Darth Mallwalker

Darth Mallwalker said:

Last night I watched sides 2 & 5 of the 1425-84 reissue from 1992, and compared the analog & digital tracks. No doubt about it, the analog track (presumably 1980 theatrical) seems more dynamic to these ears than the digital, which I'll presume to be a remix.
So far I haven't discovered any elemental differences, alternate dialog takes or the like, but I'm 98% certain they're two different mixes.

 

Compared to when I wrote that in June, today I'm leaning the other direction.
Got a hunch the PCM track on the '92 reissue is exactly the same as the analog track: CX-encoded.  They sound different because the player is [correctly] not trying to decode the PCM.  (Digital soundtracks aren't supposed to be CX in the first place.)
Whoever made the new glass master in '92 took a lazy shortcut methinks.
Would explain why the PCM sounds much less dynamic.

Anybody heard of a software CX-decoder ?

Hey Ash, you seen this thread ?
It drifted off-topic and right up your alley.

JayArgonaut said:

Regarding ROTJ, from what I've seen on my W/S THX 1995 PAL VHS release, during the Death Star battle, just before Han deceives the Imperial forces into opening the rear base doors, Lando says: "Now. C'mon Han old buddy, don't let me down".

According on imdb and here virtually all the other pre-SE home versions have the same line. However, the JPN and 1990 U.S LD contain the full scene (present in all versions from 97' onwards) of Lando adjusting a few controls and commenting: "We're sure in the middle of it now...", after which he then says "C'mon Han old buddy, don't let me down". I don't have access to the 1993 DC or Faces sets to check them (perhaps others who do, can?), but if I'm correct, the JPN and 1990 U.S releases would be the most complete OOT version of ROTJ available.

I recently bought 1478-80, the first domestic ROTJ LD. It's the first pressing by Pioneer in Carson, CA not the later reissue by Mitsubishi.
Here are my recordings of it, both analog and digital, as well as my domestic DC digital only. (DC is the first version, missing the Leia welding bit.)
FLAC are the digital sources; WAV is the analog track.

Equipment chain was LD-V8000 --> M-Audiophile 2496 PCI card.
Like many pro-sumer cards that one has no input level controls, so DC is overdriven to clipping. Belbucus' is the definitive source anyway.

My SC finally arrived from Japan after being lost nearly two months (avoid Celga like plague, Grrr) but I've not unpacked it yet.  Might record it later.

I think it's safe to conclude ROTJ was remixed in '93.
Still don't know if the earlier one(s) are theatrical tho

well now the secret's out, vbangle, you see I never read the news, just listen on TV while cooking supper

I fully support this project and look forward to the results
I have the V8 disc to keep me occupied while Arne fries the bigger fish
(and recently got my own JSC)

I can't comprehend how anyone would presume this project dead.
Seven weeks is a moment in time...

And Arnie.d is nowhere near M.I.A.
He popped up in the GOUT image stabilization thread just days ago

Sluggo said:

The best part was going and seeing Star Wars with a gaggle of friends.

...in the same theater where we'd first seen it as kids.

Looks great g-force!
But don't take my word for it--head over to ****** and see for yourself

My sister bought that Meco LP.
Hated it back then, but like yourself, I enjoy hearing it now

He did do the first version (pre-Miami).
IIRC his NTSC had exactly the same running time as the PAL original, which confuses me and suggests some sort of trickery with frame rate, but at least the resolution was downsized 576->480.

That's not the case here.
This Miami torrent appears to retain the PAL VOBs untouched (I can verify that later) so replacing the IFOs with the PAL ones should do the trick--as long as one can play PAL.

Erikstormtrooper said:

I've finished downloading the torrent, and it is definitely NTSC.

Originally was PAL.
Torrent file sizes match the original, so I doubt it's been re-encoded.

Looks like some fuckwit has tried jiggery-pokery on the IFO files, perhaps trying to fool his player.

Original IFO files (from Moth3r's usenet post) available here:
http://rapidshare.com/files/280091725/MIAMI_RTJPAL.rar.html

worst idea?

combining Fan Edits and Preservation Efforts together in the same forum

JSC is missing some frames, so its running time is shorter than GOUT.
For example, in the final Tantive IV scene when Vader says "There'll be no one to stop us this time" there's a few frames missing from the end of that shot and a few missing from the subsequent shot of the star destroyer leaving Tatooine's orbit.
That interlaced frame shown in dark_jedi's thread is another example from the beginning of the "Going somewhere Solo?" shot.

So unfortunately, Belbucus' GOUT audio won't sync without some editing....

ffdshow provides a VfW interface to libavcodec, the same library used by mencoder.

Chewtobacca said:

 you don't have to worry about some idiot having unpacked the ISO or otherwise messed with it.

