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HDDVD and Blu-Ray Discussion Part XVII - The Beat Goes On..


JoeyN

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Do not get the Samsung

 

That bad? Not being one that read much into Blu-ray, I vaguely remember reading how bad the Samsung units were but then saw mentioned somewhere about a firmware update. I just assumed that whatever was wrong was corrected. Guess not.

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They have improved since the update, but its still considered to be the bottom of the BR hardware list. I recently saw a updated one in action, and the picture quality is not as good at the PS3, Panny and Pioneer. Better then it used to be though

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I have been reading about BR/HD DVD stuff on HTF and someone mentioned the "Family Friendly" audio track that bleeps out the bad words in Crank so he can watch it with his kids. I have never seen the movie but someone mentioned that it's full of utter violence, drugs and nudity so it's quite odd they would choose this movie to add this feature to. :lol: I think I'm gonna go order this at Amazon now. :D

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That bad? Not being one that read much into Blu-ray, I vaguely remember reading how bad the Samsung units were but then saw mentioned somewhere about a firmware update. I just assumed that whatever was wrong was corrected. Guess not.

 

Angel, the only future proof Blu Ray device on the market is the PS3 (and by all accounts no standalone unit is actually meant to significantly better the image quality the PS3 spits out). All the standalone players are compromised in on way or another.

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The Good Shepherd comes to HD DVD on the 2nd of March. It will be a combo release, but no firm specs have been announced thus far.

 

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Universal/Disc_Announcements/Universal_Brings_The_Good_Shepherd_to_HD_DVD/452

 

Here's the Nutty Prof artwork Adam mentioned:

 

mznqrgy2vyso-1nuttyprof.jpg

 

... and we also have Eternal Sunshine artwork:

 

9x0rlmb15b4g-1eternalsunshine.jpg

 

*edit* Both of the above will street on the 24th of April.

 

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (HD DVD)

1080p High Definition Widescreen 1.85:1

Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 (English & French)

English [sDH] & French Subtitles

Bonus materials:

- Feature Commentary with Director Michel Gondry and Writer Charlie Kaufman

- A Look Inside Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

- A Conversation with Jim Carrey and Director Michel Gondry

- A Conversation with Kate Winslet and Director Michel Gondry

- Deleted Scenes

- Polyphonic Spree "Light & Day" Music Video

- Lacuana Commercial

- Inside the mind of Director Michel Gondry

- Anatomy of a Scene: Saratoga Avenue

- Deleted / Exteneded Scenes

 

 

The Nutty Professor (HD DVD/DVD Combo)

1080p High Definition Widescreen 1.85:1

Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 (English & French)

English [sDH] & French Subtitles

Bonus Materials (DVD Side):

- Theatrical trailer

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The feature list looks solid on that one.

 

Save for adding DD+ decoding, better scaling/deinterlacing chip via the Reon and an ethernet port for updates there was no indication in their CES powerpoint slideshow, or in the press releases or spec details from Samsung that the player is really any more functional with regards to advanced BD-J/PiP than the BDP-1000 is. If it can't meet the 1.1 spec (and predating the 2q/3q testing phases with a March/April release it may not be able to) then it'll be a solid doorstop and little more.

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I have been reading about BR/HD DVD stuff on HTF and someone mentioned the "Family Friendly" audio track that bleeps out the bad words in Crank so he can watch it with his kids. I have never seen the movie but someone mentioned that it's full of utter violence, drugs and nudity so it's quite odd they would choose this movie to add this feature to. :lol: I think I'm gonna go order this at Amazon now. :D

 

We just watched Crank via Netflix last week (or maybe two weeks?). Anyhow, we checked out the Family Friendly version for a laugh. I hope I'm not spoiling anything by saying within the first two minutes of the film there's a certain object with a bad word written on it in sharpie...and that bad word is clear as daylight in the family friendly version, so I wouldn't exactly call it friendly :)

 

Very surprisingly entertaining movie, though!

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The HD DVD Promotions Group are seemingly making their silly leaps of faith again. What on Earth might have prompted them to add Jaws, E.T and Jurassic Park to the forthcoming content list (as of the 29th) I’ve no idea, but they’re on there. Most odd, especially since Universal chair the Promotions Group.

 

Here’s the list for what it’s worth (and past experience has proved it to be worth little):

http://www.hddvdprg.com/eng/list/list.pdf

 

 

They're still showing The Aviator as a Universal title which I think speaks volumes about the lists reliability.

