a question for those with the force (owners of the bootlegs), how long did it take to recieve them?

Really? Which Asian countries? Not Hong Kong, I think. 16:9 is widescreen, standard is 4:3, right? There are some widescreen TVs in Asia, obviously, but only a small percentage.

I was in Hong Kong and Singapore a couple years ago and went to a few electronics stores. All of TV's for sale were 16:9 format. I didn't barge into people's houses to verify they had 16:9, I just made the assumption. I could be wrong. I am also fairly certain that the European market also has 16:9 sets. To keep with the original subject, I would like to say that the reviews here have sold me into buying the Star Wars DVD's. Thanks to all of the contributors.

Well, you obviously didn't go into the same shops as I do. I promose you that if you go into Fortress (the largest electrical chain in HK) you'd be lucky to see more than one or two widescreen sets for sale. I have looked, and would consider buying one if the price were reasonable, but they don't seem to have taken off yet, and prices are still high.

On the average 2-3 weeks, however, it is not impossible for delivery to take up to a month.

The norm is two (2) weeks though.

Not bad. Won auction on the @ 2pm on April 20th. Received all three as promised with laughable cover of "The New Hope" at 12:00 pm April 30th. Not too damn bad. I'll provide my opinion on the disks later. Thanks to badash for alerting us to this.

thanks fellas, I am only into my 6th day of waiting for my copies, and wanted to know how much longer.

I ordered Episode 4 on 3/28, and received it on 4/10.
I ordered 5 & 6 on 4/12, and received them on 5/1.
This was from an Asian DVD/VCD reseller, not from eBay.
I'm a happy camper!

Got my Trilogy yesterday. BadAsh's reviews were right on. In my opinion, these are awesome. Not USA DVD quality, but close enough to endorse them. I truly think that it will be several years before anything "official' is released. These discs more than adequately fill that gap. Though the video is a bit soft, it's not a problem. The audio is outstanding. I didn't order Ep 1, I will definitely get it now. I personally don't care if the covers are not accurate, I never bought a DVD because the cover wasn't good.

Hi,

I'm searching around for the full sets of Star Wars DVD through the internet, none e-store sell them..maybe I'm not thorough enough. Can someone help?

I've saw the VCD version but not the dvd version.

Hey vincentchua, as you may or may not know, this DVD set is a "bootleg" and this forum does not condone discussion of "bootleg" sources. I would ask you and others not to ask such questions here.

To give you a short answer that hopefully doesn't break the rules, try auction sites.

waaaahhhh... my doorbell just rang and i ran to it hoping it'd be a package from Singapore. Alas, it was 'just' a big Columbia House shipment (which i threw aside & didn't even open). This wait is taking me over. I am turning into a 9 year old boy again, waiting for the dang movie to finally play in my hometown's theater!

Anyone else know if it takes longer to get packages from Singapore?

Also, (now i am getting really paranoid) isn't it conceivable that customs could seize one of our packages since they are bootlegs? Or do they have enough(cough*herion*cough) other stuff to worry about rather than a few stupid boots?

While it is conceivable that any item (bootleg or legit) can be seized by customs, it is highly unlikely. I have heard stories of people getting stopped in airports and having customs confiscate their purchased items but I myself have never had a problem importing from Malaysia, Hong Kong or Singapore.

As far as taking longer to get packages from Singapore, I don't think I have ever noticed anything. As I posted earlier, it can take anywhere from 2 to 3 weeks for delivery from either Malaysia, Hong Kong or Singapore.

Do you kow when your copies were shipped? Add three weeks there just so you don't get too excited and then go to the fridge and get a drink... relax, they'll get there.

Took me less than 2 weeks for mine to arrive in CT. Good luck.

Both of my shipments from overseas had, as the description
of the contents, the word "gift". So the nice customs people can tell that it's not drugs or bootlegs or anything
like that.

I paid 80 bucks for all 4 movies shipped, took a week for it to come from Singapore. Great movies, the quality is pretty much all discussed here.

My thanks to BadAsh for his excellent reviews, and to all the others who have contributed their opinions. At last, I can offer mine. By now, I imagine everyone's already made up their minds, but for what it's worth:

Ordered all 4 movies, for about $13 each. Took about 2 and a half weeks to arrive. Unfortunately, I didn't notice the delivery slip scrunched down in my mailbox for a couple of more days! AAAAARRRRRGGGHHHH!!!!! "I could have been watching The Saga for 4 days already! AAAAHHHHHH!!!!"

