2015 - Time to buy my first Laserdisc Player
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- čas přidán 11. 10. 2015
- One of a series of videos where I experience old technology for the first time. Today it's Laserdisc. Ebay laserdisc links below:
Laserdisc Films goo.gl/4NpyjZ (UK) goo.gl/pR39iX (US)
LD PLAYERS goo.gl/qMViWS (UK) goo.gl/FmhwzN (US)
BLOG: www.techmoan.com/blog/2015/10/...
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Fun fact: Laserdisc is the only format in which all 114 Hanna-Barbera Tom And Jerry cartoons are presented uncut.
Just for that, I want a Laserdisc player, but only after I’ve flown the coop.
And you watched all episodes?
There was something undeniably magical about the technology of the late 80s/early 90s. Even the hypothetical leaps into what they could evolve in to, like seeing a cyberpunk anime or movie where they have some 'futuristic technology' that's actually all clunky, semi-analogue and housed in some big grey console - even that, was something beautiful.
The real reason to get laserdisc? THE ORIGINAL TRILOGY OF STAR WARS UNALTERED.
Or use VHS.
+HotPocketLord Plays
Or get the "Despecialized Edition(s)" by Harmy.
+GuntPulp I totally agree! It's the legal way! Now I miss only the Return of the Jedi!
+GuntPulp Yeah I got them they are great
+GuntPulp They came out with the original trilogy on DVD unaltered with one of the Lucas-edited versions, in one of his many cash grabs. First he altered the movie with his first stupid CGI alterations, then he came out with an unaltered packaged with the altered so you'd buy that. Quite sneaky that guy lol. I used to have a copy. The quality is about what you would get with laserdisc, which is quite low-to-unwatchable. Maybe you can find on Ebay or at a pawnshop. . . still a better way than hunting down the Laserdisc AND the Laserdisc Player. . .
But the best solution is to wait for Disney to release the originals on Blu Ray.
"I'm not going to be trying out MUSE LD"
*Laughs in future*
yeah it's expensive to get into but the quality is great.
In about 2002 I did the exact same thing. I was always fascinated by laser disc, but when I was younger I could never afford to buy the machine, or the discs. So when I found an incredibly cheap mid-90s Sony laser disc player on ebay for only $35 CAD, I took the plunge. I bought dozens of films off eBay, and what I loved most was that I found versions of films that you just could not buy new at the time,. Films like the original theatrical versions of the Star Wars trilogy, or the international theatrical release of Blade Runner. And with the 27" Sony Trinitron television connected via S-video and optical digital to my amp, they looked and sounded great. Honestly, just as good as DVDs, on that CRT television. Eventually, I even connected the LD player to my computer and made very good copies using the video capture card of my ATI All-in-wonder, then edited the captured files from each side (or sides) into one mpeg2 video file and created my own DVD versions, which I still have. Good times.
the thing i liked was the sound, even on 2ch stereo with the soundsystem I had that only accepted L and Right input the sound was awesome and the picture wasn't super bad it was just analog, but those soundtracks, this is the whole reason I am in it today with the same machine I bought in 94, simply because I will accept a less than high quality picture for the sound, in today's blu rays and dvds especially the blu-rays a lot of sound is super compressed to leave more bandwidth for the HD picture so the sound is crap, and the best thing that made a movie were the soundtracks, and Laserdisc had them and no format ever since could touch the sound of a Laserdisc
I was born in 92, didn't grow up with laserdiscs, but started collecting them in high school. I already have most of the films on a more accessible format, but there's just something about LD. You're right, it is like collecting vinyl. Especially when it comes to Criterion editions or box sets. Disney put out some amazing LD box sets of their animated classics. I know it's not the best format, but it's got a permanent place in my heart.
I really like lazer disc, but at the same time, getting up to swap discs 3 or 4 times in one movie can get old, and breakup the experience.
I remember being blown away watching Starship Troopers on a LaserDisk through a 36 inch Sony Trinitron WideScreen TV! At the time I would have sold a kidney in order to own that setup
You'd sure be kicking yourself now haha
me too, but luckily I didn't have to, I had the pioneer av receiver and a laserdisc, and compared to my 6 head VHS hi fi couldn't even touch a laserdisc from the picture to the sound, the only downside with a Laserdisc is that they couldn't be recorded on
@@nthgth they are so useless now lol i have like 200+ of them they weigh a ton and take up a lot of space... bad vid quality, have to flip them over and change discs... such a pain.
I'm only a few minutes into the first video I've ever watched on this channel and it's already my new favourite.
+hepatitis123 thanks - just another 300 to go.
+Techmoan Well, I guess I know what I'm doing this weekend :p
Pre-answers to questions from the future:
1) The Lines on right of the TV screen are caused by a panel failure - nothing to do with the laserdisc. A new TV has been ordered.
