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Ready to go Blu-Ray. Anything I should be aware of?
- Thread starter StephenCampbell
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I have not tried the AirX feature. If you want to watch stuff on little iOS devices why does it need to be Blu-Ray? On those screens surely you can't tell the difference?
edit: Right now it's greyed out for me. I'll try it when I see it available.
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How did you download them again? Did you go as if to buy them, and it didn't charge you again?
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What do you mean?
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I just went into my purchases and redownloaded them.
iTunes never re-charges you to download things you've already bought.
Got it. Thanks!
Now I'll definitely be able to compare Midnight in Paris and In A Better World... cause I have them in iTunes already and will be buying the Blu-Rays.
Fair question. I'm not buying the BD to watch it on the iPhone. I'm on the iPhone wanting to watch a disc I've already purchased in the past on BD and just want to stream it to the little screen.
And to anyone who is about to suggest ripping to iTunes first, that takes way too long and really ruins the spontaneity.
the profile itunes is using now is much better than the one itunes used to use.
It's also not better than blu ray, and it's TOTALLY, UTTERLY FALSE to claim that it's more efficient than what's used on blu ray.
itunes uses main or high, version 4. blu ray uses high profile *only*, version 4.1.
itunes has no advantage here. 8 Mbps vs 50 Mbps is absolutely an apples-to-apples comparison.
Unfortunately I know just enough to be dangerous. I'd be parroting Google results but I'm sure you can uncover some stuff. A program called MCSE is used, if that helps. There's a forum out there that pretty much just messes with this topic.
brentsg -
Yeah, I ended up spending a good hour or so learning about riplock this afternoon. Now I'm weighing the benefits (and likelihood) of finding a drive thats available (currently sold), compatible (with Mac Pros), and flashable (with riplock free firmware). I'm not sure in a venn diagram theres a drive out there that intersects all these circles.
I read that Liteon helpfully allows you to disable riplock by holding the eject button for 3 seconds, the only problem being that Macs generally do not allow access to an eject button on the device.
Yeah, I ended up spending a good hour or so learning about riplock this afternoon. Now I'm weighing the benefits (and likelihood) of finding a drive thats available (currently sold), compatible (with Mac Pros), and flashable (with riplock free firmware). I'm not sure in a venn diagram theres a drive out there that intersects all these circles.
I read that Liteon helpfully allows you to disable riplock by holding the eject button for 3 seconds, the only problem being that Macs generally do not allow access to an eject button on the device.
A downloaded copy would be a bit perfect copy of the file apples servers... any packet loss encountered in in the file transfer (tcp) are resent and the files are checksummed ... streaming the file live can be subject to packet loss as most streams are sent using udp and udp has just sends the packets out but to keep the stream going udp doesn't do any checks so any packet loss means lost pixels. The plus side is if you have a good connection the movie plays with little buffering. i think that the stream is also rate shaped to match the best viewing experience on your connection...
Just watched scenes from Midnight in Paris in iTunes 1080p. I'm beginning to feel like Apple just rushed as quickly as they could to the 1080p resolution so that they could say "1080p HD!" without really having the proper bitrate behind it. I will be getting the Midnight in Paris Blu-Ray.. but just the 1080p iTunes alone looks "soft" to put it diplomatically.
Edit: By the way, the 1080p movie trailers Apple provides come in at about 183mb for a standard 2:30 trailer. That would be almost 9GB for a 2 hour film. QuickTime displays the Mbps at close to 10.. usually 9.7 or so. Midnight in Paris in iTunes 1080p is 5.2 mbps.
The trailers look significantly better than the films on iTunes.. in fact I never had an issue with the picture quality of the trailers, and I've been collecting them all since 2006. Once Apple gets to a 10 Mbps average on iTunes (which will roughly double the current file sizes) it will be much closer to Blu-Ray quality.
