The newest Blu-ray basher: Stereophile!?

[UFAlien]

Does anyone here read Stereophile? It's a magazine I get for no apparent reason, and I'm regularly entertained by how hypocritical just about everything they write is.

Today I got an issue where one of the writers used the "Sam's Space" section to discuss the evils of region coding and how he somehow thinks Blu-ray made this worse.

Here are some choice quotes:

There are only three Blu-ray regions. A Region 1 Blu-ray player bought in the US or Canada might be able to play some Region 2 or 3 discs. That's because some Blu-ray discs are manufactured as Region 0. But which ones?

Sam leaves this hanging, apparently implying that it's impossible to know.

I was at a press conference recently at which a manufacturer presented an expensive Blu-ray player. I asked if there was a way to unlock the region coding for regular DVDs. Apparently not - at least, no way that the manufacturer would reveal in public.

Uh... DUUUUUUUUUUUUHH.

If I was ever tempted to buy a Blu-ray player to play favorite movies such as Pinocchio and Reds, I am no longer. I won't have to replace my vast DVD library, only to have my new Blu-ray player gag on our Region 2 and 5 DVDs.

Well IF he replaced them, he wouldn't HAVE Region 2 or 5 DVDs, would he? And it's not as if he needs to replace Region 1 discs...

And the following quote concludes the article:

Blu-ray? I should say shoo-ray!

Oh, well played, Sam. That piece of comedic genius is sure to guarantee nobody calls you out on your bull.

Here is the letter, in full, that I sent them:

I began receiving Stereophile a few months ago, and I still haven't figured out how it happened. It just sort of showed up one day, but I'm fine with that since it makes a good fly swatter. Sometimes I'll get really bored and read some of it. Now, I am not into the audio hobby - part of why I'm so perplexed at the fact that I receive it.

What I am interested in, and quite intensely, is film. I took enough offense to your article questioning the benefit of surround sound, which was capped off with the author stating he usually only watched movies in mono - brilliantly discrediting everything he'd just written about how useless surround is for anything other than "action movies". But the article on region coding - which then turned into an exercise in Blu-ray bashing - was rather pathetic.

Sam mentioned how a region free player allowed him to buy DVDs from Amazon UK, without mentioning the NTSC and PAL standards. You can put as many PAL discs into an NTSC player - region free or not - as you want, and get nothing. As for the purpose of region coding, it is done for a valid reason - the same company does not necessarily distribute the same film all over the world. They are simply protecting their investment in distribution rights. Another reason is simple economic differences - in Japan, for example, the average DVD is much more expensive than the USA.

As for his mention of upconverting to 1080i - upconverting in general is a very mixed bag. You cannot generate detail not present on the source. The best upconversion can do is smooth out "jaggies" in the video, and it can, in fact, remove smaller details. Also, for your information the "special uses" region coded DVDs are for certain international uses, like in-flight movies on airplanes.

As for region 1, 2, and 3 Blu-rays... well, for one, they are A, B, and C. Secondly, finding which Blu-ray discs are region-free is a rather simple matter. Websites such as www.blu-ray.com maintain lists of just this info - perform a simple search for any Blu-ray release and you'll get region information along with plenty of other technical info.

And then he decides not to buy a Blu-ray player because it uses region coding and can't play region 2 or 5 DVDs, and furthermore, as Sam seems shocked to report, the company won't tell the press how to disable region coding in a public venue. A company protecting its partner's interests? Unbelievable! Certainly, nothing like this could have happened with DVDs.

He then mentions how cheap DVDs are - a valid point, for sure, perhaps the only one in the article. If you don't think the quality is a large enough improvement from DVD to justify the price, that's your decision. But telling customers to avoid Blu-ray because it can't play foreign DVDs - a format which, in the same article, he refers to as "obsolete" - and deriding it for not openly telling the world how to hack its technology (which he apparently thinks was a common practice with DVD) is ridiculous, especially when, once again, in the same article, he points out one can in fact obtain region free BD players from the internet.

As a magazine about the audio hobby, you could, perhaps, avoid similar accuracy and logic issues by keeping articles limited to a field you are knowledgeable in - namely, audio. It would also improve the quality of the magazine if self-contradiction was less abundant.

