HD DVD's - which region?

[Gingerbillc]

Hi,
I keep noticing that people refer to certain countries versions of HD DVDs when expressing a preferance when buying. Having only just taken the plunge I am puzzled as to where to get my discs from. I have bought a few from the US and a few from here and apart from the Federal warning, what's the difference? Seeing as Unforgiven bought from Tesco had the same Federal warning as other US discs, are they not just the same films, albiet with different warnings?

Thanks for your time in reading this.

Bill

[signs]

there is no difference ,although some maybee "combo" disc's (plays both SD/HD)

[AES256]

Originally Posted by Gingerbillc

Hi,
I keep noticing that people refer to certain countries versions of HD DVDs when expressing a preferance when buying. Having only just taken the plunge I am puzzled as to where to get my discs from. I have bought a few from the US and a few from here and apart from the Federal warning, what's the difference? Seeing as Unforgiven bought from Tesco had the same Federal warning as other US discs, are they not just the same films, albiet with different warnings?

Thanks for your time in reading this.

Bill

With some releases, the transfer will be the same, from the same master etc.
With other releases, the source material will be a different master, the transfer will be a different encode. A good example of this is Serenity, the US and UK versions of which are different transfers with the UK encode being done some six months later and benefiting from Microsoft's, by that time, improved VC-1 codec. The results, according to some reviewers are noticeable in that the PQ of the UK release is ever so slightly better than the US release.

Aside from the main movie, differences between releases will be found in the packaging, different subtitles, different audio tracks, different extras etc. Another difference is that some US combo releases may be non-combo elsewhere.