In all honesty, I'm a little disappointed, but I don't feel ripped-off (Madacy's Metropolis felt like a rip-off, and I received that as a gift!). I synched up "The New Hope (sic)" with my THX VHS widescreen copy and switched back and forth on my 36" Panasonic Superflat (4:3 ratio) TV. I thought the DVD was pretty good--until I did the comparison. It's difficult to describe the differences. The VHS appears to me to be MORE "detailed" than the DVD. The DVD looks soft, like watching a movie that's just out of focus, or a broadcast channel that is naturally soft (ever notice how some channels just look better than others?). OTOH, the DVD image appears more...stable? The VHS "detail" might just be overdone "(edge?) enhancement" to make it "look better." The DVD does not have little halos or ghosts around dark objects in front of light backgrounds, and the color seems purer. I find it very difficult to put into words. So, I cannot honestly say that I think the DVD is "better" than the VHS picture. (Like I CAN say "Spartacus:CC is way better than the VHS!") It's just different. And most importantly, watchable. Action or scenes with fast camera moves look very good; the "softness" is most noticeable in still scenes. The movie sound is perfectly adequate -- it sounds like STAR WARS (the Dolby Digital logo sounds INCREDIBLE by comparison). And the sound is in synch all the way throughout.

I wish I could say the same for Empire and Jedi. I haven't checked these two as thoroughly as New Hope, but I swear the audio goes in and slightly out of synch throughout both movies--not just the final 20 minutes or so of Empire. We're all working under the assumption that these are mastered from laserdisc, right? I'd hazard a guess that every time a new side of the laserdisc starts, the sound is in synch, and it gradually becomes out of synch until we reach the end of that "side." New "side" starts, it goes back in synch. The video appears to be of equal character to "The New Hope."

Phantom Menace, to my surprise, looked the LEAST good to me. Again, I have not checked this out as thoroughly as New Hope. Seems to be lacking bass in some scenes. I'm glad I never broke down and bought the VHS; this WILL keep me satisfied until the official release, rumored for this fall. I was glad to see PM is time-coded; the Trilogy discs are not.

This is my first experience with this "type" of DVD. As a Star Wars fan since I saw the first photos in STARLOG magazine, months before I even saw the movie, I am ECSTATIC to have the original cuts of The Trilogy in a digital format, that presumably won't degrade like tape. As a critical DVD buyer, I have to say that these are definitely not as good as most major-studio, quality releases. They are better than the Madacy Public Domain movies I've seen. Soft video quality and sound glitches aside, I'm glad I took the plunge for these discs. I won't hesitate to give George Lucas more money for his official releases; bare-bones, deluxe sets, whatever he chooses to finally release. I just wish he had greater respect for his own history, and would realize that even with all their "imperfections," the original versions had something undefinable that millions loved (namely, HAN shoots FIRST!) and are worthy of preservation in their original state. But that's another thread.

To sum up: if simply being able to see the movies you love (and cannot live without) in the preferred original versions is more important to you than acheiving the theoretical limits of your Home Theater system... then May the Force be With You! (But please don't spend $100 on ebay--that would be a rip-off, IMHO. If a novice like me can find an alternate source, anyone can.)

Thanks Grouchofan! Glad to read a very detailed review from someone w/ a monitor around the same size/quality as mine. How do you have your dvd player hooked up - s-video or component?

Question for everyone else - how do the Star Wars Trilogy thx widescreen VHS copies compare to the THX VHS of Phantom Menace? I only own the TPM vhs, and the quality is absolutely horrible. Horrible sound. Horrible, soft, unfocused and wavering image. Faded colors. I can't imagine the trilogy looking any better? I also can't imagine a dvd (even a bootleg) looking anywhere near as terrible as the vhs TPM.

i must say this thread has rekindled my interest in all things STAR WARS for the first time since the original movie came out (which i saw god knows how many times that summer). I actually went to the library & checked out EMPIRE BUILDING by Garry Jenkins, and, while it is an overview of some stuff i had already known, it is one of the better books profiling Lucas's peculiar personality (he sounds like the a$$hole boss i had at my old job!).

I have to say, even though i prefer the original version, after reading most of the book (not done yet) i can almost (almost) understand why he'd go back and make some (some) of the changes to the original versions. I can also see for the first time that, yes, he REALLY does need to control every single knob-twirl and switch-pull in everything he does. Previously i was one of those that said, 'why doesn't he just hire someone to produce the dvd's, like everyone else does?'. Now I see that even though he will probably hire someone, he will be standing behind them working the puppet controls making sure every single little insignificant detail is exactly the way he wants it.

