[Chris Moreau]

I would be suprised to know that this hasn't been posted, earlier, but I couldn't find anything about it with a search. If it's old news, I do apologize.

http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/8435.cfm


I also find the first entry in the related articles quite fascinating, in that it says that Sony says that anyone producing porn in BD will lose their license. There are many who claim that porn was one of the major reasons that VHS beat out Betamax.

 

[fronn]

You apparently didn't search the right forums... there's been lots of talk about both of those topics.


51gb discs are vaporware at the moment and need to be accepted by the dvd forum before they'll have a chance of seeing the light of day. I, honestly, don't think they'll matter, as HD-DVD group has actually done a pretty good job of proving that 30gb is plenty -- now they're going to have to try to prove that 50gb is necessary, which, would likely help out the BR just as much.


The porn situation is all bunk -- Sony didn't say that and porn on BD is being released... Sony's pressing lines just won't be doing it, but their dvd ones don't do it either. Sony isn't the BDA and can't pull a license if someone produces porn.

 

[Chris Moreau]



Quote:
Originally Posted by fronn /forum/post/0


You apparently didn't search the right forums... there's been lots of talk about both of those topics.


51gb discs are vaporware at the moment and need to be accepted by the dvd forum before they'll have a chance of seeing the light of day. I, honestly, don't think they'll matter, as HD-DVD group has actually done a pretty good job of proving that 30gb is plenty -- now they're going to have to try to prove that 50gb is necessary, which, would likely help out the BR just as much.


The porn situation is all bunk -- Sony didn't say that and porn on BD is being released... Sony's pressing lines just won't be doing it, but their dvd ones don't do it either. Sony isn't the BDA and can't pull a license if someone produces porn.

Perhaps I didn't do a sufficient search (although I did try) -- I am sorry. Thanks for adding clarity to the BD porn thing, as well. Makes sense to me!


-C

 

[bobgpsr]



Quote:
Originally Posted by fronn /forum/post/0


...51gb discs are vaporware at the moment and need to be accepted by the dvd forum before they'll have a chance of seeing the light of day...now they're going to have to try to prove that 50gb is necessary,...

I just don't get this. Why shouldn't Toshiba and the DVD Forum be allowed to grow the format capabilities? Frozen in time forever? Should hard drives not be allowed to grow to 5 TB capacity?

 

[fronn]



Quote:
Originally Posted by bobgpsr /forum/post/0


I just don't get this. Why shouldn't Toshiba and the DVD Forum be allowed to grow the format capabilities? Frozen in time forever? Should hard drives not be allowed to grow to 5 TB capacity?

They (and forum lunatics - maybe mostly them?) spent an good amount of time convincing people that 30gb was enough... and I agree, judging by some of the 30gb HD-DVD titles, I don't think 50gb would do a whole lot to give consumers a patently better movie experience. I'm not saying it wouldn't be good to have, it's just it isn't a huge deal and probably won't matter much since 30gb is enough -- for it to matter, they'd need to justify it someway. As far as benefit in the end, it probably won't make much of a difference at this point (to the consumer experience, at least). Marketing/PR wise, it sends a mixed message to some extent ("so 30gb isn't enough now?").


In the recent Amir interview at Hidefdigest, he even states 30gb for movie is enough and extras on a second disc is a fine way to go. So what's the point of a 51gb disc? 30gb is enough for video and a second disc is fine for extras (infact a lot of the j6p consumers like getting two discs -- it makes them feel like they got a good deal -- amir even mentions that).


And in most cases, once a format is drawn out and released, they generally don't change it much... so it's hardly comparable to a harddrive in how they increase in storage capacity.


@Chris Moreau, I didn't mean to sound mean there -- the first line is lacking a wink-smiley. Hopefully you didn't take it that way.

 

[eightninesuited]

I think the entire thing was marketing babble.


Why haven't we seen a working 45gb disc? It's been over 2 years since we first heard of the 45gb. Surely, if they can't even get a working prototype of the 45, who knows what's going on with the 51gb. This is beyond vaporware. It hasn't even been submitted yet for approval = still on paper.

 

[darinp2]



Quote:
Originally Posted by fronn /forum/post/0


In the recent Amir interview at Hidefdigest, he even states 30gb for movie is enough and extras on a second disc is a fine way to go. So what's the point of a 51gb disc? 30gb is enough for video and a second disc is fine for extras (infact a lot of the j6p consumers like getting two discs -- it makes them feel like they got a good deal -- amir even mentions that).

Amir doesn't make the decisions for Disney. I'm guessing he would like to given how he has told us in the past that no studios were interested in doing any secondary tracks with lossless audio and how kids don't need lossless audio with relation to Disney (despite knowledgeable people knowing that the Disney group controls a lot more than just kids movies). Another insider has mentioned that packaging costs matter to the studios. From what I've read, they will do dual disc releases for big movies, but are less likely to do so for less successful movies (basically ones that don't look like they will sell as many copies). The 2 disc thing works pretty well when the studios keep it somewhat special. Start using it for over half of releases and it will become much less so and probably even get into annoyance territory after a while if people can get just about as much content on 1 disc without sacrificing quality.


