Bias of Some Region 1 DVD Forums

[DeadWalk]

I've been a regular visitor to many dvd forums on the web, mainly because they are an invaluable source of help and information... very much like this one.

However, I've recently started to notice that quite a few of the Region 1 based dvd forums (I don't want to name names) have a tendency to disregard/discredit any release (whether this be a movie, tv show or whatever) simply because that release is not a Region 1 release. Contributors often spew forth what can only be described as venom if someone mentions a movie is available on Region 2 or Region 3, etc.

Granted, there are many more releases available on Region 1 than most any other region, but this number is dropping steadily as more and more dvds are being released worldwide.

I just find it a little bit mystifying that so-called movie fans are so biased towards one particular region at the expense of missing some truly outstanding or superior releases not available in their home region. As a movie fan the picture and audio quality as well as the quality of the extras are the things I consider when purchasing a disc... the region coding of a dvd is probably the last thing on my mind.

Has anyone else noticed this?

[Roborob]

:wave: Hello,

If I remeber right Region 1 is USA, and the US has a tendency to ignore the rest of the world at the best of times. :oh-hum:

My advice is to stick here, We can give a mutitude of views, some good, Some Bad or like mine simply Insane. :lol:

oh and some time Evil too. :thumbs:

Hahahahahahahahahaahahaahahaahah! :lol:

ByE! :wave:

[Adam Barratt]

... the region coding of a dvd is probably the last thing on my mind.

I think you have your answer right there. It might be the last thing on your mind, but it's a big deal in the US. DVD players there are almost always R1 only, making discs from other regions worthless to the majority. Even for those few who own multi-region players, no mass-market TVs in the US are capable of playing PAL, making R2 PAL even less accessible.

If you point out that something better is available in another region to someone who can't take advantage of it, then they're bound to be irritated.

Adam

[thescrounger]

Plus Americans think they are better than the rest of the world. They are not, we were running the world before them whilst they were still playing cowboys.:razz:

[Squirrel God]

DeadWalk,

I view and post on a number of forums, two of which are US forums. One is like this one and very DVD oriented, the other is more hardware oriented.

On the DVD-oriented forum, I haven't found what you describe at all. The Americans went absolutely ape plop for our 24 Limited Edition Boxset, were endlessly talking about how better our packaging was for the Alien Quadrilogy, and even go on about what British TV shows they should buy on R2 from places like Blackstar and Amazon.

I've seen them start numerous threads on R3 editions (popular because of their NTSC format) and on one thread they were talking about R4 and I assumed they meant R4 Australia. Nope - they were going on about how good some R4 Brazilian disks were.

[ratso-rizzo]

Originally posted by thescrounger
Plus Americans think they are better than the rest of the world. They are not, we were running the world before them whilst they were still playing cowboys.:razz:


That's probably their point - we used to run the world. Now they do.:D

[cm-9]

I often post on AVS forum about PAL vs NTSC type issues. Most US posters even on that technical forum do not give the impression of knowing what PAL is, liking it or owning any PAL discs, even though those people are certainly capable of playing back PAL discs if they needed to - they are either the HTPC crowd or the projector crowd.

I even changed my user description to "PAL is better!"!!!!

In general, US enthusiasts do not appear to know that:
* PAL has more lines of resolution (576 as opposed to 480)
* Anamorphic PAL on a PC has a resolution of 1024x576 (i.e. a perfect match for an XGA resolution projector)
* PAL disks do not have 3:2 pulldown, and therefore it is far less common for them to have interlacing problems on a HTPC or a progressive scan projector system
* Sometimes the R2 transfer of a movie is just better than the R1 eg Star Wars TPM (US R1 had bad transfer with lots of edge enhancement / ringing); Lord of the Rings FOTR (US R1 had a lot of detail filtered out compared to the R2)

If you really want to tease them, just mention Buffy series 7 ...

Or :gag: "foreign films with subtitles" :lol: :lol: :lol: :brickwall

[StuBruise]

Originally posted by cm-9
If you really want to tease them, just mention Buffy series 7 ...

...or that Buffy's better in 16:9 than 4:3 :suspect:

~~stu

[Much]

PAL might be better for 24FPS movies and UK originated items, but surely those that were filmed for US TV in the first place (I'm assuming Buffy and 24 is / was) would benefit from being released in their original unconverted format?

IMHO that's the ony real consideration in a NTSC vs PAL choice of release; other items like anamorphic, aspect, extras, sound etc are all down to the release company.

[Michael Mackenzie]

Originally posted by Much
PAL might be better for 24FPS movies and UK originated items, but surely those that were filmed for US TV in the first place (I'm assuming Buffy and 24 is / was) would benefit from being released in their original unconverted format?Not really, because film-sourced shows like Buffy tend to get a half-decent DEFT conversion for PAL releases. The result is that it usually just comes down to which annoys you more: 3:2 pull-down or 24>25 fps speed-up.

[Michael Mackenzie]

Originally posted by DeadWalk
However, I've recently started to notice that quite a few of the Region 1 based dvd forums (I don't want to name names) have a tendency to disregard/discredit any release (whether this be a movie, tv show or whatever) simply because that release is not a Region 1 release.To be fair, I've found that a lot of UK DVD buyers have a habit of doing this as well, even "hardcore" fans. The attitude I often see is "I'll wait for the R2", even if there is no real incentive to do so. There does seem to be an unhealthy distrust of buying things from another country -- for some reason, people just don't seem to realize that buying a DVD from abroad is often easier, faster and cheaper than buying it locally! Importing, for many, seems to be an "if all else fails" option rather than a viable alternative. I buy almost all my DVDs of mainstream titles from the US now, simply because they almost always cheaper (from DVD Pacific, at any rate) and often available earlier. (Plus, I loathe PAL speed-up with a passion.)

PS. Don't get me started on people who think the term "R2" is interchangeable with "UK". :nuts:

[Roborob]

:wave: Actualy ratso-rizzo The usa DOES not run the world. :razz:

If it did Osmin Bin Laden would be in US hands,

France would sink into the sea thus joining the North Sea and The Med.

China would be nice.

North Korea would not exist.

Everyone would be Right wing and Christian and white. (W.A.S.P.)

AND ANYONE LIKE MYSELF, WHO TALKS NASTILY ABOUT THE US OF A WOULD BE SENT TO THE CHAIR.

:notworthy Thankfully that is not happening. :clap:

America likes to pretend it is in control. It takes an event like Sep 11 or a person Like Maggie Thatcher to remind them that they are not. :nono:

Did you realy think The 1st Gulf war was started By George Bush Snr? :lol:

Bye! :wave:

[Mr Nice]

Originally posted by cm-9
* Anamorphic PAL on a PC has a resolution of 1024x576 (i.e. a perfect match for an XGA resolution projector)
Well, sort of, you have a perfect match vertically of course, but at the end of the day the 1024 is still a horizontal stretch from the native 720 ;). Oh, and if your using a HTPC, and an amp with analogue 5.1 inputs, or a soundcard which can encode to DD 5.1 on the fly (some nvidia mobo chipsets do this too), but thats a net quality loss by comparison, then via WinDVD or using the reclock audio renderer you can ask it to slow down PAL to 24fps, and the pitch goes down accordingly, so you can in principle get the advantage of the extra 20% PAL resolution, while still having correct pitch, feel free to use that info to wind up US posters cm-9:D. (in theory reclock can do it on straight spdif passthrough, in practice the results aren't so great and the pitch doesn't drop so fairly pointless).