Digital doesn't automatically mean quality

I was interested in Owen Gibson's article about BSkyB's proposed HDTV service in Media Guardian today. I saw a demo of the Euro1080 service at the BBC's Kingswood Warren Reasearch & Development department last year - and I have to say I was taken aback at the difference in picture quality.

It was showing basketball, and the thing I couldn't get over in my head was that I could actually "see" the people in the crowd. Of course you can "see" them on regular telly, but this was like a step-change between the kind of F1 Racing game I used to play on the Sega Megadrive (Need grass in the scenery? Have this one blocky shade of green) and current fave Colin McRae 2005 on my PS2. The improved quality didn't make me any more interested in the basketball though ;-)

I must take exception, though, with the opening paragraph:

"on Wednesday, BSkyB was unveiling its own vision of the future of TV that could have equally profound ramifications. In the same way that music fans have down the years got used to forking out for better quality formats and more convenience, from vinyl to CDs to digital downloads, now the visual medium is trying the same trick."

Convenience I can accept, but I defy anyone to demonstrate that the fidelity of my 160kbps mp3 download is comparable to the quality of my CDs, or that they are comparable to the "bitrate" of my analogue vinyl collection. Plus, of course, you haven't even gained convenience if you purchase DRMed discs that won't allow you to copy music to your own PC or portable device!

Posted by Martin Belam, March 7, 2005
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