NetFlix BD's Without DTS-HD Master Audio / DD 5.1 Instead - Page 4

+1 I've not noticed the lack of HD audio on Netflix BDs.


Interesting. I'll have to look out for this on future rentals.

You all are so funny. This was a great read listening to the banter and double-talk of some and the sane voices of others trying to share insight and reason to some of the unreasonable.

I love the folks that are up in arms about not having HD audio, and yet they "only rent and never buy" because the "video quality of transfers and new releases aren't any good".

So you are OK with what you say is a crap picture, but pissed off about not having good audio? Really?

Then you have the people that say that they rarely ever watch a movie more than once and thus almost never buy, but turn around and say that they re-rent the same movie multiple times? Honestly?

And it goes on...

I think that people today just are looking for some piss poor reason to get on a soap box and never get off it.

• Yes, it sucks that rentals don't all come with the same HD audio that the retail version do.
• No, boycotting rentals, purchases, or any other movie viewing is NOT going to make a difference.
• Yes, I've read *speculation* (note, NOT fact) that some of the reasoning was to give people that "invest" in the purchase more of an incentive with better audio than the typical $1.50 RedBox renter.
• Yes, you can get new releases for less than $20 quite regularly, and if timed right, recent releases for around $15.
• No, not everyone buys movies. Some use the money from not buying a handful of movies to fund their renting of whatever they want.
• A lot of people buy a majority of movies and rarely rent as well.
• Yes, I know a few people that rip about every movie that they get their hands on to (bought, rented, or otherwise), but they don't seem to care about 100% best picture/audio anyway.
• Yes, there ARE people who do rip every movie that they get their hands on (same qualifiers as above) that DO want 100% best picture/audio. They voice some of the loudest grumblings that I've ever heard. They want *more* for *free*.
• Yes, there are still honest people in the world.
• Yes, there are whiners in the world as well.
• Yes, there are people with legitimate gripes and complaints.

I think that about summarizes this thread with all of the noise. Now, some people have asked for useful information, like rental versions with stripped down audio, etc. Maybe instead of just rehashing the same stuff, this could turn productive? Or not, and people can just yell and complain for the sake of yelling and complaining because again, as listed above, doing that here will NOT change anything.
Edited by nickbuol - 9/27/12 at 7:27am

Who pissed in your corn flakes? If you find flaw with the thread then why bother to post? But instead, post and run? I don't get that. This forum is a vehicle that allows all to respectfully voice their opinions, gripes, questions, etc. We agree with some. Disagree with others. While I agree that nothing will likely be accomplished on this site to resolve the title issue of the thread, it perhaps is a starting point to inspire thought. And perhaps someone here will take it to the next level outside of this forum. Regardless, it's validation for me to find more people than I realized to be of like mind to my issues of inferior audio on rentals. Guess I'm not alone in this universe

I'm willing to bet that 90% of the viewing audience that rent blurays through redbox, netflix, blockbuster or their local library never even noticed that half the discs they've been renting haven't come with lossless audio tracks. And judging by some of the comments here, I'll bet even some avsforum members didn't know it before others pointed it out to them.

As a consumer this is very upsetting. To many companies these days use cheap tactics to get us to spend more. Rentals are not something new and this audio scheme cheapens the whole movie buying and renting experience. I personally cannot believe any of you would think this is ok, but then again some of probably have stock in their company. What other reason would you have to defend such crappy business tactics you have nothing to gain and HD audio to lose. I think far to many consumers are standing up for companies that pull shady moves, they do not need any of us to come to their defense they have plenty of lawyers and PR reps.

JMHO

John M.

Agreed. This matter really goes beyond personal preferences. This is a matter of deceptive corporate practices at consumer expense.

I think NF values their streaming contract with Studios so much that it won't risk the wrath of Studios to buy retail copies. I knew Redbox has indeed bought retail copies for rental but that is before they have their own stream solutions. Now they are going offer streaming soon, they too can't afford to piss studios off.

There are only a few titles on NF catalog that have this problem. You are correct, majority of the renters don't even know it. But those ppl also don't read AVS Forum either. My first encounter of such title is 'The Grey' rental disc but others claim they got the version with HD audio. So I chuckled that up as anomaly back then.

