JP_S,
I will try and answer the DTS and DD question. If I am wrong, not only will we find out, but I will learn too. Amirm seems to know his sh@t and can explain it very well.

From what I understand, DTS has stricter guidelines for their audio compression, 768 if I remember correctly where as DD is 192. For example LoTR Ext has great DTS and DD tracks. My guess is that the DD track is >192.

I know i am missing some of the proper terms here, but this is all from memory.

Please correct me as needed

Quoting amirm:

Quote:
No studio we work with needs or has asked for TL-51.  Otherwise, TL-45 would have been productized long time ago.

Could that be because HD DVD only has 1 major exclusive studio and the other neutral studios just work with you on space and bandwidth constraints?  Disney asked for it with Blu-ray from the beginning.

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They see clearly that consumer pays more when there are more discs in a package, not less.  Remember MI3?

DVD almost never has just the movie on one disc and extras on the other.  A 2-disc DVD set meant there was more than just deleted scenes, commentary, and a featurette.

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So why is it there?  Because Toshiba engineers don’t sit still.

Are you saying Toshiba engineers created a 51GB HD DVD disc, basically, because they had nothing better to do?  These engineers just decided to spin their wheels because they wanted to create something that wasn't needed?  Or, was is it needed?

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They have continued research and created even a higher capacity disc than BD and like to see a standard defined around it, as they have done with their other proposals like DVD and HD DVD.

BD's capacity is 200GB.  You know that.  The 100GB BD should be out by 2009.  That still doesn't help HD DVD's bandwidth limitations.  Proposals like the DVD9 were created because they need more space.  Are you saying that HD DVD needs more space than 30GB (if it's as they have done with their other proposals)?

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The DVD Forum is the right place for that so a working group has been created to study their proposal and will weigh in with a final spec a few months from now.  Once that spec is finished, we will know the level of compatibility.

So, if it is found that the 51GB discs are incompatible with current HD DVD players, will the camp alert their supporters to this?  Will the HD DVD camp scrap the whole effort, if the 51GB discs are incompatible with current players?

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Due to above reasons, TL-51 is a non-event for us.  We have 3 hour plus movies already out in HD DVD-30 and there will be more.

I believe the HD DVD supporters missed the fact that they could not enjoy King Kong in lossless audio.  That must have been due to the bandwidth limitations.

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Right.  An unknown source telling someone how much the discs costs.  Let me ask you something.  If BD-50 discs are such a bargain, and can be readily produced, why would a replicator not quote the price in public?  As you noticed in the article, there are replicators quoting HD DVD-15 and 30 plus BD-25 but not BD-50.  Do you know why?  Well, you would if you read the AVS Forum insider thread where one of their employees said they could not replicate BD-50.  So my request remains for you to show rates from an independent replicator.  Not the secret word of someone else that no one can verify for accuracy.

Let's see.  First, you try to discredit the article.  Then, you turn around and try to use information from the article to make a point.  On top of that, you want me to believe a forum thread from which the information can not be verified for accurancy.  Interesting.

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Your answer seems to indicate that you don’t really understand the technology involved.  So let me explain it.

BD discs require very high level of flatness for the layers (about 8 microns if my memory is right).  DVD however, does not.  If you build a DVD layer, and then try to put the BD layers on top of it, you run out of tolerance and your yields go to zero, making the cost essentially astronomical.  It is a bit like wanting an ultra flat surface, but painting on top of wallpaper.  The thickness variation shows through no matter how flat you attempt to make the paint layer.

The analogy in computer is if Intel wanted to product 5 Ghz processors.  I am sure they could push to produce one chip that would work at this speed.  But with a failure rate of 99.9999% at this clock speed, it would not really matter that they could get a single chip working.

So it was not a matter of it costing a bit more.  It was a matter of designing something that simply is not practical to manufacture.  Like wishing you could build a BMW for 10,000.  You can wish it.  You can draw some pictures of it.  But if you can’t manufacture and sell it for that price, you don’t have a design.  You don’t get to come back and say it cost too much.  Your competition doesn’t seem to have that problem.

