programming and human factors
by Jeff Atwood
I've been monitoring the progress of high-definition video playback on the PC for quite a while now:
It's been almost two years since I wrote that series, and I think we're dangerously close to viable high definition video playback on typical, mainstream PCs. One metric I follow closely is the price of the hardware, and OEM Blu-Ray drives are now only $99 shipped.
This drive is a DVD burner, in addition to playing HD-DVDs, Blu-Ray, and obviously DVDs -- and it also has very positive customer reviews. I couldn't resist, so I bought one.
I have no need for a standalone Blu-Ray player, but a cursory look tells me those are down to around $250 for decent models. And then of course there's always the PlayStation 3 option.
It's a shame OS X and Vista don't natively support HD playback of any kind (although Vista does include some copy protection mechanisms specific to high-definition video playback, which was the source of great hue and outrage). When you pair this $99 drive with some third party playback software like PowerDVD HD or WinDVD HD, you're set.
I'm particularly interested in high definition PC playback because the home theater PC I recently built is more than capable:
Also, I finally own a true 1920 x 1080 HDTV now -- yes, you can all stop making fun of me for using a creaky old brass and steam powered 852 x 480 EDTV -- so all the pieces are now in place for me to adopt Blu-Ray. I switched my Netflix account over to Blu-Ray this morning.
I'm not quite a high definition video early adopter, but I'm still on the leading edge of the curve. Funny how technology cycles repeat themselves. I distinctly recall being an early adopter of DVDs back in 1998, almost exactly 10 years ago. The 720 x 480 resolution and Dolby Digital sound seemed so impressive back then. I remember marvelling at the fancy interactive menus on the Austin Powers DVD. Of course, DVD quality is pretty pedestrian by today's standards. We've almost gotten to the point where DVD-level video quality is available worldwide in a typical web browser, not necessarily through YouTube, but through Vimeo and other alternatives.
With that in mind, I wonder how quaint Blu-Ray will seem in 2018?
The problem with this new generation is not the player itself, but the screen. The DVD worked on all televisions, blu-ray doesn't. Not until everyone has high def TV will the blu-ray win over DVD.
Hoffmann on December 5, 2008 1:10 AMI went the PS3 option. I haven't used it much as I refuse to pay $25 for blu ray movies.
David S on December 5, 2008 1:11 AMYou'd want to connect your living room computer to your receiver/television via a single HDMI cable.
I believe the Auzen X-Fi HomeTheater HD is the only sound card that will output Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio via HDMI.
http://www.auzentech.com/site/products/x-fi_hometheater_hd.php
It is scheduled for the end of January.
You'd use the following ports:
HDMI Input
HDMI or DVI-to-HDMI cable with video from the graphic card
(even better: internal HDMI from a future NVIDIA card)
HDMI Output
video and audio to your receiver/television
Hey Now Jeff,
Is it time?
Coding Horror Fan,
Catto
To get any of it to work, though, I think that your disc player, video card, sound card, receiver, and television/monitor all need to support the right version of HDMI and HDCP DRM copy protection. What a P in the A.
Zack on December 5, 2008 1:15 AMI'm a naysayer. For me it's all about who's the one behind the curtains; Sony. Just look at Sony's history with their other formats; Beta vs VHS, memory stick versus CF and SD, MD discs (remember those?), UMD (those discs for the Play Station Portable), ATrack (their music compression format), etc. ad nauseum.
Blu Ray burners are still hideously expensive, as are blank discs. And the movies are way more than dvd movies.
Comments like: Blu Ray burners are still hideously expensive, as are blank discs. And the movies are way more than dvd movies.
Displays your lack of actually seeing a bluray as compared to a regular dvd.
Slapnuts on December 5, 2008 1:59 AMOnly $99!?! Meanwhile, read-only dvd drives are $14.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106086
And then compare the Blu Ray burner at $230 versus the dvd burner at $25.
I'll pass.
The other thing I'm wondering about is the agreement between Sony and Toshiba where Toshiba agreed to drop HD DVD. I read that Toshiba is still aggressively marketing HD DVD in China. My guess is that it's got a time limit on it whereupon when it expires Toshiba will be back with something better, and by then everyone will be tired of waiting for Blu Ray prices to become reasonable.
Rusty on December 5, 2008 2:01 AMDisplays your lack of actually seeing a bluray as compared to a regular dvd.
No, it just displays my lack of wanting to throw away money on another potentially failed Sony format.
I have an xbox 360 and a 1080p tv, and I've downloaded HD movies from xbox live. And the xbox games are all HD. But, to be honest, I prefer reading to watching movies. And to be really honest, I don't watch tv; I don't have cable and where I live you can't get anything without it and it's not hooked up to an antenna. The tv is only for the xbox. I don't rent that often.
Rusty on December 5, 2008 2:09 AMMy only comment after reading all these comments is: was the (dis/mis)information as rampant when DVDs had just come out?
W on December 5, 2008 2:36 AMThe DRM built into Blu-Ray doesn't bother you, Jeff?
No more than the DRM in the Xbox 360, or the DRM in the iPhone. Obviously I'm not excited about DRM (who is?) but if they can keep the prices low and deliver products that just work and aren't overly consumer hostile, then sure. Why not?
