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dpjones

Audioholic Intern
Does anyone have an inside scoop on what changes are coming soon? I'm wanting to pull the trigger and buy my gear, but I'm wondering if there are some good changes coming, espeically on the video side of things. When it comes to a projector, I've been considering the Sharp Z12000 which can support 1080i. TI is releasing a new chip DLP that will be able to support 1080p. Is 1080p worth the extra cost and wait for a projector to support it? Will broadcasts, or even DVDs, be in 1080p anytime soon? Another issue is HDMI switching on pre-amps. I've been looking at B&K and Sunfire and neither support DVI, let a lone HDMI. I'm scared I will buy my equipment and then later this fall there will be a wave of new components and projectors that handle 1080p/HDMI/etc.

Any thoughts or advice would be greatly appreciated!
 
U

Unregistered

Guest
There is going to be a fairly large amount of new generation gear supporting HDMI and DVI. 1080p is also gaining popularity, but it may be some time in the future before it is fully implemented in DVD's (blue laser DVD's may not even have enough space to support the full raw 38.4 Mbps required for the 1080p signal. So in raw form a 2 hour movie would need ~33.75 GB of space. And that is just for the video signal! Add in 7.1 channel audio and you add a lot more space needed.

So, this is really a technology that is at least 1 more generation away from happening. But, remember that the blue laser DVD's only took about 6-7 years to appear after DVD's first became available, and with compression like MPEG-4, it may very well be possible to have 1080p movies on blue laser DVD's (MPEG-2 disks would still be possible when splitting the movie onto 2 disks, which is surely possible, or using double sided, dual layer disks, which is also possible).

So what you need to ask yourself is, "Is it worth it to buy a 1080p display now, knowing it will most likely last you through 2 more generations worth of media formats probably lasting 14 years or more? Or do you want something that will possibly be obsolete within the next 4-6 years with higher quality format of 1080p being widely implemented?"
 
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dpjones

Audioholic Intern
Thanks for the reply. One of the problems is that there isn't currently a projector that supports 1080p. So, I will have to wait for one and I'm guessing it would be early next year before they are available, and a full year before they come down in price to a reasonable point.

I've also heard/read that 1080p over the airwaves will never happen due to the bandwidth it would require. If 720p or 1080i is all that will be broadcast, then 1080p isn't as important to me. I wish there was a known timeline for when/if these things are going happen.
 
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