Edit: By the way, the 1080p movie trailers Apple provides come in at about 183mb for a standard 2:30 trailer. That would be almost 9GB for a 2 hour film. QuickTime displays the Mbps at close to 10.. usually 9.7 or so. Midnight in Paris in iTunes 1080p is 5.2 mbps.
The trailers look significantly better than the films on iTunes.. in fact I never had an issue with the picture quality of the trailers, and I've been collecting them all since 2006. Once Apple gets to a 10 Mbps average on iTunes (which will roughly double the current file sizes) it will be much closer to Blu-Ray quality.
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Again, Apple is using a different H.264 profile for iTunes. It does higher compression at the same quality at the expense of CPU usage. You can't directly compare the QuickTime trailers to iTunes.
I said iTunes used more efficient encoding, I never said it was better quality. What I was saying is you can't directly compare bitrate vs. bitrate across two different H.264 profiles. That's like directly comparing the bitrate of MP3 to AAC. It's just a bunch of un-scientific hand waving.
It also doesn't mean iTunes implicitly has worse quality. An MP3 file can be better quality than an AAC, and vice versa. But iTunes certainly uses a better profile than Bluray.
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Well, I can compare the trailers to iTunes visually. The trailers look like solid 1080p, crisp image, hardly any compression artifacts, no softening, etc. They don't look as good as Blu-Ray, but they look like a polished version of iTunes 1080p.
What's really interesting is that there are people in this discussion vehemently defending the quality of iTunes 1080p... with a passion beyond what would make sense if it were a simple opinion.
The two are incomparable. Blu-Ray is in a different world. You can argue that it doesn't matter, and that iTunes is good enough for you, but there are several people here who seem to be trying to convince themselves that the difference isn't that great.. and that's ridiculous. On the right screen, the differences become painfully obvious, and when we explore the differences in bitrate between the two (even if iTunes uses a more efficient codec), this obvious difference is explained.
That's not the problem.
That's the problem. Every professional opinion out there puts iTunes at least in the same league as Bluray. It's scientifically proven that at a 30" screen size 1080p should not matter. Yet here we are.
No one is saying Bluray isn't at all better. If that were the case, I wouldn't have a Bluray player. The argument is that scientifically, Bluray really only matters on 40" displays and higher. Yet we're going back and forth about Bluray on a low quality 30" display with stereo speakers. That's why iTunes is in the discussion. The question isn't about Bluray being better. The question is about you not really having equipment to get much more out of Bluray than you would iTunes.
But nobody else has yet spoken in here with personal experience of comparing the two on a 30" ACD, and I'm telling you that there is a very big difference!
It was never my intention to argue. All I did was compare the two on my screen and I shared in here about how surprised I was at how great the difference was, and got responses saying "you must be mentally deranged or something wrong with your eyes because there isn't a difference at that screen size."
I do get much more out of Blu-Ray, okay? The Blu-Ray looks crisp, deep and complete. The iTunes looks soft and washed over in comparison. End of ****ing story. Use your science to Find Out and Explain what causes this visual difference... not to try and deny reality.
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It's already been statistically found that the display isn't big enough to justify 1080p. There aren't enough receptors in the eye.
Your personal choice is your personal choice. I'm not here to stop you from using Bluray or anything. But scientifically the display just isn't big enough or high quality for real 1080p use. Not to mention, because it isn't a 1080p display, you're going to get scaling artifacts on either Bluray or iTunes. It's just a very bizarre choice for someone who claims to be about quality.
Unless you're watching Bluray on a pixel perfect 1920x1080 display (or letter boxing) you're going to get scaling artifacts because it has to create pixels that didn't originally exist.
That's why TV display resolutions have stopped at 1920x1080. You don't actually want to make them higher until you can do something like pixel doubling (which is Apple's way out of this problem.)
Oh my god, please stop posting things like this that are COMPLETELY untrue.
Both itunes and blu ray use h.264. So, no, it isn't like comparing AAC to MP3. It's like comparing a ****ing h.264 video file to another ****ing h.264 video file.
