What would it take for YOU to get D-Theater? (1 Viewer)

[Matt Pelham]

I agree. I bought DVD knowing it was a transitional format leading into hi-def formats. Once I found out they were going back to VHS I immediately decided I would never buy a DVHS deck unless they drop into the $70-80 range, or about the same price as a normal VHS player.

I'm hoping the format dies a quick death.

 

[Mark_Mac]

I would never buy a DVHS deck unless they drop into the $70-80 range, or about the same price as a normal VHS player.

and people wonder why their tapes get eaten. Lets buy the cheapest POS vhs player you can find. Just because DVHS uses a tape that resembles a vhs tape doesnt mean the player is the same.


So George, why 3 progressive scan DVD players....not happy with the quality of DVD?

 

[Mike_G]

Lets buy the cheapest POS vhs player you can find.

Like I said, my $1000 S-VHS deck now eats tapes, so don't say that it's just the cheap junk that does it.

Mike

 

[Sean Aaron]

So why even add anything to this thread?

Because an open question was asked. As I said when I initially posted: if the person who started this thread wanted responses only from HD TV owners or only US-residents, then that could have easily been stated in the opening post. I saw nothing that suggested the questions in this thread couldn't be responded to by anyone.

In order to reduce the number of comments that don't seem relevant to you perhaps you could raise the possibility of creating an HD-Only section of HTF which would very likely reduce the number of people participating in these threads.

Otherwise a more focused thread topic might have the desired result.

 

[Mark_Mac]

Like I said, my $1000 S-VHS deck now eats tapes, so don't say that it's just the cheap junk that does it.

Mike_G,
Sounds like you need to change your pinch roller...easy fix...and I didnt say it was just cheap junk eating tapes.
What do people expect when they buy bottom end equipment.

 

[JasenP]

Here is my personal experience with VHS:
1) How long have you had VHS tapes in your home video library?
Since 1984. First title purchased was Wargames.
2) How many tapes do you have in your home library?
I had 75+, purchased mostly before sell-through pricing was popular
3) How many prerecorded tapes that you purchased brand new have deteriorated? By deterioration I mean tapes that after become unwatchable due to wear on the tape itself, or have simply become eaten by the VCR and rendered unplayable.
40 of the around 75 titles were unwatchable by 1994
4) How many home made tapes (i.e. blank tapes that you purchased and subquently recorded onto) have deteriorated?
Roughly 60%
5) Were your home made tapes consisted primarily of high quality blanks? Or the cheaper blanks?
All were premium brands
6) How many of those deteriorated tapes were handled by children?
None
7) Has your VCR(s) been cleaned on a regular basis? I'm referring to standard tape cleaners one can buy at the store, nothing professional.
Every three months my VCR was professionally serviced including cleanings.

 

[george kaplan]

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking. Why do I have 3 dvd players or why are they progressive scan?

I actually own more than 3 dvd players, but only 3 have progressive scan. I have multiple dvd players because I have multiple rooms in my house, and in my main theater I have two because I watch films both with my wife, and by myself, and if my wife & I are in the middle of a movie, but she's unavailable until that evening to finish watching it, I don't want to have to eject it and then find our place again.

Am I happy with the quality of dvd? Yes and no. I love it. If I can improve it with progressive scan I will do so. If on top of that I could improve it with a line doubler (and could afford one that would actually make a difference) I would do that. I have a tv set that can take advantage of anamorphic discs. I have paid for professional ISF calibration of that set (and recalibration once a year). When HD-DVD comes along, I will upgrade all my dvds as available.

In other words, I am always looking for improvement that I can afford. If that seems incompatible with my stance on dvhs, I've made the logic behind that perfectly clear and get yelled at every time I repeat myself, so I won't repeat it here.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

...In fact, DVD was obsolete the day the first HD sets hit the shelves in 1998. At that point, a mere 18 months after introduction, DVD was rendered NOT GOOD ENOUGH.
...
In 1997, I decided to pass on DVD and buy a better laserdisc player instead. I decided that since DVD was practically designed to be temporary, I'd just wait it out until something better came along.

Ok, I'm a proponent of D-VHS but I *still* have problems with the above.

