Quick Question about Blu-Ray and HD-DVD

[kranzel]

Hi all,

Looking around the forums to determine if Sage can play HD-DVD and or Blu-Ray discs. I have discovered it cannot play the actual discs but it can play H.264.

I was just wondering if someone could help me answer a few questions.

1. Does Power DVD 7 come with VC-1, AVC, H.264 codecs? As far as I remember any of these three codecs could be used on HD movies so I assume installing Power DVD 7 would allow me to play any of the currently available HD content on wither format. Is that correct?

2. I am thinking of buying a a Blu-Ray Drive and grabbing the XBOX360 HD-DVD drive for my PC. If I am correct (Not asking for the name of the program here so don't worry) there is software that can copy Blu-Ray/HD-DVD to a hard disk.

Assuming this to be true. Would sage be able to play those backed up disc?

Just as a note. I live in Canada so backing up my DVD's is not illegal, Yet! Give the movie industry time I am sure they will do their best to strip away my rights as a consumer.

Thanks for any help and Sage Rocks!

[Jesse]

Hi,

Not possible at this time. The problem is that the file structure (.evo ?) is not recognized by sage at all.

You could try launching PDVD from within sage using nielm's dynamic menus.

HTH.

Jesse

[Lucas]

Originally Posted by kranzel

1. Does Power DVD 7 come with VC-1, AVC, H.264 codecs? As far as I remember any of these three codecs could be used on HD movies so I assume installing Power DVD 7 would allow me to play any of the currently available HD content on wither format. Is that correct?

Yes you need these decoders to play h.264 video.

Originally Posted by kranzel

Assuming this to be true. Would sage be able to play those backed up disc?

No.

[kranzel]

Thanks for the quick reply. Much appreciated.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by kranzel

Hi all,

Looking around the forums to determine if Sage can play HD-DVD and or Blu-Ray discs. I have discovered it cannot play the actual discs but it can play H.264.

I was just wondering if someone could help me answer a few questions.

1. Does Power DVD 7 come with VC-1, AVC, H.264 codecs?

Yes, though I'm not sure it installs DShow filters for all of them.

As far as I remember any of these three codecs could be used on HD movies so I assume installing Power DVD 7 would allow me to play any of the currently available HD content on wither format. Is that correct?

Theoretically yes.

2. I am thinking of buying a a Blu-Ray Drive and grabbing the XBOX360 HD-DVD drive for my PC. If I am correct (Not asking for the name of the program here so don't worry) there is software that can copy Blu-Ray/HD-DVD to a hard disk.

Yes, such options exist.

Assuming this to be true. Would sage be able to play those backed up disc?

No, PowerDVD Ultra and WinDVD 8 (Japanese version) are really the only programs that understand the logical structure of HD optical discs.

Think of it like this, DVDs basically have MPEG video on them, but with additional things like menus and a somewhat specialized container (VOB), but not every program that can play MPEG video understand the special format of DVD.

Same is true of HD optical, the above programs are the only ones that understand the HD-optical specific HDi (HD DVD menus), BD-MV, EVO, and M2TS formats.

In addition to the logical format issues, the audio codecs are a problem too. Outside Sonic 4.2 decoders (available through Sonic Scenarist) there aren't any Directshow filters that understand the Dolby Digital Plus audio on most HD DVDs.

Now, say you had your own, home-authored HD DVD, that's made of EVOs and what not. It's theoretically (at least) possible for you to take the EVOs from that, demux the audio and video, and remux them into a more well supported container.

[Polypro]

The HP Drive will save you some money.

P

[GbrNole]

this is why i'd just rather find a way to make the ps3 work with sage.

[stanger89]

I highly doubt Sage running on the PS3 would support BD.

[GbrNole]

that's why i would just want sage to be user selectable from the sony web xbar rather than an independant OS.

it **almost** works right now through nielm's web interface.

[mikesm]

I think the main point though is that Sage needs to formally support HD-DVD and BR, just as they do with normal DVD. It's very hard to hack in, but it's going to be a requirement for any media center system soon.

Thanks,
Mike

[stanger89]

"Soon" is a questionable term. The Matrix Trillogy only sold 13,900 copies the first week, that's pathetic by media sell-through standards. Casino Royale set records, and I'm pretty sure it was under 100,000 copies, might have been under 50,000.

There's only 200-300k HD DVD players out there (Under 200k if you don't count the 360). And there's far less standalone BD players.

We tend to squawk about these things, but make no mistake, HD DVD and BD are very small markets at this point.

Further, Sage would open themselves up to an $8Million liability by officially supporting HD DVD/BD (and the requisite AACS).

I would love to see them support it, but until there's a way for them to piggyback on somebody else's work (ie something similar to DShow, or maybe the Broadcom card), I wouldn't expect, nor would I really recommend them try it.

[briands]

Originally Posted by stanger89

We tend to squawk about these things, but make no mistake, HD DVD and BD are very small markets at this point.

Sage isn't really mass market either though... I'd guess this group to be a little more interested than the average public in the new technologies.

[stanger89]

True, but I think it will be a while (year, maybe two) before there's really any negative to not supporting them.