You'd want to connect your living room computer to your receiver/television via a single HDMI cable.
Not in my case; I send audio to the receiver via optical out and video to the display via HDMI. The motherboard in my HTPC build has both of these outputs built in, which is nice. Have I mentioned how much I love that system? Man. It's a dream box.
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001107.html
IMO, part of the enjoyment of Blu-Ray is the ability to hear 7.1 uncompressed sound
Dolby TrueHD, mandatory for HD DVD and optional for Blu-Ray
http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/trueHD.html
DTS-HD Master Audio, optional for both
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DTS-HD_Master_Audio
Looks like LPCM is a standard Blu-Ray audio format and it is lossless?
http://www.blu-ray.com/faq/#bluray_audio_codecs
No, it just displays my lack of wanting to throw away money on another potentially failed Sony format.
Your other points well taken and entirely valid, but I don't think bluray is failed. It looks absolutely stunning for some movies like Ratatouille or Cars or (hate to say it) the new Rambo. The sound is incredible for any movie as well.
I too hate the $25 price tag for movies, but sometimes you can find them reasonably priced.
Perhaps just the marketing is failed? Or perhaps Sony's history is questionable?
Slapnuts on December 5, 2008 3:18 AMI don't think I would specifically buy a blu ray drive I will just wait until I next upgrade my computer. Can't see it as worth it since I can buy a couple of terabytes of hard drive space and have all my media accessible over my home network at the touch of a button. No messing with discs and any room I want.
Surely this is the point internet video downloads surpass disc.
pete on December 5, 2008 3:24 AMWhat can I say except can you say Sony!
I have this drive and an ATI card with HDMI out. I cannot play anything back through the included PowerDVD because of HDCP.
JDL on December 5, 2008 4:52 AMI meant to add, I am unaware of a video card that does support HDCP. Infact, ATI was sued over the issue.
JDL on December 5, 2008 4:54 AMHold on partner: the EDTV is still a perfectly good choice, especially if you don't have Blu-Ray yet. I would recommend it for at least another year or so. Save yourself a bundle (if you can find one, I guess).
mgroves on December 5, 2008 5:25 AMBlu-Ray doesn't have much time left. I always thought the HD formats were doomed to die because consumers respond much more to an increase in convenience than an increase in quality. Look at the music industry: the record format changed to a double-sided format, even though it sounded worse, then to cassettes that could be played anywhere that sounded worse, then to CDs that didn't sound as warm and finally to MP3s that sounded worse. The consumer that cares about quality is the minority. Most consumers only care if it's unusable, and upscaling makes DVDs perfectly usable on a HDTV.
Merus on December 5, 2008 6:47 AMThe (relative) lack of comments this entry has gotten is interesting--how often do geeks pass up an opportunity to bicker with each other about media formats?
The truth, I think, is that Blu-Ray seems quaint *now*: with Netflix downloads available over both Xbox 360 and TiVo, spending hundreds of dollars on a machine that plays shiny discs feels very three years ago. We're still a few years away from the kind of bandwidth that will make regular HD downloads to the home feasible, but considering that a sizable percentage of HDTV owners don't even know they're not watching HDTV (http://www.pcworld.com/article/154428/HDTV.html), I have a hard time believing that 1080p and 7.1 sound is going to matter to a lot of people before then anyway.
phh on December 5, 2008 6:49 AM1. Why are so many people complaining about the purchase price of Blu-Ray movies? Do the Blockbuster stores in your area(s) not carry any Blu-Ray titles? Mine does. Netflix also offers Blu-Ray for many of their movies.
2. HDCP support is present in nVidia Geforce 7 and 8 series GPUs and I imagine their later chipsets. I have an 8800GT and it 'supports' HDCP, but I don't have a Blu-Ray drive to test.
jtimberman on December 5, 2008 8:08 AMI'll just keep right on waiting myself. Maybe as long as it takes for the next big rev to come around.
And if there is a format war for that format, or its drm crazy, or they want what I foolishly paid for my first DVD player in 96, maybe I will just keep right on waiting.
Honestly, DVD video is quite acceptable. Don't get me wrong, HD video is nice and all, but the quality increase lacks parity with the price increase. From VHS to DVD was a no brainer, but the next leap is either going to have to be a 40$ player kind of cheap or so revolutionary that the synapses in the back of my head punish me for not selling my grand children to get it.
Xepol on December 5, 2008 8:15 AMConsumer no need 1080p...
Consumer only want convenience......
PPL in china is converting video from 1080p(bluray) to 1080i/720p.....and seems it is more popular........
bergkamp on December 5, 2008 9:38 AMIt's not time yet Jeff, give it 6 months.
retospect on December 5, 2008 10:17 AM/\ +1 Insightful
Stefan Mai on December 5, 2008 10:32 AMHow quaint do DVDs seem now? Originally launched in 1996 (Europe in '98). Blu-ray progression will be comparable!
no on December 5, 2008 10:34 AMIt's definitely getting harder to resist buying a 42 LCD HDTV with 1920x1080 resolution. Prices are well under $1000 now.
