I am going to be buying the Harry Potter movies individually. Probably one every week so I can watch each over the weekend. Now my question is, what are the differences between the blu-ray and hd-dvd version on each movie? Is there something spectacular that either version offers over the other one. I am leaning towards the blu-ray version because I notice a slightly better PQ out of the PS3 vs the A3 and not to mention the load times are ridiculously better.

They're pretty much all the same except... Goblet of Fire and OOTP have the IME feature on HD DVD, extras in SD on both movies.

Blu Ray OOTP has the IME segments separate from the movie and all the extras are in HD. Blu Ray GOF doesn't have the IME segments but otherwise, the extras are the same as the HD DVD. And of course Blu Ray has Uncompressed 5.1 PCM and HD DVD has Dolby TrueHD

I'd just save up for four weeks and buy the boxset since it should by $50 cheaper than buying the movies individually.

Here's an article on the web enabled extras on Order of the Phoenix.

Harry Potter HD DVD to Feature First-Ever "Community Screening" Function
http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Warner/Exclusive_HD_Content/Harry_Potter_HD_DVD_to_Feature_First-Ever_Community_Screening_Function/1188

The bluray version of OOTP will have extras in HD, while the HD-DVD version will be SD.

got them and compared them (BR) with the HD verson of a friend... hmmmm it seems warner really got cheap with the menu system on the BR side....

but yeah BR have PCM audio while HD DVD have TrueHD. Video side theay are all the same VC1 encodes.....

The bluray version of OOTP will have extras in HD, while the HD-DVD version will be SD.

Really? Sounds like the US version is different from the European version, then. I got the Norwegian edition yesterday, and all the extras are in HD.

yep. got the UK version yesterday aswell and it has two HD DVD's. One for the movie and one for HD extras.

I'd just save up for four weeks and buy the boxset since it should by $50 cheaper than buying the movies individually.
$50 cheaper:confused:

If you bought the BD boxset at Amazon, price is $104.95

If you bought them separately, price is $104.75

I'm getting them individually. A boxset only makes sense if all Harry Potter movies have been released on HD. There's still 2 left.

Thanks everyone for the input. So im hearing conflicting reports. Will the BD have the extras in HD and the hddvd version in SD??? IME is a non-issue to me since i've probably watched it only once. I'm not one for extras but if i do decide to watch one day, i'd rather watch it in HD of course!
And i am buying them individually because there are more harry potter movies coming out and a 5 movie boxset doesn't make sense since its incomplete. Besides, its the same price anyway.

BD only has the extras in HD on order of the phoenix, but lacks IME. Goblet of Fire on HD has IME, BD does not. The other 3 discs are the same in terms of features.

BD only has the extras in HD on order of the phoenix, but lacks IME. Goblet of Fire on HD has IME, BD does not. The other 3 discs are the same in terms of features.

ok so to conclude

Harry Potter 1 - 4 are identical in every aspect on both hddvd and bluray(So i will buy the bluray version)

HarryPotter 5(OOTP) are identical PQ but the hddvd version has IME and the web community, take over all your players feature but the blu-ray version has th extras in HD ??

If all this is true, i'll just buy all 5 movies on bluray

1-3 = the same
4 = HD with IME, BD no IME
5 = HD with IME extras not in HD, BD no IME, but has extras in HD

They all have the same video transfer
Audio is TrueHD on HD and PCM on BD.

Hope that helps.

Mike

1-3 = the same
4 = HD with IME, BD no IME
5 = HD with IME extras not in HD, BD no IME, but has extras in HD

They all have the same video transfer
Audio is TrueHD on HD and PCM on BD.

Hope that helps.

Mike

Awesome summary mikeyj. Thanks. I didn't know about the PCM actually. Thats even better. I'm not too keen on warners Dolby TrueHD tracks when i compared the trueHD track on 300 with the PCM. I also own 300 on hddvd and compared it to the pcm track on the bluray and for some reason, the truehd track is not as dynamic as the uncompressed track. Warner must do some sort of processing to the audio for compression. Just a guess.

So really the only thing that hddvd has over bluray at this point to me is
1. IME on HP 4 and 5 (Not that important)
2. That community thingy on HP 5 (Not that important)

Blu-ray for me has
1. Extras in HD on HP 5 (Not that important)
2. Super fast load times and chapter skips from my ps3( Important )
3. Slightly better PQ output from my ps3 over the A3 (Important)
4. PCM tracks tend to be slightly better than Warners Dolby TrueHD tracks (Important)

So its blu-ray all the way then. Thank you all

It gets even funnier here in Germany: The Blu-Rays have English PCM, but the HD DVDs have German TrueHD. No German PCM on the Blu-Rays and no English TrueHD on the HD DVDs. So if you're living in Germany and want lossless audio for both original and dubbed track, you need to get both the Blu-Ray and HD DVD!

Ouch...