Author Archives: Stephen Dawson

Visiting elsewhere

Posted on March 23, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

That’s naughty of me. I’ve been hanging around elsewhere over the last ten days or so. Primarily here. That is a site for gathering detailed statistical information on Blu-ray content. I’ve contributed some information on a few discs, thanks to … Continue reading →

Posted in Admin, Blu-ray, Testing | Leave a comment

Overseas Blu-ray purchases

Posted on March 12, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Today I received a copy of the Japanese Anime movie Akira, which I ordered on Blu-ray from Amazon. Reason: the Japanese 5.1 channel Dolby TrueHD sound track is encoded at 192kHz and 24 bits: the maximum supported by the format. … Continue reading →

Posted in Audio, Blu-ray | Leave a comment

To Bookmark, or Not To Bookmark?

Posted on March 12, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

A lot of Blu-ray discs come with a book marking facility. Such facilities have appeared over the years on a number of DVD players. Most were utterly useless, since the moment you popped the disc out your bookmarks were wiped. … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray | Leave a comment

Do these cables support HDMI 1.3?

Posted on February 27, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

On lots of Internet forums there is discussion about suitable cables for home theatre. In particular, people frequently ask about HDMI 1.3 cables. The problem is, despite labels on some cables, their capabilities aren’t as clear cut as simple versions … Continue reading →

Posted in Cables, How Things Work, Rant | Leave a comment

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Posted on February 26, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

In the last item on today’s ‘Best of the Web Today’ column in the Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, the writer draws attention to a gaffe by the US Vice President in which he made reference to ‘a website number’. … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer, General Tech | Leave a comment

Disclosures and subjectivity

Posted on February 24, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

This morning my attention was drawn to my disclosures page on this site (click on ‘Disclosures’ above). Having more or less forgotten about it, I went and had a read. Two things struck me. First, it was woefully out of … Continue reading →

Posted in Audio, Equipment, Rant, Video | Leave a comment

WALL-E Blu-ray vs PAL DVD screenshots

Posted on February 23, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Here’s my comparison between the two formats for WALL-E. The most startling of the six comparison shots is this one (DVD bottom left, Blu-ray bottom right, full frame top):

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More Blu-ray vs PAL DVD screenshots

Posted on February 22, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Classics this time: Bonnie and Clyde (1967) (made slightly topical by Faye Dunaway’s meanspirited dismissal of Hilary Duff soon reprising the Bonnie Parker role – we all have our doubts, but perhaps this will be a breakout performance, proving Duff … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray, Disc details, DVD | Leave a comment

Whacky WALL-E

Posted on February 21, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Well, that has been a struggle. Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment has sent me both the Blu-ray and DVD versions of the most recent Pixar animation: WALL-E. So I set out to do a Blu-ray vs DVD comparison. There were … Continue reading →

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Alex Proyas’ Dark City on Blu-ray

Posted on February 16, 2009 by Stephen Dawson

Reel DVD has released Dark City on Blu-ray. In addition to providing a ten minute longer Director’s Cut version, the Blu-ray offers amongst the greatest picture quality improvement I’ve seen from the format over DVD. UPDATE (Saturday, 21 February 2009, … Continue reading →

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