Kuerwen on December 5, 2008 10:35 AMIt seems as if Blu-Ray is getting beat by digital distribution in convenience and cost. Looking at new services popping up like NetFlicks streaming and the slow adoption rate of Blu-Ray seems to indicate this.
You gotta wonder whether consumers will ultimately choose convenience over the next perfect picture and sound experience. Maybe I'm just not a movie buff, but I find streaming media to be much more appealing than owning a disk. Heck, I own a PS3 and I hardly ever use it to play Blu-Rays.
Maybe it's my anti-materialistic attitude towards things nowadays. I just don't feel the need to own movies. Is there a certain novelty in your mind about owning the definitive version of a movie?
Norman on December 5, 2008 10:36 AMOnly $99 for that drive? I have DVI-to-HDMI adapter I use on my video card (1 GB GeForce 9800 GT), so I can hook that mess up to my 40 LCD HDTV. Seems like a really good option. Of course, the DVD player in my computer I bought off newegg for about $20.
Joe on December 5, 2008 10:37 AMOh and I was just remembering, I justified buying a PS2 back in the day because it could double as a DVD player. If PS3 prices would drop another $100 I'd make the same justification again for Blu-ray.
The only problem with the PS2 and DVDs was that the PS2 was really sensitive to scratches and dust and would stop playing very easily. I wonder if the PS3 is like that with Blu-ray?
Kuerwen on December 5, 2008 10:38 AMEh, don't toot your horn too much, you're far from on the leading the edge
Bluray has already won the format war. We've had 3 different HD video res, and several HD screen technologies have come and gone.
Balls on December 5, 2008 10:38 AMnah, not good enough yet, 'cause the OEM software that the drives come with only output STEREO!
So when you add up the $$ of software on top of the drive, I'd still rather get a standalone player.
Henry Ho on December 5, 2008 10:40 AMFor playback, especially if you're using MCE, you should get ArcSoft Total Media Theater.
If you want to back up your movies to HD and play from there, add in AnyDVD HD:
http://www.ditii.com/2008/07/25/windows-vista-media-center-play-blu-ray-and-hd-dvd-movies/
Brad Wilson on December 5, 2008 10:40 AMhttp://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=dZnmXwLjV0Ufeature=related fmt=22
^ hd on youtube. I wish I had a better video for you, but you'll have to gag through the Hillary Duff to watch the HD wonderfulness.
(click on Watch in HD on compatible videos where the higher quality link used to be)
Jeff on December 5, 2008 10:42 AMI have to wonder if we'll reach a saturation point. For example, there haven't been advances to audio technology, and I believe this is because CD and MP3 are adequate for our needs. At some points you reach the native resolution of the human body and adding more is just wasted information.
I think we have a ways to go on video, as that is our highest bandwidth port to the outside world, but the current high-definition video is pretty impressive looks practically real to me.
Drew on December 5, 2008 10:46 AMYou could do this blu-ray drive + netflix blu-ray subscription and you have yourself a pretty affordable HD viewing experience. Just make sure you have a monitor that can do at least do 1920 x 1200 resolution.
Adam on December 5, 2008 11:10 AMI just am not all that impressed by the blu-ray playback quality. Upscaled DVDs look FANTASTIC on my 1080i Westinghouse set. I haven't bought any blu-rays for my ps3 yet but I've seen plenty of store displays and I just haven't noticed a big enough difference to justify the cost.
o.s. on December 5, 2008 11:10 AM@Drew:
I doubt most people are aware how close we are to the biological limits yet. I'm betting the marketers will exploit that to pitch the new stuff, even if we can't process much of the extra information.
Aside from that, I'm sure there other profitable avenues for TV technology to explore...
Evan on December 5, 2008 11:13 AMThe DRM built into Blu-Ray doesn't bother you, Jeff? (Not saying it should; genuinely curious about your thoughts on it.)
Eric Meyer on December 5, 2008 11:18 AMThe next step is obviously a higher dynamic range. The size is irrelevant if the color depth remains unchanged. 32bit displays are hopelessly terrible compared to what the eye can see.
http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/208
YES, blu-ray is worth it!
I owned the Lost Season 3 DVDs, and on a whim, ordered the blu-ray version of the same episode from Netflix.
The difference was like night and day. We switched back and forth several times and it was way, way better on blu-ray.
Bill on December 5, 2008 11:21 AMThe DRM built into Blu-Ray doesn't bother you, Jeff? (Not saying it should; genuinely curious about your thoughts on it.)
In 90% of the cases the only people who care about DRM are the cheap ass pirates.
ola ! on December 5, 2008 11:22 AMI'm just wondering, is the DRM on blu-ray completely broken now and how's the support for that on linux?
@ola some of us are fine buying the discs and the players, but I refuse to run windows and buy some lousy software program to do actual playback.
wds on December 5, 2008 11:27 AM@ola!:
The DRM built into Blu-Ray doesn't bother you, Jeff? (Not saying it should; genuinely curious about your thoughts on it.)
In 90% of the cases the only people who care about DRM are the cheap ass pirates.
Or Linux users.
Forgive my ignorance but blu-ray uses a blue laser, which is a big part of how it gets higher data densities, correct? Do they need a red laser also to double as a standard dvd player?
