And that is probably the part that makes it tough to sell to the average Joe. Unless you see a side-by-side you don't know you are missing something. Every Joe with a VCR could tell they were missing out when they saw a dvd.

Well, it depends on the movie, too. Mad Max didn't seem that dramatic until I went back and forth between the two, but I just saw a clip of Police Academy 2, of all things, in high-definition, and I'd have a hard time taking anyone seriously who could confuse that with a DVD. Unless it's a movie with softer, grainier photography (like The Man Who Would Be King or All The President's Men), the difference is generally striking. I'd imagine the vast majority of the people who say that older movies won't benefit (or wouldn't benefit much) from a high-definition format haven't actually watched much of anything in HD.

Really, though, I couldn't care less if Joe Whoever can appreciate the difference or not. My eyes are the only ones that matter to me, and even though I'm sure DVD is good enough for a great many people, I'm not among them. I don't expect either format to be widely adopted for a pretty good while, I know I'm going to pay a premium to get movies in the best possible quality because of its limited market, and that's okay. My family got our first Laserdisc player in 1984, so this isn't exactly unfamiliar territory. :)

Sony isn't using a cartidge because of this TDK technology. Its called DURABIS. From the website:

It really is a remarkable thing. The coating is not only scratch resistant, but also smudge and dust resistant. Joe six pack treats their optical media like crap, so anything that prevents them from having to change their habits is a welcome feature. Like I will continue to say, Blu-Ray was designed with consumers in mind, while HD-DVD was made with movie studios in mind.

http://www.durabis.com/en/index.htm

It doesn't depend on the movie, per say. It depends on the guy at the board remastering for HD resolution. Recent film is much higher resolution than HD, so any movie that was filmed will benefit from a good HD transfer. SDTV is on video and stuck in lower resolution, no benefit.

The only way it depends on the movie is what condition the actual stored films are in. If they are beat to hell, remastering can't do much.

Semantics. :) You know what I meant.

This definately intrigues me. Since we know there will be BR disc out because of the PS3, we will get a good handle on how they do hold up. I hope it is all true, but I am skeptical of a coating that takes 300 passes from steel wool. Seems too good to be true.

I think the name is going to be a huge factor.

Just picture this... a dad or wife walking into a store, thinking "I want to buy my (husband, son, daughter, etc.) a High Def movie, I know they make High Definition movies".

The dad or wife asks the BB sales rep "Sir, do you sell High Defenition movies? I don't really know what they are, but my son/husband calls them high def".

BB rep "Yes, we sell HD-DVD, or Blu-Ray"

Dad/Wife immediatley equates HD to High Def. "I'll take the HD-DVD".

Your average consumer won't care which has higher capacity...but I'm guessing they'll buy whatever is named closer to the product.

Found this DVD-R with Durabis at CNet:

http://news.com.com/i/ne/p/2004/111504dvdscratch.jpg

Yes, it was still playable.

Edit: They have been selling these for a while. I've searched the CD Freak board, and it looks like everyone is happy with them. Couldn't find any reviews on the scratch resistant feature though.

I very strongly agree. If by some strange miracle these formats do merge, they'd be nuts to name it anything other than "HD-DVD". Everyone knows what "DVD" is. I'd guess most people know what "HD" is. Hardly anyone outside of people like us have a clue what a "Blu-Ray" is. Sure, that'll change somewhat when the PS3 comes out, but "DVD" has such high name recognition value that that alone could give it a huge advantage in the marketplace.

As for the scratch protection thing, there are murmurs that as effective as Durabis is, it's too expensive/too cumbersome to be used on a wide scale, and Blu-Ray might lean in a different direction despite what's been said. (Word is they're looking at a protective film over a hard coat.) As for whether or not that's true, I have no idea.

I have seen a lot of HD content, but my comment had more to do with the way studios treat older catalog titles than the technology itself. Maybe I'm being a pessimist, but I don't see them doing more than a simple upscaling to the same master they used for DVD, not unlike the same way an upscaling player does. Sure, it gives you the lines of resolution, but it's still not really HD, even if there's a noticeable difference.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for this and will buy into whichever format wins. I don't think I'll be repurchasing many of my titles, though.

Right, but there are a ton of high-definition masters already out there. The studios aren't starting from scratch. If they're willing to go to the time, effort, and expense to make such nice looking transfers of movies as obscure as <i>Hero at Large</i> and <i>Night of the Comet</i> (and they have), I think we're probably okay where everything else is concerned.

Agreed. (Although, as Adam says, for many titles there are already existing HD masters.)

The point you are making is one of the many reasons that I'll be taking this eventual upgrade/transition VERY slowly. I'm going to be pretty pissed after reading a rave review of a title to find that (after purchase) it basically looks identical to my upscaled standard-def DVD. It's going to take a while to find sites/reviewers that I trust. ;)

Sure, there will be good ones out there, maybe I made it sound like none would be, if so, I didn't mean to. I think it will really be on a studio by studio basis. Some will go out of their way to put out a good product, others just won't. Kind of like it is now with some studios and DVD.

Night of the Comet? That's not even out on DVD, is there a HD version showing on cable or sattelite?

