swum on its own merits. Having an Blu-Ray drive in the PS3 by default is more likely to be weight around the system's ankles, rather than a buoy to the top.

Re:Price differential

[jofi]

They're gonna try to maximize their profits, just like those who bought the first $900 CD player. But the dollar was worth more back then..

Re:Price differential

[Jules Mercuri]

Not even $620, $499 for the HD-A1. Now, early reviews said that it was rife with problems (slow startup, constant crashes) but the fact remains that if you want to watch a movie, on a disc, in 1080i, right now, you can do it for $499 with the HD-A1.

Myself, I don't care about this format war at all. My TV update cycle is "when it breaks, get a new one", not "when Hollywood wants to impose new DRM on me, get a new one", so I'm sticking with plain old DVD for the next two years, at least.

Re:Price differential

[Doomstalk]

They're gonna try to maximize their profits, just like those who bought the first $900 CD player. But the dollar was worth more back then..

While that may be the case, this is a very different situation. CD didn't have any real competition when it launched in 1982. Blu-Ray on the other hand, is embroiled in a multi-front war for multiple applications. Not only are they fighting HD DVD and DVD (it may not be HD, but it's massively entrenched- for all we know this format war may leave both HD formats as dead ends like Laserdisc) for video disc supremacy, but they're also fighting wars on the data and video game fronts as well. At this stage of the game, and price gouging is an act of pure hubris.

Re:Price differential

[Doomstalk]

Er, make that "any price gouging"

Re:Price differential

[Chandon Seldon]

CD didn't have any real competition when it launched in 1982.

There was casette tape and vinyl records. Vinyl is arguably higher quality - and some of the early CDs were just vinyl rips anyway. When CD players cost $900, "nobody" bought them because casette tapes were fine.

The fact of the matter is that within a couple years (five at the outside), tri-format optical disk players will cost under $200 and nobody will care if their disk is a DVD-ROM, BD-ROM, or HD-DVD.

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[Jherek Carnelian]

HR-HDTV - full res HDTV quality encodes

If you think the HR xvids are equivalent to full res HDTV, you are missing out.
They are only 960x540 and the bitrate is nowhere near enough to prevent artifacts like macroblocking and mosquito noise.

Don't get me wrong - the HR encodes are better than most any analog tv signal, but it is rare that they are better than a good DVD much less the equal of HD.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[Ucklak]

Just add some prices for reference:

A friend of mine bought a Beta II machine in 1980 for ~2000$US. Complete with a wired remote for pausing video (for skipping commercials)
When it looked like VHS was winning the format war around 1983/4, I bought my JVC VHS for ~500$US and that had a wireless (IR) remote and programmable timer that you had to tune one of the 13 available tuners to.
My first CD player, 1985 ~150$US.

I paid ~200$US for a HiFi VCR from Samsung in 1992.
First DVD player for computer was ~110$US and that came with the Hollywod Plus decoder card in 1998.
Console DVD player in 2000 for ~200$US.

I'll wait until one of the formats has a player under $100.
720p is fine for now.

Upscaling does work!

[Locomorto]

I think many of you are missing the entire point of upscaling. Almost every HD tv has a fixed number of dots, just like your LCD monitor. Try setting that down a bit in the resolution and whatch how much the image deteriotes. THATS why you upscale.

Re:Upscaling does work!

[Anonymous Coward]

what are you? retarded?

nobody ever mentioned decreasing resolution once!

Re:Upscaling does work!

[TeknoHog]

Actually, there's upscaling involved in any case. It's either the monitor or the player that has to do it. If the monitor uses a crappy upscaling algorithm, then better let the player scale it instead.

One word: "multipass"

[michaeldot]

The Fifth Element is a launch title.

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[plasmacutter]

I don't know where you get your HR-HDTV stuff.. but frankly all the stuff i've seen has been excellent with not such much as a single block or bit of noise, better than dvd quality by all standards and it's been 720 p all of it. Granted most people still dont encode like this but keep in mind few people have upgraded beyond 1024x768 monitors.

that said, i happen to have digital cable (TPB is my new vcr really).. and quite frankly even the worst encodes in standard def dont look half as bad as digital cable.

ever seen discovery or TLC in digital cable? any high motion scenes have macroblocks the size of dinner plates.. so bad you cant even make out what is going on. analog was way better.

