dvd-r/rw

[dank]

Someone asked a while back about the availability of DVD recorders. I can't find the thread now, but I had said that a few models were available for under $1,000 and that they'd probably be half that or less within a year. Well, Panasonic has a model out now for $600, the LF-D201 DVD-RAM Drive.

It's in the new Midwest Micro catalog, which is now part of Global Computer (http://globalcomputer.com) or something, although their site is loading hideously slow (I've typed this entire message in the time it took to load two pages) and does not appear to list the drive...

It appears there are three different types of recordable DVD media, the best of which looks to be only tailored for PC use at this time. The Type 1 disk (in a non-removable cartridge) would appear to be the way to go -- more storage space (9.4 gig) and much less chance of disk damage. The latter seems rather significant. DVD (movies) is basically touted for two things: superior sound/picture quality and better durability. Well...

1) I'm not convinced the quality is as much better as the marketers would have us believe, assuming you compare to a quality VHS/Pro Logic setup. VHS has nearly the discernible picture quality of a theater screen and perfectly fine sound quality (why else would the adds for DVD on a VHS sound and look so good?). Where DVD has the major advantage is in surround sound, but that's due to the surround format itself, not really the DVD (Kenwood has introduced a Pro Logic 2 which is supposed to greatly bridge the gap between Pro Logic and Digital). Pro Logic was a pretty lame attempt at rear channel surround sound.

2) Durabiltiy (what this topic started off with...) If a VHS is stored properly, it will not degrade in any noticeable fashion for at least 15 years, probably more. A DVD/CD is just as likely to be scratched in that time frame, rendering it somewhat useless. Aside from the cost and ridiculous size, I believe that's largely why Laser Disc never caught on -- something that big and fragile is asking for trouble. If the Type 1 cartridge approach can be carried over to home theater use, this concern would quickly become a moot point.

[3)] Extra features. After watching a few of these, you can't help but wonder if they are an afterthought that got left on the cutting room floor before DVD... "Hi, I'm Joe Schmo, and I play Bill in the parking lot scene. My character's dilemna is..."

Now that I've gone completely off-topic and stolen my own thread, what the heck's this got to do with general computing...?

Dan

[PaulKroll]

VHS has nearly the discernible picture quality of a theater screen...

You're insane. :)

VHS peaks, PEAKS, at 240 horizontal lines by 480 vertical lines of res. Film is easily 4000/7000, although that varies a LOT depending on the quality of film/era when the film was done. But even a 1940's color film (Adventures of Robin Hood was 1938, two-strip technicolor) is higher resolution than even HDTV.

DVD is 720/480, MPEG2 compressed. There can be compression artifacts, and earlier discs (and cheap discs) often show such. These days, those bugs are pretty much gone. I haven't seen artifacts in a disc in a long time.

VHS is horrible. If the difference between VHS and DVD isn't apparent to you, then consider yourself lucky, because it's driven me INSANE for decades. I had one of the first S-VHS vcrs, just over $1000 when it came out, and several S-VHS decks since then, and not one of them looks as good as LaserDisc (despite the resolution being similar) and none of them came anything NEAR DVD.

Videotape is magnetic. It'll degrade just sitting around. It's tape: as time passes, tapes tend to stick, tend to stretch each time they're played. The magnetic media flakes off (literally, since it's actually being hit by a video head 30 times a second...). The ultimate longevity of DVD is certainly in question, but VHS tapes that are 15 years old are absolutely hideous: if you compare a brand-new one to a 15-year old one, you can see that difference. If you've been watching it once a year for 15 years, you probably CAN'T... though I'll bet I could. :) And it would annoy the heck outa me.

Death to VHS: Long Live DVD! (Well, long enough to get us to HDTV-DVD... DVD is STILL no where near Good Enough, given the technology of today.)

