360 HD-DVD

sportdan30 · Post by **sportdan30** » Tue Aug 21, 2007 7:42 pm

True, it is getting ridiculous. I'm ready for one format. It honestly doesn't matter to me.

Sport73 · Post by **Sport73** » Tue Aug 21, 2007 9:44 pm

What's funny is that if they don't sort it out soon, either by one camp surrendering or by the market declaring a CLEAR winner, they will BOTH lose.

Not to DVD, which WILL eventually be replaced by an HD standard, but to Digital Downloads. Whether XBox Marketplace, iTunes, Amazon UnBox, or other, HD downloads are either coming or already here. Despite being lower quality than true 1080p Blu-Ray or HD-DVD, they're a step up from standard DVD and can provide almost instant gratification. If the market or competitors don't let a physical media take hold soon, the market will shift toward this 3rd option and both will be irrelevant.

greggsand · Post by **greggsand** » Tue Aug 21, 2007 10:31 pm

Sport73 wrote:What's funny is that if they don't sort it out soon, either by one camp surrendering or by the market declaring a CLEAR winner, they will BOTH lose.

Not to DVD, which WILL eventually be replaced by an HD standard, but to Digital Downloads. Whether XBox Marketplace, iTunes, Amazon UnBox, or other, HD downloads are either coming or already here. Despite being lower quality than true 1080p Blu-Ray or HD-DVD, they're a step up from standard DVD and can provide almost instant gratification. If the market or competitors don't let a physical media take hold soon, the market will shift toward this 3rd option and both will be irrelevant.

Exactly. The other thing is that people who finally buy a plasma or LCD TV: The first time they watch a SD DVD on their new tv, it'll will instantly look better (esp. compared to watching it on your old tube tv). The average joe doesn''t have a burning desire to get a hd or bluray player out of the gate.

I can't wait until xmas. My mother-in already bought a blu-ray disc by mistake the other day thinking it was just a 'special edition' of a standard def movie. Imagine telling your Grandma, "ok Grams, I want Batman on blu-ray DVD, not HD-DVD or SD-DVD, but Blu-ray! It'll be in a special section away from the regular old DVD's. Got it?" Save those receipts kids, it's gonna be a movie buying nightmare.

wco81 · Post by **wco81** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 10:22 am

Fox is least likely to switch after Sony Pictures.

They've been vocal about BD+.

It's assumed that maybe Disney could be susceptible to overtures from the HD-DVD camp.

Maybe also Warners, but they typically sell twice as many Blu-Ray versions of their movies as the HD-DVD versions, such as 300 which sold 200k to 100k.

Of course, a couple of hundred million dollars would make that sale volume look paltry.

jcalvert · Post by **jcalvert** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 9:01 pm

greggsand wrote:The other thing is that people who finally buy a plasma or LCD TV: The first time they watch a SD DVD on their new tv, it'll will instantly look better (esp. compared to watching it on your old tube tv). The average joe doesn''t have a burning desire to get a hd or bluray player out of the gate.

That was me. First thing I did when I got my new TV was to put in LotR in my PS2 and it looked a lot better compared to my old TV. After getting the TV I had to go HD all the way, which in turn led to my PS3 and Blu-ray support. If you are going to pay 2K or more for a TV, you want the best experience as possible, so you almost have to go with one of the two HD formats.

greggsand · Post by **greggsand** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 9:19 pm

jcalvert wrote:
greggsand wrote:The other thing is that people who finally buy a plasma or LCD TV: The first time they watch a SD DVD on their new tv, it'll will instantly look better (esp. compared to watching it on your old tube tv). The average joe doesn''t have a burning desire to get a hd or bluray player out of the gate.
That was me. First thing I did when I got my new TV was to put in LotR in my PS2 and it looked a lot better compared to my old TV. After getting the TV I had to go HD all the way, which in turn led to my PS3 and Blu-ray support. If you are going to pay 2K or more for a TV, you want the best experience as possible, so you almost have to go with one of the two HD formats.

Sorta, except the "average joe" is paying around $600 to $900 for a vizio or something these days - only a few hundred more than a ps3 itself. Hell, earlier this year, the AP had a study showing most people buying HD-TV's had no 'immediate' plans to upgrade their cable or sat to HD programming. Figure that one out...

jcalvert · Post by **jcalvert** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 9:29 pm

greggsand wrote:earlier this year, the AP had a study showing most people buying HD-TV's had no 'immediate' plans to upgrade their cable or sat to HD programming. Figure that one out...

Does not make sense. I know as soon as I finally decided to pony up 2K for my TV, I put in the order to upgrade my cable to HD programming. It take another 12 weeks to justify the PS3 purchase, but how can you spend the money and not upgrade your movie system?

10spro · Post by **10spro** » Sun Nov 04, 2007 1:21 pm

Toshiba is selling their machine for less than $100.

http://www.dailytech.com/HD+DVD+Player+ ... le9498.htm

kevinpars · Post by **kevinpars** » Sun Nov 04, 2007 6:05 pm

I agree that there is little point upgrading your TV if you are not going to pony up a few extra bucks for HD.

