HD-DVD, Blu-ray, and region codes...

[London Geezer]

Does such a place even exist?

I don't mind hearing either side's point of view but I wouldn't take either as gospel without some kind of 1st hand knowledge myself, or at least someone being involved whose opinion I actually trust...

Trust no one but yourself!

 

[threepac3]

Trust no one but yourself!

Exactly, and if it sounds one sided it probably is...

 

[wco81]

There is some talk about dynamic region coding. If an American takes a laptop to Europe, it would let him play R2 titles while he's there. It would require him connecting to authenticate an ad hoc region change.

 

[Carl B]

Well, I'm not going to read through all of that, but most of what I've been hearing about BD-J vs iHD paints BD-J as the 'fuller' of the two technologies. The problem for Microsoft (and to an extent Intel) is that it doesn't fit neatly into their Vista paradigm right now.

Whatever the case, I think we can all agree regardless of preference that Blu-ray has the much greater Hollywood momentum right now, and whether that's due to things like BD-J or in spite of them, it almost doesn't matter anymore.

 

[wco81]

Most people at AVS don't trust Amir on a lot of things. Way before MS dropped their "neutrality" and endorsed HD-DVD, people could tell where MS was because of Amir's posts.

There's a lot of skepticism about his claims about how iHD is better than BD-J, which he accused of being too complex with too many methods and classes, higher memory footprint, etc.

Of course MS doesn't want anything with Java to do well.

The BW article suggested that if MS had joined the BDA, Blu-Ray might have adopted iHD. So like everything else, there's politics instead of pure technical merit behind these things.

But some studios have cited their preference for BD-J.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

BD-J, which he accused of being too complex with too many methods and classes, higher memory footprint, etc.

But as a programming language developers are free to use as much or as little as they like, and of course there'd be various studio tools to make things easier. Are people expected to develop an iHD interface writing pure code or will it have tools? Memory footprint seems neither here nor there as well seeing as a few megs RAM is dirt cheap, unless ti's forcing loads of extraneous junk to be loaded too.

 

[PC-Engine]

But some studios have cited their preference for BD-J.

Actually make that one studio...again you seem to not be able to get your facts straight. How many people does it take to change a light bulb? BD-J says it takes about 4 people while iHD says it takes only 1.

 

[London Geezer]

Actually make that one studio...again you seem to not be able to get your facts straight. How many people does it take to change a light bulb? BD-J says it takes about 4 people while iHD says it takes only 1.

Yet for some strange reason, it seems all Hollywood studio and production houses are willing to put up with it, instead of staying HDDVD-exclusive! The blasphemy! The madness!

 

[wco81]

BTW, people reading that long-ass thread at AVS will notice "Julie" says the same anti-Sony things that PC-Engine does here.

Most people have "her" on Ignore over ther etoo.

 

[London Geezer]

Also, i participate in the AVforums discussions (the UK version) and well, it might have some experts, but it's still an internet forum.
It is definately the best place to get informed opinions, but it's still opinions.

That is to say, like you get idiots on here, you get them there too, only there they are much more civil and therefore harder to spot.

At least here you know who the people with an agenda are, from the way they post.

This myth about the AVforums being this perfect ignorance-free place is in need of a revaluation.

So, PC-Engine linking to "some guy who works for MS" is no real surprise, the fact that he posts in the AVSforums doesn't make him a saint. Especially seen how he works for bloody MS. Then again, PCEngine would do that.

 

[mckmas8808]

Yet for some strange reason, it seems all Hollywood studio and production houses are willing to put up with it, instead of staying HDDVD-exclusive! The blasphemy! The madness!

I know. I still can't figure out why Hollywood millioniare presidents aren't listening to MS and Intel. What's going on?

 

[PC-Engine]

Yet for some strange reason, it seems all Hollywood studio and production houses are willing to put up with it, instead of staying HDDVD-exclusive! The blasphemy! The madness!

What's with the attitude? If you don't like it when facts are presented to correct FUD then don't respond.

BTW, people reading that long-ass thread at AVS will notice "Julie" says the same anti-Sony things that PC-Engine does here.

Most people have "her" on Ignore over ther etoo.

And people who know their facts over at AVS have to help you with your facts over there just like I'm helping you with your facts here.

This myth about the AVforums being this perfect ignorance-free place is in need of a revaluation.

So, PC-Engine linking to "some guy who works for MS" is no real surprise, the fact that he posts in the AVSforums doesn't make him a saint. Especially seen how he works for bloody MS. Then again, PCEngine would do that.