[dank]

I knew someone would object to my VHS/theatre statement in terms of resolution... While picture quality and resolution are technically the same thing, I'd say they're quite different in practice. Resolution doesn't take into account things like flicker, distance, lines vs. size of screen, viewing angles, and large cowboy hats in front of you. :)

Having watched hundreds, if not thousands of videos over the past 10-15 years, and some of them the same tape 100 times or more, I would venture to say I'm pretty well qualified to comment on the picture quality and durability... Of course, I'm also pretty well qualified to be committed... There are tricks to increasing the longevity of VHS, such as not storing the tapes on their side, away from magnetic sources and heat, taking up slack when it's done rewinding (we used to have a super cool custom machined acrylic tool for that), etc.

When viewing movies on my VHS/Pro Logic setup, several people have commented that it's "almost as good" as the theatre. When a friend watched a movie on my DVD upgraded system the other day (with the THX intro that probably woke up every neighbor on the block), his jaw literally dropped and he said, "that's better than any movie theatre!"

Less speakers, less watts, smaller screen, lower resolution, but equal or better viewing experience. That's what I mean by quality being much more than the raw numbers indicate.

Dan

p.s. I'm not dumb enough to goe toe to toe with IMAX. :)

[PaulKroll]

To be fair, resolution also doesn't take into account signal/noise ratio, color accuracy, jitter (seperate from flicker!), and a host of other issues, yes. Contrast being one really large one: I've never seen a video system with the contrast of good film.

If you compare a well tricked-out home theatre to a poor movie theatre, you'll probably find the home theatre more enjoyable, but that doesn't mean that it's "better than any movie theatre!" First, your friend may simply not see or care for the differences: many people don't even see a difference between 6-hour mode VHS and 2-hour mode VHS, which is pretty freakin' obvious to me. Second, that exclamation is likely a brightness issue: Ebert has gone on about this time and time again, and I've seen it at most theatres. They turn down the brightness of the projector to save on bulbs.(Those projector bulbs cost a few THOUSAND dollars each). The result is that films get shown, dark. This is a Big Problem. One of the most fun things about seeing The Matrix on an IMAX screen in Chicago is that it was Well Projected. :)

I don't mean to pick a fight here, but, watching thousands of videos over years and years doesn't mean you're "qualified" to comment on their video quality. Have you ever been dissatisfied with the quality of your video system? I've never been able to stand mine, and most folks who see it are Far More Impressed Than They Should Be. The closest I've ever come to a VCR that was Good Enough was an M2 (that's a tape format, not a model number) portable VCR at an animation house I worked for a summer, but at $13,000 I couldn't afford it and of course, no one put films out on it. :) (That VCR could easily beat some of the specs of DVD today, such as signal/noise, but wouldn't have beaten DVD in resolution: it peaked at about 500 horizontal lines)

Rent a DVD of one of those 100-times-watched films and A/B compare them. If the VHS version doesn't look like a blurry, color-over-saturated, jittering mess in comparison, well... like I said, consider yourself lucky. :)

[dank]

but that doesn't mean that it's "better than any movie theatre!" First, your friend may simply not see or care for the differences
Well, if one does not see or care for the differences and enjoys it more because of it, then that comes back to what I was saying about the comparison being a non-quantifiable thing. Sort of like people saying alcohol is an acquired taste, when the only reason for acquiring it is social...

many people don't even see a difference between 6-hour mode VHS and 2-hour mode VHS, which is pretty freakin' obvious to me.
I'm definitely with you on that one.

Have you ever been dissatisfied with the quality of your video system?
Yes, but only when the tape is in poor condition. [Aside: Like I said before, I was never very impressed with the channel separation of Pro Logic's surround sound, but it was the best available until Dolby Digitial. However, I think that is what generally gets confused with the sound quality of DVD, as proper surround sound placement makes the sound sound much better.] Believe it or not, I actually flip the lid and check every tape for wear in the store before renting it.

It sounds like you know quite a bit about AV equipment (more than your share, actually :) ), but one thing I've often found is that more expensive equipment often is not better sounding/looking, despite the numbers showing it to be higher quality. Again, purely a non-quantifiable opinion.

Rent a DVD of one of those 100-times-watched films and A/B compare them.
One problem with that suggestion -- there isn't much motivation on my part to rent something that I already own on a different format when I believe it to be of fine quality.

