High Definition Media & Technology Thread

[David Hingtgen]

I'm in Iowa.

[eugimon]

That is mostly because those sets are really no longer made. Those 30" WEGAs were the "big boys" of their day... the thousand dollar "elite geek level" sets. They have since been replaced by the HD sets. The retail outlets are a pretty good indicator of how the market is going. Right now the push is to HD because of the pending analog to digital conversion that will occur in a year. No manufacturer wants to keep making SD sets, they are a dead breed, so they have all switched over to HD sets.

well, that's my point. Not everyone wants an HD set, they just want something as big as the one that died and they HAVE to upgrade.

My wife's father is a prime example. He wants a new TV and he is doing a lot of research... his problem is that he currently owns an old Mitsubishi 60" rear projector. He is not so much concerned about picture quality as he is about SIZE. He's an older gentleman and he wants a big BIG picture, 60"+. His problem is that all he can find in that size lately are hugely expensive HDTV's. He is going to get one here eventually but he is just so stymied by how expensive they are. I talk to him on the phone a lot and have been trying to get him to lower his size requirement so he can get a smaller, more affordable set but he is dead set on huge and it's going to cost him. BUT he has done so much research that when he does finally buy his set he'll know exactly what he needs for it and how to get it going. My concern is that he is old and I may be drafted to fly to Iowa and help him install it all.

Well, that's great for your father in law but maybe not so great for you... But like I've said, I know plenty of very smart, even very technically smart people who just want the basics out of their sets. Forget about cables and SD versus HD content, these guys don't even play with the contrast and brightness settings on their sets, forget about fiddling with color or geometry. They plugged in their TVs and whatever the factory set their screen to, that's what they watch. Again, they''re not stupid or even lazy, they just don't care.

[David Hingtgen]

Honestly, a nice new 32 or 36in SDTV would be nice to have in the living room. Due to the extreme viewing angles and giant windows, no HDTV AFAIK would look good. Plus the fact that it will only ever see SD cable and VCR, with occasional DVD. I don't think I've seen a SDTV bigger than 24in for sale for over a year.

[cschell]

Honestly, a nice new 32 or 36in SDTV would be nice to have in the living room. Due to the extreme viewing angles and giant windows, no HDTV AFAIK would look good. Plus the fact that it will only ever see SD cable and VCR, with occasional DVD. I don't think I've seen a SDTV bigger than 24in for sale for over a year.

Actually when it comes to windows some of the flat panel LCDs out there have excellent anti-glare screens (or at least they used to, current trend seems to be moving to glossy screens for a little higher contrast ratio.) When I replaced my CRT a few years ago with an LCD with the anti-glare screen in a room with a big window just to the side of the TV it was so much easier to watch than the CRT due to the reduced glare. Also helps a lot at reducing the glare from floor/table lamps.

Viewing angles are pretty good these days as well. Not the 178 degrees they all claim, but fine for most practical viewing angles.

Of course if you're never going to use HD, then it's pretty pointless to get an HDTV. Extra cost, small 4:3 pillar boxed area relative to screen size, and scaling required. Have you considered thrift stores or garage sales?

[David Hingtgen]

Trust me, I mean EXTREME viewing angles. (Also, I'm very sensitive to viewing angle brightness---I don't like a lot of screens just standing dead center, as the edge of the screen is a few degrees off from my eyeball, relative to the center of the screen--I notice that 3-degree difference on many screens)

170/178 is pure BS. Notice how all of a sudden they ALL did that? Not because of some amazing new technology, but because they revised the definition so that they all "improved" to 178.

[JsARCLIGHT]

There are also limits with tube technology in big screens. You couldn't get a true "big screen" TV in a tube, they were all rear projection or front projection... and they all looked like a slide show on the back of a tarp. Plus the things were huge and required two guys and a dolly to move around. I think that is my aversion to "modern" DLP HDTV's as well... the whole "rear projection" thing just doesn't work as well as it sounds in practice.

One big thing that irks me about the new lines of LCD and Plasma TV's are that everyone seems to have discovered overnight the magic of a glass screen. The lion's share of the new models all sport highly reflective glass screen coatings rather than the older matte screens. From what I have heard the newer glossy screens are supposed to reflect more ambient room light, thus boosting the black levels of the screen matrix... but when you look at one in a bright room, or god forbid the Best Buy showroom, all I can see is ME staring back at me inside the TV picture. It's kind of creepy. Best Buy at least figured it out that they needed to create their new "Magnolia" sales area that has all this muted, indirect light which downplays those reflections on all the new high dollar sets. But that doesn't help those of us who have living rooms with huge windows looking out into the bright outdoors. It's great for keeping the room inviting but it's hell on electronic screens. When my new TV comes I think I'm going to have to invest in some better blinds.

