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Random Thoughts — Page 666

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Thanks guys, maybe I’m crazy.

Mark’s Down On Your Syntax said:

Collipso said:

What’s Pulp Fiction’s original aspect ratio? I rented it on TV to watch it 2 days ago and it was 2.35:1, but I seem to remember watching it a couple of years ago and I think the aspect ratio was 16:9. Am I crazy, or was there a release with a different aspect ratio, or has it always been 2.35:1?

I had it on VHS in the 90’s and the aspect ratio was 2.35:1

I remember because at the time all I had was a 14" TV and the movie looked tiny!

Hahaha yeah, we used to have a pretty small TV back home too, and some movies were barely even watchable! Some very fond memories of that TV.

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Strange technological events are afoot at my house…

So, I’ve got a multi-region blu ray player which I use only when I’m watching imported discs. It’s new(ish) and made my Sony, not Sorny. The rest of the time I use either my PS3 (hooked up to the same TV) or my PC.

Using the multi-region player and not the PS3 I popped in Star Wars Rebels - Season 3 this afternoon and found the main menus were juddery. Assuming it was just a random error I played the first episode and discovered that while the audio was perfect, the video would play for a second or two, freeze, then whizz forward to catch up with the sound, play for another second, freeze again and repeat.

My first thought was that the player had gone wrong so I tried the other discs, but they all performed in the same way. So I tried switching regions from A to B and back again to no effect. Then I tried another blu ray, and it worked fine. Then another, then another, then a DVD, then I tried Star Wars Rebels - Season One and it also worked just fine, Season Two also played as it should.

Thoroughly confused I put Season Three back in and the juddering resumed, at this point I felt like an idiot because this was clearly being caused by dodgy discs - but when I played it through the PS3 it was fine.

Instead of spending my Sunday afternoon watching Kanan and the gang I’ve tested nearly all of my discs to see if any more of them get the judders. The upshot is, for whatever reasons, every single blu ray and DVD I own will play perfectly in my multi-region EXCEPT The Force Awakens (3D & 2D version), Rogue One and Season Three of Rebels. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol: 2 plays fine but the main animated menu displays the same kind of judders.

So basically, although I haven’t bought any more than those four, every Disney blu ray I’ve got which was released after November 2015 seems to have taken offence to something going on in my multi-region player. I’m glad to have other blu ray players because if I only had the one and it was making my Star Wars judder, I’d be a bit miffed.

I’m assuming it’s something to do with interference from copy protection, or possibly wizards are involved. Has anybody else experienced anything like this before? It’s a bit odd!!

I’m looking forward to testing Thor Ragnarok next month to see what happens with that.

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Maybe also depends on what codec they authored the bluray on? It’s not like DVD where it’s all mpg2. Most these Days seem to use avc but I think h264 and mpeg2 are also technically bluray compliant.

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MPEG-2 is horribly inefficient by today’s standards, but Blu-ray does support it. I reckon most recent Blu-rays use H.264 (which is actually AVC) because of its much greater efficiency and quality. All Blu-ray players can play it because it is a part of the standard.

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You might need a firmware update? Also wouldn’t surprise me if Disney did something that wasn’t kosher with the format specs and the Sony is hiccuping on it.
These things never happened with HD-DVD. 😛

I have the odd DVD or two that seem to spin faster than anything else I own, or at least they make the player really noisy to the point you think the disc is going to fly out of the machine and kill you. No idea what causes it.

Forum Moderator

Where were you in '77?

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 (Edited)

yhwx said:

MPEG-2 is horribly inefficient by today’s standards

Not as true as you might think. At low bitrates yes of course. But at bluray level bitrates the difference isn’t so big.

Meaning a 5 gb mpg2 feature will pale in comparison to a 5 gb h264 feature, but a 22 gb mpg2 compared to h264 the difference wouldn’t be quite so apparent.

So yes I guess by definition that does make h264 more efficient, but when you’re talking a Blu ray sized file it doesn’t make a huge difference. I’ve authored a few Blu rays using mpg2 and they look fine even projected into a 120 inch screen as long as the average bitrate is a minimum of about 20 mbps, max at about 30.

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I am also unsatisfied. But a bit more content than a few months ago.

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I have a youtube channel just so I can comment on videos when I want. I have posted no videos or anything else. Yet I was notified that someone subscribed to my channel. Why would they do that?

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Warbler said:

I have a youtube channel just so I can comment on videos when I want. I have posted no videos or anything else. Yet I was notified that someone subscribed to my channel. Why would they do that?

It’s likely to be someone who hopes you’ll follow back or someone running some sort of scheme with shady links to shady stuff. Could be a bot. Or a secret admirer. Maybe they just want to keep their eyes on you.

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Everybody on the internet gets one complimentary stalker? Maybe it’s a bot of some kind?

Forum Moderator

Where were you in '77?

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Warbler said:

I have a youtube channel just so I can comment on videos when I want. I have posted no videos or anything else. Yet I was notified that someone subscribed to my channel. Why would they do that?

“Won’t you tell him please
To put on some speed
Follow my lead
Oh, how I need
Someone to watch over me.”

TV’s Frink said:

chyron just put a big Ric pic in your sig and be done with it.

