Iron Man on Blu-ray - May Have Dodged a Missile

[admin]

In true super-hero style - Iron Man might have narrowly avoided a near disaster. No, it wasn’t an explosive missile from his arch-nemesis in the film, Iron Monger played by Jeff Bridges. Instead it was something that could have been devastating for the film’s Blu-ray release and possibly delivered a spot of damage to the Blu-ray format overall.


Discuss "Iron Man on Blu-ray - May Have Dodged a Missile" here. Read the article.

[mike c]

ack. all my dvd/bd purchases are waiting for Iron Man to release before i hit the order button.

[birdonthebeach]

Imagine that.... blu-ray having a techie problem........

[Seth=L]

Imagine what it would be like now if HD DVD had won the format war. HD DVDs would be starting at $20, players around $100 (maybe some cheaper generic ones would be available).

*sigh*

Now just look what we have to put up with. This supposedly "superior" format is still outlandishly expensive and quirky.

[gus6464]

Originally Posted by Seth=L

Imagine what it would be like now if HD DVD had won the format war. HD DVDs would be starting at $20, players around $100 (maybe some cheaper generic ones would be available).

*sigh*

Now just look what we have to put up with. This supposedly "superior" format is still outlandishly expensive and quirky.

At least look at the bright side. If HD DVD would have won we would have never got Transformers with HD audio or Iron Man with HD audio.

[Wayde Robson]

Originally Posted by gus6464

At least look at the bright side. If HD DVD would have won we would have never got Transformers with HD audio or Iron Man with HD audio.

Wasn't Batman Begins (HD DVD) the first high-def disc to feature a high-res soundtrack.

Not to re-open an old debate because I am firmly entrenched in Blu-ray technology over at the Wayde Home Theater:

However...

There is no way I will be convinced that Blu-ray was/is not an inferior technology - hobbled together too quickly and pushed out the door to compete with HD DVD. It's problems continue to haunt the format to this day and Iron Man is one more example.

The ONLY reason the boisterous majority fell on the side of Blu-ray is one simple numeric value...

the number 50 > 30 (psst... that's the dual layer capacity of each format)

If Blu-ray and HD DVD were purely memory or storage technologies that would be the end of it... Blu-ray would be better. But it was never that simple.

Sony used BD+ (a term I can scarcely spit from my mouth without complete derision) scandalously convinced the studios (ahem...FOX) to side with BD even though it was an untested, ill-conceived and in the end damaging method of content protection.

Convincing the studios there really was a Santa Clause was Blu-ray's slam dunk.

BTW...

Where are we on that class action lawsuit against Samsung for their early BD players... BD-P1000 / 1200?
http://www.courthousenews.com/2008/0...uRayNewark.pdf

I have since fallen in line with Blu-ray and own Panny's BD-30. Let's face it...

...it's a crying shame that there are people out there with HDTVs and they're just using it to playback DVDs and SD television. Even HD digital cable and Satellite is far too compressed to show off the real image quality of HDTV.

[ivseenbetter]

Amen Wayde

[dobyblue]

Originally Posted by Wayde Robson

The ONLY reason the boisterous majority fell on the side of Blu-ray is one simple numeric value...

the number 50 > 30 (psst... that's the dual layer capacity of each format)

Ah but that's not the number that convinced the majority of CE's and studio's to support Blu-ray - it was 54.825 > 36.55

While HD DVD was great for three studios with limited releases per month, it was never designed to handle 1080p with lossless audio for all studios with a mass market release schedule.

Even Amir stated that Microsoft could only handle so many encodes per month in an attempt to "wring out all VC-1 has to offer" - in his own words.

Originally Posted by Wayde Robson

Sony used BD+ (a term I can scarcely spit from my mouth without complete derision) scandalously convinced the studios (ahem...FOX) to side with BD even though it was an untested, ill-conceived and in the end damaging method of content protection.

You couldn't be more incorrect. BD+ was Fox's brain child, co-developed with Panasonic. As Panasonic is the biggest giant in the Blu-ray consortium it took very little to convince the BDA to add BD+ to the specifications. The majority of BD+ testing goes on at the PHL.

It was only damaging to Samsung as they were behind the 8-ball on testing their hardware to conform with specs, thus resulting in them looking a little lost in October 2007 when FF4SS was released. Every manufacturer is welcome to send hardware to PHL for testing, that's part of what it's there for in addition to doing all the Disney and Fox BD encodes.

BD+ so far has been successful in doing what it was designed to do, which is keeping the new codes off the market for a 3-4 week window. There are other parties currently interested in adopting it based on the last year's results.

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Originally Posted by gus6464

At least look at the bright side. If HD DVD would have won we would have never got Transformers with HD audio or Iron Man with HD audio.

I'm still not sure if that really matters.

I was disappointed with Transformers' TrueHD.

One BD reviewer mentioned that he thought the Iron Man's Dolby Digital sounded better than the TrueHD. He later said the DD was 4 or 5 dB louder than the TrueHD.

I have never heard of such volume issues with DTS-HD MA, have you?

[jostenmeat]

Originally Posted by Wayde Robson

Let's face it...

...it's a crying shame that there are people out there with HDTVs and they're just using it to playback DVDs and SD television. Even HD digital cable and Satellite is far too compressed to show off the real image quality of HDTV.

+1

Displays have outclassed the sources feeding them for years now, and that's starting to change with the modest proliferation of BD. This includes 720p displays.

I'd prefer to have a 42" 720p $800 display coupled with a $250 BDP, than a 50" 1080p $2,000 display with SD-DVD and hi-def tv broadcasting combined. With a grand in the pocket.

That's just me. But, my pic will look better, not even close. Source is everything.


edit: mikey c, sorry about that! we all know that you were waiting too... sheesh