Composite outputs?

[fbg111]

Why composite? Seems like a complete waste of money. First, anyone able to afford $999 for a BD player, or whatever reduced but still expensive price this thing will cost until PS3 arrives, will not be watching it on a TV so cheap/antiquated that its best input is composite. Second, I'm not a videophile/home theater buff, but I can clearly remember the vast difference in image quality on my Xbox and PS2 when going from composite to component and composite to s-video, respectively. Seems like composite on a BD player negates the primary selling point of the BD player in the first place - image quality. The only reason I can think of for including composite is that composite is now so cheap that its inclusion has a negligible effect on the unit's manufacturing cost, in which case, why not? Anyone know?

Re:Composite outputs?

[realmolo]

Like you said, composite outputs cost next to nothing. And, more importantly, EVERYTHING works with composite. What if you need to hook up your player to a TV that doesn't have HDMI or component inputs? Or even s-video? You'd have to use the composite outputs. Hell, you can even hook up a composite source to an RF input with a cheap adapter. Yeah, it won't look as good, but it will still WORK.

It's the same kind of good marketing logic that puts a USB-to-PS2 adapter in the box with almost every mouse and keyboard you can buy.

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[Anonymous Coward]

720p at what framerate? If it's 30, that's technically EDTV.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[pete6677]

Anyone who buys this first Blu-Ray player will confirm the theory that a sucker is born every minute. Assuming Blu-Ray is even around a year from now, players will cost maybe $300-$400. Remember how fast DVD players came down in price? This is probably just to make money from the 10 or so people who are stupid enough to pay a grand just to have bragging rights, and then the price promptly drops by a couple hundred $$.

What a great deal

[Aqua OS X]

Wow.. double the price for non interlaced video!!! What a compelling feature! AND they toss in dynamically updating DRM for FREE. Sign me up!

But seriously, screw BluRay. I think Sony is seriously overestimating the influence of the videophile. At least in this country (the US), most people don't know HD from a hole in the ground. It's -so- rare that I actually find someone with an HDTV that's actually using the damn thing properly... even if they have access to content.

Heck, forget HDTV, just look a widescreen TV in general. How often to do you see people watching ugly a** stretched content because they simply want to fill the whole display and avoid vertical letter boxes? You'd think if people actually cared about picture quality they'd refuse to watch an episode of 24 where everyone is short and has giant fat heads. But nope, people view TV like that ALL the time.

But in 'merica most people just want to see sh*t bigger and on a flatter screen. What's actually on that screen is a different story.

Good luck on selling everyone on 1080p. Perhaps one might find a market with the 20 people who have 5.1 DVD audio collections.

Ripoff!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I just hooked it up to my RCA CT-100 set and don't see any difference!

Can it be destroyed remotely ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Remeber the "feature" which allowed the player to be rendered useless over the net connection ? Given SONY's obsession with proprietary formats I wouldn't be surprised if they implemented it already. I'll wait for the first real world example.

You actually can improve the "perceived" quality.

[voxel]

I don't know if they do it on this player or not, but there is some easy-setup software you can do on your PC to check it out for yourself.

Use ffdshow (google for it). It is a DirectX filter (correct me if im wrong), in which youc an apply many effects to an image.

The trick is to scale the DVD 720x480 up to 1080p (or whatever you want) then apply a LANCOZ sharpening filter on ONLY the luma channel. *NOTE: I think I got that right, lancoz on luma channel, its been a while forgive me if im spelling something wrong.

There are actually lots of articles on the net (again google), that talk about this technique.

So I tried it for myself. Low and behold, the image really DOES look better. It amazingly adds "perceived" detail.

The trick again is sharpening only one channel in the image (luma/chroma/something else... (im no expert)).

Who are they marketing to?

[BumpyCarrot]

Surely all possible early adopters have already ruined their eyesight like the rest of us tech-heads? I can't tell the difference between DivX/XviD and DVD unless someone bypasses my eyes altogether, and I wear weak lenses.

You complain about a digital disc player...

[Khyber]

.... costing a grand???

How about spending 15 fucking grand for something to play VINYL, and an extra FEW GRAND PER NEEDLE?

