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HD VMD Playable In Standard DVD Drives!?

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HD VMD Playable In Standard DVD Drives!?

Postby Ian on Tue Feb 20, 2007 4:06 pm

Who needs a $500-$1000 HD DVD or Blu-ray player when you can play HD VMD discs on your existing DVD drives.

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/070220/latu082.html?.v=92

As one of the invited keynote speakers at MEDIA-TECH, Dr. Levich will educate attendants on VMD technology as the quality and value-driven solution for the mass market. Dr. Levich will cover the benefits of HD VMD to consumers, PC drive and media player manufacturers, disc replicators and content providers, and discuss why this proprietary optical storage solution is a major development for the packaged media industry. Dr. Levich will speak on Wednesday, March 7 at 11:30 a.m. and will illustrate his lecture with a live demonstration of the true HD VMD 20 (GB) disc played back in a regular "off the shelf" DVD drive. He will also display a new HD VMD Media Player based on this "off the shelf" DVD loader.


If true, this could make HD VMD a very interesting alternative to Blu-ray and HD DVD. Of course, they still need support from Hollywood, which they don't seem to be getting.
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Postby CowboySlim on Tue Feb 20, 2007 4:52 pm

OK, Ian, time to doctor up that photo that you took several years ago when you snuck into Hox's room. :D
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Postby [buck] on Tue Feb 20, 2007 4:57 pm

If it plays in current DVD players, that means no new DRM, which means that there is a 0% chance of Hollywood ever adopting it as a format :roll:
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Postby Ian on Tue Feb 20, 2007 5:16 pm

DRM would most likely be handled by software. Right now, I can view the files on an HD DVD disc but I can't play them without software that supports AACS.
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Postby [buck] on Tue Feb 20, 2007 10:35 pm

Oh, I'm sorry, I thought the article was saying that they were able to be played back in set-top DVD players. That makes a lot more sense.
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Postby Ian on Tue Feb 20, 2007 10:42 pm

They aren't exactly clear. I'm taking it as a PC-based DVD drive.
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Postby Wesociety on Thu Feb 22, 2007 1:35 am

Yeah, the "quotes" around the phrase "off the shelf" and the term "regular" DVD drive or DVD loader are highly suspicious.

I would suspect that a normal DVD drive could handle the media, but special software / firmware would be needed in order to playback the HD VMD.
In other words: there is no way that existing DVD standalone players will be able to play back these HD VMD discs.

HD VMD format and players provides the world's only low-cost and true high-definition playback solution utilizing today's red laser technology and existing DVD industrial infrastructure. Incorporating break-through optical storage capacity, a red laser-based HD file format, encryption technology, authoring tools and compression technologies


Blah, blah, blah... Another format dead before it arrived.
No major studio support, no major CE support. Bye bye HD VMD.
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Postby Ian on Thu Mar 08, 2007 6:39 pm

NME said it again in today's press release:

http://biz.yahoo.com/pz/070307/115071.html

NME's HD VMD PC technology will enable consumers to make their current PC drives compatible with VMD playback format through a simple download, and will also offer PC manufacturers VMD drives for future VMD technology formats. NME will officially demonstrate its true HD VMD 20 (GB) disc playback with an ``off the shelf'' DVD drive equipped with HD VMD PC playback software, along with its new HD VMD media player. The proprietary PC drives will go on sale in Q3 07.
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Postby Wesociety on Fri Mar 09, 2007 2:24 pm

Hmmm, I would expect that a firmware update would be needed in order to playback an HD VMD correctly.

If that's the case, each manufacturer will have to be willing to support a firmware upgrade that enables the functionality. That could be a mess...
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Postby Ian on Fri Mar 09, 2007 6:02 pm

According to the presentation they did at MEDIA-TECH, you will need a firmware update:

http://www.media-tech.net/fileadmin/tem ... levich.pdf

HD VMD PC drive: usual DVD drive with upgraded firmware


I can't believe I'm posting a link to this, but cdrinfo was at MEDIA-TECH and posted some pics and info on NME's new products:

http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/News/De ... wsId=19926
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Postby Wesociety on Sat Mar 10, 2007 6:59 pm

Wow, CDRInfo actually wrote something themselves for once instead of stealing content from another website. I'm stunned. I will never post a link to them because of their content stealing practices.
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Postby Wesociety on Wed Mar 14, 2007 10:10 am

DailyTech just published an interesting article on HD VMD here:
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=6307
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Postby Ian on Wed Mar 14, 2007 10:26 am

Yeah, I saw that. They're like "oh, look at this brand new format!". Sorry guys.. been out for awhile now.
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Postby Wesociety on Wed Mar 14, 2007 10:49 am

Ian wrote:Yeah, I saw that. They're like "oh, look at this brand new format!". Sorry guys.. been out for awhile now.

Yeah, that part was funny. This format isn't new guys...
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