DVD: The Death Knell of Laserdisc

[@Neogeddon]

The PS2 was no joke! We got one just to play DVDs because it was cheaper than most of the dedicated players at the time; we didn't even have any games for it for years.

[@nickwallette6201]

It's the only standalone video disc player I had until I got a PS3 last year. We also used it 99% for movies, with like two games we ever played on it.

[@Yeen125]

It was also the final nail in the coffin for the Dreamcast and SEGA’s hardware business.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

@ Gage M. Yeah, Sega should have chosen DVD as the medium when they designed the Dreamcast. But at that point the format was too expensive. I remember seeing pictures of a Prototype DVD drive addon that was supposed to sit under the Dreamcast. But that never seemed to get any release.

[@WebVManReturns]

My first CD Player was a Sega CD.

[@common_c3nts]

No DVD playback is what killed dreamcast and made the gamecube a kids toy. Sony was genius with the PS2. They gave the most value by playing DVDs at the height of DVDs. I hate all sony products but I will admit that the PS2 was best system and most innovative system designed of all time. The PS2 had ethernet, you could add a hard drive, run linux, play multiplayer online, 1080i resolution, surround sound, They made games for the PS2 until 2014. In my opinion the PS2 is better than the PS3 and PS4.

[@tvtech2582]

I have serviced hundreds of VCD, CED,LD,CLV units.I worked for an electronics company who serviced hundreds of retail stores from 1982 -2005.I went to countless manfuctures seminars to learn what seems to just roll of your tongue.I am amazed at your vast knowledge.Usually I try to pick out incorrect information from KZbin videos like this,but EVERY time I watch you are just so so correct.Please keep up your GREAT work,Steve.

[@GoldSrc_]

His research is top notch

[@mattfromeurope]

Absolutely. Also, the presentation of the information is just perfect, not being too serious (and thus, boring and dry), but not ridiculously joking around either. I‘d say you can feel that there‘s definitely an enthusiast of these technologies at work here. Keep up the good work! And by the way: why did you choose to drop your intro?

[@collegeman1988]

It is evident that this guy really knows what he’s talking about when producing these KZbin videos.

[@downscale]

best repl(ies) ever.

[@mrnmrn1]

Well, yes, the content and production quality is very good on this channel, but this video had at least one incorrect information. DVD players do have separate red and IR lasers in them, as opposed to what he said at 12:35 .

[@basharmously2162]

For 23 minutes I sat and listened and waited for him to mention the PS2 I was starting to lose hope but man this guy knows what he is doing!!

[@danieldaniels7571]

Bashar Mously not unlike what the PS3 did for Blu-ray. Seriously makes me wonder why the hell the PS4 didn’t support 4K UHD Blu-ray

[@duscarasheddinn8033]

@@danieldaniels7571 I think that 4K UHD Blu-rays did not yet exist by the time the PS4 came out.

[@zdoomcentral]

@@duscarasheddinn8033 but they did by the time the PS4 pro came out and by that point Microsoft had added 4k Blu Ray support to the Xbox one s and shortly after the one x. So still confused why sony never added it.

[@duscarasheddinn8033]

@@zdoomcentral Good point.

[@DyoKasparov]

@@zdoomcentral Yoou sure ps4 pro can't do 4k blu-ray? whyd I think it can Some ppl were also saying Slim can do 4k on "media playback" whatever thatd b

[@TechnologyConnections]

Hmm. Twenty-six minutes and twelve seconds. This could be considered a test of the attention span... Also, I am aware that I misspelled "Antarctica" in the graphic. I am ashamed. My goodness what an oversight. Such carelessness. Also also, I ended the last video by suggesting we'd cover some things that aren't covered in this video. This was getting terribly long and needed to be broken up, and even then it wouldn't be hard to argue it's way too long. So, sit back, relax, and enjoy this dork tell the long-winded story of the DVD and how it just annihilated the Laserdisc.

[@Natalie-ez1zc]

I could go way longer. However Family guy's coming on in 25 minutes and I can't miss it

[@Natalie-ez1zc]

>implying no girl wants a white guy

[@mukiex4413]

Early DVD drives were dual-laser as well (one for CD, one for DVD). I think Sony developed a single laser that could do either? It probably has something to do with variable focus but I don't know too much about it. I just remember reading stories in the 90s about drives coming out with a single laser that could do both CD and DVD.

[@TechnologyConnections]

Ooh, perhaps I was wrong to say DVD players don't have two lasers! I'll have to get my hands on an older standalone DVD player and see what's inside.

[@TRUCKERS7]

Technology Connections what about the video now I used to have one of those

[@andrewlankford9634]

The Matrix DVD sold a lot of surround sound stereos, large screen tvs, and dvd players.

[@jamess.3013]

Andrew Lankford and PS2s

[@Lightblue2222]

@@jamess.3013 ps2 was my families 1st DVD. Back when ma called DVD a fad.

[@jamess.3013]

LightBlue2222 getting my PS2 is legitimately one of my favorite childhood memories. It would’ve been about 2001/2 and I was about 8 and my mom took me to gamestop. I asked for a PS1 and she said yes. But when we got to the counter she asked the guy “the ps2 plays those new DVD things right?” The guy said yes and she looked at me and smiled then asked if they had any in stock, he said yes, and that day I went home with the console that started my love of games.

[@jamess.3013]

Matthew Hopkins plus side...more time to play through that backlog?

[@jamess.3013]

Pontefract -W-Banker thanks haha I’d actually had a snes and 64 before that but they didn’t connect with me like the ps2 did. My first games were kingdom hearts and Final Fantasy X, FFX to this day is my favorite game of all time

[@redsquirrelftw]

Makes me feel old to realize how long ago DVD came along. I grew up on VHS, and DVD still feels new to me lol.

[@marccaselle8108]

I like DVD because you could clearly see and hear the difference, no pun intended. I also liked DVD because it made movies widescreen and more like the movies at the theaters. I also like DVDs because of the special features for lots of movies and the picture quality is great. 🙂 I saw a few movies on Blu ray on a friends hi end tv. It literally didn't I press me. The minor upgrade in detail wasn't blowing my mind and I didn't want to spend 1000s of dollars to move over to Blu ray. For me it's DVD all the way and I can digitize them so they only take up 1 to 2.5 gigabytes each.

[@douglasfreeman3229]

I grew up with VHS. It wasn't good and I knew at the time. DVD feels new to me too, although I'm switching to blu-ray 4k now. I jumped over standard blu-ray.

[@TORQUENDB]

​@@marccaselle8108No offense, but you must be blind and/or your friend's TV had all the crap like sharpness and motion interpolation cranked up like it comes from the factory, or you watched a Blu-Ray with a terrible transfer. I haven't bought a DVD since 2006, the quality difference is massive. Don't forget the lossless audio, either. It's ok to not care about the difference, but it's blatantly false to suggest the difference is small.

[@marccaselle8108]

@@TORQUENDB well the few Blu rays I saw wasn't that big of a difference from DVD.

[@user-zg5ey5xo9i]

​@@marccaselle8108You need to get new glasses.

[@JRCSalter]

Was worried you weren't going to mention the PS2. For a number of years, that was our only DVD player.

[@danielgartin6993]

I still own mine! Mine still works after all these years!

[@scottplumer3668]

I was gonna buy a Blu-Ray player for our family room, but I bought a PS3 instead. Plays Blu-Rays, plus it has the other functionality. I play about one game a year, so the gaming thing wasn't really an issue.

[@Alias_Anybody]

@Scott Plumer Neither the PS3 nor Blu-Ray took off as much as Sony wanted though. I feel like half of all people owning one forgot Blu-Ray was even a thing.

[@LongPeter]

That PS2 startup sound gave me some serious feels. If the PS5 came with an option to switch to a PS2 menu skin, and that sound*, I might be buying my first new gaming console in nearly a decade. *(and a high-def remake of Vice City)

[@K3vyB]

@@Alias_Anybody It took off just fine, but the age of non physical mediums was dawning quickly and it lost future relevance, why would they pursue dominace through blu ray with a revolution around the corner?

[@lovelywaz]

15:46 "It was very very rare that movies needed a 2nd disc." Peter Jackson: "Hold my beer!"

[@solarstrike33]

Ah, Peter Jackson. Shame Mortal Engines didn't do too well for him...

[@justanotheryoutubechannel]

SolarstrikeVG Mortal Engines was the worst movie I watched in 2018. As a fan of the books, it was a monstrously bad adaptation. They couldn’t even build London the right way round!

[@jakublulek3261]

Once Upon Time in America. The only 2 DVD movie I own.

[@batt3ryac1d]

To be fair even the bluray LOTR extended editions need 2 disks lol

[@akimbofurry2179]

Looks at gangs of new york. >_>

[@goopah]

Actually, that VCD you played looked and sounded pretty damn good. When you said it was ridiculously compressed, I was prepared for far worse. When you consider they had to fit video and sound into the same space as a music CD, I think they did a fantastic job. Remarkable achievement. Not that I'll be buying any soon, but kudos to the geniuses that made it work.

[@electrictroy2010]

VCD is actually Half the resolution of VHS tape. VCD has only 240 scanlines per frame, while VHS has 480 .

[@miguelescutia5556]

VCDs are still somewhat popular in South East Asia.

