Blu-Ray and HD-DVD spar over security measures
by Ross Miller 
{ Aug 10th 2005 at 7:10PM }
Did the Laserdisc and DVD companies ever
clash this much? Did the Laserdisc guys go "Hey, listen, if a consumer was ever involved in a fight, our
Laserdiscs could inflict a lot more damage on an opponent than a small DVD disc, and that is why our product has better
security features." Probably not, because no one would ever think to use discs for fighting (except for that
scene in Shaun of the Dead, but that was with vinyl records and, frankly, it didn't help them much). The big
argument over the next-generation of data storage is protection from piracy, and Blu-Ray already has three separate
security measures. Toshiba's HD-DVD only has two security features planned so far - AACS (which is also on the
Blu-Ray) and an updatable encryption (which is very similar to Blu-Ray's BD+). Yet, despite the similarities,
Toshiba claims that Blu-Ray's extra security (which is, currently, just a watermark) "may result in playability and
reliability issues for the consumer." What?
It's sad that these two companies could never reach an agreement to combine their efforts into one format, because I highly doubt the HD-DVD will ever succeed if Sony's Blu-Ray-equipped PlayStation 3 hits the market first. This could be a reason why the Xbox 360 does not initially have an HD-DVD drive: they may wait to see if it's even worth supporting.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
AbleJames @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Honestly, I'm excited about the technology. That said, until a very good and reliable hack comes out, I'm not gonna be a part of the "it's the inevitable future and we might as well just get it since it's the only way to play High-Def" crowd.
My right to do what I want with the media I buy ARE that important to me, and I'm guessing they are to a lot of other people. I didn't expect them to announce a DRM-free product, but that's really about all I'm gonna shell out my hard-earned cash for, whether the "DRM-free" component is illicit or not.
Joe @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Check out http://www.dvdfile.com/news/viewpoints/editors_desk/2005/05_18.html for why the DRM could result in playability issues. Basically, SPDC (which is conjectured to be what Fox required of Blu-Ray as a condition of releasing discs in that format) and AACS allow for such wonderful things as revoking the ability to play individual discs or use individual players, even after you've bought the discs/player. So, for example, if someone figures out how to hack that new Blu-Ray player you've bought, the studios can set it up so that it no longer will play any Blu-Ray discs. Pretty scary, if you ask me.
Brian @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
HVD IS THE BEST AKA Holographic Versatile Disc
Hundred movies on an optical disc? That's the goal of the Holographic Versatile Disc (HVD) Alliance.Six companies, including Fuji Photo and CMC Magnentics, have formed a consortium to promote HVD technology, which will let consumers conceivably put a terabyte (1TB) of data onto a single optical disc. The consortium said an HVD disc could hold as much data as 200 standard DVDs and with a transfer speed of over 1 gigabit per second, or 40 times faster than a DVD. HVD is a possible successor to technologies such as Blu-ray and HD DVD. Single layer Blu-ray discs hold about 25GB of data while Dual-Layer discs can contain 50GB. DVD discs, meanwhile, hold up to 8.5GB. HVD technology will be pitched at corporations and the entertainment market, the HVD Alliance said. The technology behind HVD is based on holographic technology from Japan's Optware, one of the six founders of the consortium. A technical committee was formed last December to flesh out HVD standards. Sony unveiled a home server with 1TB of storage for the Japanese market last year. Half of the capacity would be enough to record six channels of TV for 5.5 days non-stop, Sony said. The organization, however, is looking at first developing discs with lower capacities. The first assignments of the technical committee involve coming up with standards for a 200GB recordable disc and a 100GB read-only disc. If history is an indication, consumers will fill the disc up. High-definition broadcasting and gaming are also expected to add a heavy burden to existing home storage systems because of the size of the files. Two hours of HD programming take up about 15GB to 25GB.
FUCK HD DVD AND BLU-RAY I WHAT THIS FOR MY P$3 AND XBOX 360!
otakucode @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Why is anyone even talking about HD-DVD any more? I mean, seriously, do some damn MATH. An HD-DVD does not have the storage to even hold a SINGLE 2 hour movie in HD resolution. It's just not there. It's too small. You want to put in a new disc halfway through a movie? No. And nobody else does either. Cheaper to manufacturer? Are we talking an order of magnitude here? Because you're going to need a cartload of HD-DVDs for that Uber Collectors Edition release of Lord of the Rings.
b @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
HD-DVD can hold up to 45 Gbytes on three layered discs. But Blue-ray can record on up to 8 layers, totaling 200 Gbytes. Yet, the minimum for HVD (Holographic) will be 200 Gbytes, and the Max will be 3.9 (Three point nine) Terabytes. Imagine a final fantasy XXIII played entirely in "movie graphics" with this. Or a huge Zelda game.
Henning Hoffmann @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Hate to argue with you (I'm a Blu-ray supporter myself) but the HD-DVD format DOES have enough storage space - just don't use MPEG2! The HD-DVD format allows for encoding in MPEG4 or VC1 as well, and both of these codecs can compress a 2 hour HD movie to fit on an HD-DVD no problem with good quality.
Adam @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
I don't know about you guys, but when I buy a movie, I want the best quality I can get. I don't want compression. Sure you can compress the HD movie to fit on the disc, but then I'm going to be seeing artifacts all over the place and then what is the point of even having HD to begin with? Blue Ray is what I want to win, it's simply better. HD DVD is what I think will win, it's got HD and DVD in it's name, and that's all that joe idiot consumer is going to care about.
duerra @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Adam, you're being ignorant. What you just said is the equivalent of saying that FLAC is worse than WAV simply because it compresses to about half the size.