So, in other words, it costs too much to implement.  I could have sworn that was what I said.

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Whenever someone shows up with a movie with that many channels.  And thinks there is a real market for them.  Go and ask the people in the business about 7.1  They all tell you that the see NO demand for it and they have fallen back on 5.1 production.

LionsGate and I.G. Cinema Selections (the group that brought Ghost in the Shell 2: Innonence to Blu-ray in 7.1) don't seem to be waiting for that.  7.1 sounds great in my house.  I guess HD DVD supporters will just have to wait.

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So you still want 24-bit audio? Can you please tell me what audio system you have?

I know this trick.  I say I have a Creston Adagio and you say it can't do 24-bit, right?

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Funny isn’t it?  Sony would rather roll over and play dead than to use VC-1.  Yet it seems from above, they can make more money than we can from VC-1 .  Seriously, the reason for it is rather simple and has to do with patent system in US.  Sony has a number of old patents that read on many compression technologies including MPEG-2, AVC and VC-1.  Microsoft innovations however, are much newer and since it takes about 4 years to have a patent granted from the time of application, those patents are just getting granted now.  As such, we expect to have a significant number of patents soon in VC-1.  And per above, these would cover much more advanced and innovative techniques for video compression like the features used in NIN.

But, I find it interesting that the article said that Microsoft has to back pay from 2006 for the codec given away with it's media player.  I also find it interesting that it said "back when Microsoft thought it owned all the technology inside of it's codec.  That would suggest that Microsoft does not own most of VC-1.  This wouldn't be because of patents being filed about 4 years ago.  It would be because Microsoft infringed on a lot of patents unknowingly (or else they wouldn't have opened it up for all to see).

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Then please quit saying that high bitrate allows compressionists to be lazy and produce content quicker.

It's not about the compressionists being lazy.  It's about getting amazing quality titles in the consumers hands in the least time.

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The best way to speed up encoding is to provide the best tools possible to allow the people who compress movies to have absolutely the best control over all the parameters.  Microsoft’s latest VC-1 encoder, which is now marketed by Sonic Solutions, is unrivaled in level of control.  For example, you can mark a “region of interest” and have the codec optimize the picture quality there (e.g. someone’s face).  For this reason, our encoder is considered the favorite among many compression houses.  There are some benefits to being in software business .

HD DVD encodes take too long and only to come close to or match Blu-ray's quality.  That extra time is too high a price to pay just to shoehorn a movie into a 30GB disc.

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Yes, they were missed.  But frames have been posted in AVS Forum showing the artifacts and I can give you the time codes to verify.  Of course, if your display is not good enough to already see them, well, not sure that will do any good.  Can you tell me what display you have?

All five reviewers miss them?  Ok.  I would love to have the time codes.  I just saw this, again, two days ago. 

This trick again.  I tell you I have an ISF calibrated KDSR70XBR2 and you say it's not good enough to see these artifacts, right?

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Why would you not read the paper I provided to you before answering back like this?  Maybe you feel you already know the science.

I've read it now.  I might have a handle on this paper and a couple others.

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If so, do you know what thermal noise is?

Nyquist noise, but that shouldn't have anything to do with our discussion on 24-bit audio.  "thermal noise" occurs when the equipment is off (charged electrons).

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Do you know what DAC linearity means?

It's distortion.  We should move on.  I would like to put these concepts to work.

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Do you think Meridian who makes DVD players that cost more than your car, doesn’t know about digital audio?  But Richard does?

How well do you know Richard?  Don't assume that just because he doesn't make "DVD players that cost more than your car" that he doesn't know what he's talking about.  If I did that, where would that leave you?

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Let me explain it to you in layman terms until you read the paper.  No analog to digital converter is able to digitize a signal that has more than 20 bits of resolution.  Let me repeat this again.  There is no ADC in the world that can produce anything better then 20-bits.

From what I gathered from the white paper about 24-bit PCM is that he said 20-bit was "enough".  He also stated that an overwhelming majority of DVD players could not pass 24-bit correctly.  He didn't even say all.  I believe the PS3 does the all the signal processing via the Cell (software wise).  So, at least from the PS3 the signal should be about perfect.  Now the Crestron maybe another story.  I need more time to verify via schematic or via engineer.

