**Official HTF HD Formats Ind./Retailer/Studio Support Thread-*SEE POST 3176, p. 106* - Page 75

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

I think the reason many of us early HD adopters may lean towards HD-DVD is because they were first out of the gate and they did it right. The very first HD-DVDs are still some of the best looking and best sounding movies the studios produced. Compare this to Blu-ray who launched late with expensive hardware and very poor transfers. It took a long six months or so before blu-ray quality finally caught up with HD-DVD, by that time, many of us built up a significant collection of HD-DVDs.

If Blu-ray would have launched with $500 players and the same picture quality from it's first releases, I don't think there would have been a format war at all because of the studio backing.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Perry,

good points about how those early days affected the format balance. The BD camp really screwed up at launch. Nobody would deny. And it's cost them... a LOT.


Robert. No doubt your posts are 100% baseless because of your bias for HD DVD. What? That's not fair for me to say? Then shut-up with the pithy remarks. It gets old and isn't contributing to any meaningful discussion.

The 300 disc, despite all the praise showered on it from the host of usual review sites, was pretty soft to my eyes. And I saw a 35mm print of 2001 and it was razor-sharp; a far cry from the soft image on the HD DVD/BD we just were handed.

I will say that there are some fine WB discs too: Happy Feet, Corpes Bride, The Searchers. But it seems that more often than not, when I see a disc that strikes me as softer than the film print elements should have looked, it's got the WB logo.

Based on the discs I've seen, ignoring the first handful of atrocious MPEG-2 disasters from Sony, the best looking high-definition images are coming from Sony and Disney Studios (some major bitch-slapping must have gone on behind closed doors at Sony once those horrid early BDs hit the streets). My ranking is based on my observation. My hypothosis that some Warner encodes cater to HD DVD limits is based on my observation. Dan feels differently. I'm sure his opinions are based on his observations too.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

It may bother you that others disagree with your observations, David, but I'll continue to feel free to point it out.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

So everytime someone disagrees with you, I should point it out to make sure we all know?



Let's move above grade-school tactics on the board. We can all read, and if someone disagrees with me and they want to make a point about the fact that their viewpoint is different than my own, they can point it out for themselves. It's not too hard for other members to read people's comments and figure things out for themselves. Most members are adults.

I have no problem with someone disagreeing with my observations. Which is why I didn't even challenge Dan when he shared his perfectly valid observations that:

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Why should it bother me that others disagree with me?

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

DVD-Rs and DVD -RWs didn't originally work in all PCs or all DVD players. And for a while you had to decide if you wanted DVD-r or DVD+r. Now because the burners just accept all formats, it really doesn't matter.

I think thats what will happen with Blu-ray and HD DVD. Once you have a player that will just play all optical media ie CD, CD video, DVD, HD DVD, Blu-ray, MP3, WMA, etc, then the whole thing will be a moot point. As it is with burnable DVDs.

I don't think HD DVD is only a movie product as the burners are on the way. Strangely enough Fry's Electronics already sells blank HD DVDs.

Doug

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

I'm afraid I can't agree with you at all on this one. I think 2001 looks razor sharp on HDM.

Doug

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Personally I have always believed that this is the major reason for the support that HD-DVD has with the Home Theater aficionados, who generally are early adopters by nature. If only the Blu-Ray group had not taken things for granted as they did initially, this holiday season would have seen the end of this war, that is if there still was one left. I think Sony's and the BDA's complacence stemmed from the anticipated success of the PS3 and the broad studio support for Blu-Ray. Instead now we have a scenario where this war is certain to drag on for a really long time atleast until something major, like Warner going Blu-Ray exclusive, happens. Which by the way, I think is highly unlikely considering Warner's direct commercial interests in the HD-DVD format. Warner choosing to go HD-DVD exclusive on the other hand will guarantee that both formats will have to co-exist and at some point studios will be forced into supporting both formats. But did'nt Warner just say that they were tired of supporting two formats? I guess there are no simple answers.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Personally that has been my observation too regarding the posts of a few HD-DVD supporters.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

I hate to sound like a cheer leader here, but Warner going HD-DVD exclusive would probably end the war too. Perhaps not as quickly, but it's worth looking at.

I personally think that since it's so close as it is, Warner being Red would tip the scales and just keep snowballing.

I think Time Warner, Viacom, and NBC-Universal has more total power than Sony, Disney, and Fox.



All of them are MAJOR media and entertainment corporations except Sony. Sony, (i've not done research for this post, but I believe this to be true) is only a power player because it owns Columbia-Tri Star and some of MGM. They don't have a foothold as major media center.