Both use the High profile.
Itunes uses level 4.0 (which has FEWER encoding tricks available to it and is LESS efficient at equivalent bitrates than 4.1)
Blu ray uses level 4.1
you are completely and totally wrong here.
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Seriously dude, you are ****ing captain mendacious.
the human eye ABSOLUTELY can distinguish 1080p on a 30 inch display at anything less than 4 feet viewing distance. I mean, jesus, just look at the chart posted on page three of this thread!
There's no need to lie so much about this, dude. itunes looks pretty damn good, but it's not quite as good as blu ray. these are the facts, and it's not the end of the world.
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What makes you say that?
First of all, if you are referring to the chart posted earlier on page 3, it says that even 1440p would be noticeable on a 30" screen with a viewing distance of 2.5 feet. (I assume Stephan is not watching at couch distance and that he is at his computer desk.)
Secondly, not all eyeballs are the same. I have 20/10 vision. This means I can make stuff out at 20 feet that most people can't see till 10 feet. I can read every single letter on that chart at the eye doctor's office. The last time I got tested, the assistant got all excited, ran out of the room, and told everyone at the eye doctor's office. If that chart is based on typical 20/20 acuity, then it's not relevant to me and many others.
Third, there is more to video quality than resolution and compression method. For example, my BD player properly outputs 1080p/24 content at 24Hz and my TV plays 24Hz content at 72Hz. This avoids the nasty 3:2 pulldown judder on panning. iTunes content does not play at 24Hz in any setup I am aware of, so there has to be a pulldown mismatch. This problem is easily visible to the naked eye during panning shots or anything with a ticker. No screen shot comparison will ever show it. Granted, Stephan is watching on a 60Hz monitor, so he's got 3:2 pulldown, but if he ever gets a home theater his video collection will be ready and waiting for equipment suitable with 1080p/24 content.
I am making the assumption OP is viewing from further than 4 feet away, which doesn't seem unreasonable. I was refering to the chart on page 3 actually. 4 feet is pretty close. (The chart actually looks more like 3.5 feet...)
Dude. That's exactly what I just said.
I sit at my desk, so I am usually no further than 3 feet from the screen.
Thank you to those who have been defending reality with me.
Edit: I'm interested in this 3:2 pulldown issue. Can somebody explain what happens with that on my 30" ACD? Like ActionableMango said, I buy Blu-Ray not just for my current hardware but for any hardware I may have in the future... I'm just curious about this.
Thank you to those who have been defending reality with me.
Edit: I'm interested in this 3:2 pulldown issue. Can somebody explain what happens with that on my 30" ACD? Like ActionableMango said, I buy Blu-Ray not just for my current hardware but for any hardware I may have in the future... I'm just curious about this.
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You seem to make everything in this discussion all or nothing. I haven't seen anyone, including myself, vehemently defending the quality of iTunes 1080p as if it's better than bluray or exactly the same. What we're all saying is that iTunes 1080p quality is pretty darn good, and the differences that you have described in calling it like SD vs. HD is the only thing that's absurd. But moving on from that...
The two are very much comparable. Just a little background so you can see where I'm coming from. You keep making this all or nothing, or a black and white discussion, it's not. I'm literally someone who started collecting movies probably longer than you. (Not sure, just a guess.) I started with laserdiscs, yes, laserdiscs. I remember the video quality jump and correct aspect ratio in going from VHS to laserdisc. At one time I literally had like 700+ LDs. That quality bump was very substantial. Then after LDs, I shifted to DVDs. Again, it was a nice bump and I remember being in the fight to kill off "full frame" DVDs, only bought widescreen DVDs, had DVD cataloging software, etc. That quality bump was great for sound, foreign subtitles, etc. I also rebought many of the same films from my LD collection on DVD for the DTS sound, etc. Then, after DVDs came HD. Holy-freakin-cow, now that is what I call a "mind blowing" experience and upgrade. I personally didn't care about the format (bluray, HD-DVD, even D-VHS) I just wanted everything in HD. It's amazing! So now that we have films on Bluray vs. iTunes 1080p in hopes of more convenience. So as someone who has been through all of THAT, it's just absurd when I hear people saying that Tunes 1080p quality is horrible, or that it's like SD, or that it's not even comparable to bluray, etc. It definitely is comparable, especially when you've been through so many previous generations of video formats that were soooooo much worse.
