What originally got you into DVD....... (1 Viewer)

[Mitch Stevens]

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[Paul J Anderson]

i got into DVD for one reason: Widescreen

i was never able to afford Laserdisc, but i love movies, so i had to go with VHS. i hated how they were mostly Pan/Scan, but there was nothing i could do about it. i rememeber hearing buzz about this new format called DVD, but didn't pay much attention to it because the players were so expensive. then, when my local Tower video started to shelve DVDs for rental and sale, i began to browse through them. i was astonished to see they were almost all in widescreen and priced much lower than Lasers. i had no clue what anamorphic was or Dolby Digital/DTS for that matter. all i cared about was widescreen. but, i still couldn't afford a player. summer 2000 rolls around and my roomate decides to take the plunge. he had a VHS collection as well, but wasn't a widescreen nut like me. he just wanted to get into the format. the night he came home with it, i ran out and bought 5 DVDs. Raising Arizona, Robocop: Criterion, The Insider, Independence Day: 5 Star and Ronin. happy days at last.

a couple of months later my roomate bought a house and i had to move into a smaller apartment. my collection had already blossomed to 25 discs and he hadn't even bought one yet. now i had no place to play them. finally in November 2000 i bought my own. a Sony SAVA-D900 home theater system and a 36" WEGA. i was finally able to experience Dolby Digital/DTS and anamorphic video. i was blown away. i finally stumbled onto this place in Jan 2001 while looking for info on what anamorphic video really was. this place has taught me soo much and i want to thank all of you. now, i have a LD player as well. what a hobby!

 

[Andrew Chong]

The first I heard about what would eventually become the DVD we all know and love after reading an article many moons ago in a computer magazine about the latest breakthroughs in laser technology and a 'compact disc like media' that could hold gigabytes of information (complete with the requisite description of how many billions of 3.5" floppies could fit onto a single disc). I was immediately intrigued.

Years later, dvd as we know it arrived and bang, home viewers can now experience movies with discrete surround sound and unsurpassed moving image. I love sound, so that was a major plus for me.

 

[Jenna]

I generally dislike seeing movies in theaters unless I go at a time when there is nobody there; I hate all the cell phones, talking, incorrect matting, and other common distractions.

I feel the same way...and usually will hit the theaters Monday afternoon to avoid the increasing rude audiences.

I was also so tired of the rewind/fast-forward mentality of VCRs...not to mention the shorter life span, and quality degredation every time you watched a videotape. Not to mention the bulky, fragile format.

DIVX originally attracted me to DVD, although it went belly up only a month later (but CC then gave me a $100 rebate on the player). No matter, the it played DVDs so I was in heaven. "Mask of Zorro" was my first DVD and my first experience with those "black bars". The next day, I upgraded to a 32" TV. Continued to upgrade until I had a Home Theater that was worthy. Along the way, the DVDs still kept their pristine condition, and with each upgrade, became clearer and sounded better.

I love the special features, alternate endings, commentaries, and gag reels; not to mention being able to purchase the movie on DVD months before the VHS version would be available.

With the exception of a few setbacks (like Disney releasing features ONLY in Pan&Scan), the DVD just keeps getting better and better.

 

[Michael Caicedo]

I started with LaserDiscs. Just naturally progressed to DVD.

 

[Lars Vermundsberget]

Around 1999-2000 it became hard to find new laserdiscs...

 

[Scott Leopold]

Blazing Saddles in widescreen.

 

[Steven_J_H]

I love Star Trek. When the movies were announced as coming out on laserdisc WIDEscreen, I had to buy a ld player (somewhere around 1990). I bought my first combo player in 1997. About a week later divx was announced and I thought uh-oh format war. But fortunately for all DVD is king.

 

[Dave H]

The video and audio quality is what got me into DVD. It opened up a whole new experience to watching movies. I remember seeing a DVD being played at Media Play and thought it looked so good. Of course, at that time, the typical "entry-level" player was around $500-600. About a year later (Dec. '99) I bought one.

The first two DVDs I bought were Heat and Matrix. It was a great experience and still is.

