Archived: Insiders Thread

[blitz6speed]

Originally Posted by dialog_gvf

If I read correctly, they've figured out how to patch the XBox add-on drive firmware to allow them bypass the AACS handshake security.

They'd need to do the same thing for a BD drive to have the same result for BD. The drives change more frequently, are made in lower quantity, and there is still BD+.

The Xbox add-on is a hacker's dream. A cheap and plentiful platform that can't be radically or quickly changed due to compatibility issues.

Gary

With what they know now, it will be possible for a all in one solution. AACS works identical on BD and HD-DVD, so they crack one, they've cracked the other. The discovery made was the last piece of the puzzle, per say.

[Josh]

Its a wonder this news hasn't hit AVS yet. I wonder if paidgeek has any insight as to if this will force BD+ to finally be used?

[Nismobeach]

Originally Posted by blitz6speed

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=124294

btw, this was all done thanks to the hd-dvd addon drive, Thanks amir!!!

LMFAO@ HD-DVD!!!

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by blitz6speed

With what they know now, it will be possible for a all in one solution. AACS works identical on BD and HD-DVD, so they crack one, they've cracked the other. The discovery made was the last piece of the puzzle, per say.

I'm not sure what they did yet.

The volume (media) key is on the disc encrypted by the host private (vendor) key in the media key block. How/why did the drive get it?

Whatever it is, it requires a patched firmware to exploit. Clearly, that isn't a "for all" solution, since each major drive vendor would certainly have their own firmware.

That isn't to say there won't be a cheap and popular BD drive that could be maintained. Assuming BD+ can't detect the fiddle.

Gary

[Nismobeach]

Originally Posted by blitz6speed

With what they know now, it will be possible for a all in one solution. AACS works identical on BD and HD-DVD, so they crack one, they've cracked the other. The discovery made was the last piece of the puzzle, per say.

This isn't as bad for Blu-ray as a patched XBOX 360 HD-DVD add-on can't read BD discs to get said volume keys.

They will need a Blu-ray equivalent add-on to do the job so they'll have to wait for Amir and the boys in Redmond to crap out another 'choice' for the 360.

[Nismobeach]

Originally Posted by dialog_gvf

I'm not sure what they did yet.

The volume (media) key is on the disc encrypted by the host private (vendor) key in the media key block. How/why did the drive get it?

Whatever it is, it requires a patched firmware to exploit. Clearly, that isn't a "for all" solution, since each major drive vendor would certainly have their own firmware.

That isn't to say there won't be a cheap and popular BD drive that could be maintained. Assuming BD+ can't detect the fiddle.

Gary

They flashed the 360 add-on drive with a custom firmware that allows them to get this information. It's fairly similar in concept to the PSP firmware hack which allows a user to flash their unit with a custom firmware that adds new/custom (and unauthorized) features to the system. The only limitation is the amount of storage space on the rom chip.

GIven how feature laden firmware updates are the norm for something like the add on drive, it probably has several MB of unallocated free space on the chip.

[paidgeek]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

To paidgeek:

The following is an excerpt of an interview with David Foster, executive producer of Digital Leisure's upcoming Dragon's Lair by Gaming Bits.



You can read the full interview here.

Since the disc is already in replication, there's no point in asking who in the BDA to blame for Digital Leisure's lack of access to the "inner circle". However, it would be a great gesture if you or Penton-Man to provide a professional courtesy ALL-ACCESS card to Mr. Foster.



fuad

It is a pity that David did not find us accessible. You can Google on Blu-ray authoring and get a hit on our authoring tools on the 3rd listed item. We'll have to follow-up with him.

[paidgeek]

Originally Posted by joshd2012

Its a wonder this news hasn't hit AVS yet. I wonder if paidgeek has any insight as to if this will force BD+ to finally be used?

If you already have the title encyrption key, then there are various ways to hack the system, but the trick is getting the key. Once the new key secrets come into use later this month, the pirates should be frustrated again, at least for a while.... BD+ will be useful, but not essential for the time being.

[crunchy]

Hi paidgeek, thank you very much for posting here. I, like many others, use the PS3 as a primary Blu-ray disc player. One of the reasons I chose the PS3 was the "future-proof" aspect created by including the Cell processor and the RSX.

My questions concern upgrades to the PS3's playback abilities. So without further adieu:

1) When will we see the ability to output 1080p/24 added to the PS3? With HDMI 1.3 this should be no problem to add this feature. (My projector supports 1080p/24)

2) When will we see the ability to decode DTS-HD MA added to the player? Everyone knows that the Cell could handle this easily.

Thank you for your time in addressing these questions. I hope that Sony realizes that these features are very important to many early adopters like myself, and it is a big part of the reason for choosing a PS3: future upgradability.

[WriteSimply]

Originally Posted by crunchy

Hi paidgeek,

Just for the newbies:
You can ask paidgeek about PS3s functions and rumors and what not and SOMETIMES he answers what he can.

But paidgeek does not work for Sony Computer Entertainment (or SCEA in the US). He works with Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

So if he doesn't give you the answer you want, don't hate on him.


fuad

[Damon Payne]

My question for the insiders today is:
People often talk about hypothetical announcements from studios. When do the insiders in the BD camp think we'll see a studio like Universal or Weinstein go neutral, or a neutral studio drop hd-dvd, etc? When will the sales #s finally cause a big event? Just your opinion, of course.

[Talkstr8t]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

To the insiders: Disney's Chicken Little has been released. One of the features is a director's video commentary on certain scenes induced by BD-J.