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Internal noise generated by ADC dwarfs the input signal and the ADC winds up giving you its own noise rather than the input signal.

I believe that's why dithered quantization would be introduced to give a smooth noise spectrum up to a certain point.

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On the playback side, Digital to analog converters have similar problem.  Here we not only have to deal with noise, we also have to deal with linearity and jitter.  In practical terms, typical consumer gear which advertises “24-bit” DAC/192khz, only resolves to about 14-bits.  Yes, not even 16-bits!  I have a Mark Levinson DAC which costs $8,000 and the only thing it does is convert digital signals to analog.  Do you want to guess how accurate its output is, even though it advertizes 24-bits of resolution also?  19-bits and if pushed, maybe 20-bits.

So, if 24-bit advertised equipment resolves up to 20-bits, then surely a 16-bit advertised equipment resolves even less.  In that case, you are better off with the advertised 24-bit than advertised 16-bit.  That should take care of the rest of the 24-bit spiel.

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So think about what performance the $10 part in your AVR has.

I don't understand why you are assuming what parts in my AVR costs.  Is that what it costs in your AVR?

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Per above, your ears are not telling you anything.  Note that even if I did manage to play something with 24-bits of resolution, the number of people in the world who can tell the difference would be exceptionally small.  Otherwise, please explain to me why SACD/DVD-A failed with their higher resolution audio.  As such, I am confident that your ears cannot resolve the difference between 16 and 20-bits let alone 24-bits.

I'm glad you know what my cochlea is capable of detecting.  It must be hard knowing as much as the government.  They are the only ones besides me than knows my hearing capabilities.

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Detecting that level of quantization noise requires training, and very transparent equipment.  When I am testing things at this level, I pair up the above $8K DAC with a $6K electrostatic headphone/amp and only then, can I discern the difference.  I am talking about a $14K audio system just for stereo!

Yes, yes...we heard...you have descent audio equipment.  That still doesn't say I can't hear the difference.

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Note that I am not saying the sound track you are hearing is not great.  It probably is.  It is just that it is not 24-bits.  It is probably not even 16-bits.

Then I can only imagine what the HD DVD owners are hearing when they think they're listening to their 16-bit movie soundtracks.  It's probably not even 10-bits.  Thanks for that information!

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Wow, didn’t realize Matrix was already available in BD.  For V for Vendata.  Or the other 12 Warner titles which have yet to make it to BD format due to lack of interactivity features there .

But, I will have them.  Plus, when Blu-ray has PiP (BD-J 1.1) at least it will be able to resolve HD PiP streams.  When will HD DVD players be able to decode two HD streams for PiP?  I know it's in your specs, but the players can't do it.  So much for HD DVD having players that can handle the complete specs, right? 

@8ballMax
Could you please not quote him anymore... I have to scroll so much every single time. 

Quoting JP_S:

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@8ballMax
Could you please not quote him anymore... I have to scroll so much every single time. 

Well then...he shouldn't blah, blah, blah, blah...so much then .

Quoting Kathy:

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My Grandpa would say he has verbal diarrhea!  

Quoting JP_S:

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Quoting 8ballMax:

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Quoting JP_S:

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@8ballMax
Could you please not quote him anymore... I have to scroll so much every single time. 

Well then...he shouldn't blah, blah, blah, blah...so much then .

Yeah that is better

I took me about two hours to get thru his post... OMG

Next time I'll just quote the salient points...errrrr...that will leave nothing to quote then .

Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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If movie theaters don't have the equipment to support 7.1 surround (I didn't say 24-bit), then it doesn't take a genius to realize there is no precedence of 7.1 in a movie theater.  It just takes someone that knows about movie theater audio equipment.  That's all.

i.e. not you.

P.S. All your blathering about 24-bit vs 16-bit audio and you have a Crestron Adagio? 
                       

Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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Could that be because HD DVD only has 1 major exclusive studio and the other neutral studios just work with you on space and bandwidth constraints?  Disney asked for it with Blu-ray from the beginning.

Are you saying that Universal, Warner and Paramount make movies and employ people that are somehow different than that of Disney/Fox?  If so, please explain as your counter makes no sense.

As to Disney asking for it from the beg. why do you think TL-45 was created?  It was to test to see if they really cared about capacity or not after saying it was important to them.  And guess what?  They still did not support HD DVD.  So we know capacity isn’t it.  Otherwise, I would be all excited, thinking that Disney would adopt HD DVD once we have TL-51.  You see, logic is a pesky thing, isn’t it? 

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Are you saying Toshiba engineers created a 51GB HD DVD disc, basically, because they had nothing better to do?  These engineers just decided to spin their wheels because they wanted to create something that wasn't needed?  Or, was is it needed?

It is their job to keep innovating.  We will probably have vC-2 video compression format that is better than VC-1.  It would not be compatible with VC-1.  But would provide even better performance, making new applications like digital delivery have better quality at the same rate, or have other features I won’t talk about.  Are you seriously suggesting that we shouldn’t do that and instead, should send all the engineers to an indefinite island vacation?

Keep this in mind as you keep bringing up TL-51.  If Toshiba succeeds in creating a spec that is backward compatible and yet, brings even more capacity than BD format, what is left for BD to claim?  I mean having too much DRM with BD+ is not it.  Having region coding is not it.  Having more expensive players is not it.  Having more expensive optical pick ups is not it.  Having more difficult manufacturing is not it.  Oh I know, having people buy a single BD disc per PS3 must be it .

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BD's capacity is 200GB.  You know that.  The 100GB BD should be out by 2009. 

Did you read the bit where I talked about tolerances?  Or the part that said 50 gigabyte discs are difficult and expensive to make?  Or the bit about 5 Ghz CPUs?  If not, let me say it differently.  I can draw a picture for both HD DVD and BD, and keep showing more layers with thinner and flatter specs for the layers written on it.  But this doesn’t mean anyone can manufacture them.

The proposals for higher capacity BD discs were for one thing, in the area of recordables.  And in all cases, it requires completely different drives, electronics and pick ups.    The recordable media costs $1/gigabytes for BD.  With that being much worse than hard disks, I don’t see the economics in bringing out even more expensive recordable media.

In contrast, TL-51 has been show to work and be manufacturable.  Yes, it increases complexity and cost beyond HD DVD-30.  But nothing like the pipe dreams regarding higher capacity BD discs.  Fortunately, BDA itself rarely talks about these higher capacity discs, knowing they have their hands full trying to get BD-50 working.

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So, if it is found that the 51GB discs are incompatible with current HD DVD players, will the camp alert their supporters to this?  Will the HD DVD camp scrap the whole effort, if the 51GB discs are incompatible with current players?

I guess I need to bring more education here too .  DVD Forum is a public entity unlike BDA.  All matters that are voted on are a matter of public record.  They are put on their web site and the next day, everyone in the world knows about them.  The votes are posted on AVS Forum news thread and major publications like CED cover them with more background info on what they mean.  So no secret will be kept.

Contrast the above with BD+ copy protection.  To this date, no one has any idea what this system is going to do to your player.  None!  This, when its counterpart, AACS, gives you full spec, compliance rules, etc.  So if you are a fan of transparency, you better move to our camp.  The weather is much nicer here!

And no, we don’t scrap anything.  If HD DVD-51 is not compatible at all, it would still be an approved standard for people to go and implement.  Maybe someone will make a new format out of it for 3-D, dual stream video.  Since no one can play this kind of 3-D video in either format, the fact that you have to upgrade the drive in addition to video electronics won’t be a big deal.  But I suspect the format will get little play if this is the way it turns out.  Since studios don’t need the space anyway, there will be no tears shed.

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I believe the HD DVD supporters missed the fact that they could not enjoy King Kong in lossless audio.  That must have been due to the bandwidth limitations.