It seems that some people want to ignore that extras have mostly been SD so far. One of the things an HD format should bring to the table is extras in HD. And HD cameras are going down enough in price that lots of extras should be in HD in a couple of years. I know that a person can argue that those HD extras can just go on the 2nd disc as common practice for even movies that will only sell an average number of copies, but I for one am glad that Microsoft doesn't get to make that decision and it is largely up to the studios.


--Darin

 

[plazman]



Quote:
Originally Posted by darinp2 /forum/post/0


Amir doesn't make the decisions for Disney. I'm guessing he would like to given how he has told us in the past that no studios were interested in doing any secondary tracks with lossless and how kids don't need lossless audio with relation to Disney (despite knowledgeable people knowing that the Disney group controls a lot more than just kids movies). Another insider has mentioned that packaging costs matter to the studios. From what I've read, they will do dual disc releases for big movies, but are less likely to do so for less successful movies (basically ones that don't look like they will sell as many copies). The 2 disc thing works pretty well when the studios keep it somewhat special. Start using it for over half of releases and it will become much less so and probably even get into annoyance territory after a while if people can get just about as much content on 1 disc without sacrificing quality.


It seems that some people want to ignore that extras have mostly been SD so far. One of the things an HD format should bring to the table is extras in HD. And HD cameras are going down enough in price that lots of extras should be in HD in a couple of years. I know that a person can argue that those HD extras can just go on the 2nd disc as common practice for even movies that will only sell an average number of copies, but I for one am glad that Microsoft doesn't get to make that decision and it is up to the studios.


--Darin

Good point. What's Disney's track record when it comes to HD extras, multiple lossless tracks etc?

 

[ottscay]

It's also funny that everyone ignores that a huge part of what Disney and others want is to include additional interactive content, including gamelets and internet interactivity ("tea parties") that would desperately need more than 30gb of space. But I agree with others who said this is just marketing blatehr. THey are marketing to the studios (especially Disney) trying to convince them that if they would only switch, they can stil impliment all of their ideas for additional revenue streams.


That said, I doubt we will ever see TL HD DVDs, because the formats main backer (MSFT) does not want them. Additional space future-proofs the format better and allows for value-added content that would better compete against IPTV, and then what would be the point of MSFT backing HD DVD?

 

[plazman]



Quote:
Originally Posted by eightninesuited /forum/post/0


I think the entire thing was marketing babble.


Why haven't we seen a working 45gb disc? It's been over 2 years since we first heard of the 45gb. Surely, if they can't even get a working prototype of the 45, who knows what's going on with the 51gb. This is beyond vaporware. It hasn't even been submitted yet for approval = still on paper.

If you goal is to port existing 50Gb disks from BD into HD DVD, 45 GB does not work. Hence the 51 GB. JMHO.

 

[darinp2]



Quote:
Originally Posted by plazman /forum/post/0


Good point. What's Disney's track record when it comes to HD extras, multiple lossless tracks etc?

In Japan they've done the multiple lossless thing. In the US it seems like they are just getting to the combination of VC-1 and BD50s. I haven't checked out today's releases from them to see what they have for codecs, sizes, and extras though.


I think with Disney we should look at their track record from DVDs. From what I've heard, they love to put a lot of extra goodies on their DVD releases. I expect them to be using a lot of HD for extras in the future, but we'll have to see.


--Darin

 

[Schlotkins]



Quote:
Originally Posted by plazman /forum/post/0


If you goal is to port existing 50Gb disks from BD into HD DVD, 45 GB does not work. Hence the 51 GB. JMHO.

DING DING DING!!! We have a winner. I can definitely see Blu-ray only studios saying "hey, we've been making encodes for Blu-ray and aren't going to redo them for HD-DVD." So, they get 51GB and then just port them.....

 

[ottscay]

You guys, in addition to DIsney loving to put extras on their DVDs (and their quick leap into putting exclusive HD BluScape videos on their initial releases) they have explicitly state their goals. They want to increase user use/reuse time, and use interativity and ISP connections to allow for kids (and otehr movie fans) participate in online events, etc. They are hoping that some will even be worth chargin for. Of course this would be in the coming 10-18 months (based upon BD-J availability and ethernet ports being standard), but then BD was intended to last ten years or more as a format.

 

[TrevorS]



Quote:
Originally Posted by bobgpsr /forum/post/0


I just don't get this. Why shouldn't Toshiba and the DVD Forum be allowed to grow the format capabilities? Frozen in time forever? Should hard drives not be allowed to grow to 5 TB capacity?

I think his point is after HD-DVD spent so much time saying 50GB is unnecessary, now they are going to have to turn around and explain the need.


