The Matrix Trilogy HD DVD Reviews... (1 Viewer)

[Douglas Monce]

Thats sweet!!!! I would have gotten in on that if I could have and I don't even like the movies!

 

[Dave Moritz]

I am currious to what everyones opinion is on the Dolby True HD track for The Matrix Trilogy? I have not yet purchased the trilogy and am not sure if I will by the Matrix Trilogy first or both Pirates Of The Caribbean?

I saw the write up on the audio but I would like to get the opinions of others that have purchased the trilogy.

 

[Dan M]

I'm still waiting for an order # on my Matrix trilogy set from CC. I ordered it for $19.99 with express shipping but but my order status is still 'pending'...Glad you got yours on the way Tim

 

[Cees Alons]

You have a point there. Those thread lines all commence with "Official HTF review" after all.

But really: the style, recommendations, etc. are mainly based on the personal preferences of the reviewer. As such, I try to compare these recommendations between different reviews of the same reviewer, not different recommendations of different reviewers.

Some reviewers seem to "highly recommend" almost everything, so when such a reviewer omits the recommendation, I know it's BAD. Others have a broader range, and in those cases I know I get positively interested when they (highly or not) recommend a release.

Also, when Robert Harris posts "a few positive words", I know I need to consider that release seriously!


Cees

 

[Cees Alons]

Which, even if it were true, have not necessarily to do with each other at all.

It's actually sad how little many people know about technical aspects of picture recordings and don't feel restrained to discuss it. Those reviewers should not try to take technicals values like "picture transfer bandwidth" into account. And perhaps they should not even be allowed to actually see a value before they've secreted their official review.

The bandwidth a recording needs (for a specific picture quality) is influenced by many factors, of which the actual image content is the most important one. A dark scene with less different details uses (needs) much less bandwidth than bright sunny scenes with lots of hi-res textures. And if bandwidth is measured between compression and decompression, even more properties play an important role: like correlating structures in the picture, movements, scene switching, etc.

I would expect The Matrix to need less bandwidth than the Pirate films, based on the known contents of both type of films alone.
And thus the observed (little) difference can hardly be any proof of a better picture quality or of the contrary.


Cees

 

[Cees Alons]

And I think.. yes, I think I use the same reviewer - yet not the same person.


Cees

 

[DaViD Boulet]

All very true (and certainly one can never draw clear conclusions when comparing two different film which, as you say, may have very different film-based characteristics that affect compression differently, not to mention the film might just *look* different to begin with).

I only meant to suggest that one shouldn't assume that higher bit-rate would *not* have yielded any improvement, just as we shouldn't assume that it would.

 

[Robert Crawford]

I'm glad we got that straight.

 

[Nick Graham]

I am curious what the results will look like if we get a high bit rate VC1 Blu-Ray at some point. Having said that, I cannot wait to get home from my business trip tonight to check out my Matrix set - it go to my house mid-day yesterday (for 19.99, thanks Circuit City!) but I haven't been home to give it a spin. At this point I only trust my own eyes anymore - format bias is killing objectivity in reviews.

 

[Mark Zimmer]

Here's the audio portion of my review from digitallyObsessed.com:

The Matrix offers DD+ 5.1 tracks in English and French, as well as a 2.0 Spanish track, but the obvious winner is the English TrueHD lossless track, which frequently has the feeling of a symphony orchestra playing right behind your screen. There's excellent directionality, both subtle and flashy, from dialogue sequences to gun battles. There's a broad soundstage that sounds completely natural, with an immerisve final result.



English DD+ and TrueHD tracks are also present on Reloaded,and they have a clean and vibrant sound. In particular, the sequence in the temple square with the heavy drumming has an excellent impact. There's plenty of surround information throughout, and the combat scenes have all the oomph you could want, with good bass extension. The quieter dialogue scenes have a nice intimate feeling to them, which is particularly appropriate for the more sensitive moments between Neo and Trinity.