2) No I have no immediate plans to look at CED Videodisc. It might be interesting for 10 mins - but the video quality is the same as VHS (much worse than Laserdisc) and I don't think I want to pay a couple of hundred pounds to make a video about something that would just go on a shelf/in the bin afterwards.
I bought an RCA Selectavision CED player on eBay and it is so fascinating. It really is a record that plays video. The quality isn't wonderful but the idea of placing a record in a 30 year old player and being able to watch it is so fascinating.
+rhythmnation2004 there are also many many titles available on CED
+Techmoan You're absolutely right. CED's are worse quality than Laserdiscs but there is something utterly
fascinating about a CED. I'm not a hardcore collector of them by any stretch but there is something very novel; very nostalgic about watching a movie from a vinyl record. The most fun about them is to show them to people who have no idea what they are. I've always said though, if CED's had come out in 1972 when they had a
proper, working prototype; things might be a little different today - at the very least, RCA might still be around.
+Techmoan I don't blame you. My local Half-Price Books had maybe 50 CED discs for $.50 a piece, but a good working CED is expensive and not worth the quality you get for the money.
+Techmoan Aww - but the CED is so .. ridiculous ;-) It wars it out with the optigan for me for silliest technology ever.
I could listen to you for hours, in fact... I do lol
Same. I go on Techmoan benges pretty regularly lol!
+James Roy He's knowledgable though with a good cadence, go watch something else if that's what you're looking for.
And he seems like a really great guy, the type you'd enjoy having a beer with, salt of the Earth and all that. Also, just as an aside, that genuine British pluck is fun, considering I'm American (and assuming I'm using that phrase correctly)
Your patience and precision is out of this world !
The thing that made Laser Discs special was that by the 90's it was a videophile only format. It was apparent it wasn't going to be a replacement for VHS by then. The standards set by Criterion discs and stores like QED Laser in Westmont IL separated the true movie lover from the pleebs marching into the ever multiplying Blockbusters. I bought a DVD player as soon as they were available in America and there was no denying the next popular home video format had arrived. It looked great, the familiar disc size was comforting and average consumers were finally becoming educated enough to enjoy the correct aspect ratio and extra features it offered. But at the end of the day it became a popular format that could be bought at competitive price points at any old store. Therefore, it could never hold the mystique or cool factor of a Laser Disc.
Yes, and DVD's competitive and econonomically attractive price points were underscored further when Wal-Mart started to sell movies on DVD for $5 or less. I will admit, that's how I was able to build up a good chunk of my DVD collection, but I do agree totally that nothing can ever match the je ne sais quoi that LD had. Especially considering there's still a few titles on LD that have never been re-released on DVD (those are the ones I try to collect in my LD library. :) )
In the Laserdisc era it was clear from those Criterion or Signature Editions that the end user was being treated almost as a colleague of the film makers. An expert to whom video transfer process, correct aspect ratio, director`s opinions, etc. were as important as the movie itself. Just the intro written and signed by the Directors/Producers found in the liner notes, felt like they were handing you the original cinema reels (with a "make good use of it") I don`t know, but that feeling I had with LDs and never got it again.
Many Television stations of the time were receiving programs movies and adverse on Laser Disk though with broadcast players not home gear.
what you said about Videophiles holds true, and even though I couldn;t rent them is the prices came down on the movies, and the truth is I got the Crow on Laserdisc 3 weeks before my pre order came in on VHS and it was just sitting in the rack, so I bought it and canceled my VHS order, I don't know if all movies were like that, but Suncoast had a lot of them and that's where I got The Crow 3 weeks before the VHS pleebs could buy it and still had to rent it if they wanted to see it again
I never got the chance to get to QED. I bet it was cool. There was a place on the North Side called Laser Image. I used to rent from them all the time. Generally, I was one of those plebes marching into the ever multiplying Blockbusters because they were the only places that rented Laserdiscs.
LD's have no menus, starts playing the movie when play is pressed?
That is just what I want to happen now with BD. Instead we have tons of fbi warnings and trailers and some over-engineered menu where choosing subtitles takes 3 minutes because of the menu animations and stuff.
+Juha Koski Sometimes there'll be some LaserDisc and studio logos (and THX and DD or DTS snippets on later discs) before the film, but no menus. And if the disc's encoded with chapter stops, you can just hit Chapter 1 on the remote if you want to skip all that stuff.
+Juha Koski That was the nice thing about ripping DVDs back in the day. It was easy to strip away all the "prohibited user options", so you could skip all that junk.
I get that feature by always ripping blurays. :-p
Lots of early DVDs I've noticed you can hit the STOP button (or the Home button on a Blu-ray player) and play again and it'll begin playing the film with no warnings or menus.
And then you have distributors like Criterion where you put one of their Blu-rays into a Blu-ray player, it goes right to the menu and doesn't give you any unskippable shit *after* pressing play either.