Tim on December 5, 2008 11:36 AMTo me, the whole idea of keeping your video on a shiny, spinning disc is already looking a bit outdated. Stream, fuckers, stream!
dan on December 5, 2008 11:36 AMHD video time? Yes
Blu-Ray? No
HD has already been with us for quite some time due to high speed Internet and low bandwidth costs; one can easily find HQ HD version of almost everything that is out online.
Wasting money and space on a physical media? No thanks.
Blu-Ray is worth it if you have a large 1080p-resolution display. In my case, I've got a 1080p projector pointed at an 80-inch (diagonal) screen. With a DVD, even the best upscaling looks lousy compared with Blu-Ray. The pixels are about 2mm square-- barely invisible from the couch. But for DVDs, the pixels are huge, and there's only so much that the upscaler can use to fix it. (I'm using a PS3, which I suspect uses Lanczos or some similar sinc-based upscaling algorithm; I can tell by the glow around the shirts on my kids' Wiggles DVDs.)
With smaller screens, 1080p is wasted because the pixels are much too small to see from a typical viewing distance.
Another thing: Blu-Ray is likely to be king for HD for a long time because it's not significantly data constrained. Cable companies and download services try to minimize the bandwidth and give you a picture that's just good enough so that you won't complain.
David Leppik on December 5, 2008 11:46 AMI gave up on TV a while ago. I don't even have one where I live right now. I watch everything on my computer. Better resolution than a standard TV, plus everything is digital. You know what would be a great service? If there was an online store that would allow you to download movies and as time progressed and technology got better you could upgrade your digital copy to the higher resolution version or newer formats.
Ronald on December 5, 2008 12:42 PM@Drew - What do you mean by there haven't been advances to audio technology? IMO, part of the enjoyment of Blu-Ray is the ability to hear 7.1 uncompressed sound. Compared to a standard DVD, the difference is impressive.
J on December 5, 2008 12:44 PMDownloading taking forever and no viable alternative for Netflix being available over here (in the Netherlands) makes Blu-Ray the only way to see HD content.
--
Andreas
@Jeff Donnici:
A) my Samsung DLP looks great at 1920x1080. connected via DVI-VGA cable.
B) i don't use it for computer activities often, but when i do it's usually web browsing. in firefox: Ctrl-+ rocks. so, that's very usable from 12 feet away. a more general solution: adjust the font size in control panel.
@Jeff Donnici:
A) my Samsung DLP looks great at 1920x1080. connected via DVI-VGA cable.
B) i don't use it for computer activities often, but when i do it's usually web browsing. in firefox: Ctrl-+ rocks. so, that's very usable from 12 feet away. a more general solution: adjust the font size in control panel.
I bought the exact same drive from Newegg on Black Friday and couldn't be happier with it. The fact that it also supports HDDVD was a selling-point for me, as you can find some HDDVDs floating around for a rather low price. Snag those up as you can, fill the rest of your collection with Blu-ray discs.
Ryan Cain on December 6, 2008 5:18 AMI have a full 1080p HD TV and to be honest, the increase in quality from DVD to HD just isn't worth the extra cost of a blu-ray player + discs. Perhaps if you have an 81 TV or something it might be worth it, but I really can't see what all the fuss is about at 46.
Not to mention the fact that if you run Linux as I do, you're going to run into all sorts of stupid problems with HDCP. To me, the idea of a piece of technology refusing to play something which I have paid for because of the operating system I run, or some component of hardware is not compliant, is unacceptable bullshit.
I'm happy with DVDs and I think blu-ray is just for the wank factor.
Dave G. on December 6, 2008 5:50 AMi have a panasonic 1080p 46 plasma and i can definitely see a difference in video quality between blu-ray and dvd. its huge. my blu-ray player is a ps3 and since i had one for games i thought id try out some blu-rays as well. i loved it. but as a poor college student i cant buy all blu-rays so i just pick a few movies that i love and buy them on blu-ray and the majority of other on dvd, there is a happy medium, no need to go all out. but the choice wasnt that hard for me since i had a ps3 to begin with. since i spent thousands on all my equipment why not spend like 5-10 dollars more on a couple movies.
mike on December 6, 2008 6:12 AMPeople who say ooh I'm gonna buy one of those full HD lcd tv's, they are so cheap now really need to *look* at them in a store. Full HD isn't that important.
When you are at a reasonable distance (living-room distance) you barely see if your tv is full HD. But you still see the colors, the contrast etc.
The cheap LCD's have horrible contrast, horrible color and horrible flow. Full HD doesn't change that. The LCD's that have an acceptable picture are very costly.
Then there's plasma. For about half the price you get a really good picture. Of course plasma has other downsides. But at least it's not like you're watching a video game.
Vista SP2 due out next year will natively support Blu-Ray burning, not sure about playback though...
Jesse on December 6, 2008 6:35 AMI stopped my BluRay subscription on Netflix when they added an extra fee for it (I think it's only $1, but they can shove it). Usually I notice the difference in visual quality for less than 5 minutes, then I'm watching the movie instead of paying attention to the resolution.
That being said, I'm still on 720p, so maybe it'll be more worthwhile when I get a new TV.