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I have been reading about BR/HD DVD stuff on HTF and someone mentioned the "Family Friendly" audio track that bleeps out the bad words in Crank so he can watch it with his kids. I have never seen the movie but someone mentioned that it's full of utter violence, drugs and nudity so it's quite odd they would choose this movie to add this feature to. :lol: I think I'm gonna go order this at Amazon now. :D

 

That someone was me. I love Crank, but to consider it for kids because it has a fake 'family friendly' track without actually looking at the content?? Wow. :) Great film, and supposedly a great HD disc.

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Dan,

Jaws was recently shown on Uni-HD last Friday in OAR(with psuedo 5.1).

 

There I go again sounding like Adam :)

 

Usually with titles thrown onto that list there is at least some kind of public reference to a film having been mentioned once, even if it were on a whim like LOTR which is partly why that list is such a pathetic reference to take at face value. Even still, I just don’t know where they plucked those three from as nobody (except for Adam :) ) has even speculated they might appear anytime soon or made any hint in the press that they might do so.

 

I’d still expect a title like Munich, and/or Amistad (and at best Pvt Ryan) to surface before any of those do. E.T is 25yrs old this year but even that I don’t think would be enough to see it arrive on HD DVD anytime soon although after how wonderfully they treated the film for it’s 20th anniversary on DVD Universal might find HD DVD to be the best avenue to cash in on its 25th rather than trying to churn out another DVD version. Difficult to tell.

 

Spielberg biggies I think can firmly remain in the "believe it when I see it" category. Releasing a few would certainly allow HD DVD to have a bit of a breather in having to contend with content coming from Blu Ray however.

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Dan,

Jaws was recently shown on Uni-HD last Friday in OAR(with psuedo 5.1).

 

There I go again sounding like Adam :)

 

I hope Universal opts to do a restoration on JAWS before releasing it on HD DVD, because I watched the UHD airing and the print had some serious white flecks and scratches, and if this was obvious on cable HD I fear what my favorite movie would look like on HD DVD in this state.

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Those wondering about DTS MA on the PS3 here was Paidgeeks response when asked about it

 

I can't speak for Sony Computer regarding PS3 updates, but expect some good things to come.

 

 

As for Jaws/ET/JP listed. I like Jaws, but Jurassic Park is the one that I want the most. Don't think it will happen though, but it would be nice

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Nice post from Alex (amillians) at AVS summarising the whole BD-J/PiP goings on with Blu Ray at the moment:

 

Lionsgate used a bit of trickery in creating "PiP" on The Descent by leveraging two complete video streams and using BD-J to switch from primary to secondary. The "PiP" stream (which can only be selected from the menu, as it's not true PiP) is identical to the movie stream, just with the PiP window burned into it. On the plus side, this solution works on any Blu-ray player (even the Samsung and the Philips, neither of which have a second video decoder onboard), as you're just switching the stream, not overlaying a PiP stream on top of the primary stream (which requires not only two video decoders, but the firmware to take advantage of this). On the downside, a lot of people fell for the ruse, thinking their/all Blu-ray players supported PiP, which they do not...yet (for some players that *do* have secondary video decoder hardware on board, such as the Pioneer and the Sony, PiP is in theory possible with a firmware upgrade, but CEs are loathe to release any info on what the future holds for owners).

 

Some have argued that as long as the viewer can't tell the difference, it doesn't matter. But you eat up twice the disc space and halve the bandwidth using this technique, so it's not viable for most films, even on a BD50.

 

Outside of this little broohaha, there was a secondary (non-related) issue of the Sony and the Pioneer not being able to play this title, owing to issues with the Esmertec BD-J stack on those units not getting enough love and attention during compliance testing. Originally, some tried to position this as a Lionsgate authoring issue, but both Sony and (eventually) Pioneer noted that there were BD-J compatibility issues with their units. Sony has fixed the issue; the Pioneer fix is forthcoming (if it hasn't already dropped).

 

As to "full" BD-J, no titles are currently pressing the bounds of what BD-J can do: it's all menus and games right now. When a *real* PiP tilte comes along that uses BD-J to handle the overlay/positioning, that would at least bring Blu-ray on par with what HDi is currently delivering on all HD DVD hardware. That doesn't mean BD-J isn't "full," just that it's being limited to easy stuff at the moment. Both HDi and BD-J have to prove themselves on network interactivity: this has already been demo'd on shipping HD DVD hardware; BD-Live hardware still is an unknown, as it's an optional profile and wasn't mentioned at CES (or at the last BDA meeting).

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Looking forward to seeing Hitchhikers again since the only time I got to see it was when my son was sick, which means I didn't really get to see it. :)

 

To me thats a good thing. I actually enjoyed the first half of the film, then to me it fell apart as a film. IMO

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