Originally posted by: Dunedain
All movies in HD you buy are compressed, even if you buy a movie at a store that's on a Blu-Ray dual-layer disk (50 gig capacity), it's going to be compressed. So that goes without saying, but it will still look great. The point is to capture the Cinemax HD broadcast of the Star Wars movies in the full quality that they are broadcast at (whatever that is), and then back it up onto Blu-Ray BD-R disks (the best available HD optical disk format). If the Star Wars movies are broadcast on Cinemax at a very high video bit-rate and the movies go over 25 gig in size each, then dual-layer blank BD-R disks will be needed to back them up. But once it's done, the movies will be very safe on those disks.
As far as disk rot and such, naturally one would be expected to make extra backup copies of the disks periodically so that a flawless backup copy is always available, and that those disks would be kept in safe places and handled carefully. And once these disks get into the hands of sizable numbers of Star Wars fans, replacements could be gotten readily, if needed.
All movies in HD you buy are compressed, even if you buy a movie at a store that's on a Blu-Ray dual-layer disk (50 gig capacity), it's going to be compressed. So that goes without saying, but it will still look great. The point is to capture the Cinemax HD broadcast of the Star Wars movies in the full quality that they are broadcast at (whatever that is), and then back it up onto Blu-Ray BD-R disks (the best available HD optical disk format). If the Star Wars movies are broadcast on Cinemax at a very high video bit-rate and the movies go over 25 gig in size each, then dual-layer blank BD-R disks will be needed to back them up. But once it's done, the movies will be very safe on those disks.
As far as disk rot and such, naturally one would be expected to make extra backup copies of the disks periodically so that a flawless backup copy is always available, and that those disks would be kept in safe places and handled carefully. And once these disks get into the hands of sizable numbers of Star Wars fans, replacements could be gotten readily, if needed.
Uh... you guys are far too optimistic.
As noted below, HD movies on cable are of a lower bitrate than movies available on bluray and HD-DVD. Most 1080i transport streams utilize MPEG2 compression, and the average two hour movie is about 8 to 12 gigs (12 is considered good). However, they're starting to use H.264 compression on transport streams, but these tend to be lower in bitrate, as a tradeoff for their more effective compression. They're usually 8 gigs in size.
Looking around, the largest H.264 TS file I've found for a movie of roughly the same length as Star Wars IV is a copy of Spiderman 2 that is 17.1 gigs in size. The largest MPEG2 TS that I can find is a copy of Starship Troopers that is 16.9 gigs.
Oh, and for your amusement, here are some links to caps of Star Wars IV in 1080i, from an German HD broadcast a week or two ago. (H.264 TS, roughly 10 gigs in size):
http://upload.georgeownsme.com/image.php/11498.png
http://img428.imageshack.us/img428/720/swpic1cm8.jpg
http://img214.imageshack.us/img214/2408/1020225106oj3.jpg
http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/1153/1020rg9.jpg
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And from SW V, 1080i, H.264 compression, 11 gigs in size:
http://upload.georgeownsme.com/image.php/12217.png
http://upload.georgeownsme.com/image.php/12218.png
http://upload.georgeownsme.com/image.php/12219.png
http://upload.georgeownsme.com/image.php/12220.png