I've thought the same thing and it's interesting to note that BR is, well, blue and HD-DVD is red. Hmm...

Just finished watching Shoot 'Em Up, I thought it was a blast... much, much better than freakin' Gigli lol. I have no idea what the bitrate shot up too cause I watched it on a BD30 (if it has a bitrate display, I don't know where it is lol), but both the PQ & AQ were outstanding. Would it have been just as good or good enough at a lower bitrate? Maybe, maybe not... I have no idea. It's not a very long film at all, so any difference would probably be negligible at best. But I am happy that (for at least one title), it appears that New Line gave BD the best they could give and took any potential PQ/AQ compromise out of the equation. More BD encodes, please!

Is the movie any good? I keep hearing it being compared to Gigli...but I can't imagine it being that bad. Worth a rental at least?

If you're an old-school action fan, you'll probably enjoy it. Mindless non-stop action throughout... but definitely closer to Crank than Bourne Ultimatum lol.

Discs being obsolete goes against all that we on this board stand for. Talk like that should not be tolerated regardless of who it comes from. I do not want to collect hard drives with stored media.

Amen.

When movies are only available as digital downloads I will stop buying them. I also want to know where the hell we will get the bandwith to stream HD movies the same quality or better than HD DVD and Blu-ray? Not from my internet provider. They can't even provide decent quality on their 720p and 1080i HD TV channels.

I think the Gigli was stated as a joke, and was mentioned to try and compare it to the worst movie the poster had ever seen.

I haven't seen Gigli (and likely will never see it), but Shoot 'Em Up is a hell of a lot of fun as long you understand going in it is totally silly yet very violent movie.
There are so many ridiculous moments, but that's what makes it fun.

It certainly changed the way I think of carrots.

I don't want to stream at all. I *might* consider renting titles by downloading them fully to some device, as bandwidth would then not be an issue during playback. But now we're talking about 25-50GB downloaded rather than streamed.

I like owning / collecting optical movie discs as much as everyone else here, but I have to say I think that's probably just a result of taking comfort in the familiar.... In short, it's a mental block.

I don't think we have the infrastructure for quality HD downloads right now, but I would most definitely support moving to all-digital download in the future. It simply offers too many tangible benefits. Us "old" folk who like our shiny discs and artwork shouldn't stand in the way of that.

Digital downloads would make storage problems a thing of the past, completely eliminate the waste of physical materials and expenses of manufacturing, completely eliminate any issues with damaged media, and could in the future offer consumers instantaneous access to effectively any media from anywhere at anytime. These are all absolutely *HUGE* benefits in my book that physical media can in no way approach.

I hope BD & HD DVD are successful as I agree that the infrastructure isn't here right now to do this with the quality we want. But by the time BD & HD DVD have run their course, I do hope we can move to digital distribution altogether.

Thank god for Sony curing cancer and ending starvation and war. I nominate the PS3 for the Nobel prize! Bravo!

Why is it in the mind of Sony supporters that any advantage their competitors get comes at the coffers of Microsoft? Here's a newsflash:
Sony buys people off too.

Also, this recent study shows that "only" 71% of PS3's are connected to HDTV's: http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/12/20...ot-far-behind/

kinda makes attach-rate a useless stat, since many of the "capable" players aren't actually capable...

Look, everyone knows that both sides are throwing money at studios (I'm sure Disney received some BDA $).

This person just gave an opinion of what he/she thinks would happen. Why are people reading into this post so much? The poster doesn't even mention the PS3, Microsoft, or Sony in the post at all. Why imply something that may or may not be there? Is it for the sake of starting yet another argument on this board?

Both Sony and MS are out for our $$$, they don't give a damn about anything else.

At least we know that when sony buys off people, its so HDM on disc survives, not the exact opposite effect that MS is going for. Just my opinion, tho.

Again, it's still all about the money to be made from HDM. Sony is just going a different direction than MS. It's not that BD is really better than other types of media for consumers...it's just the one that will make Sony some cash.

Mike? Is that you?

Reading these boards, I'm beginning to think people prefer speculating about what's going to happen to their preferred choice of HD material instead of actually enjoying them.

Explain your logic.

Look, anyone with a hint of impartiality can clearly see that the poster implied that the only reason why HD DVD would ever secure Warner as an exclusive studio would be from some type of payoff. Also obvious by omission is the lack of such a comment should BD secure the exclusive services of WB.

I'm not trying to start any argument, but this passive agressive bullshit from several of the BD fanboys here makes me sick to my stomach. People can't say they hate Fox because they fuck up left and right, but shit like this is passable. Ridiculous.

There are some people that jump on anyone that says anything that is not all flowy and happy about BD and slap the "HD DVD fanboy" label on them. I am impartial. If BD wins, then it wins., My heart won't be broken. I don't care. I think dual format is the way to go. BD's die hard supporters are definitely very much like "Republicans" in that they will back their man without question, and divert arguments when they are backed into a corner, and distort facts to fit their views.

It is hard to have serious discussions about this stuff with people who can't read one critical thing without throwing their shilling two fucking cents in. THAT is what starts arguments and derails threads.

HD DVD's screw ups with combos and their "late-to-the-game" approach to software pricing are negatives. BD's lack of standardization on their players is one of theirs. BOTH formats have positives and negatives. You wouldn't know that by reading some of the stuff that is mentioned by a few posters here. I won't mention names, but we all know who they are.

Enough is enough.

I agree with you completely though, both MS and Sony are out for one thing: money.

It's like most media, people enjoy arguing/discussing them as much, if not more than, the actual thing.

Not me! I'd rather find room to put some movie discs somewhere than back up a 1TB disk array of HD movies.

Or say I buy movies from a digital service, shackled with some DRM. What happens when the digital service goes out of business? Plenty of folks are finding out with this exact scenario lately.

People like things simple. Even techy geeks like me. And people like to buy things in retail stores. What is Best Buy left selling when DVDs and CDs all vanish from the shelves, hmm? There are retailer & business pressures, and consumer pressures.

I'll just point out: despite dips in sales from digital downloads, satellite radio, and internet piracy we still see millions and millions of CD sales.

I've been hearing this digital downloads will get rid of physical products thing for at least a decade. Not happening. Maybe in 2 more decades.

If anything, it's Sony we would expect that would want digital downloads: They love nasty, vicious, consumer unfriendly DRM even more than Microsoft - and unlike Microsoft, they have a studio arm that owns tons of content.

Talk to me about this Microsoft-Digital-Download-Conspiracy when CDs are being phased out from the shelves. Because DVDs will only follow long after that, and Hi-def after that.

Jedi Jim,

Cool, I just didn't see it that way. Looking at his/her post history doesn't show fanboyism (new word?)...but I completely see where you are coming from due to the lot of format zealots that we see day in and day out.

It's a shame that it isn't just about the movies anymore. I bought a 60GB PS3 because of its value to me (BD's and Games). As soon as I watched a BD, I new I would have to get an HD DVD player at some time. There is no way I was going to miss out on Bourne, Hot Fuzz, etc. I got an A2 and haven't looked back since. I've been reading this site and getting the newsletter for years, but just joined the forum because this crowd seems to have thier collective heads on straight when compared to other boards.

Summary...understand, love movies, let's all be happy...

-Non-confrontational Nick (nmr1723)

This isn't being closed because of any one particular post, but this thread is getting pretty heated, and it's so speculatory at this point that maybe it's better off staying closed until there's some actual news to share.

Thanks Adam for the closure. Just to restate one thing:
Feel free to start a new thread when WB actually announces something.

namja
Moderator, DVD Talk Forums