Of course, I haven't bought a single BluRay disc, yet. I'm not really interested in starting over with my collection, especially knowing that there are further advances coming with more storage and higher resolutions (on both TVs and the storage media).
Vizeroth on December 6, 2008 8:35 AMHave you had much luck getting your 1920 HDTV to run Vista in a nice, high resolution?
I did the HTPC thing a couple months ago also and have it connected (via DVI-HDMI adapter) to our new Samsung LCD (from the ToC series).
At a resolution like 1280 by 720 (or something like that - I'm not near it), it looks pretty good -- but ovbvious there's not much screen space there to work with. When I bump it up to 1920x1200, (or thereabouts) there's a definite fuzziness that makes it look not native on the television.
Just wondering if A) others have seen similar issues getting the high resolutions to pair up between PC and TV and B), I suppose there's the question of whether 1920x1200 is usable from the couch 10-12 feet away.
Jeff Donnici on December 6, 2008 11:02 AMPeople here seriously need to go see a 70mm film and then tell me that resolution doesn't matter. We aren't even close to digitally reproducing what the eye can resolve. The only reason it may seem that way is because Full HD is such a relatively miniscule improvement. It's still very substantial thought. It being most obvious in video games what the difference between 480p and 1080p actually is.
Full HD is just over 2 megapixels. 35mm film is worth almost ten times that. I don't even know what the numbers are for 70mm. And that is visibly clearer than 35mm.
BmB on December 6, 2008 11:54 AMWith the price and reliability of solid state media becoming better by the day, BluRay seems like an answer in search of a problem.
4GB and 8GB flash drives are becoming retarded cheap. Pretty soon, someone will have the idea to plop a movie on something like that with a dedicated player. Imagine a whole season of television programming on something the size of your thumb.
So, if downloads don't catch on as quick as needed, solid state drive movies are the next media shift.
BA on December 6, 2008 12:59 PMBlu-Ray? I think thats just a fad and that the future is laser-disc. With a name like that how can it not be futuristic?
Robbo on December 7, 2008 3:15 AMI have been using the same drive you just bought for a few months now. I would give it 5/5 except that I have had issue with some scratches on rental disks. Since this is my only drive I cannot compare how good it is at reading over scratches, but it is a very nice drive otherwise.
Brook on December 7, 2008 4:29 AMThink they can fit any more branding on the front of that drive?
Jerz on December 7, 2008 8:19 AMThe only problem I have with the Blu-Ray DRM is the HDCP part. Basically requires me to toss the rest of my system out because I don't have the right output going to my TV. No thanks.
The stuff preventing me from copying the disc is annoying, but livable. Having to replace half my rig so that I can't exploit the analog hole is not.
Mike on December 7, 2008 8:47 AMHD, HDPC, HDMI, DVI, DVI, PRI, CMI, FBI... Bah humbug. I hate how complicated all of this crap has gotten, and I grew up at a time when you made your computer run better using solder and EPROM burners. I'm not a technophobe. I'm just too lazy to make going to Wally World to buy a new TV into an extended research project. Bleck. Who cares?
I've bought Star Wars too many times as it is, thanks. I don't really need to count Princess Leia's nose hair.
I do have to chuckle a little at the people bitching about $25 Blu-Ray movies though. Hell, it used to be blank VHS tapes cost more than that, and movies were up to $100, and that was call it 1982 dollars.
Michael on December 7, 2008 11:26 AMNo, it just displays my lack of wanting to throw away money on another potentially failed Sony format.
It's not a Sony format. Sony is just one of the 18 board members of Blu-ray Disc Association.
You could just as well say that you don't want to throw away money on another potentially failed Warner Bros. format.
when is there going to be an .MKV file support on XboX? it supports DivX so why not hd rips too?
anyone knows how to playback .MKV's in Vista (or XP) Media Center?
Ruslan on December 8, 2008 5:45 AMThis is all very entertaining to read!
I remember a lot of the same arguments when the formats changed from VHS to DVD, the players were several hundreds ( or $? first one then the other) the discs were ludicrously priced and many TV's (y'know those old Cathode Ray tube devices) didn’t have the right connections like scart.
Then it all changed as VHS was phased out and bargain players and movies came out. Now in the UK we can buy a separate DVD player for under 20 and buy films for 2-5, combine that with sales in HMV or similar and it is all very cheap now.
Unfortunately this whole HD thing is all about getting those stupidly big TV's to actually look good, which is pretty ridiculous as most people (in the UK at least) would need to either move house or have major building works done to actually get one in their house and have the appropriate distance between themselves and the screen otherwise your gonna see those pixels anyway or give yourself major neck strain looking up at the screen.
I have yet to see a new display at the old size of 28inches look better with a HD input than it looks on the older DVD format, even the LCD/Plasma TV's of that size still look shit! Go to any electrical store to see what I mean.
Anyhow, if Blu-Ray was to gain the acceptance and popularity of other previous formats then it will only happen if DVD was phased out and this would only happen if they were cheap enough. Given the popularity of downloaded/streamed content and as someone rightly pointed out the cheapness of solid state storage I really don't think there will be a phasing out of DVD discs in favour of Blu-Ray discs, more likely a phasing out of discs in favour of downloads or flash memory storage.
