WOW, if this is true..

[Sciascia]

Look at this . This is very interesting if it is true, could possibly be huge. This is the biggset news for the digital video world that I have seen in a long time.

OK, did I build it up enough? Pretty cool stuff. The coolest part is that I actually beat Doc to posting it!!!

[Joel Cairo]

As an archivist, I have severely mixed feelings about the system that's been worked out. Although MPEG has its faults (and they are legend), at least its compression is a literal translation of what is actually appearing in the video image... **this** scheme sounds much more like a rendition of "what we think the motion in your image will appear to be, based upon some stored samples that we have".

I would be interested to see a frame by frame comparison of an encoded file with the original source material-- particularly material with a lot of motion.

-Joel Cairo

[dZeus]

They quote 1.1Mbps for broadcast quality video... I can't see that being too far off current MPEG4 compresion rates.... so my guess is that until they demonstrate a lineup to compare it to other formats, it doesn't say much (if anything) at all.

[Dr Mordrid]

There are several companies coming out with improved MPEG-2 compression schemes that supposedly give high quality at low bitrates, so these guys will have to fight for acceptance with outfits like Ligos, Microsoft and others.

The push towards this comes from these issues;

1. the MPEG-4 licensing fiasco brought on by MPEG-LA (who else?)

2. the high cost of upgrading factories and players to use DVD-Blue (405 nm) for HDTV. Using low bitrate MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 would allow HDTV to be put on the current 650 nm DVD's, the technology for producing which is already paid for.

APEX is making their move on this by implementing WMV in their decks this fall with Microsofts next-gen system, CORONA, due for inclusion later on.

CORONA has various profiles, one of which was recently demoed by streaming a movie to theaters in Seattle and Dallas for projection. Now word on how it went.

Watch & wait for now.....

Dr. Mordrid

[Sciascia]

NAB's coming up soon isn't it? God I wish I could go this year, so much cool stuff out there right now. It really is an exciting time for us A/V nerds

Anyone here going?

[Brian Ellis]

Back at home base, busy installing DVD-RW from Pioneer and 2 Maxtors + Raid.

This one sounds very much like MPEG-4 from their description :-(

[dancray]

nice eyeball Brian