Quality Of Millennium Dvd's

[Guest Forza]

I have all 9 seasons of "The X-Files" on DVD, and all of them have varying degrees of artifacts and other visual anomalies, despite store returns and testing across mutiple DVD players. In short, they play fine in non-progressive scan DVD players, but display visual artifacting (i.e., graphical screw-ups) on progressive scan DVD players. As a result, I am continually forced to choose between a superior picture with artifacts or a generally poorer (i.e., non-progressive scan) picture.

I will say that some other DVD's of TV shows (e.g., Star Trek TNG) display the same problem.

Question 1: Is anyone else having the same problem?

Question 2: Will MilleniuM's DVD's be mastered and produced with greater care?

PS. Se7en&One's DVD's are flawless!

[Guest Gary]

Totally agree with you regarding the X-Files DVDs! As I lost track of the show after Season Four, I'm currently working my way through all the DVDs (and having a damn good time, too!), and I too have had the occasional problems that you describe, but nothing that really spoils my enjoyment of them. One thing I've learnt about DVDs (and to a certain extent, DVD players) is that they can be funny things when they want to be!

I really, really hope the Millennium DVDs are mastered well, though! :grin2:

[Guest amnesic]

i also noticed problems with my XF DVDs which i was really pissed off about. they should be flawless at £90 a set at full RRP!

[Guest Forza]

i also noticed problems with my XF DVDs which i was really pissed off about. they should be flawless at £90 a set at full RRP!

Hear, Hear!!!

[Guest amnesic]

Hear, Hear!!!

more like "Har Har!" from 20th Century Fox. what a great business plan. release sub-standard DVDs at ridiculous prices and watch to see how many fans buy them regardless.

[Guest Forza]

more like "Har Har!" from 20th Century Fox. what a great business plan. release sub-standard DVDs at ridiculous prices and watch to see how many fans buy them regardless.

To add insult to injury, they will re-release them using "1013-Bit Technology" that eliminates the visual anomalies. Record companies did the same thing with CD's: release a crappy first edition and then come out later with a "Super-Bit" edition!

Thankfully, the problem is sporadic and more of a nuissance than a problem.

[Guest chrisnu]

I've noticed that the picture has gotten better with each new release. I'd rate the quality of picture as follows:

1) Seasons 8-9

2) Seasons 6-7

3) Season 5

4) Seasons 3-4

5) Season 2

6) Season 1

Then again, I have a non-progressive scan DVD player.

[Guest ender.wiggin]

I may be wrong, since I have not actually seen the artifacts that you are experiencing, but based on your description that the artifacts only appear when played on your progressive scan DVD player, I wonder if what you are viewing is an artifact due to the MPEG compression scheme used for DVDs. Improving the DVD player (progressive scan is usually 12-bit output) and/or your TV (i.e. HDTV) will quickly bring out the limiations of MPEG encoding.

Do you experience this problem with any DVD movies also?

[Guest Forza]

Progressive scan is only of use with a HDTV, and I have one. Believe me, the quality of the picture is noticeably better when played with a progressive scan player, but occasional artifacts are apparent, especially when switching between scenes or during rapid movement, when the picture degrades. I have a $500 Sony DVD player, so I doubt I can find a better one.

These artifacts are usually absent on my PS2, however, which does not include a progressive scan function. Unfortunately, the quality of the picture is not as good because of the lack of progressive scan.

Finally, I agree that the quality has improved as the DVD's have been released, but some degree of artifacting is present even in the Season 9 episodes, which were released two days ago.

Edited May 13, 2004 by Forza

[Guest Second Coming]

I've never noticed any problems with the dvds. Of course I don't have a progressive scan dvd player.