Also I do think the incompatibility of many different elements of the technology is a major obstacle to wide-spread adoption - too many different ways to do the same bloody thing!
apparently, i've been solving so many problems with this DVD burning thing, I've turned myself into a problem, LOLZ.
If you look carefully however, that isn't true. Technology standards are pretty lame in large institutions like universities, govt offices and so on. People all through the hierarchy do not use Blu-Ray. High speed broadband, maybe made pervasive by wireless, would've probably been the best thing to do, but alas! the profit margins don't quite look sexy for bright globe-trotting geniuses trained to solve problems. So, we have to sit and discuss Blu-ray here.
Imagine what Jini had promised long ago - back in 1993 - with today's spread of the internet. (Hey, I just noticed its too bright and sunny for my strained eyes... er.. umm.. whatever... sorry...)
Pervasive free wireless, I must move to Mountain View, really!
But Mountain View is blurred and foggy aaprently, this time of the year, so since it's not that clear, maybe it will interfere with digital signals.... The rest of us who dont live in Mountain View need BluRayz?!?!? LOLZZZZZZ!!!
I've been tossing around a few discs lately, its not a funny thing, you know, considering the wait and seek times. Lead time is the worst. Hah! M$ has a good set of ways to cut through this, but they never respond to the real end-user market's demands. They try to decide what the market will be and what is fit for the kids and so on. So, we are here, the tech community, some of us wanting to make transfer of information better and faster and cheaper, and others M$ busy doing their own stuff, totally not communicating with the end-users for feedback. M$ collude with the lawmakers to make grand announcements but don't deliver. Same old story over the decades.
Why do they brand and package things as new and revolutionary?
Did I digress, transgress?
All I want is general progress in this technology and discussion.
System broken :(
P.S. Jeff, I really do think you should add some different fruit to your Captcha salad but the Gothic script is quite fetchingly Gangsta!
Echo Gnome on December 8, 2008 5:48 AMIt's all sad really. Sheep driven to conspicuous consumption.
worried about people on December 8, 2008 5:59 AMIt kind of assumes that Blu-Ray will actually have a time and won't be bypassed by whatever comes next. The interest in DVD was more about the compactness and the disc format and the fact that it didn't degrade in quality over time, I think, than anything else. A lot of people went in and bought big DVD libraries based on those factors that they won't want to go and re-buy (and this was a significant factor in DVD's success -- sales of the back library), and now we're heading into difficult economic times.
I think BluRay may become a bit like LaserDisc...
Jeff, why don't you change your blog's name to Jeff's Tech Shopping Sellout, or if you would like to stay credible, at least disclose what you make from your direct product links to NewEgg, Amazon, etc. Product placement in movies and TV shows is lame, but blogging about products so you can make a commission on 'em is borderline sleazy.
@codinghorror I've got the same mobo for my HTPC, but can't find the right driver/software combination to play blu-ray - what do you use?
Greg Hurlman on December 8, 2008 7:05 AMI think the sampled differences in the quoted articles would be more meaningful if the screen captures were both adjusted to the sRGB color profile from their respective NTSC and HDTV profiles. The HDTV picture should have superior colour and contrast, not merely be darker and duller, as presented, which is purely an artifact of presentation. The differences lie not just in the number of pixels, but in issues such as compression artifacts and width of color gamut.
Paul Coddington on December 8, 2008 7:22 AMUsing optical audio with a blu-ray player is essentially utilizing only half of the player's power. Uncompressed audio tracks are leaps and bounds better than standard dolby digital or DTS (in the same sense that 1080p is leaps and bounds better than 480p). With how cheap HDMI audio decoding receivers have gotten, there is no excuse to not feed the uncompressed LPCM signal straight into the receiver. I have no idea whether a modern pc can send the audio track over hdmi, but it should be able to. I think this is something most people tend to overlook for one reason or another -- they shouldn't, sound is 1/2 of the package.
Bryan on December 8, 2008 7:32 AMFor the individual who said if P$3's lowered by $100 they'd buy it, the stand alone cost for each would be considerably more. You get a better deal buying the P$3, even if it was the 40g unit, as you can upgrade with a larger, cheaper-to-buy HDD.
But for those who only want blu-ray, definitely get the OEM drive. Take advantage of the technology while you are still young..don't wait another 10 years for something else, or to see if blu-ray caught on. Just rent the movie, don't buy.
D Garcia on December 8, 2008 8:36 AMstebe,
Are you kidding? Sounds like commercialismistic-paranoia has crept up on you. Even so, who cares what ppl get comped for promoting (not saying he is), this is how it is. Step outside, you'll see.
D Garcia on December 8, 2008 8:38 AMI read an article (wish I had the link but sadly I don't) that felt that BlueRay would only last five years before being replaced by something better.
As someone who routinely uses a media center for playing all my videos, I would much rather have a blue-ray quality service that streamed video I would watch than have to store all those discs.
That said, i don't think bandwidth will be plentiful enough to make that a reality for several years so in the mean time, jumping on the BlueRay bandwagon for a few years wouldn't be a bad idea.
Kris on December 8, 2008 8:41 AMAs quoted by mattbg,
I think BluRay may become a bit like LaserDisc...
