Good read for smart people. Here is the link (http://http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Joshua_Zyber/Commentary:_Specs_vs._Reality/1096).

By Joshua Zyber

One of the inevitable side effects of the High Definition revolution is that the advanced video and audio technology used in the Blu-ray and HD DVD formats tends to bring out the know-it-all tech geek in home theater fans. Sometimes this can be a great benefit, when knowledgeable users band together to analyze specific technical deficiencies that have occurred and share their feedback with the parties responsible, hopefully leading to improvements in the future. We've seen some of this at various points during the format war. Early Blu-ray releases such as 'The Fifth Element' exhibited obvious visual deficiencies due to weak source materials and poor digital compression encoding. Likewise, HD DVD catalog titles from Universal have been hit-or-miss in quality, many of them recycled from dated and problematic video masters (like 'In Good Company', with its ghastly edge enhancement artifacts). Reviews published on this site and others were negative, and buyers voiced their displeasure to the studios, eventually resulting in improved mastering on subsequent releases. 'The Fifth Element' was even remastered in significantly better quality as a direct result of owner feedback. That wouldn't have happened had no one spoken up about it.

Generally speaking, the High Definition studios, knowing the intense scrutiny their work is placed under, have maintained a much higher standard of quality on recent releases (with some notable exceptions, of course). Just imagine what might have happened had the public been apathetic and merely accepted whatever shoddy treatment they were handed. In this case, the voice of the people resulted in a better end product for everyone to enjoy.

Unfortunately, the above example is a best case scenario. On the flip side of that coin, we have countless cases of agenda-driven individuals attempting to use a partial understanding of technical matters as a bludgeon in arguments supposedly "proving" the superiority of one format over the other. Anyone who's spent time browsing home theater discussion forums has suffered through an endless string of debates about how the HD DVD format "sucks" because its discs can only store 30 gb of content, while Blu-ray discs can store up to 50 gb, and therefore must be amazingly superior. Never mind that HD DVD has time and again proven capable of delivering exceptional picture and sound quality, plus copious bonus material, easily equaling even the best available on Blu-ray. At the same time there are others who point to the occasional Blu-ray encoded with MPEG-2 compression as being "unacceptable", even though MPEG-2 can certainly achieve excellent results when given enough room to breathe (witness 'Black Hawk Down'). To some people, the actual quality presented to them is irrelevant if they don't like the sound of the specs on paper.

This "specs above all else" mentality has reared its ugly head again recently with the release of 'Transformers' on HD DVD, a title that delivers stunning video and audio, as well as a number of innovative interactive features. What could possibly be the problem here? Well, the soundtrack is only encoded in Dolby Digital Plus format, not a lossless codec such as Dolby TrueHD or an uncompressed one like PCM. In his review of the disc for this site, our Peter Bracke gave the DD+ track a perfect "5" for audio quality and said of it that, "Directionality, imaging, accuracy of localized effects, and the sheer depth of the soundfield are all fantastic stuff." Nonetheless, in the minds of many, this disc is a huge failure, and its soundtrack a pathetic disgrace for not including a TrueHD or PCM option.

I should mention at this point that at least one working Hollywood sound mixer has voiced his opinion that, when played back on his professional dubbing stage, well-mastered Dolby Digital Plus soundtracks encoded at the high 1509 kb/s bit rate that Paramount uses can be audibly transparent to the studio masters, when tested on movies that he mixed himself and would presumably know better than anyone else. But what use is the informed opinion of an expert in the field when it's easier to just point to the specs list on the back of a disc's packaging to make conclusive statements about matters of quality? In the forum on this site, a number of readers have made proclamations such as, "Compressed audio is just not acceptable these days" and "Whether you can tell the difference or not is irrelevant."

The disc's audio being indistinguishable from its studio master is "irrelevant"? Even with just a Dolby Digital Plus track, the 'Transformers' disc rated the highest score for audio quality that we can give. What more could we demand from it? It's absolutely terrific, but it's just not absolutely terrific enough if the packaging doesn't have a listing for TrueHD or PCM, even when it's likely impossible for human ears to tell the difference? What kind of argument is that?

The lossy compressed audio formats offered by Dolby and DTS use perceptual encoding techniques to filter out data from the studio masters in order to conserve disc space. The intent of perceptual encoding is that the data removed should consist mainly of either frequencies beyond the range of human hearing or frequencies that would normally be masked by other frequencies in the track anyway. With the most heavily compressed formats, including basic Dolby Digital and DTS (the standards on regular DVD), often additional frequencies within the range of hearing are affected, and this has resulted in much variability in sound quality. However, Dolby Digital Plus, especially the 1509 kb/s variety found on a disc like the 'Transformers' HD DVD, uses much more efficient encoding techniques at a very high bit rate. The people who actually make these movie soundtracks have found it pretty impressive, and yet average home listeners seem to believe with absolute certainty that the home theater speakers in their living rooms would be capable of resolving with precision the mathematical difference between a high bit rate Dolby Digital Plus track and a lossless one, and that their golden audiophile ears would also be capable of discerning it. Personally, I would like to put these people to a properly-controlled blind test, where all of the audio levels have been carefully matched to the same volume, and then see how well their hearing fares.

I would not claim that all DD+ tracks are flawless or transparent to their masters; it does take some effort to encode them properly. But to dismiss the format out of hand simply because the soundtrack isn't labeled as lossless or uncompressed demonstrates an ignorance of the technology being used. If the audio codec alone were the only important criteria in sound quality, how could it be that a disc like 'Dinosaur' with a 48 kHz / 24-bit PCM 5.1 track would sound so underwhelming? With specs like those, why isn't that disc a spectacular audio showcase? Somehow I doubt you'll find too many critical listeners who would ever claim that 'Dinosaur' sounds better than 'Transformers', but based on the specs, shouldn't it? Perhaps it's time we all realize that there's more to quality than the specs can tell us.

Yet we see the same thinking applied to matters of video. How many more arguments must there be about the different video compression codecs? Proponents on one side proclaim the infallible superiority of VC-1 above all other options, while those opposed insist that VC-1 is garbage and only AVC MPEG-4 is any good. Both camps attempt to prove their point by capturing screen shots on their computers, which they run through PhotoShop to crop, zoom, filter, and distort in all manner of convoluted ways in order to locate individual errant pixels, completely invisible to the naked eye in the normal course of movie watching, and heartily declare their victory in the debate.

The truth of the matter is that all video compression codecs have the same purpose, to accurately represent the source using a fraction of the storage space. In the hands of a good operator, both VC-1 and AVC are more than capable of achieving this goal. Even the dated MPEG-2 codec has been known to deliver excellent results (owners of the now-defunct D-Theater tape format sure didn't seem to have any problem with it). There are plenty of examples of "reference quality" transfers using any of the above, from 'King Kong' (VC-1) to 'Final Fantasy' (AVC) to 'Kingdom of Heaven' (MPEG-2). In all cases, the skill of the compressionist and the quality of the work is more important than the codec used to get there.

It's also more important than the bit rate. As far as I'm concerned, Sony's decision to incorporate a bit rate meter in their PS3 Blu-ray player is one of the worst things to have ever happened to the home theater hobby. Because of that one seemingly-innocuous and frequently-inaccurate data display, now just about anyone, no matter how technologically ignorant, can believe themselves to be experts in the field of video reproduction, based on nothing more than whether their bit rate meters read a high number or a low one -- as if that number were even relevant. The whole point of video compression is to squeeze a High Definition picture into as little space as possible. A compressionist who's maintained a high-quality picture with a low bit rate has done an excellent job, but that's a point lost on most consumers, who assume that a good picture needs a high bit rate, regardless of what they actually see on their TV screens. The bit rate alone is a meaningless statistic and says nothing about the quality of the compression work. It is equally possible to create a lousy video image with a high bit rate, or a great image with a low bit rate, depending on the complexity of the content and how well the work is done. I found it extremely amusing to read complaints about the low bit rate used on 'TMNT', a disc with a razor sharp and amazingly detailed picture that some owners nonetheless decried as "soft" against the evidence their own eyes gave them, for no reason other than an ill-founded assumption that the picture would have been even sharper if the bit rate meter spiked a little higher. How would they know? Have they compared it against the studio master?

This misconception has reached such heights of absurdity that certain viewers have started petitions demanding that Warner Bros. stop using the same video encodes on HD DVD and Blu-ray, and instead "maximize" the bit rates on their Blu-ray releases if the extra disc space is available. But for what purpose? Video compression doesn't work on a linear scale. Using advanced codecs like VC-1 and AVC, there are diminishing returns above a certain point, and throwing more bits at a picture that doesn't require them accomplishes nothing more than to make the meter number go up. As time goes on, compression tools and techniques become more efficient, requiring even less space to achieve visual transparency to the original master. Warner Bros. has many times over demonstrated outstanding results within the 30 gb limit of HD DVD, even on very long films such as the 'Troy: Director's Cut', a movie that runs 3 1/2 hours and yet fits comfortably on a 30 gb disc with beautiful picture quality, despite also squeezing in a lossless Dolby TrueHD audio track and a bunch of supplements. So what if the Blu-ray edition has an extra 20 gb of space available? Are we watching the movie or watching the bit rate meter? If there were no bit rate meter, would anyone have a legitimate basis to complain?

Back when they were supporting both High-Def formats, Paramount actually did what these users are demanding. They authored every movie separately for HD DVD and Blu-ray, each maximized to its format's potential. And what were the results? The same movie looked visibly identical on the bit rate maximized Blu-ray as it did on the lower bit rate HD DVD. Once again, the quality of the compression trumped other considerations regarding tech specs or bit rate.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to imply that all HD DVDs and Blu-rays are perfect now. Video artifacts do occur, and the studios have been known to rest on their laurels and allow shoddy work to slip through. Sometimes disc space really does strain the limits of what a studio wants to include on a High-Def title. It's important to scrutinize their results, lest we return to a state where the original 'Fifth Element' Blu-ray is considered acceptable. But it's equally important to understand what we're actually looking at. Many times, the "artifacts" picked apart by viewers have nothing to do with video compression or encoding whatsoever, but rather are issues found in the source, such as natural film grain, which isn't a flaw at all. Yes, a soft picture can be the result of poor compression or excessive filtering, but it can also be the result of soft focus photography. A heavily-grainy image could be overcompressed, or it could be stylistically intentional. Not every movie is photographed to look exactly the same as every other, and even within a film certain shots or scenes may look different than others. We must understand what a movie is supposed to look like before we can judge how well a video disc reproduces it. Being moderately proficient at manipulating still images in Photoshop does not necessarily qualify someone as an expert in the art of filmmaking.

I'm not suggesting that viewers should relax their standards or accept substandard quality as "good enough" when it's really not, but the technical specs alone simply do not tell the whole story, and over-emphasizing them is a matter of misplaced priorities. We should judge these discs by the actual quality they deliver, not by misleading statistics like the bit rate or the specs listing on the packaging. Surely, that can't be too much to ask.

Blu-Ray boys...skip this thread. I'd hate to see your heads explode from a dose of the real world.

As a dual-format owner and enjoyer of all HD media, I couldn't agree more with the arguments put forth in that article, as well as the overall tone employed by the author.

The problem is, it won't silence those that we all know who have some psychological need for their format of choice to "win" at all costs. Logic and facts have no place when arguing with a single-format fanatic. For some warped reason, those that argue the inherent superiority of their chosen format so vehemently are no different than religious or political zealots that do the same thing. The primary difference, people, is.....THIS IS NOT LIFE AND DEATH STUFF WE'RE DEALING WITH, HERE! At least religious and political debates and beliefs deal with real humans and real lives. This...is...consumer...electronics.

Sorry, I've been wanting to get that off my chest for some time now, and the author of that article appears to have had the same desire, and did so quite eloquently. Buy HD-DVD. Buy Blu-Ray. Heck, buy both, I don't really care. But if someone disagrees with you about your choices, you know what? That's fine. It does nothing to diminish the pleasure that you can have with your purchase. And, if your chosen format, or both, don't survive, life will go on. The sun will still come out tomorrow. Your loved ones will still be around. So, please, for the love of all humanity, please keep things in perspective. It's fine to have passions and voice opinions, but do so with respect for the other person, just as you would if you were having a face to face conversation.

Okay, deep breath. Rant over. I'm going to go play with my 3 year old daughter who just woke up, wait for my 2 year old to wake up, greet mommy when she comes home from work, have dinner, and then enjoy either The Robinson's on Blu-Ray, or Charlie & The Chocolate Factory on HD-DVD. My 3 year old hasn't decided yet.

Extremely well written article that I agree with whole heartedly. Problem is...it is Blu-ray flame bait.

I agree that codecs are what makes the quality of the disc, not space of bit rates. The author clearly states why this is true.

are no different than religious or political zealots that do the same thing. The primary difference, people, is.....THIS IS NOT LIFE AND DEATH STUFF WE'RE DEALING WITH, HERE! At least religious and political debates and beliefs deal with real humans and real lives. This...is...consumer...electronics.

Very well put.

"The bit rate alone is a meaningless statistic and says nothing about the quality of the compression work. It is equally possible to create a lousy video image with a high bit rate, or a great image with a low bit rate, depending on the complexity of the content and how well the work is done."

I wonder why it is then that all those Warner titles with the very low bitrates all tend to look soft and smooth, whereas recent Fox titles with very high bitrates like Silver Surfer and Mr. Brooks look outstandingly sharp?

I guess it must be that all of Warner's movies must be just poorly shot.

I don't think Josh Zyber has been off-key once with his commentaries. All of his commentaries are very well written. Whether it is about specs, the combo discs, aspect ratios, war of hype, etc he always seems to hit the nail on the head.

"The bit rate alone is a meaningless statistic and says nothing about the quality of the compression work. It is equally possible to create a lousy video image with a high bit rate, or a great image with a low bit rate, depending on the complexity of the content and how well the work is done."

I wonder why it is then that all those Warner titles with the very low bitrates all tend to look soft and smooth, whereas recent Fox titles with very high bitrates like Silver Surfer and Mr. Brooks look outstandingly sharp?

I guess it must be that all of Warner's movies must be just poorly shot.

wtf, V for Vendetta looks awesome, Batman, heck there are lots of Warner titles that look great, are you having a laugh or tying to be serious?

Extremely well written article that I agree with whole heartedly. Problem is...it is Blu-ray flame bait.

I agree that codecs are what makes the quality of the disc, not space of bit rates. The author clearly states why this is true.



Very well put.


Well if throughout history we had to worry whether or not someone will consider facts and reality as flame bait then we really need to discuss why this happens.