But - at least in the case of the LCD I bought - SD doesn't look as good as it does on a tube TV. Also, it depends on your interests. HD is great for sports, but at the same time, the networks can do a crappy job with the HD feeds for sporting events.

As for a HD player for movies, I am happy with my upscaling DVD, and will wait and see what the format wars bring.

vader29 · Post by **vader29** » Sun Nov 04, 2007 10:36 pm

10spro wrote:Toshiba is selling their machine for less than $100.

http://www.dailytech.com/HD+DVD+Player+ ... le9498.htm

I was able to pick one of these up yesterday as my local Walmart store had two left, very good deal for a standalone hd player plus you still get to mail away for 5 free movies. Picked up the Planet Earth set today as my first hd dvd purchase.

jondiehl · Post by **jondiehl** » Mon Nov 05, 2007 12:11 pm

An even better deal than the Toshiba HD-A2 player for $98 at Walmart (w/ 5 movie mail-in rebate) is their 3rd generation player that just came out, the HD-A3.

It started out at $299, but I picked it up this weekend at Best Buy for $199. Even better, I used a 12% off Reward Zone coupon to get it down to $175.99. $76 more, but here's the kicker..... it comes with 2 free HD DVD movies in the box (300 and Bourne Identity) AND Best Buy lets you take ANY 3 HD DVD's off the shelf for free with purchase. I selected Superman Returns ($34.99), The Departed ($34.99), and Transformers ($29.99).

$175.99 + tax and I got a 3rd generation HD DVD player with 10 free HD DVD movies (3 of my own selection, which had a total MSRP of $99.97).

The wife and I watched Transformers HD DVD the other night and were absolutely blown away by the video AND audio quality (playing on a 110" front projection HD system).

Even if you don't want to get HD DVD's, this thing is an incredible SD DVD upconverted. I played Cars, Nemo, Incredibles, and other standard def. movies for my kids and they looked near-HD.

Danimal · Post by **Danimal** » Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:29 pm

I am experiencing an issue with the HD add-on and newer DVD releases. Both Bourne Ultimatum and the new harry Potter (both combo dics btw) would not play on my 360.

In fact they 360 wont even recognize them as a format it supports. My older HD-DVD still work fine. Ive searched all over the avs forums and xbox forums and some people are reporting similar problems, but thos people are at least getting the DVDs to load, they then freeze etc.

Anyone else having this issue?

10spro · Post by **10spro** » Mon Dec 17, 2007 5:32 pm

Danimal wrote:I am experiencing an issue with the HD add-on and newer DVD releases. Both Bourne Ultimatum and the new harry Potter (both combo dics btw) would not play on my 360.

In fact they 360 wont even recognize them as a format it supports. My older HD-DVD still work fine. Ive searched all over the avs forums and xbox forums and some people are reporting similar problems, but thos people are at least getting the DVDs to load, they then freeze etc.

Anyone else having this issue?

Hmmm, I just bought the 'Bourne Ultimatum' HD-DVD, I'll try it later to see if I have any issues.

10spro · Post by **10spro** » Mon Dec 17, 2007 7:02 pm

The movie asked me to accept cookies or not which I declined. It took awhile to load and at one point the loading did seem to freeze. However after rebooting, the loading time still seemed very long and again at one point of the load the progress line did seem to stop. I waited another minute or so and the movie started.

So based on my experience don't do anything when the loading seem to freeze on you, just wait it out. Not the ideal start for such a good movie but I hope an update fixes this issue.

Danimal · Post by **Danimal** » Mon Dec 17, 2007 8:49 pm

See I don't even get to that point. Mine just says it is an unreadable disc.

10spro · Post by **10spro** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 1:30 pm

'Bourne Trilogy' free with a purchase of the 360 HD-DVD.

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/ ... layer/1277

Danimal · Post by **Danimal** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 1:57 pm

Hey question is your HD version of Bourne the comb (ie Hd one side, Standard the other?)

What I am seeing is any HD DVD I have works, anyone that is a combo won't read the HD side.

10spro · Post by **10spro** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 6:58 pm

Danimal wrote:Hey question is your HD version of Bourne the comb (ie Hd one side, Standard the other?)

What I am seeing is any HD DVD I have works, anyone that is a combo won't read the HD side.

Combo.

10spro · Post by **10spro** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 8:25 pm

Or try this: Go log-in Xbox Live & then play your 'Bourne Ultimatum' dvd. While it loads, just wait & Live will 'update' your Xbox 360 HD-DVD add-on player for you. You might have a open box that says "Would you want to update your HD-DVD"? Then select yes.

After that, the loading is about a full minute before the movie starts. If that doesn't work, you may have a defective disc.

Danimal · Post by **Danimal** » Wed Dec 19, 2007 3:25 pm

Ok I went back and got a 3rd copy and now it works fine. I did some research and the new combo format of HD-DVD's is basically s***. From what i can tell no matter what player you own you've got about a 1/3rd chance in getting a disk that won't play or load.

