The Bus

An HD DVD title with 5.1 PCM?

Interesting.

I have to say the visual style of A Mighty Heart does not lend it to be amazing on HD.

The Bus

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/sh..._Uncertain/878

BuckNaked2k

It would seem to me that there must be crates of "Blades" already in warehouses around the country on the Blu-Ray format. Are these going to just be recalled and destroyed by Paramount? If so, you just know some of them are going to slip out. Blu-Ray "Blades" could become the Butcher Cover of 2007!

IIG

This announcement really gives HD-DVD some legs. I must say, I'm one of the guys that was waiting for Universal to go Blu and call it ballgame. What this does is prolong this war, and establish that HD-DVD isn't playing any games. I for one couldn't care less about many of Paramount's upcoming releases, but Dreamworks exclusivity is a big, big deal for me.

Still, I don't understand why Blu-Ray supporters are acting like they lost the war. The support is still there in spades. The Blockbuster and Target deals are huge for the format. They still have more studio support, and in my opinion still have the heaviest hitters in the form of the Spiderman series, the Pirates series, Disney, etc. And their main ace in the hole is the PS3 console, which is having a somewhat disappointing 2007. I see the PS3 as a 2008 console, so if Microsoft hasn't countered with a XBOX 360 console with HD-DVD drive built in by then, I can see the gap widening that much larger.

Content is key, and I for one am watching New Line and Warner's moves very closely. I don't think either format should be counted out any time soon, but for my money, you have to recognize Blu-Ray still as a clear frontrunner. If they lose any more studio support, or if Warner decides HD-DVD is the way to go, Sony better look to start rebuilding as a company. I think that Sony has more tricks up their sleeves though, and they will be unleashing them soon enough to ease doubt (Weinstein anyone?).

Artman

Oh how sweet it would be to steal away The Whole Bloody Affair and Grindhouse from HD-DVD....

JetSter735180

Quick question.....

I just realised that I could always get the XBOX HD-DVD addon, I just want to know if it does 1080p/24 ? Yes, I have a XBXO Elite and a Samsung 4061f that supports 1080p/24.

The Bus

Knowing Weinstein, I give those a 40% shot of ever being released.

wewantflair

To clarify this point, no it has not been established. The only place this number has appeared is the NYT. In fact, on AVS, Amir wrote in the insider's thread that the deal is for "several years." So who knows?

bunkaroo

That would be strange if Paramount went with PCM instead of TrueHD, but either way lossless is a move in the right direction.

I also can't believe there aren't copies of Blades of Glory pressed and ready to go on Blu-Ray, but maybe the fact that the cover art listed specs was in flux until recently suggests otherwise.

kiett_2000

I think Speilberg is waiting for someone to give him the largest sum of money and then he'll release his movie in that format.

bookcase3

What does do these two audio versions mean?

nmr1723

I don't post here much, but I get a lot of great info from this site...that being said...the format cheerleading on both sides is ridiculous. This is the whole reason I don't visit AVS as much as I used to. Let's not turn DVDtalk into the same stupid "my format is the best" argument we see all the time at AVS.

I currently only own a PS3, but I've been looking for an excuse to buy an HD DVD player for some time now. The Bourne Identity is one of my all time favorites and I knew I was going to bite the bullet sometime...looks like it's now. Let's hope that this agreement will light a fire under the a$$es of Paramount and Dreamworks and that we will see some great releases come out in the near future. It's about the movies folks...

I get pretty passionate about my sports teams, but I don't think I would ever get all crazy about HD DVD vs. Blu-ray. I just want my movies in Hi-def...who cares if the case is red or blue...or if I have to use two different players.

Now...do I go with the A2 or the A20...or do I sit and wait for the gen 3 players?

Decisions...

Gizmo

Weinstien, while I enjoy some of their movies, has released little to nothing on HD DVD. If the BDA were to pay and steal them away (wouldn't be shocked), it wouldn't mean a whole lot. There are too many releases that come out that they don't even put out on HD DVD, and when they do, its months after the DVD comes out.

RockStrongo

Ive never been on the Bill Hunt bashing bandwagon, but his article or whatever on his site yesterday was very very "whiny". I bet he was crying as he wrote it. I can't believe he was criticizing MS for playing the capatilist game.

Wow, they payed for something.

Im not going to go to his site anymore. Im format neutral and cant stand the format bashing on either side.

Qui Gon Jim

Translation:
"I won't do the research to back up my statements. You do the research to refute me." Are you a politician?

Seriously, it is widely accepted here in the adult HD Talk forum that BD is more costly to manufacture than HD DVD. That gap has certainly been closing since BD's rollout, but it still exists from all accounts.

Operating on an order of scale, even a small difference in a production cost can translate in to a big difference in profit/loss for a final production run.

You seem to be taking this very personally. HD DVD is only doing what BD has been doing from the start: business.

aynrandgirl

I think it isn't quite parallel. SACD/DVDA isn't obviously better unless you have high-end stereo equipment, and the MP3/iPod crowd don't care about quality at all. Except for a few notable exceptions (Rolling Stones SACD) the studios never really supported hi-def audio with either publicity or product, plus it was all catalog titles not new releases. In many cases the hi-def release was just as compressed, maximized, and otherwise terrible sounding as the CD, if not a simple copy of it, so you couldn't even be assured of quality. Computer drives don't support them either, probably due to the exaggerated fear of piracy the labels suffer from, and the players never got cheap. They were doomed from the start.

On the video side, it isn't too hard to show somebody that high-definition video really is better. The hard part is getting them to care. Even though LCD and plasma displays are selling like hotcakes most people just watch TV on them and (aagggh!) horizontally stretch SD video to "fill the screen". It's horrible. They don't have the audio equipment to take advantage of better audio codecs, so that isn't a selling point just like SACD wasn't. The studios are at least supporting HD video with product and publicity, so it has a chance to succeed.

aynrandgirl

I see your point, with the inferior and space-wasting mpeg-2 releases the studios have foisted on the public in the early days of high-def video. With H.264 or VC-1 the space problem goes away.

MBoyd

I don't see how anyone could consider whatever High Definition discs you end up "stuck" with worthless as Laserdiscs.

ThriceDamned

Sniff sniff....the little thread I so innocently started is closing in on 22 pages. I feel ever so proud.

Or I would if it didn't mostly contain pointless bickering and whining from both sides. I currently only have blu-ray, as I believed (and still believe) that it will eventually emerge as the dominant format. This belief has nothing to do with any perceived superiority of the format, which I don't believe is there. I've tried HD-DVD and think it's a great format, which simply doesn't have the support and backing that blu-ray enjoys (although that has shifted somewhat with this announcement). This stupid zealotry is pointless and counter-productive.

I'm thinking about getting HD-DVD this fall for those titles that I can't get on blu-ray. If the titles are available on both formats, I'll probably stick with blu-ray though.

darkside

All of my laserdiscs still work fine. I am hardly stuck with those either.

Vipper II

Nah, Beatboy said they'd go neutral at CES 2008. When has he ever provided justification to doubt his claims?

Giles

I'm just surprised that a thread that isn't in the 'Other' forum jumped to 22 pages in just over a 24 hour period.

rfduncan

I find it amusing that you think he's that articulate. I'd have expected him to blow up Spielberg's house with 10 times the amount of fire and explosions necessary for the task.

I think you mean "route".

Tracer Bullet

"Paper round" is the British term for "paper route". Perhaps the "mum" should have tipped you off?

Giles

Americans - silly bunch aren't they...