Blue-Ray or HD DVD

[JGouse0498]

That's crazy. What kind of set up where you watching the demo on? Was it full 1080p? HD DVD blows standard DVD out of the water and its video fidelity is definitely on par with Blu Ray.

Don't know. Both were side-by-side at Best Buy, so I'd imagine that they are set-up similarly. Maybe they were cutting corners the day they did the displays???

On a side note, am I the only one who's starting to see this thread spiral into the home video equivalent of Medi vs. SSC???

 

[JGouse0498]

Unfortunately, that is comparing apples to oranges. How well the movie displays depends on the transfer performed by the studio rather than what media format they distribute on. From what I understand, the *only* way to compare Blu-Ray to HD-DVD is to compare identical transfers of the same movie.

Well, seeing as how I don't own an HD-DVD player, my comparisons are limited to what the stores choose to show on HD-DVD. Perhaps they should start loading the same movies into the players?

 

[JGouse0498]

King Kong in HD is a HUGE upgrade over the DVD...your two cents aren't even worth that much!

Wow...thanks for being completely ignorant and rude to me.

Seeing as how I've owned DVD since 1998, I'm pretty used to knowing how DVD transfers look from many different companies, and the HD-DVD King Kong I saw at Best Buy looked not much better than the best DVD transfers.

But if this discussion is going to turn into another crap-fest because of posters like you, then I'll gladly leave the proverbial room.



And Tom, wow, man...that's a big chunk of change sitting in your high-def library!! Kudos to you!!!!

 

[Natrix]

Wow...thanks for being completely ignorant and rude to me.

Seeing as how I've owned DVD since 1998, I'm pretty used to knowing how DVD transfers look from many different companies, and the HD-DVD King Kong I saw at Best Buy looked not much better than the best DVD transfers.

But if this discussion is going to turn into another crap-fest because of posters like you, then I'll gladly leave the proverbial room.



And Tom, wow, man...that's a big chunk of change sitting in your high-def library!! Kudos to you!!!!

I was JOKING around hence the , little touchy are we or just lashing out at me because others don't agree with you?

You are entitled to your opinion but like I said to ME and many others here, there is a noticeable difference from standard DVD otherwise why would any of us get any movie in a HD format? However, since you mention King Kong looking no better than a DVD do a little search on any AV forum and you will find that everyone says King Kong is a vast improvement over the DVD and one of the best HD transfers around.

 

[user 1190]

Anyone have any idea how to convert or transfer a HD-DVD or BluRay to a regular DVD.

Ok before I get all the why questions and everything, I plan to buy most of my movies on HD from here on out but I also would like to be able to watch some new movies on my portable DVD player for long plane rides and stuff like that without buying the same movie twice.

 

[tomandshell]

I don't think they always know what they are doing when they set up displays at chain stores. I can't count how many times I have seen a DVD player set to 4:3 hooked up to a 16:9 display so that the image is distorted and stretched out horizontally.

I can tell much more of a difference between the regular and high def versions of King Kong (I have both and have directly compared them) than the first Spider-Man movie (which I have also compared). I would call Spidey 1 on Blu-ray practically indistinguishable from a standard def upconvert. However, that doesn't speak for the format. Ratatouille and Cars and Open Season look astonishing. Most reviews of Warner dual-format titles admit that they look identical, whichever version you choose.

 

[darthviper107]

Anyone have any idea how to convert or transfer a HD-DVD or BluRay to a regular DVD.

Ok before I get all the why questions and everything, I plan to buy most of my movies on HD from here on out but I also would like to be able to watch some new movies on my portable DVD player for long plane rides and stuff like that without buying the same movie twice.

It's really difficult, I tried searching for some tutorials on how to do it but it really seems complex and I couldn't find something that was really clear.

By computer you would have to have a program that can copy the disc to your hard drive in a format that you can use and then convert that to some other formats and then burn it to a DVD. But I think the most simple way to do it would be to send the HD-DVD or Blu-Ray player through a DVD Recorder and just record the movie to a disc, although you'd have to use component to get past the HDCP protection in the digital signal of HDMI.

 

[tomandshell]

I would like to put some movies on my iPod but so far I have no way to do that.

 

[darthviper107]

I would like to put some movies on my iPod but so far I have no way to do that.