It's so bad that on the AVS forums someone ties to the format is doign a disc study and if you send them a bad disc they will send you back one that works on your player.

I think until further notice I will stay away from HD-DVD and go with Blu Ray whenever possible.

fanatic · Post by **fanatic** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 10:24 am

I was considering picking the 360 HD DVD today (Boxing Day Sale). Anybody really love theirs? I'm only doubting it because there seems to be a lot of HD movies on TV, including Pay Per View HD movies (e.g. I am going to order Transformers later on tonight).

Do regular DVDs look better on it too?

10spro · Post by **10spro** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 11:08 am

fanatic wrote:I was considering picking the 360 HD DVD today (Boxing Day Sale). Anybody really love theirs? I'm only doubting it because there seems to be a lot of HD movies on TV, including Pay Per View HD movies (e.g. I am going to order Transformers later on tonight).

Do regular DVDs look better on it too?

I do see a difference, and if you have an HDTV to complement the player even better. I've been using the Blu-ray as well for different titlles but the latest flick that rocks on HD is 'The Kingdom'. The other alternative, the Toshiba player is going today here for only $99 bucks , so depending on the price it's a good time to invest in one now.

fanatic · Post by **fanatic** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 11:28 am

10spro wrote:
fanatic wrote:I was considering picking the 360 HD DVD today (Boxing Day Sale). Anybody really love theirs? I'm only doubting it because there seems to be a lot of HD movies on TV, including Pay Per View HD movies (e.g. I am going to order Transformers later on tonight).

Do regular DVDs look better on it too?
I do see a difference, and if you have an HDTV to complement the player even better. I've been using the Blu-ray as well for different titlles but the latest flick that rocks on HD is 'The Kingdom'. The other alternative, the Toshiba player is going today here for only $99 bucks , so depending on the price it's a good time to invest in one now.

Hey...Yeah, I'm in Canada too...just saw the ad for the $99 Toshiba player. I think Best Buy has the 360 HD DVD at $150. Although I heard the sound on the 360 version isn't quite optimal.

Might have to pick up Planet Earth too...

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 12:47 pm

You guys buying the 360 add-on are really missing out on a standalone player. The Toshiba HD-A3 is less than 200 bucks now, so it seems to be fairly silly to have to connect through your Xbox. Any time that you can watch a DVD and not have the ticking time bomb (the 360) running, is a good investment, even if it's like 30 or 40 dollars more.

Zeppo · Post by **Zeppo** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 12:54 pm

fanatic wrote: Do regular DVDs look better on it too?

Regular DVDs won't look any different when played through the 360's HD-DVD add-on than they will when played through the 360's internal DVD drive. The drive makes no difference, it just reads the data on the disc; it's the software in the 360 itself that produces the picture, so there's no difference at all with standard DVDs between the internal drive and the add-on. By all accounts, the 360 is a well below-average DVD player, but by the same token it appears to be as good as any other HD-DVD player in terms of picture quality for HD-DVDs.

I am getting close to buying the add-on myself, but I'm also considering a Toshiba A2 or A3 player, and I'd love to get some opinions from those here who've had experience with Toshiba's units. From reading over at AVS, it seems to me that the HD-A2 is a superior machine to the HD-A3. I'm not sure why that is, but I've seen comments to the effect that it has a better chip set in there. It also appears that the HD-A3 is cheaper to buy than the A2 at a lot of places. Weird. Maybe that has to do with the scarcity of a discontinued unit, I don't know.

My receiver doesn't have HDMI and I will not be upgrading that unit any time in the foreseeable future, so the only way I could get the new lossless audio formats is with a player that has analog multi-channel out. However, I have a Toshiba DVD player plugged into my receiver's multi-channel in which I use for DVD-Audio and SACD (which I really love a lot, though I admit I don't use it all that often). Also, as far as I can tell only the higher-end Toshiba HD-DVD units have multi-channel analog outs, but I'm not 100% sure. I don't really want to be paying the kind of dough to get the A30 or A35 or what have you, and having the DVD-Audio/ SACD player taking up the multi input makes it all that much easier for me to discount that possibility. So, it seems to me i am pretty much out of luck for the new audio formats for now.

Thus, the big question is, what are the bonuses, if any, of the lower-end stand-alones versus the 360 add-on, especially when it comes to audio? Does the 360 add-on decode the new audio formats and pipe them through DD or DTS, or does it just send out the standard DD or DTS audio track? If so, does it do any better or worse of a job than the Toshibas (assuming that they do so), and how much of a difference does that make over listening to the standard DD or DTS audio?

One issue I'm a little worried about is the noise of the 360s fans even when it's just sitting in the dashboard. It's not super-loud, but I'm pretty sure I'd hear it in quiet scenes. Are there other differences between the add-on and the Toshibas that I'm not considering?

If I can find an A3 for oly $20 or $30 more than the add-on, I don't really see a reason to get the add-on. However, if I can get the add-on for $130, it makes it a lot more attractive unless there is something I am not realizing in terms of the benefits of the stand-alones.