"Fastplay" had nothing to do with confusion with menus, it is a convenience feature. It plays a movie directly by skipping all the promo/trailer/meuns etc. crap. It is mostly found on movies for kids. Anyone who has kids will tell you how important "Fastplay" is.

Straight movie play usually means the after the language selection it will play but if you hit MENU it will bring up a menu for scene selection / language selection and subtitles .. if any extra feature are included such as trailers for upcoming movies and current BD releases then there will be a menu option for it.

Some BD discs are like this .. not a lot and yes it is much better for the viewer rather than sitting through the ridiculous trailers and forced ads/copyright notices.

fastplay is designed for those who find it confusing to navigate thru menus -- even if it's kids --
http://disney.go.com/disneyvideos/fastplay/faq.html#Q1

We are talking about James Bond movies here. How many 8 year olds are allowed to watch James Bond movies? Disney DVDs is a different story.

Newdeep .. if kids are watching James Bond flicks parents have a problem ..

7

i rest my case

those on facebook can track this link for the excel blu-ray and dvd of QoS

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/even ... 328&ref=nf

Will the 'Quantum Of Solace' Blu-Ray be Region coded and if so what region will it be? I think Excel's policy of 'Region coding' their Blu-ray releases is a very bad idea, since they are losing out on potentially the largest Blu-ray player base in India, ie. the Playstation 3. Now consider this, most PS3s sold in India are via the grey market and most of those players are 'Region A' from Singapore. To make matters worse, even the officially sold PS3s are not all of a single region. In fact I myself have found PS3s being sold by Sony India from Region A, B & C. Which is why Sony has been releasing all their own Blu-Ray software, free of any 'Region coding' (their Blu-Ray discs are all marked for Region A, B, & C). Whereas the couple of Excel marketed Blu-Ray discs that I have come accross are 'Region C' only. Thus they are of no use to me or any of the other 12 - 13 people I know who have Blu-ray players or PS3s, since they are all 'Region A'. I myself have a PS3 and a Panasonic BD55 Blu-ray player and both of them are 'Region A'.

sanjay, that's a very valid observation.

meanwhile, just double-check -- excel blu-rays also carry region-B in addition to region-C on the same disc, even though case would say only C.

a few also have region-A over and above B and C.

Got the Excel DVD of QUANTUM OF SOLACE! First impressions --- PQ and Audio appear to be fantastic!!

Hindi 5.1 is truly enjoyable -- The movie disc features English 5.1, Tamil 5.1, Telegu 5.1, Hindi 5.1.

The 2-disc edn comes with a slipcover in shades of Silver and Black -- classy!!

Three cheers to Excel -- for maintaining theatrical-release English subtitles for foreign-language dialogues as is (as they are in the theatrical print, in the "reel"), while allowing player-generated English subtitles for English dialogues. (Meanwhile, when you use the remote to cycle through subtitles-ON and subtitles-OFF, you are also presented with "on-screen text-translation subtitles" options for Indian-languages. However, spoken dialogues are available only in English subs.)

Excel appears to be "uncut", at least as uncut as the British DVD. Excel runs 101 min 53 secs; while the British DVD, as reported on the BBFC web site, is almost the same at 101 min 49 secs.

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Yes, the audio and the PQ on Excel QoS both pack a solid punch -- crystal clear dialogue in all languages, just the right bass, and just that wee bit better surround activity than I remember in the theatre! And great colour and nice detail on 29 inch TVs.

The biggest relief is the flawless disc operation -- ekdum makkhan kay maafik -- I was a little apprehensive seeing that it was replicated at Sony DADC, which has been prone to "disc freezing" problems lately. QoS discs (both of them) not only played smoothly, they also loaded faster on the DVD player compared to many other DVDs in my collection.

Good to see Indian languages and dubbing artistes get their due -- Excel have thoughfully included credits for Hindi, Tamil, Telugu dubbings (which roll up at the end of the main movie credits) -- this truly makes Excel QoS a well-rounded complete package IMO.

I caught the Hindi-text subtitles at 4 or 5 places (remember, spoken dialogues are only subtitled in English) -- two of them were translations of messages on cellphone/electronic devices, one of them was an on-screen signage (board) translation, and one sequence was when two people in a car are both talking in foreign (non-English) languages -- with the primary character's (Mathis's) dialogues dubbed in Hindi (and displaying English subtitles as in the "reel" in the theatrical version), and the secondary character's (Cab driver's) dialogues as they are in the English film -- in the foreign language, but subtitled in Hindi. This was an interesting scenario and a lot of thoughts crossed my mind -- allow me some time to articulate them and share with you alongwith screenshots. Very very thought provoking.

The de-cluttered plug-and-play was a welcome relief, and it's a great feeling to have my mother finally be able to play a DVD without my help.

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True to its name -- Excel excels with QoS. The only thing I might miss long-term is the absence of a "chapter menu", but then, without the menu, it's so much more user-friendly for majority of fans in the subcontinent.

I wish film would be worth the transfer too

on the small screen, the film appears to be less flawed... just like ghajini

What is the retail price of the Excel BD?

If you are in India, SMS QOS to 53030 for buying any "Quantum of Solace" product directly from Excel at 15% discount, and which is delivered to your home free.

There are at least three DVD variants in the market from Excel:

2-disc Limited Special Edition with movie in English 5.1, Hindi 5.1, Tamil 5.1, Telugu 5.1 (Rs.499)

1-disc Edition with movie in English 5.1, Hindi 5.1, Tamil 5.1, Telugu 5.1 (Rs.399)

1-disc Edition with movie in Hindi 5.1 (Less than Rs.200)

Looks like there are no VCDs this time.

And Blu-Ray too, but not aware of the price or features still...