Also, it should be mentioned that Warner Bros. going HD-DVD would probably lead to New Line going Red also. Same can be said for going Blu.


I donno, I wish I had other things to waste my time lol.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

I doubt it, since Sony and Disney still hang on. As long as there are "exclusive studios" - even one, the war drags on. At least for us HT-buffs..

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Doug,

what's your display system like? I'm curious as to what player you're using, your projector, connection type (ie, HDMI?) and viewing-angle. (not an arguement here, an honest question).

thanks!

dave

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Re: 2001: A Space Odyssey - Have to agree with Doug regarding the clarity of the image. I was honestly surprised that you consider this release to be "soft", David. I just think it looks terrific, especially the Pan-Am clipper sequence; the detail in the orbiting space station is marvelous. However, I will admit that this is a very subjective opinion, as I've never had the opportunity to view the film theatrically.

My environment: HD-XA2 - HDMI - Panasonic AE700U - ~100" Da-Lite screen @ 1.5 screen widths.

- Walter.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Interesting.

Walter, is that an LCD projector? Are there other titles that look noticably sharper to you on your system than 2001 or does it qualify as "top sharpness" in comparison to other HD material you've seen?

thanks!

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Not a fair comparison, David. It's about as valid as me watching the same Warner's title on HD-DVD and proclaiming....hey, what's the big deal with Blu-ray's so called superior specs since what I'm watching is what's available to the Blue-ray viewer.

To properly evaluate HD-DVD you need to buy a HD-DVD player. Only by doing so can you evaluate the player itself and titles released by other studios besides Warner Bros.

Well....I would find your reviews suspect in any case because your description of 2001 PQ as being "soft" is just way off base. Even watching this film from a distance of 12' away from the 9' wide screen via my Sanyo Z4 LCD projector the image is razor sharp!!! Ken Brown over at High Def Digest gave the HD-DVD/Blu-ray PQ 5 out of 5.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Evaluating a "player" is a different conversation. The same video DAC and signal chain would be the ideal way to compare the signals optimized for two different formats keeping all extraneous variables out of the mix. And that's what Warner enables me to do. Within the context of Warner, it's 100% valid to watch their encodes as they are 100% identical on both HD DVD and BD. You don't need a player of both formats to determine this. They are bit-for-bit identical.

What you say is true that I can't make determinations about the HD DVD format generalized to other studios like Universal and Paramount. You're correct and I agree.

But in regards to Warner, my impressions are certainly telling me what Warner Brother's HD DVDs look like. 100%. Even Amir from AVS agrees. This isn't really a debateble topic once it's understood that the same bit-idential video file is used for both platforms with WB discs.

Oh, and the reverse is true. If you're an HD DVD consumer, watching WB HD DVDs is telling you what Blu-ray consmers see with the same titles. Naturally.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

David,

Yes, the AE700U is a 720P LCD Front Projector. If I had to rank 2001 in terms of sharpness or detail it would probably be just below the best titles in my collection. Not "the" sharpest, but still awfully nice. Over at AVS, 2001 is a Tier 1 Blu-ray title and that is a close fit to my own subjective opinion regarding presentation.

I'd have to review some of the better titles in my collection to really answer what looks "sharper". Probably Ratatouille - which is perfect in every way; Corpse Bride - due to style?, maybe Casino Royale - at least in certain segments.

- Walter.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Can't agree with you Dan.

Betamax and VHS were non compatable formats and survived for many years. Their competitive spirit resulted in vast improvements in tape recorder technology with the introduction of HI-Fi sound/video and the introduction of the concept of owning a "home theater".

Currently, you only have to look at the "war" between DBS giants DirectTV and Dish Network. They have incompatible equipment, exclusive providers and yet both have millions of subscribers and have probably done more to promote Hi Def viewing than either Toshiba or Sony. I suspect that the current format war is going to evolve along similar lines as the above.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

I've gone on record that there are, and have been, good things to come out of format-war competition.

However, there's no way to take the Beta/VHS saga and assume that hi-fi sound and home-theater were direct results of inter-format competition. Even if there had just been a *single* format, those same features would have been natural developments. Why? Because you still have competition between manufacturers of hardware even in a single format model, as well as studios looking to earn your dollar ahead of another studio's titles.

Laserdisc added digital sound in 1984, then DTS, then AC-3 a few years later without having to compete against another direct format (it wasn't competing with VHS... it had its own niche market of videophile collectors). Why? Because the studios wanted to improve product so you would buy *their* laserdiscs instead of somone else's. Same with hardware... digital sound meant a new laserdisc player sale for Pioneer.

