DVDGuy’s Blog @ Digital Digest

There has been several developments recently that has gotten me a bit excited. Anyone who reads this blog semi-regularly knows I’ve got a thing for H.264 (otherwise known as MPEG-4 AVC). Having being around just before DivX hit the big time (and having successfully predicted its rise by launching DivX Digest), I’m getting the same feeling with H.264, only this time I think it will be even more widespread in terms of usage. That’s mainly because H.264 is much more versatile than DivX, and there’s a lot more industry support ranging from mega companies like Apple, to CE firms like Sony, Internet brands such as YouTube, and now video technology companies like DivX Inc are embracing it too.

But enough about H.264 for now. let’s first look at the more mundane, but still somewhat interesting news in regards to the latest range of CPUs. Intel is just about ready to launch it’s new “Nehalem” CPU range in Q4 2008, which looks set to redefine CPU performance once again. But for now, there’s a few new CPUs from both AMD and Intel, and some price movements, at least here in Australia. Starting with AMD, their new Phenom X3 (triple-core) and X4 (quad-core). The original Phenoms were a bit of a disappointment, especially when up against the Intel Core 2 Duo range. But these new X3/X4 Phenoms are a different proposition, and they give genuine competition to the market dominated by the Intel E8200 and E8400, as well as finally providing a price/performance reasonable upgrade path to AMD’s ageing Athlon range. The X4 9750 come at an excellent price, and the 9850 occupies the region (both price and performance wise) between the 8400 and 8500. The X3s are all very competitively priced too. Remember, you get an extra core or two with the Phenom over the E8400/E8500 as well, so while performances are similar for current day apps, future apps that take advantage of the multiple cores will run better on the X3/X4s.

Intel took action promptly as always and lowered the prices of several CPUs, notably the E8400, E8500 and the Q9300. The Q9300 is in direct competition now with the X4 9850, both in price and performance, but the 9850 has the slight edge in both areas. AMD still lacks upper end processors to compete with Intel though, and Nehalem looks set to make everything else look decisively old hat.

On a related note, I’m also running a poll on which types of CPU people are using … the results could be interesting.

But enough about CPUs, let’s talk a little about their replacement. Yes, the replacement for the humble CPU is just around the corner. Perhaps replacement is the wrong word, supplement is probably a better word. Nvidia has been touting it’s new CUDA architecture which allows GPUs to be turned into CPUs for processing of specific tasks. For those of you who have kindly offered your spare CPU power for Folding@Home, you might already be aware that there is a version of the client software that can use your GPU for added processing performance. The same principle can also be applied to video encoding, and Nvidia recently demonstrated H.264 encoding on it’s new GTX range of GPUs. These are now dubbed GP-GPUs (General Purpose GPUs), and the GP means that these GPUs can do other tasks other than graphics processing. Because GPUs have unique architecture that helps them do certain tasks really quickly, these same optimizations apply to video processing too, and that’s why video encoding, particularly the very processor intensive H.264 encoding, can greatly benefit from GP-GPUs.

Let look at some specific examples. A 2 hour HD movie will require 10 hours of encoding on a 1.6 GHz dual-core system with integrated graphics. The same movie will take 5 hours and 33 minutes on a 3 GHz quad-core system also with integrated graphics. But on a GTX 280 with the slower 1.6 GHz dual-core system, the same movie only took 35 minutes to encode thanks to the GTX 280’s GP-GPU. 10 hours down to 35 minutes … now that’s what I call acceleration!

Of course, GPUs are great for certain tasks, but not so good for others, and CPUs will still be the centerpiece of computing for some time yet. But their importance will be diminished if GPUs can suddenly take on tasks traditionally reserved for the CPU. Should Intel and AMD start to worry? Maybe not, but they will definitely be doing some deep thinking on this issue.

I almost forgot about Digital Digest’s 9th birthday on Friday. It was 9 year and 2 days ago that I secreted the very first version of Digital Digest onto the World Wide Web. I chose an easy to remember day to launch the site (4th of July), so I would not forget the site’s founding anniversary. But I still forgot. Mainly because I don’t live in the US I think so 4th of July is just another day here. Anyway, 9 years and 2 day of hair pulling later, here we are. Yeah!