Revolutions features more of the same high-impact sound, starting with the moody musical mix. That features strong brass hits and ominous trombones, as well as heavy and frequently metallic percussion. The club setting offers plenty of deep bass extension and the gun battles, as usual, offer plenty to rock your home theater. The whooses of the wirework moments have nice spatial differentiation. At a few points the audio is oddly hissy, but this is apparently intentional for some reason.

==

Revolutions also offers some house rattling subsonics during the siege of Zion. Make sure you have a big, bad subwoofer for this one.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Great comments Mark!

I'm off to read your review in full...

dave

p.s. I love that so many folks are really enjoying the sound of lossless audio on HD DVD/BD and really "getting it". Those of us who enjoyed laserdisc PCM knew just what we lost when we went to the 10:1 data-reduction Dolby on DVD, and it's thrilling now to get it all back again along with 1080p HD pictures...

 

[troy evans]

Well,I bought the Matrix HD-DVD movie only set and found it to be stunning!All of those 3 looked and sounded fantastic.Most notable the 2 sequels.I put in POTC 1 and 2 on the Hd -dvd player to see what the upconvert looked like and WOW!" Spiderman 2.1","So Close"(asian),even "Dracula 3" all looked great.Sony/Columbia and Disney/Buena Vista have always had some of the best transfers on Dvd I've seen.That being said,I don't think disc bit rates are playing any type of significant role in this right now.I would put the upconverts up against current Bluray releases of the POTC just to see if anyone else out there has noticed how well the sd versions look given there Bluray counter parts.I'm sure Bluray has an edge over them,But,I'm guessing it isn't by much. I've ordered "Underworld:Evolution" today on Hd-Dvd.I'm going to compare the sd Sony release to the Hd-Dvd release.I'm not expecting much though,because the sd release also looked amazing upconverted.

 

[Shane Martin]

Yep. It's like welcome to 1995 all over again for us laserdisc folks. The comments about hating DD now are just hilarious because those are the same people who said "There's no way your Laserdisc PCM sounds better than my DVD blah blah blah".

Oh sure

 

[DaViD Boulet]

"Back to laserdisc" was almost the phrase I wrote in my last Blu-ray review regarding lossless sound. It's exactly the notion that went through my mind. Now that I'm hearing lossless again, I don't know how I lived without it for so long. Also making me realize that many of the "upgrades" I tried to do to my audio system to "open up" the sound were really just trying to put back in that air and nuance that the lossless audio preserves.



The improvement over the SD DVDs of the POTC discs is at least as good as the improvement over the SD DVDs of the Matrix by the new 1080p Matrix HD DVD set. How big a difference would you suggest for that one?

Not only are the BD discs of POTC *reference* which easily puts them above *any* DVD up-convert (even on the excellent Toshiba scaler, which I truely love and regard as the best upconverter for DVD), but the original POTC DVD was HORRIBLE and riddled with muddy/noisey/MPEGGY blacks and edge-halos everywhere. Having reviewed Buena Vista DVDs for HTF for several years previously, I can state that their live-action DVDs were actually well below-industry standards concerning picture quality.

Several reviewers have already stated that even with the better-DVD of the second film, there's no contest between it and the new 1080p copy.

 

[ppltd]

You are absolutely correct. Watching Matrix or POC SD disks on my Tosh XA2, which is a very fine upconverting player in it's own right, does not compare in any way to the BD POC disks or the HD DVD Matrix disk.

Even the much maligned BD version of 'The Fifth Element' has detail the upconverted SD Superbit disk can not show. At it's worst, the HD formats still outperform there counterpart upconverted SD. At it's best, an the case of POC and Matrix, some of the finest examples of HD releases to date, the difference hits you in the face.

 

[Edwin-S]

How can anyone believe that a 480p picture with added interpolated lines could come anywhere close to looking like a high def transfer with actual increased picture data due to the increase in resolution? I sure wish I could check out some upconverted DVDs. I would like to confirm with my own eyes that they are nowhere near true HD.

