But why have 1 disc when you can have a "TWO-DISC Special Edition!!!"???

IF the TL discs won't be ready until a year from now anyway and
IF they won't play in earlier generation machines,
THEN that creates a serious problem, possibly enough a problem for the studios to not produce any TL discs for home movies.

PLUS given the consumer conditioning that The Bus mentioned earlier, there would be little incentive to develop TL discs for the mainstream. TWO-DISC SE would create much more "value" to the consumers than a ONE-DISC version, that even if the movie and extras came up to 45GB, they'd rather put it on two DL discs than one TL disc.

I would want a TL for long movies, instead of having to split between 2 discs.

So they don't count? Also, even if most early adopters don't mind buying a new HD DVD player every 2 years, and even plan to, the fact that the old player won't play all discs makes it near useless as a secondary player. Suddenly early adopters are paying twice for one fully functional player, instead of paying twice and having two fully functional players.

DTS wasn't added to the DVD spec later on.

http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html#1.32
"Contrary to uninformed claims, the DVD specification has included an ID code for DTS since 1996 (before the spec was even finalized)."

DTS on DVD is analogous to the optional audio formats on BD, where they're in the spec but not required. So far, TL isn't even an option in the HD DVD spec by most accounts, although some think it's possibly been planned for.

But if a studio has to press two discs anyway, why not just make a 2-disc DL set for everyone? This format war is confusing enough, I don't see many studios being eager to have possibly four different video discs on the shelves (DVD, BD, and 2 HD DVD).

Considering the compression ratios studios are claiming to get from VC-1 right now, it'd have to be a very long movie before it'd need to be split over two DL30 HD DVDs: Somewhere over 4 hours.

Unfortunately, this is often true in terms of companies getting new tech out the door. Hence the term bleeding edge. You bleed, not them.

Should point out that 4 different sets are already fairly common, just counting DVD. TFE is up to around 7 with the BD. LOTR has 4 for each flick. Etc.

Not all at the same time. And none of those are "incompatible" with others.

My point being, once again, that studios are not magically going to stop double-dipping or "SE-ing" us just because they can put 1080p on a disc. You and Jay and others seem to think they will do exactly what we collectors at DVDTalk want them to do to benefit our shelves the most. Which I find hilarious. Sorry.

Not sure what incompatible means, the discs don't do anything to/with each other. Do they? I mean, I don't watch them at night...maybe....

Well... if the original 1080p transfer was flawed, then the reissue (aka SE) could be justified.

However, trying to double dip on Batman Begins or Tokyo Drift is going to be pretty tough sale. There's only so many times you can use the whole "re-mastered in High Def" moniker.... and that shit aint going to fly on HD-DVD or even Blu-Ray unless they come up with some other crap to feed us.

That's the risk one takes when one chooses to become an early adopter. I've been an early adopter on many technologies. Sometimes everything works out smoothly, and sometimes there are unforeseen bumps in the road that make my early investment obsolete.

You're splitting some very fine hairs here. The very next sentence at dvddemystified reads:

"Because DTS was slow in releasing encoders and test discs, players made before mid 1998 (and many since) ignore DTS tracks."

So the fact remains that DTS was not fully supported by all DVD players from day one. Which was my only point.

Most accounts don't mean anything. The only account that means anything is the DVD Forum account. And at the present time, that account is still unknown.

Again, hearkening back to the introduction of DTS DVDs, there were many who claimed it would be too confusing for consumers. Why? Because many early DTS DVD releases were accompanied by separate, non-DTS releases. However, in the final analysis, it all worked out fine. I don't see this as being any different. Sure, brick and mortar retailers may not be thrilled with the idea, just as they aren't thrilled with having widescreen and fullscreen versions of DVDs today, but I doubt that companies such as Amazon would have a problem.

HDMI may be a good example of this, or those that bought HDTV before DVI or HDMI who have to deal with possible HDCP issues.

Still, DVD never changed in spec during its lifespan, and for the newer disc formats to do so would be detrimental to it, even if it's not unexpected by some early adopters.



DTS is not fully supported by all DVD players now. Most still don't decode it, and some may not be able to pass the signal to something that can. It's still an optional format that was included in the spec. TL is not currently in the HD DVD spec, not even as an optional format. If it is introduced into the spec, it'd have to be as a requirement, since I don't see studios creating discs with a full layer that may or may not play back in consumer's equipment.

At present time, HD DVD only officially goes up to 2 layers, according to the DVD Forum. That's all that's required at the moment. What's specualtion is whether TL will be added to the spec, and whether existing players will be backwards compatible.

Back then, you were still only dealing with two different releases, both of which would still work in any DVD player. In the proposed new split format, it would be creating another incompatible disc when other incompatible discs already exist.

Fortunately, both Warner Brothers and Paramount are not into the whole double dipping trend, unless it's necessary -- i.e. re-issuing old, non-anamorphic titles in remastered anamorphic form, or re-issuing very old titles, ala Blade Runner and Heat. Universal, Sony, and Fox, on the other hand, are not as frugal; Sony is the worst, though, with Fox not far behind.

It may be possible to create a disc that could have its first two layers read by any player, but the whole point of TL in the first place would be to spread a movie (and supplements in the video stream like IME) across the three layers. It wouldn't be worth it to make the third layer supplements only, when the studios would rather just include a second disc anyway.

I too doubt that studios will stop double-dipping. Current SL BDs are a perfect example of a double-dip waiting to happen. The difference though is that a DL BD double-dip will be playable on all BD players that were up to the original spec. A 2-disc SE HD DVD re-release of some titles are likely too. Even a TL HD DVD re-release may happen if TL become part of the standard required HD DVD spec and hardware compatiblity becomes very common.

What I don't see happening is simultaneous DL and TL HD DVD releases, especially if TL isn't a required spec and not playable on most machines. It'd be cheaper and wiser for the studios to use solely DL discs that are playable on all HD DVD players.

Oh, it's not that hard to figure out:

Batman Begins on HD DVD, now with all special features in HD!

I'm not joking. I'm positive that will be the first double dip studios attempt. Not necessarily for Batman, but that will be the selling point.

Oh... it definitely makes sense.

I was just thinking about the future.

Featurettes in True HD
Production Stills in 1080p
Seemless Branching with IME
Realtime Cast Commentary via the web.
IM the director via your Toshiba player.

.... Christ, this list goes on.

Don't know if this has been posted yet, but Sony is going to release it's first BD50 title: Click. Yep, Click.

HighDefDigest

Obviously it is MPEG-2 since Sony is releasing it:

As has been stated all along, Blu-ray was designed with bit rates/disc capacity to support umcompressed PCM and MPEG-2. I just don't see what BD50 gets us if it can simply give us what we've already come to expect from HD DVD (we already expect all the DVD special features, etc.).

It will be interesting to see if MPEG-2 can even hold up on BD50. Some say it won't compare to VC-1 anyway so it'll be good to hear what people have to say about that.

Awesome news! BHD is looking to be a very sweet release.

There is also a rumor that Taledega Nights will be shipped with every launch PS3.

Well, I'll say it. It's definitely a step in the right direction. Now the big question is whether the quality will be up to the HD DVD par. If it is, then, interesting.

I wonder if they'll be any playback issues. and if so, will they be resolved via firmware upgrades.

Biggest question for now will still be the build quality of the 2 layer discs. A/V quality will have to be relegated to second place til we know they have fixed the mfgring issues.

Yeah, wouldn't that be nice?