First, I want to thank BadAsh (love that name!), GrouchoFan, and others who have helped to provide very realistic expectations for these discs. I don't generally go in for "bootlegs", but this is a very special case. Since we know that the versions presented here will never be made available on DVD, this is the only opportunity we will ever have to own them on a semi-permanent format (laserdiscs notwithstanding). And, considering how much I've already spent on VHS copies of the movies, and the fact that I fully intend to own the special edition DVDs, when or if they are ever released, Lucasfilm really isn't going to be losing a dime from me.

My copies will (hopefully ) be arriving in a few days. When they get here, I'll be only too happy to offer my observations of how they look on my 50" RPTV.

Hi,

From all your discussion..dvd version will not be out for the full sets of star wars. However, I saw a full set for VCD. How come lucas came out with vcd but not in dvd?

Is it worth to buy the vcd format instead?

ummmmmm...in case you are not clear about this, the discussion is a review of the "unofficial" DVDs.

In my opinion only, I wouldn't waste my money(around $30.00) for the lousy VCD versions of these films. You will not be happy. Read BadAsh's reviews of the bootleg DVDs on the 1st page and the 1st post of this thread.Then decide where to spend your money. The reviews for the most part are quite favorable with regard to these discs.

Please don't ask anyone in this forum, where to buy these bootlegs. This forum does not condone buying or selling bootlegs.

You're welcome, Pasolini. Pioneer DV-525, s-video connection. (Bought my TV about a year before component connections were more widely available.) And FYI, my VCR is connected by the RCA video jack. I only have a pro-logic sound system. But man, that DD logo-thing on the disc still sounded absolutely un-be-FREAKIN'-lievable on my equipment.

Looked at more of Jedi last night, and I can confirm my earlier description. It's really hard to tell when the sound is out of exact synch, because there are so few scenes that feature human lips facing the camera! At worst, the sound is only a fraction of a second ahead of the picture. It doesn't look NEARLY as bad as an English dub of a foreign-language film (the Godzilla effect).

I haven't seen anyone else mention this, and maybe it's particular to my supplier: On The Trilogy discs (on my player, at least) I can't skip back and forth between every chapter at will. Further explanation: Each movie has 12 chapters selectable from the menu. I can skip from Chapter 1 to Chapt. 2, but not from 2 to 3. From 3, I can skip to 4, but not back to 2. And so on. And I can't fast-scan backwards past a chapter point that I can't skip. I can scan backwards from 4 to 3, but not from 3 to 2. If I try, it just stops at the beginning of Chapt. 3. Weird, huh? I can access any chapter with the numbered keys on the remote though.

I haven't double-checked New Hope or Empire, but Jedi and PM cut off the first couple of drumbeats of the 20th Century Fox Fanfare music. That bugs me, because I love the fanfare music.

And this is probably particular to my supplier, but the Trilogy keepcases have, hands-down, the BEST disc-locking hub thingy I have ever seen! Some kind of spring-clip thing--I've seen nothing like it in USA. You press down on the center hinge, the disc pops up. The hinge-thing stays down until you replace the disc. Press the disc down, the hinge pops back up and holds the disc. I'm not kidding, I love this!

You will find this style DVD Case used for every DVD put out by this "studio". That includes the Star Wars set, the Indiana Jones set and the R0 "bootleg" of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon.

I really like these cases too. They have a very stable mechanism for holding and releasing the disk. I'd like to see these cases used more for R1 discs.

I'm not sure but I think these are called "M" style DVD Cases.

vincentchua,

If you do a search for "VCD" or "Star Wars VCD" you will find more information here at DVD Talk concerning both the VCD format and the Star Wars VCD release.

I have the VCD version as well and it is actually not bod. The VCDs are in full screen (Pan and Scan) and while they are limited to the MPEG compression/technology of the format which does tend to include higher levels of artifacting in high action sequences, all in all, this is not a bad format of the movies. The VCD set is of the Special Editions. For VCD, the video is pretty crisp (at times) and the sound is outstanding in comparison to the VHS tapes.

Read the reviews of the Star Wars VCD set both here at DVD Talk and on the web sites cited in some of the reviews and then take a look at the "bootleg" DVD reviews in this thread and make your own decision. I would never want to tell you NOT to buy the VCD set. After all, the VCD set is at least an "official" LucasFilm release.

Take a look at the review and see what you think. But I don't think either would be a bad purchase... it is all a matter of taste.

------------------

To all that have thanked me (and others) for the reviews here, I thank you as well. This thread has lasted way longer than I anticipated and it is because we have all followed the rules of DVD Talk and kept this thread alive with great discussions of the movies and its many different video transfers. Thank you all.