But all in all if I had my druthers I'd opt for the new TVs over the old tube sets any day of the week, for mostly two reasons: size and weight. My older 1080i Phillips plasma is a good TV. It has a nice compact size and it's weight is quite slim. My wife and I can pull it off of it's VESA mount and move it around with ease. When my new TV arrives it is a VESA mounter so it will just hang right up in the spot the old one sits in. I contrast that to my last TV, which was a Toshiba 36" tube which I swear weighed something like 200 pounds, had to have a special reinforced stand for it to sit on and took two burly guys to pick up and move around. Plus it gave off more heat than the sun and it suffered from all the usual tube TV overscan issues. Having grown up through several generations of televisions, the more new stuff I see the more I like it. Memories of that old 13" black and white JC Penney set I had in my room in the '80s make me relish every plasma and LCD I see.

[Oihan]

By "cutting edge" I mean buying something before it's even out. People who stand in line and put down payments on new electronics that are not even released yet scare me. They just have so much trust in the technology and then they all bitch to high heaven when the expensive machine they just bought turns out to be a doorstop. With all the sped up development cycles and rush rush rush to market these days a lot of products are shipping in states of "unfinished" or unperfected. The HD market is kind of glutted with a lot of half baked product these days that was rushed to market before it was really thoroughly tested or even basically tested. Then that whole situation is compounded by the internet and the dramatic "fanboy effect" it has. Can you truthfully trust early reviews, even from "trustworthy" sources? IMHO no, you can't. You need to wait until all the reviews are in and all the facts are out. The original Xbox 360 is a prime example. The thing is an albatross of a design that totally butt humped a lot of early adopters (and still is to a good degree)... but when it first came out it had glowing reviews and people waiting in line to jerk the thing off. Then there are all those super new Samsung LCD TV's that everyone raves about that have bad HDMI boards in them. Several of the early adopters had to suffer through board replacements, firmware upgrades, etc. etc. and only after the TV's were in the market for a good 6 months did all these problems come to light, as well as their remedies.

As for the people who don't even know how to hook up their equipment, that does not surprise me in the least. Think about how many people don't understand how their car works or how to do basic maintenance on it, or understand how to properly use their cell phones, etc. etc. etc. We are living in an age of a lot of stupid people engaging in "smart" activities and hobbies without knowing what they are doing... and most of them don't care simply because it's all about the consumer culture. About "having it" and not so much knowing it or benefiting from it. Most people buy something because someone else told them to, or because someone they know has one. Only the hardcore geeks research things, learn how they work, buy them and install them/operate them correctly. Your average man on the street just doesn't care to know... he just wants whatever is "new" that he saw on TV.

Funny thing...my father just recently bought a new Sharp 46" HDTV and needed a new cable box (so he could get the HD channels). Well, the guys that came to set up the new box hooked it up all wrong on the back of the TV; I had to go back there and correct things. It just amazes me that these persons couldn't even get it right when they work for a cable company. I mean...call it laziness or what have you, but there's just no excuse for setting up something wrong when it's your job to go in and set it all up right. ...It's not just your "average Joe" that's an idiot.

[JsARCLIGHT]

That's assuming the cable company hires decent people to begin with. When I had cable I had a few problems and every person they sent was... well... a dull fork to say it politely. In all honesty the cable companies of America are totally behind in the HD market and I'd assume that translates to their workforce as well.

[EXO]

That's assuming the cable company hires decent people to begin with. When I had cable I had a few problems and every person they sent was... well... a dull fork to say it politely. In all honesty the cable companies of America are totally behind in the HD market and I'd assume that translates to their workforce as well.

A cable guy that came to my house the first time we had cable installed left his drill inside the hole he was drilling into. I guess he found an existing connection that he could use and ran the wire that way. I didnt take the stupid thing out. I just waited a week before he finally figured out which house he left it at.

[David Hingtgen]

When I finally got broadband (cable) the guy who came was very professional--switched out everything needed quickly, custom-made some lengths of cables, changed a lot of things in the junction box outside, and checked and set-up all my settings on Win XP and setup the initial account. I can only hope than when (if) I get HD cable, their HD installation guys are as good as their broadband installation guys.