To me, this shows ONE way of PiP being done with current BD hardware. Unlike a running video commentary ala M:I-3 on HD-DVD, some titles do not have a running video commentary or do not need one. By doing it the way Disney did it, more interactive or more interesting content can be presented on BD.

What do you guys think?

BD-Video "1.1" is only required for authoring PiP using secondary video. The Descent and Crank authored PiP by dual-encoding the full movie (once with PiP and once without). This could probably be done more efficiently by dual-encoding only those sections of a movie where you want PiP and using seamless branching to jump in and out of those sections. Disney is doing commentary with overlaid graphics (which could include animated graphics, for some purposes providing capabilities similar to those offered by full video). There is lots of flexibility in the platform allowing compelling commentary even without secondary video support.

- Talk

[Talkstr8t]

Originally Posted by Valore

They will most likely be released after the 31st of October. All players manufactured and released after this date will feature significantly improved functionality, including mandatory full support for Blu-ray Java interactive technology. While current Blu-ray disc players feature Java interactive technology, most lack full support for it and firmware updates may not be able to provide full support either.

Couple of corrections here. Only new models released after October 31st need support the BD-Video "1.1" profile. Existing models can continue to be manufactured after this date.

Also, this is not a Blu-ray Java (BD-J) issue, it's a hardware support issue. All players fully support BD-J, but all don't currently have underlying hardware to support all features. PiP can be accessed by either HDMV or BD-J.

- Talk

[Talkstr8t]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

Since the disc is already in replication, there's no point in asking who in the BDA to blame for Digital Leisure's lack of access to the "inner circle". However, it would be a great gesture if you or Penton-Man to provide a professional courtesy ALL-ACCESS card to Mr. Foster.

The [publicly accessible] list of Blu-ray Disc format licensees doesn't show Digital Leisure, which suggests they may not have licensed the full BD-J specifications. If they tried to author the content based on freely available specifications (i.e. Java ME, GEM) it would definitely leave a number of gaps in their understanding of the platform details.

Nonetheless, additional authoring tools are becoming available on a regular basis which will ease the task of developing BD-J content.

- Talk

[Talkstr8t]

Originally Posted by Damon Payne

My question for the insiders today is:
People often talk about hypothetical announcements from studios. When do the insiders in the BD camp think we'll see a studio like Universal or Weinstein go neutral, or a neutral studio drop hd-dvd, etc? When will the sales #s finally cause a big event? Just your opinion, of course.

Universal is the one which matters, and I think we'll see activity by the end of the year. Between the many rumors and the ever-widening salesgap, it'll be increasingly hard for them to justify their current stance.

[Damon Payne]

Thank you for your thoughts. On the same token, what are your feelings on Warner witholding various good titles claiming IME support as the reason? Do you feel they strongly believe in this feature or is there an element of trying to throw HD-DVD a bone?

[Talkstr8t]

Originally Posted by Damon Payne

On the same token, what are your feelings on Warner witholding various good titles claiming IME support as the reason? Do you feel they strongly believe in this feature or is there an element of trying to throw HD-DVD a bone?

While Warner does have IP in the DVD format (and hence would see some revenue from all sales of HD DVD discs, not just their own), in numerous discussions with various Warner execs I've seen no indication that they don't want to see Blu-ray Disc succeed as well. They appear to have a different viewpoint than the Blu-ray exclusive studios in terms of what strategy will lead to the greatest overall market success for high-definition optical discs, but I don't believe any title release choices they've made have been intended to advantage one format over the other.

- Talk

[blublublu]

Originally Posted by Talkstr8t

Couple of corrections here. Only new models released after October 31st need support the BD-Video "1.1" profile. Existing models can continue to be manufactured after this date.

Also, this is not a Blu-ray Java (BD-J) issue, it's a hardware support issue. All players fully support BD-J, but all don't currently have underlying hardware to support all features. PiP can be accessed by either HDMV or BD-J.

- Talk

Is there some BD-J middleware layer that provides some abtracted interface to a players hardware capabiliies for PiP functions for example?

And if so, is there a version of BD-J associated with each BD-Video profile?

What I'm trying to understand is whether there are any outstanding dependencies on BD-J to allow studios to deploy IME capabilities on Blu Ray.

As well, does the PS3 currently support the 1.1 BD-Video profile (via software for example for the second video decoder).

If no BD-J dependencies, and the PS3 can support, then I don't see why the likes of Warner are holding up their IME releases on Blu Ray, since everyone knows that the PS3 is the dominant Blu Ray player.

[ra1024]

Originally Posted by Talkstr8t

I've seen no indication that they don't want to see Blu-ray Disc succeed as well. They appear to have a different viewpoint than the Blu-ray exclusive studios in terms of what strategy will lead to the greatest overall market success for high-definition optical discs

Can you elaborate on this? I'm curious if they are ok with the idea of formats coexisting or if they are anxious for one to win out.

Can you also give us an idea of whether they feel like they're short changing the BR crowd with encodes designed for lower capacity discs? I keep hoping they will do encodes optimized for both formats but I don't see this happening with THD on the horizon. I think it's an absolute waste to release titles like the Matrix and 300 with lower bitrates.

[phloyd]

ra, you will see over and over again that the likes of Ben Wagonner claim that there is no advantage in having more bitrate for VC-1 than the bitrate they release with (a convenient truth perhaps).

I think most sane engineering types find this hard to believe, but if Warner is being told this by Microsoft's leading compression experts, you can't really fault Warner for believing it.