To Blu-ray or not to Blu-ray?

Good point. A blu-ray release is no better than the quality of those that produce the product. Some go through a lot trouble to bring you the very best. While other do the minimum just to put the label on the product.

Sometimes I rent before I buy but this is not always a good judge since some manufacturers use a lesser quality for rental discs than they do for the consumer version (generic print).

The good news is, that there are websites that rate many blu-ray disc (as well as DVDs) so you don't have to take a chance on getting less than what you pay for.

 

I like these snippets that talk one part of the experiences of watching BD movies but forget the other hardware that plays the output is more important then the BD hardware player because no matter how good your BD movie is or BD player is if the viewing hardware is craptastic you can rule out any good viewing experiences of watching BD.

 

The best blu ray hardware is a pc, period.

Viewing hardwares, i think it is always laptop screen (maybe monitor) in this discussion.

Keeping everything else equal, a bd will look better than a dvd most of a time, right?

 

Yes, but that's true of almost any product: Try running a Ferrari with SUV tires or off-roads. The experience will likely be less than thrilling. We take for granted the rest of the package is complete.

I've never experienced an occasion when it didn't.

 

There are a lot of blu-ray releases that really is just the originally licensed stream, just put through a stretch-filter. Perhaps with more soundtracks added, along with an upsampled 5.1 track. But that's up to each individual publisher, if they want to do that. And, you know, essentially waste the rest of the space. Seen a lot of re-released releases like that, that are basically dvds that cost less to produce this time around, but cost more in the shop.

(Not that the "official" blu-ray format isn't also a horrible waste of space. Just to have almost uncompressed files playing through a non-lossless decoder in 2013 should, frankly, be illegal. When you easily could have highly compressed near raw-formats, without degeneration in the encode, near what the actual movie was shot in (if the director thinks that will actually look good, and so on) on the same disc..)

 

if you think you might use it to watch blu ray movies. i'm kind of in the same bind. i can convert my dvd drive bay to an HDD bay and use my hdd bay for an SSD. however i sue the discs so rarely i could get a blu ray drive any ways and make it in to an external USB drive.

EDIT:fyi TNG is coming to blu ray, in fact a few season are already released, i read a review and it said they took good care to make it of good quality.

 

For those that aren't science fiction buffs, that would be Star Trek the Next Generation. In any event, the greatest challenge with these upgrade is the sound track.

It's these full more dynamic sounds that give you the all encompassing visceral experience that makes watching a movie via blu-ray far and away more satisfying than any other lesser medium. Granted, you have to have the system to resolve it. But if you do, you'll find all other experiences, sadly, nowhere near as rewarding.

Have you heard if they said anything about re-releasing the original series? That would truly be a challenge to update visuals and sound (they already added updated cg way back when it was released on DVD), and well worth the extra cost if they can get it right.

 

I'll always prefer physical media i can hold and own versus cloud based storage or streaming rental, so I am still a fan of optical media. Currently, blu ray is the best.

As for TNG and the original in Blu ray....personally, I've noticed that sometimes viewing these shows in higher definition can be a bad thing, as you can more clearly discern set construction, makeup effects, and the like. Now, if you enjoy being able to spot these things then it's a plus.

One last aside, Riker never sits down normally in a chair. He always swings his leg over. You'll never see an episode the same way again.
Riker sits down - YouTube

 

I don't think of it as bad thing, but it is definitely more revealing. Nevertheless, this is not something unique to re-released movies and/or TV shows. Rather, all of the industry. Newscasters are particularly aware of the importance these days to "look young" and may agree with your negative perspective. (Notice the texture of too heavily applied makeup?)

Part of his macho image character I suppose. Although if I'm not mistaken, he does sit down normally in one episode and in the movies.

BTW, have you views recent released movies like Marvel's Avengers? On a high quality monitor you can clearly see the bloodshot in Downy's eyes. Is there any wonder a lot of folks don't feel a need for 4k.

 

Yes but, they have edited and digitally remastered and in some cases re-render certain scenes an graphics. there was a good few paragraphs talking about the work going to the LCAR displays alone. and yes they did it right and did right by the series from what i have read. (3rd party review)

 

Same here I prefer the physical media DVD or BD as I can watch whenever and where-ever and don't have to rely on oh will my wifi or network not drop or disconnect me-goes down to I own it and can do as I please with it and watch it when I want to and not have to rely on how good my internet is to watch it. That is the problem with streaming both sides have to be 100% flawless and no disruption otherwise you can forget about constant streaming. Streaming isn't true streaming it is buffered streaming so we should also burst that bubble as well. There is no such thing as true video streaming there is buffering before the video streams or buffering to the device before you can watch it.

