Blu ray v HD-DVD?

So guys thoughts... which is the better format?

I watched Rocky 6 on Blu-Ray on a 1080i Philips TV through a PS3 and to me it seemed that when it is native (ie shot HD) the quaility was gob smacking. Otherwise it was impressive but HD-DVD seemed to be the more robust, consistant format (Serenity was outstanding - again XBOX360 playing HD-DVD drive)

So which is better and will either format win...

Anyone else?
 
It only depends on the person who is authoring the HD-Format. Both HD-DVD and BluRay can deliver very nice quality. As noone one the format war between DVD-R and DVD+R, I expect the same outcome with the new HD formats.
 
It all depends on the movies you want to watch. So far, BluRay has 7 of the major studios on board whereas HD-DVD has only one or two major studios (universal being the primary) as exclusives. Some are producing both formats. The mantra over the last 6 months was always "cost, cost, cost". but I just picked up a Sony BDP-S300 on Saturday for $499, and now they're running a promotion of 5 free BD movies with the Purchase of any BD player from July 1st onwards for about 6-8 weeks. HD laid down the gauntlet by offering free movies, now the BluRay camp has responded. Cost is no longer a factor so HD-DVD just lost its biggest advantage.

So far, I've watched Tears of the Sun, We Were Soldiers, Rocky Balboa and a couple others (the latter four rented from Hollywood Video). I am about to watch Apocolypto, Babel and Seven Years in Tibet (two of which also rented). I own two movies so far becuase Fry's was offering 2 movies for $25 so I bought two with the player. I'm running HDMI to a 73" Mitsubishi 1080p DLP rear projection TV with 6.1 discrete sound. Broadcast HD was never this good! I've had HD broadcasting for 3-4 years at least, and my major complaint was macro blocking during heavy action. You won't see that with either HD format, and both are good formats. It's all going to come down to the content. With the $499 BD player (and that price will drop) and Toshiba HD-DVD players dropping to $299, I will most likely own both formats by Christmas. With prices like this, why choose? :)

If you have kids, you'll want BluRay because Disney is exclusive to the format, although I hear the Harry Potter franchise is going to HD-DVD.

A side note, don't buy The Fifth Element yet. The BD transfer sucks (they had it on demo at Fry's, and I concur that the picture quality is crap). They're in the process of remastering it and Sony is offering an exchange for those who already bought it. Remastered version is due out sometime this month.
 
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Incidentally, at some point in the future it may not matter which format you go with today because studios are already planning dual format discs

This kills me... How much will they have to compress the picture to get BOTH HD formats on the same disc?? And if there are any additional featurettes and the like, they'll have to compress it even more.
 
Heh... I guess the chances of the best technology being owned by the company with the biggest promotional muscles and/or money is pretty slim.

Could've been the mastering that was the difference?
 
Already doing it. Who needs BluRay or HD-DVD when you have USENET and DVRs?

But I do say that when the HD Star Trek Original Series DVDs come out on HD-DVD, I think that is the day I will break down and buy a next-gen player.

As for Sony, I was saying that they didn't quite have the promotional capability to out-muscle the consortium that was backing JVC's VHS format, at least that's what I understood the political situation to be regarding that particular format war.

I think Mini-Disc was a technology that arrived just ahead of its time, and that was just marginally too costly at the time. When Mini-Disc came out, people were still buying CDs instead of using MP3's. The perception at the time was that the Mini-Disc was inferior to the CD because it used "compression" technology. I remember the campaign was such that Sony claimed "we're just removing the stuff you can't really hear anyway," but people weren't buying the "less is more" argument. Mini-Disc also claimed "no skip while jogging," but by that time CD players were available that cached the data and played back from a buffer to eliminate skipping.

Then MP3's happened and people forgot all about sound quality in favor of portability.
 
Here's the real story why JVC's technically inferior VHS tape beat out Sony's Beta technology: Pr0n

When the two were released, Sony said NO to distribution of pr0n using Beta. JVC said YES and a new industry was born.

Recently, Sony was asked about licensing Blu-Ray to the 'famous six' pr0n distributors. Sony said NO. The HD-DVD consortium stepped right up and said YES.