Amen, brother!
Takes the fuckwit factor right out of the equation

Russs is right of course.  I'll add that it was an early DC pressing, missing the Leia welding bit

neebis said:

I ended up putting mine right after the scene where Luke is doing saber practice with the remote on the Falcon, where it cuts to a scene on the Death Star behind a conference table. On my set-top player, it cuts to the Death Star shot, then pauses, then the door opens and the scene continues. It was the best I could find given the size of my video, because there's no motion and no dialog or obvious audio to be clipped at the pause.

The scene you've chosen corresponds to a cinematic reel change.
It's possible theater audiences also experienced a pause at that spot, depending on the skill level of the projectionist.

dark_jedi said:

I am waiting to burn this

I'm waiting to download it LOL

Curious if the proper LD is also missing frames at the side changes. Will you have to decode the individual channel WAV's as before?

-edit-

Ooops, I type too slow.  Guess you won't know the answer to that one yet.  Keep us posted

Yeah it's possible.  That's why some have suggested Verbatim.
Not all Verbatims are created equal, apparently.  IIRC you should look for the ones made in Singapore, not India.  adywan said something to that effect recently.
And even the "good" ones can have a bad batch slip through QC now and then.

FWIW the better part of four years ago, when we were anxiously awaiting Citizen's ESB release, I bought a 15-pack of Memorex DL+R (acutally 14-pack since it was an open-box return.)
Only within the past month have I started using them.  So far they've all burned okay.
One gave an error trying to eject the disc after the burn finished, but it had already finalized and is readable in another DVD-ROM drive.

Despite my successes, I've always heard the discs sold by Memorex (they're not manufactured by Memorex) were of dubious quality....

neebis said:
then I tried Muxman which worked fine in terms of audio and video, but I think I have to do chapters manually (rather than importing the PGCDemux celltimes)

Click the File menu at the top of Muxman's window to import PgcDemux's Celltimes.txt

Aleksbmw said:

dark_jedi said:

page after page of spechs and no samples

 

Speeches ?

Guessin' he meant specs . . .
btw I'm enjoyin' all your tech talk and I'm sure others are soaking it up eagerly too.
I'm glad you started this thread sooner, and didn't wait until you'd got the whole kit assembled.

Sorry if you've already mentioned in one of your 'specs speeches' in the other thread
but have you hot-rodded your players analog audio section and/or CX decoder?
Do you expect your Hercules will have much cleaner audio signal than for example Elite'97 ?

And before I officially announce my project to capture ESB'80 soundtrack,
can you tell us how badly my V8000's analog CX decoder is compromised by its industrial design goals?
How does it stack up agaist others in the consumer lineup wrt analog audio ?

http://rapidshare.com/files/255794977/ESB_80.rar.html
that's the AC3 track from dark_jedi's CAV ESB preservation (1425-84) Standard Play.
Believed to be the same Dolby Surround mix heard in cinemas.

Dark, I have a question about this one.
(I know it was a long time ago, but this question doesn't require too much memory ;)
Is this set from your personal collection, or did you borrow the LD from somebody?
If yours, and if you still have it, will you please tell where were the discs were pressed?
I'm guessin' the cover probably says "Printed in USA" but what about the discs themselves?
Do disc labels say "Manufactured in USA" or "Manufactured in Japan" or something else?
Thanks

dark_jedi said: will VDub take a single frame screenshot?

VirtualDubMod (which is what I'm using) will do. Try choosing "Video" from the top menu bar.
Beware those screencaps might not have square pixels. They'd be 720x480, or anamorphically squeezed in this case (unless you're taking them from your lossless .AVI which might be a different rez...)

Now playing at a news server near you:

UNRAR 3.60 freeware      Copyright (c) 1993-2006 Alexander Roshal

Volume STAR_WARS.ISO.part129.rar

Pathname/Comment
                  Size   Packed Ratio  Date   Time     Attr      CRC   Meth Ver
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 STAR_WARS.ISO
            6445924352 45936512  <-- 12-03-09 15:17 -r--r--r-- D8DE711D m0g 2.0
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    0                0 45936512   0%       volume 129

Layer break: 1573712

Thanks for sharing it Arnie.d! We're lookin' forward to the new improved one.
In going from V8 to X9 you'll completely bypass the W's :-P

dark_jedi said:

well I will have to synch the PCM's,they are way off,the sound starts way to soon,so these are not already synched to the GOUT LOL.

Here's what Belbucus wrote:

Don't worry about which is which.  Do they sound different ?
The closing credits music sounds quite similar to my ears, with the digital being just a little hotter as SilverWook suggested it might.
Dialog levels, effects, and even music during the movie seem quite different.
Not different dialog or different effects, but mixed at different relative levels.

(assuming it's the same analog mix from the 1985 pressing)

Good point.  There's one way to find out . . . I'll have to record the earlier pressing.
I suppose then we'd also have to compare this digital mix with some other contemporary release such as JSC or SWE.