My question is how accurate is that information. I saw mis-printed information on NF BD disc sleve all the time. According to web site information, Battleship is also DD 5.1 only (don't have it yet myself). And half of the upcomming titles in my queue are DD 5.1 only as well. Time will tell.

Studios also has the right to withhold any future streaming licenses, not just the streaming of current releases. So, NF is in a really touch spot. They are lossing streaming licenses from various studios every other week.

But since when they did start this silly surcharge, this wasn't an issue, its at least another reason for them to revisit the policy. I don't think the studios are forcing them to charge extra for BD.

Blu-Ray costs more for Netflix/Redbox/etc vs DVD. I think the surcharge makes sense, you want more, you pay more.

The potential benefit that could be gained by Netflix circumventing the studio's insistence on providing DD-only rental discs (by obtaining retail discs) is far outweighed by the costs that would be incurred by upsetting them (loss of streaming rights, higher prices demanded when renewing deals). Not to mention that the unit costs of obtaining the retail discs would be much higher than the studio-provided rental copies.

It sucks for the customers who really want HD audio on their rentals, but business is business.

I only discovered this issue last night when I rented What to Expect When You're Expecting from a local Redbox. So, this is limited to Lionsgate releases?

Sorry, I already have hundreds of HD DVD's and dozens of Blu-Ray discs. I'm not buying discs new at retail. I barely did that during the format war.

Streaming? The video quality of streaming is worse than HD-lite on cable/satellite. I'll wait a year and watch the movie on Epix, HBO or Starz before I bother streaming.

Thankfully Battleship from Redbox did have HD audio. I could not imagine buying that horribly formulaic movie and watching it more than once.

The movie industry should examine history and look to what happened to the music industry when they restricted access and reduced quality.

When Netflix first started offering streaming, it was small potatoes. The studios literally gave away content for streaming, and when Netflix growth for streaming exploded, the studios started tightening the screws and wanting more money. Look at Starz on Netflix as an example. Starz wanted a lot more money than Netflix was willing/able to pay to keep the content on Netflix streaming. So Netflix lost all the Starz content.

Netflix has publicly stated they are a streaming company first and are betting the farm on streaming. They won't do anything on the physical disc side that would potentially result in studios hurting their streaming side.

I rented cheap as much as anyone here via Netflix and Redbox. That said, look what has happened with physical rentals. The cheap rental options have literally forced most brick and mortar rental stores to either go backrupt, or shut their doors forever. The people here who use Netflix and Redbox and then complain that there are no stores to rent from anymore near their house are missing the forest through the trees. Netflix and Redbox closed those doors. Cheap renting has become the new standard. The studios are fighting back because home video revenue from sales AND renting is down billions of dollars since the peak. It is what it is. I can see both sides of the argument, but if I really want a lossless track and the only way to hear it vs lossy is to buy the disc, then buy it I will. It is not like you cannot find most Blu-Ray's for uber cheap these days if you wait for a good sale or a used copy.

But when you start getting half quality BluRay rentals, the extra cost no longer justifies.

When I pull this link up it doesn't say anything about the soundtrack. Am I missing something? And personally, I'm not a NF user, I go to Redbox and there is nothing on their website either regarding soundtrack specifications. So unless I'm missing some detail here, I would say "yes" there is deception as the expectation of BD rentals is HD sound.

Agreed. I can tell you this, if BD rentals had a standard def picture but lossless audio, I bet all that see/feel "no problem" with this issue would all of a sudden find great issue with it.

There have been lots of double blind tests done with lossy vs lossless with regards to audio quality, and truth be told, even people with high end audio systems cannot tell the difference. Granted many of the tests I have seen were with Dolby Digital Plus vs TrueHD but the facts remain. I would bet for most titles none of us could really tell the difference between lossy and lossless. There are acutal film mixers (one of which is extremely knowledgeable and mixed tracks for blockbuster movies and HBO content) that have posted on AVS who have stated that cannot tell the difference using state of the art audio gear in a treated room.