Just one format. And we still saw the same pattern of improvement that your assumptions like to competition between two different formats. And even with VHS, once Beta was all-but-dead to the average consumer, we still saw advances like S-VHS take hold... even without Beta players competing side-by-side on the store shelf. Those S-VHS decks were competing against other VHS decks. Intra-format competition. Happens all the time.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

IMO, the format competition has brought the consumer a lot of good.

I would agree that it's (some of) the industry that feels some undeniable pain and would like it to cease.

Also: formerly, incompatible formats have existed next to each other (different speeds of records, different specs of floppy discs), formats that were basically incompatible, but did not work out as "a war".

It's the studios (by being format exclusive) and manufacturers (by bringing out exclusive players) who have changed it into a war. (And a few misled consumers who believed they were forced to "choose" sides. Others were mainly victims of the war: they had to choose which to buy or else buy both.)

If true combo players are readily available (and to a reasonable price), which was the case in the examples I mentioned above, and which should have been there from the beginning of the launch of the HD formats, the "war" is over.

Indeed: it will be in the interest of the industry mostly, so I still hope they will see the light. And in the end, we, the consumers, will profit from that too.

But don't forget: competition is a basic principle of our economy. So much even that it's requested if absent!


Cees

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Well, different "speed" records weren't incompatible formats: They could easily play on the same hardware by just adjusting the rotation speed of the platter, which was a feature that was added to production phonograph players at hardly any cost at all.

What *was* an incompatible format was Edison's original cylinder and platter which used a *vertically* vibrating needle instead of a horizontal vibrating needle... which meant that the needle needed to be "tracked" by a mechanized arm and couldn't be played with an arm that just rested in and was carried by the grooves like 78, 45, and 33 rpm records (Edison invented the phonograph only to have Victrola actually take it over and market its own version that evolved into records we talk about). That was the real "format war" of its day, with Edison's record the losing "beta" and Victorola's the winning "VHS" if you will.


Agreed. The studios created this situation, that now is the thorn-in-their-side.


Cees,

you continually bring up "combo players" as the "perfect solution". And I think you'd be absolutely right except for one thing: it will *always* cost significantly more to manufacture a combo player versus a stand-alone for a single format. Why? There are physical differences to the disc drive and lens assembly making it more comlciated to design a single drive that works well with both disc structures. There's also significant differences in the software decoding side that necessitate a more complicated mother board and chip structure: BD-J and HDi may look similar when they do a PIP image on the users screen, but what's going on behind the scenes is entirely different... and you've got double-the-chip-power under the hood if you want to do both.

ie: combo players are much closer to "two single format players under one hood" than they are "a universal player with tweaks to work with both systems".

It's not just marketing that Keeps Samsung's combo players at about twice the cost of their single format machines.

Now, could this "twice the cost" ratio shrink over time? Most likely, But even in the best of circumstances a combo player would probably cost a consumer at least 50 percent more than would a single-format machine (and it would probably take years for production volume to push prices low enough to be a non-issue versus single-format solutions). So... in the interest of consumers and price (something you champion all the time ) a single-format solution would be best for everyone, especially given that any "inter-format competition benefits" ejoyed thus far would also disappear with the advent of ubiquitous combo-players because the "format" would become invisible to the end-user: Studios would be competing just as they always have... one studio's titles against another on discs that play in your one machine. Might as well make that machine as cost-effective as possible (single format).

The advantage of a combo-player solution model, of course, is that if that were to happen, no one's existing HD library of software is left in the ebay-cold. And if combo players could be manufactured at costs equal (or extremely close) to single-format hardware I'd be content. But that's not likely based on some significant physical and software differences between BD and HD DVD.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

To the extent this MAY be true (and, having purchased a Pioneer 563-A SA-CD / DVD-A player in 2004 for then then-cheap $150, I don't think it is), I think it would be so for political not the practical/engineering design reasons you cite.

Why have apparently no manufs embraced the diffraction grating Ricoh designed that could be used to make a combo player?

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

I was unaware of the Laserdisc format until, I think it was approximately 1982, when I saw a demo of ABBA's greatest hits in a local hi tech store and was very impressed. But the hardware was way to expensive so I stayed on the sidelines. About 10 years later I bought my first and only LD player for $400 on sale. During the next 6 years I only purchased 6 titles because of the price $40+, the last title being TITANIC.
So for approx 16 years I was a by-stander while this format just plodded along than finally died. Sure there were technical improvements but YEARS would go by between these events.

