OT: What's the deal with Blu Ray 2.0?

[lunchmoney]

Is it a new format Blu Ray disc that you won't be able to read with a 1.0 or 1.1 player? Is a Blu Ray 2.0 required to read 2.0 discs?

Or does the 2.0 player simply have additional features that aren't critical for normal movie watching?

Would it be stupid to not by a 2.0 player?

[mike1234]

I hadn't heard anything about it but a giggle search found this... http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...of-player.html

[Jason]

Here's a good thread on the different BD profiles.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=868226

There is no difference in the disks themselves, the profiles apply to the capabilities of the player. I can't think of any rational reason you WOULDN'T want a profile 2.0 player (i.e. BD Live). The only pseudo-rational reason I've heard is that with BD Live, the player is connected to the internet and can report your usage.

[Dirk]

A 2.0 player isn't neccisarily connected to the net. It does not HAVE to be. But if you want all of the improved interactivity and whatnots, well, yes, you should connect it up.

If you are only interested in watching movies -- just the main film and not all the other stuff on the disc, then a 1.1 player will do just fine.

[lunchmoney]

A 2.0 player isn't neccisarily connected to the net. It does not HAVE to be. But if you want all of the improved interactivity and whatnots, well, yes, you should connect it up.

If you are only interested in watching movies -- just the main film and not all the other stuff on the disc, then a 1.1 player will do just fine.

And no risk that 2.0 blu ray disks won't play on it?

I don't really care that much about the extra crap... just wanna watch the movie.

[Jason]

Yeah, there's no such thing as a 2.0 disk. Any blu-ray disk will work in any blu-ray player. There may be certain features on the disk that you can't access unless you have a 2.0 player (this is strictly bonus features), and some may require that you be connected to the internet. If you don't care about any of the BD-live features, a Profile 1.1 player would be fine.

[Dirk]

No risk.

[jkrutke]

To clear things up a bit more, a profile 2.0 encoded disc will play on a 1.1 machine without issue.

To put my own personal spin on it, I believe profile 2.0 was created as another way to show you advertisements and take your money. As soon as you hook up a 2.0 profile player to the internet, you're going to see ads. Screw that. I just want to watch a movie without any BS, so I sure won't be scrambling to get a 2.0 player, and if I ever do, it won't be plugged into the ethernet.

The industry needs to work on getting the blue ray prices down (both players and discs) before the format really takes off.

[Jason]

To put my own personal spin on it, I believe profile 2.0 was created as another way to show you advertisements and take your money. As soon as you hook up a 2.0 profile player to the internet, you're going to see ads. Screw that. I just want to watch a movie without any BS, so I sure won't be scrambling to get a 2.0 player, and if I ever do, it won't be plugged into the ethernet.

Really? To be honest, I haven't done my full homework on Blu-ray, as I'm in the camp that's still waiting for prices to drop, but advertisements aren't something I'd heard about yet. If that's true, I'd consider that a legitimate reason to not go for the Profile 2.0 player (or at least not plug it in).

[mike1234]

"The industry needs to work on getting the blue ray prices down (both players and discs) before the format really takes off."

AMEN, brother!!

[lunchmoney]

So if you have no interest in hooking up to the internet, is there any reason to get a 2.0 player?

[Dirk]

I'd look at the other features the player has before I worried about the 2.0 profile. I'd want a player that could handle as many of the audio codecs as possible, like DTS-HD MA and Dolby TrueHD. Do you want to stave off the need for a new receiver? Then look for a player with 7.1 analog outputs -- they're out there. If you want to keep life simple and get rid of the old DVD player, I'd also do some digging to see how the player handles rescaling of standard DVDs.

[johnnyrichards]

Just wait for oppo to release their player next year. They will have a guaranteed superb picture quality and as usual, the world class oppo SD-DVD upscaling.

As a side note, I have been surfing the Doom9 forums and it seems the hackers have found out how to play BD on Linux! When this happened to SD-DVD, burners and blank media plummeted in price and the format skyrocketed in popularity, driving prices down for home players in the process. I am thinking this will happen to Bluray as well.

I would advise waiting until next year before buying Bluray, oh AND keep it off the internet. We already have enough "user prohibited option" material on disks as it is.

[Dirk]

As a side note, I have been surfing the Doom9 forums and it seems the hackers have found out how to play BD on Linux!

Eh, wake me up when I have accelerated h264 to actually play it back.

[Jason]

Just wait for oppo to release their player next year. They will have a guaranteed superb picture quality and as usual, the world class oppo SD-DVD upscaling.

I agree that the Oppo will be an excellent unit, but the initial pricing estimates are putting it in the $500+ category, and will probably appeal to the true videophiles, and those looking for a universal player. I think people are hopeful that they will follow it up with a lower cost option (probably cheaper scaler, abandon DVD-A/SACD, no internal decoding, etc) which is the one I might be interested in.

[johnnyrichards]

Eh, wake me up when I have accelerated h264 to actually play it back.

Be a matter of time. Nothing spurs software development like hacking proprietary stuff.