Mike I am moving towards HD DVD myself! Just waiting to catch a deal on HD A1, as X1 is essentialy same heavier unit! as soon as I find below $400, I'll get it!
Alternate is to buy Xbox 360 with 20GB hard drive! now around $350 and then add HIGH DEF drive to it for around $100, but XBOX itself no HDMI, hopefully outboard drive will support it!

more so knowing crapolla hindi dvd industry, there will be occasional HD DVD courtesy to ur beloved UTV and devil ZEROS!

If you are in no hurry I would wait some more. If you want to buy now the Toshiba with the latest firmware offers solid quality with most HD-DVDs. The future of HD-DVD (and BR) is open for the time being. Worst case you invest in a system that is obsolete 2 years from now and have some hundred titles to enjoy on it.

Alright… after spending several days with the Samsung player and several different Blu-ray discs, I feel I’ve got an excellent grasp on what you can expect from this player and the format in general for the next few months. Old readers of DVDFile might remember that I used to be one of the site’s main reviewers for DVD content, so I do have a bit of a background here. I’m going to focus on what I viewed to be the best looking of the BD titles I viewed in addition to a title that hasn’t been covered elsewhere: XXX. This is a title that provides for a longer running time than most of the early BD titles (123 minutes) and also contains lots of movement to test MPEG2’s abilities.

The short of it is that I completely agree with Andrew P and, by extension, BigMikeATL. Blu-ray, as it exists today in both hardware and software, is a good, but not great format. I’m starting to see a bit of a pattern with these early BD titles as they generally are shorter films with bright, colorful cinematography. Those are the conditions under which MPEG2 BD looks its best. While I was initially questioning what the early adopter appeal of films like Hitch or 50 First Dates could be, now I can understand it.

Let’s start with SD ability as it compares to the Toshiba. Again, I put the player in the very good but not great slot. I think the Toshiba still presents a slightly sharper picture overall when compared to the Samsung. But the Samsung is very much improved over their older models. So if you owned an 841, 850, 941, or 950, you should be happy with the improvement that the BD-P1000 provides. However, those previous models provided an option to pillarbox 4:3 material and zoom 4:3 letterbox images, neither of which is possible on the 1000. So the Toshiba gets a point on that, but the Toshiba also lacks the ability to zoom 4:3 letterbox material, so shame on them both. But overall, advantage Toshiba on SD DVD presentation.

For BD ability, I’m now going back to my XXX disc and BD in general. Had this format and these titles launched in early April, I would have been happy. Unfortunately for Blu-ray, HD-DVD launched in mid-April and did two things to impair BD: They’ve gotten more titles out to consumers and they’ve provided an HD experience that is better than BD. Now the difference isn’t huge, but it should be noticeable, even to people who might not normally see these kinds of things. Sorry to have to say it, but BD is an unimpressive format in the shadow of HD-DVD. Had they happened in reverse, HD-DVD would have had to work hard to impress upon people that buying their player (even at half the price of BD) was worth the effort for the slight improvement they offered. Now, BD is in a position to justify a premium for a product that is slightly inferior to what is already available. When I first cracked open the HD-A1 in April and popped in that Last Samurai HD-DVD, I was wowed with what I thought to be the best HD image my television had ever produced. The HD image was smooth and rich with a sharpness and depth I’d never experienced. Most of the HD-DVD titles released thus far (with a few now famous exceptions) have this “pop” that takes them out of the realm of what I would consider normal HD. The Blu-ray discs I’ve sampled thus far, while they’ve looked good to even great, have all lacked that “pop” and instead generally look a lot closer to good OTA HD broadcasts. If you were to show me the XXX BD and tell me it was a Showtime broadcast, I wouldn’t hesitate to think you were telling me the truth. But I would never believe that about most of the HD-DVD titles out there right now.

The sad truth is that MPEG2 just isn’t cutting it against VC-1. Now while it’s difficult to impossible to be able to judge the quality of one film in one codec against a different film in a different codec, I can stack the deck to try and approximate a decent comparison. I compared XXX BD to Unforgiven HD-DVD. Unforgiven is 10 years older than XXX, so this should have been a slam dunk for image quality in favor of XXX. Guess what, the VC-1 Unforgiven consistently outperformed the MPEG2 of XXX. Just look at chapter 4 of Unforgiven. All of the characters are sharply in focus, while the intricate detail in the background wallpaper is consistently resolved. XXX, by contrast appears somewhat soft and lacking in dimensionality. In all of the BD titles I viewed there’s a consistent soft, yet noisy quality to the images that appears as a mixture of natural film grain and digital noise. Fine details, such as rocks on the ground or wall textures, are often seen flickering slightly, which is often annoying.

