Physical & Digital EST: The Future of Home Video Discussion Thread

[cheez avenger]

Watched Wayne's World 4K disc last night and it is a terrific catalog release. Crank it up, because the Atmos was awesome.

[alchav21]

Enough of this Disc Watching, we know in order for Streaming to match Disc Quality the Bitrate will have to increase. Here is a Fiber Company with a solution. Next Level is designing Fiber Networks you can own, a bit expensive but for some of you very Doable! Read the Article.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...-each-network/

[Vilya]

A slow week for me; I only added:

and

How could I resist Christopher Lee portraying Rasputin? Or Peter Cushing pursuing the Abominable Snowman?

I was supposed to get Reservoir Dogs on 4K, but my pre-order was pushed back to early December.

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by alchav21

Enough of this Disc Watching, we know in order for Streaming to match Disc Quality the Bitrate will have to increase. Here is a Fiber Company with a solution. Next Level is designing Fiber Networks you can own, a bit expensive but for some of you very Doable! Read the Article.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...-each-network/

First, it is impossible to have too much "disc watching." It can't be done.

For most of us, increasing streaming bitrates is not a problem with our ISP. Even in my tiny little backwater village, I get 780 Mbps download speeds, which vastly exceeds any streaming needs. All my ISP needs to work on is its service reliability. Well, that and their insatiable greed.

The current anemic streaming bitrates are due to the choices made by the streaming providers themselves. They could increase their bitrates at any time, but they do not want to incur the extra bandwidth cost. And why should they increase their bandwidth costs when most of their customers, like you, already thinks that everything looks and sounds "fantastic!"?

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by Vilya

A slow week for me; I only added:

and

How could I resist Christopher Lee portraying Rasputin? Or Peter Cushing pursuing the Abominable Snowman?

I was supposed to get Reservoir Dogs on 4K, but my pre-order was pushed back to early December.

Speaking of Christopher Lee, I braved (the ordering of) The Howling 2 today! It’s coming tomorrow. I recently bought the 4K Steelbook of the original and this bizarre sequel will make an interesting companion. It’s been many years but certain parts really stuck in my mind.
One thing I am certain of is that it’s not a classic like the original.

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by Steedeel

Speaking of Christopher Lee, I braved (the ordering of) The Howling 2 today! It’s coming tomorrow. I recently bought the 4K Steelbook of the original and this bizarre sequel will make an interesting companion. It’s been many years but certain parts really stuck in my mind.
One thing I am certain of is that it’s not a classic like the original.

Having Christopher Lee in it elevates it one star automatically.

Amazon U.S. is offering the Shout Factory edition for $209.99!

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by Vilya

Having Christopher Lee in it elevates it one star automatically.

Amazon U.S. is offering the Shout Factory edition for $209.99!

Arrow did it here, paid £12.99

Naturally, far more excited about the original. I have a backlog of around 100 4K discs to get through, should be fun

[cheez avenger]

Watched Three Thousand Years of Longing 4K disc and I was blown away by it. Loved the film and the barebones 4K disc is reference. What a great blind-buy; to quote Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: "I chose wisely."

[alchav21]

Originally Posted by Vilya

First, it is impossible to have too much "disc watching." It can't be done.

For most of us, increasing streaming bitrates is not a problem with our ISP. Even in my tiny little backwater village, I get 780 Mbps download speeds, which vastly exceeds any streaming needs. All my ISP needs to work on is its service reliability. Well, that and their insatiable greed.

The current anemic streaming bitrates are due to the choices made by the streaming providers themselves. They could increase their bitrates at any time, but they do not want to incur the extra bandwidth cost. And why should they increase their bandwidth costs when most of their customers, like you, already thinks that everything looks and sounds "fantastic!"?

That's not true anymore Bitrates have been going up Jaramy from Techthusiasm has been doing some testing with his Apple TV 4K and getting readings 25-30Mbps. He has tested Amazon Prime, iTunes, Netflix, Vudu, and some others. So all you need now is a Fiber Network because Bitrates are only going up!

Amazon Streaming Quality "Rings of Power" "Vox Machina" "The Boys" on Apple TV 4K HDR - YouTube

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by alchav21

That's not true anymore Bitrates have been going up Jaramy from Techthusiasm has been doing some testing with his Apple TV 4K and getting readings 25-30Mbps. He has tested Amazon Prime, iTunes, Netflix, Vudu, and some others. So all you need now is a Fiber Network because Bitrates are only going up!

Amazon Streaming Quality "Rings of Power" "Vox Machina" "The Boys" on Apple TV 4K HDR - YouTube

The 25-30 Mbps 4K streaming bitrates are nothing new for the very few streaming sources that offer them. The better streaming sources (Apple, Movies Anywhere, Disney+) have offered that for ages now. We were discussing 4K streaming bitrates in the 25-30 Mbps range in 2018! These 4K streaming bitrates are nowhere even close to that offered by a 4K disc which can easily average in the 80-90 Mbps range with peaks hitting over 100 Mbps.