Yeah, the FBI warning me about what I just payed for puts a little damper on my experience right out of the gate. Isn't this supposed to be a relaxing entertainment? Receiving a warning from one of the most powerfull governments on the planet isn't so relaxing to me.
Between that, unskippables, and HDCP, I just don't watch many movies anymore. It actually encourages piracy in my case, as rips are more enjoyable and reliable, scales better too.
Can you imagine the amount of video/data that would fit on a disk if Blueray was the the size of an old LD. 2 sided even. it's amazing how far we've come along with technology.
it would be 313GB of Data
ROOM FOR ACTIVITIES 4TW
+Colin Sevier I wish companies would produce a LD sized BR player so we can watch half of Smallville on one side and the second half of Smallville on the other side of a LD.
***** i calculated it. Its 313GB
Waiting for a Blu-ray Laser Disc to burn... I ain't got time for dat.
aguyandhiscomputer actually it wouldn't be long. In the outer parts of the disk would be actually faster
I was a Pioneer LD tech from '81 to '03. A bit of disc trivia... There was a company that put out "adult" LDs (late '80s I think), Miracle Films. Their motto was "If it's good, it's a miracle!"
I still chuckle when I think about that.
whatever if it's outdated, this giant disc in a vinyl like sleeve is sooo cooool!
DTS: This video was all about me trying out some equipment I've never owned before...I'm not claiming to be an expert on this subject (and made a point of saying as much in the video). Well it turns out that I didn't mention something that the laserdisc experts want me to mention (even though they already know all about it)...it's DTS. Apparently there were some laserdiscs released with DTS soundtracks and apparently these will sound better than the same DTS soundtrack on DVD due to being uncompressed. So there's something I didn't know. I'll check through my discs to see if any of them have a DTS soundtrack to try out...and if you are interested you can find a list of Laserdiscs with DTS soundtracks here moesrealm.com/home-theater/guides/list-of-dts-laserdiscs/
+Techmoan Yeah, that was probably the AC3 RF/RCA jack on the back of compatible players. You had to have a standalone DTS decoder back then to take advantage of the surround channels, at least when the system first came out. Later receivers may have included built-in jacks and support.
+lookatmeanimator Since laserdisc stores video in composite format, the SCART connector probably just outputs composite video anyway. It would be worse than the standalone RCA composite output because SCART cables cram the audio and video wires right next to each other - usually with poor shielding.
+Techmoan Good luck finding laser discs without disk rot. Very simaliar to CD rot.
+keith “yoro 70” parkhill - I have never found a LD with rot . I have tons of CDs with it though.
+Techmoan Uncompressed DTS would be somewhere in the 5-6000kbps range, per your link they had 1400kbps tracks. Every DVD i've ever played with DTS has it encoded at 1536kbps. Only really weird/old releases were at 768kbps. So no, the audio was inferior in nearly every case (though not by any amount 99.9% of people would notice in the case of DTS/DD releases)
Great video. I DID own this equipment back in the day. In fact, I spent a small fortune on my elaborate home theater installation which featured a LaserDisc system as the star of the show. This brought back some great memories. I do miss the beautiful box sets with special artwork and bonus content. It all felt very substantial. Thanks for a great retrospective on a wonderful albeit obsolete format. Good times.
This is a pretty cool look at laser discs. I've always been curious.
You hit the nail on the head. My interest lies in the grandness of the size, the novelty, the fun, & the rarity.
I had never seen a Laserdisc before until a few months ago. I do volunteer work at a charity donation type shop, and I spied a big box of what I assumed to be LPs. Looking closer I noticed they were all film related, so I thought they were film soundtracks. But then looking inside the sleeves, I found whopping great mirrored plastic discs - my first time ever seeing a Laserdisc! No one else working in the place had any clue what they were, despite them all being middle aged and presumably having noticed them advertised for sale all throughout the 90s. They must not have been popular in Australia at all, because I've yet to meet anyone who really knows what a Laserdisc is. I ended up buying about a dozen of them for a couple of bucks each, stuff like Terminator 1 and 2, Akira, Life of Brian etc. I still don't have a player though!
nobody knows what laserdisc is here in Italy, not very popular at all
I honestly love this, some of my earliest memories growing up were watching land before time,twister,the mask,roger rabbit and more. Every time I mention to someone I had one growing up most of the time they don't know what in talking about. I always did love the cover art tho it truly did shine. thanks for this video!
I remember VCDs fondly. Back in the days in Hong Kong you could get 10 VCDs for basically £10s. They were mostly old movies but when you're on holiday in a place that often rains quite heavily it's pretty nice to just relax and watch some old movies.
2021 - time to buy my first laserdisc player. I have watched your video in 2015 and afterwards I was always intrigued to get a machine myself but I always seen the high prices for such players and did not see much use for me at a high cost. And this year finally I was also able to get a good 300 Euro deal on an old player with 31 movies with it so I could not resist. This would have been a technology I have never seen or used if there were not you and your always charming and interesting presentations. Thank you and greetings from Germany!
