http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/ Engadget HD Comments for First HD DVD vs Blu-ray title bout - "Training Day" http://hd.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://hd.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2009 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 10:43AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 10:44AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 10:52AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
What?]]>Aug 1st 2006 11:13AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
Well, that and the extra $400 I could be spending on games and movies.

In the meantime, my HD-A1 will serve me well, though I'd like to see more titles annonced!]]>Aug 1st 2006 11:26AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 11:32AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 11:32AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 11:34AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 11:50AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 11:58AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 12:18PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
I have no intention of buying into either format until at least second generation hardware... therefore, I am reserving final judgement until then.

HD-DVD has had a strong start, but I see no reason why Blu-ray can't still put up a damn strong fight one they sort out some of the issues that are causing them problems with these first few releases.

Don't forget that very few people actually own either format's players yet, so this intial dent to Blu-ray is not going to be a long-term handicap.

Who will win long-term? No idea. Don't really care to be honest... I just dont think it's wise to count Blu-ray out just yet.]]>Aug 1st 2006 12:32PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 12:52PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 1:15PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
It looks like they are spending too much time trying to get the Blu-Ray techonology just working that they are not spending enough time making sure that they MOVIES look good... that is what this format is for isn't it?]]>Aug 1st 2006 1:19PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
Dave the problem likely is MPEG2 at the bitrate required for 25GB Blu-Ray discs is at the threshold where if given more datarate it would probably be equivalent to VC-1 but they can't quite get the video there without a bit of polarization or other anomalies.

Frankly I've always expected both platforms to crank out high quality HD video so I'm been more concerned wtih price and featureset. ]]>Aug 1st 2006 1:21PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://cmd.netblender.com/2006/08/01/media-news-for-81-including-amazon-and-hd-dvd.aspx. Apparently the player's due out around Christmas. This is the first ad we've seen for it -- has anyone seen another?]]>Aug 1st 2006 2:32PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 7:07PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
And as such, Warner Home Video is encoding their Blu-Ray releases using the MPEG2 codec instead of the H.264 MPEG4 codec. Automatically, that places their Blu-Ray title releases below that of their VC-1 encoded HD-DVD titles.

I say match an HD-DVD VC-1 release against a Blu-Ray H.264 MPEG4 release and then we'll see which format is indeed better. Here's a hint, it won't be HD-DVD.

]]>Aug 1st 2006 7:14PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 7:34PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 9:21PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 1st 2006 9:51PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
I know there's currently the MPEG-2 issue, but according to the specs, both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray support the same video codecs. Sony (or the BDA) will eventually ditch MPEG-2 in favor of h.264.

All this bickering over pits on a plastic disc. You could put the same damn file on either disc and it would be the same. This fanboy ranting is just ridiculous.

Makes me wonder how many Joystiq readers post here.]]>Aug 2nd 2006 3:34AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
SONY:A Proud History of Poorly Adopted and Supported Formats.

UMD Movies/Games
DAT
Mini Disc
Beta Videotape
DiscMan Books
Memory Stick Duo/Pro
Magic Cap PDA's

]]>Aug 2nd 2006 4:28AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/The HD-DVD fanboys are the true morons. They try to act like there's this vast conspiracy over Sony in that it will never transition over to H.264. Hate to break the news to you chaps but Sony has a lot of experience with H.264. In fact, they encode their UMD releases using H.264.

Which leaves me to speculate that the reason why the first Blu-Ray releases are using MPEG2 has to do with the deficiencies of using the current Broadcomm decoder chips in both the HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players. When the Sigma Designs decoder chips hit the market and become integrated into the players, I would speculate that Sony will dump MPEG2 and shift over to H.264. They could use VC-1 currently with the previously mentioned deficient Broadcomm chip but Sony doesn't want to pay royalties to Microsoft, and I don't blame them for that.

One should also remember that neither of these formats should be on the market currently. But the HD-DVD camp jumped and released hardware that should have not seen the light of day in a last-ditch effort to shore up their deficient platform, probably at the behest of Microsoft trying to protect projected future royalty payments for iHD and VC-1; both of which they won't be receiving if Blu-Ray wins.

HD-DVD fanbois try to claim that us Blu-Ray supporters are Sony fanbois. Sorry, but Blu-Ray has support from far more companies than HD-DVD. It isn't a "Sony only" platform. Whereas HD-DVD is a Toshiba/Time Warner last ditch patent saving platform that has been sold out to Microsoft to save it.]]>Aug 2nd 2006 12:29PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 2nd 2006 1:23PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
1. The Toshiba and Samsung decks use the same Broadcom decoders, so Samsung slapped a custom deinterlacer on the tail end to live up to the 1080"p" mantra driven home so much by the BD camp. Saying that it's a little inaccurate to say the Samsung deck is outputing "true" 1080p. It is not. In fact it would be better to just let the player output 1080i and have an external scaler or a tv deinterlace the image.

2. Mpeg2 on 25Gb discs with space hogging LPCM soundtracks need to go. Chalk up another victory for the HD-DVD camp by mandating Dolby TrueHD and Dolby Digital Plus, along with DTS-HD. VC-1 combined with space saving next-gen audio codecs is win-win for the consumer. Because BD made these sound formats optional you're far less likely to see them proliferate releases as you will on the HD-DVD releases. PCM sounds great, no doubt, but it's a space hog and with Sony handling authoring for the titles so far mpeg2 is making it hard to justify it's inclusion.

I've no doubt that Warner could make just as good a looking BD release of Training Day as with the HD-DVD version. They just aren't being given the tools they need to make it happen. Sony seems so intent on profiting from BD that they've taken what should have been a slam dunk victory over HD-DVD and basically put the ball in the hands of Toshiba. Pretty amazing, to be sure.]]>Aug 2nd 2006 6:19PMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/
Picture quality is very important as it's the primary reason to jump from current DVD. But it doesn't appear to be a huge difference. As someone posted earlier, Betamax supposedly had better picture quality than VHS.

So yes this gives HD-DVD the lead but the the ultimate factors will be price and titles.

I definitely don't care who wins but it's funny that on the Blu-ray fanboys posts you could replace Blu-ray with PS3 and HD-DVD with 360 and it could go right onto the joystiq site.]]>Aug 3rd 2006 12:04AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 3rd 2006 12:38AMhttp://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/http://hd.engadget.com/2006/08/01/first-hd-dvd-vs-blu-ray-title-bout-training-day/Aug 5th 2006 10:27AM