Anyway, back to the news roundup.

Let start with copyright news, while I will talk more about it in the HD section, but out of the news that Toshiba was going to pursue an updated version of the DVD specifications (basically turn HD DVD into DVD 2.0), there was an interesting tidbit about adding managed copy for DVDs. This is something Microsoft has demanded for a while now. Imagine Windows Vista Media Center that plays all your DVDs copied and stored on your PC (or external networked drive) – no need for discs, no need to search your library and find that movie you want to watch … everything at the click of a few remote buttons. Managed copy will allow movies to be copied but still retain DRM, as to prevent piracy – I think that’s a good compromise for those of us who want to “digitize” our DVD libraries. On the other end of the “fair use” spectrum is the MPAA’s latest attempt to prevent movie piracy, by introducing a new form of movie distribution using a system called DreamStream. Because this is a streaming service, and not a download one, the actual movie doesn’t end up on users’s systems (the cache is probably encrypted probably to prevent ripping of the movie through the cache). What this will mean for Internet congestion and bandwidth costs, one can only imagine. Remember that these are the same people who thought that disposable DVDs was a good idea without any environmental impact as millions of discs are thrown away every year under that system.

The fight against YouTube continues from Viacom (no doubt with support from other studios). The judge in the case has now demanded Google hand over logs of which users watched what, when and where, to Viacom. Will the fight against piracy lead to the death of privacy instead?

In HD news, the BD-Live/Profile 2.0 push is continuing, with both Sony and Disney make sure all their future releases will be Profile 2.0 enabled. Of course, this doesn’t mean that these movies won’t play on your Profile 1.0 or 1.1 player, just that if you want to get best out of what you’ve paid for, you’ll need Profile 2.0. It’s all a bit confusing and ultimately unnecessary, but what can you do? My last blog post talked about two polls I ran on the site which basically told me what I already knew, that Blu-ray was too expensive (and hardware more so than movies). Another threat to Blu-ray is gaming, and a new report has just come out showing that the gaming industry is now bigger than the DVD (and Blu-ray) industry in terms of revenue.

Still not fully satisfied being the loser of the format war, Toshiba is trying to start a new war with their DVD 2.0 format, which adds a lot of the features found on HD DVD onto the DVD format. The video will be at a lower resolution than Blu-ray, a sacrifice necessary to fit HD movies onto DVD. There is also something called DVD Download DL, which I’m not quite sure what it’s all about. I think it will be some kind of downloadable DVD service, given that the interactive HDi elements found on HD DVD (and DVD 2.0) can be used as both a download platform (to download the movies) as well as the usual interactivity element (menus …). It’s an interesting project, but you cannot see Blu-ray backers supporting this format unless they see no future for Blu-ray, in which case, they won’t have been Blu-ray backers in the first place. Of course, Toshiba through the DVD Forum can push through a format and make it mandatory for any manufacturer making DVD players to adopt this new format – including Blu-ray backers. Heavy handed, but effective, as this would mean all Blu-ray players will have to have DVD 2.0 support, or they will have to remove DVD playback functionalities altogether (ie. commit marketing suicide).

But regardless of whether DVD 2.0 wins or if Blu-ray beats Toshiba again, H.264 will be one of the codec that will be used for encoding the video. H.264 encoding is a painful process at the moment, because a typical 2 hour movie will take 10+ hours even on the fastest PCs. But Nvidia will try to reduce this to less than 30 minutes with their new range of graphics cards that has GP-GPUs (General Purpose GPUs). Basically, these are graphics card that have GPUs that can also act as CPUs for purposes such as H.264 video encoding. And because GPUs have optimized architecture designed to speed up these sorts of processing, the encoding speed will jump through the roof. A x264 encoder with GP-GPU support would be a very nice thing to have.

And finally in gaming news, PS3’s much awaited 2.40 firmware update with support for in-game XMB and trophies has hit a hitch. It has been pulled because it caused corruption problems, and so some more testing and waiting will be needed before PS3 users can enjoy the new features, which are really just a rip-off of Xbox 360’s in-game Dashboard and Achievements. The 360 launched with Achievements enabled, and a strict system that governs how each game will provide Achievements and Gamerpoints. Unfortunately for the PS3, this is not possible as Trophies is more of an after-thought. So if you want trophies in games you’ve already finished, you’ll have to play through them again as Trophies aren’t retroactive, for example.