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Sir Ridley said:

Warbler said:

I have a youtube channel just so I can comment on videos when I want. I have posted no videos or anything else. Yet I was notified that someone subscribed to my channel. Why would they do that?

It’s likely to be someone who hopes you’ll follow back or someone running some sort of scheme with shady links to shady stuff. Could be a bot. Or a secret admirer. Maybe they just want to keep their eyes on you.

It’s JediTemple34.

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TV’s Frink said:

Sir Ridley said:

Warbler said:

I have a youtube channel just so I can comment on videos when I want. I have posted no videos or anything else. Yet I was notified that someone subscribed to my channel. Why would they do that?

It’s likely to be someone who hopes you’ll follow back or someone running some sort of scheme with shady links to shady stuff. Could be a bot. Or a secret admirer. Maybe they just want to keep their eyes on you.

It’s JediTemple34.

How would you know this? Is it a sock prescious?

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Yhwx you really need to let the “Yhwx speak” thread Die, as it’s humor has long run out. We’ve had enough nonsensical posts about you getting lunch and dinner without bumping the thread to run it by us again. Much like the Possessed Speak thread which died when my swipe app started actually learning, the yhwx speak thread needs to die for not being funny anymore.

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TV’s Frink said:

Sir Ridley said:

Warbler said:

I have a youtube channel just so I can comment on videos when I want. I have posted no videos or anything else. Yet I was notified that someone subscribed to my channel. Why would they do that?

It’s likely to be someone who hopes you’ll follow back or someone running some sort of scheme with shady links to shady stuff. Could be a bot. Or a secret admirer. Maybe they just want to keep their eyes on you.

It’s JediTemple34.

Jesus I was caught off guard and simply laughed out loud in the middle of the living room. I wasn’t a member here nor was I a frequent spectator during JediTemple34’s era, but I seem to remember coming to this place checking for links and ending up in off topic with some people discussing how ignorant the man was. I remember laughing, too.

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Possessed said:

Yhwx you really need to let the “Yhwx speak” thread Die, as it’s humor has long run out. We’ve had enough nonsensical posts about you getting lunch and dinner without bumping the thread to run it by us again. Much like the Possessed Speak thread which died when my swipe app started actually learning, the yhwx speak thread needs to die for not being funny anymore.

I’ll kill it if I have to.

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yhwx said:

Possessed said:

Yhwx you really need to let the “Yhwx speak” thread Die, as it’s humor has long run out. We’ve had enough nonsensical posts about you getting lunch and dinner without bumping the thread to run it by us again. Much like the Possessed Speak thread which died when my swipe app started actually learning, the yhwx speak thread needs to die for not being funny anymore.

I’ll kill it if I have to.

He’s right though.

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LordZerome1080 said:

TV’s Frink said:

Sir Ridley said:

Warbler said:

I have a youtube channel just so I can comment on videos when I want. I have posted no videos or anything else. Yet I was notified that someone subscribed to my channel. Why would they do that?

It’s likely to be someone who hopes you’ll follow back or someone running some sort of scheme with shady links to shady stuff. Could be a bot. Or a secret admirer. Maybe they just want to keep their eyes on you.

It’s JediTemple34.

How would you know this? Is it a sock prescious?

Go do some reading.

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TV’s Frink said:

yhwx said:

Possessed said:

Yhwx you really need to let the “Yhwx speak” thread Die, as it’s humor has long run out. We’ve had enough nonsensical posts about you getting lunch and dinner without bumping the thread to run it by us again. Much like the Possessed Speak thread which died when my swipe app started actually learning, the yhwx speak thread needs to die for not being funny anymore.

I’ll kill it if I have to.

He’s right though.

I never said that he was wrong.

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TV’s Frink said:

yhwx said:

Possessed said:

Yhwx you really need to let the “Yhwx speak” thread Die, as it’s humor has long run out. We’ve had enough nonsensical posts about you getting lunch and dinner without bumping the thread to run it by us again. Much like the Possessed Speak thread which died when my swipe app started actually learning, the yhwx speak thread needs to die for not being funny anymore.

I’ll kill it if I have to.

He’s right though.

Hallelujah! Preach it brother.

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yhwx said:

TV’s Frink said:

yhwx said:

Possessed said:

Yhwx you really need to let the “Yhwx speak” thread Die, as it’s humor has long run out. We’ve had enough nonsensical posts about you getting lunch and dinner without bumping the thread to run it by us again. Much like the Possessed Speak thread which died when my swipe app started actually learning, the yhwx speak thread needs to die for not being funny anymore.

I’ll kill it if I have to.

He’s right though.

I never said that he was wrong.

Just trying to make sure the message gets through.

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Possessed said:

Yhwx you really need to let the “Yhwx speak” thread Die, as it’s humor has long run out. We’ve had enough nonsensical posts about you getting lunch and dinner without bumping the thread to run it by us again. Much like the Possessed Speak thread which died when my swipe app started actually learning, the yhwx speak thread needs to die for not being funny anymore.

The only way I could be able be a little bit more than the first one to make sure that they can make the same page for a couple hours of free game to be the only way I could get it a little frustrating to have the same page on my iPhone and iPad.