 

[Ted Todorov]

Unlike practically everyone here, I was not videophile before DVD. In fact I did not have a TV, nor had I ever owned a TV. I saw TV as I waste of time (I could be going to the movies instead).
Then in January of '99 I upgraded to a new Mac, a B&W G3 with a DVD drive, and bought Leaving Las Vegas just to try it out. I was floored by the picture/sound quality, the widescreen presentation and the fact the the film was uncut.
The rest is history: I now have well over 500 DVDs, a widescreen TV, and an excellent AV receiver and speakers. Still no TV though (no antenna, no cable and in fact, no NTSC tuner)...
Ted

 

[AllenD]

An informercial stating DVDs will have OAR/widescreen presentation.
Ted,
Try an ATSC tuner.

 

[Scott_MacD]

I was a J6P..
I was shown the light by a friend, who invited me to watch The Matrix on laserdisc, only a few months after I saw it in the cinema. The crisp, uncompressed PCM stereo sound floored me by comparison to VHS. The clean picture, and the fact that I didn't have to rewind.
A quick ignorant rant by about widescreen later, and this eternally patient friend asked me how many times I'd seen Star Wars. I replied "Too many.". He showed me the assault on the Death Star in letterbox, and I saw the differences for myself. He then showed me Ghostbusters : Criterion. I gasped. The extras, the fact that you could see all four ghostbusters in the frame at once, sold me.
He then told me that there was a format called DVD which had all of the advantages of laserdisc. I got an overdraft, put down £350 for a player and 5 discs, and have pretty much stayed overdrawn for two years, upgrading my HT and buying loads of movies. It's been fun.
P.S. My friend resisted DVD for as long as he could, but he's joined us.

 

[Jeff_HR]

I could find Laserdisks at retail any longer.

 

[nousername]

I bought my first DVD player a year ago (Panasonic DVD-RV31) primarily to play MP3s that I had burned onto CD-Rs. The ability to play DVDs was just an afterthought. The first DVD I played on my 27" TV (a non-HDTV Sony Trinitron) was Chicken Run, and the quality blew me away.
Since then, I have upgraded my TV to a Sony KV-36XBR450 and now have well over a hundred DVDs. My MP3 collection has been collecting dust, and my pocketbook is now a lot lighter!

 

[Josh Pounds]

Well, mine's pretty simple. When Merlin first debuted on television, I was absolutely enthralled with the movie...I bought the tape when it was released, only to be very, very disappointed when I found out there was a very very large chunk of the movie missing. (I was young when this happened...) Anyways, I had to buy the DVD. My first two DVDs were The Fifth Element and Merlin. My story.

 

[Jeff(R)]

What Got Me Into DVD
In 1995 I bought a 53" rear projector, a prologic system and shortly after a DSS satellite system. VHS looked awful at that size and I was debating whether to get into Laserdisc, but I knew something else, something better was on the horizon.
I first heard about the competing standards (Philips/Sony and Toshiba/Warner) around 1995 and waited to see what would happen. Then in '96 the DVD standard was announced.
I watched as the Laserphiles began to panic, scream, moan, and yes sometimes lie, attacking the new DVD format at every opportunity, as if their lives depended upon it. It was amazing (and disturbing.) I watched alt.video.dvd grow as the newsgroup went from one, two, to three and more posts per day.
I decided to not purchase a first generation player, not due to doubts of the format's potential, but because I knew the first players might have bugs and that 2nd generation players would have DTS capability. I ordered a Panasonic 110 when they first become available.
Jeff

 

[Sean Moon]

Main reason I jumped all over DVD....widescreen! As another poster said, it is hard to be an OAR snob with a VCR.

The other thing that got me into DVD was the extra content.

 

[Ken Garrison]

Basically what attracted me to DVD was the better picture quality, sound and the fact I don't have to rewind. But then I noticed they were widescreen. All I hadda do is read on the back of the box, Presented in Letterbox to preserve original theatrical exhibition. I immediatly accepted it. Now I want NOTHING to DO with VHS when I'm shopping for a new movie or renting a movie. THEY SUCK. DVD IS THE SHIT MAN!!!!

 

[Talal]

onme thing got me into DVD: WIDESCREEN

gone were the days of searching through the tiny collection of widescreen titles at suncoast.

 

[Yumbo]

Apple Powerbook G3 came with a DVD drive as bonus.

LD died.

why not?

2,500 DVDs and counting - 1,000 a year, 100 a month, 3 a day, 1 every 8 hours.

the woman prefers them to things Apple.

smiles.

ps. I make my living off them now.