[@tom0900060]

VCD is perfect for CRT, but on lcd screen it's unwatchable 😅

[@jhutt8002]

I recall downloading VCD versions of few movies back in the day because my computer had 7 gb hardrive.. It still took day and a night to download :D

[@xxxdumbwordstupidnumberxxx4844]

It isn't bad for what it is, but VHS was considerably better, at which point it becomes kind of redundant.

[@bluedragon9925]

I honestly never noticed the layer change pause on any of the DVD players I've used. Either every dual layer DVD movie I've watched was mastered in such a way that the switch would happen when you'd least notice it (as mentioned in the video) or every player I've used was fast enough that it performed the switch too quickly for me to notice... Also, I do know of *one* DVD player that can't also play CD's... The PlayStation 4...

[@TEDodd]

Lucky you. I remember many bad layer changes on the older players and discs(through ~2004). Would have to go back and see if newer players have buffering to cover it up better or it was just that badly done.

[@Adam-qs5ir]

Yeah, the PS4 and why???

[@jimmyjimjimdoctor]

It was a program code put into the ps3, disabling the reading of CD format discs. I believe sony has removed that program code by now through an update.

[@SmaMan]

@@Adam-qs5ir Because they wanted to sell their Playstation Music service... which just became a rebranded Spotify in the end.

[@fluxypoo]

I dont remember any switches either.

[@brendancross2767]

"playing a dvd is childs play to a 200 dollar laptop" Hehe yeah *hides 750 dollar laptop without a disc tray*

[@ShakeItLittleTina]

Yeah you bet... *covers up $700 gaming pc with no disc drive*

[@warrenlehmkuhleii8472]

Yes, covers $1000 Gaming PC that I unknowingly bought without an disc drive. Whoops.

[@SmaMan]

Cool beans. *hides stash of $15 external DVD drives*

[@happysmash27]

Sure, but you can always get a DVD reader, copy the disk to the hard drive, then play it from there flawlessly.

[@DevReaper]

I'm proud to say my shitty ps2 that I found next to the dumpster still plays DVDs great

[@Chapien]

>no need for a second DVD Someone hasn't seen the Lord of the Rings Extended Edition boxed set.

[@peterwilhelmsson4168]

My DVD-box for Armageddon was 2-discs, you had to switch in the middle of the movie.

[@botigamer9011]

I have "Around The World in 80 Days" (1955) and it has 2 discs

[@Daan03]

Chapien we also have that box set, I’ve been watching it every summer vacation for now three years :))

[@volkan7844]

Earlier does of long movies were 2 discs because Daul layered dvds didn't exist then

[@coolguy91975]

@@peterwilhelmsson4168 I think that was the Criterion Collection version? Oddly they made one. The Disney-mastered DVDs were not anamorphic for a very long time, Armageddon included.

[@LMacNeill]

A CD player stuffed inside a DVD player stuffed inside a LaserDisc player - it’’s a digital turducken!! ;-)

[@downscale]

Less delicious though.

[@corneliusjohnson5357]

also called, a tofucken

[@the_kombinator]

Some of it is analog tho.

[@HellfireCignus]

I was going to go with digital haggis but turducken works too!

[@loganiushere]

No, a turkduckenailailenailailduckenailailenailail.

[@AvidSonicFan]

The VCD was playing too fast because it was playing at 25 FPS, which was 104% higher than the 24 FPS that they used a 3:2 Telecine Pulldown on to convert to the 30 FPS NTSC TV format without any speed-up whatsoever.

[@BPJJohn]

Telecine refers to blending fields on a CRT on a LCD with what you probably watching this on they're just repeating the frames to make up for 24fps creating judder, both pal vcd and ntsc vhs examples have this if you slow the video down.

[@intensellylit4100]

It was over 100% higher? That doesn't add up.

[@PanAndScanBuddy]

Gotta go fast! Up, over, and gone!

[@mayhair]

@@intensellylit4100 yeah bad choice of words. they mean that if 100% is the original speed then 104% is the pal speed.

[@dr.insaneoiv]

Yes, but there's a little bit of slowdown thanks to NTSC being a lower refresh rate.

[@Dazlidorne]

I love how I lived through all the stuff you usually cover, yet you still are able to teach me things I didn't know.

[@kaustubh_kp]

This channel will be used in schools for teaching children in future.

[@aiodensghost8645]

History of tech class yeah

[@tygonmaster]

@@aiodensghost8645 I mean, in colleges, internet history is a thing, so....

[@DarkWiNKenzo]

@S. vs honnestly, im sceptical to the idea of having a 52K monitor or TV, because, one days, we'll going to get to the end of the Resolution peak. Sad, but true, i know.

[@DarkWiNKenzo]

S. vs was it ?, i guess that even in a virtual reality, i don’t get the joke, but i am still in my point if view, because my comment is legitimately a factional quote, you don’t have to respond because i am stills right, although, now, i like the joke, because i am a bit less sceptical and more likely to see it and laugh, which i actually did the first time, sorry again

[@williamreid6255]

Kp _rider It already has...😱😂

[@SomePotato]

Singapore uses PAL. That's probably why the VCD movie was a little bit to fast.

[@therealhardrock]

It's the PAL speedup that he mentioned here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/aXuppWmqa86dgtU

[@vwestlife]

Yup, I'm sure they "converted" it from 24 fps to PAL's 25 fps just by speeding it up.

[@TechnologyConnections]

Indeed! I didn't think to check until after one of my Patrons pointed it out, but going through the footage frame-by-frame reveals that it repeats every 5th frame--thus spreading 25 out into 30. (Edit: I just can't seem to post a comment without at least one typo at first)

[@benm8503]

jeez, do all my favorite youtubers watch each other?

[@old4mat]

It would appear so.

[@kris-wj3wj]

I remember begging my parents for a ps2. I told them time and time again it played dvds and my mom(wanting a dvd player herself) would go "yeah yeah stop trying to sell it!" Well I ended up getting one for Christmas, and after 5th grade me got done irritating them with gta3, I popped in a dvd and my mom was instantly pissed of that I actually had a dvd player in my room and they didn't have one in the living room. lol

[@Dj.MODÆO]

kris Sumerfelt same scenario but it was my Dad who was pissed.....when he finally realized I wasn’t lying about the PS2 also being a DVD player, he made me put in the living room.

[@kris-wj3wj]

@@Dj.MODÆO lmao. My parents would of done the same thing if that didn't mean forcing them to watch gta and other shooters every time they were in the kitchen or living room. My mom doesn't handle video game blood very well.. lol It was the real reason it stayed in the back of the house.

[@TiberianFiend]

I don't have a story about parents being pissed, but I bought a PS2 with my first tax refund check and used it as my only DVD player. Bought the remote control with the IR receiver, too.

[@danieldaniels7571]

William Brinkley I was grown when the PS2 came out, but didn’t have kids yet. Your story is kind of similar to me getting 4K Blu-ray for my living room by getting an Xbox One X. I let the kids play games on it, but primarily got it for me to play 4K discs. I also have a decent home theater setup in my bedroom, so if I’m not amused watched them play games I go in there. They mostly play Minecraft & Goat Simulator. My younger daughter has a PS2 in her room but she usually just uses it as her DVD player.

[@singletona082]

My little brother still uses his ps2, WITH REMOTE EVEN, as his primary dvd player.

[@DexterKDC]

VCD was extremely popular in asian countries, i used to remember my childhood days as the streets of Malaysia were filled with Original and also Bootleg copy of VCDs...

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

Yeah even now there's still new releases on Video CD over there. :) Quite nice to see such a format still being so popular.

[@CommodoreFan64]

I use to import VCD here to the US back in the late 90's and early 00's as it was usually cheaper for things like Anime, which was still very expensive when bought on DVD as those where considered special releases with smaller runs, and where sold in stores like Suncoast, or Sam Goody stores which where found in malls so the prices where naturally higher anyways unless they where having a big sale which was rare. So yeah even as an American I have memories of VCD from my late teens into my early 20's.

[@scottlarson1548]

I had a friend come back from Taiwan claiming that she had bought a dozen DVD's there for only a dollar each. Guess which format the discs *really* were. No one here had ever heard of Video CD's.

[@PanduPoluan]

I live in a tropical Asian country, so I can vouch for this. As Steve mentioned, the main drive is VCD's relative reliability in the humid air. Videotapes rot, VCR heads got fungal growth, and all the rubber belts elongate... VCD solves most of the problems. Oh, and very cheap 😁

[@denshi-oji494]

I still think VCD is the most popular release format for Karaoke discs... China also introduced the SVCD format, which brought MPEG2 compression to the CD media based video market. I was encoding VCDs and later SVCDs for making personal archives far before buying any DVD media, drives, or players due to what I saw as quality issues with DVD Video releases. Sadly they started to "digitally author" LaserDisc titles, and the quality, especially on letter box titles, suffered horridly. Since I will never buy a pan and scan release if there is a proper version available, I was very sad at seeing wonderful movies with scan line reduction artifacting from the digital mastering process on LaserDiscs. I could not stand the digital compression artifacts on the DVDs either, so I started buying many VCDs, some are really, REALLY badly mastered, while others look much better and are far more enjoyable to watch than early DVDs or many of the newest LaserDiscs.

[@Akshay13134]

This channel is highly underrated u deserve more subscribers to the content u create

[@RayEttler]

Akshay Kumar No it's not underrated. More likely not everyone is in love with his face and teaching stance.

[@klaushergesheimer8602]

It's about yourself. Do you want to learn something or judge people by their appearance? If you judge everything in life by its appearance you will miss a lot of interesting things.

