HD DVD coming very soon - Microsoft Windows Media compression

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#1

I just posted the article HD DVD coming very soon - Microsoft Windows Media compression.

Slashdot has an intresting article about the latest Windows Media compression
quality. Altough HD DVD, the format that makes use of the blu ray laser is
making progress and the first…

Read the full article here:  [http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/5722-HD-DVD-coming-very-soon---Microsoft-Windows-Media-compression.html](http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/5722-HD-DVD-coming-very-soon---Microsoft-Windows-Media-compression.html)

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#2

this development has nothing whatsoever to do with the blu ray laser technology. the blu ray laser technology is going to replace current mpeg2 dvds. the MS technology, on the other hand, is intended for streaming media, so a totally different purpose. anyway, if you watch the samples on MS website and zoom them to at least 200 or even fullsize, you’ll see how shitty the quality is. this is FAR from perfect. it seems that with current technology it’s possible to show perfect video in stamp size. ridiculous. zoom a little and you won’t recognise anything. don’t zoom, and you don’t see anything because video is too small. what is needed is perfect quality in fullsize, and this is not possible. the only solution is to increase internet speed by giving all people on earth dsl/cable, otherwise no video compression will help.
[edited by WRFan on 12.04.2003 06:12]

#3

I once encoded HD resolution nandub divx at 1920*1080 that looked really good. I haven’t tried Windows media 9 much since the encoder keeps crashing on me. I don’t know if this will be the successor to Mpeg2 DVD, since MPEG4 codecs usually have problems with complex material like dark scenes.

#4

I don’t feel very good about having some format that is very Windows oriented (even it’s name suggests this) for a general thing like watching movies on a PC which can run a lot of different OSes like Linux, Mac OS, … And on top of these Windows Media formats aren’t aren’t that good quality wise. I would like to see some high quality and open format replace todays formats. I just don’t want to be restricted how, where and when I watch my DVDs and I feel that Microsoft want’s to do exactly that. Restrict us to Windows only and possibly add some shit like Palladium / Digital Restrictions Managment to it.

#5

I’d say DivX, XviD, etc. would do very well at 1280x960. First, one would need a very good RAW HDTV source with at least this resolution and 25FPS (HDTV is specified at 50/60f/s). I checked the average bit-rate of a few DVDs and seen that quite a number only use 3Mbps on average, unlike the 6mbps M$ is using here. Going by calculations here: If DivX/XviD can encode a resolution of say 704x576 at 1000kbps with near original quality, then by calculation, DivX should be able to handle 1280x960 (roughly 3x DVD resolution) at 3000 (3Mbps) with near original quality. This is at half the bitrates M$ are using for their HDTV samples. :wink:

#6

This is one of the killer applications for Intel’s Hyper-Threading Prescott 3GHz processors with 800MHz FSB and the latest 4x DVD writers from LG, Sony, LiteOn, NEC, Ricoh, Sanyo, etc.

#7

The clip I encoded with divx was 1920*1080p. It was from a film shot on HD Cam. I encoded it at 4000 kbps. This was a few years back and I couldn’t playback the clip on my computer then. On my new 2.1 Ghz computer I can play the clip if I turn off all post processing. The clip wasn’t as complex as the microsoft clips so it’s hard to compare. By the way, does anyone know how the windows media decoder works with post processing? Does it have some kind of check of how fast the computer is and applies as much post processing as the system can handle?

#8

windows media video is better than any current MPEG-4 video. People just hate it becus its microsoft (dumb people).

#9

My 2 cents (+ Tax/VAT, ex. shipping and handling) It is not just for streaming. I think is was just last week that there was a press release about Microsoft licensing their technology to movie theatres nationwide. I think it is VERY dangerous for the free world (consumers) if Microsoft technology is also going to dominate another huge market. First software, they tried and still try hardware, now Movies and next sound. My stand is similar to Intel/AMD, which is - Even if they do make a better product, I buy the competitor. Example waiting for the arrival of a Compaq 2100 2.4GHz AMD, 512MB RAM, 60GB HD and if there was an operating system, other than Microsoft’s that would run ALL my Windows software I would reformat my harddrive before you could say monopoly.