Blu Ray Dissapointing: MPEG-2, 16/48 analog sound... NEED 1080p24 out, 24/48+ digital

[Health Nut]

I'm very dissapointed to hear that Sony is Squandering storage space and bandwidth using MPEG-2 only... I am also dissapointed that the sound is only core DD/DTS as well as standard 16/48 khz multichannel... First, it is ridiculous not to use the better codecs MPEG-4 AVC/VC-1 running at an avergage bandwidth of 15 Mbit/sec instead of MPEG-2 running around 22-24. This is simply a waste of space and bandwidth, particularly when you can gain better picture quality with the newer codecs running at higher rates (but less than MPEG-2). Absolutely absurd. Further, why and the F*** would I buy any player that is not HDMI 1.3 compliant at this point??? HD-DVD sucks, but Blu Ray is starting off uneccessarily porrer quality than neccessary. No Doubt SONY, the KING OF MILKING will re-release these same Blu Ray discs in 2-3 years with MPEG-4 and call then SUPERBIT HD or some BULLS*** when they could just use an advanced codec NOW and run the bitrate so high that you would far exceed the equivalent quality of MPEG-2... Then you have the issue of why 16/48 sound? You could at least do 24/48 multichannel in this day and age... AND what kind of output would this be, ANALOG? I'm so sick of this crap... No wonder, even as much of a technology enthusiast as I am, I'm not buying HD-DVD or Blu Ray until they sort out the 1080p NATIVE issue, HDMI 1.3 issue, and have 24/48+ LOSSLESS quality multichannel included.

Good luck but I'm not buying any of this first generation bullcrap. HD-DVD and Blu Ray can go choke on these first generation bullcrap players. Send me an email around November of 2006 or so if there is any new news... I'm in no hurry this time. Go fn choke on this first gen stuff....

[zombie]

I find it hard not to agree with everything you said. Both formats are failing to provide the very best audio and video quality that's available, at least initially. I'm disappointed as well, but not so let down that I'm going to wait even longer than I already have for HD on disc.

[JTK]

Welcome to first generation early adoption. This is all too typical of the kinds of things we see in consumer electronics.

Unfortuneately, I feel that even early adopter types have become WAAAAAY too forgiving of these sorts of things.

Just because someone may have the money to blow on changing out their 5 figure front projector several times a year doesn't mean ANY company or CE venture should be able to put what are essentially incomplete products and it's simply sluffed off like: "Gosh darn it, it's first gen so ya get what ya get."

This is why I've never early adopted in my life, but isn't that unfortunate? It's too bad that a CE venture of any kind can't be solidified enough where you COULD buy a first gen piece of hardware and then not be s**** outta luck in a very short amount of time.

In this specific case, I'm almost certainly sticking to my original gameplan: Get a PS3, which I would do as a gamer anyways regardless of anything else, and simply use it as my BR stopgap until second or more likely third generation comes along.

I didn't even buy a DVD player until about third generation, so I'm used to this.

But again...it's a pity that I have to be that way, isn't it?

I'd be willing to pay a certain amount of money now, within reason, if I thought I could honestly get a product that I could keep and be confident in for years to come.

[Shadowself]

First, let me apologize up front for the length of this post. Sorry.

There are reasons why virtually all the content will be done in MPEG-2 rather than MPEG-4 Part 10 (aka AVC or H.264) for a while: Experience, available space and licensing fees.

The studios have a great deal of experience dealing with MPEG-2 and can thus tweak the compression variables associated with it in order to get the best output (MPEG-2 is not the "black box" many consumer software makers would have you believe -- and neither is MPEG-4 Part 10). They don't have as much experience with MPEG-4 Part 10. Eventually, as their experience and comfort level grows, they will shift to MPEG-4 Part 10. However, there are some instances where MPEG-2 will output a better image than MPEG-4 Part 10.

It may be wise to allow the content suppliers to use what they are good at rather than us buying disks where they are still "experimenting" with the new compression methodologies and thus may be providing an inferior product.