[Blu Titan]

At this point the efforts of Blu-ray haters are moot. Blu-ray is established as the successor to DVD, and nothing will change that. Just have fun with all of the trolls.

[blarneyrubble]

I love your response to his article, let us know if they prinhttps://forum.blu-ray.com/images/icons/icon14.gift any of it. Oh, and be sure to let us know if they cancel your subscription.

[Azyiu]

Love your respond to that BS, however, I'd like to discuss this minor point you mentioned.

Sam mentioned how a region free player allowed him to buy DVDs from Amazon UK, without mentioning the NTSC and PAL standards. You can put as many PAL discs into an NTSC player - region free or not - as you want, and get nothing.

Depends on where you get your dvd players, there are some dvd players indeed play not only dvds from different regions; they are able to play BOTH NTSC and PAL formats! As long as your tv set is capable of handling multi-system formats, you are able to view anything from any region regardless of formats. You can easily find such kind of players here in Hong Kong, for example. And I am pretty sure you can get similar players in Malaysia as well.

[UFAlien]

Thanks, I didn't know that. Thankfully is specified "NTSC player" in the message, so hopefully I didn't seem too ignorant

Though I did forget to capitalize one "c" - fixed it here.

[witheygull]

Originally Posted by Azyiu

Depends on where you get your dvd players, there are some dvd players indeed play not only dvds from different regions; they are able to play BOTH NTSC and PAL formats! As long as your tv set is capable of handling multi-system formats, you are able to view anything from any region regardless of formats. You can easily find such kind of players here in Hong Kong, for example. And I am pretty sure you can get similar players in Malaysia as well.

My North American model Samsung DVD player will play both PAL and NTSC, so it's not just Asian models capable of this.

[Azyiu]

Originally Posted by witheygull

My North American model Samsung DVD player will play both PAL and NTSC, so it's not just Asian models capable of this.

Nice, I didn't know that before.

[Chizzap30]

I do read it on occasion for information on audio gear. It's surprising though that they are talking about Blu-ray in the realm of movies. If they were talking about it for an audio capability or for concert discs, I might be okay with it. But I'm surprised they even bring it up since it seems like in the realm of Hi-Fi that stream high-resolution audio files from a storage device seems to be the next evolution for music. That seems to be the trend due to Linn creating their Digital Stream (DS) players, and Meridian purchasing Sooloos (which has an amazing, AMAZING user interface).

But I would really just ignore anything they say about Blu-ray since it really isn't going to be up their alley as a technology for Stereo/2-channel music systems.

[Astrakan]

Originally Posted by Azyiu

Depends on where you get your dvd players, there are some dvd players indeed play not only dvds from different regions; they are able to play BOTH NTSC and PAL formats! As long as your tv set is capable of handling multi-system formats...

And on top of that, there's players that do the PAL->NTSC conversion for you. My trusty Malata N996 is one such player. Now that I have a multi-format projector I don't have a need for it, but back in 2001 it was a life saver.

KM

[syncguy]

Originally Posted by Blu Titan

At this point the efforts of Blu-ray haters are moot. Blu-ray is established as the successor to DVD, and nothing will change that. Just have fun with all of the trolls.

Yes indeed. The industry should assist people to move forward with HD and enjoy rather than confusing people with misinformation.

[LordCrumb]

I was a blu-ray hater when it first started out. Obviously I've been turned around and have 120 titles. Some things are still niggly though, like not being able to use the Pop-Up menu when your actually watching 'Special Features', you have to go back to the main menu.

[FinalEvangelion]

Originally Posted by Blu Titan

At this point the efforts of Blu-ray haters are moot. Blu-ray is established as the successor to DVD, and nothing will change that. Just have fun with all of the trolls.

Exactly - even Toshiba is going forward with Blu-ray, along with 100% of the Hollywood Studios and retailers.

The day Xbox 720 is announced with BD is when things will finally come to full circle with haters.

[neos_peace]

Originally Posted by KaiGusto

have 120 titles. Some things are still niggly though, like not being able to use the Pop-Up menu when your actually watching 'Special Features', you have to go back to the main menu.

I think your mistaken of that point. I believe that only pertains to some titles or manufactureers. I have some that allow you to do both. Id have to recheck some but I'm prety sure it depends on the titles.

[David Craig]

Great that you sent them a letter.