Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater High def water is fine---Jump In

Just noticed this post today:

http://www.audioholics.com/news/industry-news/netflix-goes-blu

A couple weeks ago I finally took the plunge buying a PS3 right after the Warner Bros. announcement. At first I was mad since I wanted HDDVD to win this war. Not to mention HDDVD had some very nice offers around the holiday season and I almost purchased a HDDVD player. But, it looks like it is going to be Blue ray.

Now, I know with this kind of format war anything can happen. But, I say now is the time to jump in. At least buy a PS3 and start renting or buying any movies that you would buy on dvd on Blue Ray. Encourage any friends and family that are even remotely interested in a nice picture on their big screen tv to do the same. If people wait too long for the format war to be over then Blue Ray is going to be in a new format war with downloads (that are already starting) before it can even establish itself well.

I realize that download speeds are nowhere near fast enough to download DVD's let alone High Def one's. But look at the music industry. When people learned that they could get the convenience of downloads they could care less about the quality as a majority. Look at all of this overly compressed crap that is being sold much better than cd's (the dying format). We are not far away from downloaded movies being overly compressed crap with no alternative, if Blue ray doesn't get established very soon. I can see the mass majority of people very happy that they can download a "high def" movie and it is only 2 to 4 gigs and being oblivious to the fact that it looks worse that a dvd they bought from the store a couple years ago.

Now is the time to get into this format if you care at all about high def movies.

- Nick

Yep, and Best Buy just announced that Blu Ray will be their recommended hardware/software in the stores, however, they will keep some HDDVD stuff as well.

so, my toshiba HD DVD player that i purchased back in November for my under construction home theater is already obsolete.

can you say eBay?

and, always buy you equipment last

later.

When Best Buy's employees are recommending Blu-ray, I wonder if they're going to be telling customers about the different Profile versions.

Exactly. It's disappointing that Bluray is winning out. Especially since costumers will think they are getting the greatest and best product on the market when in fact 6 months down the line they players will not be compatible with the latest Bluray profile. Sad really.

I personally feel HD-DVD was a better format from the get go. I had at one time a PS3 and Xbox HD-DVD player. I ended up selling the PS3 because I didn't see anything special with the Bluray. Luckily I have held out and not purchased any HD-DVD's and only rented them via Netflix, but not anymore.

My upconverting player just went in for warranty repair and I was thinking that if it cant be repaired I was gonna get a HDDVD player as a replacement since they are cheap and will upconvert my DVD's as well.

Do most Blu Ray players still not upconvert DVD that well?? Or are they reasonable? I have lots of my kids and wife's DVD's and some classic sports DVD's that I own (Hoosiers, Raging Bull, Breaking Away, etc.) I was gonna use the HDDVD as mostly an upconverter and watch some HD for a few years until Blu Ray improved upconversion and came down in price.

Still a reasonable strategy or should I try to get store credit on a BD player??

Do you mean "Final Profile", "Final Profile 1", "Final Profile 1b", "Definitive Final Profile", "Definitive Final Profile v2"...
If I ever see a "Final Profile 1b", I will laugh for weeks and weeks!

I'm satisfied with the quality of DVD upconversion of my ps3. I can't speak of other standalone players though.

I've heard the Panasonic Blu Ray player does a great job upconverting standard DVD's. The Sony's have been "alright".

Last October I bought an HD-DVD player. Last month I bought a Blu-ray player. On my 118" screen and 1080p projector, nothing comes close to the picture quality of either of these two formats. They are simply amazing. On our new 56" 720p TV, a good upconverting DVD player can make standard DVD's look nearly as good as HD cable and almost--but not-quite--as good as Blu-ray/HD-DVD's. The moral of the story: If you have a screen over 60 inches, go with high-def disks. They are fantastic. If you have a smaller screen and don't sit too close, get a good upconverting DVD player for now if you're not sure about Blu-ray/HD-DVD.

Also, I can't recommend Panasonic's DMP-BD30 Blu-ray disk player enough--especially if you have a new Denon receiver with HDMI 1.3. Great machine.

As for Blu-ray/HD-DVD players handling upconversion of standard DVD's, I'd recommend buying the Oppo OPPO DV-980H for $169. Regardless of how well a certain Blu-ray or HD-DVD player may upconvert, they are very slow compared to most stand-alone DVD players and it can be frustrating to navigate DVD's. I say keep them separate.