Lansing @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
umm, i have to agree with Adam though about at least the name. I believe blu-ray will win because of ps3 but joe-idiot will like HD-DVD over blu-ray.
It's funny because when they were talking about maybe joining efforts to make a standard format I asummed they would use Blu-Ray's tech and just give it the HD-DVD name since thats all I thought HD-DVD brought to the table that would be worth taking (besides the elimination of competition that is)
Adam @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
I don't want, ANY compression. I don't care how good everyone says it is. If I am paying for it, I want it perfect. I'll take whatever compression if I am putting it on my mp3 player, my hard drive, whatever. Those places I need to conserve space.
But if I have it on a DVD, I want it to be perfect quality. Blu Ray can do perfect quality, I want that. Also, I could copy my hard drives onto like 6 of them and that's just awesome.
J44xm @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Adam's right in that when you buy a movie or music, you should get an uncompressed copy. Ideally, there'd be a choice between well compressed and uncompressed versions, but if there's no choice, it must be uncompressed.
JOE IDIOT @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Hey I take offence to that.
Taavi Taijala @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Adam, apparently you don't know much of anything about compression. One hour of uncompressed 720p video at 60fps is over 500GB. There is no way you will ever be watching anything in an uncompressed format, no matter how much you want it. The largest Blu-Ray disc to date (and it's not yet been chosen as a standard yet) is 200GB, but when that will be available is anyone's guess since the 100GB disc won't even be in production until 2007.
Data Rate Info: http://www.digistor.com.au/content.php?s=5&p=76
Blu-Ray Disc Info: http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,117867,00.asp
Bryan @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
*Laughs*
Who CARES about high definition or blu-ray technology? I'm perfectly fine with regular DVDs and even VHS's. I've seen movies on huge HDTVs on HD-DVD dics and even though there's a bit of a difference, you're still watching the same movie. And as long as you aren't blind, you can still see the movie perfectly fine.
I think you're all getting caught up in technology; while some people WANT these high definition qualities, it's never going to be a necessity -- so don't get so pissed off about it. Sheesh.
Dribbleman @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Joe Idiot; that's the first time an engadget comment made me laugh out loud. Nice one.
Adam @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Who watches movies at 60fps? Isn't 24 the standard that movies are filmed at, maybe 30.
Anyway, the difference between HD and normal res is HUGE. A lot of times there are huge compression problems (like HD digital cable) but watching an xbox game in HD is awesome (especially on a huge projector...). Would you run your computer at 480i? why run your tv at that?
Your liberal nemesis @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Frankly, things are not:
-fast enough
-cheap enough
-able to hold the amount of data it would take
...to have movies uncompressed. Technically, it's just not a reality yet. Unless you really think having striped-RAIDS of HUGE capacity(terabyte levels here I'm saying) and SDI uncompressed video cards outputting to an HD set is 'reality.' Only editing, post, and effects companies really consider running movies uncompressed, and it's used for creating the movies, not casually watching 'Anchorman' before heading to bed.
The compression has gotten better and it will look great on HD, whichever format you have. And there really is a difference in HD versus regular NTSC, Bryan, it's pretty fookin' amazing if you get a chance to check it out - watch some football games, it's cool being able to read player's names and the crowd shots show detail, not just fields of dots and colors. One thing that does happen is that you get used to it pretty quickly.
You lose a lot of detail when you drop to 720 x 480, the pixel-res of a NTSC frame on DVD. HD is almost 3 times that res at 1280 x 720, and that gets dusted by the 1080 HD formats which are up at 1920 x 1080.
I watched some scenes from 'Attack of the Clones' and 'Return of the King' on my friend's HD Tivo and it was crazy seeing the detail again in the battles - detail I hadn't seen since the movies were in the theater. It really gets lost when it goes to the current DVD resolution.
Mashko @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
I managed to record Spiderman 2 over the weekend in HD and compared it to the DVD I have. Everything jumps off the screen compared to the DVD and I'm running the DVD player through DVI with upconversion and all that good stuff. It just doesn't compare.
http://mashko.blogspot.com
Whuh? @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Adam, movie without compression wouldn't even fit on Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. It's huge, kinda like WAV to MP3. A WAV file can be 60mb while an MP3 is 6mb, what do you want for the same quality? Same thing with compress files, they don't loose anything thing! The last time I check, LOTR HD movie was around 11gb on some torrent site.
Lost_Canadian @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
My contribution to Adam's blind hate for compression - there IS such a thing as lossless compression. That's what .PNG and .ZIP files use, resulting in no loss of quality at all. Saying that you "hate compression" is pretty dumb.
vidGuy @ Dec 18th 2005 10:08PM
Lost_Canadian, you beat me to it.
I hate lossy compression. Obviously, things would be much tougher if we didn't have lossless compression. I've always thought it a good idea to invest just as much time and effort into better compression schemes as you do new storage technologies.
But there is even a case for lossy compression to a point. I believe MP3 is a lossy compression, but at 128kbps or above, there is little (if any) noticable loss in quality. That's because the pieces that are thrown out are not heard by the human ear. Listen to an MP3 sampled below 128. It sounds horrible.
If lossy compression is done correctly, it can be comparable to lossless.
How do you guys get a dual layer DVD onto a single layer? Personally, I use a compressing utility that is technically lossy. It takes a small bit of the detail out of each frame. This amounts to a large size of data over a 2 hour movie... just enough so I can get it onto a single layer disc (I haven't dropped the coin yet for the dual layers). Yet, even with this supposed lossy compression, I don't notice a difference in the picture's quality!
I agree that if I'm going to purchase a movie I want it exactly like it was presented in theaters (can't wait till I get that 10.1 surround sound ;) ), ideally exactly like it was filmed. But this is perception, and there are many ways to achieve an exact look/sound alike with compression.