I disagree since there was an acknowledged intention to get TL-45 approved sometime this year, and it was clearly intended merely to have it available if studios wanted it. Given the 15GB layer was developed several years ago, the advance to 17GB is an understandable technological leapfrog to TL-51.


So that remark is really nothing more than spin.


What's more interesting to me is the suggested increase of disc rotation rate to 1.5x. I would love to hear what that's really all about

.

 

[trgraphics]

^ I'm very curious about that speed increase myself considering I own 4 HD DVD players.

 

[TrevorS]



Quote:
Originally Posted by eightninesuited /forum/post/0


I think the entire thing was marketing babble.


Why haven't we seen a working 45gb disc? It's been over 2 years since we first heard of the 45gb. Surely, if they can't even get a working prototype of the 45, who knows what's going on with the 51gb. This is beyond vaporware. It hasn't even been submitted yet for approval = still on paper.

The TL45 was developed and replicator verified back in 2005 (searchable news clip). Toshiba's expectation was to have it approved by the DVD Forum around mid 2007 (according to a Toshiba optical drive engineer interviewed during the European consumer product show last summer and reported on AVForums).


So no, there is no reason at all to suppose vaporware for the TL45. Articles discussing TL51 are plausible so we can only wait and see what actually materializes.

 

[skogan]



Quote:
Originally Posted by ottscay /forum/post/0


You guys, in addition to DIsney loving to put extras on their DVDs (and their quick leap into putting exclusive HD BluScape videos on their initial releases) they have explicitly state their goals. They want to increase user use/reuse time, and use interativity and ISP connections to allow for kids (and otehr movie fans) participate in online events, etc. They are hoping that some will even be worth chargin for. Of course this would be in the coming 10-18 months (based upon BD-J availability and ethernet ports being standard), but then BD was intended to last ten years or more as a format.

The problem with this theory is that (1) the kind of interactivity talked about here is much smaller than the HD content, almost nominal in comparison, and (2) Disney was the co-creater of HDi.


Based on those two facts, I don't see interactivity as the key reason for Disney joining BD. They will have lots of interactivity, but I don't think that was the deal breaker because I don't think BD has an advantage there.


I would bet they are planning on putting three or four kids movies on a single 50G disc, and then allowing parents to buy only one of them. Later, they could spend a bit more and unlock the other 2 or 3.


That would be a valid reason to want a 50G disc imo.

 

[TrevorS]



Quote:
Originally Posted by trgraphics /forum/post/0


^ I'm very curious about that speed increase myself considering I own 4 HD DVD players.

Kind of reminds me of when DTS was added to SD DVD players. Though the discs were still backwards compatible, the new audiotrack required a new player (same kind of thing happened with VHS, Beta, and LD). God knows what the story will be on this one, or if it will even materialize.


For that matter, we don't know anything yet about TL51 compatibility with our players either (though at one time, Amir reported being told TL45 was expected to be hardware compatible). If TL51 is approved, I wonder if SL15 and DL30 will also be rolled forward to SL17 and DL34? From a production standpoint it would make good sense. Hopefully our current drives can handle it (at worst requiring a firmware update).

 

[Richard Paul]



Quote:
Originally Posted by plazman /forum/post/0


Good point. What's Disney's track record when it comes to HD extras, multiple lossless tracks etc?

Not much at the moment, but than again what was their track record on DVD extras in the first year of its release? Blu-ray is not even a year old yet so it would be jumping the gun a bit to assume that more extra features in the future won't be in HD.

Quote:
Originally Posted by skogan /forum/post/0


The problem with this theory is that (1) the kind of interactivity talked about here is much smaller than the HD content, almost nominal in comparison, and (2) Disney was the co-creater of HDi.

Just to point this out but from what Talkstr8t has said Disney didn't really put that much into HDi and the main reason they were involved in it looks to me as a means to make HDi look like something not entirely made by Microsoft. Also from the sounds of it Disney is working on BD-J with their future Blu-ray titles so what difference does it make that they were once involved with HDi?

Quote:
Originally Posted by skogan /forum/post/0


I would bet they are planning on putting three or four kids movies on a single 50G disc, and then allowing parents to buy only one of them. Later, they could spend a bit more and unlock the other 2 or 3.

Strange that you mention this theory since I am pretty sure that I saw this being promoted as a feature on the HD DVD Promotions Group website. I believe this is a feature that can be done with AACS so both HD formats are capable of it.

 

[egcarter]

I don't think that the DVD Forum needs to do any explaining about increasing the HD DVD capacity to whatever... I do believe that if any particular content provider(s) have told them privately that the only thing preventing them from producing on HD DVD is that their business plan has specific requirements for that 50GB capacity sometime in the future, then clearly they should have no objection to supporting the HD DVD format if they trot out a viable 51GB product. I think they are just paving the way for wider studio support down the road.


Eric