Re:You complain about a digital disc player...

[Jeremy Erwin]

Analog technology is expensive. With CDs, there's really no point to mounting the player on the same sort of isolation platform that's normally used for electron microscopes. But with vinyl, it improves the signal to noise ratio. Of course, the increased signal might still be masked by other factors.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[dubmun]

We recently bought portable dvd players for our kids last Christmas. The price tag? $200 each. As for Blue Ray? I'll probably wait till you can get a PS3 for less than $200.

Speculative

[ghostbar38]

Is the start of something and like all is speculative and amarillist! I need to wait now like 2 years and then that technology came to my country...

Well does the wait worth it? Yes! I will have more titles avaibles xD

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[Anonymous Coward]

If the filename is something like "foo.hr.hdtv.ac3.5.1.xvid-rg.avi" where foo is the show name and rg is the initials of the release group like ctu, umd, tvd, etc - then the files are 960x528 to 960x560 range - it is a quasi-standard among tv "cappers" just like 640x350 is a quasi-standard if the filename does not include "hr" and 1280x720 if it includes "720p" instead.

Typical filesizes are:

xvid - 360MB for ~42 minutes (1 hour minus commercials)
hr.xvid - 730MB for ~42 minutes
720p.xvid - 1.4GB for ~42 minutes

Those are by far the most common formats on places like tpb and the alt.binaries.* groups.
All of those quasi-standards are bit-starved.

Bright outdoor scenes with little grain often look "perfect" (just like they do for regular DVDs, which is the reason you always see super-saturated animation and brightly-lit outdoor sports like football playing on the demo systems at Best Buy and brethren) - but indoor and night scenes easily run out of bits and that's where you get the problems.

If you are downloading some other format of "HR-HDTV" caps, it is highly unlikely that you are getting them from tpb, certainly not in any kind of volume.

As for regular digital cable - big deal, everybody knows they overcompress the crap out of it, just like the mini-dish satellite guys over-compress the crap out of their channels so they can fit more in the limited bandwidth they've got.

great

[sentientbrendan]

I can't wait to plug it into my hdt... oh wait, never mind.

You know this is coming...

[NotQuiteReal]

Someone will defeat the DRM in the HD format... so that they can rip and re-encode / compress it down to a CD-R sized movie.

LOL in advance.

$20 on Amazon

[SuperKendall]

Most Blu-Ray titles appear to be $20 on Amazon, and if you order a few early you get 10% off all Blu-Ray titles for a year.

That means...

[Belial6]

That means that if you buy every title, you are paying ~$130 per movie. Too much.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[lovswr]

Well here is a whole http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=68 8422 (including my self) who disagree. I believe that as I type, four have been "liberated" from various BB's around the country. The thread starter is now also claming that he has The Fifth Element BDA disc. p.s how do I post links as words here?

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[Anonymous Coward]

atlantis hr hdtv was fine.. night scenes and all.. the problem is not with the bitrate but morons who dont know how to use avisynth properly.

here

[Anonymous Coward]

<a href="http://yada.yada.com">how do I post links as words here?</a>

$20 for discs

[SuperKendall]

Most of the Blu-Ray discs on Amazon are $20 currently (search for "Blu-Ray").

It's a good point that you can simply bittorrent a lot of HD content now (esp. TV), but Blu-Ray discs will probably look a good deal better and be easier to get. A really large HD torrent can take quite some time to aquire.

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, but you are wrong.

I have both the original .ts transport streams and the hr.hdtv xvids of atlantis - season1 by MiNT and season2 by TVD and the xvids pale in comparison. I just pulled up a couple of them now to double-check and I can readily identify mosquito noise and macroblocking in the xvids in just the first 15 seconds of all the episodes I looked at. They also suffer from reductions in contrast and dynamic color range.

I am watching these on a display that is 1440x1024 - roughly 1440x800 of useful pixels for 16x9 material. Most of the .ts are 720p and the hr.hdtv xvids are 960x544. I am using VLC for playback.

The Hot eBay Collectible of 2036

[mencomenco]

Why hot? Because there will be only 205 of these first-generation Blu-rays made, on for each retail outlet and five for swapouts.

But the big money is in the demo disks to be shipped to the stores. Only 2000 of those, but much higher dollar density!