There are some programs for converting DVD's directly to your Ipod, but it would take a lot of work to go from an HD format. Plus, if you convert from a DVD you can get problems, for instance with Star Wars it will play through the opening crawl in each language along with the end credits and you'd have to edit that out or deal with it. Really the easiest way to put your movies on your Ipod is to try and download the movie from somewhere online which will be a smaller file size and already be edited and can go directly into the Ipod conversion program. But again, that'd be kinda illegal.

 

[Kabukiman]

The best (and free!) way to get DVD's on your iPod or any other device is Handbrake: https://handbrake.m0k.org/

Won't work with HD or Blu-Ray though, sorry. I want to know how to convert high-def DVD's to standard as well because there is no way I'll be buying my son a HDTV and high-def DVD player for his room any time soon, and I really don't want to buy the same title twice.

 

[Darklord Dave]

I have HD and Blu-ray now and I'm a little hard pressed to notice any difference between them and an upconverted regular DVD. HOwever I haven't compared the same films.

I happen to have 300 in both HD and BD and flipped back and forth between them and really couldn't tell any difference at all on my 1080p TV.

Right now it seems Harry Potter OotP on HD is outselling the BD version, I bought the box set in HD, I'll be comparing the earlier movies to the regular DVDs that I have.

 

[tomandshell]

The HD DVD versions of the last two Potter films each have an IME ("In Movie Experience"/picture in picture commentary) that is not present on their Blu-ray counterparts. However, the Blu-ray version of OOTP has a 45 minute TV special that the HD DVD version doesn't. So each format has something exclusive.

I went for the HD DVD because I wanted to see the IME clips, which is new material filmed by the cast just for the video release VS. the rehashed TV special on the BR (which is apparently made up primarily of footage from the previous films anyway). The fourth movie's IME is hosted by the actors who play Fred & George Weasley, and the fifth one has Danielle Radcliffe & Co. It's neat that they go to the trouble to participate and film bonus materials that such a relatively small amount of people will ever see, lol. I am also able to listen to the Dolby TrueHD soundtrack on the HD DVD (through the six channel output), whereas the PS3 will not output uncompressed audio via optical (so I would only be getting 2.0 sound). So that is another selling point for me.

 

[Darklord Dave]

I know it's no fault of the format, but HD just pissed me off because my player couldn't play the new Harry Potter without an update. Good to know about the IMEs, sounds like I made the right choice (provided I can get the player working).

I hope the TrueHD sound works through HDMI.

 

[tomandshell]

My problem is that I don't have an HDMI capable receiver. My surround sound system has six channel analog input, digital coaxial, and optical--but no HDMI. However, my stand alone HD DVD player decodes the TrueHD audio signal and will output it via the six channel connection to the receiver. So I am able to listen to it that way.

 

[Natrix]

I know it's no fault of the format, but HD just pissed me off because my player couldn't play the new Harry Potter without an update. Good to know about the IMEs, sounds like I made the right choice (provided I can get the player working).

I hope the TrueHD sound works through HDMI.

Updates are also required on the Blu Ray players though too, maybe not for the HP movies but in general they need to be kept updated as well.

 

[KitFisto]

Updates are also required on the Blu Ray players though too, maybe not for the HP movies but in general they need to be kept updated as well.

Exactly how do you "update" a stand alone Blu Ray player? Or an HD DVD player?

 

[Gruson]

Exactly how do you "update" a stand alone Blu Ray player? Or an HD DVD player?

Either burn an update disc or have them connected to the Internet. All of my players are connected.

 

[KitFisto]

Either burn an update disc or have them connected to the Internet. All of my players are connected.

My PS3 and XBox 360 players are connected, but my stand alone players are not. I would assume the data needed for an update would be on the manufacturer website and is a simple "data disc"?

 

[IrishJedi]

Yeah, most (if not all) HD players have ethernet ports and use integration with the internet. HD DVD in particular utilizes this on quite a few of its titles. And it makes firmware upgrades a snap.

 

[KitFisto]

Yeah, most (if not all) HD players have ethernet ports and use integration with the internet. HD DVD in particular utilizes this on quite a few of its titles. And it makes firmware upgrades a snap.

Do you mean a "Update needed" pop up when you try to play the movie? Then just plug it in to your server and and hit "update"? If so, yeah that's a piece of cake.