It's no secret that the first players that are to be released by Toshiba for HD-DVD playback, are limited to 1080i (interlaced) resolution. At least we have been told this is the case for the HD-A1 and HD-XA1 models due out in the next weeks. For some of us, this seems a bit risky- as why would we want such a player if it cannot produce the highest resolution from a blue laser disc, 1080p (progressive)? The investment for one of these players is significant to most and with a format war to boot, we want to be sure we are making good decisions.
Here we have an interview with Richard Doherty, a senior manager for Microsoft, who is also an administrative member of the AACS Licensing body. This is the group responsible for copy protection mechanisms for both HD DVD and Blu-ray players. In this talk, Mr. Doherty dismissed the whole issue, since owners of 72 frames per second, 1080p displays, will be able to "digitally reconstruct" the 1080p image from the 1080i signal.
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But another way that consumers could solve the dilemma of how to get the optimal picture quality from a first-generation HD DVD player, Doherty said, is for them to purchase a modern HDTV display that can reproduce a 1080p image. Because the high-def signal is digital to begin with, he said, "you can in fact reconstruct completely the original frames, no matter how you communicate. So in fact, the difference over the digital connection is meaningless, and we're getting into a lot of areas of 1080p versus 1080i that, in fact, have no consumer difference whatsoever. "Because [the signal] originally came from a progressive source - 1080p/24 on the disc - and was communicated in a digital form," Doherty reiterated, "it can be completely reconstructed in its native, original form." In response to statements from Blu-ray proponents that its first-wave support of 1080p places it automatically ahead of HD DVD in the format war, Doherty classified their argument as "a big red herring." The current, new generation of so-called "smart displays" for HDTV, he said, whose maximum output is 1080p/60, should be capable of re-compositing the signal most appropriate for displaying film or video encoding from any high-definition disc. "So a very smart display," he said, "could take a connection in any format - whether that be 1080p/24, 1080i/30, or 1080p/60 - and reconstruct the appropriate and best-looking display for the display that you're looking at." |
Well there you have it! If you would like to read the TG Daily interview in it's entirety at the source, please visit this link. As you can see, this person has quite a lot of information at his disposal. The firmware upgrade comment is interesting indeed.
Source: TG Daily
Of course M$ wants Blu-Ray to to die and HD-DVD to be the winner. So, every things they say about all this, should be taken with a very big grain of salt...
And I doubt you have any idea what you're saying. Do you know what interlacing is?
All the TV has to do is wait for both sets of scans lines to be sent, and you'll have the full progressive image. The drives and communcation likely happen faster that was the actual playback rate is, so there won't even be a delay.
You should really had Blu-Ray then, using an old codec (MPEG2) instead of newer more efficent ones. The discs have to be larger to hold the 1080p MPEG2 files.[edited by GezusK on 27.03.2006 06:58]
Happy Birthday to you 