In 360 land, Microsoft is planning to have a series of price cuts around the world (it’s already official here in Oz). The rumours of a new 60 GB version of the console won’t go away either, as are the rumours of a motion controller. There is now even a rumour that a new Dashboard update will make it controllable using motion controls, much like how computers were operated in Minority Report by Tom Cruise.

That’s it for this week, more of the same next week probably. In the meantime, don’t forget to read my new guide: RipBot264 PS3, Xbox 360 H.264 Encoding Guide – it makes encoding H.264 for the PS3 and Xbox 360 very simple indeed. So easy in fact, that the new Quantum of Solace trailer I made was made using this method. Try it out for yourself, although I recommend you start with a very short clip as encoding can take hours.

Two months ago, I posted an analysis of some polls that I ran on the website, which told us a little bit about the state of Blu-ray before and after the end of the format war. The conclusion I sort of came up with was that Blu-ray’s success was being hindered by high prices.

I promised that I would follow it up with two more completed polls that would concentrate on both Blu-ray hardware and movie prices, and what people thought about it. The results are finally in, and they paint a very clear picture: Blu-ray is too expensive.

Here are the results:

Seldom have I seen such one sided polls. Hardware prices are obviously too high, with only 6% of the people polled believing the “price is right”. It was a little bit getter for movie prices, which have come down quite a bit recently (both in the US and UK, Australia should soon follow) – 12% polled felt pricing was quite good already.

I need to stress again that these polls are hardly scientific, so the margin of error is quite large. But even with that, the picture is clear … Blu-ray needs price cuts before people are interested. The good news is that Blu-ray movie discounts are quite common now, not only in the US, but UK stores such as The Hut and dvd.co.uk are offering discount deals such as “2 for £18”, and this will surely drive sales upwards.

But I was thinking just today why people still buy music CDs, when downloads and higher quality audio disc formats are available. Would Blu-ray suffer from the same phenomenon, in that people won’t upgrade from DVDs even though there is something clearly better? Obviously the average person is less likely to be able to appreciate the difference between CD and higher quality audio, or even if they can hear the difference, they may not care about it. Video is different, in that the differences could be quite noticeable, so perhaps Blu-ray will do better than CDs. But to displace DVDs as the preferred video distribution method is going to take something quite amazing.

There was a recent, somewhat optimistic prediction, that Blu-ray sales will overtake DVD sales by 2012. Even if this were to come to fruition, it still means that at that time, nearly half of movie sales will still be DVD based. That’s four years from now, and still Blu-ray will not established itself as the totally dominant video format. And this not even taking into account the effect downloads will have on optical disc sales. Toshiba, the major backer of DVD, is now planning to launch “DVD 2.0“, which will include downloads as part of the DVD specifications, as well as including many of the technical advances used in the defunct HD DVD format. So the next four years will be quite unpredictable, I think, and it’s hard to say who will come out on top.

But competition will be good for consumers, and having so many choices when it comes to watching and purchasing movies is a good thing too.

P.S: Totally forgot that today was Digital Digest’s 9th birthday. Can’t believe I’ve been working on this website for 9 years already. You know how they say time flies when you’re having fun, the last 9 years seemed only like 7 years, 8 at most!

Welcome back to another edition of WNR. Not a hugely busy week in terms of news, but still some interesting bits and pieces to chew on. Let’s not waste any time and get to it.

Starting with copyright news, in the war against torrents, torrent site The Pirate Bay are upping security measures by introducing encryption. This is mainly due to new laws in Sweden which came into effect last week that allows the government to spy on private communications, including Internet traffic. It was always a matter of time before technology makes torrent downloading impossible to track and stop. The whole idea of torrents itself was to de-centralize file sharing so it cannot be stopped, and encrypted communications channels and privacy filters is just the next natural step. But the war goes on for now and in the courts, the MPAA has scored another victory, this time against torrent site EliteTorrents.

DRM is still refusing to die, but progress is being made to make it a bit fairer. Microsoft is the latest to come out with a new piece of software for Xbox 360 owners that allows DRM’d content to be moved to another 360 box, which was previously not possible before.

