How is the PQ?

Is is better than or equal to the Blu-ray version's PQ?

I'm not sure which one to buy.

It may be one to pass on if the Blu ray transfer is any indication of what to expect.

It's probably the worst PQ of any movie in my collection (20 HD DVD's, 24 Blu Ray's)

If you already have the SD DVD, it doesnt get much better.

I think its at the bottom of Teir 3 in the BD PQ list
wish I had checked before buying :(

It may be one to pass on if the Blu ray transfer is any indication of what to expect.

It's probably the worst PQ of any movie in my collection (20 HD DVD's, 24 Blu Ray's)

If you already have the SD DVD, it doesnt get much better.

I think its at the bottom of Teir 3 in the BD PQ list
wish I had checked before buying :(

Well that makes me more curious if the HD-DVD import is an improvement over the Blu Ray. XXX is an early Blu Ray release though, correct? Wasn't all of the early releases poor compared to more recent releases?

I have the HD-DVD import of xXx. PQ is pretty good. Won't knock your socks off but miles ahead of the SD DVD. Haven't seen the BR version, though.

I have the HD-DVD import of xXx. PQ is pretty good. Won't knock your socks off but miles ahead of the SD DVD. Haven't seen the BR version, though.


Ditto

How is the PQ?

Is is better than or equal to the Blu-ray version's PQ?

I'm not sure which one to buy.


I completely disagree about the blu ray transfer. The transfer is good. Note particularly the night shots in the drug manufacturing compound. Very delineated and clear. It's not a perfect transfer but in my books it's still much better than the sd version. Not sorry at all that I got it. Unfortunately I don't have the HD DVD to compare it with.

I need someone who has seen both so I can compare. I did read that the BR version was bad, and was encoded very poorly. But seeing that HD DVD trasfers are usually encoded in VC-1, and that Euro transfers are usually better, I would like a comparison.

'Cause I'm not paying over $40 for an import without good PQ.

Keep in mind that all of the Japanese HD DVD releases have been in AVC. Personally I thought it looked much better than the superbit version I watched upconverted. I wouldn't call it perfect by any stretch but the majority of the film looked great. I do not have a BD player so I can only go by the reviews I've read.

'Cause I'm not paying over $500 for BD.

I prefer the HD DVD over the BD version.

I prefer the HD DVD over the BD version.

Could you be more specific? What aspects of the HD-DVD release do you prefer?

I've not seen either retail version, but I recall the portion on the BR demo disc looking absolutely horrendous.

The BD is under par in my book but the import XXX is a good sound disc tier 1.5. Not the best HD DVD can do but fun disc, I did get lost in the menus though!!. It is AVC.

I saw all sorts of 'artifacts' on the BD disc. The digest review sums it up well, it was an early one from a poor master and from then on in there was little they could do.

Just a quick note, I picked this up and certainly isn't the greatest PQ, considering the import price. Just about every HD DVD I own, I have been impressed with, not so with this one. The film is pretty grainy, not as bad as American werewolf but not great. Also, dark scenes suffer a lot and looks compressed to me. Very much a tier 3 release.
It was very satisfying to see the Columbia/Sony pictures logo at the start though and the end credits look fantastic.

No BD to compare with, but I did compare with the Superbit DVD. The HD DVD was easily a better looking disc than the upscaled Superbit (using an XA2). The whole HD DVD probably isn't demo material, but certain scenes definately are.

My only problem with the HD DVD was that the picture quality was inconsistent. At times, it would rival the best transfer HD DVD has to offer, and then at other times, the image would be very soft and not much better than the Superbit. The best way I can sum it up is that at it's worst, the HD DVD is only slightly better than Superbit DVD, and at its best, it is a nice improvement.

On a similar note though, I'm beginning to wonder if the inconsistency isn't at least somewhat the fault of the master. The exploding drug compound scene was featured on the Bullitt editing special feature. Here again you would see that at one camera angle, things would be sharp, and then it would cut to another angle, and the picture would be softer. This special feature was in HD and used a VC-1 encode. The HD DVD is also inconsistent in that same scene. So there you have a VC-1 encode and an AVC encode of the same scene, and both show inconsistency in picture quality from one angle to the next, which means the problem could be at the source.