[@hippiedave1362]

Akshay Kumar Definitely!

[@TheMarquistador]

19:11 This section with the aspect ratios and how they function was extremely interesting to me! And how exactly you made that all appear must've been a fun exercise inside your video editor of choice. Thank you

[@scottlarson1548]

When the DVD was introduced there were lots of people on Usenet declaring that they were going to stick with their laserdiscs because the DVD format is compressed therefore it must be inferior in every way. Some were also complaining that the discs were too small therefore they couldn't be any better than the terrible Video CD format.

[@MR_MRM_]

Those people still exist at "laserdisc forever" websites. I did read articles in 1997 wondering if LD would keep the deleted scenes, commentaries, etc., and DVD would be just the basic film -- co-exist, basically.

[@GewelReal]

Was it THAT noticeable tho?

[@charlescampuz5812]

Richard Vaughn Buddy, Laserdisc is an analog source. The video quality *WILL* degrade beyond the worst DVD master & DVD mastering has already been “mastered” for over a decade. Mpeg artifacts haven’t been a problem for years.

[@charlescampuz5812]

Richard Vaughn Because an Analog signal from a Laserdisc is *SO* much sharper than lets say a Blu-ray Disc. Maybe you’re forgetting the point of digital compression. Maybe it’s to efficiently store more data onto smaller storage devices while retaining sufficient quality? Do you legitimately think that a blurry, low-res & unrefined Video feed from a Laserdisc looks better than an efficiently compressed, hi-res master used on Blu-ray and DVD? There’s no point boasting the lack of artifacts if the main signal wasn’t clear in the first place.

[@filiplou74]

Richard Vaughn google laserdisc rot...

[@candykid5135]

DVD still popular because : 1- quality is good enough 2- dvd drives are everywhere, computers, cars and playstation 3- dvd is cheap, you can get new dvd for 5$ at some stores and on amazon 4- many titles are only available on dvd

[@elijahfordsidioticvarietys8770]

DVD never dies. Blueray can’t win.

[@MaximRecoil]

Which is a good example of the stupidity and/or ignorance of the general public.

[@nthgth]

@@MaximRecoil it's not stupid and/or ignorant to be happy with 720 x 480

[@solarstrike33]

Although Blu-Rays seem to be winning in the enthusiast arena.

[@charlescampuz5812]

MaximRecoil It’s not really dumb, it’s just that more people find it convenient to stream HD Movies instead.

[@coenisgreat]

"Woah, a Laserdisc. The Cheat's playin' something on a Laserdisc. Everything's better on Laserdisk. What ever happened to the Laserdisc, Laserdisc!" ~Strong Bad

[@LelouchOnTwi]

Disc masters! Prepare for combat!

[@ShakeItLittleTina]

Dammit, now this is stuck in my head and I have to find the source from Homestar Runner, do you remember what ‘toon it was from?

[@KairuHakubi]

dunno if this helps a month later, Tyzelle, but check the homestarrunner wiki for that kind of thing. or like, just google it, and it's going to get you a result from said wiki on the quickfast. it was lady...ing

[@nthgth]

@@KairuHakubi "on the quickfast," nice

[@KairuHakubi]

You like that one? That's a certified Strong Bad line. from Rough Copy.

[@lemagreengreen]

That Pioneer dvd player is a thing of retro beauty, I like a good complicated mechanism :)

[@heidirichter]

That was fantastic, well worth the time it took to watch. Well done and thank you.

[@downscale]

completely agree!

[@danielmarshall4587]

Totally agree these are a great watch.

[@GameSack]

I have the Pioneer DVL-700. I bought that when it was NEW! I don't even wanna remember what I paid for it but I'm sure it wasn't cheap. You mentioned $1000 and that's probably right (plus tax!) It, of course, was my first DVD player. I still have the unit and it still works... for LaserDiscs anyway, I haven't played a DVD on it in 30 or 40 years. It's honestly kind of a bad DVD player. At the time I remember being disappointed that it couldn't flip sides for DVD since lots of DVDs were double-sided back then. It could do this on LaserDiscs but whatever. I was pissed it couldn't play Divx. Actually, no I wasn't.

[@WoddCar]

I bet you regret buying that 3do at launch as well

[@ErebusAbaddonAzrael]

Um dude dvd came out in 1997 how tf you watching it 30 to 40 years ago!

[@WoddCar]

@@ErebusAbaddonAzrael it’s an exaggeration for how little he used it

[@rillloudmother]

totally, who played DVDs on a pioneer after like 1979?

[@harrison00xXx]

As much you were pissed because of missing DivX support... I once bought a nice DVD player, a Cambridge Audio DVD-99 (paid the price of a DVD-89 but got somehow the 99 with USB and nice support for much formats, didnt complain and was getting fast out of the store lol, saved about 100$ with this) It also supported DivX, that was nice but pretty soon, h.264 became MUCH MORE popular and this USB features were pretty useless except for music and "old" xvid stuff. At the top of it this "cheap" DVD player was replaced then with a dedicated, even 4x as expensive CD-only player. Time goes on.... i also had already a pretty modern AVR and from one day to another.... many AVRs were equipped with Dolby ATMOS,.... aaaand there goes another 500-700$ into the small home cinema since i had already a 7.1 system, would not have to care much about atmos in 5.1, but for 7.1 it makes already a bit sense, ofc it begin to get really nice with 9.2/11.2 and so, but thats a completely different price league, even today 9.1/9.2 is some sort of impossible to afford or hard to manage with racking up multiple amps for a better price/performance ratio(which make a pre-amp/decoderstation with 9.2+Atmos support necessary which are also very expensive).

[@kiele21]

I had a combination LD and DVD. I think they made the tray like that just to be cool. The more buttons and moving parts, the cooler it was.

[@TEDodd]

The smaller try is faster when swapping CDs. They maintained that with the DVD addition. And CD use is likely why the system defaults to the CD/LD laser. Trying to recall if my DVL-919 remembers it was playing a DVD if you flip/change a disc. Something make me think it did. Sadly the DVD laser broke 15+ years ago so I haven't been able to use the DVD function. It was cheaper to by a separate DVD (or DVD+VHS combo) than get the DVL repaired.

[@tilleye3774]

7:30 turn on captions

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

In essence there are 3 major important things in the DVD timeline that are vital for it's success. 1. Introduction of the Dual Layer standard (DVD9) 2. The Playstation 2 3. the DVD release of "The Matrix". Which also was the reason why the PS2 became a big seller. Everyone wanted to watch "the Matrix" on DVD and the PS2 was both a console & DVD player. A no-brainer for many.

[@CommodoreFan64]

Very true on the Matrix, and If I remember correct the first print runs of the Matrix on DVD had issues with some very early players of not being able to playback correctly due in part to the menus being coded with a new format, and they had to issue the people effected corrected disc. I can remember my first DVD player in mid 99 costing me around $220 after tax, and that was a cheaper APEX unit too boot, so I can see why at the time many people went for a PS2 over just a DVD player alone.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

Yeah Warner releases often had issues and had some exchange batches shortly after. Mostly it was due to faulty audio. That includes DVD and Blu-ray releases. The Menu bug might have been because of the interactive features and the "follow the white rabbit" feature. My first Player was bought in July of 2000 for 500 Deutsch Mark. That was a super hot deal back then. It was a Philips DVD710 and i almost got a no-name player by some asian company called Yamakawa. However it was already sold out so i went with the Philips model. It worked fine with Matrix thou. However the Layer-Break was always very noticable. I also used it for playing my few Video CDs and all my Audio CDs because it had a very good DAC inside. Anyway, it could play all of the special features and only sometimes (very rarely) the DVD would just freeze. My player sometimes couldn't even handle a layerbreak well. Also a good indicator of a possible faulty pressing.

[@MethosOhio]

I agree "The Matrix" was the reason to get a DVD player.

[@Quandry1]

I think there was one other. The DVD player was way more heavily pushed and advertised more than other products that I can think of. As the prices came out and more and more movies were released on it. It was a technology that was really pushed. I remember even some early games being pushed on it even though most games were still on CD. I don't remember blue ray or laser disc having the same marketing push.

[@alvallac2171]

*its success (possessive) it's = it is

[@Vaderd2k926]

You are one of the most well spoken and expert speakers I’ve ever encountered on KZbin or anywhere for that matter. In 45 minutes I’ve learned more about this tech than in all my total experience with it. Well done.

[@nneeerrrd]

So basically DVD could have been called Red-ray :)

[@Zenodilodon]

Well it doesn't work that way, or they would of called it Violet-Ray :P

[@MinecraftPro97k]

Мандибрики і Цирупопики No

[@brpadington]

Only if Sony marketing was in charge of naming it.

[@annother3350]

He's the communist guy at the end of my street

[@ckaceritus]

I think you mean Re-Ray.

