I don't get what's stopping current Blu-ray players from playing Divx. Its not like they don't have the hardware. All they would need is a firmware update. I get that they don't have the licensing... but that doesn't explain why they can't get them licensed.
DiVX is just a brand name slapped on top of various MPEG 4 Part 2 ASP profiles. There is no compulsion at all to get DiVX certified in order to be able to play DiVX content since it's just ASP.
The advantage of certification is that it says your player has robust and reliable ASP playback. DiVX is also a name that people associate with the format even though DiVX just popularised it and hijacked it as their own. Funai could have done without it, or gone with an alternative certification such as XVid or Nero and it probably have meant pretty much the same thing.
Personally I wish industry would produce their own neutral certification logos for ASP and AVC that covered various profiles for phone, handheld, computer, cinema systems and enforce them. The current situation with AVC is completely ridiculous since there are multiple profiles and multiple levels within those profiles. In addition some players only support certain resolutions or framerates, while others (e.g. Apple TV) claim to support a profile such as High but the smallprint say lists exceptions which means it doesn't at all. On top of that there are differences in audio codecs (AAC has profiles too), container support, maximum file sizes, bitrates, subtitles, alternate data streams etc. etc. etc. A proper industry certification is desperately required to clean up this mess. If they don't do it, DiVX will swan in and become the defacto standard and they will pocket all the money in the process.
Sony's just released a 15.5-inch addition to its VAIO S Series that not only adds a crucial bit of extra display acreage, but also bumps things up to a full 1080p.
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I don't get what's stopping current Blu-ray players from playing Divx. Its not like they don't have the hardware. All they would need is a firmware update. I get that they don't have the licensing... but that doesn't explain why they can't get them licensed.
DiVX is just a brand name slapped on top of various MPEG 4 Part 2 ASP profiles. There is no compulsion at all to get DiVX certified in order to be able to play DiVX content since it's just ASP.
The advantage of certification is that it says your player has robust and reliable ASP playback. DiVX is also a name that people associate with the format even though DiVX just popularised it and hijacked it as their own. Funai could have done without it, or gone with an alternative certification such as XVid or Nero and it probably have meant pretty much the same thing.
Personally I wish industry would produce their own neutral certification logos for ASP and AVC that covered various profiles for phone, handheld, computer, cinema systems and enforce them. The current situation with AVC is completely ridiculous since there are multiple profiles and multiple levels within those profiles. In addition some players only support certain resolutions or framerates, while others (e.g. Apple TV) claim to support a profile such as High but the smallprint say lists exceptions which means it doesn't at all. On top of that there are differences in audio codecs (AAC has profiles too), container support, maximum file sizes, bitrates, subtitles, alternate data streams etc. etc. etc. A proper industry certification is desperately required to clean up this mess. If they don't do it, DiVX will swan in and become the defacto standard and they will pocket all the money in the process.