I’m also curious about how many of these initial discs are truly 1080p. I saw more stairstepping and artifacting throughout one viewing of XXX than I have in 2+ months of HD-DVD viewings. Here’s a few moments for reference… at :38 the tail of the Revolutions logo there is some pretty good banding visible. Right after that, serious jaggies on the XXX logo that starts the film. At 32:08, look at the grill of the car for more jaggies while 10 seconds later, at 32:18, you’ll also get some pretty good stairstepping at the base of the balcony. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you view it), these artifacts don’t appear on the SD Superbit version of the film when viewed on the Toshiba A1. More surprising, they also don’t appear when the Superbit DVD is viewed on the Samsung BD-P1000. The banding was visible on the Superbit, but it was much less severe than the Blu-ray banding.

Essentially, from what I’ve seen so far, visually Blu-ray is, at its best, all of the worst qualities of HD-DVD right now. If you’re someone who was bothered by the HD-DVDs of The Fugitive, Full Metal Jacket, and Perfect Storm, you’re not going to find a ton to like in some of these early offerings. Again, they can look really, really good, but they don’t consistently look great. How much of this is a byproduct of the Samsung player is unknown until other players make it to market but a few things are pretty clear…

Sony, as a company, has a lot riding on the success of Blu-ray. With as much at stake as they have, these titles needed to raise the bar over what we’ve already seen. But because as a company they seem to be more focused on their royalties and the ability to cross promote, they have succeeded in being the second to market with the second best product. Here’s an example of what I mean… The XXX disc has a selection in its menus for “Previews.” These are the SD MPEG2 trailers for Stealth, Into the Blue, and SWAT. So there’s approx. 200-250MB taken up by Sony trying to get you to buy other Sony products. With that space, Sony could have instead done a few other things. Why not include the XXX trailer and the Rob Cohen commentary? Why not use that 200MB to try and eliminate that banding at the beginning of the movie? Instead, Sony appears to have needed that space to get you to spend more money rather than providing us with the best product to entice us to spend more money. Compare that with the Warner and Universal titles, which are not only visually more impressive, but also packed to the rims with bonus content. Universal certainly didn’t need to include all the stuff from the more expensive 2 DVD Cinderella Man, but they did and provided an excellent value on that disc.

Sony has two things that have to happen and happen fast in order for Blu-ray to really make this a good race: They need to implement the advanced video and audio codecs and they need to get 50GB discs working. They have to do both of these and they have to do them fast. With only 50GB and still working MPEG2, they’re probably going to be able to equal or hover slightly below HD-DVD as it exists now. With newer codecs but only 25GB discs, they’ll be able to match HD-DVD visually, but will have a 5GB disadvantage. Only with both of these in existence will this format even have a chance. And they need to do this much sooner rather than later. Unfortunately, by the time the Sony player launches in mid-August, there are going to be maybe 30 titles available, while HD-DVD, by that point in August, will be sporting double that and could be up to as high as 75 different titles.

A few of the quirks about the Samsung BD-P1000 that I haven’t seen mentioned yet are the resolution and audio settings. On the video side, I’ve had a few instances where the resolution would change on the player without me having to select it. It switched from the 1080i that I had set it to to a very much inferior 720p setting that softened the picture even more that I found it at 1080. I’ll be curious to see additional comments as the player becomes more widely available and whether the player switching itself from 1080 to 720 happens with others. On the audio side, I’m running the player HDMI to a new Denon 3806 HDMI in. Unfortunately, there seems to be something bungled with how the player handles the bitstream vs. PCM tracks. To play the Dolby 5.1 track, the player has to have the digital out in the player’s menu set to “bitstream.” However, if you select one of the Sony uncompressed 5.1 tracks from the menu, it will only play back in 2-channel PCM. Selecting PCM from the player menu will output 5.1 PCM via HDMI, but then converts the Dolby tracks to 2-channel PCM. So you could potentially have to change player settings depending on the disc and soundtrack you want to hear. Can anyone else using their player via HDMI confirm this behavior?

