LG GGC H20L Box from Newegg.com

Ok, I admit it: I’m a geek. But, I’m not so much of a geek that I have lost all of my common sense. I know that many times computer/electronic manufacturers turn out new product simply because it’s new and not because it’s really an advance over previous technology. Hype and buzz often obscure the fact that much “new” hardware is simply not worth your money. To be sure, there are upgrades that improve the hardware substantially, but these occur less often than the tech sites would like you to believe.

So what about Blu Ray? You may have heard on the Overcast that I’ve bought a Sata Blu Ray drive for my computer  with some Xmas bonus money back in January.  I’ve been dubious about the new technology for some of the reasons I’ve listed above. Why did I suddenly cave in?

Criterion released their first batch of Blu Ray discs (after being staunchly against doing this for some time) and PC Blu Ray drives are now suddenly much less expensive than they used to be. I bought mine at a Fry’s Electronics sale for $99. I bought the LG GGC-H20L combo drive (it plays Blu Ray AND HD DVD’s) after doing a bit of research and reading reviews.  The drive currently sells for $109 at Newegg.com (my favorite online store). PS this drive is essentially a year old now and has been discontinued by LG.  But it’s pretty easy to find. Check the LG site and CDfreaks.com for current Blu Ray players if you want the latest.

The drive installed like a charm (my mobo has easy sata connections). I bought a HD disc on sale (2001: a Space Odyssey, $10) and a Blu Ray disc (Akira, $25 on amazon.com) and they both played perfectly. Since I have such a large DVD collection, I’m not looking to replace my entire collection, but buy films that are significant to me; ones I plan on watching several times (if I haven’t already).

Verdict? Thumbs up, baby.

The Blu Ray image is almost like watching it (and hearing it) on the big screen. Since I have a large, 24″ Dell monitor (won in the Blizzard Wow contest for “Edge of Remorse”), the image is sparkling clear with color resolution that puts the older SD DVD’s to shame. The difference is that HD/Blu Ray has many more lines of resolution for the image because the actual blu ray disc can store up to 50 GB’s of data (dual layer). That means you can have a 1080p HD image running at 1920×1080, crusing along at 42mbs.  Amazing visual image is the result.

Is Blu Ray really that better than Standard DVD? Yes, it is. Although you have to do some work to make sure your computer is ready for HD. You have to have an HD compliant video card, an HD compliant monitor and a fast enough processor to move everything along nice a quickly. Do some research here to see if your system is ready for Blu Ray.

There is still some apprehension about upgrading to Blu Ray; not everyone’s system works well, larger TV screens can show some artifacts and some folks just can’t see any visual difference between standard and Blu Ray definition. I can only answer by saying that it REALLY works well for me. I love watching Blu Ray discs now. I”ve expanded my collection to include the BBC doc “Planet Earth“, Criterion’s “400 Blows” and the just released “Goldfinger“. I still buy standard DVD’s, but I spend a lot of time at dvdbeaver.com (my favorite DVD review site) and they are nuts about Blu Ray.

Keep in mind, the cheap Blu Ray drives are PLAY ONLY and if you want to record to Blu Ray DVD you have to buy a re-writeable Blu Ray drive which is about twice the cost of the play only drives. AND you’ll have to buy some extra software to record your discs. The PowerDVD software that came with my drive works just fine, but it’s not so good (without an upgrade) with recording/ripping.

The Blu Ray community is expanding rapidly (including the hacking community). I have a feeling that this technology will replace the standard DVD in four or five years. We’ll see….In the meantime, I can’t wait for the first Blu Ray of “Alien”!

Tags: Akira, Blu Ray, Dvdbeaver.com, LG

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 5th, 2009 at 11:15 pm and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.