MPEG-4 Part 10 was created/optimized for the best resolution at the lowest reasonable bit rates. It was not optimized for just getting the best image quality. Thus if you can "afford" a higher bit rate (say 50 Mbps or higher) then MPEG-2 may give just as good -- and maybe even better -- quality as MPEG-4 Part 10.

The 50 GB Blu-ray disks give the content suppliers this option. I know of no movie right now (other than maybe some of the old epics which were several ours long) which would require more than 50 GB even at a moderate bit rate for MPEG-2.

Finally, the licensing fees for MPEG-2 are less than the fees for MPEG-4 Part 10. Eventually, the fees for MPEG-4 Part 10 will come down. Until then, for the reasons mentioned above, I don't mind the content providers avoiding the higher fees.

As far as HDMI 1.3 goes... I'm not even sure the "1.3" version is even published as a final standard. My understanding is that virtually all (if not all) of the details have been worked out, but it has not been ratified by the organization nor have the details of the specification of this "1.3" standard been "published". My understanding is that the current version is HDMI 1.2a. The last I checked "1.3" was supposed to be published no later than the end of June. You can't expect SONY or any other organization to commit to shipping products on a standard that is not even available yet. (As an aside note, the last I checked into it, the HDMI organization [HDMI Licensing LLC] still had not decided as to wheter to call this next iteration "HDMI 1.3" or "HDMI 2.0".)

As far as 1080p goes... to what 1080p are you referring? 1080p/24? 1080p/30? 1080p/60? Most film is shot at 24 frames per second and then through shuttering is shown at an effective rate of 48 frames per second, but there is no 1080p/48 standard.

Because of historical reasons, most TVs don't directly support the projection of 24 or 48 frames per second on the screen (what the viewers eye's see not what the internal electronics see). So there is no direct way for the viewers eyes to see what they would see in the theatre.

The new digital cinema standards won't solve this as they are
1080 x 2048 at either 24 or 48 frames per second (fps)
or
2160 x 4096 at 48 fps.
Again neither 24 nor 48 are directly viewed by the consumer when watching their TV.

So what do you want for your 1080p? What standard 1080p standard do you want? What conversion from 24 or 48 fps do you want? Do you want the conversion done in your Blu-ray Disk player? Do you want the content provider to do the conversion?

With regard to sound, we had a rather interesting discussion about sound on another thread in here. You might want to find it and read through it.

[aktonin]

This is my first post on the board, though I have been reading for a while.

What I don't get is, isn't true that some new HDTVs can display 1080p/24 natively? If so, then will it not be possible for a Blu-Ray player to output 1080p/24 to HDTV with 1080p/24 support, thus enjoying the film's original frame rate?

Thanks.

[phloyd]

The simple answer is the more that is new, the more will go wrong and the more delay of launch needed to get it right.

Also the more that is new, the more new equipment you need to support it. Going from DVD you already need to buy a new and expensive TV. The new amps supporting the new formats will be equally expensive.

And sure there could easily be better versions of the first wave of discs further down the line. The same was true with DVDs with no change of format.

It amazes me that this kind of thing makes you so angry - just don't f***ing buy it. Simple. Or start a rival format that does everything you want.

Cheers!

[Health Nut]

MPEG-4 Part 10 was created/optimized for the best resolution at the lowest reasonable bit rates. It was not optimized for just getting the best image quality. Thus if you can "afford" a higher bit rate (say 50 Mbps or higher) then MPEG-2 may give just as good -- and maybe even better -- quality as MPEG-4 Part 10.

I don't mind the content providers avoiding the higher fees.

HD-DVD early discs don't seem to show a quality issue. Each decoder has some quality tradeoffs, but the new advances not only allow for higher efficiency, they can allow for high quality as well. So 'overall' MPEG-2 is not going to outperform the latest codec. Most importantly, you are not going to be able to have peak bandwidths and the kind of headroom you have with MPEG-4. This just isn't a good reason. The latest codecs really are overall better, especially when you look at the whole picture of all considerations together.

