Are there any neutral titles that are technically better on Blu-Ray?

[Maxell]

It seems as if all "neutral" titles are the same specs for both hddvd and blu-ray (mostly hddvd ports it seems). Are there any that are technically better on blu-ray, such as bitrate, sound options, extra features, etc?

It sux to know that many movies could've turned out better blu-ray versions instead of cutting costs and "copying over" hddvd maximum capabilities.

[richard lichtenfelt]

Nature's Journey.
http://www.hidefpreview.com/Exclusive%20Interview.html

[JadedRaverLA]

Ironically, many of the Paramount releases (prior to their being bought out by the dark side) had better video on the BD version -- though the HD DVDs often had the better audio.

Warner's the only other "neutral" studio, and they use Microsoft's conversion tool to take their HD DVD VC-1 encodes and convert them to Blu-ray. I think there's a few Warner titles with better audio on Blu-ray, but not many, and it's late and I'm too tired to look back up what they are.

[jd213]

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix has extras in HD that are in SD on the HD DVD, and it has a documentary that the HD DVD doesn't. It and the 2nd-4th movies (and some other recent WB Blu-rays, I think) also have many more foreign language dubs than the HD DVD versions.

[stockstar1138]

300 has the same video quality but better sound quality on blu-ray.

Flags of our Fathers has a "sharper" look on the blu-ray, because paramount used an avc encoding instead of the vc-1 on the hd dvd. i believe the term "sharper" was used in the hidefdigest review.

The Untouchables also has an AVC on blu-ray vs. VC-1 on HD DVD, but I don't know how much better the picture is.

Others have already been mentioned above.

[bhampton]

All of them are better on Blu.

None of the Blu Rays have to be boiled to make them work.

And the Red cases will look like crap in a year when 80% or more of your movies have those nice Blu cases.

I certainly relate to you notion that it's sad that many films are prepaired for HD DUD and then dumped onto Blu Ray with the lower capabilities of DUD still intact. I hate that. That would be the main reason I want WB to go Blu because maybe then they will encode for the better specs of Blu Ray instead of just porting. That's kind of a problem when you have the best. Popular games also get ported from the inferior X-Box console onto PS3 with similar type of shortchanging.

-Brian

[Tulsa]

Sorry for the dumb question but...

What is this story on the boiling? I must have come into this after whatever the reference is about. Having seen this many many times here referenced, doing a search of boiled would only yield hundreds of results, so I thought it much easier to simply ask.

[jorg]

Originally Posted by Maxell

It seems as if all "neutral" titles are the same specs for both hddvd and blu-ray (mostly hddvd ports it seems). Are there any that are technically better on blu-ray, such as bitrate, sound options, extra features, etc?

It sux to know that many movies could've turned out better blu-ray versions instead of cutting costs and "copying over" hddvd maximum capabilities.

also teh harry potter series on blu-ray has many other audio options

[bhampton]

Tulsa,

Apparently from what I've read (because I never owned any HD DUD stuff) lots of problems with combo discs could be solved by boiling the discs. I think it had to do with epoxy of different layers of the disc not setting properly at the factory. At first the info was everywhere but the DUD-ers realized how embarrassing it was and starting trying to hide it. So,.. you don't see it mentioned that much anymore.

Shame too because I still read about people organizing a movie night when something new comes out and having people over only to have problems with the combo disc and after several tries they wind up watching the DVD side.

-Brian

[Tulsa]

Originally Posted by bhampton

Tulsa,

Apparently from what I've read (because I never owned any HD DUD stuff) lots of problems with combo discs could be solved by boiling the discs. I think it had to do with epoxy of different layers of the disc not setting properly at the factory. At first the info was everywhere but the DUD-ers realized how embarrassing it was and starting trying to hide it. So,.. you don't see it mentioned that much anymore.

Shame too because I still read about people organizing a movie night when something new comes out and having people over only to have problems with the combo disc and after several tries they wind up watching the DVD side.

-Brian

Thank you sir!

[HeavyHitter]

Originally Posted by bhampton

Shame too because I still read about people organizing a movie night when something new comes out and having people over only to have problems with the combo disc and after several tries they wind up watching the DVD side.

-Brian

Yep - there's countless stories of this over at AVS. The sad thing is, many of these fools still support HD DVD combos since that is part of the company line and Amir has told them how much potential they have.

[Sonny]

Originally Posted by bhampton

All of them are better on Blu.

None of the Blu Rays have to be boiled to make them work.

And the Red cases will look like crap in a year when 80% or more of your movies have those nice Blu cases.

I certainly relate to you notion that it's sad that many films are prepaired for HD DUD and then dumped onto Blu Ray with the lower capabilities of DUD still intact. I hate that. That would be the main reason I want WB to go Blu because maybe then they will encode for the better specs of Blu Ray instead of just porting. That's kind of a problem when you have the best. Popular games also get ported from the inferior X-Box console onto PS3 with similar type of shortchanging.

-Brian

A BIG +1 ON THAT

[sj001]

Originally Posted by bhampton

All of them are better on Blu.

None of the Blu Rays have to be boiled to make them work.

And the Red cases will look like crap in a year when 80% or more of your movies have those nice Blu cases.

I certainly relate to you notion that it's sad that many films are prepaired for HD DUD and then dumped onto Blu Ray with the lower capabilities of DUD still intact. I hate that. That would be the main reason I want WB to go Blu because maybe then they will encode for the better specs of Blu Ray instead of just porting. That's kind of a problem when you have the best. Popular games also get ported from the inferior X-Box console onto PS3 with similar type of shortchanging.