Everything the author said is 100% true and several out of quite a few reasons I support HD DVD as a consumer.

The gamer mentality with "OMGZ Bit-Rate is not maxxed out" comment with Blu-Ray crowd is really a big problem. I think this is the type of people who lack capability of understanding values, looking at things objectively and are very easily manipulated. We have quite obviously witnessed this. Just take a look at Blu-Ray.com. Of course this is all cleverly lead on and manipulated by BDA and again one of the major reasons I have real dislike for anything coming from this group.

The stats, the bit rates and similar PR numbers prove this as well. The mentality from unobjective and easily lead on consumers that consider these numbers like some kind of superiority is beyond understanding and indeed troubling.

If anything has shown us that world in general and our future as consumers is seriously in danger by individuals like the ones who support Blu-Ray (especially this new wave of gamers that Sony has so cleverly managed to generate and manipulate as a tool).

All I can deduce from this article is that the future doesn't look bright for any consumer with reasoning like this present.

wtf, V for Vendetta looks awesome, Batman, heck there are lots of Warner titles that look great, are you having a laugh or tying to be serious?

I guess you hadn't heard that there are a lot of people who think Batman Begins looks really soft?

This view of Warner's PQ is widely held.

Nice article Josh.

I guess you hadn't heard that there are a lot of people who think Batman Begins looks really soft?

This view of Warner's PQ is widely held.

I saw it in the theater, I own the disc, its not "soft".

I agree that codecs are what makes the quality of the disc, not space of bit rates.






Must have read a different article than I did.

"The truth of the matter is that all video compression codecs have the same purpose, to accurately represent the source using a fraction of the storage space. In the hands of a good operator, both VC-1 and AVC are more than capable of achieving this goal. Even the dated MPEG-2 codec has been known to deliver excellent results (owners of the now-defunct D-Theater tape format sure didn't seem to have any problem with it). There are plenty of examples of "reference quality" transfers using any of the above, from 'King Kong' (VC-1) to 'Final Fantasy' (AVC) to 'Kingdom of Heaven' (MPEG-2). In all cases, the skill of the compressionist and the quality of the work is more important than the codec used to get there."

I don't think Josh Zyber has been off-key once with his commentaries. All of his commentaries are very well written. Whether it is about specs, the combo discs, aspect ratios, war of hype, etc he always seems to hit the nail on the head.

What a shock. :D

What a shock. :D

Completely unexpected and a total surprise. ;)

I think this is the type of people who lack capability of understanding values, looking at things objectively and are very easily manipulated.

You said it friend! Oh, and here's just one example:

Originally Posted by Woodshed
I would dump my whole family for $150 million.

Josh has always been even-handed as I've recalled...Very cogent stuff.

excellent article. the shame is that this thread will eventually devolve into the bitrate and lossless arguments the article talks about.

edit: I see that's already started.

"Sometimes disc space really does strain the limits of what a studio wants to include on a High-Def title."

I think Transformers audio/sound track suffered due to this limit.
I guess it's "good enough" for the "value" of the price you pay for the player.

What a shock. :D

What did he say that was completely wrong, or a bit off target? If you disagree then post why you disagree. Don't act like a condescending ass.

The Paramount bit is not accurate. It's still not clear whether or not Paramount did encodes for Blu-ray. It doesn't make a lick of sense from a business standpoint to do a completely new transfer using Mpeg-2 when a equal, if not superior encode is already done for HD DVD using VC-1. There were rumors that Sony did all the Paramount encodes, which is curious because when Sony started doing AVC, it started showing up on Paramount titles as well.

Bottom line is, there is still, and never has been a single Hollywood movie tailored to each format's specs. NIN and Nature's Journey are the only two using different encodes of the same codec.

Great thread!

Good read for smart people. Here is the link (http://http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Joshua_Zyber/Commentary:_Specs_vs._Reality/1096).

So how many professional reviewers 'missed' the pulsing on "the perfect" looking title King Kong while someone like Gary Murrell did not? :)

Hate to dig up an old thread but here you go!

King Kong is NOT the image King! (http://archive2.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=751065)

Well well well

he must be from an IT backgroud! Real world ALWAYS ALWAYS will be the measurement, NOT what the whitepaper is harping.

What a shock. :D


The real shock is you not trying to make some kind of BD fanboy point in this thread. Any opinion regarding the article?

This is doing my head in, I'll have to forget my principles and go dual format to find out for myself!

How can we establish once and for all whether or not DD+ is transparent, or whether uncompressed is really better than even lossless compressed, as some are saying.

He's a clever writer is Josh Z. He starts off by saying that your eyes and ears are right even where the specs suggest otherwise, which I agree with entirely. But then uses a seamless sequence of logic to prove that the Transformers soundtrack could not have been improved with a lossless track.

Anyone spot the gap in the logic, there?

Nick

Wait, people listen to Josh Z? You are better off ignoring every single thing he says. He still refuses to admit that Traffic HD DVD is a upconverted DVD. You cannot trust someone with an agenda like that. My 2 cents anyway.

Sounds like he's upset with the bitrate meter. Everytime he sees the PS3 bitrate meter goes over 30Mbps, he probaby runs and takes a cold shower to try to wash off the shame.

Wait, people listen to Josh Z? You are better off ignoring every single thing he says. He still refuses to admit that Traffic HD DVD is a upconverted DVD. You cannot trust someone with an agenda like that. My 2 cents anyway.

Ding Ding Ding thats 2 BD bois saying Josh has an agenda. I guess if you dont like what someone says, you push the automatic AGENDA button.

I think Transformers audio/sound track suffered due to this limit.

And what are you using as the basis of this opinion? The specs on the back of the cover?

Congrats -- you just proved the point of the article.

I guess you hadn't heard that there are a lot of people who think Batman Begins looks really soft?

This view of Warner's PQ is widely held.

Uhh It looks as the director intended man....really next we will have people asking why the Matrix is green.:)

Josh appears to have based his argument heavily on Peter Bracke's perplexing 5* audio rating:
Even with just a Dolby Digital Plus track, the 'Transformers' disc rated the highest score for audio quality that we can give. What more could we demand from it? It's absolutely terrific, but it's just not absolutely terrific enough if the packaging doesn't have a listing for TrueHD or PCM, even when it's likely impossible for human ears to tell the difference? What kind of argument is that? Yet he has mysteriously forgotten about the rest of that review. Not the actions of a neutral observer, or someone without an agenda. I think we ought to remind ourselves:
Note that although I'm giving this audio mix five stars, that doesn't mean I agree with Paramount's decision to forgo high-res audio on this title. Without a TrueHD or PCM mix to compare this one to, there's no way of telling how much better such a track might have been, but based on the upgrade I've seen with other titles, I'm guessing a high-res mix could well have trounced this one. That's not to take anything away from this truly exceptional mix, but this is one case where I think you truly can improve upon perfection. Nick

This is the best article I have read about the two formats since they were first introduced.

Nice Josh thoughtful and balanced at least to me. I have seen BD with mpeg 2 that were stunning and lossless tracks that failed to deliver. I hope we get some thoughful and meanuingful discussion going and we dont reduce this thread to arguing and namecalling.

As a dual-format owner and enjoyer of all HD media, I couldn't agree more with the arguments put forth in that article, as well as the overall tone employed by the author.

The problem is, it won't silence those that we all know who have some psychological need for their format of choice to "win" at all costs. Logic and facts have no place when arguing with a single-format fanatic. For some warped reason, those that argue the inherent superiority of their chosen format so vehemently are no different than religious or political zealots that do the same thing. The primary difference, people, is.....THIS IS NOT LIFE AND DEATH STUFF WE'RE DEALING WITH, HERE! At least religious and political debates and beliefs deal with real humans and real lives. This...is...consumer...electronics.

Sorry, I've been wanting to get that off my chest for some time now, and the author of that article appears to have had the same desire, and did so quite eloquently. Buy HD-DVD. Buy Blu-Ray. Heck, buy both, I don't really care. But if someone disagrees with you about your choices, you know what? That's fine. It does nothing to diminish the pleasure that you can have with your purchase. And, if your chosen format, or both, don't survive, life will go on. The sun will still come out tomorrow. Your loved ones will still be around. So, please, for the love of all humanity, please keep things in perspective. It's fine to have passions and voice opinions, but do so with respect for the other person, just as you would if you were having a face to face conversation.

Okay, deep breath. Rant over. I'm going to go play with my 3 year old daughter who just woke up, wait for my 2 year old to wake up, greet mommy when she comes home from work, have dinner, and then enjoy either The Robinson's on Blu-Ray, or Charlie & The Chocolate Factory on HD-DVD. My 3 year old hasn't decided yet.


I could not agree more!

patrick,

This view of Warner's PQ is widely held.

And a lot of people still think the earth is flat, that the moon landing was staged, and that Elvis still lives.

Josh said one thing that really sums the situation up - Everyone thinks they are an expert, and pretty much everyone thinks that what they BELIEVE is correct. In most cases nothing could be further from the truth.

I think Transformers audio/sound track suffered due to this limit.
I guess it's "good enough" for the "value" of the price you pay for the player.
Except for the fact that there is approximately 5GB of free space on the Transformers disc which means there was PLENTY of room for a lossless track.

NEXT!

Except for the fact that there is approximately 5GB of free space on the Transformers disc which means there was PLENTY of room for a lossless track.

NEXT!

But probably not enough bandwidth without reducing video bitrate and picture quality.

But probably not enough bandwidth without reducing video bitrate and picture quality.
You can speculate all you want, but Troy IS a longer movie and has TrueHD. If Paramount would have seen reason to include lossless on this disc, it could have been done with room to spare.

And what are you using as the basis of this opinion? The specs on the back of the cover?

Congrats -- you just proved the point of the article.
I could care less what it says on the back of the cover for specs.
Myself and countless others here and at MB forums have raised issue with the audio quality and soundtrack of Transformers.

Nice Josh thoughtful and balanced at least to me. I have seen BD with mpeg 2 that were stunning and lossless tracks that failed to deliver. I hope we get some thoughful and meaningful discussion going and we dont reduce this thread to arguing and namecalling.

Never going to happen.

Everything in Josh's post has been said by at least one professional in the business at one time or another. It will be attacked here also until hell freeze's over.

You can speculate all you want, but Troy IS a longer movie and has TrueHD. If Paramount would have seen reason to include lossless on this disc, it could have been done with room to spare.
But they didn't and figured it was "good enough."
NEXT

Top-notch article, I hope some people actually read the dam thing rather than just skip if to see if it favors their preconceived notions/agendas.

But they didn't and figured it was "good enough."
NEXT
and yet it still sold over 100,000 copies this week.

So how many professional reviewers 'missed' the pulsing on "the perfect" looking title King Kong while someone like Gary Murrell did not? :)

Hate to dig up an old thread but here you go!

King Kong is NOT the image King! (http://archive2.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=751065)


I don't know what King of Kongs has been watched by some, but the King Kong I watched on HD has AMAZING PQ and sound...give me great experience in HD and you can keep your mathematically high bit rate number professor :)

I could care less what it says on the back of the cover for specs.
Myself and countless others here and at MB forums have raised issue with the audio quality and soundtrack of Transformers.

"Countless" others huh? Please.

Josh,

Always a great read. I hope you continue to do these articles :)

I could care less what it says on the back of the cover for specs.
Myself and countless others here and at MB forums have raised issue with the audio quality and soundtrack of Transformers.

So you fanboys must be more educated than the professional reviewers and the people who make the audio tracks. WOW, that is impressive!:eek:

I knew Josh was pro HD-DVD, but come on! This really belongs in the HD-DVD section since its HD-DVD propaganda.
I lost all interest the minute he started defending lossy audio.
Regardless, we can put this to rest when R&B films puts out its next disc with both having lossless audio. If the PQ is equal, I will buy an HD-DVD player.(you can quote me on that one).

p.s. Can we please stop using the opinion of one film mixer as evidence that lossy is "good enough"????

I enjoyed the article, and it makes a great deal of sense. If we worry too much about specs, we will never watch movies such as Casablanca because no matter how much work is done on it, its specs won't match either Transformers or Spider-Man 3.

This misconception has reached such heights of absurdity that certain viewers have started petitions demanding that Warner Bros. stop using the same video encodes on HD DVD and Blu-ray, and instead "maximize" the bit rates on their Blu-ray releases if the extra disc space is available. Some people have clearly lost their minds.

Great job Josh.

I lost all interest the minute he started defending lossy audio.
...
p.s. Can we please stop using the opinion of one film mixer as evidence that lossy is "good enough"???? Do you realize that what you are saying is precisely what the article was about?

You can speculate all you want, but Troy IS a longer movie and has TrueHD. If Paramount would have seen reason to include lossless on this disc, it could have been done with room to spare.

More speculation, "Troy" was recorded at lower bitrates for the "softer" scenes (of which there were quite a few) and peak video bitrates weren't as high as they needed to be for "Transformers" (understandable since "Transformers" is all special effects) thus allowing for the lossless audio track.

As a dual-format owner and enjoyer of all HD media, I couldn't agree more with the arguments put forth in that article, as well as the overall tone employed by the author.

The problem is, it won't silence those that we all know who have some psychological need for their format of choice to "win" at all costs. Logic and facts have no place when arguing with a single-format fanatic. For some warped reason, those that argue the inherent superiority of their chosen format so vehemently are no different than religious or political zealots that do the same thing. The primary difference, people, is.....THIS IS NOT LIFE AND DEATH STUFF WE'RE DEALING WITH, HERE! At least religious and political debates and beliefs deal with real humans and real lives. This...is...consumer...electronics.

Sorry, I've been wanting to get that off my chest for some time now, and the author of that article appears to have had the same desire, and did so quite eloquently. Buy HD-DVD. Buy Blu-Ray. Heck, buy both, I don't really care. But if someone disagrees with you about your choices, you know what? That's fine. It does nothing to diminish the pleasure that you can have with your purchase. And, if your chosen format, or both, don't survive, life will go on. The sun will still come out tomorrow. Your loved ones will still be around. So, please, for the love of all humanity, please keep things in perspective. It's fine to have passions and voice opinions, but do so with respect for the other person, just as you would if you were having a face to face conversation.

Okay, deep breath. Rant over. I'm going to go play with my 3 year old daughter who just woke up, wait for my 2 year old to wake up, greet mommy when she comes home from work, have dinner, and then enjoy either The Robinson's on Blu-Ray, or Charlie & The Chocolate Factory on HD-DVD. My 3 year old hasn't decided yet.

