Star Wars saga in HD on Spike now!

[mdavej]

Looks good so far. Misa like!

[jimmyv2000]

Looks good so far.

yup looks awesome!:D

[Steve615]

Just tuned in to check it out for a minute or two (too much baseball going on).
The PQ looks great and the audio seems to be good quality too. :D

[lragusa]

Just tuned in to check it out for a minute or two (too much baseball going on).
The PQ looks great and the audio seems to be good quality too. :D

Doesn't look like HD to me and i'm not getting it in DD5.1 either.

[arwlin777]

I'm watching it now, looks great!

[Brandon428]

Looked good to me.

[Earl Bonovich]

Looks good so far. Misa like!

Are U Sur Ani?

[CrestronPro]

Is anyone else noticing grainy PQ in the backgrounds? Specifically when looking at a some of the skyline shots, the solid color backgrounds are at times grainy. It seems to be more in the blues and grays. Other times, everything looks great.

[506PIR]

Is anyone else noticing grainy PQ in the backgrounds? Specifically when looking at a some of the skyline shots, the solid color backgrounds are at times grainy. It seems to be more in the blues and grays. Other times, everything looks great.

I noticed some grain. Pq looks just alright to me

[heisman]

Is this amateur hour or something? It's not OAR or 5.1. What a joke!

[Bsquared]

Doesn't look like HD to me and i'm not getting it in DD5.1 either.

Yeah, why no Dolby Digital 5.1?! That was disappointing.

[BubblePuppy]

Is it still on?

[mdavej]

Are U Sur Ani?

May the force bring us Dolby 5.1 in episode II.

[ajc68]

HBO’s HD channels have shown all six Star Wars movies several times over the past six months. The movies look fantastic! Btw, they aired the touched up versions of the original trilogy.

[xxzone]

Very Disappointing! This looks like complete crap. Totally grainy in the background on any light images. This is just a joke. The regular DVD looks way better than this.

I purchased a new 1T Hard Drive to upgrade my dvr space for this. Would have been better off just buying and up converting dvd player.

[spartanstew]

:eek2: :nono2:

You don't have an upconverting DVD player?

[ulbonado]

What's the point of an upconverting DVD player? I have an upconverting TV.

[drx792]

What's the point of an upconverting DVD player? I have an upconverting TV.

umm no you dont.....tv's scale but they dont upconvert

[ulbonado]

What's the difference? There's only so much resolution on the disc. If you want to present it at a higher resolution than that, I suppose there are various algorithms you can apply, but you're not going to create detail where there was none.

At any rate, I actually do have an upconverting DVD player, and I have compared its upconversion vs. that of the TV (a Panasonic 1080p plasma) and empirically I can see no difference. So I leave the DVD player outputting 480p, since that's all that's really on the disc anyway.

[tacob]

not being in oar, really killed it for me

[drx792]

What's the difference? There's only so much resolution on the disc. If you want to present it at a higher resolution than that, I suppose there are various algorithms you can apply, but you're not going to create detail where there was none.

At any rate, I actually do have an upconverting DVD player, and I have compared its upconversion vs. that of the TV (a Panasonic 1080p plasma) and empirically I can see no difference. So I leave the DVD player outputting 480p, since that's all that's really on the disc anyway.

well definition wise there is none, but there is actually a difference visually

im not the best to explain this, but

Your TV scales a picture to fit its fixed resolution(sort of like stretching it to fit), an upconvert DVD player kinda does the same thing only better and actually alters the resolution in the digital signal(why it can only be done with HDMI-also a HDCP thing) before hitting the TV.

if anyone has a better explanation feel free to override mine.

[SSpectre]

The movies themselves look pretty good... but I forgot how bad the acting really is. Especially in Episode 2 with Hayden "Cardboard Cutout" Christensen.

Edit... referring to Episode 2.

[keith_benedict]

well definition wise there is none, but there is actually a difference visually

im not the best to explain this, but

Your TV scales a picture to fit its fixed resolution(sort of like stretching it to fit), an upconvert DVD player kinda does the same thing only better and actually alters the resolution in the digital signal(why it can only be done with HDMI-also a HDCP thing) before hitting the TV.

if anyone has a better explanation feel free to override mine.

Here is a REALLY good explanation from Oppo Digital, maker of the best upconverting DVD player on the market.

