rorkesdriftvc.com Forum Index


rorkesdriftvc.com
Discussions related to the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879
Reply to topic
ZULU Blu ray Awesome!
leightarrant


Joined: 21 Feb 2006
Posts: 131
Location: East Sussex
Reply with quote
The best viewing since the cinema re release in 1972!
Towering the Mightiest dwarfting the greatest okay. It matches even the new films of today in picture clarity for sure. The sound is also in Stereo.
Just a quick note to say that it doesn't get any better than this and is worth the final plunge, despite owning several other releases over the last ten years. Bring on the ZULU DAWN film now.

Thanks and best wishes to all for 2009

LT
View user's profileSend private message
Sawubona


Joined: 09 Nov 2005
Posts: 1179
Reply with quote
I just watched the first fifteen minutes of my Christmas-gift "ZULU" Blu-ray on my Christmas-gift Blu-ray player. OMG! It's awsome! There's such an incredible sense of depth in the screen image that I had to touch my eyelids repeatedly just to make sure I wasn't wearing 3D glasses. I don't have a 1080P television (only a 720P), but the resolution is still a quantum upgrade from the standard definition DVD.

Leightarrant is right that the movie hasn't looked as good for 35 years.
View user's profileSend private message
rich


Joined: 01 May 2008
Posts: 897
Location: Long Island NY USA
Reply with quote
Saw..good to hear...I've got something to look forward to when I get my blu ray copy...

_________________
Rich
View user's profileSend private message
Coll
Guest

Reply with quote
Not got blu-ray, but have watched 'Zulu Dawn' several times now, on a new 32" flatscreen. Very Happy

It's the largest television I've ever had ! Shocked

I know many 'zone in' on the film's faults, but I must say I enjoy it even more now, as I am able to overlook the flaws.

As with 'Zulu' the colours of the uniforms, etc., against the amazing African scenery are all shown at their best in the bigger screen, rather than squashed into the usual television.

Watching it at night, a small lamp on, whilst having a few drams of my favourite whisky. Paradise ! Wink

I too, look forward to an improved edition of 'Zulu Dawn', especially now.

Coll
Steve Moore


Joined: 30 Aug 2005
Posts: 47
Location: West Midlands
Reply with quote
Hi, had to be done, couldn't resist any longer, so off to the sales & got a Panny BD35 Blu-ray player, with multiregion playback on the DVDs, so I can still play my US discs.
Next stop was to buy Blu-ray Zulu disc. Absolutly amazing on pictures and sound is pretty good as well, the thing also upscales my existing DVDs so they look & sound much better. Blu-ray is not all hype as I suspected, it simply is so much better and really adds so much to the enjoyment of the films. Sell the cat & put the proceeds towards a Blu-ray player, you wont be disappointed!

Regards

Steve Moore
View user's profileSend private message
Sawubona


Joined: 09 Nov 2005
Posts: 1179
Reply with quote
"Forwarned is forarmed" however. There is a Dark Side to Blu-ray. Most of it seems to result from either a lack of standardization or changing disc copy protection. My first Blu-ray player was a Magnavox (can I say that, Alan?) and it would have been a good machine if it didn't accept a disc and refuse to either play it or eject it. I had to reset it every other disc and so I replaced it. Parenthetically, it also was able (so they said) to play -RW's and +RW's, but I never got that far with that handy feature. It was replaced by a Samsung which seems to be a good player, but won's play -RW/-R's, only +RW/+R's. And it also sports a LAN connection as well as the expected USB port for firmware upgrades, which are VERY important to keep up with.

As a duplicate Christmas present we received a Memorex, which simply refuses to play certain discs (specifically Horton yadda yadda in my case and the X-Files for some users). I've been told by Memorex that I'll be notified when a firmware upgrade is available, but that information doesn't resolve the problem right now. Come on, Memorex, how many manhours could it take to write the necessary code? Which part of "support" don't you understand?

I give Blu-ray two thumbs up for it's picture quality, it's backward compatibility, and it 7.1 audio capability, but do your homework and upgrade the firmware whenever necessary and possible. The last takes a bit of computer savvy, but the disc manufacturers (Fox in particular) are rapidly evolving their anti-piracy protection and the firmware has to be kept current for the player to work.

I apologize for the fact that this isn't more AZW related, but it's just a matter of time before "standard" DVD's go the way of the VHS and our old low resolution DVD's of ZULU join our old tapes of the same on the closet shelf.


Last edited by Sawubona on Thu Jan 08, 2009 12:22 pm; edited 1 time in total
View user's profileSend private message
garywilson


Joined: 16 Apr 2007
Posts: 46
Location: Romania
Reply with quote
Keep the cat and sell the wife - doesn't make so much noise when you're watching Zulu for the umpteenth time Very Happy
View user's profileSend private messageSend e-mail
Alan
Site Admin

Joined: 30 Aug 2005
Posts: 1530
Location: Wales
Reply with quote
Sawubona wrote:
can I say that, Alan?


