Ask questions to Sony Pictures Entertainment insider "paidgeek"

[DaViD Boulet]

I'm getting reports of EE and DNR on this new transfer. Is there EE and/or DNR? If so, why?

Paid,

I'm about to write my review of Baron Munchausen and I have similar questions for that title as well. While I see no "ringing" on any edges, and the picture is incredibly detailed, it has a "harsh" quality that in the past I've associated with DVDs that have been edge-enhanced to emphasize detail. Can you comment on that before I write and publish my review?

thanks!

[WickyWoo]

Paid is on vacation. I'm going to lock this until he's back to keep things from piling up

[Polyh3dron]

Hey paid, I don't know if you've been asked this before or not, but if I'm not mistaken, Sony Pictures has the US home video rights for Wong Kar Wai's "Ashes of Time" film, which has never had a worthwhile DVD release even.

PLEASE tell me that Sony has plans to put this movie on Blu-ray.

[lgans316]

Originally Posted by mhafner

I'm getting reports of EE and DNR on this new transfer. Is there EE and/or DNR? If so, why?

You are right. Many reviewers and videphiles have reported EE on Gattaca. Let's wait for PG's response.

[patrick99]

Paidgeek, I think the BD of 30 Days of Night is among the very best looking SPE BDs. Not that it couldn't be improved with a higher bitrate, but if every SPE release looked like this I would be very happy. Most of the close-ups of faces are just gorgeous: clean, clear, detailed, crisp, and stable.

[syncguy]

Welcome back paidgeek. Hope you had a good break.

Just wish to check that Sony has not forgotten about our burning requirement to nudge subtitles up/down with Sony player (PS3) firmware. Really simple/basic nudge up/down. Not the fancy stuff that the blu-ray s/w is capable of.

[DaViD Boulet]

Also wondering if it's on the plate to address the PS3's issue of dropping 1080p output with 1080i and 480i/p encoded BD material (while upconverting all DVD SD material to 1080p). I had to buy a new Panny BD30 to keep a constant 1080p60 output for my new display... and I was hoping to use the PS3 for at least another six months.

[Kris Deering]

Hey Paid,

Hope you enjoyed your vacation. I was watching Dewey Cox last night using the Panasonic BD30 (up to date fw) and I was experiencing A LOT of audio dropouts throughout the entire film. It isn't unusual to get about one a film with TrueHD soundtracks for some reason, but this was almost unbearable. I watched the extended cut which makes me wonder if it is related to the branching at all. Any ideas?

[bferr1]

Originally Posted by DaViD Boulet

Also wondering if it's on the plate to address the PS3's issue of dropping 1080p output with 1080i and 480i/p encoded BD material (while upconverting all DVD SD material to 1080p). I had to buy a new Panny BD30 to keep a constant 1080p60 output for my new display... and I was hoping to use the PS3 for at least another six months.

I second this. (I posted this same question here.) I think that fixing this BD upscaling issue and the constant breaking of the HDMI connection that goes along with it, as well as adding the ol' DTS-HD MA decoding, will absolutely make the PS3 a near-perfect BD machine, at least for me. It's so damn close already.

And thanks for keeping this topic alive, DaViD.

[mark antony]

I "third" the fixing of constant changing of output resolution on BD material. It seems to be the ps3's menu's more than anything else that cause the problem.

I would also like the ability to tell the player the order of which audio track to auto-select first, dependent on whats on the disc, eg DTS first, then Dolby Tru then dolby 5.1.

Finally would it be possible for the player to downconvert a PCM 5.1 track to DTS 5.1. The reason i ask is for those of us who can only use optical sound at present, PCM 5.1 is a no-no and yet consistantly sounds better than a vanilla dolby 5.1 track. As DTS core provides over 2.5 times the bandwith of DD at even 640kbps it would be a good alternative if poss...on the first toshiba hddvd players i seem to recall they transcoded dolby digital plus to dts, so there can't be a licencing issue...

Thanks

M

[frank_t]

Originally Posted by mark antony

I would also like the ability to tell the player the order of which audio track to auto-select first, dependent on whats on the disc, eg DTS first, then Dolby Tru then dolby 5.1.

M

+1! (And I think this is over my quota now for posting about this)

I just find it annoying, esp. with Warner titles that auto-play and default to DD 5.1 that I have to change the audio.