[@johnsim3722]

A UK perspective. I owned a LD player and bought many discs, which we had to get imported from the USA. Our players had to support both NTSC and PAL, and there were a few companies which specialised in importing discs and selling them in the UK. Tower Records even did this! But the costs were high, very high, for Laserdiscs. Then the UK anti-piracy (FACT) body raided the importers to stop them. Just to put this in to context. They were raiding companies which were selling genuine product to a tiny number of people in the UK. Not someone who was sharing videos for everybody for free. The studios were still getting paid! Just as Home Cinemas (Theaters) were starting to get popular FACT were trying to stop people embracing this new industry. Trying to stop people from buying films! And they're supposed to represent the software industry? They were doing more harm than good. Without the US discs the selection was terribly poor. Realising that LD was on its way out, and that was obvious when you have a format like DVD gaining so much industry support, I bought a DVD player directly from the USA. I still bought discs in the UK that were imported from the USA because the UK just didn't have the selection yet. There wasn't many of us buying US discs because that market was still small, but FACT were still trying to stop people from doing so. Ultimately what stopped people from buying from the US was the availability and lower cost of UK titles once they started to come through. And that's when I got my UK player. You could then buy the discs in high street shops or at the supermarket. The availability of the DVD was far superior to LD. We in the UK / Europe also have the SCART connector and on a DVD player you got RGB output which was supported by most good quality TVs. Instantly you avoided all the cross-colour and other artefacts of composite video. Once the encoding became better on the discs the picture quality was far superior to LD, and ultimately that's what the Home Cinema (Theater) buff wants; Picture quality. It was, after all, why they bought LD. We bought LD because we believed we were buying the best, and that we'd buy collectors editions of films like the Star Wars Trilogy (long before Jar-Jar!). And that name, "Collectors", suggest that you can buy this and it would be safe for year, decades, to come. Alas, not the case as I found out. There is a term "laser rot" to describe when a LD disc starts to produce dots in the picture. These get more and more, making the discs less watchable and ultimately unplayable. You expensive investment in this collectors edition is junk. Ultimately the biggest contribution that Laser Disc made was to prove that there was a market for Home Cinemas. Not just for better quality video, but as AC-3 audio proved, for superior surround sound. Amplifiers started to become available which could work off the audio output by these players giving far superior results than Pro-Logic. It laid the ground work for DVD. And I managed to sell my player and the discs which weren't rotten on eBay. Although I did sell Star Wars but with the disclaimer that it has some rot on it. It did come with a super book. And, yes, Han shot first.

[@TransmissionEpicts]

Interesting read! And Jar Jar caused my DVDs to rot :-(

[@maxgonzalez214]

Dear Sir: It's the first time I watch one of your videos. Please allow me to congratulate you on this knowledge filled, very articulate, most excellent presentation. Great job!

[@TheMetalMachinist]

I just bought a blu ray DVD player for my new home now in 2022 (almost 2023) . I absolutely love thrifting old DVD and VHS movies as that was all I had growing up, we never had cable, or even basic cable for the matter. Just whatever DVDs mom got from the video store that week

[@verdatum]

I continue to really like this guy. keep up the wonderful work!

[@downscale]

I totally agree. I just found him and I am on Binge-mode.

[@Dazlidorne]

18:52 One of the smartest things I did when I was buying DVDs was to get the widescreen versions when available. It made my DVD library future proofed when we went to widescreen TVs. They still look pretty decent with upscaling.

[@PaulMurphyMusic]

I remember back in Christmas 2000 getting a Dreamcast and because Sega were so scared of the PS2 they bundled a stand alone DVD player with it. Though I loved the Dreamcast, I still ended up getting a PS2 a year and half later as I really wanted to play Metal Gear 2. I then had 2 DVD players. Memories.

[@AureliusR]

MGS2 is what sold me on the PS2. I had played MGS on the PSX so much, and when my friend visited for the summer with his PS2 and MGS2 I was blown away by how awesome it was.

[@crazedlunatic43]

I don’t think Sega had ever officially released a standalone DVD player, but there was one on display.

[@tookitogo]

The reason for having separate lasers for each media type is that the pits and lands are not read the way people think they are. It's not that the light shone in a pit goes off in a different direction or something, it's that the pit depth is specifically chosen so that it's about 1/5 of a wavelength of the light, such that light reflected from a pit is phase-shifted from the incoming beam, causing destructive interference that can be detected in the pickup. Consequently, a different wavelength laser is physically incapable of reading the data on a disc designed for another wavelength. Furthermore, by 1996, CD-R was already on the market, and the recordable media is designed to absorb a specific wavelength. (Many CD-Rs use dye that is transparent to visible light, and so would also be unreadable to a red laser.) And finally (though this is pure speculation on my part), the focusing range of the lens could be a factor, too, since CD, DVD, and blu-ray all use discs 1.2mm thick, but the range they need to focus varies radically: In a CD, the laser traverses the entire thickness of the disc, so it's focusing around 1.2mm depth. In a DVD, it's focusing at only 0.6mm for a single layer, or 0.6/0.3mm for dual-layer. And on blu-ray, the data is just 100 micrometers (0.1mm) deep *at most* - on a 4-layer disc, the shallowest layer is at 53.5 micrometers (0.0535mm) depth!! And remember that different wavelengths of light focus differently, further expanding the focusing range needed. This is why blu-ray players have three lasers, usually across two lenses.

[@denshi-oji494]

Very nice concise refresher! Thanks!

[@tookitogo]

Doc T'Soni Well that’s what I thought too, but when researching my reply, wiki said it was 1/4-1/6 wavelength, hence my “about 1/5”. (I mentioned “destructive interference” in my comment, by the way...)

[@dozog]

@@tookitogo Don't forget the refractive index of PC.

[@tookitogo]

@@dozog I didn’t forget it. That’s where the 1/5 to 1/6 comes in: it needs to be 1/4 wavelength, but adjust for the different refractive index and it ends up being a bit less, hence 1/5 to 1/6.

[@discoRyne]

This is seriously one of the best channels on KZbin. Addictive format, well-presented, hilarious easter eggs / jokes sprinkled throughout. I wish everyone shared information like Technology Connections did. Learning new things would've been so much more engrossing if that was the case.

[@megaascension2748]

I never knew about the double layers on DVD. I just thought I accidentally scratched it and it froze for a split second.

[@111highgh]

You're a fart head!

[@bLd321]

You can read about it on the box of DVD movie.

[@111highgh]

@@bLd321 You're a fart head!

[@arthyualagao8279]

I had a combination LD and DVD. I think they made the tray like that just to be cool. The more buttons and moving parts, the cooler it was.

[@BenitoFan760]

Lmao 😂

[@96SN95]

6:53 A good way to get around previews is to go to chapter selection, select from the second or higher chapter causing the video to play without previews and you can immediately hit the previous chapter button and play from the beginning of the movie.

[@Nabeelco]

Other way round, it originally stood for "Digital Video Disc", and later became "Digital Versatile Disc", once they started using it for audio and data. Originally, the "video" subtext under the DVD logo didn't exist.

[@TheStOne1]

You're right

[@tokyojimu]

It was referred to that way as it was being developed, but the official name when released was "Digital Versatile Disc".

[@neilsluman8267]

Yes. There are rules about the order of adjectives, which we instinctively understand. It's why a "blue big car" would sound a little strange. "Versatile Digital Disc" would be the more normal order but they didn't want to change the initials

[@derekheeps1244]

Correct : I was at the European Launch of the DVD format ( by Toshiba , they made the first drives ) and held in the Old Course Hotel in St Andrews , where it was introduced as Digital VIDEO Disc ; the versatile thing was marketing speak and came later . At that event I was introduced to the VP of Toshiba , and his friend Mr Kawasaki , who came over to play golf , with the words 'perhaps you've heard of his family business' !

[@corrado]

Also all DVD players have a way to skip the mandatory trailers and main menu. You simply press STOP-STOP-PLAY and your disc will skip straight to the beginning of the film. You’re welcome.

[@FinalBaton]

Great video man, as always! One thing I would add : starting in 2003 or so, companies started storing the full progressive frames on DVDs. That means that even though the video produced by these newer DVDs is still 480i, DVD players with upscaling (480p and higher) had access to full progressive frames to work with for the upscaling. Making for a sharper picture. The same DVD players spinning older DVDs would of course have a less sharp picture, since they're working with fields and not full frames, so they have to deinterlace first and then upscale.

[@denshi-oji494]

Depends on the release, there were some progressive releases of movies the first year of DVD Video existence, though they seem to have been few. Also, there are still some DVDs being released interlaced, mostly of older television programming.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

Yeah the source material usually depends on how the DVD encode ends up either as interlaced or progressive. In good case scenarios the DVD encode will be the same as the source without any pointless progressive conversion of interlaced material. In the early days of DVD most encodes were interlaced simply because they often just re-used the videotape masters that were used for Laserdisc and VHS releases and they were all laserdisc. Because there was no such thing as progressive scan on NTSC laserdisc and VHS. Unlike PAL where 25fps worked fine within 50i, which gives you a pseudo "progressive scan" without being one. Also called "progressive Single frame" where the first and the second half-frame are identical and not being different and without dropped frame trickery. Nowdays movies are digitally mastered for DVD and Blu-ray releases and professional Digital Videotape machines all are capable of progressive scan so you get actual progressive scan Encodes most of the time. Unless it's vintage video sources. On DVD it doesn't matter what the monitor is capable of. A CRT TV with interlaced scan or a modern HDTV with progressive scan, they all can show it just fine. Something that was well considered while creating the DVD-Video standard.

[@benji888578]

The 1080p standard is full frame NTSC, and, it is also widescreen by design, not anamorphic. 1080i will vary depending on PAL/NTSC. And, in actuality, most blu-ray releases are done at 24p to maintain the same frame rate as the original, (film runs at 24fps, and even professional digital cameras capture at 24fps). That’s why it’s a special notation when a film is high(er) frame rate (HFR) (i.e.: The Hobbit at 48fps) in the cinema. Blu-ray players will output at 24fps to capable HDTVs, and for HDTVs that are not capable the blu-ray player will use a 3:2 pulldown to convert it to 60p. 3:2 pulldown is usually pretty good most people won’t notice, however, there may be some “judder". …Even some DVDs are actually 24p, though, I’m not sure DVD players support this, in my blu-ray player you’ll have to manually select to get 24p playback on your 24p capable TV. (I’m speaking mostly of NTSC as I’m in the US.)