Ultimately, the potential is there for Blu-ray to succeed, but it is unclear when that potential might be approached. For all of the complaints about HD-DVD not being ready for primetime, I think that despite all of its faults, the bottom line is that HD-DVD delivered the big jump up in picture quality and interactivity that many of us were anticipating and has set the bar in terms of HD. Blu-ray, unfortunately, has failed to go “Beyond High Definition.”

Cliff

Equipment list:
Toshiba 50” 50H13 DVI in from
Denon 3806 HDMI out and in from
Samsung BD-P1000 HDMI out and
Toshiba HD-A1 HDMI out

I dont even wanna imagine how bad a Bollywood HD DVD will be!

Samsung will consider later this year if it will launch a high-definition movie player compatible with both the Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD formats, it said Tuesday.

Samsung is a supporter of the Blu-ray Disc format and its first player will go on sale in the U.S. in the next few days. The BD-P1000 is the first consumer Blu-ray Disc player from any manufacturer and its launch will kick off full competition between the rival formats. Toshiba, which is the main backer of the HD DVD format, started player sales in March.

There are only a few technical differences between the formats but they're big enough to make them mutually incompatible. That's a headache for consumers because most Hollywood studios have initially committed to releasing movies on one or the other disc format but not both.

Samsung is already working on a drive that handles both Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD, said Kim Du-Hyon, an assistant manager in Samsung's home-platform product planning division, in a briefing with reporters at the company's headquarters in Suwon, South Korea.

"We don't have a plan to make an HD DVD-only player but are considering a universal player," he said. "We are preparing HD DVD [support] now and if we launch a universal player it will be the end of this year or early next year."

Kim underlined Samsung's belief that Blu-ray Disc will beat HD DVD in the commercial marketplace but said Samsung will consider a universal player should HD DVD prove as successful as Blu-ray Disc.

Samsung is not alone in working on drives that support both formats, according to industry sources.

While LG has publicly declared its plans to make drives for both formats, many of the leading Blu-ray Disc backers are also members of the DVD Forum and so have access to HD DVD technology and specifications.

In addition some companies on each side of the battle have optical disc production joint-ventures. Samsung is partnered with Toshiba in Toshiba Samsung Storage Technology and Sony and NEC, which back Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD respectively, formed Sony NEC Optiarc in April this year.

Samsung's BD-P1000 will go on sale in the U.S. from June 25 for US$1,000. It will hit Korea in August, Australia and Europe in October and be available worldwide by the end of the year, Samsung said.

10 Reasons Why High Definition DVD Formats Have Already Failed
Wednesday, June 21 2006


10 Reasons Why High Definition DVD Formats Have Already Failed

I’m not typically a doom and gloom kind of guy – really, I’m rather optimistic. But this pending format release/war is simply the most ridiculous thing I’ve seen in a long time. The hype machine is entirely enthusiast-created and since that day I realized Steve Jobs could sell a fart provided he sued a public Mac forum for talking about it before its release, I began to understand the power of public mania.

There are a number of reasons why the new high definition DVD formats have already failed and I’ll gladly go over some of them in this article. I am not a soothsayer, but I do study the industry – and at times, sit back and take assessment of what’s happening from both a consumer and manufacturer perspective.

Without any further ado, here are the reasons HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc will never turn into the dominant formats for digital media viewing:

Nobody likes false starts
With the debut of HD DVD at an underwhelming 720p/1080i, coupled with a buggy interface and a transport that makes boiling water seem like a speedy event, the entrance of high definition DVD into the mainstream came out of the starting gate lame and hobbled. For Toshiba to release a player that didn’t support true HD at 1080p (even though the software does), and with no lossless audio format to accompany the video track, the high definition wave was more of a ripple. Add to this the delay of HDMI 1.3, lack of market penetration and supply, and a dearth amount of software titles and you have a very unimpressive product launch.

Format Wars Don’t Sell Players
The only reason Sony’s Playstation, Microsoft’s Xbox and the Nintendo GameCube can sell so well simultaneously is because of the prevalence of excellent software titles. People want to buy the hardware just so they can play the software. This is not a format war – it is choice, just like Chevy and Ford (and just like the gaming systems, some people have one of each). The high definition DVD formats, however are really just the same source material packaged in two different wrappers- not to provide choice, mind you, but because the two camps simply are too greedy to combine forces, and not innovative enough to drive two truly separate products successfully. Take careful note – a format war is NOT competition, it is a hindrance and the bane of high definition DVDs.