Now, you THINK HD-DVD would win this round, right? It's still 50/50 at this time and it looks like Blu-Ray has a slight lead right now (only because of Sony's tie-ins and the PS3 gaming platform push).

It's anyone's game. HD-DVD looks better, but Sony might pull it off by bullying. <shrugs>
 
Now, you THINK HD-DVD would win this round, right? It's still 50/50 at this time and it looks like Blu-Ray has a slight lead right now (only because of Sony's tie-ins and the PS3 gaming platform push).

It's anyone's game. HD-DVD looks better, but Sony might pull it off by bullying. <shrugs>

Pr0n doesn't want HD period, because otherwise they'll have to start naming and giving credit to all the pimples on the herpes-ridden pr0nsters' bottoms.
 
Already doing it. Who needs BluRay or HD-DVD when you have USENET and DVRs?

Because the bandwidth available for uncompressed audio and high-bitrate video isn't there yet. I've watched HD with my DVR for over two years now, and that quality cannot touch either HD-DVD or Blu-ray.

But I do say that when the HD Star Trek Original Series DVDs come out on HD-DVD, I think that is the day I will break down and buy a next-gen player.

The original Star Trek series barely has enough original bandwidth for standard defition DVDs let alone high-definition. This was a television series meant for broadcast over the airwaves (analog, not digital like today). Analog TV signals are 512 lines for PAL (plus overscan) and 460 lines for NTSC (plus overscan) interlaced. This translates to roughly 720x576 (PAL) or 720x480 (NTSC) maximum resolution. HD-DVD and Blu-ray are at least 720p (1280x720) and at best 1080p (1920x1080) progressive. Studio cameras of the past cannot touch high-definition picture quality of today. What you have on standard definition DVD is the best you're going to get unless you use upconversion. But you still can't add detail that isn't there to begin with.

Standard definition DVDs are running 4-8 Mb (megabits) on average whereas Blu-ray is 42 Mb (HD-DVD is 36Mb), moving up to 10 times more information per second to your television. Try moving 42 Mbits of data on a single channel over your cable or satellite signal. It isn't going to happen anytime soon. And unless you are downloading content over the web that is 10+ Gig in size, it's highly compressed and you're not getting near the quality.
 
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Were they for sure shot on studio video cameras?

This page says they were shot on 35mm as were most TV shows of the time (or 16): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060028/technical

And they have been now mastered to HDCAM @ 1080@24p.

I bet they will be gorgeous to watch the way they were shot.

If they had all of the original film footage and scanned it in high resolution, then that would be fan freaking tastic.

Actually, it looks like they did. Woo hoo! Shows how out of touch I am. I haven't been following recent developments in the original series.

Now I wonder what HD format they'll use to release it...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Original_Series#Remastered_series

Remastered series

In September 2006, CBS Paramount Television began syndication of an enhanced version of Star Trek: The Original Series in high definition with new state-of-the-art CGI visual effects.[11] These are being done under the supervision of Mike Okuda, technical consultant to the show. All live action footage was scanned in high definition from its original 35 mm film elements, while visual effects shots have been digitally reproduced. Notable changes include new space shots with a CGI Enterprise, and other new models (a Gorn ship is shown in Arena for example), redone matte background shots, and other minor touches such as tidying up viewscreens, etc. A small number of scenes have also been recomposed, and in some cases new actors have been placed into the background of some shots.[12] In addition, the opening and closing music has been re-recorded in digital stereo.

The first episode to be released to syndication was "Balance of Terror" on the weekend of September 16, 2006. Episodes are being released at the rate of about one a week and broadcast in 4:3.

While the CG shots have already been mastered in 16:9 for future applications, they are currently broadcast along with the live action footage in the original 4:3 TV format to respect the show's original composition. If the producers choose to reformat the entire show for 16:9, live action footage would have to be recropped, widening the frame to the full width of the 35 mm negatives while trimming its height by nearly 30%; though this would add a marginal amount of imagery on the sides, much more would need to be eliminated from the top and bottom of the frame to fit.
 
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