xbox 360 marketplace movies...the best I quality besides blu-ray?

I think teh quality is great on my 32 inch toshiba(720P). can't vouch for anyone with a higher end set but I'm happy with the value to quality ratio.

They dont compare to a Blu-ray OR HD DVD movie on my 61" (1080p)screen. Both Blu-ray and HD DVD will win out the battle. While the quality of the movies is meh at best IMO it is watchable for movies that are not available on either format or that you want to "rent" only......

What exactly does this have to do with an HDTV programming forum?
It would be perfect for the Microsoft Marketing forum, assuming they have one here , but NOT this one.

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Palladin

Chance favors the prepared mind

I voted fair based on the quality of the trailers on Xbox Live.

On a 70 inch SXRD they dont look good enough to be on PAR with either HD-DVD or Blu-ray for what I saw.

They are pretty good quality but are not at the level of Blu Ray and HD-DVD. The downloads are much better than what I 've seen on cable hidef.

id agree with that except id go a bit further.... the level of quality from xbox live is "good enough" that for a vast majority of movies i dont need the smallish quality difference that bluray has over xbox live. considering the file sizes im actually pretty damn impressed how close xbox live can get with 720p vs bluray.

Xbox movies are auto-encoded. To the extent the market grows for such services, they can also deploy hand tuning like it is done for HD optical. In that sense, the quality can improve further.

edit:

Agreed, though I'd rather just pay a $1.50 for a DVD instead as the price of Live is more than renting a blu-ray. The picture quality of live is much closer to DVD than Blu-ray and the audio quality is dissappointing. Basically over priced for the quality that is delivered.

on a 70in sxrd rear projection screen the quality is better/same as hi-def from cable...the difference between hi-def optical and xbox live is not as great as some are suggesting but no question there is a difference.

if i don't plan on buying it (not buying much if anything these days) and i just can't wait to get it through blockbuster online (or sometimes a last minute requirement for viewing material), i have no problem ponying up for the xbox live content (i love how you can start watching it when enough has been downloaded; in my case, after only a few minutes with a high speed broadband cable connection).

now what do i dislike about it, the 14 day expiration after download regardless of whether i started watching it or not and the 24 hr viewing window once you've started playback...but these are dicated by the studios, not MS

make it a little cheaper (or give me a blockbuster/netflix type pricing scheme), relax some of the DRM restrictions and i would probably jettison my blockbuster account.

JMO ... YMMV

I think the Live downloads are great for those of us with sub 40-inch 720p sets. Otherwise, I can't imagine where the 720p XBL videos would compare to the 1080p HD-DVD and Blu-Ray sources.

I've been very pleased with the hi-def content from Xbox Live marketplace I've downloaded. Picture quality is very good, better than the hi-def cable pay-per-view in my area. I have no issues choosing to download/watch a movie, especially if I don't plan on buying the movie.

Basically my opinion on it. I've downloaded a lot of trailers and some of their HD TV episodes, and the quality, while nowhere near HD DVD, was good.

Quality is way better than the PPV of cable HD. There is very little macroblocking if any and audio is better as well. I would have to say that it is better than DVD but not as good as Blu-ray or HD-DVD. I usually can start watching in under 4 minutes with my roadrunner connection. Nice compromise and I dont have to goto the video store. which has become a $4 trip alone nowadays.

I love the 360 downloads. The big drawback is the 24 hour limit though. Sometimes I just can't finish a movie in one sitting or things come up after I start it. In order to watch it after 24 hours I have to pay to watch it again. 72 hours would be much more feasible in my opinion, with the option to even buy perpetual rights for about $17 to $20 would be fair.

agreed... the usefulness is limited by the you can only keep it for 2 weeks and the 24hr viewing window.

ive always said if somebody can get a netflix style subscription (thats not way more expensive than netflix) with these services its game over for me.