Monthly Archives: August 2010

Edge compression effects

Posted on August 22, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

I’m working up a Blu-ray vs DVD comparison for the 2005 version of Pride & Prejudice and noticed something interesting. [Update: the comparison is here.] Virtually all widescreen Blu-ray discs have, in my experience, conformed to a convention where the … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray, Codecs, Compression, Video | 1 Comment

Long delayed Blu-ray reviews

Posted on August 22, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

I’ve allowed my Web uploading of Blu-ray reviews to lapse for a few months, but that is now corrected. So, if you’re interested in my thoughts as published in Sound and Image, Australian HI-FI or Australian Smart Home Ideas, here … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray, Disc details, Giveaway | 3 Comments

You’re Not Even Reading This

Posted on August 20, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

Today I received from local disc distributor, Eagle Entertainment, its latest Blu-ray: Evil Angel, a horror thriller starring Ving Rhames (Marsellus Wallace from Pulp Fiction). The company distributes lesser known and independent films on DVD and, increasingly, Blu-ray. As is … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray | Leave a comment

Apologetically region coded Blu-ray

Posted on August 17, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

I’ve just noticed over at the ‘NEW Unofficial Blu-ray Audio and Video Specifications Thread’ on the AVS Forums a remark about the region coding screen of a new Blu-ray disc. It apologises for its existence!

Posted in Blu-ray, Region Coding | 6 Comments

Another TV arrives

Posted on August 17, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

An email I sent this morning to a certain large company: Well, DHL turned up today with a large carton almost held together by just two pieces of sticky tape. The DHL guy said that his boss back at the … Continue reading →

Posted in Testing | Leave a comment

Finding solutions

Posted on August 16, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

One of the fun bits of this job is inventing protocols to unambiguously determine different aspects of performance. While this is now largely a thing of the past (since most Blu-ray players now feature full audio decoding for all codecs), … Continue reading →

Posted in Audio, Blu-ray, Codecs, Giveaway, Testing | 2 Comments

Co-incidences

Posted on August 16, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

An hour or so ago I was reading a piece online in The Wall Street Journal about Google, in which the phrase ‘sticky wicket’ was used. This derives from cricket, of course, and on a whim I researched the author, … Continue reading →

Posted in Misc | Leave a comment

Yamaha now properly supports 1.0 sound

Posted on August 15, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

Last year I whinged a bit about Yamaha because if would not handle 1.0 audio properly. Its receivers insisted on turning it into 2.0, apparently because Japanese TV had a disconcerting habit of switching between 2.0 and 1.0 for advertisements … Continue reading →

Posted in Audio | 1 Comment

The Godfather: Part II disc replacements

Posted on August 13, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

A while back I wrote about problems with The Godfather: Part II Blu-ray. Basically, it had stopped working at around 1:41:30 into the movie. The picture froze, and several minutes beyond that point were unplayable. I could jump past those … Continue reading →

Posted in Blu-ray | 2 Comments

Chrome

Posted on August 11, 2010 by Stephen Dawson

I’m bit of a conservative these days when it comes to software. Add to that my sometimes background in doing computer articles, which prompted me to keep my installation pretty much bog standard, and I’ve persisted with some software for … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer | 6 Comments