Messages posted by Simon P

Quote HD-DVD has ceased for many years by the origanization that developed HD-DVD specification.

The movie disc contains DRM and it might require online authentication for playing on a PC (just like what Blu-ray movies do), and the authentication service has absolutely been taken down for a long time.

The most feasible playback solution is buying a HD-DVD TV player from Amazon or eBay if the legacy standlone players are still available on the market.

I believe most of the old movies that released in HD-DVD format also have the versions released in Blu-ray or online video formats.

My solution for playing my old HD-DVDs is to rip them to disk using Makemkv and playing the .mkv files with MPC-HC.

PDVD will prompt only when the disk first starts but not when the main programme starts playing. The interactive menu of many blu-rays have a framerate of 60Hz so if have your PC set to 60Hz you won't get a prompt.

I only discovered this because my HTPC is set to 24Hz and when I play many blu-rays I get the prompt asking to set the framerate to match the content. I guess someone has assumed that the framerate will be the same throughout the whole blu-ray disk like it is with DVD's.

Quote:

Quote: The review for powerdvd 16 on cnet said....

" a CyberLink representative confirmed to me that the software will support 4K Blu-ray once PC hardware becomes available (and the Blu-ray Disc Association releases a PC-based standard)."

And that's the problem, there are no drives with AACS 2.0 authentication yet.

Also very few graphics cards that support HDMI 2.0 and HDCP 2.2

Quote: I do wish they would reinstall HDDVD playback. I really don't know why thay took it out.

It was taken out because HD DVD lost the format war and ,yes, I backed the wrong format.

My solution to playing back my large collection of HD DVD's was to convert them to MKV files using MakeMKV (MakeMKV can read HD DVD disks in a Blu-ray drive) and play them back with MPC HC. PowerDVD will play the MKV files but doesn't select the correct framerate so playback is very jerky.

I recent bought a Yamaha BD-A1040 Blu-ray player and although it can't play HD DVD disks, it plays back my HD DVD MKV files almost perfectly with a few intermittant stutters.

Quote: If you don't mind, what software exactly allows you to bitstream Dolby Atmos from your laptop to your amplifier? Does the amplifier confirm it is receiving Atmos?

It definitely works with PowerDVD 14 but I haven't installed PowerDVD 15 yet so I can't check it.

Daft question, you do have the "Non-decoded high definition audio" output option set in PowerDVD set? otherwise it will only output Dolby Digital or LPCM.

Quote: As far as I know, to play UHD-BD title on PC. You'll need an Optical Disc Drive that supports UHD-BD, but so far there's no ODD available for PC that supports UHD-BD.
So maybe the era of UHD-BD on PC is not yet come, but I think they probably is on the way to go.

You also need a graphics card that supports HDMI 2.0 and HDCP 2.2 and also supports 4K protected content.

Quote: Yes it would be nice if cyberlink would throw us a bone.
Looks like DTSX, HDR and HDMI 2.0a has made most AVR's outdated again already.
If only there was an all in the box software solution that supported/decoded all formats we could buy.......

2 years later, back at the camp and nada!
Looks like powerdvd sold their high end users down the river.
might as well just buy a networked bluray player and skip powerdvd altogether if you take sound seriously.

If you like apps that you'll never use and a piece of software which essentially just passes data through to be decoded by your hardware (I.e pointless) then powerdvd is what you need!

One reason I decided to wait before upgrading my old AVR. My setup suppoorts DTS:X, Atmos and has HDMI 2.0a and HDCP 2.2

One question, I presume you play ripped blurays rather than play the actual disk because your highend kit won't have a protected audio path which will mean playing from a disk will only output 16-bit LPCM audio rather than 24-bit.

Dolby Atmos works Ok with PowerDVD 14 so there shouldn't be a problem with 15.