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

@ benji888578: it depends on the DVD player. I think the first generation players without componente and HDMI output don't support progressive scan. However Blu-ray players do so if you playback a 24p DVD on a Blu-ray player, this will work much easier.

[@benji888578]

Yes, that's what I meant...I can play some DVDs at 24p in my blu-ray player, but, have to manually select that option each time I watch a DVD, whereas with blu-rays, you can select 24p playback in your settings once and it will automatically play BDs at 24p, as long as your TV supports it. (Why it works this way, IDK.) Of course, blu-ray players will also upscale DVDs to 1080p. ...DVDs started out working with analog TVs, so things are different there. DVD players with digital output will usually upscale, up to 1080i w/component or 1080p w/HDMI, default is 30fps interlaced/60fps progressive, (so if what's on the disc is 24fps, it will be converted in the player automatically). Surely some DVD players will do 24fps output, however, it may be at 480p or it may be upscaled to 1080p. And, one reason DVDs look better or worse upscaled is that DVD content can be 240 or 480, (288 or 576 for PAL). Early DVDs were not anamorphic, so, made for 4:3 screens and so widescreen is not only letterboxed, it is pillar boxed, or window boxed, since it has black bars all around, ...the actual content is using less pixels, so upscaling and/or zooming won't look as good, (especially when it's 240).

[@xRaVeRv]

I feel so much more informed every time I watch your videos. Thank you for your time and effort bud. You help me keep calm in these fucked up times I live through.

[@ChronicWhale]

I'm 6 years late but I really appreciate all the research you put into these videos and the pure density of facts you spit out, straight to the point and you always add interesting side-notes

[@Jaymac720]

I, born in 2001, grew up watching movies on VHS and DVD. I also grew up with multiple analog TVs in my home. When my family started to go more modern and therefore more digital, the picture quality was an insane upgrade. I still remember watching Spongebob on Saturday mornings with the interlacing pattern present. My grandma was the first to get a huge hi-def LCD TV. I was blown away at how good it looked compared to the tv in my living room

[@caymanhilldesigns453]

This dude is like "Modern Marvels" back in the day. I LOVE it.

[@musicmaniac32]

This was far more info about Laserdiscs than I ever thought I'd find out. I was just searching for it because I had a momentary flashback to watching science videos on Laserdisc in elementary school and wondered what happened to them. Four videos later, I'm thinking about all our old tech. I think my grandmother had a Laserdisc player, but she only had one disc - a nature doc or something. Old electronics like this fascinate me and my mom. We have a collection that includes VCRs, 8-track players, old record players, typewriters, gaming systems, and until recently, old computers (They all still worked, but I finally threw out the Windows 95 PC we got in 1997 and the Windows XP desktop I got in 2003; I think I wanna hold on to my XP netbook from 09, though. It's so cute, still works, and served me well as my only computer for 8 years). The problem with some of the devices is that some don't work, but neither of us knows how to fix them. The last VHS thing I bought her was a VHS/DVD recorder combo in somewhere around 2009-11 so she could transfer some home movies to DVD. It got struck by lightning a couple months ago and now is just another relic in our "museum." I sure wish I knew someone who could fix it and also her Commodore 64. I bet my grandmother still has her Laserdisc player that needs some TLC somewhere, too.

[@vwestlife]

My guess is that the combo LD/DVD player doesn't use the red laser for playing CDs because the DVD functionality is really just an add-on, as you mentioned. That way it could be based on the same chassis and circuitry as models without DVD playback, saving manufacturing cost rather than redesigning the DVD-capable model from scratch. And as for the separate tray for loading a CD or DVD, some CD changers did the same thing, having a separate small tray for impatient people to load a single CD without having to wait for the big drawer to open and close.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

I think so too. If Pioneer did have the time to really design the whole thing better, it would not have had these "child sicknesses". It kinda looks like they only had very limited time left to retrofit a Laserdisc player with some DVD technology so they had a model to sell and cash in potential customers and have a low-risk offer for DVD early adopters. Also… HEY!!!! :D Always nice to find you in the comment section of any video.

[@nickwallette6201]

You have a proven LD platform, and a fledgling DVD platform. The former won't change much and is nearly feature complete and debugged. The latter is new and undergoing rapid development. Spinning up new silicon to tackle both tasks would be expensive and prone to introduce bugs in the LD/CD side. This modular approach is very common for first generation products. The integration comes about over the next few product cycles.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

0:22 Ah i miss the Warner Snapper cases. I'm glad i have quite a few of them from before they switched to keep-cases at one point in 2006 or so. I think the last new Warner Snapper DVD release i ever bought was "Ghost Ship".

[@ninjamaster3453]

KRAFTWERK2K6 I didn't even realize they were a novelty at this point.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

They were even some of the first non-jewelcase DVD cases i ever saw back then, when DVDs first appeared in regular CD cases like Video CD and before the Amaray Case became the de-facto standard for DVDs. The first snapper i held in my hands was Batman. Must have been back in 1998 or early 1999.

[@JobeStroud]

You would be surprised on how many movies come like that. Check out your cheapo bins at Wal Mart or wherever. You can still find them.

[@thebeststooge]

I hated those snapper cases and loved it when they finally died off. I am being serious here.

[@SnapshotOfASoul]

I love Ghost Ship.

[@phillipblades6784]

Your videos are great, fun to watch! I’m one of those who will NEVER give up on physical media. I own four (made in 2009) Magnavox combination VCR/DVD recorders. These are all refurbished, like new. I use one of them for recording tv shows almost daily. I have a collection of almost 1000 recorded movies too, along with just as many purchased movies and tv shows on DVD and Blu Ray. I also own a nice dual cassette deck from 1995 that sounds like new and a newer model Tascam CD recorder. I don’t like being dependent on streaming services for my music or tv. I’m getting ready to drop my Cable subscription and watch what I’ve been recording and buying for the last 35 years. And, I won’t stop buying new physical media until it becomes impossible to do. I love the history lesson attitude of your videos. Keep up the great work!

[@argebarse]

I've only ever owned one VCD, Star Trek First Contact. Watching it on the kind of cheapass CRT television a twelve year old kid has in his room in 1997, it was indistinguishable from VHS

[@klaushergesheimer8602]

Philips produced some really good looking VCDs/CDi-Movies in their CDi heydays around '95.

[@common_c3nts]

Good choice.

[@justinm2037]

i got some anime imports cowboy beebop,outlaw star,trasformers car robots

[@electrictroy2010]

VCD is actually Half the resolution of VHS tape. VCD has only 240 scanlines per frame, while VHS has 480 .

[@DonnyHooterHoot]

I bought my lasdisc because I was disgusted by the low quality and high prices of VHS at that time.

[@MitchCieminski]

To your question at 12:30, my best guess is that this device (especially its ejection and playing mechanism) was originally planned as a CD/Laserdisk combination player with ONLY an infrared laser, the concept for which was scrapped but the design of which was substantially repurposed for the combination DVD/CD/Laserdisk player you're looking at. If you take a look at which circuitry does CD decoding vs which does DVD decoding, you'll see they're totally unrelated, with the CD decoding seeming to be integrated with the laserdisk decoding hardware.

[@wrentubes1886]

Technology Connections, I have heard that the "Super Density" disk logo was re-purposed as SD card logo, hence the spinning disc in it.

[@nickwallette6201]

Yep.

[@liteoner]

I know this is an old comment, since he has made a video on this

[@fgregerfeaxcwfeffece]

20:50 ah, that section reminds me of the market projection for computers: "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers" Turned out to be less then 5 per person on average. Close enough.

[@electrictroy2010]

???. There were already more than 5 computers as early as 1960. Your quote is probably a “madeup” quote that nobody ever said. It happens alot. As Lincoln said “You can’t believe everything you read in the newspaper websites.”

[@rob_over_9000]

I never realized how much I appreciate the newer tweed-jacket-at-a-desk format until I come back to these weirdly jumpy cut videos from 2018. Oh, the good old days.

[@JohnDRobinsonelectronicdrums]

Great video as usual. The first DVD i bought was The Fifth Element..back in December 1997..I couldn't believe the quality leap between VHS and DVD!

[@Me-wk3ix]

My first was The Perfect Storm, it was a huge difference!

[@Nor1MAL]

I also bought the Fifth Element as my first DVD! But then I realized it was the wrong zone dvd for my player (This was between 96-98?, before I got it chipped). Right now I can't remember which I got instead... I probably still have it, so when I see it, I will know then :P

[@dacypher22]

This is a new record for this channel. 15 seconds in and you have blown my mind already that DVD stands for "Digital Versatile Disc" and not "Digital Video Disc".