I don't think so. Given the storage capabilities alone, it will never go that route. Heck, LaserDisc is still popular. I have a complete collection of my favs that I have enjoyed collecting and watching. Even if Blu-Ray did go that route, it still would be nostalgia, thus be collectible.
I do, however agree that movies will somehow become available on micro SD type media. Or something more portable. We are a teeny-tiny people. We love small and compact. Hell, look for movie pills you can pop and dream your movie. Science is always looking for a reason to spend more useless government dollars.
D Garcia on December 8, 2008 8:44 AMAs quoted by Kris,
I read an article (wish I had the link but sadly I don't) that felt that BlueRay would only last five years before being replaced by something better.
As someone who routinely uses a media center for playing all my videos, I would much rather have a blue-ray quality service that streamed video I would watch than have to store all those discs.
That said, i don't think bandwidth will be plentiful enough to make that a reality for several years so in the mean time, jumping on the BlueRay bandwagon for a few years wouldn't be a bad idea.
Word
Yeah I don't know about all this. If I'm more than 2 feet away, I can't really tell the difference. I wonder if that's my eyes or just the way it is for everybody.
Jasmine on December 8, 2008 8:51 AMWhy would anyone want blueray when we got 10Mb/s or more in the wall?
Optic media is dead and if you still like having 12cm plastic discs laying around all over your house our good old DVDs can actually fit a hd-movie.
I've downloaded some 720p movies on around 2.5Gb each(2 HD movies on one DVD!) and if you check the filesize on the 1080 versions they arrive at 8Gb, just enough for a double sized DVD.
And no...this is not obtained with crappy codecs, x264 is realy realy good. Trust me, im sensitive to visual quality.
Why isn't the movie companies using all this potential? Or does DRM take up the remaining 80% of the discs?
And what's wrong with DVI for outputing the movie? 1920 1200 @ 60Hz would be enough for anyone atm. At least for movies that can't even be obained with higher quality now. I would love higher resolution and refreshrate on my pc-monitor though.
Blueray BRINGS NOTHING NEW like the dvd did. It will take very very long before it will reach out to the masses.
DRM is the problem.
On philosophical grounds, I simply do not buy any product that has DRM. That means no iTunes, no region-coded DVDs, and certainly not BluRay.
I would add that I do not feel deprived by not having the content either. I've come to the conclusion that live music is it. CDs from the major labels of over-priced based on what actually ends up in the artists pocket and over-processed to the point of being disappointing when compared to live performances and my old LPs. I enjoy live performances and I may buy CDs from the performers directly and only if they are not enslaved by some major music label.
The harassment by the recorded entertainment industry has gone too far and it has to stop some where. Let it begin with me. I just will not buy it.
JMHO
I would have thought people would shy away from blu-ray considering the minor economic meltdown the US is experiencing right now; at least in reference to the stand alone players.
Matthew on December 9, 2008 2:02 AMThe transition from CD/DVD was fast enough I think, when DVD players started selling cheap. In Developing countries, still the Blu-ray is very costly, when comparing to their wage level. I believe that, space does matters when it comes to hi-definition things. Only players like Google can withstand the costs. That is how the DivX Video http://www.stage6.com/ service died very earlier. In recent time only youtube started streaming some more high quality videos. I agree with you about 2018 :) if no magic happened in the costs for space and service come to a lower side.
Sarath on December 9, 2008 2:48 AMDownloading movies is the future! :)
(That and super fast internet connections—I am not sure when those are coming)
Practicality on December 9, 2008 7:05 AMBluRay -
If you have a 1080P screen then yes
If you have a decent speaker system then yes
If you are watching on a Normal TV/Screen with standard stereo then you will not notice the difference ...
Sony tend to pick the winner more than you think?
VHS vs BetaMax - Sony was involved in both sides ....and VHS used mostly BetaMax technology by the end ...
The various Sony only formats were all hamstrung by being Sony only and by having copy protection built in ...
HDDVD vs BluRay - Sony was on both sides ....
I will no tolerate attack on good people. I will retaliate. I will give a reply.
@stebe : Ad hominem!
You must go from the internet (yes!) and the online media (yes!)
Go recluse yourself into a dirty dark corner. (yes!)
How does that sound, dear?
Arguments should be precise and must first consider responsibilities that the individual has, or has not. Am i wrong? May not be, because finally the Grand Jury always talks Law in the end, and as we all know,
The Law Is An Ass(TM).
:-) :s grrr...
On the average size display, depending on the source the difference between 720p and 1080p can be debatable.
I thought so as well, but I just did some window shopping today and was quite surprised by what I saw.
A side-by-side comparison of 32 screens with a good Blu-Ray source revealed a great deal of difference between 720p and 1080p capable sets. Oddly, the 1080p picture was a actually a little hard on the eyes because of all the extra detail, especially when that detail was moving (leaves, water).
Another point I should have mentioned earlier, along with colour/contrast is moire patterns. One obvious improvement of HD over SD regardless of screen size is that pinstripe suits and brickwork, etc, have far less tendency to break up into shimmering rainbow patterns. That is quite a significant step forward in picture quality.
Paul Coddington on December 10, 2008 8:33 AMI hope that the era of noisy mass media with rotating parts
is finally over.
