Blu Ray is freakin' amazing!

[Batutta]

Thanks and sorry for being so cryptic. It's really just academic, but I was curious. I hooked up a Sony BR player via component to my 720P Epson Cinema projector. I noticed a huge difference between watching DVDs on a regular DVD player vs. watching the same discs through the Blu Ray player. The few BluRay disics I have watched looked great, but I couldn't tell much of a difference between the BR discs and the DVDs played through the BR player.

I'd hook up via HDMI and see if you notice a bigger improvement.

 

[Jim Brennan]

I will. I covered that argument on the web and there didn't seem be a clear winner for projectors since they don't need the audio signal. It was mostly flame wars about which was better.

I went with component because I have 25' and 50' cables that I use on set for my HVX to go to a monitor. Now that I have an AF-100, I'll need to get some long HDMI cables for that. When I get those I'll try them out to see the difference.

Thanks

 

[Batutta]

It's very hard to do component over long runs without interference or picture degradation, unless you have top notch cable. With HDMI that's a non issue. The cable either works perfectly or not at all. On my projector you can only do true 24fps via HDMI, which produces a better picture. The projector isn't doing any pulldown, it's displaying 24 frames every second like a film projector (actually 48, repeating a frame twice) so you don't get any motion artifacts from 3:2 pulldown in 30p mode. I had my XBOX hooked up via component and there was a HUGE difference in quality between HD DVD's and blu-ray over HDMI.

BTW, eforcity has really cheap cable. I got my 50ft HDMI from there and it's been perfect--

http://www.eforcity.com/

 

[ade4all]

I see a huge difference between decent encoded bluray & decent encoded dvd - but i cant tell the difference between component & hdmi - this is all judged on my 720p Optoma projector on a 100" screen - it looks magnificent both ways

 

[Billy Pilgrim]

Ugh. I gave Alien 3 another look just to check out the 'director's cut' and it was not improved, just more of what was already bad.

In defense of Fincher, the movie was kind of out of his control, with the script being rewritten by the studio at the last minute. The "director's cut" is really just a restored work print. Fincher has more or less said that the only way you could ever have an Alien 3 director's cut is to re-make the entire film from scratch. I'm interested in seeing what that would be like.

As for the actual topic at hand...uh...I would like a blu-ray player and HDTV, but I don't look forward to having to start my collection from scratch again.

 

[Jim Brennan]

As for the actual topic at hand...uh...I would like a blu-ray player and HDTV, but I don't look forward to having to start my collection from scratch again.

That's the best part, you don't really have to. I believe the folks that report a significantly better picture off of a Blu Ray disc even if I haven't seen it in my limited experience, but regular DVDs look far better thru a Blu Ray player on an HDTV than going the SD route. That alone was worth it to me. We have over 700 DVDs. No way I'm replacing all of that.

It's very hard to do component over long runs without interference or picture degradation, unless you have top notch cable. With HDMI that's a non issue. The cable either works perfectly or not at all. On my projector you can only do true 24fps via HDMI, which produces a better picture. The projector isn't doing any pulldown, it's displaying 24 frames every second like a film projector (actually 48, repeating a frame twice) so you don't get any motion artifacts from 3:2 pulldown in 30p mode. I had my XBOX hooked up via component and there was a HUGE difference in quality between HD DVD's and blu-ray over HDMI.

BTW, eforcity has really cheap cable. I got my 50ft HDMI from there and it's been perfect--

http://www.eforcity.com/

Great info. Thanks.