Yes, on HDNet Movies. If you have access to it, they show a bunch of older but still really fantastic looking movies, and that should ease your concerns some.

I don't think that'll be an issue for a while. The studios are sitting on enough really good transfers right now and will continue to hammer out more for the day/date releases, and that stockpile alone is more than they could realistically get out in the marketplace for years. TV-on-DVD -- aside from more recent shows and extremely high-profile older series -- is where I'd expect the difference between DVD and the high-definition formats to be marginal/non-existent.

There's something that hasn't been mentioned about TV on DVD in this thread. Even if the video quality on an HD format disc is the same as DVD, they'll be able to cut down on the number discs required because of the greater capacity. It's obviously not worth rebuying a season or series for 99% of the population, but it'd be a nice convenience to those who haven't bought the DVD version.

I actually don't think so. The price will be the same (as the cost to print the media is cheap anyway) and people will still pay an extra $10 or so because there is some "special 2 disc set" which will make the companies continue to make them, even if they don't need to. I don't see people (on average) paying for a special edition that has the same number of discs as the regular edition.

Ask 10 random people (average Joe consumer) the capacity of a normal dvd and see what they say. I bet 90% have no clue.

I think there are three level's of HT peoples...

Level 1 is your "VHS" guy. He is just recently bought a DVD player(or within the last few years) when they have gone down under $100 a unit. He buys only a select few movies and rents alot from local rental store. Pice isn't a concern because he either spends his money on other things or he dosen't have much to spend.

Level 2 is your "light" HT hobbyist. He purchased a DVD player when they came down to $300 or so. His reciever is in the $400 range and his TV is probably 1080i capable. He probably has around 200-300 DVD's. Price is a concern but only to a certain point.

Level 3 is the "whammy". Price is not a issue with him and he grabs the latest tech that hits the streets. Own's upwards to 1000 DVD's. He burns cash to heat his house.

Level 1 guy won't be interested in the next-gen DVD players. They offer nothing for his system(regular tube television) and he wont be willing to purchase the new players when they hit anyway.

Level 2 guy is probably a HD-DVD guy. The increase in DVD prices and fairly new players will be within his budget in a short time. Backwards compatability will be a high priority for this level.

Level 3 guy probably will be the Blue-Ray guy. Price isnt a issue and if it holds more capacity then all the better.

Me? Im level 2. Price is important to me. I don't want to have to pay more than $25 for a DVD and I would like to pay less if Im simply getting the movie with not alot of fluff. Backwards compatability is HUGE. I must have this in the next format. I have 200 DVDs and no more shelves in my cabnet for another player. It would be several years after the the new formats launch that I pick one up if its not backwards compatable.

Not to mention I have had some pretty bad dealings with Sony in the past. Im hoping everyone gets the HD-DVD format mindset.

Hmm. More like 20 levels. But your points are valid. Many won't even notice HD discs. It will be very interesting to compare the high-rez audio dual-headed mess with the video mess yet to come.

They will all be backwards compatible. They know as well as any of us that to NOT have these machines play DVDs would be the bonehead move of the decade in electronics, beating out Cablevision's Voom fiasco.

Here's a pretty good article on the coming war...

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...yndication=rss

There was also an article on slashdot yesterday. I find the "PS3 install base" logic quite compelling. In addition, there was a thread on AVSforum that contained photos of all HD-DVD and Blue loaders from the CES. IIRC, there were about 10 Blue loaders and only 2-3 HD-DVD loaders. That would not seem to bode well for HD-DVD ...

Fox is officially in the Blu-Ray camp, by the way.

I don't find the PS3 logic all that compelling. PS3 users have to have a HDCP enabled HDTV to take advantage of BD. Thus you can rule out analog only HDTV and Analog SD TV.

The studios support is pretty much even. Early adopters are going to need to have both units. It's likely that there will be a Xbox360 unit that supports HD-DVD as well.

What I'm hoping for is a Universal player. Hopefully samsung jumps on this once the pricing comes down on the parts.

It does not rule out SDTV or older HDTVs. It just means you cannot watch in HD res. Which is obvious for the SDTVs, very annoying for those with component-only HDTVs.

It truly is amazing that all this is just over the resolution. 480i downconversion is always available, copy that all you want.

The bad thing is that the HD-DVD players won't even send out full bandwidth video through the component outputs; it'll be downgraded to 480p. So there are a lot of people with HDTVs who won't even be able to take advantage of the new format since their displays don't have DVI or HDMI.

I think there are two mistakes being made right from the start: two different formats with studios backing different ones, and no full bandwidth video over component. I don't see how this is going to succeed, but I'd like to be wrong in this case.

But they'll need to sell a lot of players (at least a reasonable amount) before more obscure titles are released on the format, and that's something I don't see happening for a long time. So I really don't worry too much about buying current DVDs, especially catalog titles, because I think it will be years, if ever, before they're released on HD-DVD/Bluray. Again, I hope I'm wrong.

I also think older films can look great in HD. MonstersHD shows a lot of old, black and white low budget films, and some of them look amazing in HD. And there are some that look no better (and sometimes inferior) to the DVD, but that is more the exception than the rule.