Do you really care if a studio pays an extra 25 cents to compress in MPEG4 v10? I'd rather have that cost passed on to ME and have a better disc now than have to re-buy another $35.00 disc in two years. The other consideration is that if you are running the MPEG-2 rate so high, maybe that is why they cut the sound down to 16/48 multichannel... No doubt. Using MPEG-2 does waste space and bandwidth and that has consequences. Also, since when is Sony releasing everything on 50 GB discs? They should release most everything on 50 GB discs and use 24/48+ 7.1 and such... Certainly lossless is the best use of space. In my opinion they should just use DD and DTS Lossless... If you want the higher quality sound, upgrade your processor in the future... MPEG-2 and uncompressed PCM, especially 16/48 isn't what I'd call desireable. Maximum audio and video quality will always be promoted by using an advanced video codec and lossless compressed audio either DD lossless or DTS lossless.

The new digital cinema standards won't solve this as they are 1080 x 2048 at either 24 or 48 frames per second (fps) or 2160 x 4096 at 48 fps. Again neither 24 nor 48 are directly viewed by the consumer when watching their TV.

I'm glad I didn't buy a projector recently. I've had my DWIN HD700 CRT for 6 years now and I'm also happy I didn't donate a dime to DLP, thank-goodness. In any case, I'm very happy that I can sit back and wait to buy a new 1080p projector at my convenience. I'm not worried about any 'TV' since I'll be buying something new for a future Blu Ray player... but it won't be until Sony et al along with the CEMA displays get there act together. I'd prefer not to buy a scaler in this day and age, so I expect a future player to do all internal high quality transcaling and be able to pass the native 1080p24output. You can't have people with older technolgy have their cake and eat it too. These new formats and new displays have to be optimized for 1080p. Certainly PS3 will be outputing games at 1080p60 which is very exciting. 1080p60 should be an ATSC HD Format, but who cares about ATSC anymore. All new displays need to be 1080p60 capable.

As far as HDMI 1.3 goes... I'm not even sure the "1.3" version is even published as a final standard.

Its not my fault Sony et all, including HD-DVD was sitting on their ass this whole time comsumers have been asking for lossless quality audio. DD lossless and DTS Lossless certainly were approved as optional formats. Audio is as important as video. Like the other person said earlier, this first generation stuff sucks, so why make a huge investment in first gen. It is not my fault Sony et others rush players to market... Get it right. First gen doesn't have to suck. All it seems is that these first generation players just get in the way with an initial installed base of players that can't deliver what they should. We already have DVD, we don't need half-assed HD-DVD or half-assed Blu Ray, becasue that is what this is... again, we already have DVD so don't expect us to dish out money for this half-assed first generation crap.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by phloyd

It amazes me that this kind of thing makes you so angry - just don't f***ing buy it. Simple. Or start a rival format that does everything you want.

Cheers!

Quoted for truth and the win.

[The Don]

Originally Posted by JTK

Welcome to first generation early adoption. This is all too typical of the kinds of things we see in consumer electronics.

Unfortuneately, I feel that even early adopter types have become WAAAAAY too forgiving of these sorts of things.

Just because someone may have the money to blow on changing out their 5 figure front projector several times a year doesn't mean ANY company or CE venture should be able to put what are essentially incomplete products and it's simply sluffed off like: "Gosh darn it, it's first gen so ya get what ya get."

This is why I've never early adopted in my life, but isn't that unfortunate? It's too bad that a CE venture of any kind can't be solidified enough where you COULD buy a first gen piece of hardware and then not be s**** outta luck in a very short amount of time.

In this specific case, I'm almost certainly sticking to my original gameplan: Get a PS3, which I would do as a gamer anyways regardless of anything else, and simply use it as my BR stopgap until second or more likely third generation comes along.

I didn't even buy a DVD player until about third generation, so I'm used to this.

But again...it's a pity that I have to be that way, isn't it?

I'd be willing to pay a certain amount of money now, within reason, if I thought I could honestly get a product that I could keep and be confident in for years to come.

exactly...and I will only have a player as I'll have the PS3...

but I won't get a real player until at least late 2007 probably...and I didn't get a DVD player until mid-1999...