Dan

[dank]

watching thousands of videos over years and years doesn't mean you're "qualified" to comment on their video quality.
Also, I said quality and durability. Although durability was listed second, that was the primary point of the statement. For 4 months a year over a 4 year period, I watched about 4 movies a day (nice symmetry; easy math). 10 years later, I still own several of those frequent viewees, and they've held up just fine.

I would guess part of the deterioration people experience is from the quality of their VCR (which, ironically, tend to work better the less frequently you clean them). Car tape players tend to wear out the tapes incredibly fast, supposedly because of the amount of heat produced in the dash. Aside from the occasional chewed up VHS tape, I've never seen one deteriorate.

Dan

[Bruce]

Handled properly, DVDs (assuming they're made from the same material as CDs are) should effectively never wear out. Unlike tape media, playing them simply cannot cause any wear (other than abrasion caused by air, which is pretty minor). The only cause of loss is decay of the actual metal film, which I believe I've heard estimates of having a useful lifetime of between 70 and 200 years.

As an amateur photographer myself, I agree strongly with Paul Kroll's comparison of VHS tape media with film: there simply is no comparison. The information, whether or not your playback deck does interpolation, resolution enhancement, or whatever, simply isn't there to make the VHS signal anywhere near as accurate as film. Unless I'm overlooking something, this becomes even more significant if you're playing a "letterboxed" VHS tape to see the same wide-screen view as the film would provide.

I've seen both high quality VHS systems (in a video production studio), and DVD systems, and would say that you can get a good picture out of a VHS deck, but it requires much more effort and money than with a DVD.

[dank]

I do have a confession to make. After several months of watching almost exclusively DVDs, the video difference of VHS is quite noticeable. Goes back to what I was saying about acquired tastes, I suppose. The main area of difference seems to be that VHS shows dark backgrounds as very muddy. Still not seeing the "blurry, color-over-saturated, jittering mess," though...

However, my VCR heads may well have been mucked up during that interim time period by a 4 hour or so marathon session (and I mean that almost literally ;) ) of constant forwarding and rewinding of a particular tape...

If I'm not mistaken, Paul, aren't the 720/480 DVD resolution numbers you quoted for progressive scan? If so, that's a rather unfair comparison, seeing as how you need to spend another $1000-$2000 for a compatible TV and up until the past few months, at least another $500 for a progressive scan DVD player.

Handled properly, DVDs should effectively never wear out.
Yes, handled properly being the key. I posit that it is easier to accidentally scratch a DVD than it is to damage a VHS tape in a decent VCR.

[PaulKroll]

I watch my DVDs almost exclusively on my computer w/a Viewsonic VA800. So in some ways I'm being unfair, as that's a seriously decent flat panel. :)

However, the 720/480 is just what the machine puts out. If you're going to a normal TV, the 480 part is assured, but interlaced, so it's not All That It Could Be. The 720 horizontal resolution is the one that's most problematic: there are consumer TVs out there that can't display half that resolution, and I am unaware of any under $1000 tv that will do more than about 500-600 across and I'm unsure if the SVHS/chroma/luma signal can actually carry 720 across.

But it's not an UNFAIR comparison, ultimately, it's a pretentious one. :) I assume anyone interested in quality video is going to end up with a $1000-2000 tv, which they'll be selling at a tremendous loss when plasma screens come down in price. I'm trying to wait for plasma, since my Viewsonic is excellent, but the relatively small size of the Viewsonic (17.4 inch) mean I'll probably end up with an HDTV tube in the next six months.

Tapes can fall apart very, very easily and in many ways (dropout, tape actually stretches, dust, humidity, magnetic fields, cats sleeping on them). DVDs can be scratched or broken, but dust and cat hair and humidity shouldn't have any affect... that's shouldn't. All the estimates on DVD lifespan are just estimates, and in the past there've been some pretty ludicrous mistakes in estimating media life. (Some laserdiscs were prone to "laser rot" because the two sides of the disc weren't sealed properly, meaning that eventually, the aluminum would rot. Rust actually. Yes aluminum can rust. It's a long story. http://www.stanford.edu/dept/news/report/news/may17/aluminum-517.html)

[dank]

Aluminum rust, interesting. I can't view that page, but that's probably just my connection. Like you, I've had funny behavior since the switch to AT&T's cable network. Every now and then a particular site won't load, and if I try to refresh the browser on that page, it will hang indefinitely. Anyway...

