Easy. Just read the link from the OP, and ignore the rest. Works a charm. OR you could stick to the news thread, which now has a zero-tollerance policy towards non-news related posts. They're both good ways of avoiding the chatter. The "insiders" thread is also occasionally a good read, and contains some interesting technical discussions of the sort which don't seem to occur on this (or many other) forums.

BTW all forums have their ecentricities, and while some AVS posters seem unhealthily obsessed with their basement's there are DVDtalkers who appear to worship their little discs of shinny plastic a little too intimately, as well. It's all swings and roundabouts, and bouncy castles. Frankly I enjoy both forums equaly, though in entirely different ways.

I've been "neutral" for a while, in that I have an A1 and a PS3. I'm not really neutral, though, as I own far more HD DVD's than BD's. There are just far fewer BD discs released that I actually want at the moment, but that tide is slowly shifting. I also cannot in good conscience buy those expensive, featureless Fox discs. I am also frustrated with my inability to use the Harmony remote with the PS3, which oddly enough, limits my use of it somewhat.

...but even finding general discussion threads worth reading is a hassle since 80% of them fall into at least one (usually several) of five categories:

1) meaningless speculation
2) when is ________ coming out on ________?
3) how ________ can win the format war, possibly phrased as a question or attached to any random bit of news
4) bitching and moaning about something or another
5) is ______ demo material?

The search on AVS usually works fine for me, but apparently a lot of people struggle with it since it seems like every third thread is a repost.

It just bugs me because AVS used to be such a great forum, and although there are still some a couple of really reliable people there (Grubert for posting news and keeping the release date threads current, amillians, and a couple of scattered others), but a lot of the people whose posts I felt like I could really trust have either been booted from the forum, left out of the same frustration I (and many others) feel, or rarely post anymore.

By no means am I saying that HD Talk is a perfect forum, but I do think the average post here is more meaningful than the average post there.

What general discussion threads are you looking for? I thought it was news you were after?

Just looking through the BD hardware forum shows a majority of worthwhile threads, discussing various aspects of the players, and how to connect/use them. There's a minimum of egocentric "i've just switched" or chearleading "ps3 is the bomb" topics.
The HD DVD hardware forum probably has a little more noise, thought that's down to the mods who handle each forum to police as they see fit. The General forum is largely a mess outside of two of the stickied threads. Though that's almost to be expected with only one dual format player currently available, and such an unattractive one at that. Genuine news is, for the most part, format-centric, and as such tends to be posted in the relevant HighDef forum, and in the General News thread.

BTW I also enjoy the postings of Mr Millians, and have had some good banter with him over the years. Shame he's not doing the do with CED anymore, or even living there any more. BTW One of the other members said his wife refered to AVS as "the purple screen of nerd" which is depressingly apposite. DVDtalk may not be as technically minded, but it caters more to the cool kids!

News in a more software-centric sense, and a lot of the time, that gets posted individually instead of the uber-news threads. I mean, I'm interested in general discussion too, but I don't really see much on AVS that catches my eye these days.

The HD DVD software forum may very well be worse off than the Blu-ray software forum. I don't spend enough time in both to say for sure. For Blu-ray, I'm more interested in the higher-level news than in-depth discussion, at least until I pick up a PS3 or something when the selection of titles is more compelling, and I can usually get that on forums like El Cee Vee Gee and DVD Talk more succinctly.

Still on the sideline awaiting a winner.

The thing is that the rest of the site is still pretty solid once you get out of the HD DVD/Blu-ray areas. It's just that particular section that's spiralled out of control. I still find plenty of worthwhile information and discussion up to the old AVS standards in the rest of the site.

Are you referring to the "PS3 Firmware Update Forum" as it should be renamed? 98% of the threads are on that topic.

:up:

The first page is about 50/50 PS3 and other players. Since the PS3 is the most owned player by far that ratio makes sense. Not sure why it should be a problem...

I'm just tired of the clutter of thread titles like, "PS3 Firmware 1.5641654654128 Now Available!" All of that discussion would be best consolidated into one thread.

In fairness it's little different to the HD DVD forum, which has twice the number of thread topics despite having relatively few players. It would be useful if many threads were consolidated, though that's true for all forums, and all sites.

I have a PS3, but I am hoping HD-DVD wins.
The only Blu-Ray movies I've bought were recent b1g1 free at Bestbuy.

I haven't taken the plunge on either yet, but I'm penciling Blu-Ray in as the winner. It's fairly hard not to when you see the level of support they have from the major studios, and the prominent displays they have in stores compared to HD-DVD. Plus, call me a sucker, but I just find the technology more advanced and cooler. Now... If Toshiba would just make a Blu-Ray player, I'd happily begin my next generation home movie collection!

How is Blu-ray more advanced than HD DVD?

It has, um, BD+ ... :)

hd-dvd only right now

well, I finally made up my mind. Blu-ray. Not because I necessarily think it's better - just because I am not personally convinced that it will win. Adult industry is no longer a player (they have had a lousy year and DVD sales are dwindling) and only Universal seems to be the hold out on BR, while there are many more who are not supporting HD DVD.

And I think HD DVD people in charge of their marketing campaign need to get a new job.. Between the market hype (true or not) and most of the B&M around me not even supporting HD DVD players, BR seems like it doesn't even have a competitor sometimes!

Yes, I think it sucks. But this is how I will think it will go.

Oh. Like in EVERY SINGLE PICTURE of it. Gotcha. From what I've read, this "coating" business is really no big deal, and certainly not worth of abullet in the Sony fanboy's powerpoint presentation. Sorry, Open Office presentation, since PP is Micro$oft. ;)

Depending on how much money you have sunk in your home theater, it seems to be a waste for people not to spend (only) the extra grand for ability to play back both HD-DVD and Blu-ray. Just minimize your purchases for now (that's where the money really adds up), and rent the titles you want to see on the particular high def format it was released on.

Where did you read that? I can tell you that I have been renting BD from Netflix since October and have never recieived a disc with any type of scratch. That is in stark contrast to DVD.

As far as the PS3 goes, I gues I should amend my statement to. the ONLY case of disc scratching I have heard of comes from Mr. Cinema. I don't read the VG forums, so there may be more, but I have not read any. It seems more likely that he had a bad PS3. He has also since said that his PS3 was flat.

Neutral. I have the PS3 & Xbox 360 add on. However, I do have a bit for HD discs than blu ray.

this is frustrating. I have searched forum after forum and can't find any complaints that mirror mine. I hope I did get a bad one. Maybe I will try again and buy another one, but I'm very cautious. I think I'll wait and see what price Amazon offers on the Samsung 1200. I believe list is $799.

I was abstaining from this whole mess until Sunday, when I picked up the Xbox 360 add-on HD-DVD drive.

However, I can't help but to believe that HD is going to fail, so I'm not going to buy any discs for it. I'll rent them from Netflix and use the player to upconvert, but I can't see starting a new collection of discs without knowing if I'll even be able to play them on something 2 years from now.

this argument i find odd. Don't you think your add-on HD Drive for the 360 will last that long?

It might last that long. However most drive-based electronics I've had in the last five years do not last this long. And so if the format fails and then 2 years from now the Xbox drive dies... I have all these HD-DVD movies and nothing to play them on.