Firstly, DVD was not rendered obsolete with the advent of HDTV or D-VHS. It's a format that can provide 16x9 compoenent video in 480 progressive just like before the advent of HD. This level of quality (especially with 16x9 encoding) can look far superior to laserdisc...which IMO *never* looked good enough to produce a satisfying image on a 100" screen (and I've seen laserdisc projected as such such with the world's reference laserdisc players so it's not an issue of the quality of a $199 Sony LD machine).

This level of image quality on current DVD will continue to look stunning and "good enough" for the average consumer on all the 4x3 and 16x9 SD TVs out there in the world which will continue to be sold and owned for many years to come. Even once DTV is mandated in the states, this merely forces the inclusion of a digital tuner in a TV set. These TVs can still be old-fashioned 4x3 480 interlaced televisions.

So DVD isn't obsolete and it isn't temporary. Was CD rendered obsolete when 24/96 recordings were produced? Did you suddenly see CD sales drop in favor of SACD or DVDA? Nope. And you won't.

DVD and CD, though they may not offer the level of quality of other pre-recorded formats, will continue to be viable and sell proficiently for the next 10 years.

When they are "replaced" in the hands of the average conumser, it won't be because of quality gains. It will be because of convenience gains (like some small quarter-sized solid state chip).

And Sean,

You don't need a huge box to get a large TV. Flat screen options are available (and will fall in cost over the next few years) and projection technology is becoming affordable too.

if you have no interest in HD or a large screen then *obviously* you have no interest in D-VHS.

-dave

 

[Mark_Mac]

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking. Why do I have 3 dvd players or why are they progressive scan?

The reason I ask is because you said you have 2 HDTV's, so you must have upgraded one of your progressive scan players in the hope of better picture quality, which I understand.
Its all about making the the home experience like the theater....thats what I thought but it seems like people care more about chapter skipping and media then sound or video quality. I admit that chapters are nice when people are over and your showing off your system but when I watch a movie I push play and forget about it. Its just irritating that someone can make a totally negative comment about something they dont even own or have experienced with.

 

[Ryan Wright]

Flat screen options are available (and will fall in cost over the next few years)

Costco is selling 40"+ 16:9 flatscreens for ~$3500. Considering my 65" RPTV was six grand 2.5 years ago, that's a hell of a bargain. However, I'm still not impressed with the image quality on a flat panel. Until it improves, I wouldn't buy one.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Well, that's why I *also* mentioned projection...which with the new improved-black level chips (both 16x9 and 4x3) can be stunning with some of the new DLP offerings.
You don't even need a 100% darkened room.
Point is that large-screen images can be bought now and in the near future if one chooses for not too much money...and in the case of front projection, IMO, the image can exceed that of almost any CRT RP TV on the market (excepting absolute black-level).
My point was that it is a given that one needs a large display to see the advantages of an HD image over DVD. There's no point in stating that D-VHS is not desireable for if HD isn't either (it seemed obvious to me that posters saying they don't care about HD probably wouldn't care about D-VHS either...so why were posting here???)

I'm at 65" and my DVDs are beautiful. I've got zero complaints about the format. There are people here with 100" and larger screens who are very happy with their DVDs.

Granted, but they'll be *even happier* with HD
-dave

 

[Edwin-S]

What would get me into D-VHS? Someone realizing that I would really like one and sending me one, out of pity for my lonely DVD player.

 

[Steven L]

In fact, DVD was obsolete the day the first HD sets hit the shelves in 1998. At that point, a mere 18 months after introduction, DVD was rendered NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

I don’t agree with that. DVD may not be good enough for you, but it’s still good enough for the majority of people. I don’t think you can say that just because it’s not the latest and greatest it’s therefore not good enough, for everyone, period.


For the record, I have a 65” WS HD RPTV, but I won’t make the plunge into D-VHS. Not because of the tape issue, that doesn’t bother me. The cost of the player is too high and the catalog of movies is too small. If these two things change, then I probably would take the plunge - depending at that time on how far away HD-DVD is.