Was there a ghost of you that I was arguing with last time when I addressed this point?  I mean even most avid BD fans admit that their argument doesn’t hold water since Universal until recently, did not use lossless audio regardless of movie length.  So your argument has no basis in fact or history.

And of course, KK received stellar audio review.  If this is bad in your book, then I don’t know what to tell you: http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/kingkong2005.html

“I can't deny that 'Kong' roars to life from the very first frame. There is nary a scene in the film that you can't whip out to impress your friends -- and that's saying something on a format that currently boasts home runs like 'Batman Begins' in its growing library. Of course, the many bombastic fight scenes and Kong rampages are sonic nirvana. The Kong vs. Dinos scene is a new home theater classic, as is the extended climax on top of the Empire State Building. The 360-degree soundfield that is created is simply flawless and incredibly immersive. As the bi-planes whizzed by poor Kong's head, I kept rewinding, just to hear the fireworks over and over again. Transparency, pans and the sense of detail and realism to the discrete effects is second-to-none -- 'Kong' didn't win the Oscar for Best Sound for nothing. Dynamics are also incredibly powerful, with some of the tightest low bass you'll ever hear, and pitch perfect frequency response across the entire spectrum.
But beyond the big action sequences, what really impresses about 'King Kong' is its attention to fine detail. The sense of atmosphere is simply the best I've heard on home video -- ever. The early scenes with Jack Black and company near the jungle island are alive with ambience and intricate sound effects. And when the crew is first surrounded by the island savages, the wall of sound that envelopes you is a true aural delight. If you have even a half-decent home theater it is hard to imagine you won't be impressed. And despite such over-the-top sound, dialogue is perfectly balanced in the mix. I never once had to adjust my volume control, which is a true rarity for a film like 'King Kong.' I can't think of a more rave review for the audio presentation on this disc other than to say that while I really didn't like 'King Kong' as a movie, I absolutely loved listening to it.”

So you see, there is more to quality than bits and bytes.  Or lossless versus lossy.  Lest you forget that none of this is about technology.  It is about enjoyment of movies.  And I challenge you to find anyone who experiences the above, and still comes away empty handed.  Project Hydra employees excluded .

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Let's see.  First, you try to discredit the article.  Then, you turn around and try to use information from the article to make a point. 

I used nothing from the article.  The article references a replicator which has its pricing in public:
“One of the only replication companies that actually lists their pricing publicly is ProActionMedia and we found the following replication costs listed on their website.”

That is the part I referred to.  Nothing else in the article is factual that can be verified.  Here is the link to ProActionMedia page again which states their pricing for BD-25 but not BD-50: http://www.proactionmedia.com/blu-ray_replication.htm

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On top of that, you want me to believe a forum thread from which the information can not be verified for accurancy.  Interesting.

The person posting on AVS is a verified insider working for ProActionMedia.  He is posting in a public forum while introducing himself as working for said company.  All of that has far more weight in my opinion than an unknown source in an internet blog.

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So, in other words, it costs too much to implement.  I could have sworn that was what I said.

Good grief.  No.  Warner stamps out 500 million discs per year.  So besides cost, you have to have yields and volume manufacturability.  Saying you can make one disc in a lab at $1000, is not the full story.  Although damning enough nevertheless .

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I know this trick.  I say I have a Creston Adagio and you say it can't do 24-bit, right?

You are learning fast!    But for you own sake, go and see if there is a review that tests its output linearity.  Post the graph here and I will explain to you what it means in terms of real resolution.

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But, I find it interesting that the article said that Microsoft has to back pay from 2006 for the codec given away with it's media player.  I also find it interesting that it said "back when Microsoft thought it owned all the technology inside of it's codec.  That would suggest that Microsoft does not own most of VC-1.  This wouldn't be because of patents being filed about 4 years ago.  It would be because Microsoft infringed on a lot of patents unknowingly (or else they wouldn't have opened it up for all to see).

