Oh, come on, people. You didn’t think I was SERIOUS about this Sacred Disks thing, did you? It’s just a fun way of expressing my happiness with DVD. I don’t actually worship them! Anyway, it’s true that Macrovision causes the picture to go light and dark when played through a VCR. It’s also true that this doesn’t make the picture unusable; however, if you’re buying a DVD player for IMPROVED VIDEO QUALITY, you probably want more than just a “usable” picture! And, even though there are some DVDs without Macrovision, I have yet to buy one without it. If you use an RF modulator, though, you can play DVDs on your TV without going through the VCR. Personally, I just play DVDs on my computer monitor. The picture’s a lot clearer than using a TV.
I think I may have been understating my case a bit, ricksummon. Instead of “far from unusable” I should have said “you can barely tell the difference.” It’s very vague, and most people who watch movies on my system never notice it.
In my experience, the light and dark variation caused by Macrovision is more than noticeable, it’s very distracting. However, this doesn’t mean that people who don’t notice anything are wrong. I’ve heard that about 3% of all VCRs are actually immune to Macrovision, so that might be what’s happening in your case. Anyway, I never DID understand how Macrovision actually worked. How can it confuse the circuits of VCRs without doing the same to TVs?
Before you go out and buy another VCR, there is an alternative. DVHS is now available on the market. DVHS tapes have the same excellent quality as DVDs. Plus, old VHS tapes will still work in a DVHS machine. Plus, you can record with it right now. The only downside is that there are not many commercially recorded DVHS tapes available. But give it a year or two.
Option #2: Buy a DVD player and get a TiVo or ReplayTV box. They basically record broadcast signals to a hard drive. Very fun to play with. And it is true what the slogans say, it will change the way you watch TV
I bought a DVD player, and got it home to find it wouldnt attach to my tv!
I had to route it through the vcr, thus reducing the quality to that of my old vcr. AND the picture faded in and out so bad, it was too annoying to enjoy the movie.
I sold it.
The same night.
Kellibelli, if you’d read any of the previous posts in this thread, you’d realize that the picture fading in and out is due to Macrovision copy protection, which is designed to STOP you from running the DVD player through your VCR so you can’t make copies of the DVD. It’s NOT a defect in the DVD format. To avoid this, you need an RF modulator from Radio Shack to connect your DVD player directly to your TV. It’s too bad you got rid of your DVD player without knowing anything about it. Perhaps you might want to give it another try. With DVD, you can rent videos online from netflix.com. They charge only $15.95 a month for UNLIMITED video rentals INCLUDING shipping, not to mention that they have almost every DVD that exists for rent! The only catch is, you can only keep four movies at a time.
And you SOLD the DVD player THE SAME NIGHT you bought it?! Why didn’t you just return it to the store for a refund?
Okay, DVD kicks ass. But you have to do it right:
[ul]
[li]Get a decent TV. If you can get at least a 27" TV, preferably a Sony Vega or XBR, then you will notice the difference. When you watch a movie at a friend’s house who has GE, you’ll know where that extra money went.[/li]
[li]Hook it up via S-video. This has been mentioned. The reason it works is that it separates the brightness from the color. The digital comb filter (if you get one of the above TV’s, it will most likely have it) in the TV will separate the colors of the analog signal, and then rebuild them, digitally. Sharp![/li]
[li]Get a good sound system! The whole beauty of DVD is the awesome, kick-booty, Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound. in order to enjoy it fully, you will need a receiver. This receiver will need to be able to interpret the 5.1 signal, and then you will need speakers to send it to. You will need front right, center, front left, rear right, and rear left speakers. These are the 5. You shoould also get a subwoofer. This is the .1. The cool thing about DDS 5.1 is that: A) you get stereo to your rear speakers, B) you get true phantom center channel and C)you get an independant signal for you subwoofer.[/li]What’s that spell? Awesome Theatre Sound! Watch “Top Gun” first, you’ll see what I mean.
[/ul]
I can’t stress enough how important sound is to the whole “Home Theatre” experience. Sound is one of the main things that makes the movie good, bad or Grrrreat.
