I dunno. You might watch low-quality stuff - I dunno - but there's plenty of high-quality productions where bluray (even if it's not 4K) offer a definite advantage over streaming. Audio is also much higher quality streamed. Heavy compression may be ok if you're not used to anything decent or not watching anything decent, but high quality sound is always going to win for me.

> Seriously I do not need a 4K Blu-ray for a 1980s grindhouse horror movie.

So, don't buy the 4K version? I've yet to encounter anything being released only in 4K format, which I thought still also commanded something of a price premium over the usual 1080p versions.

Personally, I solved DRM permanently by buying an HDMI capture device. If I can watch it, I can record it. Problem solved. Though, admittedly, it's rare that something can't just be sourced from the high seas.

> If you've ever been in a thrift store and seen a stack of old Blu-ray players that's why...

My local Goodwill's electronics section consists almost exclusively of old WiFi routers and DVD (not Blu-Ray

> The only trend that's kind of fucking that up is these shitty 4K blu-rays. Seriously I do not need a 4K Blu-ray for a 1980s grindhouse horror movie

You probably don't need it period. Movies are generally mastered in 2K. It's a rare movie that isn't. And the more special effects there are, the more likely it is 2K.

(It's really weird, because the cameras they use are typically 4-6K, but apparently Hollywood's mastering process is way lower res than the cameras are. There are exceptions, Christopher Nolan

Even though you still technically don't own the work.

But, you don't have to worry about: "I'm altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it further".

Plus you are not a recurring revenue source for some big corporation.

With DVD's being cracked encryption-wise they're just a flexible as audio CD's, although ripping them is still currently illegal due to the DMCA.

> Streaming services are one of the pinnacles of enshittification. You pay for stuff you don't own. Everything can be taken away from you at any time. Ads can be added at any time, etc.

> Having physical media means that you can get a simple DRM-free file from it, you can watch whenever and wherever you want.

Basically my thoughts. Is it the appeal of physical media, or the increasing enshittification as streaming services fracture, remove content, increase prices... I need to stop talking about all the crap they are doing.

Actually, rather than DRM, the main benefit of physical media is that we own something unalterable by the powers that be. As we saw in 2020, production houses started changing the contents of classic movies, such as eliminating Confederate flags in "Gone with the Wind" and replacing that with Union flags, completely changing the story. With streaming services, one is stuck with that, but if one had a DVD or a BluRay, then one would continue to see what one bought (assuming it was pre 2020), rather than wh

> Streaming services are one of the pinnacles of enshittification.

Streaming is great for watching things you don't want to buy, or to find that one in a dozen movies you didn't know (or didn't think) you'd want to watch more than once. It's a useful tool if you use it appropriately.

The 9 GB dual layers do break down, though, but overall yes I think the reason they standardized the codecs the way they have is to have lightweight processors in the players. Transcoding a 4k disc takes a pretty long time on a modern processor running on all threads.

Agreed, format wars were stupid, but DVD has limited capacity and there's not much you can do about that. DVD-9 is fine, but heavy on the CPU, and (whilst backwards compatible) is nonetheless another standard.

FWIW HD DVD could work with both the HD DVD media and old fashioned 9G disks. It was medium neutral in that respect. The problems were:

1. It didn't take off.

2. It was assumed, correctly, that the expense of blue lasers - the only real reason to continue using 9G discs - would eventually come down. HD DVD's 30G discs weren't any more expensive to press than red laser 9G DVD media, it used the same equipment with the exception of the master creation system itself.

3. It was assumed since the start that H.264 couldn't compress 2K/1080P video with the same quality that MPEG2 compresses 480P/576P at DVD bitrates. I think, after a decade of streaming services generally topping out at 4-5Mbps for 2K, that this isn't really true.

But in theory Hollywood could have made cheap disks with high definition movies on them at streaming rates had HD DVD succeeded, but preferred Blu-ray's DRM. Which... well, not come across a BD I couldn't rip, so that was a waste of everyone's time.

> No, HD-DVD and Bluray don't count...both of them were too expensive, too limited and too encumbered by the format war between them, and never became as attractive as DVD.

I think "Were too expensive" is operative here. Blu-Rays are pretty cheap these days. You can pick them up used at thrift stores for a couple bucks each. If you deal hunt on Amazon you get get them for $5 new. Even UHDs aren't bad, especially if you buy in bulk. You can get the Alfred Hitchcock Ultimate Collection UHD box set on Amazon for $112. That's 14 movies, which averages $8 per film.

One thing I don't get - what's wrong w/ flash memory here? They easily match the densities offered by DVDs (16-32GB), Blu-ray (32-128GB). SD cards have lock buttons that both vendors and customers can use, and the other legacy memory formats are there as well - CompactFlash, memory sticks, xD cards,... - any of which could have been used. Also, if vendors wanted it for DRM purposes, they could even have had flash memory w/ read-protect features, which would have prevented copying of movies

Exactly. Buy the physical media for stuff you like before it disappears from streaming sites.

Streaming is inherently quality-capped - there's only so much pipe coming out of the streaming service, it's gotta handle an Internet clogged with cats and porn (and, trust me, you don't want the cats in the Interwebs batbatbatting your film to knock it over the edge), and it's got to be a simple enough format that low-end low-power laptop/phone CPUs can handle it.

So it's partly watch-forever for DVDs, but also a case of what to do if you really really want high quality.

Would be pretty hilarious if Blockbuster comes back and beats Netflix.

An even better source of DVD's: Your local swap meet (usa) or car boot sale (uk).

We've been collecting physical movies for a long time, far longer than streaming services were a thing. For a long time my collection was predominantly Laserdisc of all things and my wife's was mostly VHS as her family had been recording off of TV for decades.

At this point DVD and Blu-Ray comprise most of our movie and TV collection but I still have well over 500 laserdiscs.

The only annoyance is physical storage. But with something like 2700 titles that isn't exactly surprising.

We got into physical media

I get a lot of DVDs from a large bi-annual charity book sale. Much cheaper than buying things new (especially for TV series).

If you want to stream and store every single episode of Thunderbirds in 1K, you're welcome to try. Although International Rescue might stop you.

(It's a pity that the 4K upgrades they did on two episodes weren't popular in the cinemas - the quality was impressive and actually showed just how much effort was put into making high quality models even for a cheap show in the 1960s. You couldn't upscale the early Doctor Who stories to 4K without a LOT of cleanup, the props weren't nearly to the same standard.)

To be fair, when DVDs were designed all TVs were CRTs and the outpht from the player was analogue. Because of this there was always subtle low pass filtering on video so the artifacts are less noticeable. With high precision LCDs it's a different story especially if it's a pure digital signal path via hdmi.

> You have to have a player machine, for one thing, so that is a barrier for any younger people getting interested.

$25 on Amazon, next-day delivery. Not a barrier.

> No one tell you when you can and can't use it.

Go play that DVD in front of a live audience and charge admission, or even free. Then get back to me after the MPAA comes knocking.

You'll find you still don't own it. You own a restricted license.