Kids are great. If it came down to a choice between my kids and all that is HDM, I'd toss my PS3, a20, amp etc: into the trash in a heartbeat.

They really level your outlook in life.

Some people have clearly lost their minds.

Great job Josh.

Do you realize that what you are saying is precisely what the article was about?

??????
Which article did you read?

I knew Josh was pro HD-DVD, but come on! This really belongs in the HD-DVD section since its HD-DVD propaganda.
I lost all interest the minute he started defending lossy audio.
Regardless, we can put this to rest when R&B films puts out its next disc with both having lossless audio. If the PQ is equal, I will buy an HD-DVD player.(you can quote me on that one).

p.s. Can we please stop using the opinion of one film mixer as evidence that lossy is "good enough"????

Why should we stop using a PROFESSIONAL film mixer who says that the mix on Transformers was great. He must know what he's doing if he's asked to work on one of the biggest movies of the year. Show me another professional film mixer that says you can definetly hear a difference between a well mixed lossy vs lossless.

In that case, every movie on BR should be released on BD50 and use the all 50gb of data and not 1 mb less. Stop using only 30gb and claiming it's "good enough".

I lost all interest the minute he started defending lossy audio.

That explains why you don't seem to have understood what he was saying :p

That explains why you don't seem to have understood what he was saying :p

No, no, anything showing why HD DVD's quality is transparent to BD is obviously propaganda.

Except for the fact that there is approximately 5GB of free space on the Transformers disc which means there was PLENTY of room for a lossless track.

NEXT!

Transformers disc 1 (the movie) is 28.3 gigs. Max space possible is 30 gigs. I know you guys on the red side have some funky math, but that looks like 1.7 gigs of free space with is not PLENTY of room.

Corporations use over-hyped specs because it's easier to sell a quantitative imporvement than a qualitative improvement. The best example is megapixels in cameras... more megapixels generally means smaller cell size and lower light sensitivity, which results in poorer signal-to-noise ratios and poorer color reproduction. But they don't care if the new model is worst than the old one, because consumers will automatically assume 8 megapixels is better than 6! And the corporations know specs will stir up the fanboys. I was a video game junkie when the PS2 launched seven years ago. When the Xbox was announced, Sony claimed the PS2 was more powerful because it was capable of 3 times as many "gigaflops". I was an obedient fanboy and I remember defending the PS2 because the specs said it was more powerful than the Xbox, even though my eyes could clearly see the Xbox graphics looked better.

Great read Josh, Well done!

Bottom line is, there is still, and never has been a single Hollywood movie tailored to each format's specs. NIN and Nature's Journey are the only two using different encodes of the same codec.

Bingo. Until we have two such discs on a relatively long movie all if this is pure conjecture (including the article from the OP).

There are some things that appear to be factual (for example, the earth rotates around the sun). If someone saids otherwise (the earth rotates around Pluto), and you are a reasonable person, then you don't dismiss him out of hand. However, the burden of proof would be on him, not you.

I accept the following statement as factual: "Given the same master, at the same sampling rate and the same bit-depth, a lossless track can never sound worse than a lossy track. But a lossy track can sound worse than a lossless track." I don't see how anyone can argue against it.

Now someone comes along and saids: "Given the same master, at the same sampling rate and the same bit-depth, a lossy track can sound just as good as a lossless." This by the way is what I believe FilmMixer is saying.

Now you are a reasonable person, but the burden of proof is on him. In other words, he will have to prove that under every possible listening environment, under every possible combination of receivers/speakers, under every possible hearing ability at every age, that his statement is true. Frankly I would rather be watching movies than doing all those tests, which could take ... forever, just for one title.

Or they can just give us lossless, and no tests or comparisons would be necessary, and you know you are not doing any worse than lossy.

Transformers disc 1 (the movie) is 28.3 gigs. Max space possible is 30 gigs. I know you guys on the red side have some funky math, but that looks like 1.7 gigs of free space with is not PLENTY of room.

jackbee you do realize that the dd+ would be negated as well as the trailers and special features....someone had a ss from thier pc where it clearly would have 5-6gbs free for sound. I think you could have had a truhd and maybe pcm with that much space right?

But that really isnt an issue when the sound is awesome as is and it got 5 for 5 from every reviewer who heard it.:)

Transformers disc 1 (the movie) is 28.3 gigs. Max space possible is 30 gigs. I know you guys on the red side have some funky math, but that looks like 1.7 gigs of free space with is not PLENTY of room.
He said plenty of space for lossless and he is right. This much extra space easily allows lossless to be stored there. It would have allowed 3 hours of lossless audio to be stored on disc given the space already taken by the 1.5 mbit/sec track....

Or they could have dropped the 1.5 mbps DD+ track outright with a True HD track instead.

I knew Josh was pro HD-DVD, but come on! This really belongs in the HD-DVD section since its HD-DVD propaganda.
I lost all interest the minute he started defending lossy audio.
Regardless, we can put this to rest when R&B films puts out its next disc with both having lossless audio. If the PQ is equal, I will buy an HD-DVD player.(you can quote me on that one).

p.s. Can we please stop using the opinion of one film mixer as evidence that lossy is "good enough"????

You wouldn't know the difference. Audiophiles that frequent head-fi often have trouble picking out lossless over compressed songs with bitrates higher than 196kbps, and these people spend more money on their audio systems than a lot of people do their cars.

I laugh at people here who claim they can tell the difference because all they're really hearing is the spec sheet calling out to them and all it's really saying is "You bought me, so you know I must be betterrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr."

Hell most adults over the age of 20 can't even hear frequencies above 16khz.

There are some things that appear to be factual (for example, the earth rotates around the sun). If someone saids otherwise (the earth rotates around Pluto), and you are a reasonable person, then you don't dismiss him out of hand. However, the burden of proof would be on him, not you.

500 years ago, the factual "truth" for "reasonable" people would have been the sun and the rest of the universe revolved around the earth. I've never seen a reasonable "proof" that supported this fact.

Good read for smart people. Here is the link (http://http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Joshua_Zyber/Commentary:_Specs_vs._Reality/1096). Are you referring to people whose opinions most closely align with your own opinions? It's a good read by a smart person, and might prove very convincing to someone who wasn't.

There's a lot of debate here, there and everywhere about the neutrality of this article, but it difficult for most folks to stay objective. Perhaps if we could persuade Blu fans to describe the ways in which it IS impartial, and the red fans to describe the ways in which it is partisan, then we might get a better understanding of the differences between opinoins and facts.

Nick

I accept the following statement as factual: "Given the same master, at the same sampling rate and the same bit-depth, a lossless track can never sound worse than a lossy track. But a lossy track can sound worse than a lossless track." I don't see how anyone can argue against it.

Now someone comes along and saids: "Given the same master, at the same sampling rate and the same bit-depth, a lossy track can sound just as good as a lossless." This by the way is what I believe FilmMixer is saying.

Now you are a reasonable person, but the burden of proof is on him. In other words, he will have to prove that under every possible listening environment, under every possible combination of receivers/speakers, under every possible hearing ability at every age, that his statement is true. Frankly I would rather be watching movies than doing all those tests, which could take ... forever, just for one title.

Or they can just give us lossless, and no tests or comparisons would be necessary, and you know you are not doing any worse than lossy.
I kind of doubt the DD+ algorithims change from encode to encode. I haven't heard they are tweaked. If it's indistiguishable in some encodes it should be indistinguishable in all encodes. Unless you can prove otherwise. :)

He said plenty of space for lossless and he is right. This much extra space easily allows lossless to be stored there. It would have allowed 3 hours of lossless audio to be stored on disc given the space already taken by the 1.5 mbit/sec track....
Or they could have dropped the 1.5 mbps DD+ track outright with a True HD track instead. I'm confused. Doesn't this mean that Xformers DID have room for a THD soundtrack? Choosing my words carefully here, that seems to contradict comments attributed directly to the studio that there wasn't room for a lossless s'track?

Nick

I'm confused. Doesn't this mean that Xformers DID have room for a THD soundtrack? Choosing my words carefully here, that seems to contradict comments attributed directly to the studio that there wasn't room for a lossless s'track?

Nick

Well there could be plenty of reasons.

1. The studio guy wasnt informed right

2. The encoding house didnt think it could fit before they did the encoding

3. It actually didnt fit

etc

I knew Josh was pro HD-DVD, but come on! This really belongs in the HD-DVD section since its HD-DVD propaganda.
I lost all interest the minute he started defending lossy audio.
Regardless, we can put this to rest when R&B films puts out its next disc with both having lossless audio. If the PQ is equal, I will buy an HD-DVD player.(you can quote me on that one).

p.s. Can we please stop using the opinion of one film mixer as evidence that lossy is "good enough"????
I want more than subjective proof that anyone here can detect the differences between DD+ and lossless. Filmmixer has an open invitation, get yourself over to his studio. I eagerly await the results.

Good read for smart people. Here is the link (http://http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Joshua_Zyber/Commentary:_Specs_vs._Reality/1096).

And anyone who doesn't agree is stupid?

And anyone who doesn't agree is stupid?

false dichotomy

false dichotomy

I don't think so. The claim was that all smart people will find this a good read. I didn't. The implication of the original claim is that I must be a stupid person if I didn't find it a good read because all smart people will find it a good read.

I don't think so. The claim was that all smart people will find this a good read. I didn't. The implication of the original claim is that I must be a stupid person if I didn't find it a good read because all smart people will find it a good read.

1) He's exactly right. Your claim could be an example of what a false dichotomy is in Webster's Dictionary. Do yourself a favor and look up the definition before you claim otherwise.

2) It appears that you can't credibly argue against the actual article that the OP linked, so instead you try to take issue with his statement? That's ridiculous.

3) You didn't find it a good read. Fine. Explain why you didn't find it a good read, instead of falsely claiming that the OP is therefore claiming that you're "stupid".

Back to the original discussion (I hope).

He said plenty of space for lossless and he is right. This much extra space easily allows lossless to be stored there. It would have allowed 3 hours of lossless audio to be stored on disc given the space already taken by the 1.5 mbit/sec track....

So remove the DD 1.5 track, include a LOSSLESS track as the SOLE soundtrack and release to the public? How many HD DVD releases have only 1 soundtrack, and that 1 soundtrack being lossless? Im going to wager a guess as it being **0**, but im sure you will have the proper answer to that also. Hugs and kisses.

So remove the DD 1.5 track, include a LOSSLESS track as the SOLE soundtrack and release to the public? How many HD DVD releases have only 1 soundtrack, and that 1 soundtrack being lossless? Im going to wager a guess as it being **0**, but im sure you will have the proper answer to that also. Hugs and kisses.

Jack I believe he was alluding to removing the DD+ track not the DD5.1 track. There would be two tracks:

DD5.1

Dolby TrueHD

p.s. Can we please stop using the opinion of one film mixer as evidence that lossy is "good enough"????

As opposed to who's opinion, yours? Call me crazy, but I'll take the guy's opinion who does it for a living over that of someone who doesn't.

But that's just me.


Or they could have dropped the 1.5 mbps DD+ track outright with a True HD track instead.

It's my understanding that you can't just have a single TrueHD track on a disc and nothing else. I think you HAVE to have a DD+ track (or DD @ 668?) along with it.

Anyway you slice it, I believe you HAVE to have two tracks.

Corporations use over-hyped specs because it's easier to sell a quantitative improvement than a qualitative improvement. The best example is megapixels in cameras... more megapixels generally means smaller cell size and lower light sensitivity, which results in poorer signal-to-noise ratios and poorer color reproduction. But they don't care if the new model is worst than the old one, because consumers will automatically assume 8 megapixels is better than 6!

...and deep colour is better than 8 bit, and 24/48 is better than 16/44.1, and HDMI 1.3 cables are better than measly 1.0 cables, etc., etc., etc., forgetting that the =source= (or master) is the driving factor more than any other... 24 megapixels doesn't mean much with a pinhole lens capturing the source, nor does an HD presentation of a film shot on VHS.

Kudos, Josh, for saying it like you think it is. It really got to me when people were holding up Crank and Ice Age as being superior to things shot on film - torched LCD settings do not make for what one may think of as a "film like" experience... This is -not- a BD vs HD DVD fanboy agenda thing... There -are- very specific instances where space would help, situations where a higher max bandwidth -would- benefit the encode (just as the advantage of guaranteed codec decoding for DD+ or TrueHD would be beneficial). The point is, judging by specs alone and ignoring the context of the encode/presentation is so entirely beyond the point that it's laughable. There is a context for all this garbage (if you think this would be such an issue if Paramount didn't go one-format exclusive then, uh, I think you're wrong... and THAT isn't a spec on the back of the box...)

Lord knows this will infuriate many who simply can't stand them as AVS contributors, but read carefully -and- critically what FilmMixer and Amir have said in the Insider's thread. Ironically, Amir has gone further than FM in carving out space for the benefits of "lossless" presentations for =musical= content. The issues of film sound production (and subsequent reproduction), the sausage factory where source material is drawn from an incredibly wide array of different quality stems, are so far beyond the scope of simple spec checkboxes. One thing is clear - when you go to your multiplex, you are getting (based on specs of the bitrate alone) a =substantially= lessened audio presentation than the one found on your home copy of Transformers.

So, which is better, analogue or digital? :)

It's my understanding that you can't just have a single TrueHD track on a disc and nothing else. I think you HAVE to have a DD+ track (or DD @ 668?) along with it.

Anyway you slice it, I believe you HAVE to have two tracks.

HD DVD Does. TrueHD AND DTS HD MA on Blu-Ray have core tracks that are used when the full meal deal cannot be extracted. TrueHD on HD DVD is its own entity and would only net 2 channel pcm for most HD DVD users, hence the need for a 5.1 track elsewhere on the disc.

But they didn't and figured it was "good enough."
NEXT

I guess The Fifth Element, House of Flying Daggers, and countless other crappy BDM are all "good enough"?

Nicely written article. Both red and blue can deliver great quality and audio depending on the execution.

Transformers disc 1 (the movie) is 28.3 gigs.

26.3

It is impossible to prove that Transformers would sound any better using DTHD, since there isn't currently any DDTHD or PCM encode available for this movie. It is also impossible to prove it sounds just as good. Specs knowledge tells us that there is a chance the DDTHD could sound better, but that's not a sure thing.

On the other hand, previous comparisons of DD+ and DDTHD have proved the second can easily beat the first if DD+ is limited to 640Kbps. This tells us nothing about what it could do against DD+ at 1.5mbps, since even DTS at higher bitrate will beat DD+ at 640kbps. At best, DD+ can hope for a tie, as long as the material is not adequate to highlight the differences that ARE there(it is a lossy codec... differences can be measured)

Do we have any HD-DVD disc with DD+ and DDTHD soundtracks that can be used for comparison? I suppose DD+ on these HD-DVD discs could be 1.5mbps to make the comparison valid.