 

" I can watch whenever and where-ever and don't have to rely on oh will my wifi or network not drop or disconnect"

yeah i can do that to, it's called a USB hard drive.

 

But do you have true menu functions? I highly doubt that - that is what I mean I use the word whenever/where-ever in relation to physical media.

 

The menus. And the "Pirate this movie you just bought dearly in the shop, and YOU WILL DIE AND GO TO HEL*" messages, of course. I mean, be honest, can you really live without those?

 

Also streaming doesn't give you all the added features: commentaries, alternate endings, theatrical/extended release, etc. All of that--and more--you get with blu-ray.

 

That is fine by me. I can live with them I own it and can watch it with no problems. Now can you live with it??

 

i don't even know what that is but, i do know i have HD movies with multichannel audio and i watch them any time.

EDIT: well any time i home, i don't have an HDD in my laptop big enough nor a USB drive... yet.

EDIT: also you can't take all your blu rays on a roa.... oh well i guess if you have oen those big "books" that holds CDs you can but, a USB HDD is usually smaller. However Digital rips are usually compressed due to size. dang it really is a two sided decision/choice.

 

Physical media have much more then multichannel got different languages subtitles and more menu function then the multichannel audio and more options and extras.

At home physical media and stand alone BD player to fully enjoy DVD/BD movies besides my laptop and desktop that have DVD/BD player software to watch with full menu functions. Laptop I got 1TB drives to store movies on there to watch.

Meaning larger HDD like 1TB drive is bigger then your USB. And cd holder can carry more movies then the USB stick can hold as well.

 

I mean USB hard drive.

 

Less capacity then even a DVD media....no real comparison there...and unless your have good rips those pale in comparison when playing from DVD/BD media itself....

 

http://www.amazon.com/Passport-Portable-External-Storage-WDBY8L0020BBK-NESN/dp/B005HMKKH4

i've never seen a DVD that can hold over 2TB

 

lol...was comparing to regular USB drives...but a HDD USB 1tb drive drop that and you can call that drive junk a dvd/bd drop and break but it's just that media not the complete drive and all the data lost on it. There are pro and cons to either but with a USB drive 1tb of movie you will need to have something to power it on the road while the cd/dvd can run from the player or laptop portable without any problems. So that would be USB drive and power adapter or cd/dvd and player or laptop no more extra cabling to have to just play the movie to watch. But then a TB media that is and most likely is coming and won't be for the masses for the NSA that would be whom would use it.. lol....

 

Incoherent rambling much?

That drive he linked to runs off a single USB cable and gets all the power it needs through the USB port.

 

he is saying optical discs and with stand being dropped. while USB HDDs if you drop them might die also all the cabling to carry them around specially if the require a wall plug. he makes some good arguments i have to say i might not focus on converting all my movies to digital so much any more.

 

¿No comprendo? It's really hard to understand what y'all are trying to say. Even the stuff I write from my phone and tablet is more comprehensible than this.

 

Put this way a HDD portable of 1tb or bigger sounds good but it has moving parts and dropping a attached USB hard drive is not a good way to extend it's life. Most large portable HDD don't usually go on the move as they are usually sitting in one spot and those with external power adapter add more inconvenience to using the drive as a portable drive itself. And for a DVD/BD media a laptop that has a drive for DVD/BD media at least will secure that it is in one device not two device meaning laptop and USB drive and power adapter that is to many part to be making it really portable anywhere. Yeah rambling maybe but I was going on the small USB drives don't hold enough space to truly put movies on them good devices to play from and plus they cost too much when you get bigger on those smaller USB drives so that rules out meaningful portability movies on them. But with anything one can do what they like to do with their portability but there comes scarifies to making it portable. I can't say just a laptop and dvd/bd alone is good but you try to minimize having to have to many devices just to be able to watch and enjoy the movies when your not home to watch on your entertainment system.

 

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No. And my blu-ray rips from my own blu-ray discs don't actually include the title and horror-tracks.

Also, I make a point of never buying films again from people who include unskippable intro-screens. ...I barely watch new films any more, really.

 

Not sure where this conversation has gone in 8 pages but if this was not answered...