[@electrictroy2010]

Because DVD also exists as a computer disk format (DVD-ROM and RAM) or DVD-audio format. The phrase “video disc” would not be appropriate abbreviation. DVD is a versatile format that can do multiple functions

[@FunnyHacks]

12:26 To answer your question. I have no source to back this up, but I'm pretty confident it's because assumptions around what is visible in the focal area no longer worked when there were different densities to be read. Most likely they were having trouble reliably being able to figure out when one bit ended, and the next started [and potentially track spacing as well] when trying to handle multiple densities. It's actually quite an achievement using one laser to reliably read different densities, and there was probably even a period of time where experts considered it impossible/not worth the R&D. I don't remember that point of view becoming public, so I guess they figured it out before going to market. But it is definitely a hard problem, especially when it hadn't been done before.

[@HilariousHarvie]

Loved my DVL-9. Good times. Being from the UK, laserdiscs (especially where i come from) was literally never heard of. Going into a Comet (electronic store) and asking for films/systems and getting a "never heard of it" made me cry with laughter. Had to import everything. Getting version of films and even getting them waay before they came out over was a huge deal. These days its a piece of cake, but a nice conversation piece for the kids :)

[@nadiaaugustine9798]

I think an underrated factor in DVD's mass success was the re-invention of the publishing of TV Shows on the format. Sure you could get SOME shows on earlier formats, but you generally had to get a single tape/disc with one to maybe 4 episodes for the SAME PRICE as a film, lending entire seasons to be EXTREMELY expensive, if you wanted a non-home recorded version of your favourite show. DVD had larger storage space, and a compact format that made the creation of single season/ complete series sets far cheaper and easier to store. Couple this with the wave of Nostalgia in the mid-00s, you can get old favorites and long-petitioned cult classics from Television.

[@guss77]

[I'm not sure this is the correct video to comment, as I watched the entire playlist, but I think I'm OK commenting here] A. Computing applications of LaserDisc: In the late 1980s, the Israeli Defense Force commissioned Rafael Combat Systems to create a "realistic" simulation trainer for tank gunners - this was for the older Merkava mk1 and mk2 (that didn't have the integrated digital turret of later models). They came up with a system that would attach on an existing tank, with sensors to sense turret and canon movements, an adapter that connects to the fire control computer and a CRT in front of the outer lens of the gunner view finder. The training computer interacted with the gunner by measuring the actual aim of the cannon (this was a completely hydraulic system) and reading the fire control commands, and playing back video from a LaserDisc player to show the gunner the results - the 1 or 2 second delay for skipping to the target video sequence matches pretty well with the projectile speed and distance to targets you normally train against. A tank commander could also instruct the computer to cue "driving forward" or "driving backwards" sequences (you can't turn). 2 or 3 training scenarios could fit on a single disc and multiple discs were provided to simulate various fighting conditions and various combat operations. I got to "play" this several times (it was the most fun an IDF Armor Corps grunt can have outside of a vacation) and also watched the instructors run the system from their control booth. B: Physical encoding of digital data on CD/DVD: ahm... actually... contrary to popular belief (and to what you say in this video) the digital data is *not* encoded into the optical medium as grooves ("pits" in the spec) for 1 (or "high") and flats ("lands") for 0 ("low"), or vice versa - instead the data is encoded in the existence of edges between pits and lands: the digital disc is rotating at a predetermined constant velocity, defined by the expected bit rate as it translates to distance by multiplying by a defined "physical gap between bits" when the signal from the optical pickup changes, a 1 is recorded and if it fails to change after traveling the expected gap distance, a 0 is recorded. To provide resiliency and reduce demands from the optical pickup, a special encoding is used so that at least two "low bits" must exist between any two high bits, known as EFM encoding, which actually uses 17 "physical bits" to store 8 "data bits" (DVDs use 16 physical bits, because they're better). This is one of the reasons you can have battery powered pocketable CD players without needing the, frankly ridiculous, cartridge loading scheme that MiniDisc has. See the last paragraph here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_disc#Physical_details

[@andrewl9472]

My parents got a DVD player in the late 90s and the quality jump was quite impressive. The player itself was also really well made and still works.

[@jamesslick4790]

DVD is one of my favorite formats. I never got "into" audio CDs in a big way because by the time they were mainstream I had already had "completed" my record collection, and was not into most new music past 1981 or so. I was NOT about to replace all of my LPs with CDs as it would have approached decent used car money. I had also dubbed my favorite tunes to open reel for home use and cassette for mobile use. Since recording was my main requirement for any new audio format, I was one or the "few" Americans who was all about MiniDisc (I even had a car MD!) My entire audio "library" has long since ben converted to *.WAV for home and Mp3 for mobile. To this day though, I have more MDs laying around than audio CDs! I DID however jump into DVD early. Since I didn't have a huge movie collection, Replacing bulky VHS tapes with DVDs was an easy choice due to the smaller physical size AND video quality gain. Once recordable DVDs and DVD camcorders became a "thing", I wondered how in hell did I put up with the craptastic video quality of VHS, LOL. HD and UHD are king now but I still have "tons" of DVDs - Since Blu Ray players also play DVDs - I have no real reason to get rid of my DVDs.

[@DaiAtlus79]

3:05 Video Disc is sometimes faster than the VHS as many masters used are probably from the PAL region where the format was very popular (especially China).

[@ilusha88]

Now that I'm playing DVDs on HD or 4K TVs/monitors I'm astounded as to the variation in quality. Law and Order looks really artifacted, but Star Wars looks really good.

[@SomePotato]

Indeed! I recently bought a DVD collection of cheap Jess Franco exploitation flicks in Spain and was really impressed by the quality on my 1080p projector. I own a lot of DVDs from major studios that look much worse!

[@klaushergesheimer8602]

Most studios artificially degraded the quality of DVDs to push their Blu-Ray sales. A self burned DVD using a good source like Blu-Ray and downscaled and compressed well can look better than the retail DVD when played on a good Blu-Ray-Player using a good upscaler and connected via HDMI.

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

It depends a lot on who does the DVD encoding. A good encode is really an artform because you have to consider a lot of things. Sacrificing the bitrate for maximum playtime per disc? Sacrificing the Bitrate for multiple audio tracks, including 1 or 2 (halfrate) DTS tracks? Sacrificing the Bitrate to squeeze in more supplemental material on the Disc instead of mastering 2 individual discs? Or just doing a damn fine encode with optimized encoder settings for a constant good bitrate for every scene? Not every label wants to or can give that much of a thought or time for a release (sadly...). And in worst case the releasing labels get an encode that was already done by someone else and won't allow you to get the raw source to do the encoding yourself. Even great labels like Arrow sometimes have to deal with such stubbornness from the producers of such and such movies.

[@nonewmsgs]

Your vids are always so good. Always well informed and even when I know a fair amount about something you add to it and it's always enjoyable

[@cam0875]

Thank god there are people who have a love for teaching this old tech. Wouldn't care to think about any of this until this channel randomly showed up. This channel has 1.65M subs, wow!

[@Chicken_Wing91]

Ironically we got our first DVD player in 2003 I remember being happy I didn’t have to rewind after watching a movie lol

[@azh698]

I was annoyed because I preferred being able to continue a movie from where I'd left it.

[@Chicken_Wing91]

@@azh698 I would pause it and leave it on lol it worked until a power surge or something 😂

[@azh698]

@@Chicken_Wing91 I had a PS2 to play dvds so that wouldn't work, as I wanted to play games!

[@RandStuffOfficial]

Also there was in the beginning a DVD-R and a DVD+R format. Not every player was compatible with both.

[@jdatlas4668]

Cat Egorical It *is* a dash, not a minus. + ruined it and made everyone say minus.

[@Stoneheart_09]

(02:54, 03:18) Those slight speedups probably had something to do with that copy of the "Back to the Future Trilogy". That copy that you have is, as far as I can see, probably the PAL Version of the said film trilogy. Films being mastered in this broadcast format are according to my personal research, sped up 4% for playback with PAL devices/systems. Malaysia used this broadcast system in the pre-DSO (Digital Switch-Over) era. My home country (the Philippines) uses the NTSC broadcast system back in the analogue TV days.

[@Ian-of9oi]

I remember when DVDs took off. Part of why we wanted them was they did not wear out. You could have your favorite movie forever and watch it when ever you want.

[@AK-nb6hz]

Probably a few other comments saying this, but DVD readers do use infra-red lasers for CD playback. I've torn quite a few of them down over the years (Strange obsessions which I'm sure you can relate to!) Grab an old dvd/cd combo drive and pull the optical assembly apart. There's a dichro prism in there which merges infra red and red beams. You can see it trying both at 4:27. Red, infra red, red infra red. As far as I'm aware, that's been the case throughout DVD's history. It's just less obvious as there's not a second optical path.

[@AK-nb6hz]

And then I scrolled down and found another comment you'd replied to... Sorry for repeating! I want to say thanks though.. your content is truly fantastic. I'm a professional audio engineer (have been for 15 years and digital is my expertise) I picked up a few things from your nyquest video.. Binge watching some of your older stuff now!

[@axellisenstain9970]

Hello, I come from the future to let you know your format gets SO MUCH BETTER I'm not sure I can finish watching this. Good job future you.

[@hydrochloricacid2146]

Damn: something actually beat VHS as far as poor video quality is concern. And on a digital format of all things.

[@ryandavidsheasby4028]

Funnily enough, using modern video encoders such as h265, that video cd could look significantly better than DVDs even.

[@witheld4975]

@@ryandavidsheasby4028 you'd never be able to decode it back then though

[@ryandavidsheasby4028]

@@witheld4975 sure you would, just not on a vcd player. My point was that compression has some so far that modern compression can put more detail into 600 mb than a DVD is able to put into 4.7gb

[@aetheralmeowstic2392]

My home-made VCD of The Uncut Story of Mewtwo's Origin is, no joke, DVD quality. I tested it in a VCD-compatible DVD player.