How did this thread turn into a debate about my *agenda* l-b? If you have a problem reading then go back and read what I said. Nobody is forcing you to drink sugar water from MS. If you don't want to learn about iHD then don't read what Amir posts. Nobody is forcing you to do anything so maybe you should calm down.

 

[London Geezer]

My attitude?

Mate, it's your "MY WORD IS FACT" attitude that got you banned, not me.

 

[PC-Engine]

My attitude?

Mate, it's your "MY WORD IS FACT" attitude that got you banned, not me.

For someone who keeps telling others to chill, maybe you should take your own advice. BTW my temporary ban has NOTHING to do with what you're saying. Not sure what my banning has anything to do with this thread. Seems like you're hoping for a permanent ban..sorry to disappoint you. If anyone should be banned it should be you for trying to derail this thread into a MS and PC-Engine cannot be trusted thread.

FACT: 1 studio was in favor of BD-J. Feel free to spin it anyway you like.

Edit: Actually that 1 studio wasn't in favor of BD-J, that studio didn't care one way or another.

 

[London Geezer]

For someone who keeps telling others to chill, maybe you should take your own advice. BTW my temporary ban has NOTHING to do with what you're saying. Not sure what my banning has anything to do with this thread. Seems like you're hoping for a permanent ban..sorry to disappoint you.

I couldn't care less if you live or die to be honest.

Your "FACT" was limited to a link to a guy who works for MS, telling us how iHD is better than BDJ (which is a really crap name, or maybe i just have a dirty mind). Which is again no surprise, since anything Java related to MS is like garlic to vampires.

Well check this out, Democoder also knows his stuff - big time - and he doesn't work for MS. Or Sony. Or anyone else involved in stupid format wars. And he made it clear how BDJ is a better solution than iHD.

So, who to believe? I'd go for the guy who doesn't work for any company involved in any of this.

Your point about "only one studio supports BDJ" is kinda useless, since Bluray still has almost 100% of Hollywood behind it, compared to less than 50% for HDDVD.

 

[PC-Engine]

I couldn't care less if you live or die to be honest.

As if that has signicant value to this board.

Your "FACT" was limited to a link to a guy who works for MS, telling us how iHD is better than BDJ (which is a really crap name, or maybe i just have a dirty mind). Which is again no surprise, since anything Java related is like garlic to vampires.

Actually my fact says 1 studio was in favor of BD-J while the rest was in favor of iHD. IOW iHD is better in their view. Feel free to disprove this fact.

Edit: That 1 studio wasn't in favor of BD-J, that studio didn't care one way or another.

Well check this out, Democoder also knows his stuff - big time - and he doesn't work for MS. Or Sony. Or anyone else involved in stupid format wars. And he made it clear how BDJ is a better solution than iHD.

Check this out, Falalada aslo knows his stuff too and? What does that have anything to do with iHD or BD-J? You make no sense. Regardless he gave his *opinion* which means little considering he doesn't know much about BD-J's capabilities/requirements. He's just an outsider looking in.

So, who to believe? I'd go for the guy who doesn't work for any company involved in any of this.

Believe who you want to believe nobody really cares.

Your point about "only one studio supports BDJ" is kinda useless, since Bluray still has almost 100% of Hollywood behind it, compared to less than 50% for HDDVD.

Actually it's not useless. It means the studios liked iHD better than BD-J for whatever reason. This is independent of why some studios support both BR and HD DVD. Don't confuse the two.

 

[DemoCoder]

If you want an example of somethings that BD-J will do that iHD can't, or atleast, no one is aware of.

1) Download new trailers, subtitles, and other content to the disc. Network access from BD-J allows any features you want.
For example, recognize what you think is an actor, but can't remember his name? Overlay IMDB looked up information in onscreen popups. Link to RottenTomatoes and rate movies as you watch them. Chat with other people watching the same movie. Skys the limit.

2) Frame-accurate synchronized animation rendered-on-the-fly.

3) Integration of broadcast and disc distributed format. BD-J is a superset of DVB-GEM. The same movie menus you get on the BR-DVD can be had on the broadcast version.


Of course Microsoft and their lap-dog HP is going to be pro-iHD (Intel probably too), because Microsoft gets a license fee everytime it is used. I'm sure MS has great things to say about VC-1 over H.264 as well. This is a very PC specific world view, tied into the Wintel monopoly. From HP's point of view, they want to leverage their existing investment and relationship with MS, so why would they want to rock the boat and go with Sun, which would only piss off Microsoft.