[mikeszekely]

When I got broadband, the cable guy came and set everything up... then forgot to actually turn it on. I tried renting an HD cable box (when I bought my TV, they made some with QAM tuners, but they were out of my price range), and I told the cable guy to just bring the box, and I'd set it up. He said, "no sir, we have to set them up. Company policy." Then he showed up, took on look at the bunch of wires behind my set, and happily left the box with me to hook up myself. I sent it back after maybe a month... I don't actually watch much TV.

[Nied]

WEll I can't speak for that new upscaler but the one in the PS3 is fried gold.

I don't have a response for this, I just wanted to highlight it because it's an awesome turn of phrase.

Also not to sound like a broken record but the PS3 also offers something that appealed to me: wifi. It's connected to my network which means any internet enabled stuff on the future BD discs will work as well as the benefit of getting firmware upgrades automatically from Sony without having to go looking for them.

That's actually one of the reasons I liked the UP5000 as opposed to LG's second gen dual format player (that and the price point), it has an ethernet jack built in. It's not quite as convenient as Wi-Fi but considering the fact that I already have a separate ethernet switch set up by my home theater stack for my Wii and satellite box it's not a big issue. Besides, I've yet to see a non-computer Wi-Fi enabled device support the encryption I use on my network anyway.

But in the end it's all about what you want and from the sound of it you've already made up your mind. I myself am skittish about purchasing the "cutting edge" before it's been out in the field for a while. I have this sad history of feeling like a beta tester when buying cutting edge stuff as most of my experiences have been negative... it taught me the hard way to be patient and wait to see how a product is going to "roll out" before blindly getting in line on launch day and then dealing with all the bugs and "teething" that the launch product has. But then again Samsung seems to have made a name for themselves lately in HD stuff. I have no doubt it's a good player... I'm just skittish about buying the new horse before I've seen it prance around the track a few times.

It's less about me having made up my mind than trying out some of the arguments I've made to myself on someone else. After all if I can't convince another person that this is a good idea I'm probably deluding myself. You do make an excellent points about trawling to see if there are any issues before buying, already I've seen some people talking about some disc incompatibility issues and lack of full support for some HD audio codecs. I don't know if those are show stoppers for me (my receiver doesn't support those codecs and none of the incompatible discs are ones I'm interested in seeing) but I'm still looking to see if something more alarming comes up. Hell, if I had made up my mind I wouldn't have posted anything here!

[bandit29]

Another buy one, get one free Blu-ray titles at Amazon. Some goods one... some turds.. Of course I bought some of these already...

here

[Alpha OTS]

JS and some others here always mention how great an upscaler the PS3 has. Is that a software only thing, and more to the point if so, what are the odds that we'd ever see a 360 update that improves the one it has?

[mikeszekely]

JS and some others here always mention how great an upscaler the PS3 has. Is that a software only thing, and more to the point if so, what are the odds that we'd ever see a 360 update that improves the one it has?

Well, there'd me minimum hardware requirements, but it's a software thing at heart. I suppose it's possible for a software update to improve the 360's ability to upscale DVDs, but I thought someone mentioned awhile back that it's partly not up to Microsoft, but the people who set the standards for that sort of stuff now allowing upscaling over component. Or something.

[JsARCLIGHT]

Yes that is part of it. MS kind of shot themselves in the foot on the Xbox initially in regard to upscaling because the goofy HDCP "rules" that the industry put in place said that in order to upscale anything past 480p it had to travel over HDMI... and the original Xboxes never came with HDMI. When the elite and the HD DVD drive entered the picture it was my understanding they disseminated a software patch that allowed the system to upscale over VGA and HDMI but not over component.

(Edit: I should point out that DVD upscaling does not affect actual gameplay resolutions. I know a lot of people that swore up and down that their Xbox did everything in 1080i initially, including DVD playback, but that was untrue. It did play games at 1080i over component, and in some cases 1080p if you had a set that would take it, but DVD playback was and still is capped at 480p over component cables.)

I used to have my Xbox hooked up to my plasma over component and can attest that it never would upscale a DVD past 480p. After I switched to VGA output and that software patch came down it now upscales to 1080i (maximum my plasma can handle but I believe it will go to 1080p). Honestly I do not see a great improvement in the picture like I do on my PS3, which leads me to believe it is not just software but also hardware. The PS3 was built to upscale out of the box through it's 1.3 HDMI out, while the Xbox was kind of "retrofitted" to do it... and IMHO it feels like it. I suppose with further tweaks the Xbox could approach and even equal the PS3's upconverter but I highly doubt it is a priority for MS. Upconversion on the Xbox has always felt "tacked on" to me so I'm not really expecting to see it pick up that ball and run with it.