Wouldn't the upconverting just make the picture look "softer" and less video-like? There is no way the picture could look as detailed as a high def transfer. AFAIC upconverted DVDs of the Matrix and POTC films wouldn't even come close to matching the detail and vividness of their HD counterparts.

After watching a Blu-ray movie a co-worker of mine remarked that picture was better but not enough to warrant the extra money. All I could think was, "you haven't watched enough of them". I would expect these discs to look even better on his new Sony set than they do on my old Toshiba RP CRT set, since his set doesn't suffer from high frequency roll off like mine does.

Keira Knightley looks pretty damn hot in HD and so would would Carrie-Ann Moss. Can't check out Carrie-Ann though.

 

[Tim Glover]

My copy of The Complete Matrix Trilogy HD DVD arrived today from amazon! Of course, my brother is getting this one, and I am getting the CCity deal.

BTW, the cool Matrix HD DVD promo that appeared before Spiderman 3 is also playing before Pirates Of The Caribbean: At Worlds End. It's rather effective.

 

[Edwin-S]

Some kind of irony in there somewhere.

 

[troy evans]

Hey Guys,I'm sorry.I didn't mean to get anyone up over this.I just got My Hd-Dvd player.I'm still in an excited stage.Perhaps I do need to just watch more material before posting My opinions.I don't want any of You thinking I was against Bluray.I actually like what I've seen.Here's what I'm getting at,the Matrix does look superior to It's Sd version,so,POTC more than likely does to!What got Me on this opinion to begin with was the other night I was watching Smallville season 5 that I purchased on HD to replace My Sd version.Just to see how amazingly different the HD would look compared to Sd,I popped it in.Well,I was disapointed to say the least.While,It did look better,it was a slight difference,not a "Smack You In The Face"difference.That got Me thinking,if movies and shows are filmed using HD cameras,HD film,HD mastering,transfers and so on how can more current material look that much better?Where there is an arguement for the improvement with older material,is there really that much for newer given all this innovation in filming over the past few years?I play My movies on A Samsung 42" plasma 720p/1080i display.I don't have 1080p yet...Yet.That might be why I have this opinion.Does 1080p blow the doors off 1080i?If so,there you go,and I rest My point.But that still wouldn't change what I've seen on My display with the differences.My display has been calibrated using Digital Video Essentials also.Not that this point means that much just that it is calibrated.

 

[Cees Alons]

Troy,

The resulting quality of a HD release is always dependent of the quality of the original content. However, make no mistake: older (even B&W) movies may sometimes have detoriated film stock, but in principle the resolution and colour (or gray-) depth of the old media were even better than current HD offers!

So "old" movies, if the material is still in good shape, can look stunning on HD too. Recent examples are Casablanca and The Searchers, and (already) many other films.

I honestly don't understand why your Smallville V HD didn't look so much better than the SD version. Perhaps the original HD material was already transferred to SD in a very good form, or the HD version simply isn't that much better.
I can assure you that (even with the remarkable upconversion some HD-players do) the HD versions I have of several films that I also own on SD, the improvement is stunning in all cases.

About your 1080i versus 1080p question: no, in principle 1080 = 1080, it doesn't matter in what order the horizontal lines are written into your plasma's image memory. Sometimes TVs do it the wrong way (either converting 1080i -> 1080p or 1080p -> 1080i), in which case it depends which "error" your particular machine happens to have (slightly older "HD-Ready" TVs often had problems with true 1080p), but your Samsung can be expected to handle it correctly.

So, the problem you're having with that Smallville version could be specific for that title (note that the extras may not be true HD, I don't know much about that title), but certainly not typical for "all" HD television and certainly not for movies, even older ones.

And no, we didn't think you were "against" Blu-ray. Most of us are interested in movies in the first place and simply hope they are presented in the best form possible for our home theater systems, using the best format(s) available!

I'm glad the Matrix Trilogy looked stunning on your system too. I'm still waiting for mine to arrive (overseas).


Cees