Games

[SuperKendall]

People like you seem to keep forgetting that Blu-Ray is also a useful weapon in the console just for games alone, where makers can add more content and more extras (like making of videos) than they might have otherwise had.

Game developers were complaining even before the 360 launch that DVD was too small and they needed more space for a next-gen console.

Re:Games

[Chazmyrr]

Yeah, because I want to watch a documentary on how they made the game instead of playing it. This is such a non-issue. It's not a big deal to switch disks once in a while.

HDDVD or Blu Ray: which one gets Betamaxed?

[Anonymous Coward]

Before I would invest any significant amout of money in either format, I would see which one becomes the popular format.

Kinda makes the $500 PS3 even more of a deal

[SuperKendall]

Since the $500 PS3 can do everything you mentioned at 1080, why would you spend $100 more just to get a bunch of stuff you do not really need for games or movies?

But the point...

[SuperKendall]

That's all true but the basic point is that people are quite willing and able to drop 15k just to hear records in the most pristine way possible.

Would it not make sense there might be a large contingent of people perfectly willing to pay a mere $1k for the nicest looking home theater video possible? I mean these players and a good 1080p projector and you'd be rivaling many digital cinema systems (heck, a number of people spending $1k on the player will probably be buying the same projectors the theaters use for the home).

Samsung not furstW

[Anonymous Coward]

Pioneer was first and this is even a burner.

Why buy some Korean crap (read: Samsung) when you can get real Japanese quality.

The BDR-101A drive will be bundled with Sonic Solutions' Roxio Blu-ray Disc software and a blank TDK 25GB write-once (BD-R) disc with a $999 suggested retail.

http://camcorders.consumerelectronicsnet.com/artic les/viewarticle.jsp?id=43466

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[Dahamma]

I'll wait until one of the formats has a player under $100.
720p is fine for now.

What source could you have that is 720p but not 1080i? I would have agreed that on a smaller (heh and by that I mean <= 42" ;) display 720p is just fine, or on a bigger display 1080i is practically the same as 1080p for movies (movies are less than 30fps anyways so 60 interlaced fields is plenty) - but as far as I know there are no 720p only sources...

It isn't just America, here in England ...

[QuatermassX]

When I moved to London a couple of years ago I was surprised by the prevelence of widescreen televisions. They're the norm, but I rarely see them being used properly. No windowboxing and nasty comments when you suggest playing 4:3 content at 4:3. Of course, the same thing happens at my mum's in South Carolina! 75% of everything we watch is 4:3 (most TV and certainly all old TV, older films) - why the hell would I ever get a 28" widescreen TV? I was very happy to get a fairly cheap 32" Sony that looks great - and I can live with the quality of the picture when letterboxing 'scope and flat films.

Re:Brazil

[paimin]

wtf?

Early...something...

[N3wsByt3]

"Anyone who buys this first Blu-Ray player will confirm the theory that a sucker is born every minute."

"Well here is a whole http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=68 8422 (including my self) who disagree."

Well...the latter doesn't really excludes the former. In fact, it could well be substantiating it.

I find myself leaning towards the former statements: people who buy such stuff for a price which will be halved next year, and even without knowing IF it will last a year, nor if it will be the surviving format...well, they are, indeed, suckers. I mean, you're basically spending 1000 bucks on something that has a good chance of turning up worthless withing a copple of years... and squandering money like that IS stupid, IMHO. Especially if it's mainly done for bragging - as the forum you link to actually demonstrates.

Then again, a person may do with his money whatever he likes, I guess, even stupid things. Maybe you'll make it so, that blu-ray becomes the dominant format and reasonable priced in 5 years; so - seen from my advantage-point - your foolishness may actually be a good thing. Keep it going, bro! ;-)

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[steve_bryan]

If the thousand dollars was diverted from somewhere else to buy that first Bluray player on the block your view might have some validity. But don't forget that for a rather large number of people that much money is just chump change. It isn't like they'd be stuck eating ramen noodles until the end of the month. Besides these people (early adopters) are an important part of our ecology and we need to encourage them so those nifty devices can start sliding down the price curve.

Composite output?

[ShimmyShimmy]

Using the composite output? I think you're missing the point.

Re:Brazil

[Anonymous Coward]

lol :)

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[ben there...]