You posted this shortly after I had purchased my first laserdisc player. I have really grown to love having the option to watch older films on this medium, especially if it was a film I saw for the first time on VHS. I don't know if it's just me but if I have those analog memories I seem to enjoy watching them again on laserdisc. Also, like you say in the video many things that never got a dvd or bluray release are available on laserdisc. That's a big plus.
I have a sony
In one of the classes in my school my teacher has a laserdisc player and she still uses it to play videos on
The one thing I like about laserdisc is all the extra stuff you get. Some movies come with little booklets and stuff.
I used to have this player as soon as it came out. I was importing laserdiscs and players in the early 90’s and I loved the format. It was glorious having movie covers and gatefold discs in 12” glory! Such a great time and when the auto playing double sided players came out it was like a god sent. Saving having to get up and manually change sides every 45 minutes haha. Although when I first got a player it was on a 14” TV haha. Apocalypse now gatefold was larger than the TV it was playing on haha. Great memories.
As always your videos are always so well done and half of the appeal is your personality; that perfect combination of passion, knowledge and sense of humor.
I still use standard audio cassette and minidisc but have enjoyed many of your other tech vids.
Techmoan buys and reviews, so that we don't have to. All that's left for us is sweet and pure nostalgia.
Uncut
Opening that laserdisc drawer - especially just after the cd drawer - in that perspective, reminds me if the opening scene of Spaceballs … ☺️
Thanks for sharing this. Having been an LD retailer back in the day (as well as a collector), I can appreciate your enthusiasm for the format.. flaws and all.
21:50 Highvision LD's "that's not something I'm going to be trying out" You betcha ...
I caught that too. A better budget does wonders! Glad too.
Jeez 2015 doesn't feel like 5 years ago.. time flies
Just found your channel and have been enjoying catching up with your posts.I am 55 and was an early adopter of everything up to Blu Ray,then lost interest,sold all my old gear years ago for peanuts,so loving this trip down memory lane.Cheers.
Just found this channel. Just subscribed. And it's entirely because it's really nice to see someone who appreciates older technology and doesn't just toss it aside.
I won't be buying any 8-track players or laser discs any time soon, but I do have a special place for retro electronics and entertainment. Even though I was born in '91 and a lot of it is before my time. It's still cool to go to a garage sale where someone is getting rid of their old equipment and you can see it has been taken care of because they enjoyed it and appreciated it... they didn't just throw it away when the new version came out like so many do with their things today.
I do want to get a turntable and some records though. That's one of the things I'd like to splurge on someday.
Here in the states, we actually had these in a few classrooms in elementary school. Around 1995.
Sadly my high school in California 3 years back still used these, that was the first time I had heard of it
I love the idea of laserdisc. Big physical album like packaging with huge physical disc. I never owned Laserdisc but it is appealing to me. That said, I can't be bothered now that I'm neck deep in blu ray.
One thing that sucks about BDs is the packaging. In the U.S. cases with holes referred to as "ECO" is absolutely ridiculous.
i'm neck deep in blu ray too but I still show my LD player some love as I just purchased 7 movies from a flea market last weekend and I got Jurassic Park and T2 in the lot I bought, and for those movies alone blu ray can't touch the sound, the picture blu ray is winning, but I like to be immersed into my movies and the blu ray can't do that
@@w8kdzradio113 The sound quality is far better on Blu-Ray in a technical sense... as long as the mastered mix is good. It is true that some LD's have a killer mix though, often a direct copy of the theatrical mix, and those can hit hard. A lot of time, the modern mixes for home releases are altered a bit and some of the dynamics are lost which sucks if you have a killer sound setup.
I was big into VHS , had hundreds of movies & TV shows. Decided to past on LD. Went big on dvd,BR, 4K movies. Thanks Matt for more trips into tech past
The box art, the formats size are always a conversation starter whenever some one looks at my media collection. And there really is something charming about the format like Techmoan says. I cant put my finger on it, nostalgia maybe, but I really dig playing my laserdiscs.
Really enjoyed. You did a great job with this video, very interesting.
+Nick Murray thanks old chap.
@@Techmoan Highpoint is a damn good film and not terrible at all.
Thanks for this episode, I always thought I might buy the original Star Wars movies on Laserdisc (where Han shot first) but the video quality examples you've shown has changed my mind and saved my money. Thanks!
Thanks for the time that was put into making this very detailed video. I really enjoyed learning info on LaserDiscs that I missed first time around.
This is SUCH a great intro to the world of LaserDisc.Thank you SO much!
I remember I was in 6th grade when my teacher brought in a laser disc player to show us "the future". Looking back, it was just a record player that used lasers. I really was the last generation to see everything considering I owned a 45 player and an 8-track.
I reckon you're about right. I'm a bit younger than you and I've seen 8-track, but only because I had an older tech-loving relative.
