Video Quality: Blu-Ray vs iTunes' New 1080P

[sholling]

Ars Technica compares the video quality of the new iTunes 1080P movies with Blu-Ray. No real surprises but it seems like it would also be a good guide to what to expect from competing services. At least until someone compares iTunes, Netflix, Amazon, and Vudu.

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Ars was recently able to conclude that the newly launched iTunes movies encoded in 1080p do, in fact, look better than the same content encoded in 720p, despite the modest increase in file size. That's good news for iTunes customers. But the real question is: how do iTunes 1080p downloads compare to the reigning king of home video image quality—Blu-ray Disc (BRD)? This is what we set out to test.

In another 5 day old story they compare iTunes 720P to their 1080P. I'm not an iPerson but some may find this useful.

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In the comments on yesterday's AppleTV story, many people doubted whether 1080p support in the third-generation AppleTV will be very useful. That question becomes even more relevant when observing the file sizes of 720p vs 1080p versions of the same movies and TV shows in the iTunes Store: despite the fact that 1920x1080 means 2.25 times as many pixels as 1280x720, file sizes often differ by a factor of 1.5 or less. So what's going on—is the 1080p content pretty much indistinguishable from the 720p version, or did Apple succeed in magically upping the compression?

For my own viewing I enjoy streaming Netflix and Amazon Prime as a supplement to FiOS-TV but I'm still renting and buying Blu-Rays.

 

[j_garcia]

That's pretty much what I get from Netflix also, which is (up to) 1080p on the PS3. Even with a pretty fast connection, I get some pixelation and banding and it definitely does not have the same detail as BD.

 

[tattoo_Dan]

but I'm still renting and buying Blu-Rays.

that's what I do,I have netflix one-at-a-time BR and my comcast HD,I'm happy with that,I tried streaming movies a couple times and I'm not impressed with it,for now anyway.

 

[timoteo]

I currently have DishNetwork but i just bought a Roku2 XD. I signed up with Netflix streaming+1BD. I am probably going to sign up with Hulu as well. Planning on buying an HD antenna to pick up over the air programing. With these 3 services i will cancel DishNetwork. Ill go from $89 per month to about $26.

Ive noticed that streaming in "1080p" is nowhere near the quality of BD. it seems to me more like 720p. I dont know how fast my internet connection is but im hoping that if i up the speed that the picture will improve. The picture is good enough for me to stream movies but if there is something that i REALLY want to see, then ill rent or buy it on BD.

The DolbyDigital+ is decent when it syncs up right. Ive been having problems with the audio being ahead of the video if i choose DD+. If i change the audio format to Stereo it syncs fine with the video. So i just let my Yammy convert stereo to 5.1 with its DSP but id prefer to be able to choose DD+.

So im still in the tryout stage of streaming before i actually cancel Dish.

Can anyone here recommend a really good over the air HD antenna?...

 

[j_garcia]

Tried out my Roku XD last night and it seems to work quite well. Video quality from Amazon Prime actually seemed a bit better than what I have been getting from Netflix, though I haven't compared the same movie on both yet. My receiver doesn't have HDMI, so only stereo sound for the moment until I upgrade. I was pretty impressed with the video quality using the Roku though. I don't know if it makes a difference, but I also added a 2GB SD card to the Roku even before I fired it up the first time. I had a spare laying around from an old phone.

No more cable bill. There seems to be more than enough content for me to watch. I will just be missing a few things, but I may just sign up for Hulu+ also and that should keep me relatively current on the few shows I do watch.