Why haven't the warez scene rippers switched to H.264? It's not like it's hard to run an AVS through x264 and mp4box to produce a much better looking rip.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[Captain Zep]

"If BlueRay or HD-DVD becomes a pupular format, expect to see these players less that 100 bucks next year. Chinese brand of course."

Actually, the price will drop faster if it's an UNpopular format (which I hope it will be). If it's selling nicely, why would anyone drop the price in a hurry? (Of course manufacturing costs will drop, but there's no reason that would be reflected in retail prices).

But if it looks like it's going to flop then prices will plummet in a desperate attempt to get at least some money back.

Z.

No SACD?

[sciencecneisc]

When Sony comes out with their Blu-Ray player why not put Super Audio CD in there just like in the PS3. State of the art and state of the art. 3,000+ SACD titles and the newest in high definition movies. Awesome audio and video. Both worth the premium.

Sanduski says that the Blu-Ray prices will come down quickly once other manufacturers bring their players to market. "There are nine manufacturers building Blu-Ray devices," according to Sanduski. "There is only one building HD-DVD drives: Toshiba."

Good news. I think Apple will have one of these babies in their Mac Pro by Rev. B of the Intel design makeover. For me, $1000 is too much. I can barely justify $100 for a low-end SACD player. My HDTV is $900 although it's worth more than that. I'm lucky to get DVR for no upfront free and under $7 a month. $1000 is out of sync with that. I'll just have to wait but Netflix supports the format and that's great because I subscribe. I can try it out if someone gets a PS3 or something.

Re:No SACD?

[SuperMonkeyCube]

I'll bet that Sony does include SACD in their Blu-Ray player. I'm sure it's going to be part of their standard firmware. The trick will be getting the average consumer to care.

Since most people seem to be eschewing the Big Black Stereo System behind the Smoky Glass Door with Magnetic Latch these days, and I haven't even seen a 15-band EQ actually being operated in someone's stereo system since the early 90's, I assume that Joe Consumer is listening to a combination of his iPod, car stereo, and cell phone. (Possibly all the same device.)

It's all compressed, and sometimes sounds adequate, especially when the noise floor is high.

Judging by my office, most consumers didn't even know that Q-Sound or HDCD happened and couldn't find the High-Def audio section in a record store with both hands and a flashlight.
Judging by my friends, SACD is some crazy audiophile format like Quad or Minidisk.
Judging by the internet, I don't want to say what I think most people think DVDA is.

Sure, they can listen to better audio. But will they _listen_?

Of course, the other problem with SACD is that it's one of two competing formats - Stop me if you've heard this one before - and when you have no obvious upgrade path people tend to dawdle and not move forward until a clear winner has been announced.

Maybe we could get Bill Gates and Howard Stringer to put on mawashis and settle the format wars in the ring. Heck, then Bill could raise some more money for his charity while he's at it.

Re:No SACD?

[sciencecneisc]

With the 128kbs MP3 craze going it could take years for people to go back to hi-fi standards. Perhaps LP's are a safe bet :) I am happy with any music I can play that sounds good, regardless of whether others know about the technology or think it's better. I am spreading my bets across the iTunes and DVD-based technologies. An entry-level $100 SACD/DVD-audio player can satisfy your curiousity about the format until you're allowed to play them on your DRM'ed DVD Player software.

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[Kjella]

search "HR-HDTV"
torrent DL
watch full res HDTV quality encodes

...and people here on slashdot were making fun of "a quarter think they are watching high definition video when they actually haven't set it up correctly" when even slashdotters can't figure it out. Ever wonder what HR stands for? It starts with half and ends with resolution.

Interpolation

[Anonymous Coward]

see Interpolation

"In the mathematical subfield of numerical analysis, interpolation is a method of constructing new data points from a discrete set of known data points." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpolation

"to alter or corrupt (as a text) by inserting new or foreign matter", http://www.webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?sourceid =Mozilla-search&va=Interpolation

the DVD visual content is based on Raster Graphics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raster_Graphics
Enlarging/Upscaling a video is similar to resizing a series of matrices. The available algorithms and techiques (e.g. filters etc) are many. Often there is a performance/quality issue. So it could be valid to say that: the interpolation that company x is using has better results than that of company y. still there may be a group of people who prefer the results of y. (e.g. raster based PDF in Acrobat Reader are antialiased (some sort of interpolation) but many prefer the "clear-cut" appearance of not-antialiased fonts).