Q: Why should I buy the OPPO DV-980H player when my HD display has an internal scaler?
A: That's because, in general, the scaler in a high-performance up-converting DVD player, such as the DV-980H, is more specialized in de-interlacing and scaling DVD signals than a typical HD display's scaler, leading to better picture quality. The process of converting a standard-definition DVD signal to the native resolution of your HD display may cause a host of video artifacts if not performed properly. These flaws will be especially noticeable on large and high-resolution screens. Quality de-interlacing and scaling are the key components to stable, artifact-free movie watching, and frequently the components built into the display (and into many competing DVD players) to perform these tasks are not up to the challenge. In most cases the scaler built into the DV-980H is more suitable for up-converting DVD video signal to high definition video signal, because:

* The de-interlacing and scaling are performed at the point closest to the video source, thus avoiding video artifacts that can be introduced when analog video signal travels from the DVD player to the TV display. Once unconverted to HD signal, the video signal is carried to the TV in pure digital format via HDMI output, and is no longer susceptible to analog noise.
* The de-interlacer and scaler have a direct digital hookup with the DVD reader, so that it can get the flags and additional information encoded in the DVD disc directly and performs the up-conversion accordingly. Doing up-converting outside of the DVD player may lose this advantage.



On the other hand, for HD displays that have high-quality internal de-interlacing and scaling circuitry, and for external video signal processors found in high-end home theater systems, the OPPO DV-980H is an excellent universal transport. Its HDMI output supports 480i/576i resolution, which is the native video format as encoded on the DVD discs. By using the 480i/576i resolution output over HDMI, digital video and audio signals stay in the digital domain all the way from the disc to the display, without going through unnecessary digital-to-analog and analog-to-digital conversions.

[ulbonado]

In other words what upscaling DVD players do and what TVs do is the same, Oppo just claims to have a particularly good implementation of it.

[mdavej]

What's the difference? There's only so much resolution on the disc. If you want to present it at a higher resolution than that, I suppose there are various algorithms you can apply, but you're not going to create detail where there was none.

At any rate, I actually do have an upconverting DVD player, and I have compared its upconversion vs. that of the TV (a Panasonic 1080p plasma) and empirically I can see no difference. So I leave the DVD player outputting 480p, since that's all that's really on the disc anyway.

This is way OT, but upconversion depends a lot on your TV. On my Sony, upconverted 1080p looks much better than native 480p from my Toshiba DVD player. So your Panny must have a better internal scaler than the Sony.

Some other posters also mentioned disappointment in the grainy look of some of the scenes in the subject broadcast. The grain is on the original film (those episodes which aren't purely digital). The fact that the resolution is high enough for you to even see the grain at all is a good thing. Sadly, even the best picture and sound quality can't make up for the abismal acting in episodes I & II. I'm looking forward to the best of the lot tonight in episode III.

Can anyone who's seen both the HBO and SPIKE versions comment on any picture quality differences?

[Brian Hanasky]

LOTR trilogy was on TNT Fri, Sat & Sun. Looked good since I just ran accross it. It's not letterbox. I'd rather watch Extended versions on DVD

[lragusa]

Can anyone who's seen both the HBO and SPIKE versions comment on any picture quality differences?

The quality on HBO was definitely better. No question.

[R.I Matt]

The quality on HBO was definitely better. No question.

I agree.

[betterdan]

I saw a few minutes of Episode 2 today and I thought it looked pretty damn good actually. Too bad I didn't like the movie or I may have watched the whole thing.

[keith_benedict]

Other than the movies I've seen on Starz, watching broadcast HD movies has been largely disappointing. I'd rather watch a DVD any day.

Between the over-compressed sound and altered aspect ratio of most movies, I just can't stomach it.

[su_A_ve]

Watched 5 minutes (and I am a SW fan). Quality was bad. My DVD (non-upconverting) looks much better.

Further, 16x9 ??? These movies are meant to be watched without any cropping.

Looked like a 480p upconversion, instead of a true HD signal...

[SteveHas]

My Denon showed the broadcast as not DD 5.1, anyone else notice that or was it my equipment?
I can't imagine they wouldn't have shown Stare Wars as DD 5.1!
I was able to get surround on other channels last night.
:confused:

[Indiana627]

I thought the PQ for Episode III was much better than for I or II, though still not as good as I've seen movies on other HD channels. And why only DD 2.0 and not 5.1?

[HongKongPhooey]

I only watched Ep. II on Saturday night. There was nothing wrong with the PQ but I kept on getting audio dropouts. Anyone else experience this?

[warriorking]

Caught episode 3 last Night, looked really good although I did get audio drop outs from time to time....Hopefully they will be released on Blu-ray in the near future...

[joed32]

In other words what upscaling DVD players do and what TVs do is the same, Oppo just claims to have a particularly good implementation of it.

I have an old Zenith DB318 converted back to LG specs. If I play a DVD on one of my other players it looks like 480p. If I play it on the upscaling player it has depth in the picture and looks much better. Haven't used any of the Oppos but in the DVD section of the AVS forum they get very good reviews. I think that upconvert which is what the TV does and upscale which is what the player does are often interchanged though they are not the same thing.

[fishingham]

Trying to listen to it in Stereo just killed half the movie fun for me. I'll pull the DVD out and watch it that way, then at least I'll feel more engrossed.

Nice try, but no cigar for being a World Television Premiere (ep III)