HD DVD and Blu-ray are NOT Quantum Leaps in Technology
Consumers came over in droves when CDs were released back in 1982. The new format offered not only a new digital media, but also a way to instantly access tracks across an entire “album”. Convenience, not technology, drove this format to almost instant consumer adoption. Fast forward a bit to 1997 when the first DVD player was released. Again, convenience, not technology, drove people to the market en masse. Unlike VHS tapes, the new DVD format was smaller, easily navigated and would not wear down over time like existing tape-based formats. Heck, the concept of a shiny plastic disc was new – and quite frankly, it was the coolest thing to hit the technological shelf since solid state technology. In comparison, the high definition DVD formats, save the color of the business side of the disc, look exactly the same… and consumer confusion will surely follow.
What do the new high definition DVD formats offer consumers over DVD? Technology and more storage. Is this enough? Not on your life. Consumers, most of whom rarely know how to properly configure their players or home theater systems, are perfectly content with their current DVD players (and indeed some have just jumped on board to DVD in the last several years). While the potential for more extras and alternate endings exists due to increased storage on the new media, there is no compelling reason for consumers to migrate over to the new high definition DVD formats in large numbers.


Studios are Conservative, Greedy and Unmotivated
Studios are so conservative in their practices as to consistently miss out on market advances – even those that can make them money (ie. Why is a computer company running the world’s most successful online music store?) The studios are not jumping on board the high definition DVD bandwagon just yet – and you can see the lack of titles to prove it. If the movie studios decided that HD DVD or Blu-ray (or both) was to be the next dominant format, it need only to flood the market with software titles and present a plan to roll back on DVD production over the next 10 years. Even though this would grant them the secure format that they seem to want (HD DVDs and Blu-ray discs promise to be much harder to rip or duplicate) there is no indication in the industry that this is taking place or even in the works. The studios are making money hand over fist with DVD they cannot seem to bring themselves to seriously initiate a new, unproven technology – even if it saves them from some other copyright headaches.
Add to this the fact that new titles are coming out at $30 a pop (and this down from an initial $35/title) and you have a really hard sell for consumers who are used to $15 titles at Wal-mart and the large electronics chains.


Playstation3 Cannot Save the World
We have consistently heard it said that the Playstation3 will “jump start” the market by flooding it with millions of gaming systems capable of handling Blu-ray Disc software. The problem with this theory is that the PS3 is not being marketed as a home theater component and, if current installations prove the rule, most will not be situated in the average consumer’s living room. The result is that the PS3 will primarily be a *gasp* gaming system. Maybe I have a more traditional group of parents in my association of friends, but, taking into account #4 above, I do not think that Blu-ray will make any major leaps forward in market penetration as a home video format – at least not anytime soon.
History is bearing this out, as the HTPC market, though driven hard by such manufacturers as Microsoft, Dell and HP, has struggled to find a place in the living room. Nearly every gaming system of the past: PS2, Xbox, and even the legendary 3DO system have been touted as “set-top boxes” but in reality find themselves situated in more “gaming-centric” environments playing… you guessed it, games.


Those Who Ignore History…
For years we’ve heard about the evils of MP3 and illegal downloading. All the while the RIAA and music industry had two formats that could have prevented any illegal copying – at least for all but the most dedicated crackers: DVD-Audio and SACD. These formats proved to be higher quality than CD, presented much enhanced copy protection schemes and were easily used as alternative formats to CD. Yet both formats failed miserably to achieve any significant market penetration. Why? Without an artificial “shove” from the record industry – which never materialized – technology alone is never enough to push a new format into the hands of consumers. In terms of convenience and ease of use, DVD-Audio and SACD offered nothing to consumers. In fact, they made listening to music more complex, since most hardware was unable to correctly decode and provide adequate bass management for the new formats.
Could these formats have succeeded? Absolutely. If the recording industry had presented a plan to phase out CDs and the “format war” had been avoided (simply by the industry picking one format over the other) we would all be using DVD-Audio players and illegal downloadable music would be mostly confined to analogue rips or older music. Is this a stretch? Perhaps, but only because history shows us that corporate greed causes most companies to miss the long term economical gains over a short term loss of licensing revenues.