I personally do buy films on bluray, but I hate the discs. I find that when I own the movies in cases on a shelf, I rarely crack them open and watch them. Why? I have no idea. So I rip them to my hard drive and then watch them at my leisure on my 60" plasma in 1080p via AppleTV and iTunes home sharing. It's soooo perfect for me, and my discs are tucked away out of sight. This way I get the convenience factor of not having to deal with the bluray b.s. of forced menus, trailers and long loading times. Yes, the rips take time, but it's done while I sleep.
So that's where we are. Just defending iTunes 1080p isn't saying it's better than bluray, it's just a reality check on you when you go off the reservation saying how bad it is. It's not. Really. You want to see bad? Get the THX approved DVD of Highlander, and get back to me on how bad movie quality can actually be, before saying a 1080p iTunes film looks as bad as SD to you. It just sounds kind of silly to me.
Peace.
Fair enough.
I'd like to note though that in comparing iTunes 720p to 1080p just now.. I've realized that the 720p actually looks better, and has a higher quality picture, albeit at the lower resolution.
I'm going to continue using 720p on iTunes (which looks much more like Blu-Ray than the 1080p does, in terms of the look of the picture and the clarity), until they have their 1080p a 1080p-equivalent version of what they've been doing with 720p.
Edit: I'll only be using iTunes for TV shows.. just to clarify.
I'd like to note though that in comparing iTunes 720p to 1080p just now.. I've realized that the 720p actually looks better, and has a higher quality picture, albeit at the lower resolution.
I'm going to continue using 720p on iTunes (which looks much more like Blu-Ray than the 1080p does, in terms of the look of the picture and the clarity), until they have their 1080p a 1080p-equivalent version of what they've been doing with 720p.
Edit: I'll only be using iTunes for TV shows.. just to clarify.
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By the way, for anyone who's interested, after Mac Blu-Ray Player decodes a disc and plays it, if you disconnect the internet and put in a different copy of the same exact film, it won't play.. it needs the internet to decode it again.
The vast majority of BDs are film encoded at 1080p/24, the latter part meaning 24 frames per second. LCD computer monitors and most inexpensive TVs display at 60 frames per second. 24fps does not divide nicely into 60fps.
At 60fps, every other frame is played twice (for 24 of the 60fps), and the other half of the frames are played three times (for 36 of the 60). 24+36 equals 60. The duplication and triplication of frames are referred to as 3:2 pulldown.
This is surprisingly not noticeable in most cases, but is very evident usually when there is a ticker or panning. Even complete "video noobs"* will notice it during the credits rolling at the end. Notice how jerky it is? It should be smooth.
Your Mac LCD is no doubt set to 60fps so you are hopefully getting 3:2 pulldown, which is the best way of dealing with the FPS mismatch. There are also worse ways of handling it, depending on the content, the player, and the OS video driver. Those will be painfully obvious though, like a constant flicker. I used to see that when playing imported PAL DVDs (50fps) on the computer.
Capable BD players will recognize 24fps and can output it at 24 fps. Capable TVs will then play it at a direct multiple of 24, such as 72 or 120fps. This way there is no uneven duplication of frames and no judder.
All of this applies to film. Material recorded for broadcast TV/cable/SAT is 60Hz.
* My GF can't even tell the difference between DVD and Blu-ray, but she sure notices judder caused by framerate mismatch.