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Is it worth the money to upgrade from DVD to Blu Ray
laurence1870
Posts: 213 Forum Member
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I wanted some peoples opinions on whether you think it is worth me upgrading my DVD movie collection to Blu Ray.
Is the quality much more superior or only slightly so?
Are more obscure movies generally released to Blu Ray, or is it only old classics and new films?
Thanks a lot all. I just wanted to really know if it's worth the upgrade. I love watching movies at home and want the best possible viewing experience.
Laurence
Is the quality much more superior or only slightly so?
Are more obscure movies generally released to Blu Ray, or is it only old classics and new films?
Thanks a lot all. I just wanted to really know if it's worth the upgrade. I love watching movies at home and want the best possible viewing experience.
Laurence
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although bluray looks stunning
upscaling is nothing like Blu Ray it cant add detail to a picture that isnt there
When I saw the film in the cinema, it was at the nearest IMAX venue. Because it is a widescreen film, it was shown letterboxed. The sequence in the arena, however, broadened the image out to fill the IMAX screen. The Bluray disc does this as well. As Katniss rises through the tube to her pedestal, the black bars slide away out of sight and the screen is filled. The DVD is letterboxed throughout, just like it would have been in a regular cinema.
But it might be worth going for digital copies rather than Hard copies, as there will probably be another upgrade in quality in the next few years.
Personally I prefer to have a hard drive full of Hi-Res films rather than a shelf full of Discs.
Ive had far too many Hard Drives fail to even go that route,look after a disc and it last's a long time,hard drives fail and die,digitally for me cloud copies seem to be the future,
The difference in picture quality between the DVD version and the Blu vary widely from film to film, but I would say that the picture quality of every Blu I have is noticeably better than the DVD version I previously used. Bear in mind the fact that just as a film on DVD may be re-released in an improved state (sometimes more than once), the same applies to Blu-rays (eg The Terminator). Beware of buying older inferior versions. Always check out online reviews beforehand. These are useful sites:-
http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/The-Terminator-Blu-ray/61372/#Review
http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/8217/the_terminator_remastered_2013.html
Summary:- If you have much of an interest in films I think it is worth getting a Blu-ray player. Just be careful which discs you buy.
Btw, regarding DVDs as clutter..... I know the current trend is to go all digital, but I have loads of older favourite tv series on DVD (most of which are unlikely to ever be re-released in any other format) that I want to keep. The space issue doesn't matter. All my DVDs/Blus are in their original packaging in two bookcases, don't get in the way, and imo look good anyway. It would only be a snag if I was moving house on a regular basis, which isn't going to happen.
It's all digital. DVD isn't analogue.
Will 'non-disc' do?
Yes Blu-Ray provides the best viewing experience but most B/R players will upscale your DVD's making them so close to HD you'll barely notice the difference, plus I think Blu-Rays are only really beneficial with high graphical stuff with epic scenery and photography and big special effects etc, the benefits in my opinion do not justify the extra cost of Blu-ray Discs which is still substantially more than DVD's which you can now pick up for peanuts.
Considering anything filmed on 32mm film is well above 1080p resolution,Blu Ray improves any films look,in fact one of the nicest looking BD i have is The Wizard of Oz and that is from 1939
Also Upscaling adds to the pixel count it doesn't add any more clarity to the picture,as it cant add what isn't there in the first place
Not disputing any of that just saying that when viewing in my opinion there isn't a vast difference in a lot of cases, I understand it will depend on the size screen you're viewing on as you get better clarity when the picture is less stretched.
Blu-ray's are better without question but I'm just saying I don't think the improvement is enough to justify the cost of upgrading a entire collection when dvd's especially when upscaled on a B/R player provide perfectly adequate quality.
I Doubt the OP will upgrade his entire collection anyway as i bet if hes like myself will have some titles on DVD that will be extremely lucky to ever get a BD release,but if you really want the best quality possible then Blu Ray is the only way to go especially if your buying a latest release,i only started buying titles i already had on DVD when they were films i like and when they were at a really great price point(CEX is useful for getting older titles for very cheap prices or places like Cash Converters),Upscaling a DVD is still using a 480i image at the end of the day
that is one of the things i think about(do i really want to play the upgrade merry go round again to another format) but i reckon im at least 8-9 years away from a upgrade to 4K and by then i reckon we will be in a Digital Download situation for 4K so i suspect that BD may be there for a long while yet,like DVD is still in my collection and will be there for a long time to come
I always keep two hard drives on the go so if one goes I've got a back up.
I'm not sure if 4K will be 8-9 years away. Sometimes it's not easy to tell. It may be sooner, it may be later. But you may be right. On occasion though these sorts of things sometimes get an industry push.
I think if you have some favourites that you'd love to watch in higher definition then just start with them with Blu-Ray. As opposed to thinking about updating everything all in one go. Then at least you won't have broken the bank if 4K becomes popular quicker than expected.
It's an endless cycle though, because once 4K becomes a popular format 8K is just peeping around the corner.:D And from all accounts 8K is truly stunning.
Jaw/floor.
So yeah, go for it. But don't get too enamoured with it. It goes without saying that image quality can't turn a bad film into a good one, no matter what level it's at.
As others have said, the industry is moving away from owning a physical film collection so I tend to only buy the odd Blu-ray now for films I really think are top notch and am happy to watch the remainder via Netflix etc.