 

[Mike Poindexter]

Ryan,
The D-Box Odyssee Motion Simulator is a home theater version of the moving platform that you would experience at Disneyland when you watch/ride Star Tours. They have them at Universal Studios for the Back to the Future ride. It will rock back and forth, side to side and will shake in synch with the movie.
Every single title for D-Theater is programmed for the motion simulator. About 130 movies are programmed for it right now and more come out every month, but while DVD has a small percentage of their movies programmed for the motion simulator, all of the D-theater titles are.
The motion simulator will be the coolest thing to have in a home theater that is not directly involved in the A/V reproduction. It can hit with 2G's of force to really make the crash scene in Cast Away have some impact, sway to give you the ocean feeling in The Perfect Storm, vibrate to make you feel like you are in the car on Mario Andretti's Super Speedway.
You can check it out here:
http://www.d-box.com/html_en.html
By the way, I was checking out the HD-DVD forum's chosen high def DVD format and while it will deliver a nice picture, it will not be able to deliver the same level that you can get on D-Theater. The D-theater tape will hold a much higher amount of data and will have a higher bit rate as well. Still, unless you have a top notch display, you may not notice it.

 

[Lew Crippen]

By the way, I was checking out the HD-DVD forum's chosen high def DVD format and while it will deliver a nice picture, it will not be able to deliver the same level that you can get on D-Theater. The D-theater tape will hold a much higher amount of data and will have a higher bit rate as well. Still, unless you have a top notch display, you may not notice it.

While I agree that ‘bit rate’ may have a bearing on picture quality, it is not at all obvious to me why the amount of data that can be stored on the media is a factor in terms of picture quality. Naturally, it compromises are made in order to force a movie to fit the storage capacity of the media, then the amount of storage available will be a factor. However, for shorter movies it would not be a factor and for longer ones, multiple disks (as is the case in both LDs and DVDs) are a solution that will not affect picture quality.

True, one may dislike changing disks, but that is a continuity issue, not one of quality.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

max bit-rate is a per-second figure. It determines the maxiumum bit rate that can be used to encode all streaming data the image at any given moment. This includes picture, sound, subtitles...multiple angles etc.

Bit *space* would describe the total playing time...which as you say wouldn't affect programming able to be spread over more than one disc, but that's not the same thing as bit *rate*.

Do you want a high quality picture with 5.1 DD *and* 5.1 DTS or commentary? A high-bit-rate is necessary for this with complex video material.

It's one area where D-VHS really REALLY excels. Even the most complex scenes don't run out of "head room" while you still have plenty of space left for various high-quality auido soundtracks (like full-bit-rate DTS or hi-bitrate DD).

-dave

 

[Joe Schwartz]

Mike,

Did you have a chance to try the Odyssee motion simulator before buying it? Although I've read about it, I haven't seen one in action. Personally, I don't think I'd enjoy watching movies that way.

In a theme park simulator, the ridefilm is designed to interact with the motion base, typically giving the viewer a first-person POV. But regular movies aren't ridefilms, and the viewer is usually meant to be a third-person observer, not a first-person participant in the action. I'm skeptical that a motion base would add anything to the movie-watching experience.

 

[Mike Poindexter]

Joe,

I have indeed been on the motion simulator. There was one at the Widescreen Review open house. While the rides are first person POV and movies are third person POV, the simulator still adds to the experience. You must think of it like this: while watching The Perfect Storm, you are not looking through the eyes of one of the people, but you are more like an observer on the boat who doesn't interact with the characters. Being on the boat, you should feel it move. Now you do.

I have felt the subwoofer seats and never really liked them, as it felt like I was being shocked with a cattle prod when action came around. This unit is more addative to the film and is VERY impressive. I, too, was not a believer until I experienced one. I felt that it could be good, but it could be bad - just depending on how well done it was. Believe me, this unit is a winner. Comparing this to a buttkicker is like comparing HDTV to black and white NTSC.

You must first realize that this machine is much more subtle than the ride simulators, which tend to be very jerky. Most of the motion I get in the ride simulators is a massive swing when changing directions, but with this unit, there is more put into the more subtle motions that just add to the feeling. Remember that a ride only has to be "cool" for a couple of minutes. This thing must be cool for a lot longer and cannot fatigue you so quickly. I can't imagine what it would be like to ride Star Tours for 2 hours non-stop. For many scenes in a movie, the Odyssee isn't even active, but it comes to life in the action sequences, or scenes where a movement/vibration effect would add to the experience.

I understand your skepticism, but unless you have tried one out, you really don't have anything to go on other than theory about what it would ro wouldn't add. If you want to try one, look them up and see who in your area has one on display.