If no valid comparisons can be made, Josh can and should have his right to say DD+ is just as good and that people are complaining about nothing with the TF release. And I also have the right to say he's full of **** and that it doesn't make any sense. Cause neither side can prove anything, so all that we have are opinions. Pointing to secondary opinions, no matter how knowledgeable they might be, don't prove or help the arguments of each side either.

What Josh can't argue against is that a DDTHD track would have avoided such discussion, and that the HDDVD currently couldn't hold this encode because of the extra space needed.

What Josh can't argue against is that a DDTHD track would have avoided such discussion, and that the HDDVD currently couldn't hold this encode because of the extra space needed.

So the times paramount didnt include lossless audio on BD its was due to space aswell?

Back in the day, "stereo stores" used to try to sell speakers based on specs and not on how they sounded. "Receivers" were pooh-poohed because you had to buy "separates" to get real quality. A slightly higher S/N ratio on one piece of equipment was a crushing blow against a lower rated unit. No one bothered even to ask at what levels music was played back at under normal conditions in the home.

As Josh points out, we haven't come very far and we ought to revisit basics. What's the final result at home? Good? Middling? Great? Yes, by all means demand the industry deliver the best possible image and sound at affordable consumer prices -- don't let them get lazy! -- but keep perspective as well: it's what it looks and sounds like at home that matters.

I have yet to read a single credible comment in forums like these that lead me to believe Blu-ray or HD DVD have an advantage in delivering the best quality movie experience in the home that 95% of us will ever be able to detect.

So for me it's about Casablanca looking "better" to me than my grand-parents enjoyed when it was first released. I could not have said that when the best available was a DVD and a 27" CRT. But today I have no doubt as I reach the grand-fatherly age (gad, that hurt to type) that Casablanca in my living room IS better than virtually all audiences before have experienced. And along the way I'm also enjoying recent stuff like Batman Begins and Blood Diamond.

Bravo! to the expert video and audio encoders who make this all possible!

...frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if Casablanca looks better (and still film like, with grain intact) than it did for those at the premiere... And yet its sales have been paltry in comparison to glossy candy...

Ah, well... I at least get to own a copy...:)

Excellent thread! :):):)

Anyway you slice it, I believe you HAVE to have two tracks.

You don't. One "mandatory" audio track is all that is required.

HD DVD Does. TrueHD AND DTS HD MA on Blu-Ray have core tracks that are used when the full meal deal cannot be extracted. TrueHD on HD DVD is its own entity and would only net 2 channel pcm for most HD DVD users, hence the need for a 5.1 track elsewhere on the disc.

Wrong on many levels.

As stated above, any HD DVD or Blu-ray disc REQUIRES only a single mandatory audio track. TrueHD is mandatory in HD DVD. A single TrueHD track on an HD DVD disc would meet the format spec. Further, stating that a TrueHD track would net 2 channel PCM for "most" HD DVD users is laughable. Only a few first generation HD DVD players were initially released with TrueHD decoders that were limited to 2-channel PCM output. Those were updated in firmware very shortly after release, a year and a half ago, and every subsequent HD DVD player has included full 5.1 decoding of TrueHD.

Continuing, TrueHD does not contain a "core" component on either HD DVD or Blu-ray. On HD DVD, decoding is mandatory, so no additional track is necessary. On Blu-ray, TrueHD encodes contain a parallel AC-3 track because TrueHD is not a mandatory codec on that format so an additional Dolby Digital track is required for backward compatibility.

I guess The Fifth Element, House of Flying Daggers, and countless other crappy BDM are all "good enough"? No, of course they weren't good enough; and I'd add Vertical Limit and Terminator to that list as well. But none of those bear any relevance to opinions and decisions that affect how we go forwards with HDM. It is impossible to prove that Transformers would sound any better using DTHD, since there isn't currently any DDTHD or PCM encode available for this movie. It is also impossible to prove it sounds just as good. Specs knowledge tells us that there is a chance the DDTHD could sound better, but that's not a sure thing.

On the other hand, previous comparisons of DD+ and DDTHD have proved the second can easily beat the first if DD+ is limited to 640Kbps. This tells us nothing about what it could do against DD+ at 1.5mbps, since even DTS at higher bitrate will beat DD+ at 640kbps. At best, DD+ can hope for a tie, as long as the material is not adequate to highlight the differences that ARE there(it is a lossy codec... differences can be measured)

Do we have any HD-DVD disc with DD+ and DDTHD soundtracks that can be used for comparison? I suppose DD+ on these HD-DVD discs could be 1.5mbps to make the comparison valid.

If no valid comparisons can be made, Josh can and should have his right to say DD+ is just as good and that people are complaining about nothing with the TF release. And I also have the right to say he's full of **** and that it doesn't make any sense. Cause neither side can prove anything, so all that we have are opinions. Pointing to secondary opinions, no matter how knowledgeable they might be, don't prove or help the arguments of each side either.

What Josh can't argue against is that a DDTHD track would have avoided such discussion, and that the HDDVD currently couldn't hold this encode because of the extra space needed. Lots of good points there, and a few things to add.

There is some suggestion nearby that Xformers DID actually have enough room for a THD track (as well as a DD track presumably). That's puzzling since this was such a critical release, and that omission has been such a pre-occupation with everyone. They must have known what they would be letting themselves in for, firstly when the decisions were taken, and secondly when they decided to state that the decisions were taken because of the room available. Perhaps they did actually master a THD track, then find they couldn't tell the difference from the DD+ track. But they didn't say that, did they?

I'm all for making pragmatic compromises in order to get what I want - just look at what we do to video. That's not perfect, so why, when we don't have a bottomless pit of space available, should audio be perfect? The infinite resources we would like to have would cost so much that no-one would buy into it. That's not what I want to see - we need a successful HD format to supercede a succesful SD format. DD+ might be the answer to that compromise - I don't know, I'm not at all sure about that, but I'm certainly curious.

What's more interesting is the nature of the film. When I was just a young audiophile, we always gravitated towards natural acoustic recordings for playing on our latest and greatest gear. Anything that was synthesized, equalised, processed or butchered in any way was never worthy of critical listening. Firstly, it was difficult to tell what the original SHOULD have sounded like - you had no terms of reference, like a real piano or a guitar. Secondly, the SQ went out of the window anyway. Synthetic music tended to sound great on portables, but was usually a let-down with good gear.

And this, possibly snobbish attitude, make me question whether Transformers is really a good film to assess the quality of an audio codec. To our great surprise, my wife and I both really enjoyed the film in the theatre. But lets face it, half of what we were watching was CGI video, and half of what we were listening to was probably CG audio as well. It could well be that DD+ is indeed transparent for Transformers, but for something more natural and subtle, a lossless track might be better. We'll probably never know, unless some super-mega-bit version comes out in few years time.

regards, Nick

There is some suggestion nearby that Xformers DID actually have enough room for a THD track (as well as a DD track presumably). That's puzzling since this was such a critical release, and that omission has been such a pre-occupation with everyone.

Since I posted a correction that the Transformers disc has nearly 4 GB of unused space, I will add that I actually DON'T think there was room for a lossless track on that disc, but not for the most obvious reasons.

The biggest obstacle in including a lossless track on HD DVD is maximum available bit rate, not total space. TrueHD is a variable bit rate codec. When the bit budget is planned for a disc, the maximum allowable bit rate peaks for video have to be capped based on what the maximum peaks in bit rate for the parallel data will be. A 16-bit/48 kHz TrueHD track has an average bit rate of ~1.4 mb/s but can have bit rate peaks above 3 mb/s. The compressionist has to allocate bandwidth for the maximum peaks in audio bit rate (and other data). This means that that 16-bit TrueHD track will actually take up more than double the space in the total bit rate of the 1.5 mb/s Dolby Digital + track.

There is also an additional mitigating factor, particularly in the case of Transformers. That is, the video encode. All video codecs are not created equal. It is pretty much a given that at the current state of the art, the three codecs used for video compression on the HDM formats are ranked in efficiency as #1 - VC-1, #2 - AVC, and #3 - MPEG-2. Paramount elected to use AVC for Transformers, and if my information is correct, the encode was done with Toshiba's AVC encoder. I have heard Toshiba's encoder is not best out there, but even if that is not completely true, there is little doubt that a good VC-1 encode of Transformers would have yielded as good (or better) results at some savings in efficiency. perhaps if Paramount had opted for VC-1 instead of AVC, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

It should also be pointed out these numbers are for a 16-bit True HD track. The 1.5 mb/s DD+ that Paramount uses is actually 24-bit/48 kHz resolution. A 24-bit TrueHD track would consume more than 6 mb/s of the available bit rate. All things considered, Dolby Digital + at the bit rate and resolution used by Paramount (and Universal, BTW), makes very good sense.

At best, DD+ can hope for a tie, as long as the material is not adequate to highlight the differences that ARE there(it is a lossy codec... differences can be measured)


Agree. Under the best possible circumstances, all DD+ can hope for is a tie.

If no valid comparisons can be made, Josh can and should have his right to say DD+ is just as good and that people are complaining about nothing with the TF release.

IMO the only scientifically valid claim Josh can make is that that if a lossless track is also available (same master, same bit-depth, same sampling rate), then DD+ may sound worse since information have been eliminated. Or DD+ may sound the same for his particular listening environment, his equpment, and his hearing. Or DD+ may sound worse. But DD+ will never sound better.

Agree. Under the best possible circumstances, all DD+ can hope for is a tie.
Well, how about this: I can encode more channels/resolution/sampling rate with lossy encode than equiv. lossless. Which would you then prefer? 10.1 lossy or 5.1 lossless? 24-bit lossy 7.1 or 16-bit 5.1?

Or here is another point of view which should warm the hearts of any BD fan :). The extra bits you are allocating to audio, is taken away from video. Do you think that is the right trade off? Are more video bits important or not?

10.1 lossy or 5.1 lossless?

That one is simple. 10.1 lossless.

24-bit lossy 7.1 or 16-bit 5.1?

Whatever the original master is. If your point is that we are already running into capacity limitations so early in the game, then those capacities need to be increased. It needs to be good enough for the next 10 years.

Well, how about this: I can encode more channels/resolution/sampling rate with lossy encode than equiv. lossless. Which would you then prefer? 10.1 lossy or 5.1 lossless? 24-bit lossy 7.1 or 16-bit 5.1?

Or here is another point of view which should warm the hearts of any BD fan :). The extra bits you are allocating to audio, is taken away from video. Do you think that is the right trade off? Are more video bits important or not?

easy questions. 24 bit 5.1 lossless everytime, no other option is acceptable. (until I change my system to 7.1 or 10.2 or whatever). :)

For whatever reason, Blu-ray's maximum video bitrate is 40 Mbps while the format allows audio/video combined at 48 Mbps. This makes an 8Mbps ( or less) lossless audio track a freebie without impacting the available video bitrate for Blu-ray. I.e. there is practically NO tradeoff to be made between lossless audio (until you get to 24/96 PCM) and high bitrate video for Blu-ray; you can have both. Can't say the same for HD DVD.

I read Josh's article and agreed with it completely and expected the fanboys to come out and pounce on him. Any time I post a simliar commentart I get attacked. I for one am tired of the numbers BS. What matters is what your eyes tell you. Is it a great picture or not? Does it sund great or not. The numbers don't tell the whole story. Remember the early days of CD? Perfect sound forever? The CD spec blew away analog and guess what, sounded like crap compared to a modest turntable. I was involved in that debate back then. NO way, perfect sound and specs, has to sound better. Can't we all put away or at least make an attempt to put away our biases and look at this subject ratioanlly? I think Josh has done a great job at that but there is no pleasing everyone as this thread illustrates. The same tired old arguments and observations.

That one is simple. 10.1 lossless.
Good. Now please answer the second part of my post. That is, are you cool with it using 11 mbit/sec data rate? Or is the video just as good with 5.5 mbit/sec lower data rate?

Whatever the original master is.
The "master" has nothing to do with it. Start reading from here on: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=12017937&postcount=420

You don't. One "mandatory" audio track is all that is required.

I'm assuming Josh was incorrect in his explanation of DTHD in his previous article about audio?

http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/news/list/3

Level of support: Support for TrueHD up to at least 2 channels is mandatory on all HD DVD players, but the majority will support it all the way to 5.1. Because there are rare cases of disc players that limit TrueHD to 2 channels (such as the LG model BH100), discs with TrueHD tracks must also contain a Dolby Digital Plus track for 5.1 compatibility.


If he is incorrect, then that's fine. That's the information I was going off of. There really isn't anything on Dolby's site that says anything about it.

Well, how about this: I can encode more channels/resolution/sampling rate with lossy encode than equiv. lossless. Which would you then prefer? 10.1 lossy or 5.1 lossless? 24-bit lossy 7.1 or 16-bit 5.1?

Or here is another point of view which should warm the hearts of any BD fan :). The extra bits you are allocating to audio, is taken away from video. Do you think that is the right trade off? Are more video bits important or not?

I don't get it - these questions make no sense at all to me regarding the issue being discussed here. Please explain.

Great article. Fair and Balanced.

Quote:
Level of support: Support for TrueHD up to at least 2 channels is mandatory on all HD DVD players, but the majority will support it all the way to 5.1. Because there are rare cases of disc players that limit TrueHD to 2 channels (such as the LG model BH100), discs with TrueHD tracks must also contain a Dolby Digital Plus track for 5.1 compatibility.

If he is incorrect, then that's fine. That's the information I was going off of. There really isn't anything on Dolby's site that says anything about it.

The last part of his statement refers to 5.1 compatibility, not meeting the minimum requirement of the format spec. Including a second 5.1 track is not required by the format, but is an option exercised because although TrueHD is a required format (to be supported in hardware), the minimum requirement is only for 2-channel.

To make it even simpler, the format spec requires that all licensed players allow one to get SOME audio, but not necessarily 5.1 audio.

In other words, an additional DD+ 5.1 channel track is not required with TrueHD, but the accepted practice is to put one on any disc with TrueHD to ensure everyone can get 5.1 audio of some kind.

The last part of his statement refers to 5.1 compatibility, not meeting the minimum requirement of the format spec. Including a second 5.1 track is not required by the format, but is an option exercised because although TrueHD is a required format (to be supported in hardware), the minimum requirement is only for 2-channel.

