Comments on: LOST Blu-Ray Review

By: johr77

johr77 — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 19:34:12 +0000

The thing i don’t understand,

i dont know for sure about the first couple seasons but
im sure at least the past 2 seasons were shot (filmed) in 720p
now how can they show it back in 1080p if it was shot in 720p?
and if the 1st season was not even shot in 720p how can it be 1080p?
did they reshoot it?

my point is if it is shot in 720p, then watching it on a hdtv in 720p
should be the best it could ever look.

anyone with blu-ray knowledge care to respond?

By: Tim

Tim — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 02:30:50 +0000

Yeah I see your points. I don’t feel that Blu-Ray is perfect. I was actually really sad when it won the “high def wars,” because HD-DVD had no load times.

Ah well, such is life.

By: brent

brent — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 00:01:47 +0000

The 28 minute download is just an example to download the entire thing. Downloaded movies are already capable of playing nearly instantly while the rest of the file downloads. And then yes, it will be in your awesome movie collection.

Yes, physical media will still be around 10 years from now. Clearly. Digital rights stuff will be sorted out eventually to the point where even if your hard drive fails, you’ll be able to tell whoever you bought it from that you need to re-download it. And it won’t be a big deal. I get frustrated with DVDs and blu-rays because of the load times. Waiting for menus, un-bypassable warnings and previews. Such a hassle. There is something to be said for point-click-play.

So I would say all your concerns will be addressed in the next 10 years with the possible exception of having a bunch of cases to show off and manually alphabetize.

I didn’t meant to turn this into a future tech debate but I like to bring it up whenever someone hails blu-ray as perfect.

By: professorstotch

professorstotch — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:28:10 +0000

I can easily see physical media still being around in 10 years. Part of the reason American’s buy things (however subconscious the act may be) is to show those things to other people. When people come over to our houses or apartments, we like the feeling when they look at our DVD collection and tell us how awesome it is. With all digital distribution, we’d have to turn on our download devices and wait for it to boot up, and then say “Check out my awesome DVD collection.”

And 28 minute downloads aren’t very meaningful to me when I can drive 5 minutes to Wal-Mart, wait 5 minutes in line, drive 5 minutes back, and be watching that movie or show before the download even finishes. Oh, and when I’m done I can add that DVD to my awesome collection.

The final point I’ll make is the fact that security rights on most all downloadable media is pathetic. I download a movie on my hard drive, I watch it and maybe I delete it. A month later I change my hard drive, and oh crap I want to watch that movie again! Well, I can’t, because when I downloaded it, it was configured to that hard drive/username combination I just got rid of. There goes $20.

By: brent

brent — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:05:26 +0000

I understand that. I just feel it’s inevitable. Just like newspapers drifting away and CDs drifting away, so shall DVDs. I like to hold stuff too but I just don’t see it 10 years from now.

By: Tim

Tim — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:51:14 +0000

I’ve never bought into the idea that video on demand will replace physical media. I still enjoy having something I can put in my hands, and packaging is really cool in some instances too, like the Seinfeld series coming in a mini refrigerator.

Stuff like that is cool to me, and I’ll always buy physical media if it’s available.

By: brent

brent — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:37:30 +0000

I’m holding out on BR until the LOST boxset comes out. Then I’ll probably buy the boxset and my first BR player at the same time. My only concern for blu-ray’s future is the rapid rise of HD VOD. Now, I don’t have have HD VOD or a blu-ray player so my words are merely conjectures. And I’m not affiliated with any service in terms of bias. Anyway, currently, U-Verse can do 18 Mbps to my house. A blu-ray disc has a maximum bitrate of 48 Mbps. So we’re a little ways off here in the USA from getting Blu-Ray quality downloads. BUT, it is rapidly changing. I think I read that AT&T hopes to double their speeds by 2010. And South Korea is out of control – they’re predicting 1000 Mbps in major Korean cities by 2012. With that sized pipe, you could be playing 4k video feeds in multiple rooms of the house. I’m not saying that blu-ray will be obsolete in 3 years, but internet technology is rapidly changing and I foresee digital storage as the way of the future, not a stack of discs. It’s very possible that in 5 years, we won’t bat an eye at 200 GB downloads. At 1000 Mbps, that would be a 28 minute download. That’s about 4-8 times the size of a current blu-ray disc. Kind of staggering. I love blu-ray but I wonder if it’s going to look like a huge tech leap 3 years from now. For me, I’m just all for technology continuing to improve.