Don't worry I made up for your slacking with the 47 HD DVDs that I have purchased.

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MODERATOR NOTE (9/15/2006)

Due to the increased bickering in the HD Talk Forum, the forum moderators discussed the matter and came up with following. Hopefully, spelling out what is and what is not acceptable in this forum will provide some clarification to all of you. For the record, this is almost identical to how we run the Video Game Talk Forum.


You are allowed to--and we encourage you to--make posts that constitute constructive criticism. Blatant bashing of a format or bashing of the studios/manufacturers is strictly forbidden.

If the main purpose of a post is to poke fun at another format, then they are nothing more than flame baits, and they will not be tolerated. Same with threadcrapping. At the moment, whenever someone posts something good about Format A, then we can count on certain supporters of Format B to enter that thread and make a snide comment about Format A. Sometimes it's just a smiley, like or ; sometimes it's just a sarcastic one-liner. They are equivalent to threadcraps, and they will not be tolerated either.

Naturally, personal attacks are not allowed (all of the regular forum rules still apply, of course). Please remember to always discuss the topic, not the person. A personal attack is the fastest way to getting banned.

Some of you may feel that we're taking all the fun away. Actually, this is how we bring more fun into the forum. When we have more user-friendly rules, then more people will participate.


namja
Moderator, DVD Talk Forums

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P.S.

1. Since we have too many stickies, I have not made a separate thread regarding the rules. Most of the rules are really common sense, and most people are generally well-behaved, so I don't think having a separate thread is a necessity at the moment.

2. If there are objectionable posts, then please do not reply with fighting words. Simple report the post to a moderator (click on the at the bottom left of each post), and we will take a look.

DVD isn't showing signs of dying, it's showing signs of plateauing. DVD sales is still increasing, just not as much as it used to.

Studios aren't as concerned with maintaining revenue though as they are interested in increasing revenue. HD is an opportunity for new revenue, and as you point out, is considered more secure so as to prevent losses of revenue from piracy, etc.

Also, another difference between migration from DVD and migration from LD or VHS is that current BD and HD DVD players are backwards compatible, which means people can still play their old format on their new player.

I am helping out too with my 50+ (and another 11 on pre-order)

Some specs on Disney BD titles:

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/sh...-ray_Specs/239

Looks like no VC-1.

And you're probably the reason behind Amazon's supply issues .

Well, I'm only ordering 1 copy of each, not 50 copies of the same HD DVD

Maybe we should call you hddvdhart.

Can someone explain to me what the advantages of having analog outs over HDMI? I'm not understanding why this is so important. Doesn't HDMI do the same thing?

I know it's 5.1 but there are some movies that I own that are 6.1 so that definitely would not be advantageous to me.

This is in regards to the Toshiba A1.

With the analog outs, the player processes the new audio codecs and then outputs the channels through the analog outs. All you need then is a receiver capable of amplifying the multichannel signals, which many receivers do these days (I bought one nine years ago that does it).

Without the analog outs, the sound has to be output as a bitstream over HDMI, or downconverted to a DTS signal for output over the SPDIF (optical or coaxial) output.

The problem here is that you need a new HDMI receiver capable of decoding the new audio codecs, and that's another purchase that will likely cost you several hundred dollars (although I don't think receivers capable of the new codecs have actually been released yet). Or, if you output the signal over SPDIF, you don't get the full sound quality of the new codecs, since the player has to convert the audio to a compressed DTS signal. In the case of Dolby Digital Plus, there's a conversion from one lossy signal to another.

It's similar to the situation when DVD first came out, where buying a receiver with Dolby Digital and/or DTS decoding was expensive, so they had DVD players that could decode DD and output the channels over analog outs. As time went on, the receivers got cheaper, and people upgraded. Then there was no need for the built-in decoding.

In my case, my receiver is old enough that it doesn't have HDMI, but new enough that it does have 5.1 analog in. AFAIK, the only ways to get 'advanced' [high bandwidth] sound are through hdmi or analog.

Question: I guess I can find out myself soon enough, but does HDMI pass through closed captions? My previous DVD player didn't output CCs via component to 480p, but my HD cable box did output CCs to 1080i, so I don't know where the issue was.

Thanks for the replies fellas.

Interesting that they decided to go with AVC/MPEG-4 for some of the titles. I wonder if they're shifting to that format over the MPEG-2 that their other announced titles will use. It's also interesting that they didn't go with VC-1. There shouldn't be any Disney aversion to using a Microsoft product, especially considering they helped develop iHD and wanted it on BD.

Also interesting was the announcement of an 1080 HD extra on a few of the discs. Is this the first HD extra announced or released, aside from trailers?

I believe Mission: Impossible III will have HD extras.

I'm fine with most extras staying SD (unless HD is truly warranted) since I'd rather the bulk of the available disc space be spent on the A/V quality of the main features.

You know, that HypnoToad link would be very appropriate here too. ANyone still have it?

http://web.qx.net/lhaddix/htoad.htm

Not sure WHERE this should go but an HD DVD blog has now been started:

http://blogs.technet.com/hddvd/default.aspx

Well today is HD-DVD player watch day...Today may very well be the day that I can no longer hold out. Well keep update, as I know everyone is soooo interested ...

Ok update...Its bought and paid for and will be picking it up later on today. $399 at J&R.

Whats the first movie your gonna watch?

Congrats and welcome aboard!! What movies are you getting first? My recommendation is Pitch Black. That one blew me out of my shoes when I first watched it in HD.

PS...

and the DFnyc helps sell another one

I seriously need to be on payroll.