[grovberg]

Didn't I hear something awhile back about Apple joing up with the Blu-Ray group, and as a result everyone was hoping for new Macs with Blu-Ray drives in them? If so, why is Apple talking up it's HD-DVD support in DVD Studio Pro 4? And does this mean that HD-DVD drives are a lot closer than we all thought? Otherwise, wouldn't the software be useless?

Just thought I'd see if anyone else had noticed.

[Big Mac]

Understandable misunderstanding, grovberg - Apple is promoting "HD DVD" support in DVDSP, not to be confused with "HD-DVD." The hyphen makes a big difference. What Apple is apparently referring to is HD video burned to normal DVDs. There is a lot more about the subject located at the Lounge.

[grovberg]

That is indeed the misunderstanding, though now that I understand I do fail to see the point of this and find it entirely misleading. I mean, no set top player will play these things right? So we're tallking about puting computer files on a DVD, no different than having them on a hard drive. I've been able to encode H.264 files for quite some time and burn them to a DVD, so what's new here?

grovberg=confused.

[Big Mac]

If you can already burn H.264 to DVD then I have no idea why Apple is promoting the feature as if it's new.

[Eug Wanker]

I'm sure Apple will support both (assuming there is a format war). Apple already supports DVD-RAM, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, etc.

Originally Posted by Big Mac

If you can already burn H.264 to DVD then I have no idea why Apple is promoting the feature as if it's new.

I have been told that:

1) HD H.264 on DVD media is one official spec of HD-DVD.
2) Apple's implementation of this meets this spec. Simply burning HD H.264 to a disc is not the same thing as meeting an official format specification.
3) It's too early to officially support Blu-Ray, since things are still in flux.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

[bmedina]

Apple will support blue-ray authoring, but the spec isn't far enough along yet. The HD DVD support means you can burn the HD DVD format to a regular DVD-R disc, and it will be readable by hardware HD-DVD players later this year.

[grovberg]

I guess that's what's so confusing. When you "Burn A DVD" from DVDSP now, it implies that you are making a Video DVD that will play in Video DVD Players. It's refers to both the content on the disc, and the disc itself and is part of a spec that all makers of Video DVDs and Video DVD Players agree upon.

If I'm understanding this new process, it's just burning a Quicktime Movie (that happens to be HD) onto media (which happens to be a DVD). One can burn any file to a DVD. and with the ability to create video in H.264 coming as part of QT 7 (and can be done now through other applications) I fail to see how this is can be considered a major feature. The result of creating a HD DVD in this new version of DVDSP will only play in a computer. I could just as well burn a HD WMV file to a standard DVD and call it a HD DVD as Apple is defining it.

I guess I'm just repeating myself, but I have to believe that there's more to it than that since Apple is treating it as if it's a really big deal.

Thanks for the responses Big Mac.

[grovberg]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

1) HD H.264 on DVD media is one official spec of HD-DVD.
2) Apple's implementation of this meets this spec. Simply burning HD H.264 to a disc is not the same thing as meeting an official format specification.

This is the answer I was looking for (there was several hours between the writing and posting of my last reply, sorry). I had not heard about there being an actually spec format for HD on a regular DVD, and that explains everything.

Thanks.

[Eug Wanker]

I'm just impressed that an iMac G5 1.6 GHz can decode the discs. According to Apple, a dual G4 1.42 GHz Power Mac cannot.

For Playing Back HD DVDs

* Macintosh computer with PowerPC G5
* Apple DVD Player v4.6
* Mac OS X v10.4 or later

[bmedina]

Perhaps a subtle push to get you to upgrade.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by bmedina

Perhaps a subtle push to get you to upgrade.

I would if there were actually commercial H.264 HD-DVDs available.