We own patents in MPEG-4 AVC.  Sony shipped millions of PSPs with AVC codec before the patent pool was formed.  So you could say they were infringing our patents by shipping that product since they had not taken a license from us.  As you may know, Apple uses MPEG-4 AVC in iTunes/iPod.  To my knowledge, they have not yet licensed AVC either.  Do you have the same choice words for them?  How about Panasonic products which read MPEG-4 video from SD card?  Did they steal patents from us too?

I don’t expect average person to understand all of this but please, this stuff has nothing to do with high def formats or I would take the time to explain more….

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It's not about the compressionists being lazy.  It's about getting amazing quality titles in the consumers hands in the least time.

Why do you have sympathies for the comporessionists who have to do their job once, but not for the poor manufacturing people who have to figure out how to stamp out these difficult BD discs?  Why do studios have to pay more per disc for BD but if a compressionist works an extra week to get the best quality is not? 

Surely you understand the economic foundation of fixed versus variable cost, right?

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HD DVD encodes take too long and only to come close to or match Blu-ray's quality.  That extra time is too high a price to pay just to shoehorn a movie into a 30GB disc.

Not at all.  Who says it takes too long?  Sony uses an AVC encoder that runs 12X slower than real-time.  Our VC-1 encoder runs at about 2X slower than real-time.  So we could encode a movie 6 times before Sony encodes it once.  Since Sony seems unwilling to use VC-1, then you must assume that they enjoy no benefit here whatsoever.  So your hypothesis here is incorrect.

Keep in mind that more than 80% of the Hollywood movies are 90 minutes or less.  As such, we are not even close to hurting for space.  The argument you were chasing came from encoding 3+ hour movies and why you may need to spend more time optimizing.  In my book, any movie that long is probably a high-budget epic, which would mean a high HD optical production anyway.  In other cases, the process is just as quick and efficient as any other format.  And in case like AVC above, is actually much faster.

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This trick again.  I tell you I have an ISF calibrated KDSR70XBR2 and you say it's not good enough to see these artifacts, right?

You should be able to see artifacts there although there is no guarantee.  We are talking about low level signals and DILA has a bit of trouble with that.  But more so, you can’t get too close to screen or the image washes out due to screen gain (and the fact that it is rear projection).  With an LCD for example, you get close and see the artifacts so that you know what to look for. 

But here there are some quick examples.  See if you can see them:
• 56:08 – close-up of pirates face while holding gold necklace showing blocking in his hat.
• 57:51 – side view of pirate while petting monkey showing blocking in his hat

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>If so, do you know what thermal noise is?
Nyquist noise, but that shouldn't have anything to do with our discussion on 24-bit audio.  "thermal noise" occurs when the equipment is off (charged electrons).

Nyquist noise?  There is no such thing. You must have done a search on thermal noise and found the wrong definition too .  Thermal noise is the level of noise generated by an electronic circuit as simple as a resistor.  At a given temperature, the device will put out that noise, burring any signal lower than that.  Unfortunately, given the fact that typical piece of electronics will route the video through hundreds of components, thermal noise adds up to a level, where the 4-bits of input signal in an ?DAC becomes pure noise.  The only solution is to super cool the components and I doubt that you want to listen to your movies while sitting in north pole or in a freezer!

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>Do you know what DAC linearity means?
It's distortion.  We should move on.  I would like to put these concepts to work.

That’s right.  If you look at linearity measurements for DACs, you see that if you change the low order bits in a 24-bit signal, you do not get a linear response.  But if you do the same for the upper bits, you do.  This means that the low order bits only generate distortion, not real signal recreation.  So if you understand this part on top of the noise point above, you realize that in a 24-bit chain, you are getting both noise and distortion in the low order bits.  If you are a fan of both, well, then I don’t know why are arguing about audio quality.

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How well do you know Richard?  Don't assume that just because he doesn't make "DVD players that cost more than your car" that he doesn't know what he's talking about.  If I did that, where would that leave you?

