Harvest Moon: Frantic Farming 
RRP: TBA
RRP: TBA
High-Def Video Superguide
Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD are here. Who makes the best next-generation movie player?
Blu-ray Disc vs. HD DVD
We slice through the technical specs to determine how the formats stack up.
| Blu-ray Disc | HD DVD | |
|---|---|---|
| Disc capacity 1 | 25GB single-layer -R/RE/ROM; 50GB dual-layer -R/RE/ROM | 15GB single-layer -R/ROM, 30GB dual-layer -R/ROM, 20GB -RW/RAM |
| Data transfer rate (audio/video) | 54 mbps (up to 48 mbps for audio and video, with up to 40 mbps dedicated to video; 6 mbps is for overhead) | 32.4 mbps (29.4 mbps for audio and video; 3 mbps is for overhead) |
| Data transfer rate (data only) | 1X BD = 36 mbps | 1X HD DVD = 36.55 mbps |
| Price of media | $20 for BD-R, $25 for BD-RE | Expected spring 2007 2 |
| Maximum resolution | 1920 by 1080 (at 50i, 60i, 24p) | 1920 by 1080 (at 50i, 60i, 24p) |
| Video codecs | MPEG-4 AVC, VC-1, MPEG-2 | MPEG-4 AVC, VC-1, MPEG-2 |
| Audio codecs | Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS, DTS-HD Master Audio, Linear PCM 3 | Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD (core), Linear PCM 4 |
| Maximum number of audio channels | 7.1 (for Linear PCM, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio) | 7.1 (for Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD) |
| On-demand picture-in-picture (via a secondary video stream) | Optional (required as of October 2007) | Mandatory |
| Storage | Optional; minimum of 256MB required as of October 2007 (1GB for BD Live ethernet- connected players) | Minimum of 128MB required |
| Movie studios supporting the format | Buena Vista (Disney), Lionsgate Entertainment, MGM, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Warner Bros. | Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, Warner Bros., Weinstein Company |
| Number of movies shipping in the United States 5 | 167 | 168 |
| Region encoding | Yes | No |
| Bottom line | Blu-ray Disc has the edge with its breadth of studio support, greater variety of hardware, and better specs. But the format's interactive capabilities lag dramatically behind those of HD DVD. | HD DVD devices deliver on most of their promised interactivity. For now, however, your hardware choices are more limited than with Blu-ray Disc. |
Footnotes:1 The writable and rewritable disc formats for Blu-ray Disc are BD-R and BD-RE, respectively; for HD DVD the formats are HD DVD-R/RW/RAM. 2 Burners will ship by spring 2007. 3 At a minimum, a player must decode a core two-channel audio stream from these formats. 4 A player must decode at least two channels of Dolby TrueHD and 5.1-channel audio for the other formats. 5 As of 2/20/07.
Chart Note: Both formats support the Advanced Access Content System copy-protection scheme.
More about LG, LG Electronics, Philips, ATI, Nvidia, Sony, MGM, AMD, Rock, Panasonic, CyberLink, Sony Computer Entertainment, Samsung, Toshiba, Sharp, HP, RADEON, Paramount Pictures, Pioneer, PLUS, Lite-on, Cyberlink, Bill, Twentieth Century Fox, Playstation, Viewsonic, VIA, Xbox, DTS, Dell, FBI, Microsoft, Intel, PowerDVD, Warner Bros, Hewlett-Packard, Data Technology Solutions
2%
10%
Comments
Post new comment