Onto HD news now, here in Australia, Blu-ray is in a good position as the PS3 is the leading console here, not the Xbox 360 as in Europe or the US/Canada. Of course, Blu-ray prices are still high, for both hardware and software, and not just high compared to DVDs, but high compared to Blu-ray pricing elsewhere in the world. A local newspaper here has written a piece that urges users to wait before investing in a new Blu-ray player, as better and cheaper stuff will be coming soon. It does make sense, because Profile 2.0 players will soon become the norm, which will drive down prices of Profile 1.1. players, and it’s only a matter of time before Chinese manufacturers get in on the act. In the meantime, it might be worth studying just what else you will need to upgrade to Blu-ray. You can of course read my Blu-ray (and HD DVD) Buyer’s Guide, but Dolby has released their own guide which, obviously, concentrates on their new high bitrate audio formats designed for Blu-ray. The audio aspect of Blu-ray is something that will confuse quite a few people, with nearly a dozen new audio formats and output combinations to contend with. The short answer is to get an AV receiver that supports HDMI audio input, and that will almost always give you support for all the new audio formats, in combination with a proper Blu-ray player that can decode everything to PCM first.

There’s a bit more movement on the PC front too, which to be honest, hasn’t seen the mass acceptance that DVDs received at this stage, despite prices being lower. PowerDVD is now certified for BD-Live (Profile 2.0) and AVCREC (HD on DVD, using MPEG-4 AVC).

But Blu-ray has to hurry before other distribution methods start eating into its market share. There’s a whole bunch of news about new download services, even including one from Sony, so there’s an obvious trend towards that kind of distribution. Sony has struck a deal with DivX to provide movie downloads for Sony products (PS3, PSP, most likely). It will be DRM’d, but the DRM is user based, not device based, so movie files can be moved from place to place without problem. The PS3 will get the movie download service soon in the US, and then later on in Europe and Japan. So if even Sony is investing heavily into downloads, you can see why other analysts might question the future viability of Blu-ray. Netflix recently launched their own download service, requiring a hardware box from Roku. But Xbox 360 owners can now get around this hardware requirement through a Media Center plugin, and get access to Netflix’s services. Official support for Netflix services might be on the way too.

And in gaming news, Sony has revealed figures showing that the PS3 has cost them $3.32 Billion so far. That figure is still growing though, as every PS3 sold still loses money for Sony. Even Microsoft, who launched the 360 a full year before the PS3, has only just started making a profit, despite having superior software sales which is the real money earner in the industry. The PS3 will get a new graphics chip soon, which might help reduce costs a bit. And there is news of the upcoming 2.40 firmware, which promises to be a big one that finally adds in game XMB and a bunch of other features that Xbox 360 users have taken for granted.

The Xbox 360 might get a price drop soon, to take it below $USD 300. That should help recent flagging sales. On the other end of the scale, you can now buy a custom made Xbox 360, that also plays Wii games and acts like an iPod, for as little as $25,000. Hope this one doesn’t RRoD after 3 month!

I think that’s all for this week. I’ll be back next week with more WNR, unless posting news is outlawed by the MPAA before then. See you then.

Got quite a few things lined up today, so won’t spend the usual 30 minutes sitting in front of the computer thinking up of a good introduction (yes, it takes me *that* long!). The best I could come up with when time is that critical is: Hello World

(programmers will know what “Hello World” means, but don’t worry, it’s not supposed to be meaningful or funny)

Let’s start with copyright news. Did I mention I was short of time today? Virgin Media, an ISP in the UK, will now spy on its users to detect potential piracy and protect music industry profits. What else will they spy on, you have to wonder. Across the channel, France is also threatening to crackdown on Internet Piracy, and plans to set up a new agency to also spy on user’s downloading habits. Big Brother in action here, but I’m sure someone is already spying on your Internet habits for the fight against terrorism or other viable excuses. But maybe none of this is needed, as the MPAA claims that no evidence should ever be required to sue someone for piracy. Because the MPAA is always right, you see, and they never ever make any mistakes, you see, and people who downloaded a movie should get a $150,000 fine without the MPAA having to proof anything, you see.