[@cube2fox]

@@ryandavidsheasby4028 No you wouldn't, neither on a DVD player nor on an at the time modern PC. At the time, some PCs were even too slow to decode MPEG-2 (used in DVDs) in software, so they sold video cards with hardware acceleration. Since h.265 is several generations more advanced, the computing power required for it is far greater than for DVDs (MPEG-2).

[@wraithcadmus]

"Who Remembers this style" - A Lot of my early anime R1 import discs came that way

[@CheekClapper879]

Twister-my favorite movie- came in a case like that.

[@cessnaace]

I bought my first LaserDisc player in 1984. While I now have 5 LD players and some 1,500 LaserDiscs (my collection is visible at the LaserDisc Database; Member cessnaace) , I own thousands of DVDs from all around the world. I own a Pioneer DVD player that can play either NTSC or PAL/SECAM discs. Entering in a pass code that I found on the Internet allowed me to change the Region from 1 to All. It also plays VCDs (I have about 100 of those) as well as S-VCDs (I've never found any of those though). My LD players are all various Pioneer models, except for one RCA.

[@GeoNeilUK]

The VCD of Back To The Future sounds like it was mastered from a PAL Telecine machine, in PAL countries films were played at 25fps without downconverting because the frame rate of PAL (25fps) was close enough to the frame rate of film (24fps) that the speed up was practically unnoticeable. Also, the MPEG4 codec (which was cheekily named after Circuit City's disposable disc format but *not* used by it) managed to get full length films as a decent quality (and I think at full resolution) but VCDs didn't use DivX as standard, they used MPEG1. DVDs use MPEG2 compression. Having said that, I do remember DVD players being sold with the ability to play the DivX codec (and play DivX CDs which at the time was the most convenient way to playing films downloaded from Bittorrent or ripped from DVD!) I always thought CDs used red lasers and DVDs used green lasers. Ah, the PS2. The console that killed off Sega's hardware business. Sony did the same with BluRay on the PS3, which is probably what killed off HD-DVD. Also, have you noticed that in format wars, it's always Sony (usually by themselves) vs JVC (usually as part of a consortium)

[@KRAFTWERK2K6]

Well HD-DVD was killed off by Warner's decision in September of 2008 to only support Blu-ray and stop supporting HD-DVD entirely. That was the signal for other distributors as well to end their support for this format and the end of HD-DVD was sealed. That was a good thing because from then on no movie encode had to be "castrated" to fit a 15GB single layer HD-DVD and leave a lot of wasted space on a Blu-ray because studios were very cheap and only made ONE encode for both formats. Early Universal titles like "John Carpenter's The Thing" are a good example. The Blu-ray not only uses the same filtered master but the dedicated Bonusmaterial of the HD-DVD became "Picture in Picture" Extras on the Blu-ray for no real reason. But Universal drastically increased their production quality of Blu-ray releases and nowdays they have some of the better releases coming from Major studios. Especially regarding back-catalog titles.

[@5roundsrapid263]

KRAFTWERK2K6 Early Blu-ray used MPEG2, and HD DVD used MPEG4 AVC. On most titles it looked better. Now all Blu-ray titles use AVC.

[@GeoNeilUK]

"KRAFTWERK2K6 Early Blu-ray used MPEG2, and HD DVD used MPEG4 AVC. On most titles it looked better. Now all Blu-ray titles use AVC." Here's a revelation for you. BluRays could also use _Windows Media Video_ as the video codec! Though they call it VC-1. I think that might have had something to do with HD-DVD, I mean, while the PS3 came with BluRay as standard, the XBOX 360 had an HD-DVD _addon_ which probably also helped to kill off HD-DVD.

[@5roundsrapid263]

GeoNeilUK AVC originally started as a WMP codec.

[@GeoNeilUK]

"GeoNeilUK AVC originally started as a WMP codec." No. VC-1 is Windows Media Video 9. AVC is H.264, a completely different codec.

[@matthewwaterhouse9925]

Any videos on why blue-ray defeated HD-DVD?

[@solarstrike33]

The PS3, bigger studio support, and (as painful as it is) greater copy protection led to BDs winning out. Though it does help most of the specs were in favor of BDs as well.

[@matthewwaterhouse9925]

I saw it "in the stars" as it were when they were battling things out between them. Somehow I felt like blue-ray was going to win out, but I never could put my finger on how I knew. It is pretty obvious though that the masses got a bit tired of their media formats changing so much which is what I attribute to the continued (though admittedly *slowly* dwindling) existence of DVD.

[@solarstrike33]

@@matthewwaterhouse9925 That and the Great Recession happened right as the format war was ending, which put off folks from adopting into both BDs and HDTVs.

[@duscarasheddinn8033]

@@solarstrike33 I didn't realize that. Now it makes sense as to why it took people that long to get an HDTV and Blu-ray player despite its victory over HD-DVD.

[@benv5798]

It ended up being mutually assured destruction. They both faught extremely hard for too long blowing hundreds of millions on exclusive content deals with movie studios. By the time hd dvd exited it had become clear that online streaming and non physical media was going to rule the market in the very near future(not to mention torrenting being rampant at the time). Bluray was now half a billion in the red in movie exclusivity deals alone (which everyone was torrenting anyway) not to mention r&d costs they had to make back. They were never going to make it back because everyone still had 720p tv's and bluray was 1080p and when you played them on a 720p tv they looked HORRIBLE. Worse than dvds. 1080p tv's were very expensive making it harder to justify the upgrade. To top it all off the ps3 had only marginal success this console generation unlike the massive success the ps2 and dvd had given each other. In the end Sony's present said he wished Sony had been more open to working with hd dvd at the start.

[@judenihal]

I used to horde VCDs when I was small, because they were digital and no quality loss each play. I didn't know back then that the quality is far worse than VHS. VCD was the future becuase you will never lose quality from them. This is why I preferred them over VCD

[@Natalie-ez1zc]

Are you going to do another series on television (Digital OTA, sattelite, cable, etc.)?

[@Dave102693]

nodrinks I would love to see this.

[@alansilva803]

UP FOR HIM TO SEE

[@scottlarson1548]

Watching high definition television OTA for the first time in 2001 was a huge thrill. It seemed impossible that such a sharp detailed picture could come through an antenna. It had been coming for years and years and *years*.

[@InsaneGamersOfficial]

> Digital OTA Though unlikely, If he does the video, I would like him to mention what happened in the UK with ITV Digital and Freeview, even if it is just a footnote. It's really interesting. A subscription based OTA Digital company which failed because they a) overpaid for soccer rights forcing some clubs to go bankrupt b) literally had to give boxes away on the street to get people to get the service and c) had their encryption cracked by their rivals, Sky TV, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch (owner of Fox News) who then "accidentally" leaked it onto the web meaning everyone had counterfeit viewing cards. Oh and the government expected everyone to get this service for the digital transition. Eventually it failed, the BBC took it over and it became Freeview which gives you 100 or so channels for free.

[@Dave102693]

InsaneGamers I wish something like that would happen in the US.

[@tristan6509]

The VCD is basically what CED would be if they've made it on time, they used existing technology (the CD) and made it output video.

[@johanliljegren4759]

Good thing the VCD flopped. It was so bad.

[@michaelturner4457]

@@johanliljegren4759 I don't know where you are, but VCD was very much a success here in SE Asia for a long time. And TC did state that. In Thailand, I never saw VHS at all.

[@johanliljegren4759]

@@michaelturner4457 It might have been popular in Asia but it was only around for a few years and the image quality was poor, just as stated in the video.

[@ca-ke9493]

Same I rmb VCDs in Singapore before DVDs came out

[@echo5156]

Vcd was a huge success in my part of europe

[@nathangoddard8115]

So weird watching these older ones. Really shows the improvements to the channel.

[@welcomestranger]

That was really interesting, and the 26 minutes really flew by, so congrats on that. I'm pretty sure my PS2 was primarily a DVD player for most of its life. Will there be a video covering the final format war of Blu-ray vs HD-DVD?

[@ClashBerry]

yes please

[@electrictroy2010]

Hardly a war. It ended in just three years. Contrast that with Betamax vs VHS that lasted almost 10+ years, because Sony just refused to give up. Even after it was obvious they lost, they introduced DVD-quality ED Betamax in 1988 (ridiculous). It flopped

[@electrictroy2010]

NOTE: Betacam is not betamax. People often confuse them, but they are not compatible (betacam plays tape 6 times faster to achieve professional level quality).

[@bbsonjohn]

4:04 holyshit a VCD revolver!

[@mildpigeon]

Loving this LD series! Keep up the good work. I lived in Singapore in the early 90s and we had a play both sides LD player. A point you seemed to have missed is that LD was also a karaoke machine! :) I would hazard a guess that the market in Asia was way bigger than anywhere else partly due to their love of Karaoke. We have a bunch of them still somewhere in my parents house, and I remember my family and I butchering many classics songs. Fun times :) Also, renting LDs was the same as renting a VHS in terms of choice and price etc. In fact, we mainly rented movies and didn’t bother buying them at all. I think after 3 years or so we only owned about 5 movies, as we would rent 1 or 2 a week.