But, competing for my entertainment dollar at the time were video tape machines. Technical improvements evolved at a much faster pace with these machine. First it was recording times that were increased, than HI-FI sound in 1984, than improvements in video resolution.

So, what I'm saying in a round-a-bout way is that technical improvements, for the most part, are spurred on more by competing formats than by competing business for the same product.

Throughout history, this has always been the case. In a much bigger arena just look at the technical improvements that occurred during WWII in the biggest competitive struggle of them all. Combative nations went to war flying bi-planes and 6 years later were flying jets. This kind of technology would normally have taken one nation many more years to develope.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Very good point. And Cees, allow me to acknowledge this often-forgotten point (which I indeed had forgotten)... there has been one chip designer who's apparently tackled many of the increased-costs issues of dual-format support with the video decoder (and may also address Java versus HDi but I'm not sure). Of course, that still leaves the issue of transport/drive differentials, but it at least lessens one aspect of "combo" units costing more.


Laserdisc was more expensive because it was marketed to videophile collectors who were happy with a 12" disc that had to be flipped. Most of my friends wouldn't have bothered with LD even had it been cheap because the "flipping" during a movie, to them, was a deal-breaker. I tend to agree as I only tolerated it begrudgingly and was all-too-happy when DVD solved that issue.

Now... funny you provide those specific examples of how VHS/Beta competition improved VHS... and suggest that the inter-format competion made them happen more quickly... while you say that the improvements of LD took longer to accomplish, when in fact they correlate pretty closely:

VHS LD
Longer record times CLV play (longer play time)
Hi-Fi stereo sound (1984) Digital audio (1984)
S-VHS DTS and AC-3



Agreed.

But that has nothing to do with this "format war" debate. We've got our format specs now... we're done with that. The format war indeed helped those specs (on both sides) to be BETTER than they would have been. I've said that all along.

What we're talking about *now* is how the format war is hampering mass consumer adoption. WWII war-developed technology being pushed on a fast-track for development has nothing to do with wether Joe-movie-renter looks at two formats on a shelf at best-buy and say to himself "I'll wait until one format wins so I don't get burned like I did with Beta".

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

David,

I agree that a combo player will probably always cost more to produce than a single format player would cost. But it's questionable if that advantage would be fully transferred to the customer. However, that could be.

But we're now facing the situation that two formats exist, with partly (to a big extend) overlapping application, partly with their own typical "best" use.

And, of course with the different covering of film titles released on HD (I'm not mentioning the studios again ).

Now, given that situation, I think combo-players are the solution. The price could certainly get lower than 1 HD DVD-player + 1 BD-player separately. And so: there's no better solution than that, while it certainly ends the format war.

It might even end the format competition by giving rise to the disappearance of one of the formats, if the industry parties realize the matter has now become moot. Although, frankly, I hope both formats will continue to co-exist next to each other and be used each in their typical and best way for individual releases.

(Let's say: like DD and HD floppies for a considerable time.)

(I'm not really going further about those records. Changing the speed of a turntable is easy and cheap indeed, just as having to switch the needle and the frequency filter, but the principle - a different and incompatible format, resolved by a combination drive - is the same and thus the example is clear.)


Cees

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

For those interested, Dave Vaughn has just posted the Nielsen Videoscan sales numbers for this past week. 76:24 Blu-Ray.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

David, One question not asked was the TV that I am using. Since I purchased my HD TVs before 1080p was available at a decent price. I have 720p. This impacts the clarity I can view. I would think the size of the TV could impact my decision. I use a 50" DLP TV.

For me I like to have better clarity but I like the movies and therefore I did include that bias in my decision.

I do agree with you that bitrate makes a difference. How many of us have rerecorded our CD collection to get better quality. I have no doubt that we will not stop at 1080p and soon be looking for even better quality. Then the bit rate will make a difference and the disc capacity.

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Wow!
'PotC at Worlds End' and 'Superbad' are doing great!

What's out next week?


Cees

Re: *** Official HTF HD Formats Industry/Retailer/Studio Support Thread

Cees, I have to disagree of the refernce to floppies. The change in floppies was an evolution of the format to an improved product. I don't recall a vendor creating their own format for a floppy. They introduced a change to the floppy which consumers saw a value and switched. There was an advantage. The floppies worked in any player with that size disc.

Please explain for me from a technology basis, which is a better product between HD-DVD and Blu-ray. This is the disc only comparision and not what is stored on it. Once we decide on the disc then we can talk about the use of it.