How much are plasma TVs running these days? One thing I find odd about the hype (unless you'd rather call it something less insulting) surrounding super shallow TVs is that other things like stereo components and speakers are unlikely to match. As it is now, most big screen TVs are about the same depth as your typical stack of A/V gear. Make that TV 8" deep or whatever, and unless you can position all the equipment off in a corner or go with a nearly invisible Bose-like all-in-one system, I would think the lack of depth symmetry would be very disturbing to the eye.

You have cats sleeping on your tapes? Wow, that sounds like the punch line to one of those really bad 80's Ethiopian jokes... :)

Dan

[dank]

Speaking of depth (and going even further off topic), one thing I find annoying is that receivers these days are much deeper than they used to be. I think the dimensions a few years ago were about 17" wide by 12" deep, now it's more like 17"x20", which means about 22" of depth is needed for cables and everything. The problem is that very few A/V shelves or entertainment centers are set up to allow more than 20" of depth. Maybe that's why so many of them are for sale? :P

Dan

[PaulKroll]

You have cats sleeping on your tapes?
Not any more. Now the tapes are placed where the cats can't get to them, which, being cats, means "in a closet that's kept closed".

The stereo and video gear not matching the depth probably will look darn weird to some folks and I'll bet on many more flat-looking components showing up as flat-panels become more popular. As long as the components aren't all strange colors, I don't much care what their visual appearance is: I just want the screen to be freakishly good at displaying an image, and large. If the screen is mounted high above the stack of gear, it might be seperated enough to not look disturbing. I dunno. This'll be Yet Another Furniture Arranging Nightmare for some.

Phillips 42" flat-panel plasma (not that I've seen this particular model, only that it's a price I could find quickly) is at $6,650. I need something closer to half that price to begin to think of it, and I don't think they'll come down that much in the next six months. Besides, that one is 852/480, meaning it's a long ways from actual HDTV... the last time I looked at a really sweet flat screen, it was upwards of $19K. My car doesn't cost $19K, so I have to draw the line... and if I didn't draw the line, my credit card company would certainly do it for me. :)

[dank]

If it makes you feel any better, I've known people who's bikes (the non-motorized variety) cost more than their car. At one point, my roommates and I had something like $20k or $30k in bikes in our garage... Now, before anyone looks up my address and comes at night to break in, let me point out that I no longer have rooomates, nor a garage, nor did my contribution to that total amount to much. :)

Dan

[Tatu]

The A/V Club at war... footage at 11.

[dank]

The stereo and video gear not matching the depth probably will look darn weird to some folks and I'll bet on many more flat-looking components showing up as flat-panels become more popular.
Prophetic. :)

http://www.bestbuy.com/detail.asp?e=11085269&m=1&cat=32&scat=244

Having a hard time picturing that not looking incredibly goofy...

Dan

[ryount]

I got an email from NECX Direct with an ad for an HP drive for $540. I don't know anything about it, but here's the link:
http://www.necxdirect.com/hai/prod_page.html?key=162889&nonce=guest&refer=XE48A

Also, If your order is over $299, use discount code WZ888 for $35 off before 2/13.

Good luck.

[dank]

The prices definitely are dropping into the affordable range. I'm a bit leery of HP quality these days, though. It was starting to show in their higher end calculators 5-10 years ago (quality control; don't ask) and is apparent in their computer products veering toward department store brand status...

For anyone considering DVD burners, look carefully into the format and intended use. From the small amount I've read on the topic, disc types are generally limited to certain types of players and possibly even the same brand (as the burner). As mentioned previously, computer DVD-R and audio DVD-R are apparently different technologies entirely (from a disc standpoint). I did just see an audio DVD-R machine, I believe it was a Panasonic for under $1000.

Dan

[dank]

Here's another "slim" example:

http://www.accessories4less.com/advscripts/detailpg.asp?sModnum=AR-PH5.2CENTER

Dan