http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/ Engadget HD Comments for http://www.engadgethd.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadgethd.com en-us Copyright 2008 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/
Seriously that is a dissapointment, though I guess not a surprise. I guess they're forcing HDMI for copy protection reasons. Were there compression artifacts on the SD movies too, or did they look OK? Was the sound at least decent?]]>Mar 15th 2006 11:53AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/
As an aside (rant that is)...whenever these inferior products come out hyping up HD content but don't deliver the goods it gets me worried. If people keep getting exposed to "HD" that really isn't HD or is so overcompressed that it looks horrible, I think they might get burned out and the technology won't spread very fast. ]]>Mar 15th 2006 12:19PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/
The HD content didn't compare to any of the WMV content I have downloaded from Microsoft's site.

I didn't check out any of the SD movies. The few SD movie previews I saw were terrible, but it wouldn't surprise me if they use different bit rates for the perviews.]]>Mar 15th 2006 1:08PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/Mar 15th 2006 1:36PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/I would tend to agree with you, but my TV does support HDCP and the adaptor I am using works fine with another HDCP STB's.

I called and talked to a very knowledgeable technician at MovieBeam. He told me that they require HDMI. I asked him why DVI with HDCP wasn't enoough and he explained that it had something to do with the chipset they were using, it actually checks for HDMI and if it sees a HDMI-DVI adaptor it will not allow HD content despite being HDCP compliant.

Feel free to call MovieBeam Tech support ask for David G., he will be happy to explain it to you.

I do know that HDMI supports additional standards above and beyond what DVI supports, but I don't think this is anything more than poor hardware support.
]]>Mar 15th 2006 1:50PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/Mar 15th 2006 7:30PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/Thanks I fixed it.]]>Mar 15th 2006 7:33PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.pcmag.com/encyclopedia_term/0,2542,t=HDMI&i=44161,00.asp and HDMI spec http://www.hdmi.org/download/HDMI_Specification_1.2a.pdf. HDMI devices do detect if it is DVI or HDMI and can determine what they want to do. I just have never heard of a device forcing HDMI. New wrinkle that hopefully will not spread.]]>Mar 16th 2006 8:11AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/It is certainly concerning considering that HDMI has been out for about a year. There are over twice as many people with DVI than only component. This could be realy bad if it catches on.

Thanks for the resources, I think this topic warrants its own post.]]>Mar 16th 2006 8:43AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/Mar 16th 2006 10:28AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/Mar 16th 2006 12:26PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/That had accured to me as well, but it's too late now since I already mailed it back.

As for the download time, you can't see the movie until it is done downloading. MovieBeam has said that they only have 1.2Mbs and they estimated 8 hours for a HD movie.]]>Mar 16th 2006 2:06PMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/
I didn't care when I mistakenly believed that DVI and HDMI were essentially the same. Now I'm ready to start a class action lawsuit against the entire consumer electronics industry (okay, myabe just Zenith/ LG and Moviebeam at this point).]]>Mar 17th 2006 11:34AMhttp://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/http://www.engadgethd.com/2006/03/15/moviebeam-review/
How pissed are the millions of people who have only analog inputs on their HD displays. There are millions of us. My $17,000 front projector has several quality input options,(component, RGB, VGA, RGB,H,V) but none of them are digital.

And remember an analog to DVI converter box would be against DMCA law.

I hope Moviebeam is dead on arrival just for this very reason]]>Mar 28th 2006 5:28PM