Netflix's bitrates are pathetic and they are actually lower than they once were; Vudu is unchanged in the mid teens and Amazon is comparable to Vudu. All of it is really a big

This quote of yours is all that anyone needs to know about your ability to assess quality, past, present, or future:

Originally Posted by alchav21

No mystery, IMO I don't see a big difference from HD to 4K.

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by Vilya

The 25-30 Mbps 4K streaming bitrates are nothing new for the very few streaming sources that offer them. The better streaming sources (Apple, Movies Anywhere, Disney+) have offered that for ages now. We were discussing 4K streaming bitrates in the 25-30 Mbps range in 2018! These 4K streaming bitrates are nowhere even close to that offered by a 4K disc which can easily average in the 80-90 Mbps range with peaks hitting over 100 Mbps.

Netflix's bitrates are pathetic and they are actually lower than they once were; Vudu is unchanged in the mid teens and Amazon is comparable to Vudu. All of it is really a big

This quote of yours is all that anyone needs to know about your ability to assess quality, past, present, or future:

Yeah, Apple and Disney way in front with the rest still struggling. Amazon can’t seem to shake off the banding, regardless of resolution or bit rate in my opinion.

[bhampton]

i am enjoying the Devils Hour on Amazon Prime but yesterday I was the only one home and the video was still terrible quality. I would get the soupy blocky melty looking mess often.

Fiber Optic internet is not offered yet where I live but usually one or two people can stream with much better quality than what I was getting.

I have really cut down on the gizmos on my network but the quality sometimes just isn't there even if I'm the only one trying to use it. When other people are home I love having my discs so that I don't mess up their networking and I have better quality also.

I may regret it but I did dare any UHD BD to be $10.



I ignored this the first time it hit $10 because I actually lived with someone very obsessed with Elvis and I kind of have my own Elvis notions but, ... I'll give it a spin.

[gotmule]

Originally Posted by cheez avenger

Watched Three Thousand Years of Longing 4K disc and I was blown away by it. Loved the film and the barebones 4K disc is reference. What a great blind-buy; to quote Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: "I chose wisely."

Great to hear! I ordered that and Halo 4K from Bullmoose (I keep forgetting about them for new releases) and saved a good bit.

[bhampton]

I regret picking this up on Blu Ray at Target for $8 because I liked enough to rewatch it at some point but I didn't expect it to be so cheap on UHD BD $9.99.

I'm going to be dealed out before Black Friday.

[Wendell R. Breland]

Originally Posted by Vilya

The 25-30 Mbps 4K streaming bitrates are nothing new for the very few streaming sources that offer them. The better streaming sources (Apple, Movies Anywhere, Disney+) have offered that for ages now.

The peak rates mean nothing without valley rates. The video average is what folks should be looking at. Using Amazon Prime diagnostics:

Rings of Power - Video 20 Mbps, audio Atmos @ 448 Kbps

Carnival Row - Video 15 Mbps, audio Atmos @ 384 Kbps

The English - Video 15 Mbps, audio 5.1 @ 192 Kbp

RoP in UHD is the ONLY show on Prime that I have saw with those numbers. Their other original UHD content is more or less like the other two mentioned. Most other content that I have checked on Prime fall a good bit below theses numbers for video.

Really wish folks that post any streaming data would include the time of day data was gathered. There can be a big difference between say 3:30 PM and prime time for any given time zone.

[Ender14]

Originally Posted by Steedeel

Can’t wait to watch Highlander in 4K. The soundtrack alone is going to be epic!

I picked up the UK StudioCanal release and watched it last night. I've never seen Highlander look this good. And the release itself with the swag is beautiful. Now one of the nicer sets in my collection.

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by Ender14

I picked up the UK StudioCanal release and watched it last night. I've never seen Highlander look this good. And the release itself with the swag is beautiful. Now one of the nicer sets in my collection.

I opted for the vanilla 4K (Dec 5th release) just to save £15 as I went a bit overboard this last month.

Great to see your opinion about the picture quality. It’s always been a choppy viewing experience but now it’s in 4K, it should be a treat.

[Warm Gun]

Requested a second RMA for Columbia Classics 3. From Here to Eternity was broken, now It Happened One Night is broken in my replacement. Pitty DeepDiscount didn't send me the replacement before having me send the old one back and that Sony didn't wanna replace the single disc for me in the first place.

There is no quality control. Bet there are skeleton crews of Mexican workers inserting discs into the cases for most of the studios, doing so many that they don't even inspect the discs anymore.

[Show spoiler]

Also have no idea how this happened after the case was already in the big box. Because the big box is undamaged. Unless the folding set swung open and then the worker had to rush to put the Annie case back in and move on to the next one.

[Wendell R. Breland]

Originally Posted by Warm Gun

Requested a second RMA for Columbia Classics 3.

My Vincent Price collection disc holder hinge was broken and 1 disc was dislodged from the retainer. That disc had bad scratch, did not check the other disc, boxed it up and sent back to Amazon. Interesting the package and the outer case showed no sign of damage.

Considering the number of disc and other items ordered my damage to undamaged ratio is very small. Amazon says I placed 111 orders in 2020 and 77 in 2022.

[Wendell R. Breland]

For those interested in various forms of HDR may want to read Stacey's post in the Spears & Munsil UHD HDR Benchmark thread - here - starting with post 725.