drednm wrote:But what's the benefit of BR over DVD? Technology for technology's sake? I can't even stand the idea of redoing all that damned wiring involved in setting up a new machine.
There is no benefit of BR over DVD if you don't have an HDTV. If you have a so-called "full-HD" monitor or TV set, then properly transferred and encoded Blu-rays will suddenly look six times sharper than the best DVDs. And if you project them on a screen with a 1080p HD projector, like many of us do, the difference is often overwhelming. With older films (especially silents), of course, you're still at the mercy of surviving elements, often duped several times in the preservation process, but for most sound films with camera negatives or finegrain positives still surviving in decent shape, a film from 50-60-70 years ago may actually look sharper than some films made in the past 30 years.
On a DVD you can barely tell the difference between scans from camera negatives, finegrain positives, and decent dupes. On a Blu-ray, as on film, you can. (The SUNRISE Blu-ray is a good example. The standard American version, a preservation dupe, looks very slightly better than the DVD edition, but the Czech cut, from an original release print, is substantially clearer and crisper than the DVD edition). I'm really looking forward to the new Blu-rays of the Universal horror classics (which just arrived in today's mail), as advance reviews claim the clarity is spectacularly better than the already good DVD editions.