VHS/DVD/HD what do you collect films etc on

[jema]

The seti forum hs just had a little discussion on the fact that one of the best if not the best series ever Babylon5 is coming out on DVD?

I have the series on VHS, but I'm leery of buying on DVD because in many ways it is as outdated as VHS.

My shelves creak under the load of tons of VHS tapes with there bulk and low resolution picture. But whilst the picture on DVD is great, the bulk is still there to come degree.

In contrast I use a PVR that if I was to use a 120gb hd drive in it. It would hold 60+ hours of DVD quality recording. e.g. 30 films. I can buy a 120gb drive for about £150 (actually a few quid more, but lets make the math easy :D) that's a media cost of £5 a film.

This is at todays prices and so can only improve and the range of PVR's is bound to increase. My Sky+ PVR for example whilst you can change the drive and even fit a removable caddy, is not exactly geared to using HD's as removable media.

But my point is, that in 2-3 years time DVD could look archaic.

jema

[NorthernYankee]

Well if you look at it from the perspective that VCR's were first introduced to the mainstream almost 20 years ago...I feel that DVD still have have at least a decade of mainstream use. And if DVD recording works out a single standard then the mainstream acceptance is going to increase even further. The reason I feel PVR(which I believe is equivalent to our TiVO) will not get a mainstream accpetance for distribution of movies is for the fact that you can't just go to say a blockbuster and rent a film. And I feel most people like having the DVD/VHS because it is Tangible it there in there face...PVR is as you say 30 movies on a harddrive, most people wan to hold it. Hey but that is just my opinion, and personally I love DVD's I only have like 6 movies on VHS but over 30 on DVD.

--NY

[dicki]

i think the tivo's are nifty little things but i think that media cost bit is skewed a bit... if you had to buy a tivo film you'd need to buy a harddrive which would push the media costs sky high.

tivo's also only work well with sky (a subscription sevice of about £40 a month for a decent package) and you have to subscribe to the tivo service too (no idea of the cost) so if you taped say 4 films a month they'd still be a tenner each + media costs and as i understand it if you keep the films longer than a certain amount of time it's actually a copyright infringment (though i've never seen this enforced and i may well be speaking out of my bottom)

i think DVD's will last a good long while simply because the industry is backing them and they are very cheap to produce in quantity

dicki

[jema]

Well a reckon the media costs of hard drives are about £5 a film. I can remember paying more than that for a reasonable quality VHS tape!

Currently of course there is the little issue of copyright, but I wonder how long things are sustainable the way it works now with all forms of films/music etc. e.g. you currently have to buy some form of widget containing the entertainment you want and you have to put said widget into a player. This is so archaic as the capacity of media grows... and surely sooner or later the entertainment industry will have to make changes. For example an encrypted format that could be transferred to hard disk etc, but always retained information on the purchaser to discourage piracy?

jema

[speculative]

I like DVD's because they don't wear (they can scratch but you can repair that, and you have to be careless to get scratches most of the time) and they are not bulky.

If you just want the film, that's 2 hours. But if you want the director's commentary, that's another 2 hours. And the actor's commentary track is another 2 hours. And the special features/documentaries if any might be another half hour... So, you're actually looking at 6+ hours for the DVD's that are in "DVD" style... and your 60 hours HD would then only hold 10 films, not very good imo.

If you think DVD's are bulky, who every said you had to keep them in their DVD case? I never keep CD's in their cases. I get those little disc carrier cases... You could get 4 of these and stack them, and they'd probably fit somewhere in your entertainment center, and that would be easy storage for around 120 or so DVD's... ;)

As to whether or not they'll be around for some time - well, with DVD recording coming to the consumer market, I think they'll be around for quite some time... If I had a DVD recorder and could stick 10 GB of DVD quality stuff on it, I would see no reaosn to ever switch to another format.

[The Therion]

Guys...first of all......

...noone knows for sure there WILL BE coming out in DVDs.

At least not anytime soon.The only thing that has been officialy anounced is the First movie and the Pilot.

Its sad that such a great series doesnt have ,and may not have (as i read somewhere) all the episodes in the best format available... :(

Simply put : I have it in VHS and i've started backing it up in CDs....

[speculative]

Originally posted by The Therion

Simply put : I have it in VHS and i've started backing it up in CDs....

Good idea Therion. I'm sure you all know to play your tapes at least once every 4 years so they don't de-magnetize ;)

[moonraker]

I think DVD's and CD's will be around for another 10 years at least, probably more. The CD first came out when, 80's, and is still going strong now. DVD by contrast is still really in it's infancy when it comes to the consumer market.

Personally, I don't collect films because I have never wanted to watch any film more than twice really. I don't find films like music, which can be listened to over and over many times. Once the novelty of the first viewing is over and the second time maybe you see some bits you missed the first, I find after that it's a bit stale. So I am more than happy to rent any films I want to watch, they take up no space at all then.

Jema, I wonder if there is some kind of spacial anomaly running through your living room?
A VHS cassette is approx 200mm x 120mm x 35mm giving a volume of some 840,000 cubic mm
A DVD disc is 120mm diameter x 1mm thick giving it a volume of 11,309 cubic mm
How does this equate to almost the same bulk? Maybe you have been using warp drive a little too often... :D

[The Therion]

speculative: mine are played quite more frequently than once a year ! :D that's why i have to do numerous hours of video capturing and compressing now :D (and its a pain)

moonraker: you're right ,but not entirely.For a VHS's case takes virtualy no extra space,while a DVD's case takes a lot of space compared toi the disc itself. Still less than the vhs though...

That of course doesnt mean jema is entirely sane :D :p ...

[KMS]

could reduce that cost a little further with some compression Jema

[tripodal]

you all have forgotten one more options .... digital VCR... basically a normal "upgraded" videotape.. digitally storing the movie
now, assuming 100% quality when comparted to DVD i would sooner buy that.. vcrs have much better reliability.. and personally my dvd's scratch FAR too easily.. and it only takes the smallest scratch to make a scene in a movie unplayable.. perhaps the worst drawback to DVD

dust scratch fingerprint misaligned lazer vibration

none of those things bothered a vcr!


of coarse dvd's are the best now.. hence my collection of 200+ ...
but damn i hate it when they skip

[The Therion]

digital vcr is a bit expensive right now :(

your dvd's get scratched easily? Well i have rented dvds from the video store that look quite ......violated and they didnt skip once :confused:

[jema]

Both DVHS and DVD RW are damn expensive for the hardware at the moment :( So expensive in fact that the HD route is probably the cheapest if you don't want the extras and don't mind a little copyright violation, thout this is a grey area as what is the boundery between legit PVR recording and not?

jema

[tripodal]

Originally posted by The Therion
digital vcr is a bit expensive right now :(

your dvd's get scratched easily? Well i have rented dvds from the video store that look quite ......violated and they didnt skip once :confused:

i suppose it must be my dvd player .. 2 years old and at teh beginning of its life i lugged it everywhere.. i was the first to get one
lol

[The Therion]

Jema, how do you transfer the vhs in the PVR hd thingy you want to get? Video capture i suppose,right? So why then not back it up in cds ?.It's even cheaper.

[jema]

You cannot actually transfer VHS to PVR, the technology is still quite deliberaetly crippled by the makers.

jema