July 4th, 2008
One of the biggest sources of confusion to many HDTV buyers is all of the cables. Many of us HD-ready folks have gone over to relatives and friends house only to see the most dreaded of all cables hooked up to their gorgeous new 46" HDTV:
It’s gonna be okay.
Well, first off, what’s so wrong with seeing the trusted ol’ composite cables? Well, first off, composite cable is really just a single channel of NTSC video thrown onto the yellow cable, with the audio split between the two white and red cables. In other words, the video information is all mixed together into a single cable, but the poor quality audio is split between two cables! And since it is transmitting NTSC video, you’re limited to a 480i video experience, and the mixing in the video cable (no separation of color information) causes the colors to be washed and mucked up.
This is all good and fine for VHS tapes and analog cable, both of which are nearly dead. But even DVD-quality is beyond composite cables.
What about S-Video cables? They have such a neat name, so must be better, right? Well, they are better: they separate the video into two channels (essentially a brightness and a color channel), which makes the signal much more stable and the color much better. But it’s still limited to 480i video. It’s still better than composite if that’s your only other option.
Then along comes component cabling: this is some good stuff. Component means that it breaks up the video signal into three component parts: one brightness and two color channels, giving you a rich color spectrum. Since it’s analog, it can run pretty much any video resolution (as long as the cable has thick enough shielding to protect it from outside electromagnetic interference, and the copper inside is thick enough to support the faster signals). This is the first of these cables to support true HD resolutions. If you are going with analog cables, component is about as good as it gets.
There are slightly better analog video options, like some 5-cable component systems used in professional video, as well as VGA, but the primary difference between these and component is the separation of signaling from the video channels. For most people, it makes nearly no difference.
But all of the above cables share one common flaw: they’re all analog. Most of us nowadays have a digital HDTV: LCD, plasma, DLP, or projector. This means there are two problems: the signal is going to have to be converted to a digital one anyways by the display, and the nature of the analog signal means that there may be syncing problems: getting the individual pixels interpreted from the video cable and lined up with the pixels of the display. The first problem of analog conversion you can’t do anything about. The second problem is why you sometimes get weird blurry text on your screen, especially with your HTPC. The only way to get around the syncing problem is to use quality cables and to use your display’s auto-sync feature to try to find the edges of the video signal appropriately.
Hope this clears up some of the confusion with your analog cabling options. Coming soon: audio and digital video!
Tags: analog, cables, component, composite, s-video, videoShare This
By Christopher Swenson -- 0 comments
July 4th, 2008
I generally as a rule am not impressed with made of tv movies. To me they tend to lack a little something that you normally get from a big screen adventure. Maybe it’s the fact that I always feel like they are trying to teach me something and are a little “after-school special”.
But when I saw “The Librarian: Quest for the Spear” (TNT) I thought what the hay. I mean I was at the library and it was free to rent so if it was bad at least the only thing I would be out of was 2 hours and we have all done that. So I went ahead and checked it out based heavily on the fact that I like Noah Wyle and was startling surprised. It was actually good.
There are funny parts and the action was surprisingly natural and although they do throw a little romance in just for effect they give you a little twist with it. The story is a little far-fetched but I guess that is why they don’t call it a documentary.
Extras were a lacking to me but I guess that could be because at the end of the day it is a TV/Cable movie.
I would so recommend this to any Indiana Jones or Mummy fans. You might find a new favorite. I know I did.
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By Tiff -- 0 comments
July 4th, 2008
Okay so I am like to only person on the planet that just saw “Juno”. I know I am so behind the times but there you have it and I will say that after seeing it I am missing some of the hype. Yes it was good and yes I enjoyed it, but it was like most good movies. Good.
If you’re like me then let me give you a brief overview. “Juno” is about a teenage girl, Ellen Page, who finds out that she is pregnant. Her first thought is to terminate the pregnancy but then decides to give it up for adoption. She finds a couple, Jennifer Gardner and Jason Bateman, through an ad in a small local paper and the rest is basically the story of her next nine months. All of the actors give excellent performances and Ellen Page does a wonderful job driving the story. However, I am not really sure that I thought it should have been an Oscar contender.
As far as extras go there was a lot of info and a fun gag reel. So if this is one of your favorites you definitely are going to want to go and pick this one up. And if in fact I am not the only one that hasn’t seen it then go and rent it. You are at least guaranteed at least some entertainment.
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By Tiff -- 0 comments
July 2nd, 2008
One of the things I find most annoying in the world are my DVDs. My wife and I have hundreds of them, and they’re so cumbersome: they take up a lot of space, are prone to being scratched (either by human hands, dropping, or faulty DVD players), and a myriad of other problems. Ugh. If only there were some way to enjoy my movies without the discs themselves!
In fact, there are many ways, both legal and illegal, to do so. I will stick with the legal ways here.