In other words, an additional DD+ 5.1 channel track is not required with TrueHD, but the accepted practice is to put one on any disc with TrueHD to ensure everyone can get 5.1 audio of some kind.


Understood. Be he used the words "must also contain". That gave me the impression it was required. And FWIW, I have never seen a disc with just a THD track and nothing else.

Again, if he's wrong than I'm good with that.

Which would you then prefer? 10.1 lossy or 5.1 lossless?


Didn't realize that was a trick question. OK, let me reanswer. I will take 5.1 lossless over 10.1 lossy any day.

The "master" has nothing to do with it.[/url]

Wow, you heard that here first.

Understood. Be he used the words "must also contain". That gave me the impression it was required.

Josh isn't wrong, but his wording and context has led you to misinterpret his point. You need the last part of his sentence for context..."...discs with TrueHD tracks must also contain a Dolby Digital Plus track for 5.1 compatibility." (emphasis mine).

The requirement for a DD+ 5.1 track is only if the studio wants to ensure everyone can get 5.1 audio because the format requirement for TrueHD support is only 2-channel. It is possible to release a compliant HD DVD disc with only a single TrueHD audio track on it. However, the studio has to recognize it is possible that in some cases, the purchaser of this disc may have a player that only has 2-channel TrueHD decoding ability. Every licensed HD DVD player will decode TrueHD, but, theoretically, not all in 5.1.

Bluray is unquestionably the best media. Its high video/audio bitrate ensure that no comprimise needs to be made with movies audio/video. Hd-dvd needs to worry about bitrate and disc space.

Again tell me how someone could choose hd-dvd over bluray?? More studio support, more data storage, higher video/audio bitrate, everything that matters. Cheaper player prices is the only reason I could imagine someone choosing Hd-dvd over BR.

Good read for smart people. Here is the link (http://http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Joshua_Zyber/Commentary:_Specs_vs._Reality/1096).

I've asked this in previous threads and will do so again. If starting a discussion about one of my columns, please post the link and a summary or excerpt, not the whole thing. Thank you.

Agree. Under the best possible circumstances, all DD+ can hope for is a tie.

IMO the only scientifically valid claim Josh can make is that that if a lossless track is also available (same master, same bit-depth, same sampling rate), then DD+ may sound worse since information have been eliminated. Or DD+ may sound the same for his particular listening environment, his equpment, and his hearing. Or DD+ may sound worse. But DD+ will never sound better.

If you can point to me where in the article I claim that DD+ can sound better than a lossless track, I will edit the piece to clarify. Strangely, I can't seem to find that anywhere in there.

If you can point to me where in the article I claim that DD+ can sound better than a lossless track, I will edit the piece to clarify. Strangely, I can't seem to find that anywhere in there.

You didn't, but I will.

If the choice for a 24-bit soundtrack master encode is between a 1.5 mb/s DD+ track with 24-bit resolution or a 16-bit TrueHD track, I'll take DD+ every time.

Specs versus reality . . . hmmmmm . . . a favorite "burr under my saddle."

Did you know that the specs for HDMI 1.3 not only allow Deep Color, but also a resolution 4X that of 720P. Yep right in the specs.

http://www.hdmi.org/pdf/HDMI_Insert_FINAL_8-30-06.pdf

Uh Oh . . . no Deep Color and only 2X 720P.:(

Bluray is unquestionably the best media. Its high video/audio bitrate ensure that no comprimise needs to be made with movies audio/video. Hd-dvd needs to worry about bitrate and disc space.

Again tell me how someone could choose hd-dvd over bluray?? More studio support, more data storage, higher video/audio bitrate, everything that matters. Cheaper player prices is the only reason I could imagine someone choosing Hd-dvd over BR.
Studio support can change, so might superior capacity :) but add PiP, internet connectivity, no profile compatibility problems, further along in advanced feature presentation, lower disk production costs, no regional coding and no unknown BD+ problems (plus the lower entry price) as reasons.

josh z, was this article even needed? the people to whom you're referring aren't going to change their opionions or stance on the matter.

i do agree with your article tho honestly. maybe it's because i'm in IT, but technical specs never equal real world performance. as long as what I'm seeing looks good to my eyes, i really don't care what the bitrate meter or a hdd reviewer says. ive asked blu-ray fantics so many times to show me a blu-ray movie that looks so much better than the best hd dvd, and I've never gotten an actual movie to watch. usually they assume it's because of my equipment since im not an audio/videophile until they realize i have 120" pj and can receive lossless audio.

I think most educated people realize that there is no PQ difference between HD DVD and Bluray's maximum bitrates, when using a next gen codec like VC1.

For proof, on only has to look at the threads for Nature's Journey - the PQ was almost identical for both HD DVD and BD - in fact there was less that a 1% difference in the entire screens posted, even though the Bluray version had a 38% greater video bitrate.

The "extra bandwidth" argument holds no water... and people are starting to see that.

Again tell me how someone could choose hd-dvd over bluray?? More studio support, more data storage, higher video/audio bitrate, everything that matters. Cheaper player prices is the only reason I could imagine someone choosing Hd-dvd over BR.

Because Sony has done more harm to consumers' fair-use rights than any other company. And that single factor overrides any superiority BR may have over HD-DVD.

You didn't, but I will.

If the choice for a 24-bit soundtrack master encode is between a 1.5 mb/s DD+ track with 24-bit resolution or a 16-bit TrueHD track, I'll take DD+ every time.

That was why I said "same master, same bit-depth, same sampling rate", otherwise you are comparing apples and oranges.

I think most educated people realize that there is no PQ difference between HD DVD and Bluray's maximum bitrates, when using a next gen codec like VC1.

Most educated people I know (meaning people who are engineers, mathematicians and computer scientists) all desire the higher bitrate of Blu-ray, even though some favour HD-DVD for being more "consumer friendly". The advantages of a higher bitrate is a simple mathematical fact. Whether it bears out in current discs is prone to all sorts of other factors that do not change this fact, but the less educated don't seem to understand this.

The efficiency of compression is affected tremendously by the source program material. If you think that VC-1 at HD-DVD bitrate is enough, then I suggest you pick up a copy of The Reaping (one of the latest Warner releases) and watch the locust scene. Even with the bitrate pegging at the HD-DVD max of 30 Mbps, there are still highly visible compression artifacts, e.g. at time 1:17:33.

I guess the guys at Paramount neen to read the article, then DD+ will become the defacto standard on HD-DVD.

Apparently all those THD tracks are a complete waste of time and money.

part of what I dont understand about BD supporters is that if lossless is a mandatory item, why is it that a rather large percentage of BD titles dont have a lossless track. Is it because BD doesnt have enough space?

ptran,

(meaning people who are engineers, mathematicians and computer scientists

unfortunately, most of those people have little understanding of how human perceptual systems work. Yes, spec wise in theory higher bit rate is nice to have. However, the question is whether it makes a perceptual difference - not whether it "is good enough" as some would like to assert, but rather, can one even tell it is there or tell the difference.

So you fanboys must be more educated than the professional reviewers and the people who make the audio tracks. WOW, that is impressive!:eek: Whats really precious is when they can opine on a HD DVD movie title without owning a HD DVD player on which to experience it themselves. :rolleyes:

Of course, its worse when some do not even have a Blu-ray player. :D

Ever notice that HD DVD fans don't usually try to disparage Blu-ray titles, but that a lot of Blu-ray fans talk of which they know not.....

As opposed to who's opinion, yours? Call me crazy, but I'll take the guy's opinion who does it for a living over that of someone who doesn't.

But that's just me.


It's my understanding that you can't just have a single TrueHD track on a disc and nothing else. I think you HAVE to have a DD+ track (or DD @ 668?) along with it.

Anyway you slice it, I believe you HAVE to have two tracks. In theory you could as every HD DVD player by spec has to be able to read and decode the Dolby True HD track.

That may mean that some future players could decode that track but output it as 2 channel only.

So in practice studios to date have not done that.

I don't know if any HD DVD has had True HD only, I think most also include DD+, even though they don't really need to.

www.hddvdstats.com

Bluray is unquestionably the best media. Its high video/audio bitrate ensure that no comprimise needs to be made with movies audio/video. Hd-dvd needs to worry about bitrate and disc space.

Again tell me how someone could choose hd-dvd over bluray?? More studio support, more data storage, higher video/audio bitrate, everything that matters. Cheaper player prices is the only reason I could imagine someone choosing Hd-dvd over BR.

+1

This is the answer.....

unfortunately, most of those people have little understanding of how human perceptual systems work. Yes, spec wise in theory higher bit rate is nice to have.

People who know something about information theory aren't any more ignorant about human perception than people who don't, and they are a lot less ignorant about the information theory and maths that codecs are based upon.

However, the question is whether it makes a perceptual difference - not whether it "is good enough" as some would like to assert, but rather, can one even tell it is there or tell the difference.

It all depends on the program material. And new codes like VC-1 don't show their blemishes in as obvious a manner as MPEG-2's blockiness, so, unless you are lucky enough to do a A-B comparison against the uncompressed source, you won't be able to tell that you are losing information.

Again tell me how someone could choose hd-dvd over bluray?? More studio support, more data storage, higher video/audio bitrate, everything that matters. Cheaper player prices is the only reason I could imagine someone choosing Hd-dvd over BR.

even tho this is 100% true (outside of your opinion that this is everything that matters), does it actually equate to a better looking and sounding movie? I'll pose the same question I've asked to any blu-ray supporter who touts the formats superiority, please name 1 movie, whether exclusive or tailored, that shows that blu-ray is superior. I've seen most of the movies considered to be best of the best on both formats, and in both cases they both w/o question excel.

The problem is that people keep referring to only technical specifications as an accurate representation of what you see on the screen. If Paramount for instance lied and said Transformers had TrueHD instead of DD+ when it didn't, would anyone have complained?

Being in IT I'm so used to it that maybe it doesn't affect me, but most people still haven't realized it. real world performance and "tech specs" hardly if ever equal the same thing. If you believe a bitrate meter over what your eyes see, i dont know what to say

Indeed, it is widely held by patrick99, by patrick98, by patrick97, by patrick96...

;)

If you are genuinely not aware that many think BB is soft, you haven't been paying attention. :rolleyes:

I read Josh's article and agreed with it completely and expected the fanboys to come out and pounce on him. Any time I post a simliar commentart I get attacked. I for one am tired of the numbers BS. What matters is what your eyes tell you. Is it a great picture or not? Does it sund great or not. The numbers don't tell the whole story. Remember the early days of CD? Perfect sound forever? The CD spec blew away analog and guess what, sounded like crap compared to a modest turntable. I was involved in that debate back then. NO way, perfect sound and specs, has to sound better. Can't we all put away or at least make an attempt to put away our biases and look at this subject ratioanlly? I think Josh has done a great job at that but there is no pleasing everyone as this thread illustrates. The same tired old arguments and observations.

My eyes tell me that the PQ on Mr. Brooks looks outstanding and the PQ on Troy DC looks mediocre. The bitrate on Mr. Brooks is high and the bitrate on Troy is low. Coincidence? I don't think so. The HD DVD side says that I am referring to two different movies and any comparison based on two different movies is invalid. Then they go on to say that the best HD DVD titles look as good as the best BD titles, and that this demonstrates that the difference in maximum bitrates is meaningless. Is this not a proposition based on comparing different movies?

My eyes tell me that the PQ on Mr. Brooks looks outstanding and the PQ on Troy DC looks mediocre. The bitrate on Mr. Brooks is high and the bitrate on Troy is low. Coincidence? I don't think so. The HD DVD side says that I am referring to two different movies and any comparison based on two different movies is invalid. Then they go on to say that the best HD DVD titles look as good as the best BD titles, and that this demonstrates that the difference in maximum bitrates is meaningless. Is this not a proposition based on comparing different movies?

Really? I will have to check this out.

My eyes tell me that the PQ on Mr. Brooks looks outstanding and the PQ on Troy DC looks mediocre. The bitrate on Mr. Brooks is high and the bitrate on Troy is low. Coincidence? I don't think so. The HD DVD side says that I am referring to two different movies and any comparison based on two different movies is invalid. Then they go on to say that the best HD DVD titles look as good as the best BD titles, and that this demonstrates that the difference in maximum bitrates is meaningless. Is this not a proposition based on comparing different movies?

Difficult time you have with logic.

You cannot make general observations based on two specifics. You can make general observations on two generalities.

The best PQ of red equals the best PQ of blue therefore the PQ of blue and red can be equal.

The PQ of this part of red beats the PQ of that part of blue so red is greater then blue.

Only one of those arguments holds up.

My eyes tell me that the PQ on Mr. Brooks looks outstanding and the PQ on Troy DC looks mediocre. The bitrate on Mr. Brooks is high and the bitrate on Troy is low. Coincidence? I don't think so. The HD DVD side says that I am referring to two different movies and any comparison based on two different movies is invalid. Then they go on to say that the best HD DVD titles look as good as the best BD titles, and that this demonstrates that the difference in maximum bitrates is meaningless. Is this not a proposition based on comparing different movies?

Seriously? Are you kidding me? How old are you, because I think that your logic skills have a lot of maturing to do.

Logic dictates (stick with me here) that to claim that one variable in a comparison is the REASON for the difference (even claiming a coincidence), all other variables MUST be controlled for. This means, the ONLY way you could even claim that bitrate makes a difference is to view two versions of the same movie, on the same gear, under the same conditions, with the only difference between the two being the bitrate. Period.

Under your scenario, I could just as easily claim that to my eyes, Troy DC looks outstanding, and Mr. Brooks looks mediocre, so since bitrate is high on Mr. Brooks, high bitrate must be a bad thing. Sound stupid? I have as much proof in my statement as you do in yours, so no more stupid than what you're claiming.

You can point out logic problems with HD-DVD fanatics all you want, but that doesn't prove anything. All it proves is that there are a LOT of people that are incapable of logical thought. It doesn't make your thoughts any more logical.

I believe that you're the person who didn't understanding what a false dichotomy was previously in this thread. Seriously. There are classes in logic. Please consider taking one before you try to debate.

1) He's exactly right. Your claim could be an example of what a false dichotomy is in Webster's Dictionary. Do yourself a favor and look up the definition before you claim otherwise.

2) It appears that you can't credibly argue against the actual article that the OP linked, so instead you try to take issue with his statement? That's ridiculous.

3) You didn't find it a good read. Fine. Explain why you didn't find it a good read, instead of falsely claiming that the OP is therefore claiming that you're "stupid".

Back to the original discussion (I hope).

The definition that I see for "false dichotomy" is presenting a choice as being between only two alternatives when there are in fact more than two alternatives. Perhaps you could explain how that applies here.