Remember, Microsoft lost a billion dollar lawsuit to Sun because MS was attempting to thwart Java's success by breaking contractual obligations they had before Java took off big (MS agreed to produce a standards compliant VM back when Java was not a threat to Microsoft)

MS also doesn't like Flash, and Amir trash talks about Flash too, even tho, hands down, Flash is the best system, bar none, for designing interactive content, thats why almost ALL movie sites on the internet for new movies are done with Flash. Hollywood loves Flash. Amir is selling us a nirvana of an HTML-like language, with SMIL-style time annotations, and JavaScript. Well, we have that today, and guess what IT SUCKS compared to Flash and Java for during fancy interactivity.

HTML+TIME, HTML+SMIL never took off. HTML+SMIL+SVG. All destroyed by Flash.

 

[PC-Engine]

Download new trailers, subtitles, and other content to the disc. Network access from BD-J allows any features you want.
For example, recognize what you think is an actor, but can't remember his name? Overlay IMDB looked up information in onscreen popups. Link to RottenTomatoes and rate movies as you watch them. Chat with other people watching the same movie.

DVDs can do most of that stuff today when played in a computer. It has nothing to do with BD-J being able to do it and iHD not.

2) Frame-accurate synchronized animation rendered-on-the-fly.

What kind of animation? Stick men? What would you use this supposed feature for anyway? It's like saying a Ferrari cannot go offroad...well does it need to for what it's designed for?

3) Integration of broadcast and disc distributed format. BD-J is a superset of DVB-GEM. The same movie menus you get on the BR-DVD can be had on the broadcast version.

Uh unless your setop box is compliant then it ain't gonna happen. Also I don't see cable companies broadcasting bonus features from the disc version with the same menus anytime soon.

Java is slow and hogs up resources big time...

 

[DemoCoder]

DVDs can do most of that stuff today when played in a computer. It has nothing to do with BD-J being able to do it and iHD not.

Completely irrelevent. We are talking about what HD-DVD and BR-DVD players can do, not what computers can do. Most DVD-ROMs don't work on non-Windows OS either.

What kind of animation? Stick men? What would you use this supposed feature for anyway?

Like I said, it's more than about movie playback. The use case for BD-J driven animation is educational multimedia.

Java is slow and hogs up resources big time...

You have no clue what the hell you are talking about. The linear execution speed of Java is orders of magnitude faster than JavaScript, and resource consumption has nothing to do with Java and everything to do with what API profile you support. JavaCard runs on smart cards with <1K of RAM. CLDC runs on <256k of RAM. People who cite "Java is slow" are people who have no clue and are regurgitating FUD, or who are disatisfied with the startup time of Swing applications. That's the only thing that's really slow in Java is Swing. In terms of raw numeric power, Java is not slow at all.

Compare C vs Java on Linpack

Or C vs Java on a variety of scientific benchmarks

It's slower than C, but not by much. But more importantly, it's anywhere from 10x to 100x faster than JavaScript interpreters out there.

Really PC-Engine, you are a FUD parrot of the first degree. Totally ignorant, but confidently asserting what other biased sources assert in other forums as your own opinion.

 

[PC-Engine]

Completely irrelevent. We are talking about what HD-DVD and BR-DVD players can do, not what computers can do. Most DVD-ROMs don't work on non-Windows OS either.

It's not irrelevent. In fact you're proving my point. DVDs can do it when played in a PC. IOW it has NOTHING to do with software language and EVERYTHING to do with what the hardware allows. It makes your programming language comparison moot.

Like I said, it's more than about movie playback. The use case for BD-J driven animation is educational multimedia.

Oh so now it's superior because you can have primitive animation in educational discs. Last time I checked even old DVD menu authoring apps can add animation. You make it sound like it's the second coming that only BD-J could provide.

You have no clue what the hell you are talking about. The linear execution speed of Java is orders of magnitude faster than JavaScript, and resource consumption has nothing to do with Java and everything to do with what API profile you support. JavaCard runs on smart cards with <1K of RAM. CLDC runs on <256k of RAM. People who cite "Java is slow" are people who have no clue and are regurgitating FUD, or who are disatisfied with the startup time of Swing applications. That's the only thing that's really slow in Java is Swing. In terms of raw numeric power, Java is not slow at all.

It's slow because it requires more processing power to do a specific task. You know of any menu interfaces for computer programs that are Java based?