As far as wondering which to buy, the best advice is to get a VCR. You will only see the benefits of DVD if you do it right. Besides, DVD will not replace VHS until
- you can record on it
- it’s cheap
- you can record on it
- you can record on it using a camera
- you can record on it
And even then, VHS will remain popular, as DVD is mostly for home theatre application and audio/video -philes.
So if you’re worried about throwing money away on a piece of equipment that will be obsolete soon, don’t worry about it.
If you are the casual movie watcher, just get VCR. If you plan on building a home theatre, get DVD.
Did I mention not to worry about DVD replacing VHS until it is cheaply recordable?
You are able to record onto DVD for about $1800 for the recorder and about $15 for single sided disks, and a little more for double sided disks. You can record in various different formats as to hold huge amounts of data on one disk.
I’ve got a state of the art theatre with a 100" screen and man every penny is worth it!, about 2 million pennys that is.
DVD players tend to bite in my opinion. The whole CSS thing coupled with so much more, tends to prevent any of the fair use policies. I’d seriously suggest waiting on buying a DVD player.
The MPAA case against Emmanuel Goldstein over DECSS is likely to make some very big waves. (you can read about it here http://www.2600.com) If the MPAA loses likely generic DVD players will start coming out by the boatload. And these won’t have the lockdown’s that players have today.
I’m not going to buy a stand alone DVD player that doesn’t let me fast foward through the commercials in the beginning, that is for certain.
Also, as mentioned before, with the new HDTV’s there will be a new DVD player. The ones out right now do not have the full resolution.
How about me: I have a large TV (big Panasonic with great picture and very good sound). I’m getting a whole home sound system for said TV (surround sound, doubtless Dolby digital with a center track, subwoofers and four mobile speakers positioned around the room). Should I buy a DVD system now while I’m in those kind of stores anyway, or should I wait awhile? Keep in mind: Where I live, the nearest rental place that has DVDs is three hours away one way. I happen to have a life beyond movies. So I either buy DVDs online, at the distant ‘big town’, or I can buy them (the higher sales volume titles only, that is) locally, just not rent them. But I’m willing to buy certain titles to get the extras if the extras are actually worth it. So here’s my question: Would a DVD player be worth it?
You should if you are going for the surround sound system: a reciever or decoder with Dolby Digital (AC-3) and DTS, two front speaker, two rear speakers, a center speaker and a subwofer.
DVD is really the only media that allows for the full use of these. Just make sure that you get the right kind of equpiment. If there is any reason to buy a DVD player it is because of the sound decoding… there is nothing like listining to DragonHeart on a full fledged system.
Ted said:
I wouldn’t. The same problems which you illustrate with DeCSS have been around with music CDs and videotapes forever. Macrovision was supposed to prevent copying of VHS tapes, but it didn’t work all the time, and no one was up in arms about it. If the scheme cracking had taken place back when I bought my player (mid-1998), that might have had a bigger impact. DVD has reached a critical mass of the market now, though, and is seen by the people who buy a lot of movies as the successor to laserdisc. I would recommend anyone buy a DVD player without reservation.
and then:
True. I don’t think I have any DVDs with commercials on them anyway. If you have some, can you tell us what they are so I can avoid buying them? 
It’s true you can’t fast-forward through most FBI warnings on DVDs, but I use the time to make sure the lights are turned down, I have my popcorn, etc. And I think the plus of not having to rewind makes me willing to put up with this. I hate when Paramount makes me sit through the FBI warning in three different languages, but that’s another story.
and then:
It’s true that the 480-line DVD output won’t match the resolution of the 1080-line HDTVs being proposed as a standard. But eight years is a long time off. The standard for HDTV isn’t set, no DVDs are being proposed as far as I know that produce 1080 lines vert, and I think most people would have looked at you like an idiot if you had refused to buy a laserdisc player eight years ago because DVD is coming. I normally replace my equipment a lot faster than every eight years. After all, how much is a DVD player, these days? Two hundred bucks? C’mon. It’s just not worth it to hold off.
Derleth: I’ve found there are two types of home movie watchers. There are those who rent and buy, and those who only rent. Which one are you? If you don’t like to buy, you might not want to get a DVD player in your situation. But, again, as others have mentioned, check out http://www.netflix.com. They’ll bring the rental to you.