A SDHC card can store a whole TV season of your favourite serie(s)
in DVD (or better) quality using a good compressing algorithm.
Open questions are the life time of SDHC cards and the number
of inserts the card reader and media survive.
And another good thing: you can reuse your old stamp-album as
a movie-album with SDHC cards.
DVD boxes occupy too much space! I already considered buying one
of these DJ cases where you can tightly store 600 DVDs so I can
finally part with my bulky DVD boxes.
Just glancing over the comments it's interesting to see that the physical limitations of the human body are mentioned.
I had a similar discussion the other day with my brother. We were discussing how due to bandwidth, compression and storage space the DVD has now been made obsolete. The large amount of data required for 720p or 1080p video makes it impractical from a cost perspective to store or transfer large libraries of videos at that resolution. Though I'm sure that will eventually change, the question is, where do we go from there.
On the average size display, depending on the source the difference between 720p and 1080p can be debatable. Obviously as you scale up in size the difference becomes more noticeable, however I do not for see a future where everyone has 50+ inch televisions. It's simply impractical for many spaces.
So what will drive the next format? Optical discs are fairly easy to use and store. I don't see a reason why you would increase capacity just to store multiple titles on a single disc. The only thing that I can think of that would drive a new format would be the possibility of 3D, especially if some level of it can be attained without some sort of glasses.
alexp206 on December 10, 2008 12:54 PMIf you already have a PS3 it is a bit pointless building a HTPC, since you can share the media on other PC to the playstation.
I do this and works great.
Vinicius on December 11, 2008 7:35 AMBlu-ray offers a negligible improvement in audio features / quality over a standard DVD / DD|DTS setup, so I'm not quite sure why this keeps getting brought up, aside from perhaps people just discovering home theater and thinking this is all new. It isn't, and audio is indeed a very important part of the experience. There are marginal codec differences and uncompressed support, but on the grand scale of things that improve the experience, it falls in the realm of completely unnoticeable even if you tried your hardest to differentiate.
Video wise, the resolution on the 35mm film they shoot movies with is generally not so great (higher ISO and thus lower resolution), which is why real life movies seldom see much improvement. Instead the biggest improvements tend to come in animated/CGI features, yet that also happens to be where video upscaling on better DVD players can achieve very comparable results.
Most people don't care about the video quality, and for those watching on a monster screen at a close distance, focused on individual pixels, realize that you are highly atypical, and you're probably so caught up analyzing the technical details and patting yourself on the back for your consumer purchases, you aren't even immersing in the movie at all, focusing on entirely the wrong thing.
I have a blu-ray player because the rental service offers it as a format, and why not? But for more viewers this is such a non-issue that will have no impact on their lives or enjoyment of movies that it's just something they'll upgrade to when forced to (which is in the plans, by the way. Expect to start seeing new movies on blu-ray in advance of DVD, if DVD releases happen at all). I won't actually *buy* any Blu-ray movies, at least not for a few years, given that they won't play in the other PCs, in the car, in the portable player, etc.
Dennis Forbes on December 11, 2008 9:42 AMOn philosophical grounds, I simply do not buy any product that has DRM. That means no iTunes, no region-coded DVDs, and certainly not BluRay.
That also includes any video game consoles, ALL DVDs (they're encoded, you know), anything that uses HDMI, cable boxes and satellite receivers, and tons of other stuff.
Most everything has DRM. Just because the particular DRM used doesn't bother you doesn't mean that it's not there.
nw on December 18, 2008 11:17 AMI think the sampled differences in the quoted articles would be more meaningful if the screen captures were both adjusted to the sRGB color profile from their respective NTSC and HDTV profiles. The HDTV picture should have superior colour and contrast, not merely be darker and duller, as presented, which is purely an artifact of presentation. The differences lie not just in the number of pixels, but in issues such as compression artifacts and width of color gamut.
http://resmontazh.ru/
i wonder if blu-ray will be the last physical media format for movies? it seems pretty clear that CD's are the last ubiquitous physical media format for music.
eventually i don't expect we'll own any kind of copy of media at all, we'll just own rights to stream it... not sure that's the world we want but i think it's what we'll get. so instead of having to buy star wars trilogy or the white album every ten/fifteen years on a new format, we'll just always have to pay to watch/hear it, or be inundated with ads, or some such thing.
on that note, i don't really plan on upgrading to blu-ray any time in the foreseeable future, if ever...
jlarson on February 6, 2010 11:13 PMHave you thought about exploiting the java capabilities built into Blu-Ray?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BD-J
Jon on February 6, 2010 11:13 PMJeff, I recommend getting the Blu_Ray version of the latest Hulk movie from Netflix. So far this has had the most impressive picture quality on my 58 1080p plasma.
Jason on February 6, 2010 11:13 PMWhat about HDCP? Doesn't your TV and video card/mobo need to support it to get this whole shebang to work? I too built a similar system to Jeff's after his most recent HTPC post, but I didn't get this blu-ray drive (though I considered it strongly) because of my concerns over getting it to work with my Sharp Aquos, which doesn't support HDCP.
Ross Johnson on February 6, 2010 11:13 PMThe comments to this entry are closed.
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