Composite video isn't just blurry, you have the problem of dotcrawls and rainbows. It's artifacting from the way the composite signal squeezes all 3 colorspaces into one signal, a form of crosstalk if you will.
Contrary to what was said in this video many players (including and specially the one I have, Pioneer HLD-X9) do a great job in separating Y and C into 2 discreet signals. The comb filter in X9 is a unique design made by private lab Nishihara Laboratories (later purchased by Mitsubishi) and is capable of doing a perfect job also on slow moving camera pans (aside from static shots where it switches to 3D and fast moving ones where 2D filtering is used).
Moire and dot crawl are thus non existent when played via the S-Video output (nor are block and mpeg noise/compression artifacts, as they simply don`t exist in LDs). I actually have 2 set-ups, one with projector (attached to a pipeline of professional scalers) and one purely LD+(34")CRT TV both look great and allow to experience some material not available elsewhere at the best possible picture and sound quality.
Most good LD players had good comb filters to assist with that.
6:48 I remember that remote. My family had a Pioneer Laserdisc player when I was young. I loved playing around with the jog feature, because of how smooth it was going from backwards to forwards. Also, the analogue reverse and forward was nice. You had so much control.
Really good job mate. I think your videos are extremely well composed and executed. You did exactly what you said, which was to talk about information that might surprise a new LD purchaser. I especially enjoyed your detailed demonstration of CAV's awesome playback capabilities. You were very fair and honest with your overview as well, brilliant.
Glad you joined the club! it's a fun thing, i review LaserDiscs and have yet to come across a terrible transfer as opposed to the millions of DVDs i have that look like shit.
Nice video!
I bought a Pioneer LD player some time ago, and at least on my Samsung CRT TV, it looks wonderful. Specially old anime series look better than on any mpeg compressed format.
I also got a sealed Escape From L.A. LaserDisc, and I enjoy it quite a lot!
Thanks for making this video!. It inspired me to pull out my player which had been dormant for the last 15 years or so and reevaluate its capabilities. While I won't be watching many Hollywood blockbusters with it, I found the output extremely satisfying from concerts that were shot on video tape. The quality is quite comparable to the SD blurays they are coming out with which leads me to believe the LD is close to the video tape master in terms of reproduction. The audio is close to spectacular as well. I've added about 30 concert videos to my collection in the last couple of months and my Laserdisc player has re-earned its spot in my component rack thanks to you. Have a nice day.
Your videos are really interesting. This is the only channel on youtube that can keep me glued to the screen for 30 minutes straight.
It's 2016 and I still don't have my 3 Heads tape deck :(
I remember played on CAV disc (side 3) of Batman Forever, watching Jim Carrey, Tommy Lee Jones, Val Kilmer, and Nicole Kidman frame by frame... OMG the old days!
They had a CAV version of that one? That must have been rare.
I always enjoy the Techmoan videos on retro technology, and this one didn't disappoint. When I was in college in the late 90s, I recall the DVD format arriving on the scene. A few friends who were film buffs were skeptical about whether it would survive as a format, and stuck with the then highest quality format, Laserdisc. I don't think any of us had any idea how quickly DVDs would catch on, achieving a very high adoption rate that even Bluray has yet to attain. Great video.
For a few weeks recently, I had a laserdisc player. Sadly, I had to toss it, because the audio channels weren't working on it. Fortunately, my father is getting me one from his workplace, and I've already got one disc: a copy of The Empire Strikes Back from about 1982. Of course, I'll be watching mine in true retro style: using my 1985 General Electric color TV, which has a screen size of about 12 inches. Either way, that's going to be an interesting addition to my video collection, which has most of the formats I can use with my set (and afford!): VHS, DVD, and soon, laserdisc.
Dude. You mentioned PC ENGINE!!!! Awesome!!! I had the US version --TurboGrafx-16 new in 1989!!!!
11:15 “That’s what the CD tray looks like”
My first reaction: “Duh! Everyone knows what a ...”
Oh wait..
your videos got me to get into laserdiscs, thanks. the fact i can store them with my vinyl is what really sold me.
I bought my first Laserdisc player in 1989 with money I received from graduating from college. I bought the Pioneer LD-W1 which had two separate trays and played all four sides of a double disc set.
The Killer! A Golden Princess Production! I use to work for them! Lol… Thanks for the support!! :)
when i first saw and LD on my friends house, his dad had one, i was stunned and wished we had one too. i waited long for them to get cheaper but they never dropped that much. it felt like "they" wanted it to be something exculsive, something thats not intended for anybody. sort of a premium product that would lose its value if it became a mass market product
that's true I dropped 700 on my first model which was a both sides play
I've been wathing your videos since I don't know 2 or 3 years, but this one is really tearing my heart. Lots of emotions an laughts I've got from it. Thank You!
