But the format's interactive capabilities lag dramatically behind those of HD DVD. Number of movies shipping in the United States 5īlu-ray Disc has the edge with its breadth of studio support, greater variety of hardware, and better specs.
Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, Warner Bros., Weinstein Company
Optional minimum of 256MB required as of October 2007 (1GB for BD Live ethernet- connected players)īuena Vista (Disney), Lionsgate Entertainment, MGM, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Warner Bros. On-demand picture-in-picture (via a secondary video stream) We slice through the technical specs to determine how the formats stack up.Ģ5GB single-layer -R/RE/ROM 50GB dual-layer -R/RE/ROMġ5GB single-layer -R/ROM, 30GB dual-layer -R/ROM, 20GB -RW/RAMĥ4 mbps (up to 48 mbps for audio and video, with up to 40 mbps dedicated to video 6 mbps is for overhead)ģ2.4 mbps (29.4 mbps for audio and video 3 mbps is for overhead)ĭolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS, DTS-HD Master Audio, Linear PCM 3ĭolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD (core), Linear PCM 4ħ.1 (for Linear PCM, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio)ħ.1 (for Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD) But King Kong, Lost in Translation, Midnight Run, and Serenity, for example, are HD DVD only. For flicks such as Cars, Casino Royale, Eragon, and the Pirates of the Caribbean Series, you'll need Blu-ray, since those films are produced by studios in the Blu-ray camp.
In fact, no HD DVD movie title today takes advantage of the ethernet connection the format requires players to have.ĭueling technical specs aside, Blu-ray for now appears to be a better gamble than HD DVD, if only for the greater number of movie studios supporting the format. The catch is, these features are not available on all movie titles (see "Now Playing on Blu-ray and HD DVD" for details on what studios are doing on their movie discs).
These minimum specs enable all current HD DVD players to support the format's fun interactive features, giving you the ability to create bookmarks held in memory, even after you eject a disc to play a secondary video stream (for viewing discs mastered with picture-in-picture extras that you can switch on and off while watching the movie) to customize your viewing experience (by changing the color of a car on screen, for example) and to download firmware updates and additional content (such as trailers or extra features that will eventually be stored on remote servers). All HD DVD players must have an ethernet connection, a secondary video decoder, and at least 128MB of built-in storage. The HD DVD format, by contrast, specified more-stringent minimum requirements from the outset. Players produced after October 2007 will fix this problem by adding a 256MB minimum requirement for storage and a secondary video decoder (for on-demand picture-in-picture video).
Though interactivity is a big part of the Blu-ray specification, the spec inexplicably failed to require early Blu-ray Disc players to have the minimum hardware needed to enable such features. The new world of interactivity includes such features as on-demand picture-in-picture displays, the ability to bookmark favorite scenes, Java-based games, and extra content that you can download to your player directly (such as supplemental audio tracks, featurettes, or trailers) via ethernet. Where the Blu-ray Disc format falters today is in how much interactivity it can deliver in the movie playback experience. Blu-ray's additional space also allows movie studios to provide full, uncompressed audio (called Linear PCM) rather than solely compressed (but high-bit-rate) lossless audio technologies, such as Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. Blu-ray supports higher-capacity discs, which gives the format more headroom to mature. Their differences, however, are significant. The competing Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD formats aren't entirely dissimilar. Choose the wrong format, and your player's technology-and your movie collection-may become obsolete. These two formats are vying to be the sole successor to standard-definition DVD, the dominant format for the past decade with no clear winner in sight, you'll have to pick sides when buying a player, whether it's for your living room or your PC. Whichever format you choose-be it Blu-ray Disc or HD DVD-you'll find your viewing experience enhanced by more-accurate and better-saturated colours, and greater detail.