On the other hand if we believe them word-for-word, then they must be behind the techniques that enable the CCTV footage in holywood movies to infinite zoom with superclarity results;-)

All I know is...

[s31523]

Based on the technical discussion on this post I can just see the fleecing of the average consumer.

I must admit, all this technical crap is interesting to me, but I am a slashdot reader. For the average joe out there I can assure you that none of the technical details that we find oh so important will mean jack. 1080p, 1080i, transmission rate vs. recording rate, etc. will be both improperly described by the jack-hole at circuit city, improperly understood by the dweep buying something, and then taken home with the feeling that he/she has the best system money can buy.

To answer the question, "Who will pay $999 for this?", the answer is the average rich idiot with a grand in their pocket.

HD-A1 is actually less

[The-Bus]

The MSRP of the Toshiba HD-A1 is actually only $499.99. So it's about half the price for a player that delivers similar results. The only difference right now is the software.

what I want to know is....

[dmnic]

ok, this is slightly off-topic, but can someone explain, or point me to a site, that fully explains what 1080p means vs 1080i and all of these other video resolution mumbo-jumbo.

I'm still just a plain old DVD user on conventional CRT television through RGB cables
(is this composite or component?)

all of this video stuff has always given me headaches and no ever expains what it means, rather they just use jargon that most people have no clue about.
pretty much the only thing I understand is NTSC (North America and Japan) vs PAL (pretty much rest of the world)

thanks in advance

Re:what I want to know is....

[SuperMonkeyCube]

Actually, I find the video resolution terms less jargonful than, say, programming terms. (But, since I don't program, of course I don't understand.) It starts with a number, which is the number of horizontal lines of resolution. The i or p indicates Interlaced or Progressive. Interlaced is like standard-def TV in the states (60Hz). One field of the odd scan lines 1-479, and one field of even lines 2-480. Two fields make a frame, 30 frames a second. Since the phosphor emits light long enough for the second field... Jules: You know the shows on TV? Vincent: I don't watch TV. Jules: Yeah, but, you are aware that there's an invention called television, and on this invention they show shows, right? Progressive scan is like your monitor. Every line is drawn every time. Since you're on /. I'll leave Googling 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, and 1080p as an exercise. Honestly, I don't know if my sarcasm detector is working, or I have to go all the way back to Philo T. Farnsworth here.

Re:what I want to know is....

[Superfarstucker]

1080 refers to the number of vertical scanlines in the images. a 1080 tv has a resolution to the order of 1920x1080. i/p refers to the nature of the signal, interlaced or progressive, an interlaced set draws every other scanline for each vertical refresh i.e. the effective 'frame' resolution is 1920x540. Progressive draws every line before moving to the next portion of the signal. The worst part about interlaced signals isnt that they reduce visual quality from the reduction in resolution, but that they introduce the ugliest visual artifacts you've ever seen on high motion film.

On a related note, I've heard that very few "1080p" televisions can actually accept a 1080p signal, they typically internally upsample the content to 1080p.

Re:You actually can improve the "perceived" qualit

[Anonymous Coward]

The parent is correct. The human eye (at least an untrained one) is much more sensitive to luma sharpness than chroma sharpness. This is why many people can't readily see a difference between VHS and a broadcast picture. It kinda looks like it, but with even a little training you can see the obvious lack of chroma resolution (aka color resolution - IIRC it's something like 50 pixels horizontally on VHS, of course blurred to all hell).

Of course, scalers never generate "new" information. They just trick your eye to think the picture is sharper. It works pretty well sometimes, and sometimes it doesn't.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[Ucklak]

DV cameras.

WTF?

[MagicM]

let's do the economics:

$1.75 for buying a bottle of coke at a gas station

or i can just:

steal a bottle of coke at a gas station for $0

thanks gas stations for adding to the cost of coke! yet another reason to steal stuff!

(Yes, I know, copyright infringement isn't stealing. But you can't exactly blame people who are trying to make money for charging you for it! Torrents are always going to be cheaper. Even if blu-ray had cost $100 for the player and $1 for the disc, you could still make the same accusations.)