I say it depends on your needs. I feel its better to have than to have not if there is only a minimal cost involved. You can still use DVD on a BR drive but not vice versa. However if there is a good cost difference and you have no need for BR at all then skip it.

If the need ever came up by the time it comes up you may be looking for a new laptop by then or can turn to a external BR drive if its simply needing it for games/installs or what ever (I do not see PC games turning to BR only if not forever then for a very very long time)


As for all the other back and forth I saw comparing optical media to hard drives.
That is not any different than it ever was. Optical media is not nearly as high capacity as a hard disk and hard disk can be easily shared via a server or NAS while optical media can more easily be taken with you and played in a device.

If you wanted to carry BR disks around you need a machine with a BR player, if you wanted to carry a 3TB external around you would just need USB.
RIPS can contain all the original BR data including menus and extras. At that point its more of a backup than a rip since your just cloning your disk image for "safe keeping"

Average Max Storage per Media
DVD DS DL - DVD Dual Sided Dual Layer = 17GB
BR DS DL - Blueray Dual Sided Dual Layer - 100GB
2.5" HDD - Laptop size Hard Disk Drive - 1.5TB
3.5" HDD - Desktop Size Hard Disk Drive - 6TB

More common maxes
DVD DL ~8.4GB
BR DL ~50GB
2.5" HDD ~1TB
3.5" HDD ~3TB

I personally prefer HDD to optical media I have lost more optical disks to actual loss, scratches, cracking etc than I ever have a HDD.
HDD is less work for me (not dealing with placing disks in/out or labeling)
I would always keep a backup of any important information, you can easily do that via any medium so if one is lost/broken you do have backup.

 

can stuff like XBMC play the images and list them in the library? or are we still limited to video files?

 

True, but if you drop that 3TB HDD all your data could be lost. A lot less likely with blu-ray discs.

Again true, but only for 4-5 years. At which point you would have to purchase a new drive and transfer your data. Nowhere near the conservative estimated 20-50 years time of a blu-ray disc.

No contest here. Winner HDD.

True, but you're not considering complexity nor expense. In addition, blu-ray disc are more versatile than an HDD. They offer the greatest flexibility and least expensive, especially ease of transport.

I can make a half dozen copies of my data and share or store them with friends with a lot less expense than any other medium.

Granted, your above points are all valid, but newer blu-ray disc are extremely durable with more durable scratch resistant coatings than ever and especially earlier optical disc. Either may be more important than the immediate convenience (which you pay more for) of an HDD.

 

How are they least expensive ease of tranport?
Portable HDD is self contained
Blu-Rays are susceptible to scratches, warping, breaking, fogging, and require an individual case or sleeve for each. They are also larger when considering a large amount of data. I have a 2TB portable HDD that will be dwarfed by the 80+ blu-rays required to match its capacity.

Greatest flexibility?
So many machines don't have a blu-ray player. Portable blu-ray players are also very fragile. HDD's are significantly faster as well. Not to mention I can easily edit, delete, erase, copy, move, etc with an HDD. Not as easy or possible on a BDR.

HDD's can do that too using any medium you want: email, file share, USB, CDR, DVDR, BDR... Sharing is completely different than data storage. I don't worry about the data integrity if I'm just sharing it with someone. I worry about it if it's my backup.

Not really. Take a knife to an external HDD case, then do the same to a BDR and see which one still works. Scratch the HDD case against the sidewalk, and do the same with a BDR, and see which one works. Put direct sunlight in a car on an HDD case, and on a BDR, see which one works. 9/10 the HDD wins those wars. And a 1TB HDD is ~ $60. BDR's cost ~ $1 and requires ~ 40 to match the capacity of that HDD. So it's slightly more expensive for HDD, but it also has better data integrity.

You will never see any IT department worth a salt using optical media to backup their data. For sharing data, sure, just one of many options. But for data integrity, HDD's are where it's at.

 

In fairness, take your HDD and put in a sink full of water along with a Blu ray disk and see which one works. Agreed that no company would use optical media as a backup, but we actually still have tape drive backups where I work. Not sure whether you'd classify those more as an HDD or optical.

For consumer backup, I still recommend optical as a backup to your backup. Wedding photos/video and things that are relatively small in size are great to put on a disc and store somewhere safe, along with a normal backup on an external drive, etc. Just my two cents, and why I hope some form of optical media sticks around.

 

Actually a disc back up is great idea so long as you have it tandem with and hdd or usb back up. thumb drives and hdds fail too.