Well, really, there’s only one legal choice: rip them. Store them on a hard drive somewhere, and use that storage as a backup and an easy way to play them. Simple, right?
Not quite. There are dozens of different formats and options to choose from when ripping, storing and playing back DVDs. Let’s cover a few of the most popular ways.
- Make a copy of the disc to a blank DVD. I don’t like this option. You aren’t solving all of the problems, and adding more: it costs money to buy the blanks, they are one of the more expensive media to backup things too, and they aren’t the most reliable of things. Plus, some DVDs are dual-layered, and dual-layered blanks are even more expensive.
- Backup the entire disc to your hard drive. As in, drag-and-drop to copy the entire VIDEO_TS folder onto your hard drive. Really, this is not too bad. Programs like VLC can play it back directly, without decrypting it or otherwise converting it. This method also saves all of the extra features, and the movie will be at full quality. However, this comes at a cost: upwards of 9 GB per disc ripped! Even a 1 TB hard drive can’t hold more than about 200 or so movies this way.
Convert it to an AVI/MP4. For example, with HandBrake, my preferred ripper. HandBrake even has presets for optimal settings for many popular devices, like iPods, PS3, etc., so that you can be sure that your ripped movie will play correctly on your device. I’d really recommend avoiding the AVI format though: it’s an old, Windows-centric container format that doesn’t support a lot of newer video codecs fully, and barely works (when it does at all) on many systems, like the PS3. MP4 is a much more modern format, and I’d recommend sticking to it from now on. HandBrake runs best on Macs, but I’ve heard that its Linux and Windows support has been very good.
Personally, I typically copy the entire contents to my hard drive first (the 2nd recommendation), and then I will queue up a bunch of HandBrake jobs to convert several of them at once overnight. HandBrake’s pretty fast, though: movies often rip 3 or 4 times faster than it takes to watch them.
Tags: DVD, handbrake, ripShare This
By Christopher Swenson -- 0 comments
July 1st, 2008
I am digressing from my normal DVD reviews to talk about a movie coming soon to theaters everywhere, “Batman: The Dark Knight”.
I am a huge Batman fan but I have to admit when I first heard that they were doing another edition about the Joker vs. Batman I was less than thrilled. In my mind I was thinking it has already been done and quite nicely by Jack Nicholson so why do it again. But then the tragic and untimely death of Heath Ledger brought it back to the forefront. Not only was it known as the next Batman movie or the one with the darker Joker but as the last movie that Ledger completed and it a few ways was almost blamed for his overdose seeing that he had started taking sleeping pills while filming.
This put a new spin on the movie for most. It made everyone want to rush out and see it except me. I was thinking it would be too hard to watch such a talented and rising stars last performance. Yet as it gets closer (July 18th is the opening date) and more interviews are done with the cast and previews are shown I find that I am wanting to see it if for no other reason than to find out if it is as good and everyone is saying or if they are just immortalizing a wonderful actor taken in his prime.
Yes, I am a Heath Ledger fan and was truly sadden by his shocking death but I don’t know if I believe any Batman performance could be good enough for an Oscar but that is what they are mentioning in regards to the installment. It isn’t that I don’t believe that the actors in any of the Batman movies aren’t great actors; it really has more to do with the story and the fact that it is based on comic book characters. Not that there is anything wrong with that but Oscar doesn’t tend to favor the less traditional candidates. True I think Ledger had the potential to have a long and amazing career but I would hate to see an award given simply because that actor died without ever reaching his or her full potential.
Which leads to why I know feel as though I have to see the movie. I don’t want to feel that I am being judgmental toward the academy or the actors that have mentioned Oscar in the same breath as Ledger. Personally I have a hard time seeing him win for Batman when he didn’t for “Brokeback Mountain” and if you saw that movie you have to know that that was an Oscar performance if ever there was one.
Tags: batman, comics, ledger, Movie, new, releaseShare This
By Tiff -- 0 comments
July 1st, 2008
Most people who took European history in either high school or college should somewhat remember the story of Anne Boleyn and the Queen of England but I don’t think anyone past the professor knew much more about her or her family. Yet “The Other Boleyn Girl” takes you into not just the life of Anne but of her whole family in a way that is down-right amazing.
This is a movie that defies labeling. It could easily be a mystery, drama, suspense, and action movie without missing a beat. I was captured from moment one and was actually ready to watch it again right after I was done. Talk about being drawn in. This is probably the best that I have ever seen Natalie Portman or Scarlett Johansson. Both women give riveting and astonishing performances. Not only to they breath live into these characters but you understand why they are as they are and why they act as they do. Eric Bana as King Henry VIII is surprising. Like most I just really remember hearing stories of him as the portly and insane king. However Bana makes him lively, likable and most importantly very seductive.
As far as extras, they might be more for those that like to understand their history. There are a few featurettes that explore the making of the movie but the ones that I found the most interesting were the ones that explored the actual history of the characters. This disc also includes some deleted and extended scenes and a commentary that are interesting and worth giving a look.