Re:WTF?

[plasmacutter]

But you can't exactly blame people who are trying to make money for charging you for it!

yes i can when they impose draconian DRM, buy laws which they use to leverage carte blac regulation over tech sectors they have no right to regulate, and sue grandmothers and families with children.

If they are going to treat us like thieves than damnit we'll live up to those expectations!

in Japan since december 2004

[lasse_2]

Where is the news it has been possible to buy a recorder since at least dec 2004 in Japan

http://archive.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php? s=&threadid=469239

Lars

Re:in Japan since december 2004

[lasse_2]

Sorry meant June 2004 ... is late here in Tokyo now. 11pm! / 23!

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[trentblase]

When I was in Taiwan, I got one of those Apex DVD players in my Happy Meal!

The new XBR2 series can.

[Mustang Matt]

Should be out any day now.

http://blog.hometheatermag.com/geoffreymorrison/06 0106/

Toshiba player

[lasse_2]

First HD DVD players on sale in Japan

31 March 2006 12:53 by Dela
[picture]Toshiba began selling its first player for the HD DVD format today in Japan, beating the rival Sony-made Blu-Ray Disc format to the starting line. The HD-XA1, priced at about 110,000 yen ($936), is the world's first commercially available HD DVD player. In April, this product will be available in the United States for around $799. It was planned to be launched this month, but unavoidable delays pushed the date back a few weeks. Movies on the HD DVD format will arrive in Japan in April also, but will be even more limited than the U.S. launch line-up.

Blu-ray Disc players are still months away from arrival, with Panasonic (Matsushita) and Samsung planning to get their players in quickly for prices of $1000 and more. Blu-ray enthusiasts were upset by the delay of the PlayStation 3 (PS3) console launch, which will now be in November. Despite the staggering number of PlayStation fans wanting to buy the console to asses its next-gen gaming abilities, it is also viewed as a "cheap Blu-ray player" as it includes a Blu-ray drive.

Supporters of Blu-ray are also not shy to cite the gaming console's ability to play Blu-ray movies as being a major part of the format's push for dominance. Microsoft, which backs the HD DVD format, has announced plans to provide an external HD DVD drive to provide a similar "cheap high definition player" to gamers who already own an Xbox 360 console. This clear tie between the next generation console war and next generation format war has been frowned upon occasionally, with one such critic being Warner Home Video president, Warren Lieberfarb.

The HD-XA1, launched today in Japan, has backward compatibility so owners can still enjoy their DVD and CD collections. DVDs can also be upconverted to output resolution of 720p or 1080i which is useful if you own a good HDTV. It supports the video compression standards of MPEG-4 AVC and VC-1, as well as MPEG2, it utilizes a new video decoder chip developed by Broadcom. The mandatory audio formats for HD DVD include both lossy and lossless formats from Dolby Labs and DTS. It features built-in multi-channel decoders for Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD (2 channel), DTS and DTS-HD.

Source:
ABC

http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/7430.cfm

there are lost of 1080p TVs

[YesIAmAScript]

Well more than 5-10. I have friends who have had 1080p-capable (display and input) for more than 6 months now. They have Sharp 45" direct-view TVs (45GXsomethingerother). These not only have native 1920x1080 resolution but accept 1080p (60fps) input. Each paid about $3400.

A coworker bought a Westinghouse 42" LVM-42w2 last weekend for $1500. It has 1920x1080 resolution and has 3 1080p (x60) digital inputs (plus a VGA input that will take 1920x1080x60fps too).

Sony also has announced (but not yet shipped) replacements for the Sony SXRDs you speak of. These accept 1080p and display it at full resolution. They are in the Bravia line now. http://www.sony.com/2006TV

I am writing this on a Dell 24" monitor for my computer that has 1920x1200 resolution and accepts full 60fps 1080p input. (I only paid $600 for it!) Mine (2405) doesn't do HDCP (unlike all the above), but the most revent one (2407) does.

There are many, many HDTVs now that can display 1080p at full resolution. People who keep repeating that there aren't 1080p displays available are just stuck in the past. It is true most people don't have a 1080p display, but there are plenty available now. Unless you are economizing, you'd do well to get one that does 1080p.