I like Laserdisc because it allows you to watch the films in the same quality as theaters. DVD and Blu-Ray won't let you watch old films in the same quality as the were in theaters due to digital restoration. I love watching old films from the 80's in the same resolution and color that everyone saw them at in the 80's, something you couldn't do with VHS, Betamax, or CED.
ahh yes i remember the laser disc era for sure
The same laser disc player is in my loft I remember playing with it as a kid I always used the LD tray button for CDs just because it was so huge
My stepdad had one, and still has alot of movies for it too- It was cool showing people movies on a huge cd-looking disc. Mind you, dvd didnt exist back then.
I must say, never had the pleasure to own a LD player. Currently I'm watching the first nine seasons of NCIS on DVD and what a joy the optical format can be. Unfortunately, nowadays it's all about streaming which I don't like.
Great Laserdisc to add to your collection is David Bowie:let's dance concert. A Great concert.
1998 seems like last week. Scary to think it was 18 years ago! I was only 10 lol.
Phil Matibag. And?
I was born that year
yes me to same watch mortal combat 1998
Lynchology101. There will be advancements made on all technology. A phone Android/iOS can only do so much. 4K Blu-Rays are out, soon to be 8K. Gaming in 4K is also starting to be produced in 5K. We just don't know what's next. It could be anything. Who would of thought in 1998 we'd all be here writing comments to total strangers on a video streaming site using our hand held devices? The next generation of kids, my son included have a lot to look forward to. I can't wait for the day we have proper 4k smartphones!!
Lynchology101 aw yeah I know folk used to do chat rooms etc. American pie demonstrates that very well. CZcams is far more advanced and it's handheld. Where as chat rooms required a pc/laptop and dial up Internet lol.
I have an LD player now and I recommend Novus plastic cleaner. There's three. One is for removing dirt and to polish and #2 is for minor scratches and #3 is for deep scratches. Vinegar also helps clean away any residue. I noticed some movies that had audio noise or picture were completely cleared up after using the novus product and even vinegar.
I just got the CLD 5104 from work! We moved buildings and they had some stuff in the storeroom, one of which was a Laserdisc player. I love it.
Jog shuttles were awesome, its too bad we don't see those as much any more. Probably fairly expensive to make though. The speed of interaction in laserdiscs and betamax tapes was obvious much faster than it is now. Technology isn't always moving forward. :-(
Excellent! As always.
Bravo! I agree, there IS something a bit mysterious about why I love LDs. The comedy & simultaneous grandeur of their size, & that whomever I invite over had usually never seen a movie on that format. It's a tremendous novelty that I truly adore.
This video brought back some very vague memories from my childhood. I now understand what i was remembering much better. thanks so much for clearing it up for me! this was really interesting.
Now you need to get a Hi-Vision LaserDisc, which are 1080i High Definition LaserDiscs... from 1993
They came out before that..
+Techmoan :O, when?
Ian Nájar they were actually 1035i, this is a very interesting technology. It seems they already transmitted in this same encoding through satellite at the end of the 80s. I could not find when the first hit vision ld players were launched, but in wiki it says they were announced in 91
You should mess about with HD DVD
GuruAidTechSupport YES
Oh, craaaaap. I'd better make sure to rip mine to computer quickly, then.
HD-DVDs usually have disc rot. He won't last a day with HD-DVD.
@@pineappleroad that's true. But I've had some Universal ones rot on me too. Basically, they're very unreliable in general in my opinion.
@@PixarMan2001 only Warner Bros titles do. Every other studio does not suffer Warner Rot. I have over 30 HD DVDs and the only one that doesn't work is 300 by Warner Bros. I only have 2 Warner releases. I just don't buy Warner Bros discs.
I think its fun to collect those large shiny discs and the artwork, thats why i do it, and the booklets oh yes. Love old tech.
I am a BIG fan of you work - those videos about obsolete formats it is a recall of days when as Young kid was browsing paper catalogues with futuristic - unaffordable piece of equipment.
As always - it was good to wait for new to come.
Thank you for posting.
A fair and honest assessment of LD - good job. Still want one though :-)
Oh I didn't know you need a CRT. I haven't had one for years, I'll have to pick one up off the roadside when I know it hasn't been raining.
What a great video. Nice, clear, and informal naturalistic speaking without any "crazy antics" or stupid comments to try and sound cool". Highly informative and a whole lot better than most of the dross here on CZcams. As an aside, it was a joy to see that Criterion Collection disc of The Killer (I love Criterion). Having only ever seen the front cover of the packaging, it was great to see it opened up. I wonder why they didn't use those subtitles for the subsequent DVD release (one of the crown jewels in my rather limited Criterion collection!). Cliffhanger, too, is another great film; they don't make them like that anymore. Anyway, apologies for the rant - thanks for sharing this video!
(Incidentally, Criterion were the ones who first started letterboxing films and providing commentaries, as well as producing special editions!)
Man you are fantastic! ...to try/test all of those vintage video/audio formats! I totally love your videos, well done! thank u so much for sharing!