It's all foreign language to me so I've no idea what you're saying anyway.

_________________
View user's profileSend private messageSend e-mailVisit poster's website
Steve Moore


Joined: 30 Aug 2005
Posts: 47
Location: West Midlands
Reply with quote
Hi Saw, ye gods! I just plugged the thing in and it plays eveything I've got! Didn't know it was all so technical, but woudn't want to watch standard stuff any more. Thanks for the heads up.
Hi Gary, what a good idea......

Cheers

Steve
View user's profileSend private message
Sawubona


Joined: 09 Nov 2005
Posts: 1179
Reply with quote
Gary, I can only speak for the economy on this side of the Atlantic, but I would realize a more gratifying return on my investment in this market by selling the cat Wink
View user's profileSend private message
Peter Ewart


Joined: 31 Aug 2005
Posts: 1797
Location: Near Canterbury, Kent, England.
Reply with quote
Alan

I'll bet you're not in my league, though. My two sons' exasperation at their father's apparent inability to use a basic "zapper" in any way which could be described as competent has to be seen and heard! For some of us, the "foreign language" starts with a basic TV set, as I'm still surprised that we don't have to get up and walk across the room each time to switch channels, and for whom the limits of a technical discussion are whether our screen has 405 lines or 625, which I gather is now an obsolete comparison!

But at least you're a computer whizzkid!

Pass me that book someone ...

Peter
View user's profileSend private messageSend e-mail
Alan
Site Admin

Joined: 30 Aug 2005
Posts: 1530
Location: Wales
Reply with quote
That didn't stop my kids referring to me in the past as a 'technocripple'.

_________________
View user's profileSend private messageSend e-mailVisit poster's website
Coll
Guest

Reply with quote
You should try the Brain Teaser disc for the Nintendo DS ! Confused

Coll
rich


Joined: 01 May 2008
Posts: 897
Location: Long Island NY USA
Reply with quote
Saw...I was intrigued by your post on the "dark side" of blu-ray. And I too have experienced some "glitches" playing some of my older standard dvds.
Some don't play at all and right it's probably because of some kind of copy protection or digital code difference. The one in question for me has music on it and I bet that must have something to do it. The music industry is so paranoid that they code everything and it does have to affect "compatibility".

Now I know blu-ray is the so-called next step up but I was wondering how it was going to stack up later on since the whole "blu" idea could be moot when we get to the stage of downloading from the Net directly to the player or tv. At that point, what's the point of buying a disc unless you want the hard copy? I'd think the resolution from download no doubt will be just as good or perhaps better. And so the "digital' world keeps marching on.......

_________________
Rich
View user's profileSend private message
Sawubona


Joined: 09 Nov 2005
Posts: 1179
Reply with quote
Rich,
I may very well know just enough to be dangerous, but here are my thoughts anyway. Blu-ray vs. "standard" is more an issue of actual disc capacity than it is of a format for reading and writing information. It a given that the higher resolution of a BD requires the slinging around and storage of greater quantities of data (essentially expressed in bytes) at a faster rate of transfer.

The standard single layer DVD holds a maximum of some 4.7 Gigabytes of information-- space required for the audio as well as video. Using an MPEG-2 compression system (typical for bought discs as well as home burned discs) that capacity translates to two hours maximum of viewing. High definition however requires a different compression system that's more resource intensive, the resultant product being well beyond 4.7 Gig. Enter Blu-ray, where a typical disc can hold up to 25Gigabytes of information. Here there's more room for the higher definition video plus plenty of space for more audio information (7.1 channels worth at present).

Think of it as a CD compared to a DVD. We can put video on a CD of 800 Meg capacity, but the compression used is CDV and the result is not particularly sharp. In fact, it's downright awful and the movie has to be short to boot.

At present, you would need one heck of a fast Internet connection to view a movie in true high definition (like a T-1 which almost no one has in a home). The present HD Internet offerings look OK on a 20 inch computer monitor, but they wouldn't be half good enough on a 47 inch home screen (and they're getting bigger and bigger). I don't think the distribution infrastructure of the cable or telephone system is near up to carrying the volume necessary for many viewers to watch HD at once, but someone with more knowledge of fiber optics might say I'm wrong.

I think we're about equal to the point years ago of renting VHS tapes except our standards for resolution are a lot higher. Remember back when Internet video was a tiny moving image of uncertain quality and our VCR was the cutting edge of quality? Well now the internet can provide the same quality (or better) than VHS, but if we want high quality video and audio then it's still time for hard copy.

One could say that it all will reach a point where it doesn't need to get any better, but then one would be required to explain to his grandchildren what his eight-track tapes are all about. Incidentally, ZULU was available for home viewing on laser disc (remember them?) a long time ago. Laser discs were no more than a big DVD ten years too early. Talk about a format that failed because it was too long before its time!
View user's profileSend private message
ZULU Blu ray Awesome!
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
All times are GMT  
Page 1 of 3  

  
  
 Reply to topic