Who Raped the Article Blurb?

[alcmaeon]

Slashdot Article Blurb:

The BD-P1000 is twice the price of the HD-A1 ($999.99 list), but supports full 1080p playback, something the first generation of HD-DVD players do not.

Quote from actual article:

[N]ow that Samsung is shipping the BD-P1000 Blu-Ray player to retailers. The BD-P1000 ($999.99 list), will go on sale June 25th, making it the first Blu-Ray player to hit the market. Until now, the only high-definition video player shoppers could buy has been the Toshiba HD-A1, which has been in short supply. The BD-P1000 is twice the price of the HD-A1...

Now see, the way I read it is that the "($999.99 list)" immediately following "HD-A1" in the blurb suggests that the HD-A1 lists for $999.99 and since the "BD-P1000 is twice the price of the HD-A1" the BD-P1000 must be ~$2,000.00. This made me think, "Gee, Blu-Ray is doomed."

In fact, the BD-P1000 is only $999.00 list as TFA makes clear. Maybe the blurb writer should RTFA.

Re:Linking things

[jZnat]

Linking things as words is done via XHTML (eXtensible HyperText Markup Language):

<a href='http://example.com/your/link/and/whatever'>t ext here</a>

Simple process, really.

One Sentence that guarantees failure

[just_forget_it]

"10 Blu-Ray titles will be available as well"

A whopping TEN movies to choose from! That's certainly worth dropping $1k on a piece of equipment.

Oppo 970HD Advanced Setup Guide

[Jeremy Erwin]

Might as well post this Oppo 970HD Advanced Setup Guide then. It contains all sorts of setup techniques that Oppo 971h owners have had to glean from places like avsforum-- the original 971h manual was pretty light on details.

boycott any of these until they sell burners

[Anonymous Coward]

useless unless I can use it to record what I want.

useless junk. useless. Boycott it all until you can burn it with Linux.

Boycott it all

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it is because most stand-alone players can't do h.264 - but the most common ones can do xvid/dvix, and they seem to be super-anal about that kind of thing - notice how most of the filesizes are chosen to evenly fit on a cd-rom, totally retro.

There are some that are playing around with x264 encodes, its just not "mainstream" yet.

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[jZnat]

Maybe because H.264 takes an assload of processing power to decode or even encode? You need a high-end graphics card just to watch standard-definition H.264 content let alone HD. When dedicated H.264 chips are added to video cards and HDTV's, I'm sure it will become far more popular. In the meantime, the huge space reduction is hard to rationalise when you need such high-end equipment to use it.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[Dahamma]

Cool, where can I rent movies in HDV format? And when do you think I'll be able to get that HDV camera for $100?

Can't wait. Nothing like the convenience of a good old magnetic tape.

Re:Early Adoptor? Not this time.

[fm6]

That would leave no room for an actual burger. You must have felt gyped.

Commentary in movies?

[SuperKendall]

Yeah, because I want to watch a documentary on how they made the game instead of playing it.

Well I generally watch a movie before I listen to the commentary track or watch special features, why would it not be like that with games?

You also are totally blowing off things like extra levels and more detailed textures largers storage allows for.

When can I get a BluRay & HD-DVD drive?

[GWBasic]

Wow! For that price I'd rather build an HTPC that has a BluRay and HD-DVD drive!

Player on Sale at Fry's in Downers Grove

[h4ck7h3p14n37]

I just came from the Fry's store in Downers Grove, Illinois and they have three of these players in stock and for sale. I didn't pick one up, but I did get a DS lite to complement my original DS.

Re:I'll take tpb's files labelled "HR-HDTV" thank

[ben there...]

I watch standard definition (DVD res.) H.264 on my old 2.0 GHz with a nVidia Ti4600 just fine. Not sure about the encode time, as I've only encoded a couple of TV shows with it so far. But I think the hardware is definitely adequate.

I also don't think the major benefit of H.264 is filesize. It uses a better compression algorithm that doesn't make it look blocky. The mp4 container also handles VBR mp3, aac, and various other audio codecs without resorting to hacks like packed bitstream in AVI.

I don't know. I'm still kind of a n00b at it, but mp4 definitely seems worth doing. It probably is because of lack of standalones that can play it or something.