I had an girlfriend in the late 90s whose father (here in Canada) had one of these. It was a 'rich man's toy'. I do remember being blown away when he fed it through a video projector, but even at the time it was a bit fuzzy. - I just discovered your channel, so I'm bouncing through the videos in no particular order.
Even though they are a bit softer it had one advantage over dvd in that quality did not degrade during complex scenes/action scenes. This is something I even notice with HD videos these days where there is pixelation/digital artifacts due to bitrate not being high enough for certain scenes. This is a huge issue with digital cable/satellite since they compress the bitrate as much as possible to fit in more channels per transponder.
Also alot of the issues with image quality also comes down to how badly modern tvs scale up the signal or how it has to use post processing deinterlacing. Often deinterlacing is even done by pretty much cutting away half of the resolution or blurring them both together causing both ghosting and blurry image. Even with a big crt compared to a same size lcd tv you would notice a huge difference in quality.
apollomemories73
Yep... CZcams is perfect example since they never use high enough bitrate for the resolution.
And the reason you notice this on analogue tv also right now is because they usually just rebroadcast the digital source so these days with analogue cable or terrestrial you get the worst from both worlds.
+bloxyman22
LDs had no compression artifacts and very few had edge enhancement, which is something that they really started going crazy with with DVDs
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Artifacting is the result of lossy data compression. Since LDs did not use data compression, you will not see compression artifacts... I don't care how good your display is.
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That is a whole different issue. Analogue media of course also has artifacts when it comes to noise, but the image does not degrade further with a complex scene with alot of changes like a action scene. And that is where digital video is much worse with todays low bitrates. Of course with a high bitrate seen on most bluray discs this is not as noticeable, but that is besides the point since I was talking about dvd which had a max bitrate of 8mbit and usually used a lower bitrate to have more video on one disc.
+Mike P : Not in all cases. I recently bought the Blu-ray of Led Zeppelin's "The Song Remains The Same" and the audio is not nearly as good as that on the 2xDVD version. Quite why I'll never know. However, picture wise it's very good.
2015: Techmoan making excuses to review some obsolete tech.
2019: Techmoan? Oh, you mean that charming british obsolete-tech historian?
Your content is always lovely at dinner time. Never offensive always so mellow and relaxing you have become my go to meal time watching on lunch break. Never disappointed!
My absolute favorite thing about LaserDisc is the fact that when you put it in the player, the movie just starts! No commercials, no ads, no trailers, no dinky menu animations. Just pop it in, and by the time you sit down the movie is underway. I will happily deal with lesser video quality for that convenience.
I still have my laserdisc player sitting in the cupboard along with some choice collectible discs including the original (unaltered) Star Wars trilogy box set which came with a hard cover book. My recommendation is if you are going to buy a laserdisc player buy on that reads both sides of the disc otherwise you will be forever flipping the disc over part way through watching a movie.
+Soshi MECH Since this is youtube i feel obligated to make this clear i'm not attacking you in any way, i'm just genuinly interested.
How does it get altered? And what is the downside of it?
jimenez de Costa I guess you are talking about Star Wars. They are the original versions of the original trilogy. George Lucas has made many revisions to these films over the years, some of the changes are good some are not good and it is debatable weather even the good changes were truly necessary.
The laserdisc version are the only true 16:9 versions that were ever released, they later released them on DVD but in letterboxed 4:3 versions, which are not compatible with widescreen TVs.
If you are original trilogy purist and hated many of the changes that George Lucas did then the laserdisc versions will probably be the best versions you can find. I accepted most of the changes to original trilogy but for me the last straw was inserting Hayden Christensen into the end of Return of the Jedi, which made little sense and just reminded me how much I hated Episode 1, 2 and 3.
If you want to know what the changes were made then do a Google search there are more than likely some very detailed comparisons out there.
Soshi MECH Thank you for providing this information. I actually didn't know there were changes that big. I also don't see the logic in it. I always thought they released the film and hope for the best. I can understand quality improvements but actually altering a movie is something completely different. ( if i understood the last section about hayden christensen correctly )
I don't like googling stuff. I prefer the interaction that emerges from asking stuff.
+jimenez de Costa the issue I had with the amended Star Wars movies was that there was so much fiddling and tweaking that it became almost obnoxious.
In the first movie, they added ships arriving and leaving Mos Eisley, little dots that got bigger the closer they went to the port. Fine. As a kid I actually figured it should look more like an airport, but maybe constraints on budget or a desire to make it look like a real back water place stopped Lucas from doing that.
But then they added so much nonsense to the rest of the scenes in Mos Eisley, little robots that buzzed about people's heads, people riding animals about in traffic, robots fighting, just too much stuff that looked out of place. Eventually you notice too much and you're taken out of the film.
A similar bit of work was done on Lucas' older movie THX-1138. I have both the DVD and a recording from TV from years ago. I keep that recording because Lucas threw in too many obvious digital touches to a movie that was about a horrible analogue future.