Plus the Xbox is just so darned noisy... compared to my PS3 which is seemingly near silent. Even if both of them had the exact same upscaling potential I'd always use the PS3 just so I didn't have to keep turning up my sound to drown out the drive noise.

[marimba]

Ok, now I'm excited...I picked up a open box Onkyo 605 at Fry's over the weekend and a 80gig PS3 along with the Nyko blue-wave IR remote at Gamecrazy this morning. Tonight after hook up and update I'll pop some popcorn and we'll all settle in for some blu-ray goodness.

Tell me again how to set up the PS3 so that it will pass the Dolby TrueHD bitstream via HDMI to be decoded by my Onkyo?

[Gunbuster]

Is anyone here going to the CES 2008? I'm really curious about the new "Laser" TVs and the new "toys" they will be announcing.

[mikeszekely]

Is anyone here going to the CES 2008? I'm really curious about the new "Laser" TVs and the new "toys" they will be announcing.

Yeah, I'm curious about laser TVs too. I currently have a DLP TV, and although LCDs and plasmas are both improving I still think projection TVs do the best blacks. A projection TV without the need to replace bulbs, if it actually works, would be a godsend.

[David Hingtgen]

NBC's going to have extensive coverage it seems, even going to broadcast the nightly news from there. They're treating it just like the Olympics, building a new studio there and everything. http://NBCatCES.com

[Dangard Ace]

Update:

WARNER is going BLU_RAY!

http://www.cnbc.com/id/22507036

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/2008...s-blu-ray_N.htm

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssConsume...444635420080104

[David Hingtgen]

::gasp:: Wow, rumors+lots of money=truth!

[JsARCLIGHT]

Interesting. The plot thickens... again.

Warner was really the only "solid" dual format supporter. For them to jump to BD exclusivity is going to be quite a nail in HD DVD's coffin.

... and I suppose now we'll see Batman Begins on Blu Ray.

[David Hingtgen]

Yeah, but not Transformers on HD-DVD. Seriously---HD-DVD has the one release that really matters to the age group most likely to "pick" a format soon. (like me, and every other PS3/360 owner) Especially considering its still notably cheaper price.

Currently "what I want on next-gen discs" is split about 50/50, maybe a slight edge to HD-DVD. Warner does comprise a good number of those, but #1 is still Transformers, and they just signed an 18 month "not on Blu-Ray" contract.

[JsARCLIGHT]

What pisses me off is Paramount holds the Indiana Jones license. With Lucas and Spielberg's hate of HD DVD chances are we won't see the new Indy film or the three old ones until that contract is up...

[Dangard Ace]

Time Warner confirmed it themselves on their own website.

http://www.timewarner.com/corp/newsroom/0,20697,,00.html

Yeah, but not Transformers on HD-DVD. Seriously---HD-DVD has the one release that really matters to the age group most likely to "pick" a format soon. (like me, and every other PS3/360 owner) Especially considering its still notably cheaper price.

Currently "what I want on next-gen discs" is split about 50/50, maybe a slight edge to HD-DVD. Warner does comprise a good number of those, but #1 is still Transformers, and they just signed an 18 month "not on Blu-Ray" contract.

I disagree. I find that there are more Must-Buy releases on Blu-Ray then there are on HD-DVD.

Last years exclusive big hitters for HD-DVD were Heroes Season 1, Shrek 3, Transformers and Bourne Ultimatum.

Bluray had Casion Royale, Surfs Up, Ratatouille, Spiderman 3, Pirates of the Caribbean:AWE, Cars, Fantastic Four:ROTSS, Live Free or Die Hard, and Lost Season 3(I think).

[JsARCLIGHT]

My HD media collection was near 50/50 but it has been slowly moving towards Blu Ray dominance. Right now my collection is something like 65/35 in favor of BD. Not so much due to "picking a format" but simply because more quality properties are coming out on Blu Ray right now, and even more have been dual format. But now because Warner has moved to Blu Exclusive that means more movies I want will be on the Blu Side.

Heck, even when I had a movie that I wanted that was available on both formats I'd almost always chose the Blu Ray version... usually because it seemed to be easily available. I'm not sure about you guys but the local stores around here in STL are slow to restock their HD DVDs.

Edit: Then again the whole "slow to stock/restock" thing drove me to Amazon... and as we all probably know Amazon seems to be slanting towards Blu Ray ever so subtlety. They seem to be having Blu Ray BOGO offers more frequently than HD DVD, and those kind of things boost the numbers.