People Want Technology that’s 15 Minutes Ahead of Its Time
For many people, getting into HDTV is all about the widescreen and being able to see their DVDs with more clarity than ever before. When Billy Bob comes home with his new high definition 720p display, the difference between that and his older SD TV is amazing – at least when he’s watching DVDs. You see, that’s the problem – and it’s two-fold. While most consumers are still getting into the HDTV craze, they’re already impressed. And the difference between SD TV and HDTV is more amazing than the difference between 480p DVDs and 1080i downrezzed high definition discs.
The other side of the coin is the lack of HD content available on TV – and this is a biggie. While Billy Bob is impressed by his DVD player, he is dumbfounded by his cable TV – which actually looks worse than it did on his old set (mostly because it’s bigger). You see, nobody told Billy Bob that he’d have to get an antenna or subscribe to HD service from his cable/satellite provider. He was also not told that most of his favorite shows (Billy likes sitcoms and the Sci-Fi Channel) aren’t yet available in HD, regardless of technology or service provider. As a result, many Americans are underwhelmed or feel like they got burned by HDTV. The last thing they’re going to do is rush out and buy the next greatest thing.


Enthusiasts Are Getting Tired (and Smarter)
While some home theater audio- and videophiles have the money and inclination to rush out and buy the latest and greatest toys as soon as they are available, many more are becoming more cautious. Burned by 8-track, laserdisc, SACD, and DVD-Audio (and possibly soon HDTV) – these war-weary consumers are going to think long and hard before jumping onto any new technological bandwagons. This leaves a shrunken market of even the bleeding-edge consumers, and that means even less sales to early-adopters.

A Skeptical News Media Doesn’t Help
I’ll admit it, we’re part of the “problem” (though I’d like to think we’re saving consumers from making the next big mistake). An increasingly skeptical news media isn’t buying into the hype of HD DVD and Blu-ray, especially not after wasting millions of editorial words on DVD-Audio and SACD, only to watch the software and technology dwindle into obscurity. Even after almost 6 years, most consumers continue to proffer puzzled looks when these audio formats are mentioned. The new DVD formats are getting plenty of press, mind you, but with the Toshiba flop and lack of software, the fact that the Emperor has no clothes (at least not yet) is hard to avoid.

Broadband and IPTV to Compete?
With Verizon, AOL, Time Warner and others jumping to provide HD on-demand services for the consumer it is a very likely event that high definition DVD will be something that isn’t relevant in a service-directed marketplace. Add to this Apple Computer’s recent push for video downloads and we may find that consumers are far more interested in quantity, portability, and ease of use over high quality source material. Even with respect to high definition formats, downloadable files burned to consumer-supplied media may make data high definition DVDs more significant than the retail formats. This consumer model is being readied for testing in South Carolina’s head-end for Time Warner Cable this year.
So, while I certainly hope for the best, that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it. High definition is headed for a niche market at best, not an industry takeover.

By Clint DeBoer


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Jun 22, 7:50 AM (ET)


TOKYO (AP) - Toshiba Corp. said Thursday it will start selling the world's first recorders for the HD DVD high-definition video disc next month.

The new recorder, the RD-A1, combines an HD DVD burner with a one-terabyte hard disk and can record and store up to 130 hours of high-definition broadcasts, Toshiba said in a statement.

HD DVD players are already available, but the RD-A1 will be the first model that can record disks.

The recorder hits stores in Japan on July 14 and will carry a suggested price tag of 398,000 yen ($3,470), Toshiba said. The electronics maker hopes to sell 10,000 recorders by the end of 2006, according to company spokeswoman Junko Furuta.

Toshiba hasn't yet decided when it will launch the product overseas, Furuta said.

The move intensifies competition with the HD DVD format's rival camp, led by Sony Corp. (SNE), which will sell players based on a competing standard, Blu-ray Disc. Sony has been selling Blu-ray recorders since 2003 in Japan, but prices have been high and uptake low.

Both HD DVD and Blu-ray can deliver dazzling high-definition video and can store much more data than today's DVDs, but are incompatible.

Toshiba launched HD DVD players in Japan in March, and in the United States in April.

Sony plans to begin selling personal computers equipped with Blu-ray drives later this month.