Perhaps you could explain what it is that you think was false about my post. Do you disagree that the OP claimed that all smart people would find the article a good read? Do you disagree that this implies that anyone who doesn't find it a good read is stupid?

I commented on the article itself in an earlier post.

Well, I answered your question, but it was removed. I must have used the term "fanboy" too many time, but I really have no idea what I said to get the posts removed.

Let's just leave it that, your comment was indeed a false dichotomy, and if you need me to point out why, it's not worth talking about.

Have a great day (and I REALLY do mean that). I'll enjoy my movies and I sincerely hope that you do the same.

Most educated people I know (meaning people who are engineers, mathematicians and computer scientists) all desire the higher bitrate of Blu-ray, even though some favour HD-DVD for being more "consumer friendly".
I'm an engineer, that that is exactly my opinion!

Watching my own projects succeed or fail, as well as following industry news of other companies rise and fall, has taught me that success depends more on business than technical issues. Often superior technologies are held back by patent disputes or lack of funding, while inferior products "win" because of reputation or funding.

This is true of consumer products too. Consider VHS vs Beta vs LaserDisc - the one with the worst PQ won. Same with video game consoles, the PS2 beat the Xbox even though the PS2 generated worst PQ. Is Windows the best OS? No. Is the Intel x86 architecture the best? Certainly not!

Therefore, I don't think bitrate will be a factor in this "format war".

Most educated people I know (meaning people who are engineers, mathematicians and computer scientists) all desire the higher bitrate of Blu-ray, even though some favour HD-DVD for being more "consumer friendly". The advantages of a higher bitrate is a simple mathematical fact. Whether it bears out in current discs is prone to all sorts of other factors that do not change this fact, but the less educated don't seem to understand this.
Well you don't know me. HD DVD has compensated for the lower bitrates. In a past career, it was my goal to get more information through narrower channels by making use of more bandwidth efficient techniques. BD wastes bandwidth by throwing additional bits at imperceptible change, I think in large part to satisfy the spec whores. HD DVD is designed around conserving bandwidth, or at least making best use of less bandwidth, resulting in a lower overall cost. It will pay off even more when we get to home networking.

My eyes tell me that the PQ on Mr. Brooks looks outstanding and the PQ on Troy DC looks mediocre.

If all other factors were equal, if someone were to switch the studio logos on the cases for those movies, so that Mr. Brooks had a Warner logo and Troy had an MGM logo, you would be right here in this forum arguing that Troy looks outstanding and Mr. Brooks looks mediocre.

Hey Josh. As usual, go get em man. You do great work.

Can you clarify something for me? As you probably have seen, Robert George and I have been having a side conversation about TrueHD and DD+5.1 needing to be on the same disc. I read your audio article as it being required that all discs with a THD track must have a DD+ track to maintain compatibility. Robert says that isn't mandatory and I was misinterpreting what you said.

Is Robert correct on this?

Try page 39:

http://www.dvdforum.org/images/Requirements%20Specification%20for%20HD%20DVD%20Video%20Appl ication-July2005.pdf

Quality article. As always, I think Josh centers his opinion on what he sees and hears...not the specs. And, this is not a shot at Blu-ray fans or HD DVD fans. It's a shot at zealots on both sides. The "I only want lossless audio" or "MPEG-2 sucks" arguments really don't mean crap if the presentation is great to your ears and eyes. The audio and video codec arguments are so overblown here it's ridiculous. As long as the movie looks and sounds great to you...there shouldn't be a problem. Obviously, everyone here will have a different opinion. I tend to think Batman Begins looks great...and I think my "crappy MPEG-2" Kingdom of Heaven disc is one of the best presentations on either format.

Last...Lemonhead99...no need to start flame wars in a civil thread. You don't really believe the "spec argument" only comes from one side do you? I don't know how many times I've heard that MPEG-2 can't deliver and that VC-1 PQ is always better...blah, blah, blah...

VC-1 is a better codec because it's more efficient...but if I can get great PQ from MPEG-2...who cares which one is used?

Can you clarify something for me? As you probably have seen, Robert George and I have been having a side conversation about TrueHD and DD+5.1 needing to be on the same disc. I read your audio article as it being required that all discs with a THD track must have a DD+ track to maintain compatibility. Robert says that isn't mandatory and I was misinterpreting what you said.

Is Robert correct on this?

I saw that thread. What Robert posted is what I was trying to say. It is technically not required by the HD DVD spec to put a DD+ track on the same disc as one with TrueHD, however all of the studios do so in order to ensure 5.1 compatibility in the event that certain players only offer 2-channel TrueHD decoding (such as the LG combi player).

I saw that thread. What Robert posted is what I was trying to say. It is technically not required by the HD DVD spec to put a DD+ track on the same disc as one with TrueHD, however all of the studios do so in order to ensure 5.1 compatibility in the event that certain players only offer 2-channel TrueHD decoding (such as the LG combi player).

Ok. That's what I wanted to know. Then I stand corrected.

Great article.

Hats off to Josh Z for shooting straight about what is truly important. The quality delivered to us consumers.

Great article.

Hats off to Josh Z for shooting straight about what is truly important. The quality delivered to us consumers.

That really is the crux of the matter isn't it. And nothing has changed over the last 20+ years . . . it TLC is given to the transfer - we get a great image. If not - we don't.

That us why to this day Criterion is still known (more for their former LD efforts) as a company that came up with the very best transfers. You were guaranteed to get the very best transfer wghen you bought one of their products.

Tody - it is almost like an assembly line. Where before it was like a science . . . now it is just a business - get the product out the door.

Here is the chance for the studios to give us, the consumer, the best to date PQ and AQ for the presentation of their product. The consumer is only limited by their HT budget as to how good it can really look.

From someone who spent tens of thousands to create a real HT in their home (144" 16x9 Micro Perf FPTV) I can tell you I hd to spend thousands of dollars on special equipment - called line doublers - to get a decent PQ from LD, SAT and DVD. Once i saw HD on my system I saw that with no special processors (read: expensive) I could get PQ that truly was 6X better then with NTSC based video.

Now - A $200 player - a $4000 FP PJ and $2000 worth of Audio equipment (plus screen) and you have an experience that will rival what you pay to see at your local Cinema.

It cost me almost $30,000 to do that.:(

Why should we stop using a PROFESSIONAL film mixer who says that the mix on Transformers was great. He must know what he's doing if he's asked to work on one of the biggest movies of the year. Show me another professional film mixer that says you can definetly hear a difference between a well mixed lossy vs lossless.

In that case, every movie on BR should be released on BD50 and use the all 50gb of data and not 1 mb less. Stop using only 30gb and claiming it's "good enough".

When is the last time anyone said "well, my work is actually sub par..."?

Blu-Ray boys...skip this thread. I'd hate to see your heads explode from a dose of the real world.
My head is still in tact.

I have no arguments with this at all.

Now if HD DVD can consistently match BD in BOTH video AND audio quality, then I will be thrilled since I think both will be around for awhile. The jury is still out on this, though.

Me neither....It's a good article.

Me neither....It's a good article.

I agree also. We can point to outstanding performance from each format . . and unfortunately - sub standard performance from each format.

Not every movie made in HDM is 5/5 when in all actuality it really should be.:(

I agree also. We can point to outstanding performance from each format . . and unfortunately - sub standard performance from each format.

Not every movie made in HDM is 5/5 when in all actuality it really should be.:(
Dude! Lee! You're trippin' me out with all this "reasoning" you've been doing lately.

Seriously though, glad to see it. :)

Dude! Lee! You're trippin' me out with all this "reasoning" you've been doing lately.

Seriously though, glad to see it. :)

To be honest - tired of getting banned for 24 hours.

As so many have stated - chill - kick back and enjoy a movie in HD on your HDTV . . .

Good advice!

I'm an engineer, that that is exactly my opinion!

Watching my own projects succeed or fail, as well as following industry news of other companies rise and fall, has taught me that success depends more on business than technical issues. Often superior technologies are held back by patent disputes or lack of funding, while inferior products "win" because of reputation or funding.
...
Therefore, I don't think bitrate will be a factor in this "format war".

I know too well where you're coming from. I myself would not bet my money on blu-ray being the commercial winner. I'm simply stating my preference that the technically superior format win, for a change.

Well you don't know me. HD DVD has compensated for the lower bitrates. In a past career, it was my goal to get more information through narrower channels by making use of more bandwidth efficient techniques. BD wastes bandwidth by throwing additional bits at imperceptible change, I think in large part to satisfy the spec whores. HD DVD is designed around conserving bandwidth, or at least making best use of less bandwidth, resulting in a lower overall cost. It will pay off even more when we get to home networking.

As an engineer, then, you should fully realize that all the bitrate saving strategies employed by HD-DVD (e.g. by using new codecs like VC-1) can also be employed by blu-ray. There is no fixed advantage except bitrate. And 30 Mbps vs 40 Mbps is immaterial in the age of gigabit ethernet.

I wouldn't be so concerned about bitrate if HD-DVD and Blu-ray are both well into the diminishing returns part of the PQ vs bitrate curve, but they are not. This curve is highly dependent on the program material. The "plague of locusts" scene in The Reaping is an example of where HD-DVD's 30 Mbps is not enough. Blu-ray's 40 Mbps won't necessarily be able to capture that scene fully transparent-to-the-master either, but it will at least be a lot better. This is why I want as much bitrate headroom as possible--to minimize the number of cases where the bitrate limit produces noticeable PQ degradation.

Great article which sums up what alot of us have been saying for a while.
But it's a great article to point people to that are having rationality issues, assuming they're into the whole reality thing in the first place.

It's true there is really no difference when watching/listening either ofrmat. and yes DD+ is not the limiting factor some uneducated people here claim it is. That's why I don't hesitate to buy a title on HD DVD. It's not a crappy format by any stretch of the imagination. I think because both formats are so close to each other - BR supporters will often feel need to exaggerate the differences to validate their passion. When someone says "HD DUD" or something along those lines it makes me wonder about that persons intelligence. When both formats are so close in specs (and in practical terms identical in PQ/AQ), what does that say about the format you are supporting? It's like calling someone who weighs 220lbs fat when you weigh 215.

All that being said, I still favor BR. Not because it looks or sounds better right now. Because in all honesty it doesn't. But right now it does have the a bit more potential and fewer limiting factors. Yes the hardware is more pricey and having growing pains still, but we all know that is only temporary.
So I'll be a bit disappointed if BR loses out to HD DVD for that reason, but I'll still be satisfied with HD DVD (if they some how pull a win out of their butts).

As an engineer, then, you should fully realize that all the bitrate saving strategies employed by HD-DVD (e.g. by using new codecs like VC-1) can also be employed by blu-ray. There is no fixed advantage except bitrate. And 30 Mbps vs 40 Mbps is immaterial in the age of gigabit ethernet.

I wouldn't be so concerned about bitrate if HD-DVD and Blu-ray are both well into the diminishing returns part of the PQ vs bitrate curve, but they are not. This curve is highly dependent on the program material. The "plague of locusts" scene in The Reaping is an example of where HD-DVD's 30 Mbps is not enough. Blu-ray's 40 Mbps won't necessarily be able to capture that scene fully transparent-to-the-master either, but it will at least be a lot better. This is why I want as much bitrate headroom as possible--to minimize the number of cases where the bitrate limit produces noticeable PQ degradation.You may be a long time lurker here but your post count is low, suggesting you haven't been through all the endless AQ and PQ analyses where the BD fans have not been able to demonstrate superiority. If it were so the BD side would be rubbing it in our noses. Despite their best efforts that has not happened. Believe me if the HD DVD supporters thought they were getting inferior PQ or AQ, they would switch. In any case BD has serious feature and compatibilty problems.

Efficiency always counts.

To be honest - tired of getting banned for 24 hours.
Wow! I knew you were outspoken, but I didn't know you were handed some bannings!

Glad to see some discipline has had such a positive effect.

As so many have stated - chill - kick back and enjoy a movie in HD on your HDTV . . .

Good advice!
No doubt.

Had a movie night with just the Mrs. and me last night, as a matter of fact. Unfortunately we chose Delta Farce. The manager of Blockbuster said it was good. Should have done more research. Just checked rotten tomatoes. It got a 3!!! 97% ROTTEN!!! And I agree. I fell asleep. Before I crashed, the only thing I found vaguely interesting was it's uncanny resemblance (though much less funny) to "Three Amigos." The Mrs. fell asleep a little while after me.

The Blockbuster guy is now off my respect list.

You may be a long time lurker here but your post count is low, suggesting you haven't been through all the endless AQ and PQ analyses where the BD fans have not been able to demonstrate superiority. If it were so the BD side would be rubbing it in our noses. Despite their best efforts that has not happened. Believe me if the HD DVD supporters thought they were getting inferior PQ or AQ, they would switch. In any case BD has serious feature and compatibilty problems.

I try to avoid the various PQ comparison threads because I don't think they're very meaningful since

1) for the vast majority of movies out there, VC-1 at 30 Mbps is probably sufficient, and
2) VC-1 hides its compression artifacts well, through blurring or mottling, so it's hard to spot where a scene is bitrate starved unless one has access to the uncompressed master; we can no longer just rely on macroblocking like we used to with MPEG-2

I'm not interested in the vast majority of cases where 30 Mbps is sufficient. I'm interested in how many cases it isn't.

It's impossible to "prove" that VC-1 at 30 Mbps (or 40 Mbps for that matter) is sufficient for all our HD desires, so debates about HD-DVD having "enough" bitrate are non-starters for me. The debate should be, are there any examples of where VC-1 at 30 Mbps has been insufficient? A single such example would justify a desire for higher bitrate. I've already found one within my library, and over time, there is bound to be more. I also expect that there will be cases where the 40 Mbps of blu-ray will prove insufficient, but they'll at least be far fewer.

Wow! I knew you were outspoken, but I didn't know you were handed some bannings!

Glad to see some discipline has had such a positive effect.


No doubt.

Had a movie night with just the Mrs. and me last night, as a matter of fact. Unfortunately we chose Delta Farce. The manager of Blockbuster said it was good. Should have done more research. Just checked rotten tomatoes. It got a 3!!! 97% ROTTEN!!! And I agree. I fell asleep. Before I crashed, the only thing I found vaguely interesting was it's uncanny resemblance (though much less funny) to "Three Amigos." The Mrs. fell asleep a little while after me.

The Blockbuster guy is now off my respect list.