+jimenez de Costa There has been a despecilization project, to get the Star Wars back to a high resolution unaltered version. They should be pretty easy to find on torrent sites.
The PS2 was capable of both component and composite
Starting to love laser disc, looks, and sounds awsome to me... Nostalgia alert! Cheers, and thank you for your great videos!!!
Really well done Techmoan ! Your whole presentation and attention to detail combined with your enthusiasm has me watching five videos in a row :) Please continue making videos and now i have found your channel i have subscribed, your videos have no annoying background music and no ridiculous flashy intros , also you dont bother asking for likes or subscribers:) just enjoyable to watch , im looking forward to future vids while watching your previous content . Thanks 😊
Great Video! But I don't think your side by side comparison is entirely fair. A lot of what makes the LD picture look "washed out" has to do with the contrast/brightness settings on your tv. Laserdiscs require some tweaking in order to look right, and you'll even get a little more detail out of 'em if you get it right. Of course, it's going to look nowhere near as good as a blu-ray or anything, but it will at least rival DVD.
+Ernst de Yeah, I have wildly different calibration settings on my rig for LD vs. DVD and Blu-ray. They really are apples and oranges, so it takes some time (and hopefully a copy of Video Essentials) to get LD looking its best like you said.
You are so right about the contrast/brightness settings. Also that's definitely a sub-par LD used for the comparison. As a longtime LD collector, I also made the observation that the average Japanese LD looks A LOT better than average US (or even PAL) discs (Criterion being an obvious exception). They are also much more collectable because of their wonderful artwork (almost always surpassing their western counterparts by far) and overall care given to each release. There are hardly any state-of-the-art Japan LDs in this video (and I'm not talking about squeeze LDs and MUSE LDs, which are still an entirely different story).
Hey, about the Disc rot... Is there anything to protect the discs?
There’s nothing you can do - disc rot happens from the inside.
@@Techmoan Found only a small handful of laserdiscs that suffer this problem. Less problematic than some Warner HDDVD discs ha ha. I think my copy of Ace Ventura Pet Detective is fine on one side but not on the other. Which is strange. My player same as yours is still going fine after I picked it up 15 years ago at a car boot sale for £15. Fast forward to today it seems a good investment and is highly sought after!
Love Laser Disc...SO UNDERRATED...regardless of video quality. I love the size just as you!
I had a CLD2950 (I think that was the model) in the 90's. It was fab. Just before DVDs came out. I got a massive DVD player as well. Good to see them still running.
Laserdisc's not only sound good they sound superior to DVDs due to being mixed in lossless PCM.
Also, DTS laserdiscs maintained the original theatrical soundtracks while blu rays are re-mixed.
Blu-Rays can do multi-channel uncompressed PCM, but only the first generation of discs seem to have that.
@@TheMediaHoarder Many anime Blu-rays still have PCM, but DTS-HD MA or Dolby TrueHD is 100% lossless compression anyway, if done properly (with a license).
A lot of Blu-ray’s have added noise reduction so they sound flat compared to laserdisc . They never did much tweaking to the audio back then .
Actually Techmoan, the image quality of Laserdisc is very much dependent on the quality of the player itself much like Records. You have a CLD-D925 which is a pretty good mid-range player (I own and use one myself as my main player), but the top end players do output better picture quality that I'm told is quite a leap.
+TheThingKing You can improve things with a better player - but however good the player they all eventually hit the limit of the 480(?) interlaced lines on the recording which is looking really very soft nowadays.
This is true of any analog format, yes. My player is an early Pioneer VP-1000 and the picture quality is as you'd expect not quite as good as what he showed here.
But it also depends on the disk and movie itself. Again, when dealing with analog video, analog masters, just so many factors...
Indeed, I have two LD players, both Pioneers, one is a lower-end 1993 CLD-D502, and the other a bit higher-end 1987 CLD-1010, and the picture quality is quite different between the two. The 1010 has some extra video NR and TBC functions (that were also on the high-end LD-S1) as well as a true red laser so some disc scratches and especially fingerprints end up almost being invisible to the laser (while other LD players have a inferior red-orange laser), resulting in less noise in the video signal and better tracking of the disc. Only the HLD-X9, an ultra-high-end Pioneer LD player (that can do High-def MUSE LD discs as Techmoan just did a video of), also has a true-red laser diode as well.
As a result, the 1010 has a much cleaner, less noisier, and a bit sharper picture than my much more basic D502, despite being 6 years older of a player. I can see this happening due to LDs analog nature, of course. :)
"I'm just really interested in silly old formats that don't make sense anymore, but, to me, I find them charming."
Very quickly, I'm joining you there.
I absolutely LOVE old technology. Its incredibly fascinating to me. The uploader put it best when he said the word "charming". That's exactly how I feel about the subject of old school technology. Absolutely Charming. Brilliant.