Myth: Blu-ray is superior because it supports 1080P and HD-DVD doesn’t

Reality: This myth stems from the players themselves and not the actual disc formats. All HD-DVD’s released to date are encoded at 1080p; Blu-ray and HD-DVD are no more defined by their respective players than the DVD format was. Many of the first DVD players didn’t support DTS, but do you hear anyone claiming that DVD doesn’t support DTS?

No, neither the HD-A1 or HD-XA1 currently support 1080p output, but with Toshiba’s third HD-DVD player/recorder supporting 1080p output, I think its safe to assume that all future HD-DVD players will do the same.

More importantly only a handful of the 1080p displays on the market today accept 1080p input, they take 1080i and internally de-interlace it to 1080p, this is why Toshiba chose to forgo 1080p output on the first two players. It was a simple matter of real-world functionality versus a perceived benefit.

The truth of the matter is the majority of the 1080p capable displays on the market, have the ability to internally de-interlace 1080i video to full 1080p resolution. So 1080p from HD-DVD is technically possible right now.

Myth: Blu-ray supports lossless audio where HD-DVD does not.

Reality: You know, I don’t even really know where this one comes from, but I’ve heard this fallacy floated around by both retail salesmen and supposed authorities alike.

HD-DVD supports Dolby TrueHD (lossless) and DTS-HD , currently the DTS-HD decoding is DTS core (lossy) only. It’s assumed that full DTS-HD (lossless) support is coming by means of a firmware update. Either way, Dolby TrueHD is supported right now, and definitely qualifies as a lossless format.

Myth: Blu-ray has more capacity.

Reality: Follow me carefully here, because the distinction I’m going to make does not rule out the possibility that Blu-ray will indeed, ultimately offer more storage capacity.

While Blu-ray is (theoretically) capable of delivering a dual-layer 25GB disc for a total of 50GB’s, the truth of the matter is, the Blu-ray (movie) titles Sony has shipped thus far are on single layer 25GB discs.

So in reality as of today Wednesday the 28th of June 2006, HD-DVD discs at dual-layer 15GB for a total of 30GB offer more capacity than Blu-ray, I’ll repeat that, as of right now HD-DVD is delivering more capacity than Blu-ray. That kind of flies in the face of everything we’ve heard about Blu-ray thus far huh?

The HD-DVD camp has even reported the development of a 45GB (3-layer) disc. And while I’ll have to take a ‘believe it when I see it’ stance on that one, I’m a lot more likely to believe someone who promised less capacity (It was assumed the first HD-DVD’s would be single layer 15GB) and delivered more, over someone who promised more capacity and delivered less.

Of course Sony could trump all of this by delivering their dual-layer 50GB discs, or even their 4 layer (yes four layers!) 100GB discs, but until it’s on the store shelves and playing in Blu-ray players, you’ll have to forgive me for being less than convinced.

Myth: Blu-ray has better image quality than HD-DVD.

Reality: I’ve yet to find one article, early review or credible observation from a trusted source, that flatly states ‘Blu-ray looks better than HD-DVD’. All the Blu-ray reviews I’ve read thus far all throw in some caveat or disclaimer, that seems to indicate HD-DVD’s performance hasn’t been eclipsed, even if they liked XYZ feature in Blu-ray more.

My own observations (Which I freely admit weren’t with a system I was intimately familiar with) found the exact opposite to be true. So far I’ve viewed, ‘House of Flying Daggers’, ‘Hitch’ and ‘Ultraviolet’ and the Blu-ray demo disc on a 61” 1080p Samsung rear-pro display. Flying Daggers had severe macro-blocking in scenes with single fields of highly saturated colors.

The same thing presented itself in ‘Ultraviolet’ during a close-up of Mila Jovovich's midriff; I again noticed distinct pixilation as if the subtle changes in skin-tone simply weren’t being rendered. It was as if this section of video just got a wash of color as opposed to the subtle shading I’m used to seeing from HD-DVD.

Hitch on the other hand was just plain bad; I noticed more macro-blocking and shading problems, and less sharpness than the other two titles to boot. It was better than DVD but not better enough to justify the expense.

While the Blu-ray demo disc did indeed have better image quality than the full length Blu-ray movies. I have to assume with the demo disc coming in it at 30 minutes or so, Sony was able to take full advantage of Blu-ray’s bit-rate, whereas they couldn’t with the full length films.