-Brian

100% man.

I hated crappy ports, hopefully this will end SOON.

[JasonR]

Originally Posted by bhampton

All of them are better on Blu.

None of the Blu Rays have to be boiled to make them work.

And the Red cases will look like crap in a year when 80% or more of your movies have those nice Blu cases.

I certainly relate to you notion that it's sad that many films are prepaired for HD DUD and then dumped onto Blu Ray with the lower capabilities of DUD still intact. I hate that. That would be the main reason I want WB to go Blu because maybe then they will encode for the better specs of Blu Ray instead of just porting. That's kind of a problem when you have the best. Popular games also get ported from the inferior X-Box console onto PS3 with similar type of shortchanging.

-Brian

+1

[Downhere]

Originally Posted by stockstar1138

Flags of our Fathers has a "sharper" look on the blu-ray, because paramount used an avc encoding instead of the vc-1 on the hd dvd. i believe the term "sharper" was used in the hidefdigest review.

Having compared the two different versions of the movie I would say the difference was negligible.

Originally Posted by bhampton

Tulsa,

Apparently from what I've read (because I never owned any HD DUD stuff) lots of problems with combo discs could be solved by boiling the discs. I think it had to do with epoxy of different layers of the disc not setting properly at the factory. At first the info was everywhere but the DUD-ers realized how embarrassing it was and starting trying to hide it. So,.. you don't see it mentioned that much anymore.

Shame too because I still read about people organizing a movie night when something new comes out and having people over only to have problems with the combo disc and after several tries they wind up watching the DVD side.

-Brian

I think this has been blown way out of proportion, in the same way the rot on some Blu-ray discs has been with HD DVD fans. I have a good amount of combo discs and have yet to have a problem. The only problem I had was with Superman Returns and I returned it to Warner Bros. and they sent me a brand new one that now works perfectly. Even Children of Men has worked perfectly without boiling or updating the firmware. So, therefore, it would have to be a very small minority that have to boil or even have problems playing combo discs.

[Clark Kent]

All Warner titles that have PCM on the Blu-ray and Dolby TrueHD on the HD DVD are better on Blu-ray because Warner uses DialNorm on their Dolby TrueHD tracks which makes the audio track not bit for bit identical.

As others have said many of the later Paramount titles have video encodes done to the maximum specs of Blu-ray, easily outshining the bandwidth limited HD DVD copy on larger screens.

The best apples to apples comparison is the Nature's Journey disc, which was authored to the limits of each format. The BD easily trounces the HD DVD version.

And a huge difference is the protective coating on all BDs. HD DVDs get scratched and have playback problems even easier than dvds due to how densely packed the data is on the disc. For problem free playback always buy Blu-ray.

[Oblivion]

Originally Posted by Clark Kent

All Warner titles that have PCM on the Blu-ray and Dolby TrueHD on the HD DVD are better on Blu-ray

Having recently gone dual I dispute this, I am yet to find any difference between the two. Indeed I am now campaigning for Warner to give us True-HD and PCM on the Blu-ray editions as we are moving towards receiver side decoding meaning our discs will need to re-brought for our future setups whereas the HD DVD ones won't. Warner need a slap here; they gave us True-HD and PCM on 300 so why not on all titles.

I appreciate this is a very pro-Blu site, and believe me I want and wish Blu to win this fight, but I'm yet to see a convincing dual format "Blu-ray trounces HD DVD" title. I mean examples like Harry Potter above fall flat on their face because the HD DVD sports PiP and interactivity. Ditto 300.

Blu-ray can win on specs and quality; so why doesn't it?

[finalfantasy]

It's 360 versus PS3...

The site members seem to agree PS3 and Blu-ray is superior over 360 and DUD...and yet, you still get silly questions...

Here is the answer...if you own 360, you think it's better on 360, and if you own DUD, you think it's better on DUD...so, you know what I say, stick to what you like and what you think is better...I guess some of us have never heard of fools gold...

Bottom line, nothing is better than PS3/BRay...

I just can't believe people actually partake in these discussions...

The discussions should revolve around which BRay movies have superior PAQ etc etc...

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by Downhere

I think this has been blown way out of proportion, in the same way the rot on some Blu-ray discs has been with HD DVD fans. I have a good amount of combo discs and have yet to have a problem.

There was no rot. It was a contaminated top coat in one production run of one title.

Why is it everyone uses "I have had no problem" as if it proves anything?

I have no repeat disc in Blade Runner.
I have no HD DVD disc in the Harry Potter box set.

Can I conclude these problems are being blown out of proportion? No. They exist in sufficient numbers to be an issue.

There have been enough reports for many combos to conclude there is a systemic problem with combo-discs. A problem may be scarce for the current number of units sold, but this is 10-year old technology that is failing. What happens if it were scaled up to a million units instead of 10K-100K?

The tech is supposed to be reliable NOW. That's one of the points the HD DVD side keeps pushing. And, it would seem clear that either the HD DVD production QA is wholly deficient, or it is actually Blu-ray that is more reliable.

Gary

[Terjyn]

Originally Posted by Clark Kent

And a huge difference is the protective coating on all BDs. HD DVDs get scratched and have playback problems even easier than dvds due to how densely packed the data is on the disc. For problem free playback always buy Blu-ray.

Better watch it or you'll have people come tell you that the hard protective coating is somehow a bad thing for Blu-Ray because it's only there because it has to be...