Blu Ray and HVX200

thefilmaddict

thefilmaddict

Veteran
I am going to take the plunge and get a Blu Ray burner. I want it for two reasons:

1. To create Blu Ray movie's that I can play on my Play Station 3 or on any consumer Blu Ray movie player.

2. To create back up 25-50GB data disks to store my raw HVX200 footage.

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I own a Dual 2 GHz Power PC G5, 4.5 GB RAM and Mac OS 10.3.9.

As far as I can tell, to accomplish my tasks I will need the following items:

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Verbatim
25GB 2X Blu-Ray BD-R Branded

LaCie d2 Blu-ray Drive USB 2.0 & FireWire 301115U

Roxio
Toast 8 Titanium for Mac

Mac OS X v10.4.8
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Questions:

Does anyone see any problems with this setup? Would you buy different items (if so, why)?

It looks like I will need to update my operating system in order to use Toast 8. Is that true? Can I go from 10.3.9 to 10.4.8 easily on my G5? Will my old programs still run?

Will Toast 8 create Blu Ray's that will play on my PS3? Is Toast 8 the way to go? Does it work similar to IDVD (just drag in a Quictime file and burn)?

Anything else I should know?

THANKS!!!
 
Toast does not have blu ray authoring capabilities. It can only create a data blu ray disc. I do product reviews and have confirmed that from Roxio.

At present there is no way to author a blu ray disc with a Macintosh. You can and I have authored HD DVDs with DVD SP 4.2 and red laser dye DVDs.

I've encoded 720/24 footage (over 60) with 4.2 and played it on a Toshiba HD DVD A1. Looks like broadcast HD.

DVD SP 4.2 does not handled 24pn at all - severe skipping. 4.1.2 handled it well.

I usually encode to 10.3 mbps h.264 with AC3/Dolby2 audio. It takes forever even on a fast MacPro, but it's worth the wait.

So for blu ray on a Mac, your set up will NOT WORK.
 
yup - toast only does blu-ray data. Which would be fine for your archiving.

I'd also stay the helll away from that Lacie burner. It 8 months it will be a $1000 ashtray.

There's not really any HD authoring support for the mac now whatsoever - as far as utilizing the actual interactivity and cool features of HD DVD/BLU RAY technolohy. The current mac support is limited to making an HD disc with standard def interactive limitations. You can certianly make a High Def video disc for playback with DVDSP and it will playback no problem.
 
I'd wait until Apple actually implements blu-ray into their Mac Pros. Then you can be sure that they'll support it software wise. You buy Lacie products for their cases, I own a lot of Lacie stuff, but in this case I'd either wait or purchase a pioneer burner (which is probably what's in the Lacie case). Buy now for archival purposes, but wait if it's for production purposes.
 
Adobe Encore will be doing Blu-ray authroing in a few weeks, and is the setup i will be getting on zero day along with a BD Burner. Sony discs are only 8 bucks a peice at frys at the moment as well.
 
Great info guys!

Would it be worth it to buy a PC laptop with a Blu Ray burner (if they make such a thing)? Does the PC have Blu Ray authoring software?

I assume that Adobe Encore will work with a Mac, right? If I wait for that to come out, what Blu Ray burner for Mac do you recommend?

Thanks!

WHY IS SONY SO SLOW WITH NEW PRODUCTS AND WHY ARE THEIR PRICES SO HIGH? ARE THEY TRYING TO LOSE THE BETMAX VS VHS WAR AGAIN?
 
Sony makes laptops with built-in Blu-Ray burners, and there are 5 1/4" addin drives that you can drop into a desktop or external enclosure. Some drives come with bundled authoring software from Cyberlink or Ulead, or you can buy a bare drive.

I have Ulead DVD Movie Factory, and it has a basic Blu-Ray burning module. It lets you put multiple titles on one disk, but it has no menu creation tools, and it only supports MPEG2 encoding at this point. The HD DVD burning module does support menus and templates, but it too is limited to MPEG2 for now. I would expect the next major update to improve both the limited authoring capabilities and add support for H.264 and VC1.
 
Roxio has a PC product for authoring blu ray.

But remember, not every blu ray set top is compatible with blu ray recordable discs.

Some are and some aren't.

This is clear from a number of posts on the internet.

Because we author in HD DVD, it isn't an issue, but for blu ray authoring, it isn't as simple as getting a burner and authoring software.
 
but keep in mind, a quick firmware update will enable blu ray players to play different formats as they hit the market (As was the case when I purchased my player when bd50 wasn't yet available), so don't let initial incompatibility be the deciding factor for you.
 
I don't see blu ray being available for the Mac for a while.

DVD SP received no upgrade with FCS2, which was disappointing.

Even the h.264 encoding support is limited right now, and some times doesn't work

I believe Apple is going to sit on the fence until blu ray or HD DVD prevails in market place.

Which translate into spotted support for HD encoding at least into fall.
 
Apple is a backer of blu-ray and I believe sits on BDA's board of director's. I doubt they're waiting out the format war. I don't think the market is large enough to offer blu ray disc authoring yet, whereas data storage is an easier, more realistic sales angle.
 
I understand that Blu Ray is new, but I'm not asking for much. Even software that created a play only Blu Ray disk would be fine. I'm impressed that people have been able to creat HDDVD disks. I just feel like Sony and Apple are moving kind of slow.
 
Demangone said:
Apple is a backer of blu-ray and I believe sits on BDA's board of director's. I doubt they're waiting out the format war. I don't think the market is large enough to offer blu ray disc authoring yet, whereas data storage is an easier, more realistic sales angle.
Click to expand...

this may be true - but it doesn't really take anything extra to make a Blu Ray video disc over a Blu Ray data disc. You need a Blu Ray burner, the appropriate drivers and software for both.
Yes, the interactive authoring software would be a different story, but burning a play only disc or a disc with standard def menu limitations and HD video shouldn't be that difficult. It's basically what were doing with HD DVD already.
 
Apple may be a blu ray associate, but it is definitely sitting out the battle.

Otherwise, how do you explain red laser dye support for HD DVD for a year, no support for blu ray, and no update at NAB2007 for DVD SP?

There must be a reason, and it isn't for lack of blu ray hardware.
 
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