[eugimon]

Amazon also put better titles up on the blu-ray bogo than the HD-DVD. Oh well, time to go purple. I've actually bought ten or so HD-DVD titles since I got my 360 add on, but since it seems pretty clear now that once paramount's 18 month exclusivity deal is up, so is the format... there seems very little point in continuing to buy any more HD-DVD titles.

Edited January 4, 2008 by eugimon

[David Hingtgen]

I'm looking more at "all" movies, not just "recent blockbusters". I'm going back to the 80's when I'm planning my purchases. Yes, Blu-Ray is better for 2007+. But for 1980-2006, I see more HD-DVD's I want.

[Alpha OTS]

Yeah, but not Transformers on HD-DVD. Seriously---HD-DVD has the one release that really matters to the age group most likely to "pick" a format soon. (like me, and every other PS3/360 owner) Especially considering its still notably cheaper price.

My HD-TV was mainly for gaming. Transformers was the reason I bought the HD-DVD player for my 360, the 5 free disc deal made it easier to do(which looking back was also a bait and switch tactic, imo). If I was going to watch that movie at home, I wanted to see as much robot detail as possible.

But I'm pretty likely to buy a PS3 soon. The format war's kind of a moot point to me though. If there are things I want to watch in as high a detail as possible, I'll find and buy the way to do so.

[Dangard Ace]

That's a personal preference and I won't argue with you there David but I will standby my statement that I see more movies that I would rebuy on Hi Def on Bluray, top on that list is Aliens(1986) and I'm of the PS3/360 age group too.

About Paramount's exclusive contract to HD-DVD. I see Blu-Ray sales taking off with the general public now and HD-DVD sales will start lagging. I would bet that Paramount has some "out" clauses in their contract that lets them terminate it if certain performance expectations aren't met by them being HD-DVD exclusive.

Remember I'm purple so I can watch both formats but I've had a PS3 for a year and HD-DVD for a week. For obvious reasons I do lean Blu.

[eugimon]

I lean blu if only because I have a kid and I know I'll be buying the entire disney/pixar library in blu-ray in the coming years.

In the meantime, i'm actually quite happy with my HD-DVDs and the library available on it. I just got breach, the kingdom, eastern promises and some other movies so I have plenty of stuff to watch until I get around to buying a PS3.

[Gaijin]

Yeah, but not Transformers on HD-DVD. Seriously---HD-DVD has the one release that really matters to the age group most likely to "pick" a format soon. (like me, and every other PS3/360 owner) Especially considering its still notably cheaper price.

Currently "what I want on next-gen discs" is split about 50/50, maybe a slight edge to HD-DVD. Warner does comprise a good number of those, but #1 is still Transformers, and they just signed an 18 month "not on Blu-Ray" contract.

You'll probably see Transformers on Blu-ray sooner rather than later. Likely a "Special Uber- Edition" once Paramount and Dreamworks kiss HD DVD goodbye. Though "Transformers" was a high selling title for HD DVD, it still fell short. Add the Warner split, the PS3's sales surge, the fact that the Paramount switch did absolutely nothing to tip sales in HD DVD's favor (including the mentioned Transformers), and all the other studios backing BD and well...you really only have Universal that is being stubborn. And even they can see the writing on the wall.

Of course, you have Microsoft wanting both formats to die, so prolonging the war, only works in their favor..in their mind.

Anyways, the fat lady didn't sing, but she's getting ready I believe backstage.

Edited January 5, 2008 by Gaijin

[eugimon]

You'll probably see Transformers on Blu-ray sooner rather than later. Likely a "Special Uber- Edition" once Paramount and Dreamworks kiss HD DVD goodbye. Though "Transformers" was a high selling title for HD DVD, it still fell short. Add the Warner split, the PS3's sales surge, the fact that the Paramount switch did absolutely nothing to tip sales in HD DVD's favor (including the mentioned Transformers), and all the other studios backing BD and well...you really only have Universal that is being stubborn. And even they can see the writing on the wall.

Of course, you have Microsoft wanting both formats to die, so prolonging the war, only works in their favor..in their mind.

Anyways, the fat lady didn't sing, but she's getting ready I believe backstage.

given how much of a blu-whore Bay is, a blu-transformers disc is probably already mastered and just waiting for the embargo to end. Maybe this one will have a proper HD audio track.

Universal is the big HD-DVD lynch pin, they have a ton of titles out there.

[Gaijin]

Universal is the big HD-DVD lynch pin, they have a ton of titles out there.

Agreed. I just wish they were consistent. Their titles range from great looking (Serenity) to what the hell? (BSG Season 1). If they go Blu soon, they better do it right.