[@NenaArindrasari]

Another reason why VCD was more popular than VHS in Asia: subtitle availability. I remember that when I was little I watched a VHS tape (Beauty and the Beast, lol) yet all I did was only understanding pictures but barely understanding every dialogue of the movie :') So the existence of VCDs (with subtitles included) really helped a lot of us foreign fans who do not understand English. Edit: oh, I forgot that VHS had subtitles, too. This is another story, then. When we played VCDs, we didn't even have to do anything like switching on subtitles and such, just play it, and there we had the subtitles already on screen (some people were just lazy enough to do it).

[@AmirZaimMohdZaini]

And also ability to switch spoken languages on VCD via MPX button.

[@p1mason]

Nice video. The name is significantly more complex though.. The format started out as two competing attempts to develop a high resolution successor to the VCD. Sony/Phillips effort was called the Mullti Media CD (the MMCD), while JVC/Matsushita were working on the Super Density Disc (SD). By early 1995, both formats were announced to the market, however, the Sony/Phillips MMCD was rebranded as the Digital Video Disc (DVD) prior to being announced. At this point, a bunch of heavyweight computer hardware and software companies stepped in and announced that they would neither install the drives in their computers nor distribute their software on the relevant discs unless two things happened. Firstly they wanted the format renamed to emphasize that it was primarily a software format not a video format. Secondly, they wanted the two formats to be unified into a single format. Faced with the prospect of losing the computer software market, Sony, Phillips, JVC, Matsushita and the other companies involved agreed to these two demands. They unified the two formats into a hybrid that took parts of both the MMCD and the SD, and they agreed that the final format should be named DVD. DVD would not stand for anything in particular, but that the V should be understood to be a reference to the versatility of the format. In this regard, it is just as wrong to say that DVD originally stood for Digital Versatile Disc as it is to say the DVD originally stood for Digital Video Disc. DVD (as applied to the format we now know as DVD) never stood for anything at all. DVD as an abbreviation for Digital Video Disc did originally exist, but was only ever applied to a different format that was never actually released. DVD as an abbreviation for Digital Versatile Disc, never actually existed and was never applied to any format unreleased or otherwise. The idea of Digital Versatile Disc is a myth and a backformation from the DVD name and the concept of versatility that is vaguely attached to the name. Albeit that this is a myth that is promoted by the DVD Forum.

[@miguelrubiorincon3904]

Those LD / DVD machines were the prime of the phisical video formats age . I missed too much that special sensation of buying a film on LD , it was special , rare , and those beautiful hughe covers . I feeled that I was purchasing something nobody had . And that digital sound they had . I , ve never had listened similar to the LD soundtracks . Not even Blu ray .

[@InZomnia365]

The DVD capability of the PS2 really worked wonders in persuading parents xD It was exactly the reasoning my parents gave when they got me one for christmas!

[@mattg3026]

How about a write up on the brief format war between Sony Mini Disc and DCC?

[@donaldvincent]

Yes I am commenting on another of your "old" videos. First, they are "New" until I watch them! Secondly, I absolutely love your presentation. Keep up the good work.

[@violetnhz]

This is so interesting. Having grown up in Singapore, I remember growing up with only CDs (no tapes at all I think) and that was the case until we started using DVDs in about 2009 or 2008 I think. I always thought that the DVD format was so much newer! Wow.

[@Sinnistering]

Watching this in 2024 and remembering that an optical drive was not just standard, but basically required on laptops. When did we go so wrong...

[@Kylefassbinderful]

I still remember when we got our first DVD player in the family. My stepdad and I waited in line for a black Friday deal at Best Buy in 1999. I believe after mail-in rebates the DVD player was 50 bucks. We also got our first CD burner which was a 10 speed and that was 50 bucks after mail-in rebates. We were the people who actually would mail in for the rebate. The CD burner was an Acer and it worked for a long time and we made many many CDs with it, but the DVD player was a KLH and it broke after six months. Plus like many people who were new to the world of DVD we didn’t realize that we weren’t gonna be able to connect it to our TV via the VCR. We had to buy a new TV with composite hookups. Before that we only owned TVs that only had a RF hook up. Due to DRM reasons, the brightness would always be out of whack because it thought we were copying movies on tape.

[@djvycious]

Another brilliant video TC. You should release this entire series on laserdisc.

[@homogenized]

Oh my God! Our copy of Christmas Vacation is in that old style of case too! It's definitely an early DVD (you can tell by its bare bones menu), but it's a very important part of our Christmas tradition.

[@Vicus_of_Utrecht]

31 years straight!

[@ChromeDestiny]

There have been a couple of pressings of a two DVD set with all four Vacation movies, two per disc, that's what I went with. $10 well spent.

[@solarstrike33]

The Warner Snappers were something, to say the least.

[@Laffy-ix5xy]

Back in the early 80s, most people got a VHS recorder where I Iive because as well as renting films, you could tape whatever you liked off the TV. I think once people realised the extra benefit of tape, it soon won over LD. My dad used to tape lots of films off the TV. I bought a VHS recorder when I was old enough to afford my own and had one until around 2003. When DVD came out, I was hesitant at first, remembering the people who had bought a laser disc player twenty years earlier and soon couldn't get any discs to watch. But because Sky had brought out their recordable box, I no longer needed to use my video recorder to catch up on my favourite programmes. I simply Sky Plussed them instead. So, my video recorder was slowly becoming obsolete. That was when I bought a DVD player. I believe that because recordable TV boxes such as Sky Plus became standard in many homes, people didn't need to rely on their video recorders anymore. It wasn't just about the better quality. It was also about how we changed the way we watched and recorded TV.

[@Claro1993]

23:55 I agree that Nintendo missed the opportunity, but they have their reasons why they stuck with the 80mm proprietary format on the GameCube: avoid paying the license fee to the consortium that sets the standard for the DVD format, it acts as a form of copy protection, and to make the console as affordable as possible, as adding the functionality to play Audio CDs, and DVD Video would jack up the price of the console. That was their idea to make the console sell more, other than their well known franchises, but we all know how that turned out.

[@CommodoreFan64]

I agree as well, but outside of using SD/Micro SD, and USB on consoles such as Wii, and newer Nintendo has really never been one to follow standards, and in some ways I'm glad they don't, and others like GameCube I was like WTF?!?, but it was the system that got me back into console gaming so for that I'm thankful.

[@KuraIthys]

It's funny though, because the Wii uses a DVD drive that can't play DVD's, and the Wii U uses a bluray drive that similarly cannot play blurays. More interestingly is hackers have dug into the firmware of the Wii and found a number of pretty strange partially implemented features that were never completed/enabled. The first is there is conclusive evidence of some form of half-finished DVD playback firmware in the Wii. This shows they considered giving it that ability, but decided not to in the end. It's surprising, because I've heard the Wii's drive mechanism is physically designed to spin in the opposite direction of standard DVD's... The other weird surprise is that the Wii supports HD output. Anything up to 1125p Why 1125? Well, there is a japanese connection format for HD signals that predates stuff like HDMI by a huge amount. It's likely it was intended for this. The question is, was this 1125p output another unimplemented feature? Or was it a Japan-only feature? It wouldn't be out of the question, because PAL versions of the console support RGB scart output, which none of the other versions are capable of. (not even in theory; The NTSC versions of the SNES can output RGB, which makes sense in Europe but serves no purpose in the US or Japan.). It's quite strange. Then again the gamecube has 3d output support designed for a special purpose display that never got released. The gamecube was also going to have a memory card adapter to allow the use of standard SD cards, which I think also never ended up happening... Both the SNES and n64 have audio input pins on the cartridge slot, which were basically never used. (technically the Super Famicom used them with the satellaview add-on I guess). And the expansion ports too; the SNES and n64 never used theirs outside of Japan. The gamecube actually had I think 3 expansion ports on original models; and while one did get used for a modem, and the GBA player used one, the third port was never used, and was removed from later versions of the machine... So... There do seem to end up being a lot of features in Nintendo consoles that never actually end up being finished/enabled... But it does look quite a lot like the Wii could've ended up with DVD playback support, but never actually did in the end...

[@Yeen125]

KuraIthys I’m guessing the 1125p was for the now defunct MUSE HD format used in Japan during the 1990s. It’s probably an unused, leftover part of the GameCube (since the Wii uses upgraded GameCube hardware).

[@CommodoreFan64]

KuraIthys If you install Homebrew channel on a Wii, and use WiiMC you can play DVD's on a Wii with limited menu support, and sometimes the disc fail to read, and it's hard on the drive, so not recommended. So yeah It was just down to Nintendo not wanting to pay per disc stamped to use the DVD format for their software, same with Blu-Ray disc on the Wii U, and from a profit standpoint I can see why, so I'm also guessing a lot of this stuff got started by the hardware designers, but had the brakes put on it by Nintendo's book keepers, lawyers, and upper management. If it counts for anything their was the Japan only Panasonic Q DVD player that also played Game Cube games, and besides by the time of the Wii low end DVD players had already dropped in price to around $30 - $50 US making it so just about anyone who really wanted one had one.

[@SianaGearz]

Keep in mind that Wii has online updates and software distribution. If i was Nintendo, i would have considered the possibility of sorting out the per-unit licensing with the consortium bound to a download, sell people "DVD-Video Channel" via WiiWare later for $40, double dip and shift the cost. Perhaps technical or legal issues occured that prevented that, or it just wouldn't have been profitable enough. After all, licensing fees are not the same for everyone - large low-cost DVD player IC manufacturers have worked out insanely low per-unit royalties with the rights holders, much lower than software companies.