Hi guys I'm new to HD at home I just bought a plasma (Hitachi 42HDS69) and I have Time Warner HD in NYC with a SA HD8300...Movies in 1080i are fantastic SOOOO much better than anything I have ever seen on DVD! :D
My question before I invest in a HD DVD player is there a BIG difference in Picture quality BTW my Cable HD feed and a HD DVD Disc?

Not knowing what you get but I have Comcast here in Michigan. There is no cable that looks as good as the majority of HDDVDs.

Art

When I got HD cable hooked up, I no longer watched movies in standard definition on TV. After I got my HD-DVD player, I no longer watch movies on HD cable. Granted, the difference between HD cable and HD-DVD are more subtle the the difference between HD cable and DVD, but they are there, and for me at least, it has made is so that I prefer to only watch movies on HD-DVD. I'm projecting on a 10' wide screen, so take that into account. You will probably be able to notice a difference on your TV. But only you can decide if that difference is worth the investment.

Fact: HD-DVD blows HD broadcast out of the water... BUT (there is always a but), depending on your screen size the difference might not be as overwhelming as what it is for some folks.

Yes, it will look better on your 42" plasma than on HD lite broadcast but not in the same way it would for someone with a 60+ TV or Projector.

I was the same way with my HDTV. HDTV blew me away at first and I could never go back to SD (especially stretched SD). Then I decided to pick up an HD-A1 around launch and now I hardly ever DVR HD movies. I'd say pull the trigger and enjoy. :D Come on in the waters great!

For my money HD DVD looks as good as the best cable HD you'll ever see, only without any of the pixelization you often get during fast-moving action scenes due to the overcompression of the digital cable signal. Aside from that (which to me, is a big deal on its own), the difference is not night and day.

If you are watching a drama sometimes Cable/Sat HD can be very compelling as well. If the action stays low and they do a good transfer it can be very very nice still. That’s about 15% of the time.

Movies on HD cable only gets half a 'Yawn' outta me most of the time, but like HD DVDs there are some better presentations than others.

Yep... depends a lot on the transfer. But as a WAG, maybe just the top 10-20% of HD cable has better PQ than the bottom 10-20% of HDDVDs.

On HD cable (Adelphia... oops, officially Comcast as of yesterday when I lost HDNet/HDNetMovies but gained ESPN2HD, TNTHD, and DiscoveryHD), I can see compression blocks during fast motion.

Sound is much better on HDDVD.

OAR is much better on HDDVD, especially if you love 2.35 as much as I do instead of 16:9 crops.

But selection and cost are much better on HD cable. There's a good chance that I'll find a good movie each week on cable, and DVR a couple more that are worth watching. But it seems like I'm buying most HDDVD titles only because they're HDDVD.

When I got my first HDDVD player, I compared "Phantom of the Opera" to the HD cable recording and I was so underwhelmed by the difference that I returned the player. When more titles were available (and after the HDDVD players dropped to $399 and $199) I gave them another try 6-8 months ago and I've been much happier.

I just checked my lists and I have several titles in common from HDDVD and HD cable, so I'll try to post screenshots of some direct comparisons... Batman Begins, Friday Night Lights, Full Metal Jacket, GoodFellas, Seabiscuit, Serenity, T3, U2.

They also change the aspect ratios to 16x9 most of the time for movies, or is it all the time? I think I saw star wars yesterday in HD in OAR, but I'm not certain. Most movies though they fit to 16x9. I prefer OAR. Lot's of pastelation in the images, especially the sky, it's supposed to be blue, so why does it look like someone sponge painted and what's with that noise in the picture? Macroblocking, yuck. I used to love watching stuff in HBO HD, then I saw seabiscuit on HD-DVD. Be prepared to be wowed when you watch your first film in HD-DVD/bluray.

Hi guys I'm new to HD at home I just bought a plasma (Hitachi 42HDS69) and I have Time Warner HD in NYC with a SA HD8300...Movies in 1080i are fantastic SOOOO much better than anything I have ever seen on DVD! :D
My question before I invest in a HD DVD player is there a BIG difference in Picture quality BTW my Cable HD feed and a HD DVD Disc?

I see you've posted the same thread in 3 different forums, I guess you want as much feedback as possible? ;)

Ya, the audio side alone makes it worth the purchase price. The audio you get with HD-DVD blows cable out of the water. No comparison there.

get a hi def player. you wont be disappointed. like many have said, you will see a difference btw the two.

as for bluray v hd-dvd? see the other 20 threads on the topic. :cool:

Yep... depends a lot on the transfer. But as a WAG, maybe just the top 10-20% of HD cable has better PQ than the bottom 10-20% of HDDVDs.

On HD cable (Adelphia... oops, officially Comcast as of yesterday when I lost HDNet/HDNetMovies but gained ESPN2HD, TNTHD, and DiscoveryHD), I can see compression blocks during fast motion.

Sound is much better on HDDVD.

OAR is much better on HDDVD, especially if you love 2.35 as much as I do instead of 16:9 crops.


Clarence,
Nice summary ! I'm looking foward to your comparisons. The motion artifacting due to bit starvation is so annoying on cable that at times the DVD looks better. This is the main sumbling block to acceptable quality there IMO. The rate of good releases is a problem for HDDVD right now to be sure.

Art

Thank you guys for your feedback! I guess I'm in for some more HD "investment" :D
I just purchased a 500GB external drive for the HD8300 to expand my recording capabilities, I will wait a few months to see if more of the dual HD DVD & Blu-Ray unit are becoming available (or I will just by the LG)

I just checked my lists and I have several titles in common from HDDVD and HD cable, so I'll try to post screenshots of some direct comparisons... Batman Begins, Friday Night Lights, Full Metal Jacket, GoodFellas, Seabiscuit, Serenity, T3, U2.I'm looking foward to your comparisons.The comparisons were more difficult than I thought. I can't capture motion artifacts (nor the difference in sound quality ;)), but you can at least see the difference in the non-OAR crops...

Toshiba HD-A1 HD-DVD player, Sony VPH-G90 CRT projector, Lumagen HDP for 1080P, 9' wide laminate screen:

"Batman Begins" HD-DVD
http://crtforum.com/img/batman2.jpg

HD cable:
http://crtforum.com/img/batman2-dvr.jpg

"Batman Begins" HD-DVD
http://crtforum.com/img/batman3.jpg

HD cable:
http://crtforum.com/img/batman3-dvr.jpg

"Batman Begins" HD-DVD
http://crtforum.com/img/batman4.jpg

HD cable:
http://crtforum.com/img/batman4-dvr.jpg

oooooo that really gets my panties in a bunch!

I think programming on inHD and HDNet often rival my HD-DVD movies. Of course there is a big difference between the HD video and film programs...
Most every other HD channel just looks like DVD or upscaled DVD.