Home Video Asylum

TVs, VCRs, DVD players, Home Theater systems and more.

Re: What's with this business about

152.3.3.199

>I've got the Zenith(LG) DVB318 DVD player, and it IS 1080i. Now the
>bad new, the numbers don't tell the whole story. 1080 does NOT equal
>HD quality at all. While regular DVD's upconverted to 1080i looks a
>little better than 480p or 480i, it's not the difference between
>cable TV and HD TV.

DVD players spit out a resolution of 720x480. The reason the 1080i output of your DVD player only looks a little better than 480p is because, well, it is 480 upsampled to 1080i (or probably still at 480p or 720p depending on how the electronics work).

Legit 1080i is HD quality... as is 720p and 480p... these are all HD formats. 1080i is only one type of HD.

There is a new version of DVD being worked on by various groups and manufacturers to make a true HD version. Somoe groups are focusing on higher compression ratios and formats while maintaining the same types of lasers (red). While I used to be against this, I think Vxid and DivX have come a long, long way in the past 2 years and might actually work out... especially considering how much more flexible both of these formats are than the current MPG2 encoding. Other groups are trying to focus more on using blue laser technologies which gives a much narrower beam and will allow much more information to be placed on the same size disc. I'm not sure where the technology is at this point, but I believe they were pretty close to a working model a year ago.

I know that Microsoft is pulling for the compression version... the T2 Ultimate Edition DVD that came out last summer showed off some of their work using the WMV9 codec. I haven't seen it, but apparently it's pretty good. Not sure I like the idea of Microsoft using their codec, but if they get results and don't charge an arm and a leg to the industry... maybe.


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  • Re: What's with this business about - Some Guy 07:27:33 05/10/04 (0)


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