Hey! I love "Three Amigos" That singing bush stick and the Germans were hilarious. I can't wait to see it in HD. But I pray to god they don't use the same Master or people who did the transfer to DVD. It's looked like crap...I said looked like:D

Hey! I love "Three Amigos" That singing bush stick and the Germans were hilarious. I can't wait to see it in HD. But I pray to god they don't use the same Master or people who did the transfer to DVD. It's looked like crap...I said looked like:D
Whew! For a second there I thought you were going to say it was "Delta Farce" that you loved.

"Three Amigos" is an all-time favorite of mine, though it doesn't hurt to have your brain altered a bit beforehand. ;)

I'm just saying that I noticed "Delta Farce" was a rip-off, which would be O.K. if they had done a decent job of it. Instead they more like desecrated it!

I fully agree with your assessment of the transfer. It's like the guy was drunk holding the camera. There are quite a few, good oldies like that. "Blazing Saddles" comes to mind.

Like you said, hopefully that will be corrected for HD.

This is a great article that summarized it all. Overall, we are all in that hobby to watch movies not player and format specs. When I through a movie in one of my player I could not care less about witch format it is. I don’t want to watch the latest BD buzz or latest greatest audio HD DVD something, I want to watch a bloody movie and I hope the studios who release that movie did their best to bring me a really good experience.

And guess watch, no matter the format there are good and bad experiences on both side.

So how many professional reviewers 'missed' the pulsing on "the perfect" looking title King Kong while someone like Gary Murrell did not? :)

Hate to dig up an old thread but here you go!

King Kong is NOT the image King! (http://archive2.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=751065)


No matter what Gary found, the overall experience we get watching this way too long movie is just awesome. And this is what movie lovers (not tech geek) are looking for.

Uhh It looks as the director intended man....really next we will have people asking why the Matrix is green.:)

Why not, we already have Blu-boys bitching about 300 being "grainy". lol

Why not, we already have Blu-boys bitching about 300 being "grainy". lol

there are grain haters in Blue, Red and neutral groups.


Grain hater's make me a sad, sad panda. :(

The "plague of locusts" scene in The Reaping is an example of where HD-DVD's 30 Mbps is not enough. Blu-ray's 40 Mbps won't necessarily be able to capture that scene fully transparent-to-the-master either, but it will at least be a lot better.

Are you sure that's actually a compression problem and not just bad CGI?

(Note that I have not seen the movie. I'm just asking a hypothetical.)

...<snip>

The "plague of locusts" scene in The Reaping is an example of where HD-DVD's 30 Mbps is not enough. Blu-ray's 40 Mbps won't necessarily be able to capture that scene fully transparent-to-the-master either, but it will at least be a lot better. This is why I want as much bitrate headroom as possible--to minimize the number of cases where the bitrate limit produces noticeable PQ degradation.

Are you sure that's actually a compression problem and not just bad CGI?

(Note that I have not seen the movie. I'm just asking a hypothetical.)

To add to Josh's question to ptran,

How could you be sure it was not a plain screw-up by the compressionist? Even if not, what if the compressionist screws it up when throwing 40Mbps of video bit-rate at it? Then would that equate to a fallacy of the BD format?

Josh,

I'm pretty sure it's not bad CGI. I've never seen CGI produce artifacts that look like compression artifacts.

How could you be sure it was not a plain screw-up by the compressionist? Even if not, what if the compressionist screws it up when throwing 40Mbps of video bit-rate at it? Then would that equate to a fallacy of the BD format?

I'm not sure what the compressionist could have done in this case, as the bitrate was already maxed out at 30 Mbps for several seconds. I'm pretty sure the video stream is being buffered as far ahead as it could go.

Giving the compressionist 40 Mbps will only make his job easier. Of course it doesn't guarantee perfection, but I'd rather have that headroom than not.

Phat

Put it this way. Hd-dvd can be equal to Blu-ray, but it can never be better then blu-ray. Blu-ray on the other hand has potential to look better then hd-dvd, on top of holding more information and having a more durable media. Blu-Ray is the better media, period. If you took both specs and asked an unbiased opinion on which they would want, who would ever choose hd-dvd specs??

I know in the real world, studios will just make a master and compress it for the lowest common denominator(hd-dvd). Both versions will look identical of course. I would like to see what another 10+ mb/s of video bitrate would do for the picture quality of blu-ray. Some scenes, probably nothing, others maybe a lot. I support Blu-ray, because it has the most potential for best picture/sound quality, the most studio support and the best media. I don't give a rats ass about sony, but it bothers me that there is still a format war between two unequal opponents.

yep, specs are everything. Nothing else matters.

That is why the Edsel sold so well. :rolleyes:

Disc space is disc space, no denying 50gb is much better then 30gb. Higher bitrate for audio and video allow for less compression which will certainly not hurt anything and possibly allow better picture and sound. Very scratch resistant discs, sounds good to me. Much more studio support. Paper or not, these things are real world useful. These aren't usless stats.

Hd-dvd is maxed out right now. Blu-ray still has room to grow and improve.
I'm not gonna change anyones mind, there are people out there who voted a second time for George W. Bush....Some people are just beyond stubborn.

Disc space is disc space, no denying 50gb is much better then 30gb. Higher bitrate for audio and video allow for less compression which will certainly not hurt anything and possibly allow better picture and sound. Very scratch resistant discs, sounds good to me. Much more studio support. Paper or not, these things are real world useful. These aren't usless stats.

Hd-dvd is maxed out right now. Blu-ray still has room to grow and improve.
I'm not gonna change anyones mind, there are people out there who voted a second time for George W. Bush....Some people are just beyond stubborn.

What if a company came out with 100gb discs, "max 80 mbps bitrate", unscratchable discs, and the same studio support as BD. Would you pay 2x the price of BD if you had to choose?

What if a company came out with 100gb discs, "max 80 mbps bitrate", unscratchable discs, and the same studio support as BD. Would you pay 2x the price of BD if you had to choose?

100gb discs aren't needed for 1080p resolution. In fact, I think 50gb is overkill. I think 40gb is perfect. Fact of the matter is, is there any visible difference between a scene encoded at 25mbps VC-1 vs a 40mbps VC-1?

Put it this way. Hd-dvd can be equal to Blu-ray, but it can never be better then blu-ray. Blu-ray on the other hand has potential to look better then hd-dvd, on top of holding more information and having a more durable media. Blu-Ray is the better media, period. If you took both specs and asked an unbiased opinion on which they would want, who would ever choose hd-dvd specs??

I know in the real world, studios will just make a master and compress it for the lowest common denominator(hd-dvd). Both versions will look identical of course. I would like to see what another 10+ mb/s of video bitrate would do for the picture quality of blu-ray. Some scenes, probably nothing, others maybe a lot. I support Blu-ray, because it has the most potential for best picture/sound quality, the most studio support and the best media. I don't give a rats ass about sony, but it bothers me that there is still a format war between two unequal opponents.

I guess you weren't following HDM last spring when everyone was laughing at Blurry transfers of the Fifth Element, House of Flying Daggers.

Disc space is disc space, no denying 50gb is much better then 30gb. Higher bitrate for audio and video allow for less compression which will certainly not hurt anything and possibly allow better picture and sound. Very scratch resistant discs, sounds good to me. Much more studio support. Paper or not, these things are real world useful. These aren't usless stats.

Hd-dvd is maxed out right now. Blu-ray still has room to grow and improve.
I'm not gonna change anyones mind, there are people out there who voted a second time for George W. Bush....Some people are just beyond stubborn.

There comes a point when specs just don't matter any longer. Can you tell the difference between a photo made with a 9 megapixel camera and one from a 10 megapixel camera? It's just marketing spin by Sony!

100gb discs aren't needed for 1080p resolution. In fact, I think 50gb is overkill. I think 40gb is perfect. Fact of the matter is, is there any visible difference between a scene encoded at 25mbps VC-1 vs a 40mbps VC-1?

That was my point, the law of diminishing returns. At what point do you say, that's as close to top of the line as we need to get for a reasonable affordable price?

Josh,

I'm not sure what the compressionist could have done in this case, as the bitrate was already maxed out at 30 Mbps for several seconds. I'm pretty sure the video stream is being buffered as far ahead as it could go.
Oh, there are ton of things the compressionist could do. Bit rate is only one of them. I think people keep thinking of MPEG-2 compression for DVD where you had was the bitrate and a pre-filter. For advanced codecs like VC-1, you have large number of "tools" that you can use to change the decisions the codec has made in its own analysis. You can get down to sub-blocks of the image and change their parameters if you like.

Think of MPEG-2 as a simple screw driver and VC-1 (and good implementations of AVC) as a complete mechanic's toolbox! :)

Giving the compressionist 40 Mbps will only make his job easier. Of course it doesn't guarantee perfection, but I'd rather have that headroom than not.

Phat
Well, this is the million dollar question, isn't it? Do we make the job of the compressionist easier or that of the replicator?

I did enjoy the commentary, it's a well written article with good points.

I agree that the bit-meter has caused more cat-fights than anything else I've seen here at AVS :)

That, and the dang Transformers not including lossless, give it up already, the audio track was great.

What if a company came out with 100gb discs, "max 80 mbps bitrate", unscratchable discs, and the same studio support as BD. Would you pay 2x the price of BD if you had to choose?
A 50G disc can easily output superb 1080p AND PCM audio. That's pretty everything I want so the answer to your question is no.

A 50G disc can easily output superb 1080p AND PCM audio. That's pretty everything I want so the answer to your question is no.

I wouldn't know that until I actually saw a movie optimized to use 100G and 80 MBps bandwidth. :D

I wouldn't know that until I actually saw a movie optimized to use 100G and 80 MBps bandwidth. :D
Well you could probably get 3D, 1440p, Deep Color, a dozen PCM tracks all in 13.1 surround and a virtual bowl of soup out of that!

I'll wait 'til the prices come down. :)

That, and the dang Transformers not including lossless, give it up already, the audio track was great.

Not really. Many reports of missing LFE information on many discs. I personally watched a netflix copy of the HD-DVD and the explosions lacked the bass punch. (but the footsteps of the transformers had the proper bass amount...it's like they forgot to add LFE information to certain sounds.) I've seen reports where people compared both the HD-DVD and DVD versions and found the LFE on the DVD version to be superior.

Disc space is disc space, no denying 50gb is much better then 30gb. Higher bitrate for audio and video allow for less compression which will certainly not hurt anything and possibly allow better picture and sound. Very scratch resistant discs, sounds good to me. Much more studio support. Paper or not, these things are real world useful. These aren't usless stats.

Hd-dvd is maxed out right now. Blu-ray still has room to grow and improve.
I'm not gonna change anyones mind, there are people out there who voted a second time for George W. Bush....Some people are just beyond stubborn.

I was reading this thinking that you were providing a VERY simplistic argument... then I got to your last sentence and you confirmed my impressions.


Blu-ray: Our added disc space will certainly not hurt anything and will possibly allow better picture and sound

Now *there's* a winner of a slogan.

Oh, there are ton of things the compressionist could do. Bit rate is only one of them. I think people keep thinking of MPEG-2 compression for DVD where you had was the bitrate and a pre-filter. For advanced codecs like VC-1, you have large number of "tools" that you can use to change the decisions the codec has made in its own analysis. You can get down to sub-blocks of the image and change their parameters if you like.

Think of MPEG-2 as a simple screw driver and VC-1 (and good implementations of AVC) as a complete mechanic's toolbox! :)

It's always a pleasure reading your responses, Amir. I appreciate the technical nuggets you bring to the discussion.

The job of a compressionist sounds extremely labour intensive if he has to micro-manage so many knobs on so many sub-blocks across so many frames... Isn't the encoder supposed to systematize such "smarts", much the way that compilers these days do such a good job that hand-written assembly is rarely needed?

Well, this is the million dollar question, isn't it? Do we make the job of the compressionist easier or that of the replicator?

Given that replication costs are ever diminishing, I'd say favour the compressionist. It's the surest way to maximize PQ in the long term.

What if a company came out with 100gb discs, "max 80 mbps bitrate", unscratchable discs, and the same studio support as BD. Would you pay 2x the price of BD if you had to choose?


I'm be all over that if it was contemporaneous with blu-ray and doesn't cost significantly more than blu-ray, the way that blu-ray is contemporaneous with HD-DVD and doesn't cost more than HD-DVD (for the software, where the cost is greatest in the long term).

well, if it wasn't contemporaneous with blu-ray, then what would be the point of the comparison? :)

Hd-dvd is maxed out right now. Blu-ray still has room to grow and improve.

right, just like how the Xbox 360 is maxed out, while the PS3 still has tons of room to grow and improve.

Just like how cars are maxed out, while jetpacks have tons of room to grow and improve.

Just like how silicon processors are maxed out and organic quantum computers have tons of room to grow and improve.

Just like how practical, rational thoughts are maxed out, while absurd mythologies have tons of room to grow and improve.

I could keep going, but I think I've made my point.

Not really. Many reports of missing LFE information on many discs. I personally watched a netflix copy of the HD-DVD and the explosions lacked the bass punch. (but the footsteps of the transformers had the proper bass amount...it's like they forgot to add LFE information to certain sounds.) I've seen reports where people compared both the HD-DVD and DVD versions and found the LFE on the DVD version to be superior.

Maybe its time for a new subwoofer.;)

It's always a pleasure reading your responses, Amir. I appreciate the technical nuggets you bring to the discussion.
Thanks :).

The job of a compressionist sounds extremely labour intensive if he has to micro-manage so many knobs on so many sub-blocks across so many frames... Isn't the encoder supposed to systematize such "smarts", much the way that compilers these days do such a good job that hand-written assembly is rarely needed?
Well, I think it is fair to say that compressionists for the first time, feel needed and excited about their jobs. Seriously, we have a lot of design wins for VC-1 strictly because of the level of creativity we give to compressionists, rather than just a bitrate knob.

As to the encoder yes, 99% of our research is on how to best pick the right parameters automatically. Every 3 months or so, we make another breakthrough in automatically detecting something that used to require manual intervention. The number of spots needing attention is far lower now than when we launched the encoder less than 2 years ago.

Given that replication costs are ever diminishing, I'd say favour the compressionist. It's the surest way to maximize PQ in the long term.
But keep in mind that compression work is "fixed cost." You do it once, and you can then stamp out millions of discs using the same cost. Replication carries a cost in every disc. If you increase your volume, you increase your costs. Whereas with encoding cost, increased volume reduces the percentage cost.

Not really. Many reports of missing LFE information on many discs. I personally watched a netflix copy of the HD-DVD and the explosions lacked the bass punch. (but the footsteps of the transformers had the proper bass amount...it's like they forgot to add LFE information to certain sounds.) I've seen reports where people compared both the HD-DVD and DVD versions and found the LFE on the DVD version to be superior.