Would I recommend this movie? Would a fat kid recommend cake? Absolutely, this is one for the collection of even the most die-hard action fan or the person that only owns comedies. It ranges the spectrum and leaves us all loving the Boleyn girls.
Tags: bana, boleyn, england, johansson, king, Movie, portman, Rentals, reviewShare This
By Tiff -- 0 comments
June 30th, 2008
Like every other Netflix subscriber, I recently was told that Netflix Profiles would be going away, and that we would lose all of out ratings and queues stored in our non-primary profiles.
Today they did a Ctrl-Z (Command-Z for those Mac fans out there) after all of the outrage this caused: Netflix Profiles are here to say! Which is good, since a lot of us don’t want to get recommendations based on our spouse’s or children’s watching habits. (Unless you one of those with eclectic tastes, and really feel like giving both Sleeping Beauty and The Re-animator 5 stars.)
Personally, my wife and I use out Netflix profiles to separate my and her current queues (naturally), but we also keep another profile that is just TV shows that we are currently in the middle of that we are both interested in, so that we don’t have duplicates, or worry about hogging queue time on one of our queue’s for something that is for both of us.
Tags: ctrl-z, netflixShare This
By Christopher Swenson -- 0 comments
June 27th, 2008
You know what I hate? A movie that doesn’t know it’s place in the scheme of things. A movie that tries to be the perfect movie for everyone.
I ventured into another very male-centric movie today: Shoot ‘Em Up on Blu-ray. And this movie understands exactly what kind of movie it is: this is the perfect shoot-first-and-ask questions-later movie.
I can best sum up this movie with one word: excellent!
It was a fairly short (about one and a half hours), but every moment of that was filled with Clive Owen sliding around, chewing carrots, and most of all, shooting hundreds of bad guys, constantly He kills at least two of them with carrots, as well as anything else around him when he runs out bullets.
The movie is purely visual, so watching it in Blu-ray really adds quite a bit to the presentation. Seeing the ridiculous gore and fun fight scenes in the more detail helps a lot with immersion.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not purely a mantastic movie: he is, after all, protecting a baby the whole time! But really, while there may be a baby and a tad bit of ridiculous romance, don’t think that this movie is meant to appeal to anything but your heist-loving, gun-firing self, cause it isn’t.
I haven’t had this much fun at a movie since Planet Terror. Rent it, watch it, and enjoy it.
Tags: Blu-Ray, clive owen, Movie, reviewShare This
By Christopher Swenson -- 0 comments
June 27th, 2008
I love old movies. The old black and whites when suspense was suspense without all the high tech and special effects of the day; that is fun for me. So when I get a chance to pick up an oldie that has been remastered and on DVD I rush to it and that is actually what happened when I saw “Holiday”.
This is a fun fast paced movie staring legendary greats Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn. Both Grant and Hepburn have great chemistry in this light comedy about a gentleman that gets engaged without realizing that his fiancé is actually quite wealthy. Hepburn enters as his future sister-in-law and the known “black sheep” of the family. Yet Grant and Hepburn’s characters seem to hit it off very well and she understands him in a way that his soon to be bride doesn’t. “Holiday” is a good movie and shows the quick talking, dry wit of the era.
If you have a chance this is a great pick up for the movie shelves and the best part is that even though this is an older movie they actually went back and found the original trailer. So do yourself a favor and schedule a little “Holiday” for yourself and your family. Trust me you’ll enjoy it.
Tags: Classic, comedy, grant, hepburn, Movie, oldie, review, romanceShare This
By Tiff -- 0 comments
June 26th, 2008
Like most of us I spend way too much time on the internet. Between internet communities, gambling and games, and videos you could conceivable spend an entire day on the computer. But I would like to think that if most of us got an invitation to a website called “killwithme.com” we would stay away. Yet in this movie that is not even close to what happened. Not only do people not say away but they flock like birds to prey and that sets the base of “Untraceable”.
I did go into this movie not really knowing what to expect and was very happy with the end result. This was a great movie. It was full of action and interest and I was soooooo happy that they didn’t put in a romance just for the sake of nothing. Diane Lane and company give great performances and I really loved the fact that the last line of the movie wasn’t even a spoken line but a comment on our society. Although some of the killing scenes were a little graphic for my taste but overall it was thoroughly enjoyable.
The extras were interesting as well. They shared how they developed each character and the back story of the movie. There were some cast interviews and interesting tidbits for everyone.
I would recommend this movie to most anyone as a great movie to watch but I think the graphic nature of the killing scenes would cut into my recommending it to buy. I just don’t know if you would be able to watch it over and over again without it getting to be too much. Plus if you have kids in the house then you really might not want this hanging somewhere they could track it down easily.
Tags: action, hanks, internet, lane, Movie, Rentals, review, suspenseShare This
By Tiff -- 0 comments
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