I know Richard fairly well.  We worked with him to move from MPEG-2 to VC-1 encode for his newer title.  And I have seen his posts and have had a bunch of discussions with him on AVS.  I also know Bob Stuart.  The two are completely different people.  Richard is on the creative side with some amount of technical knowledge.  Bob on the hand, could teach a University course in signal processing and impress even the faculty there.  This doesn’t make one person smarter than the other.  Bob knows signal processing and how to create great sounding audio equipment.  Richard knows how to produce DVD titles.  Neither can replace the other’s job. But in this context, I trust what Bob (and hundreds of other researchers and engineers) on what constitutes proper digital audio.  If you don’t believe me, go and ask Richard what thermal noise is and see if he knows the answer.

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I believe the PS3 does the all the signal processing via the Cell (software wise).  So, at least from the PS3 the signal should be about perfect.  Now the Crestron maybe another story.  I need more time to verify via schematic or via engineer.

A ton of what Bob talks about is about the quality of the DAC.  The cell has nothing to do with that.  Nor the PS3 for that matter because it is not outputting analog signals.  So yes, you have to go and find a measurement for your crestron.  But I assure you that it will not show anything beyond CD quality.

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So, if 24-bit advertised equipment resolves up to 20-bits, then surely a 16-bit advertised equipment resolves even less.  In that case, you are better off with the advertised 24-bit than advertised 16-bit.  That should take care of the rest of the 24-bit spiel.

This is not true in real life unfortunately.  There are many PC sound cards that advertize 24-bits, but they put out 11 bits on a good day due to interference from the rest of the PC.  As such, they would badly underperform a high quality CD player with 16-bit resolution.
But you are right that all else being equal, an equipment with 24-bit DAC is liable to resolve the 16-bit signal better than one with 16-bits.  All else being equal.

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So think about what performance the $10 part in your AVR has.
I don't understand why you are assuming what parts in my AVR costs.  Is that what it costs in your AVR?

$10 .  That is why I have a dedicated DAC for critical listening with hand tuned discreet components.  I know my Anthem D2, despite costing the same as some cars, doesn’t have anywhere near the same performance given the fact that it was assembled and shipping without hand selecting components, and tuning them for hours with precision instruments.  But I still enjoy watching movies on it.  It sounds great there and I am not bothered at all by it.  But I don’t sit there and fool myself thinking it is putting out 24-bit signals because that is what the spec sheet says.

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I'm glad you know what my cochlea is capable of detecting.  It must be hard knowing as much as the government.  They are the only ones besides me than knows my hearing capabilities.

We have done audio research in my group for nearly 10 years.  We have conducted many large scale studies.  I have been through countless listening shoot outs at major record labels and top end post production houses.  So we know the capabilities of general public and even those with “golden ears.”  Actually, the term golden ear was coined precisely because so few people poses the magical abilities to detect the smallest variations in audio quality. The rest of the world unfortunately, is not so blessed.

How do I know you don’t fall in golden ear class?  Because of your choice of arguments.  A golden ear audiophile would use very different language and arguments.  And I know with confidence that none would come within a mile of Crestron equipment.  Not that their stuff is bad.  It is not. But it is not in the same class that we are talking about here.

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Then I can only imagine what the HD DVD owners are hearing when they think they're listening to their 16-bit movie soundtracks.  It's probably not even 10-bits.  Thanks for that information!

You are confusing discs with equipment.  I said your equipment may only reproduce 14-bits.  If so, and you feed it 24 bits, you hear 14-bits of accurate sound.  If you feed it 16 bits, you still hear 14-bits of accurate sound.  Because that is the limit of the reproduction in your equipment.  It is not like the equipment subtracts quality from the source by a fixed ratio as you seem to incorrectly be thinking.

Put another way, your equipment will reproduce no more fidelity than HD DVD contains regardless of what it says on the back of your BD box.

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But, I will have them.  Plus, when Blu-ray has PiP (BD-J 1.1) at least it will be able to resolve HD PiP streams.  When will HD DVD players be able to decode two HD streams for PiP?  I know it's in your specs, but the players can't do it.  So much for HD DVD having players that can handle the complete specs, right? 

You should really hang around AVS.  You might learn that some arguments have been dealt with and folks have nothing to say on them.  This is one of them.  Here is the link for your enjoyment: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10978870&&#post10978870.  Go down half way into the post and read from there.