[nielm]

Will BD/HDDVD make that big a difference compared to DVD?

Technically, yes, they have more bandwith, more pixels, better sound, etc, but when it comes down to it, will it make that big a difference to viewers?

The difference between digital HDTV and analogue SDTV is like night and day, but that is because analogue SDTV is, well, crap! while DVDs already have good bandwidth, mature encoders and decoders, and a reasonable resolution.

I saw 2 demos recently which emphasised the point: one was a BD demo disk on a 36" screen which had a split-screen comparison of BD HD content with the equivalent DVD version (I think it was a battle scene extract from Troy) , and frankly, the DVD version looked better! The HD version was visually noisy, and too sharp (like someone had set an edge-detection filter to MAX).. Now it is possible that the TV was badly set up (this was a high street HE vendor), or the demo disk was of poor quality (hard to believe), but the second demo I saw emphasised the point:

This was a DVD playback via an upscaling player to a HD projector onto a 90" screen. The quality was fantastic! I was expecting to see Mpeg2 blocking artifects, even pixel edges, but no, it was crisp and clear...

Now, maybe I am comparing a poor demo with a superb demo (please tell me if I am wrong), but based on these examples, the huge price difference of mass-market players, the price premium of content, the relatively large market penetration of DVD players, the relatively small quality difference (at least in the demos I saw), I think it will be a long time before BD/HDDVD will take off...

[stanger89]

I've come to the conclusion that for most A/V enthusiasts, if you can see any difference at all, it qualifies as "night and day".

I can confidently say that HD DVD is noticably better than DVD, at least on a 110" wide 2.35:1 screen from approx 1.5x width viewing distance. However I do have to say that given all the hype, and the "night and day" comments, I'm somewhat disappointed by HD DVD (haven't seen BD personally). Not that the quality is poor or anything, far from it, but that it's not as big of an improvement as I was expecting.

My theory on the reason for this, is not any technical fault with HD DVD (or BD) as they theoretically can be far superior to DVD, and that's born out in some content. My theory is that due to the process with which motion pictures are captured/created (focus, film, etc), that there just isn't anywhere close to the ~2megapixels of information HD-optical can reproduce.

Combine all that together with the complexity and hurdles to using either format, and I still haven't abandoned DVD, and actually ponder abandoning HD DVD, at least for a while.

[GbrNole]

i've done a countless comparissons now and i was very much a skeptic at first but an upscaled dvd, even the best dvd encodes (the recent ghost rider movie is an awesome encode) just doesn't come close to the visual quality of BD or HD-DVD - not even in the same ball park.

i admit that there isn't a whole lot to be gained from a small screen over the quality of the best dvd's but since a lot of us in the USA or toting 50" or larger screens it gets very obvious very quickly.

the fact that the PS3 is now one of the best upscaling DVD players you can buy (top 3 at worst save having a standalone video processor) it just sweetens the pot.

you do make good points about high def dvd's though and the adoption rate is extremely slow - the xbox 360 market place having high def download rentals doesn't help speed up the matter either. that's why the PS3 and 360 being able to be high def dvd players is such a good bonus since they are great entertainment machines beyond games.

[GbrNole]

lol - stanger and i posted at the same time and he just described me

i guess you can say i'm sold on convergence products - love 'em! i'm not a sony fan per se but i love the gadgets that i can do a lot with - my PSP goes pretty much everywhere with me, 8 gig mem card always with 3 or 4 vids on it, a ton of music and at least one game at all times.
having net access and remote link to stored vids and music over the net (new feature with psp update 3.5 and ps3 update 1.8) is pretty damn nice too.

i guess where picture quality is concerned though i'm more impressed with the color accuracy and tone rather than how sharp the video is - this is the big difference i notice. on very accurate video displays it will probably be less aparent?

[lobosrul]

Remember, it took DVD about 4-5 years to surpase VHS in sales. That was with almost no competing formats (anyone remember divx? and I dont mean the mpeg-4 encoder), an obviously better picture than VHS on all TV's, and "neat" features like being able to skip to any part of the movie, multiple audio tracks, subtitles etc.

Even if there was only one HD disc format, expecting it to surpass DVD before ~2010 would be insanely optimistic.

To me, the difference between HD (720p) and a good anamorphic 480p DVD is noticeable. But no its not night and day. 480i SDTV, especially if I'm zooming in on a widescreen show which effectly makes it 360i, is definantly night and day from 720p.

[VikingCrown]

Wait, you can access sage through the XMB of the PS3??? I had no Idea! Where can I find more info about this, i'd love to try it out on mine.

[Polypro]

Originally Posted by stanger89

I've come to the conclusion that for most A/V enthusiasts, if you can see any difference at all, it [doesn't qualify] as "night and day".

Combine all that together with the complexity and hurdles to using either format, and I still haven't abandoned DVD, and actually ponder abandoning HD DVD, at least for a while.

I'm running the HP HD-DVD with PDVD...first movie watched was "The Good Shepherd". Wife says "I don't notice a difference" I know HTPC's upscale 480p really well, but I *did* expect HD-DVD have a little more Wow!, than it did. Luckily, $129 is acceptable to experiment with.

P