Let me get this straight. You saying that possible, and I do mean possible low LfE in some scenes is do to DD+ and that with a lossless track it would not have happened? I'm not sure what to say to that.

And on my system, the sound track is as good or better than anything I've ever heard. No low LFE here. Why is that if it's the fault of no lossless track?

I was reading this thinking that you were providing a VERY simplistic argument... then I got to your last sentence and you confirmed my impressions.


Blu-ray: Our added disc space will certainly not hurt anything and will possibly allow better picture and sound

Now *there's* a winner of a slogan.
And since the price of software is roughly the same...

I guess the HD DVD slogan would be something like...

"HD DVD. Less space, bandwidth and almost as good as blu-ray for the same price!"

Let's get off this please.

Let me get this straight. You saying that possible, and I do mean possible low LfE in some scenes is do to DD+ and that with a lossless track it would not have happened? I'm not sure what to say to that.

And on my system, the sound track is as good or better than anything I've ever heard. No low LFE here. Why is that if it's the fault of no lossless track?
I hate to be the one to give this to tr, but...

links?

There was a thread with Spectral graphs of the LFE channel in TF. a couple of times it goes into single digits.

edit:
here we go

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=11961968#post11961968

I guess you hadn't heard that there are a lot of people who think Batman Begins looks really soft?

This view of Warner's PQ is widely held.

Would those people be BR fans?

Not really. Many reports of missing LFE information on many discs. I personally watched a netflix copy of the HD-DVD and the explosions lacked the bass punch. (but the footsteps of the transformers had the proper bass amount...it's like they forgot to add LFE information to certain sounds.) I've seen reports where people compared both the HD-DVD and DVD versions and found the LFE on the DVD version to be superior.

That sounds like a mastering problem, not DD+

Would those people be BR fans?

Nah... just those with 100+" screens.

And since the price of software is roughly the same...

I guess the HD DVD slogan would be something like...

"HD DVD. Less space, bandwidth and almost as good as blu-ray for the same price!"

Let's get off this please.

I'll gladly get off this the day someone shows me a Blu-Ray and HD DVD, mastered from the same source material, that shows any major difference. Paramount optimized for both formats -- the result was identical experiences. To date, we don't have a single release that looks radically different between formats.

If "less space, bandwidth, and almost as good" results in an identical visual/audio experience, what the frick does anyone care? Talk to me about something that matters -- specs are just numbers unless it results in a noticable improvement in my home theater.

And if the format with "more space" is cranking out bare-bones editions (cough*robocop*cough), I have to wonder why I should be so impressed with the increase in GB.

I'll gladly get off this the day someone shows me a Blu-Ray and HD DVD, mastered from the same source material, that shows any major difference. Paramount optimized for both formats -- the result was identical experiences. To date, we don't have a single release that looks radically different between formats.

If "less space, bandwidth, and almost as good" results in an identical visual/audio experience, what the frick does anyone care? Talk to me about something that matters -- specs are just numbers unless it results in a noticable improvement in my home theater.

And if the format with "more space" is cranking out bare-bones editions (cough*robocop*cough), I have to wonder why I should be so impressed with the increase in GB.
Well let's see... off the top of my head...

http://avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=929853

Well let's see... off the top of my head...

http://avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=929853

You've got a movie released in two different regions by two different *studios*. Even if they were ultimately created from the exact same source (which I have doubts about)... this is a bit of apples and oranges, isn't it?

That comparison says nothing about the capabilities of BD vs. HD. It just points out that one studio added some DNR while another didn't. That isn't a format limitation issue... at most it just points out that Paramount had some idiots doing thier transfer.


I'm asking for some actual real-world evidence that BD's specs result in better PQ/AQ than HD DVD's specs. To date, there's no such meaningful proof. That's ultimately all that matters, no?

Great read. A bit long, but worth it.

That comparison says nothing about the capabilities of BD vs. HD. It just points out that one studio added some DNR while another didn't. That isn't a format limitation issue... at most it just points out that Paramount had some idiots doing thier transfer.



Exactly. It makes no difference what the specs on your format are if you've got dimwits twiddling the knobs.

The latest Sorpanos HD-DVD set only has English TrueHD, no DD+. I hope this becomes the trend.

The latest Sorpanos HD-DVD set only has English TrueHD, no DD+. I hope this becomes the trend.

Me too, though I'd prefer PCM. ;) And I hope they follow that trend with Sopranos Season 1, Band of Brothers and Rome, the Complete Series.

The latest Sorpanos HD-DVD set only has English TrueHD, no DD+. I hope this becomes the trend.

Seconded. It's such a waste of space, especially when they're 24bit. Next move forward is to start using 20/48 rather than 24/48.

Having said that, I'd rather they just used 1.5mbit DD+ on everything. Saves 3.5mbit compared to 24/48 THD, which can then be used for video.

I guess you hadn't heard that there are a lot of people who think Batman Begins looks really soft?

This view of Warner's PQ is widely held.

"Widely held" by bit-rate zealots, not folks who actually watch movies.

Vincent

Seconded. It's such a waste of space, especially when they're 24bit. Next move forward is to start using 20/48 rather than 24/48.

Having said that, I'd rather they just used 1.5mbit DD+ on everything. Saves 3.5mbit compared to 24/48 THD, which can then be used for video.

I'm not sure, a lot of people really like lossless audio. I would be all for studios using TrueHD only for English and then allocating the bandwidth that would be used for the secondary English track for the video or IME features.

I'm not sure, a lot of people really like lossless audio. I would be all for studios using TrueHD only for English and then allocating the bandwidth that would be used for the secondary English track for the video or IME features.
Who wouldn't like it? The real question is do they need it? Is it even necessary? Most won't be honest on that issue.

Except for the fact that there is approximately 5GB of free space on the Transformers disc which means there was PLENTY of room for a lossless track.

NEXT!

The 5Gb of free space on the HD-DVD of Transformers was irrelevant since it is the bandwidth limitations HD-DVD has that affected the decision not to place the higher quality audio. Josh's article is very biased toward HD-DVD and while he mentions the 5 audio score Transformers received on highdefdigest, he failed to mention in the same article the rest of the story about the audio. He tries to mislead people reading this article into thinking the format war is all about the extra 20Gb of space when he fails to mention a single thing about the bandwidth limitations. I think this is intentional since he also feels it was a mistake having a bitrate meter in the PS3 and doesn't want people to focus on the words bandwidth or even bitrate for that matter.. As for Transformers, the audio is far from perfect since there is a problem with the LFE's in the audio which has already been confirmed on the Michael Bay website.. So anyone giving Transformers audio a perfect score must not be listening that closely since the bass is far too quiet compared to what we all heard in the movie theater....And to debunk Josh's entire point he was trying to make defending HD-DVD quality when compared to Blu-ray's; Paramount made the decision to not use Lossless audio on Transformers for the plain reason that in doing so, the picture quality would suffer since the video's bitrate would have to be lowered to compensate for the extra bandwidth that would have been taken up by the audio... So the movie studio knows the differences between higher bitrate and lower bitrate yet Josh wants us all to believe they aren't important and we all shouldn't pay attention to them... Give me a break Josh..

The 5Gb of free space on the HD-DVD of Transformers was irrelevant since it is the bandwidth limitations HD-DVD has that affected the decision not to place the higher quality audio. Josh's article is very biased toward HD-DVD and while he mentions the 5 audio score Transformers received on highdefdigest, he failed to mention in the same article the rest of the story about the audio. He tries to mislead people reading this article into thinking the format war is all about the extra 20Gb of space when he fails to mention a single thing about the bandwidth limitations. I think this is intentional since he also feels it was a mistake having a bitrate meter in the PS3 and doesn't want people to focus on the words bandwidth or even bitrate for that matter.. As for Transformers, the audio is far from perfect since there is a problem with the LFE's in the audio which has already been confirmed on the Michael Bay website.. So anyone giving Transformers audio a perfect score must not be listening that closely since the bass is far too quiet compared to what we all heard in the movie theater....And to debunk Josh's entire point he was trying to make defending HD-DVD quality when compared to Blu-ray's; Paramount made the decision to not use Lossless audio on Transformers for the plain reason that in doing so, the picture quality would suffer since the video's bitrate would have to be lowered to compensate for the extra bandwidth that would have been taken up by the audio... So the movie studio knows the differences between higher bitrate and lower bitrate yet Josh wants us all to believe they aren't important and we all shouldn't pay attention to them... Give me a break Josh..

Are you saying that HD-DVD cannot have 48/24 TrueHD and maintain great PQ? Probably a lot of people will disagree with you.

But regardless, I wish they would include only the TrueHD track (same sampling rate and bit-depth as the master), and drop DD+ altogether. If someone can enjoy 1.5Mbps DD+, then their equipment will also allow them to enjoy TrueHD, so the DD+ track is redundant in that regard. Here's hoping that the latest Sorpano is the first of many to do that.

Are you saying that HD-DVD cannot have 48/24 TrueHD and maintain great PQ? Probably a lot of people will disagree with you.

But regardless, I wish they would include only the TrueHD track (same sampling rate and bit-depth as the master), and drop DD+ altogether. If someone can enjoy 1.5Mbps DD+, then their equipment will also allow them to enjoy TrueHD, so the DD+ track is redundant in that regard. Here's hoping that the latest Sorpano is the first of many to do that.

HD-DVD can have TrueHD and maintain good picture quality depending on a few factors which include lengh of the movie and if IME will be used at the same time. If the studio plans to use up bandwidth on IME along with getting "Transformers" quality video (which is the route Paramount chose to take because of lack of enough bandwidth to keep the video bitrate high), then a sacrafice has to be made and in this one case it was in the audio dept. King Kong is another example where they could have used TrueHD had they eliminated the IME/PIP and still kept the bitrates for the video high enough to look great even though I feel King Kong did have some spots which could have been better... HD-DVD can produce high quality audio and video using the available bandwidth, however my point is that there isn't much room for IME on longer movies or vice versa with the audio if they choose IME instead. I do agree with you that a DD+ track is irrelevant on an HD-DVD disc, however we wouldn't be having that discussion if lack of space and bandwidth was not an issue... In all fairness, I applaud Toshiba for trying to catch up to Blu-ray by introducing TL51. The truth of the matter is you have people like Amir and Josh who wrote this article who think in much the same way about how High Def should be viewed by the general public (They would be happy if most people continue to ignore the specs). In this case by not wanting the bitrate meter in the PS3 available for all to see, Josh would rather not give people that opportunity. The same way Josh avoids talking about the crux of the issue which has to do with HD-DVD's greatest spec limiting factor which is bandwidth. He also fails to mention TL51 as being on the horizon by Toshiba to battle this specs limitation HD-DVD has. It is funny how people who support HD-DVD leave out a lot of information in articles that are supposed to inform individuals.

The 5Gb of free space on the HD-DVD of Transformers was irrelevant since it is the bandwidth limitations HD-DVD has that affected the decision not to place the higher quality audio. Josh's article is very biased toward HD-DVD and while he mentions the 5 audio score Transformers received on highdefdigest, he failed to mention in the same article the rest of the story about the audio. He tries to mislead people reading this article into thinking the format war is all about the extra 20Gb of space when he fails to mention a single thing about the bandwidth limitations. I think this is intentional since he also feels it was a mistake having a bitrate meter in the PS3 and doesn't want people to focus on the words bandwidth or even bitrate for that matter.. As for Transformers, the audio is far from perfect since there is a problem with the LFE's in the audio which has already been confirmed on the Michael Bay website.. So anyone giving Transformers audio a perfect score must not be listening that closely since the bass is far too quiet compared to what we all heard in the movie theater....And to debunk Josh's entire point he was trying to make defending HD-DVD quality when compared to Blu-ray's; Paramount made the decision to not use Lossless audio on Transformers for the plain reason that in doing so, the picture quality would suffer since the video's bitrate would have to be lowered to compensate for the extra bandwidth that would have been taken up by the audio... So the movie studio knows the differences between higher bitrate and lower bitrate yet Josh wants us all to believe they aren't important and we all shouldn't pay attention to them... Give me a break Josh..

Well stated!...

and smacks of the patience I don't have. I'm so tired of the bandwidth cover up and the failure of so many to do their research.

Bandwidth is an issue for HD DVD, people. Be honest with yourselves and sleep better.

Actually, the Transformers disc didn't have bandwidth for lossless simply because they preferred to keep space for extra foreign (dubbed :confused::eek::mad:) language tracks. My version has 1.5mbit english as well as spanish and french DD+ tracks, a stereo portugese and a director's commentary to boot.

Earns them a giant FFS! in my book - who wants dubbed movies? They're awful.

HD-DVD can have TrueHD and maintain good picture quality depending on a few factors which include lengh of the movie and if IME will be used at the same time. If the studio plans to use up bandwidth on IME along with getting "Transformers" quality video (which is the route Paramount chose to take because of lack of enough bandwidth to keep the video bitrate high), then a sacrafice has to be made and in this one case it was in the audio dept. King Kong is another example where they could have used TrueHD had they eliminated the IME/PIP and still kept the bitrates for the video high enough to look great even though I feel King Kong did have some spots which could have been better... HD-DVD can produce high quality audio and video using the available bandwidth, however my point is that there isn't much room for IME on longer movies or vice versa with the audio if they choose IME instead. I do agree with you that a DD+ track is irrelevant on an HD-DVD disc, however we wouldn't be having that discussion if lack of space and bandwidth was not an issue... In all fairness, I applaud Toshiba for trying to catch up to Blu-ray by introducing TL51. The truth of the matter is you have people like Amir and Josh who wrote this article who think in much the same way about how High Def should be viewed by the general public (They would be happy if most people continue to ignore the specs). In this case by not wanting the bitrate meter in the PS3 available for all to see, Josh would rather not give people that opportunity. The same way Josh avoids talking about the crux of the issue which has to do with HD-DVD's greatest spec limiting factor which is bandwidth. He also fails to mention TL51 as being on the horizon by Toshiba to battle this specs limitation HD-DVD has. It is funny how people who support HD-DVD leave out a lot of information in articles that are supposed to inform individuals.

Supes.. dude, please use paragraph breaks to separate logical points in your posts.

As for Transformers, the audio is far from perfect since there is a problem with the LFE's in the audio which has already been confirmed on the Michael Bay website..

I looked around the Michael Bay web site and did not find confirmation of a problem with the HD DVD disc. Could you please post a link directly to this confirmation? Thanks.