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In Reply to: Re: You have a good point about region coding posted by David Aiken on February 16, 2007 at 23:25:13:
No, unfortunately very much alive. For example, HDTV in Australia is based on a 50Hz frame rate (eg. Channel Nine and Ten broadcasts at 1080i 50Hz) whereas in the US it's 60Hz.Similarly, players also run at 50 vs 60 Hz.
The reason is so that when you downconvert HD to SD you don't have to change frame rates.
Anyway, my point was not a technical but a legal one. From a legal perspective, one could argue that Region A titles are 60Hz therefore "unplayable" in Australia therefore no need to permit parallel importation, therefore region coding does not restrict competition. It's a stretch, I know, but a good (ie. really slimy) lawyer could probably mount a strong case.
Follow Ups:
Here is a quote from "home entertainment" magazine, one of our local and not too high quality publications, on Blu-ray discs currently available in Australia:"All six, interestingly, are US-style 60 Hz discs. At the moment that means that they tend to appear a little jerky at points due to the way that 24 frames per second film is transformed into 60 frames per second video." I can remember seeing something somewhere else which indicated that the discs we would get here were essentially the same as in the US except for any region coding.
The comment quoted refers to 6 Sony discs used in a review that "home entertainment' did of the Samsung and Panasonic players. One of those discs was 'Into The Blue', a film I'm unfamiliar with but did watch for a few minutes on a store display. I didn't notice any jerkiness on it, nor have I noticed any on any of the other films I've seen used in demos. If I remember correctly, the Sony player was being used for the demo that was showing "Into The Blue".
In any event, I just checked my TV's specs and it supports PAL in 2 varieties, one of which is 60 Hz. There may be a problem with 50/60 frame rates on older TVs but I wonder whether that is an issue with most current model HDTVs on the market here. The review of the Samsung and Panasonic players indicated that they both supported 50 and 60 Hz progressive.
It's definitely a very different issue with standard definition material because that adheres to the PAL standard which is 50 Hz, at least here in Australia.
David Aiken
If an Australian player is playing back an Australian Bluray of a film at 60Hz, then it's potentially a bug. This is because BluRay is supposed to encode films at 1080 24p, which should then get expanded to either 50Hz or 60Hz depending on region.I suspect these first generation players are finding it difficult to convert 24p to 50Hz, so they are using 60Hz instead. converting 24p to 60Hz (also known as 2:3 telecine) results in judder, however, it takes a very experienced eye to detect the judder. It's unlikely you'll notice it unless you know exactly what to look out for.
We may see some true 50Hz titles in the future, particularly with locally produced content, mastered from HDV at 50i.
Actually even for SD NTSC/60Hz has never really been an issue in Australia as most TVs sold are multi-format. Every single TV I've owned (even one bought in the eighties) has been able to play back NTSC.
There are a few units that don't support 1080i 50Hz and 1080p 50Hz though. These are typically early model projectors. Anything bought in the last few years should be fine though (fingers crossed).
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