And please stop with the drama. Where I live a DVD rental is $1.20 per day. A Blu-Ray rental is $1.50. If you don't think the PQ upgrade alone is worth 30 cents, then you should probably stop posting at AVS.

So, what you are saying is that no one can tell the differences between DTS-HD MA 7.1 track and DD 5.1 track? What's next, you gonna tell us no one can tell A down-mixed DD 2.1 track from DD 5.1 track ? So we should all be fine with a stereo track.

The two discs mentioned here both have DTS-HD MA 7.1 HD Audio in retail discs.


Worth or not worth the money is personal preference (not to mention when this fee was initiated, we got both HD audio and video). Just because you think it is worth it, doesn't mean everyone else has to agree. BTW, if you think HD PQ alone is good enough for BD, you should probably stop posting at AVS.
Edited by Foxbat121 - 9/27/12 at 9:14am

I consider myself a big movie buff. Like everyone else, each title peaks my interest differently. Having had owned a Laserdisc collection and a DVD collection and seeing their values plummet to pennies on the dollar, I am much more careful of what I buy. I guess I could categorize my levels of interest as follows.

(Most interested at the top and least at the bottom.)

1. See it at the theater and buy it.(Rare)
   
2. See it at the theater and rent it. (Very rare)
   
3. Buy it new.
   
4. Buy it used.
   
5. Rent it (Most common)
   
6. Skip it.
   

Outside of watching the value of my previous movie collections rapidly decline, I also noticed another unfortunate trend. I do like to watch a lot of movies more than once, but often several years or even over a decade will pass before I do. The problem is that my media has become dated when I revisit some movies. This leaves me outdated copies that I bought and only watched once.
As far as rental BD not containing HD audio, what bothers me the most is the transparency. I never saw a disclaimer at Redbox or Blockbuster informing me that the rental BD is inferior to retail. I rented Cabin in the Woods from both BB and RB and they both said DTS-MA on the DISC but both did not actually have an HD track.
Being a D-Box system owner, I feel even more sensitive to this as the MFX codes won’t work in these inferior copies.
I have, however, recently found a solution that works for me. Ultimately, I go to the Movie Trading Co to rent movies that have inferior rental copies. It cost more ($5) per rental, but I am able to get my hands on a full retail copy. Unfortunately, this requires me to do my homework. I know now that Lion’s Gate will not have a rental with HD audio so that studio’s releases are easy to track. Other studios require more work to identify.

"Redbox doesn't have many movies PERIOD. (And even fewer BDs)"

Really?

Wow! This is an unbelievable post. Stranger than fiction even. You're actually arguing that it's acceptable to defraud the public as long as they can't tell the difference. I purposefully use the word "defraud" not so much because I believe this is what NF and RB are doing (entirely). But because this is eventually what WILL happen with this thinking. Charge them premium prices for regular gas because they can't tell the difference. Charge them prime prices on select beef because they can't tell the difference. Education? Medications? Where would it stop?

You speak in terms of pennies, which, yes essentially we are talking pennies in practical terms but in actual terms we are talking percentages. There is a 25% difference in the cost to rent DVD vs. BD. Why? Because BD is considered a premium medium. A medium which all along since inception hailed both HD picture AND sound. HD picture and sound is expected because that's what we were told and what was sold to us. It's synonymous with BD and even HD DVD. But what if you were told you were buying a four bedroom house but after you paid for it you only had a three bedroom house? And what if for the same credit score as your neighbor and same house you got a 25% higher interest rate on that home from the same bank? But hey, you don't know what your neighbor has so it's okay, right? How about this, you buy a corvette but when you get home you find out you got a V6. Although the idea of a V6 in a Vette is laughable, as no one has ever heard of such a thing, it's okay because it still goes 70mph on the highway, right?

My wife loves to watch behind the scenes stuff in addition to the movie and alot of th rentals are stripped of this. Funny thing is alot of the main menus still have the "Features", "Additional" radio buttons but when you click on it, it states this is a rental.

It is very occasional that I buy a movie after renting it but I would like to know that the rental is the SAME as what I buy.