[mark antony]

Originally Posted by mark antony

I "third" the fixing of constant changing of output resolution on BD material. It seems to be the ps3's menu's more than anything else that cause the problem.

On further reflection, I think the system would work best if the PS3 menu kept the same resolution of the last BD film/Game that was played, as it not only switches when you change from a game or film to then main menu, but also within sub-menu's - even those that should have nothing to do with picture output.

It's also important to still be able to keep the native res of the BD film or game as some of us have external scalers or projectors with far better scaling and de-interlacing ability than even the mighty ps3 can muster!

There also doesn't seem to be a subtitle off function on the player, just a choice of which language you do want...

M

[lgans316]

Originally Posted by mark antony

I "third" the fixing of constant changing of output resolution on BD material. It seems to be the ps3's menu's more than anything else that cause the problem.

I would also like the ability to tell the player the order of which audio track to auto-select first, dependent on whats on the disc, eg DTS first, then Dolby Tru then dolby 5.1.

Finally would it be possible for the player to downconvert a PCM 5.1 track to DTS 5.1. The reason i ask is for those of us who can only use optical sound at present, PCM 5.1 is a no-no and yet consistantly sounds better than a vanilla dolby 5.1 track. As DTS core provides over 2.5 times the bandwith of DD at even 640kbps it would be a good alternative if poss...on the first toshiba hddvd players i seem to recall they transcoded dolby digital plus to dts, so there can't be a licencing issue...

Thanks

M

+1. It would be great as PCM sounds pants on my legacy HT.

[owa]

Originally Posted by lgans316

You are right. Many reviewers and videphiles have reported EE on Gattaca. Let's wait for PG's response.

If you don't mind, which sites/reviewers? I only know of 3 places to check, besides here and those are: High-Def Digest, Home Theater Spot and Home Theater Forum. They don't mention anything about that, with HDD and HTS saying it's one of best catalog releases they've seen this year. So, I'm just curious as to who the "many reviewers" are. I'm always looking for more sources for reviews anyway. Thanks.

[DaViD Boulet]

Finally would it be possible for the player to downconvert a PCM 5.1 track to DTS 5.1. The reason i ask is for those of us who can only use optical sound at present, PCM 5.1 is a no-no and yet consistantly sounds better than a vanilla dolby 5.1 track. As DTS core provides over 2.5 times the bandwith of DD at even 640kbps it would be a good alternative if poss...on the first toshiba hddvd players i seem to recall they transcoded dolby digital plus to dts, so there can't be a licencing issue...

Guys...

even BETTER than DTS... no kidding here... just play the PCM in 2.0 stereo mix-down over SPDIF and listen via ProLogic on your receiver.

Guess what.

BLOWS DD 640 *and* DTS away. Really. Fidelity is far improved. If you have PLII you don't lose that much in channel steering. But the bottom line is that the *fidelity* of the signal is much better with PCM even when downmixed to stereo and played back via Prologic. For real!

[lgans316]

Sorry. PCM still sounds awful on my HT via OPTICAL. DD vs PCM on my HT = No Contest. I would love to see an option in the PS3 to convert LPCM to DTS and bitstream via TOSLINK. I am not sure if this is possible as there seems to be no on-board decoding of DTS in the PS3.

[JasonR]

Originally Posted by lgans316

Sorry. PCM still sounds awful on my HT via OPTICAL. DD vs PCM on my HT = No Contest. I would love to see an option in the PS3 to convert LPCM to DTS and bitstream via TOSLINK. I am not sure if this is possible as there seems to be no on-board decoding of DTS in the PS3.

You are only getting two channel PCM via optical, so yeah DD sounds better. And no it's not possible.

Prologic is Prologic, just because it is stereo PCM does not mean it sounds better. No way.

[mark antony]

Originally Posted by JasonR

You are only getting two channel PCM via optical, so yeah DD sounds better. And no it's not possible.

Prologic is Prologic, just because it is stereo PCM does not mean it sounds better. No way.

Why is it not possible?

I agree that i'd rather listen to dd than downmixed pcm stereo via pro logic ii, even on my krell processor !

[WickyWoo]

DUnno who unlocked this, but since Paid isn't back yet..................