HD DVD questions........

[Liquifire]

I am thinking of upgrading to HD DVDs and I have some questions. Do they make HD DVD players that are necessary to play these on and is this the way to go. I just looked at ebay and they have some on there with built in processors to upgrade the normal dvd to 720 or 1080.........does that really work well? Or does a standard DVD player play the hd dvds automatically at the higher definition? Need info.........thanks for the help.

[JonB]

I'm no expert but from what I understand, a regular dvd and hd dvd are two different things. They have full hd dvd players out now there somewere around $600+ and from what I understand they will upconvert your old dvd to near HD but will not be full HD like an actually HD dvd. There are also cheaper upconverting dvd players out there that do basically the same the upconvert a regular dvd to near HD. Personally I'm waiting for the price to drop on the hd dvd players and for more movies to come out on hd dvd. It really kinda sucks cause just as you start to get a good collection of dvd's the go and start hd and now its like starting all over.

[94z28l]

just wait, there will be a computer program to turn standard dvd's to hd with in the next year. blue ray is similar to hd dvd

[99_natural_beauty]

I'm no expert but from what I understand, a regular dvd and hd dvd are two different things. They have full hd dvd players out now there somewere around $600+ and from what I understand they will upconvert your old dvd to near HD but will not be full HD like an actually HD dvd. There are also cheaper upconverting dvd players out there that do basically the same the upconvert a regular dvd to near HD. Personally I'm waiting for the price to drop on the hd dvd players and for more movies to come out on hd dvd. It really kinda sucks cause just as you start to get a good collection of dvd's the go and start hd and now its like starting all over.

Ditto on everything. HD dvd players are still pretty pricey, and theres not a good selection of HD movies out there yet (not to mention the fact that I dont have a HD tv either). I am going to wait for things to get a bit cheaper before I dive into the fray. I have no problem being the last kid on the block to have something if it saves me a bunch of money. And yeah, they still havent decided on a single format, there is HD dvd and Blue ray (or however you spell it).. might want to wait until they standardize that first also.

[Big D Z]

...and from what I understand they will upconvert your old dvd to near HD

Its not near HD at all. It could look better perhaps, but only if your TV isn't very good at displaying 480p.

Its simple, you can't convert something that wasn't mastered in HD to be like HD. All you are doing is scaling the picture...that's it, scaling it. Some DVD players and some TVs are better than others at doing this. But don't fool yourself into thinking your regular DVDs will look almost like an HD-DVD

[Big D Z]

just wait, there will be a computer program to turn standard dvd's to hd with in the next year. blue ray is similar to hd dvd

Ummm...no. You can scale a DVD, but you can NEVER turn a regular DVD into HD with software. There isn't enough information in the original DVD. All software will be doing is "filling in the gaps" with a guess to what it would look like. The only way to do it is to remaster the original source into HD.

[Big D Z]

I just looked at ebay and they have some on there with built in processors to upgrade the normal dvd to 720 or 1080

Guess what...and this will blow your mind....Your HDTV already does this for you!!

You send your HDTV that has a native resolution of 1080i a source from a DVD player which is in 480p, your HDTV converts its (scales it) to 1080i for you! Granted, there are DVD players that are better at scaling than your HDTV probably is.

Key word to remember in all of this: SCALING!

[Liquifire]

thanks for all the info, I will wait until the price comes down and not waste money on a converting dvd player

[SLIM_DURST]

I only interested it from a computer point of view - blue ray will how about 25 gigs on 1 disk, while HD DVD abotu 1/2 that. and with blue ray they already can produce 8-layer disks that can hold 200Gig on one disk, but the players for that arent ready for a while. IMO, sounds like blue ray is better in the long term since it can store more, and HD DVD is based on older technology, instead of the new blue laser. as computer users prefer blue ray to store stuff on, so maybe the players on your tv will go that way too

[NICKLE57]

I only interested it from a computer point of view - blue ray will how about 25 gigs on 1 disk, while HD DVD abotu 1/2 that. and with blue ray they already can produce 8-layer disks that can hold 200Gig on one disk, but the players for that arent ready for a while. IMO, sounds like blue ray is better in the long term since it can store more, and HD DVD is based on older technology, instead of the new blue laser. as computer users prefer blue ray to store stuff on, so maybe the players on your tv will go that way too

You are kind of correct. However both HD DVD and blue ray use a blue laser. The difference is in the actual disk themselves. Hence the format war. I think HD DVD will catch on quicker than Blueray

The thing that sucks is that both Blueray and HD DVD's are more costly. I think this whole new format is an excuse to get people to buy the same movies again in HD. Not only that but the new disks cost 25-39 dollars instead of 14-24 dollars.

[Big D Z]

I only interested it from a computer point of view - blue ray will how about 25 gigs on 1 disk, while HD DVD abotu 1/2 that. and with blue ray they already can produce 8-layer disks that can hold 200Gig on one disk, but the players for that arent ready for a while. IMO, sounds like blue ray is better in the long term since it can store more, and HD DVD is based on older technology, instead of the new blue laser. as computer users prefer blue ray to store stuff on, so maybe the players on your tv will go that way too

Blu-ray holds 25GB on single layer, 50GB on dual layer.

HD-DVD holds 15GB on single layer, 30 GB on dual layer, and 45GB on triple layer.

Both use blue lasers.

[Big D Z]

The thing that sucks is that both Blueray and HD DVD's are more costly. I think this whole new format is an excuse to get people to buy the same movies again in HD. Not only that but the new disks cost 25-39 dollars instead of 14-24 dollars.

HD-DVDs cost slightly more to produce than DVDs. There's only a small manufacturing change, so the infrastracture is mostly already there to produce HD-DVDs.

Blu-ray on the other hand is more costly to produce. There is no infrastructure in place. Manufacturing plants have to be completely re-tooled.

In the end, I believe HD-DVD format will win over Blu-Ray. Simply, because consumers are simple. Contrary to what SLIM_DURST believes, consumers do not care about the capacity of the disc. HD-DVDs and Blu-Ray are targeting the HD movie market, not the PC consumer. To a home movie consumer, they can care less which holds more data. Its irrelevant to them. All they know is that HD-DVD is a HD version of DVD. They know the players cost half as much as the Blu-Ray players currently. And they have no freakin' idea what a Blu-Ray is. Not to mention, that so far every picture quality comparison has been won by HD-DVD over Blu-Ray.

[whitelightnin99]

my $89 Panasonic52S looks damn close to HD on my Hitachi with regular DVD's, i dont see spending another $1000 just to get a little better picture.im sure you can tell a difference but its way too much $ IMO

[Big D Z]

my $89 Panasonic52S looks damn close to HD on my Hitachi with regular DVD's, i dont see spending another $1000 just to get a little better picture.im sure you can tell a difference but its way too much $ IMO

Its not $1000, its only $500 for a HD-DVD player.

[whitelightnin99]

still too much

[juiced99ws6]

the new ps3 is a blue ray player for only 600$ and that will help blue ray alot....

[Phlash_riot]

wait a year for a standardized format and prices to drop.

[Ed Blown Vert]

I am still going to wait.

[whitelightnin99]

im sure ill end up with one but ill be patient for now

[Big D Z]

still too much

That's subjective.