I have a very nice 40" TV that supports 1080P very nicely and I've run blu ray movies vs upscaled DVDs and in my opinion there is very little noticeable difference while you are watching the moive.
Now certainly if you pause the film and go an look at it close up you can see the the upscaled DVD is much more blurred than the crisp Blu Ray picture but when it's playing you just don't notice it very much, if it all.
For games, it is more noticeable, playing Ninja Gaiden II or Assasin's Creed you can just boggle at the pixel perfect scenes but in movies (unless its a VERY boring film) you just won't be doing that. I spent quite a bit of time in Assasin's Creed climbing huge towers just so I could enjoy the view, and even going right up to the screen to look at details right in front of my charecter, you would never do that in a film. So for most people I think, yes a Blu Ray player is very much not needed right now. You can enjoy almost the same experience with barely any noticeable difference and DVD's are much cheaper and more availble than Blu Ray movies are.
Imagine if the PS3 came with a laserdisc player, would that be worth it? Blu Ray is still quite in danger of becoming the next laserdisc.
There are 90,000 DVD movies on release right now, vs 772 Blu Ray titles. Most DVDs cost from £3-£15 vs Blu Ray coming in at £35 + Blu Ray have all that horrible DRM.
DVD WAS a MASSIVE improvement on VHS, I can only assume you did not have to use VHS for any length of time to not appreciate it's drawbacks.
DVD's do not use sequential access VHS did.
VHS quality rapidly detoriated, cared for properly DVD does not.
DVD's allowed menus and additional features to be layered into the film, VHS did not.
DVD's are small and light, VHS was big and heavy.
DVD's allowed better video quality.
To use DVDs you only needed a DVD player to get most of the benefits.
The very few new things Blu Ray has over DVD is:
Incrementally improoved visual quality, (requiring, 50" 1080P HDTV to really be noticeable).
Slightly improoved audio quailty (for people with the latest high end sound systems only).
Haven't you heard of the law of diminishing returns? The more pixels you have the less the number of pixels matters...
Darkheart
Now certainly if you pause the film and go an look at it close up you can see the the upscaled DVD is much more blurred than the crisp Blu Ray picture but when it's playing you just don't notice it very much, if it all.
For games, it is more noticeable, playing Ninja Gaiden II or Assasin's Creed you can just boggle at the pixel perfect scenes but in movies (unless its a VERY boring film) you just won't be doing that. I spent quite a bit of time in Assasin's Creed climbing huge towers just so I could enjoy the view, and even going right up to the screen to look at details right in front of my charecter, you would never do that in a film. So for most people I think, yes a Blu Ray player is very much not needed right now. You can enjoy almost the same experience with barely any noticeable difference and DVD's are much cheaper and more availble than Blu Ray movies are.
Imagine if the PS3 came with a laserdisc player, would that be worth it? Blu Ray is still quite in danger of becoming the next laserdisc.
There are 90,000 DVD movies on release right now, vs 772 Blu Ray titles. Most DVDs cost from £3-£15 vs Blu Ray coming in at £35 + Blu Ray have all that horrible DRM.
DVD WAS a MASSIVE improvement on VHS, I can only assume you did not have to use VHS for any length of time to not appreciate it's drawbacks.
DVD's do not use sequential access VHS did.
VHS quality rapidly detoriated, cared for properly DVD does not.
DVD's allowed menus and additional features to be layered into the film, VHS did not.
DVD's are small and light, VHS was big and heavy.
DVD's allowed better video quality.
To use DVDs you only needed a DVD player to get most of the benefits.
The very few new things Blu Ray has over DVD is:
Incrementally improoved visual quality, (requiring, 50" 1080P HDTV to really be noticeable).
Slightly improoved audio quailty (for people with the latest high end sound systems only).
Haven't you heard of the law of diminishing returns? The more pixels you have the less the number of pixels matters...
Darkheart