Blu-Ray -- is it worth it?

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Damn I wish I had that. You got one you want to sell?

 

I have an 1080p television hooked up to a pretty good upconversion DVD player. I also have DirecTV HD. There is a difference between the picture on the upconversion and the HD satellite, but it's not NEARLY enough for me to fork over the money for a Blu-Ray and the more expensive discs.

 

I bought a Toshiba HD-DVD for $79 earlier this year and its fantastic (with my 40" Sony HDTV). It upconverts standard to near HD, pretty close to HD programming. Now I'm not a huge video guy so I do not have a problem watching upconverted DVDs for a few years until there's a competitor for Blu-Ray or prices go down. Do not think its worth it to pay $300+ for blu-ray.

 

You do realize that HD-DVD was the competitor for Blu-Ray, and you were able to buy a player for $70 because Toshiba has abandoned the format?

 

Ummmmm

 

Just a tip for all you fine folk: day after Thanksgiving at Wal-Mart, they've got a blu ray player on sale for $128.

 

Looked at it today... looks a little clunky, but don't all blu-ray's?

I appreciate the advice above about getting an upconverting player for anything less than 1080p

 

Yes. I guess I was not clear, its beautiful to play the HD-DVDs that are available and it is an upconverter too which is just as good for us as Blu-Ray going forward.

 

I've got a PS3 and I don't have any problems with the discs loading. I think it does matter how old your tv is and how many HDMI ports your tv has. If it has an upgraded HDMI (newer) port the wires you can get are more capable of handling the information running back and forth. However, if you don't have 1080p quality on your tv blu-ray is worth the wait until you can upgrade your tv. It matters.

Now, a lot of people will say blu-ray isn't worth it. I bought my PS3 because of the blu-ray features. I have two movies on blu-ray (Spider-Man 3 and No Country for Old Men). I was blown away at the crisp quality of both of them and am amazed everytime I go into work and see Pirates of the Caribbean or Transformers or Die Hard With a Vengeance playing on the tvs in the store I drool a little bit. It's truly incredible, the detail you can pick up that is.

In the long run it's worth the money, but you can still hold out for a while. Getting a DVD player that upconverts your older movies to a higher quality will suit you just fine for now.l

 

blu-ray is great. one of the best purchases i've made in a while. makes even normal dvds look amazing.

 

There's some LDs down in the basement. None of them are "Heathers," though. Sorry.

My guess is BluRay will be similar to Beta and LaserDisc. Worth it if you're willing to pay more for the format, but at the cost of scarcity and I just dunno if it will become widespread enough to bring the price down.

To boot, an HDTV of at least 1080p is needed to see the difference. But at that point, the difference is noticeable.