Derleth:
Check out http://www.netflix.com. For $15.95 per month, you can rent as many DVDs as you want every month, having four out at any one time. They mail them to your house, and when you’re done, you mail them back in a postage-paid self-mailer. When they receive one back, they’ll mail you the next one on your list; or you can go to the website, tell them you’ve sent it, and they’ll release the next one right away. It’s a great system–I’ve been using it for about a year.
There is a differnce though. CSS wasn’t intended completely as a copyright protection scheme. They have much better tools to do that. It was intended as a way to control the media, what players could use it and how they could use it as well.
And I’m not really irritated that they even did this. I expect nothing less from businessmen… what irritates me is that they belive they are justified in striping away all of your fair usage rights.
I would recommend they see if they can get a good deal. =] If they do not have the fullfledged AC-3 system and the like, I’d really try to find a good player that is less than $200.
I’ll do that =] (there are very few of them, they contain the previews for other dvds at the begining. )
If you’re short on funds and have a nice linux system, just go with a dvd drive. They’re only $100 or so and you have complete control over the disk. No lockout features at all.
2008 is merely when they are making the complete switch over though. 1080 - line DVD players could be out with in the next two years or so. (I’m not saying they will be though.)
My advice to anyone who’s thinking about getting one is plain and simple. Go rent a DVD player and some of your favorite movies. Have a fun time of it.
If you like it, buy it.
If you don’t think it’s worth the price, don’t.
Thanks for netflix. It sounds like a great service. Yes, I do plan on buying at least a few DVDs when I get my DVD player. I do, in fact, have an extensive VHS collection collected over the years. Plenty of them are taped from TV. I’d pay plenty when they come out with a DVD-RW-type system to go with the digital HDTV, but putting DVDs on my analog TV and Dolby digital surround sound (I’m getting the full surround sound system) sounds fine for now. How different is the DVD version of a film from the VHS version of the film? I know quality is leaps-and-bounds better in DVD, but how many extras does the average DVD have?
Well, that’s a good question. There are DVDs out there with no extras at all (such as Street Fighter II: The Movie), and there are DVDs that have so many extras, they need a separate DVD just for the extras (such as Fight Club, The Abyss, or Independence Day). Almost all DVDs are in widescreen and usually have Spanish or French subtitles and/or audio tracks. They’ll also usually have the original theatrical trailer of the movie. A lot of DVDs have commentary tracks by the director or other people involved in the movie. Some of them have “making-of” documentaries about the movie. If you want a comprehensive overview of DVD extras, you might want to check out the DVD reviews at The Digital Bits or other DVD review sites.
Thanks for the link. You guys are better than google.
http://www.insidedvd.com/dvdfaq/dvdvhs.html - general faq
http://dvd.ign.com/news/15687.html - some interesting screenshot comparasions
http://www.dvdcity.com/resources/dvd7.html - general info on standard features.
A couple of points from my point of view:
- Do you never use your VHS to record TV shows? DVD can’t do that (yet). I record 13 shows a week on my VHS (Simpsons, Jeopardy, and Futurama, and no, I can’t watch them all), but I rent movies about two or three times a year. If my VHS broke and I wanted to replace it, there’s no contest, I’d need another VHS.
B) The analog broadcast is scheduled to be discontinued someday (someone said 2008), but I can’t see this happening. The adoption of digital standards has been too slow. The FCC is the agency who made the rule, and congress won’t let them kill off analog that soon IMHO.
III) What’s up with calling VHS tapes/movies “videos”? Wouldn’t a movie on a DVD format also be called a video? It seems to me that videos can come in one of two media formats - DVD or VHS. Of course, I also thought that audio “albums” could come in to formats - CDs or LPs, and the market seemed to decide that album=LP.
DVD stands for Digital Video Disk I think. Right now if I say “Let’s watch a video” most people have an image of a cassette being placed into a VCR.
Just like CDs in the 80’s DVD is a relatively new thing competeting against a product that has been established for years. They need to focus on how different and better they are then the old standard. So they even need a new name so people won’t get confused. I’m not watching a mere video I’m watching a DVD!!
Marc