Rarely do I put good news in this section, but there are in fact two pieces of good news this week. First is Microsoft’s reversal of a decision which say their MSN music store bought DRM’d files become unplayable because validation servers were shut down. Microsoft will now keep these servers up until 2011, which should give people plenty of time to find a way to crack the DRM. Good news for PC fans, as the PC version of BioShock will have its controversial and troublesome DRM removed. Sales stats show that games with lots of copy protection does not necessarily sell better than games without copy protection. Just like with music. This is mainly because most forms of copy protection can be easily broken, and also games without copy protection garners greater community support for buying the game (“Sins of a Solar Empire”, is one example). Both types of games will get pirated anyway.

But is piracy really a bad thing? Not according to piracy-evangelists, Sony, who finally admits that piracy has helped them sell lots of PSPs. I think most companies know that piracy helps just as much as it hinders, and without it, products often fail. Think PCs, DVDs, PlayStations, Nintendo DS and how easy it is to get pirated content on these platforms, and think of the competitors that failed and how hard it was to get pirated content on those platforms, and you begin to see a pattern. Also coming out of Japan and related to Sony, as well as the next section of this news update, Japan plans to put a piracy tax on Blu-ray disc recorders and blank discs. Yes, I’m sure doing this will greatly help reduce the high cost of Blu-ray recording, and I’m sure it will help Blu-ray catch up and replace DVD’s lead in this area.

Onto HD news now, and I must really stress on the fact that I have to leave very soon. Lots of positive news for Blu-ray, or is that positive spin, I don’t really know anymore. Studio presidents are claiming, or hoping, that Blu-ray sales will reach $1 Billion dollars in 2008. DVDs sell this much every two months, by the way. Blu-ray take-up is faster than DVD’s at the same time in the development phase, but only European figures are available or quoted, which makes me suspicious. Plus, this is only significant if Blu-ray follows the same pattern of growth as DVD, which I highly doubt since DVD saw an explosion of mass consumer uptake (after a rather quiet start), and I doubt Blu-ray will see something similar, since it’s not a revolutionary format, merely an evolution one. And it appears I’m not the only one that thinks that, as a research study comes up with pretty much the same prediction: that Blu-ray’s win over HD DVD may be hollow. The study makes several very valid points, including a lot based on similar formats in the past and their performances, plus future distribution methods for movies which will slowly destroy the optical disc as the most preferred method. Video-On-Demand and truly interactive TV, is something that I think will take on both the notion of the traditional TV broadcast, as well as the necessity to buy and keep lots of movies for “on demand” viewing. When I read the next article’s headline, I thought that they were trying to say the same thing too, but I was wrong. The article with headline Interactive TV: Blu-ray’s Worst Enemy was actually about the Profile 2.0 features for Blu-ray (Internet connectivity), and how this is causing problems for studios when creating discs that need to be compatible with players that do not support Profile 2.0. A problem that could have easily been avoided though, simply by having one mandatory profile that supports everything, much like DVDs.

And finally in gaming, sorry, but I really have to go now as people are waiting for me. But before I go, I will tell you about how the PS3 will beat the PS2 in hardware sold, as least according to Sony (a lot of “according to Sony” in this edition). It’s going to take a while, or something unexpected to occur, before it happens though (127 million versus 13 million, is the current score). But an in-game XMB (finally!) and “Trophies” (Xbox 360’s Achievements copied) will certainly help the PS3 sell more units, when these additions arrive in the next major firmware update. Wii Fit, following the fine example set by Wii Sports early on, is causing millions of dollars of collateral damage when people play. The Wii really does help the economy in more than one way, doesn’t it? How many windows, doors, coffee tables, LCD screens, desk lamps and other such things has the Wii caused to be replaced, and hence, improve the economy? Wii-insurance might be the next big thing, you know.

Ok, I really have to do now. I’m sorry I’m in such a hurry today, but you know how things are. Oh wait, Star Trek: TNG is on TV now … it’s a season 3 episode I haven’t seen in a long time … might just sit down and watch for a bit, I’ll call and tell people that I’m going to be a bit late. Checks TV guide. Voyager, DS9 and Enterprise on next? A Star Trek marathon? Awesome! Maybe I will have to cancel my plans, since how often does a Star Trek marathon happen anyway (twice a month, at most!).

I’m such a geek …