Blu-Ray vs. HD DVD

[Bob]

Have to agree with you Bob. Reliable movie-on-demand with a decent catalog would probably win me over. The emphasis is on reliable *and* decent catalog. Neither of which are there presently. I'm currently viewing movies-on-demand through my cable service but the selection is pretty grim - mostly recent releases and a limited selection of moldy oldies. No catalog to watch anything other than what they are listing that month. I rely on my extensive DVD collection for most of my favorites.

Downloading won't cut it either. When I want to see a movie, I want to see it now. That means I'd be more likely to burn any downloaded movie to DVD anyway, and I'd much rather purchase a commercial copy and save the time and effort.

As for audio, MP3 isn't the best of quality, but it's good enough. Most people don't notice aural artifacts as much as they do visual ones. It's much more important for video to be high quality.

[Ken Jarstad]

I have little interest in commercial movie distribution. I am very interested in low-cost hi-def distribution of personal video.

WHAT WE NEED IS SOMETHING SIMILAR TO SVCD. AN HD FORMAT THAT UTILIZES CURRENT DVD TECHNOLOGY.

Personally I would be happy with 720p. And 20 ~ 40 minutes is plenty of time until the more mainstream products become reasonably priced.

I stumbled across this info on the HD VMD format which apparently has garnered some ground in the far-east because those folks are not happy about paying royalties for our DVD tech. Basically, their idea is use existing red LED tech but make a multi-layered media.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,136977-c,hometheatersystems/article.html
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070910-do-we-really-need-another-hd-format-hd-vmd-to-challenge-hd-dvd-blu-ray.html?rel

I looked at DivX since v6 supports HD, but existing upconverting DVD players with DivX won't support HD.

[Ken Jarstad]

How would you like to buy an upconverting DVD player for $89.99 usd that just so happens to also play hi-def movies and even comes with 7 "free" titles? That's what TigerDirect is now offering. And that seems to be a reasonable price for an upconverting DVD player. Hmmmm.........

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=3304908&sku=T24-9148&CMP=EMC-TIGEREMAIL&SRCCODE=WEM1567C

Here is the pitch from the sales email:

Folks,

Toshiba lost the war... but their pain is your gain!

I have an incredible deal for you. Did you know this HD-DVD player is also an incredible up-convert DVD player? This will usually run you around $79.99, but we're giving you an HD-DVD player for $89.99 with 7-FREE HD-DVD movies (2 in the box, and 5 by mail) a $140.00 value, FREE! This offer ends Feb 28th, so don't delay!

How did we get such a low price?

Sony and Toshiba have been battling over two high-definition formats. Blu-Ray (from Sony) and HD-DVD (from Toshiba). This week Toshiba announced they will stop producing the HD-DVD format and will work on the next generation device. As soon as we heard, we fought hard to get a new low price for you.
I succeeded: You get the HD-DVD player, 7 Free HD-DVD Movies (worth $140), and the up-convert capability for just $89.99.

Look, all of us have traditional standard format DVD movies. This HD-DVD player not only plays HD-DVD movies, but it also upconverts standard DVD movies to the HD signal. What does upconvert mean? It takes the standard definition signal and converts it into a high definition signal. While it's no comparison for a true HD-DVD, the upconversion process dramatically increases the quality of your old standard definition movies.

NOTE: Upconverting DVD players sell for around $79. I'm offering you an HD-DVD player, with built-in upconversion, and 7 FREE* movies (worth $140) for just $89. Heck, it's like paying nearly 50% for the movies and getting a free HD-DVD player.

Look, Toshiba has discontinued this item and will not make any more. Once we sellout of these, they're gone. This is a once in a decade event that just occurred. If you've been shopping for and HD-DVD player or an upconverting DVD player, this is the deal to get. But only if you hurry.

Regards,

Carl Fiorentino
President, TigerDirect.com

[Paul LS]

Good deal Ken. And I have heard they are one of the best up converting DVD players you can buy. Really worth it just for that... I wouldn't hesitate to buy one. But unfortunately we dont get those deals in the UK.

[Bobby]

I guess that if you need an upconvert player, that is not a bad deal. BUT otherwise I wouldn't touch it. Not worth the trouble for a few free movies.

Always forward, never look back!

Bob

[hpharley90]

I bought that one a few weeks before Christmas and when Warner Bros decided to go Blu Ray in mid January I returned it and bought the same one online that night from newegg.com.
$123.00 delivered to my door.
That's $80.00 less than I originaly paid.
I new if I waited a few weeks longer I could get one for less money.(like now) But seeing that model is the third DVD player I had bought in the matter of weeks and is the only one able to play my burned DVDs I needed it.

When my APEX died (and it played anything I put in it) I ended up with the HD-A3 after 2(SD) others that did not work.
It plays my burned DVDs (Taiyo Yuden-Verbatim -Rs) and makes them look great but it won't play DVD+RW or CDs.
I haven't tried my DVD-RW yet.
I'm glad I bought it.

[Ken Jarstad]

I have heard they are one of the best up converting DVD players you can buy.

I suggested to someone on the Afterdawn forum to get an upconverting DVD player and they said the low-end $40 upconverters do a poor job. I know that scan converters have been improving over the last couple of years but I didn't know there was an obvious, visible difference in the visual quality between a low-cost upconverter and a "lowest"-cost upconverter. Does anyone have experience with two such devices? I may not want to recommend the lowest-cost devices. And then of course I can obsess over whether the Toshiba is the "best" upconverter compared to my Sony - and so on.

[Ken Jarstad]

It has been over two weeks ago that I bought a Toshiba HD-DVD player at Costco. I haven't had time to evaluate it much yet but thought I would share my first impressions.

I was able to pick this unit in March, after the five free movies offer expired, for $79.99 usd. I picked it up mainly because it should be a great upconverter. I have only watched acouple of std-def movies with it so far, but my first impression is not good. The $100 Sony upconverter does a much better job! Perhaps I need to tweak it a bit. I'll see - sometime.

I expected a model HD-AD2 or HD-AD3 but I got HD-D3KU. Didn't even think to look until the other day. Checking Google I found that the D3 was made exclusively for Costco and is the same as the A3. <shrug>

[hpharley90]

What do you think of it now Ken?

[Ken Jarstad]

Hi Richard,

We are not avid movie watchers, so we haven't used it much. My secondary opinion is that the Sony is simply not trying so hard to provide a sharp picture. If I turn down the sharpness in the Emerson 32 inch panel when using the Toshiba then the picture looks about the same as the Sony.

I have also discerned from just a very few movies that the quality of movies varies a lot also. For instance, a major release shot on film - and top quality transfer to DVD - looks to be near-high definition. But a low-budget movie for the grandkids shot on video showed a great deal of flaws. A major release with poor quality DVD transfer shows lots of 'mosquito noise' around sharp edges.

This hi-def technology is still imature, IMO. Waiting for things to improve a bit is my recommendation. After all, standard definition DVD burning has taken until just the last two years to finally get reliable.