Film bandwidth

[Bill]

HD all the way, no point in spending all that money on my HD tv otherwise 

I've been looking at Netflix and Lovefilm reviews and I'll probably go for Lovefilm.

Netflix seem to have better quality, but a lower proportion of films available- I'm not greatly interested in old TV programmes except for the occasional documentary I might miss, and I can use iPlayer or 4oD for that.

[pctech]

Bill, be warned.

Lovefilm will automatically use as much bandwidth as is available and for HD that might be about 1.7Gb an hour but yes I do agree Netflix is a tad more limited, I queried this with their support (0800 number but routeed to the States) who were very pleasant but told me that 'the studios often make us wait'

[pctech]

Here's the figures for Netflix

Good quality (up to 0.3 GB per hour)
Better quality (up to 0.7 GB per hour)
Best quality (up to 1 GB per hour, or up to 2.3 GB per hour for HD)

[Bill]

Bill, be warned.

Lovefilm will automatically use as much bandwidth as is available and for HD that might be about 1.7Gb an hour...

That's OK- iPlayer on my PVR does that (haven't tried it on the PS3). If it takes me more than 5 or 6 minutes to decide I don't really want to watch the hour-long HD documentary I've just selected then it's too late- 2GB up the spout

[pctech]

The downside of superfast broadband eh?

[Bill]

Yup... but I can live with it

[Simon]

Looks to me as though its one product for all.

Now I've seen the website properly, yes, I would agree.

[psp83]

Is there a big diff in HD quality between Netflix & Lovefilm?

I signed up to Netflix through Quidco. you get £5 back just to sign up and then an extra £15 back for becoming a paying member for 3 months.

Can cancel any time though, so can easily change over to lovefilm

[pctech]

I don't know Paul

When I used Lovefilm to stream a couple of films I saw about 4 GB disappear.

[Steve]

I think that they both do 1080p, the key for me would be the film libraries.

[Bill]

Is there a big diff in HD quality between Netflix & Lovefilm?

I really don't know- I'm just going by the Netflix vs Lovefilm reviews I read, but they were all several months old.

I wouldn't expect Amazon to let themselves get left behind though... They've got a free 1 month trial offer on at the moment, maybe worth giving them a try?

[psp83]

Just signed up, will stream a film later and let you know.

[Steve]

HD quality from iTunes is 1080p, the resultant PQ is excellent and it's about 4-5Gb per film. The other bonus is the surround sound. I presume Netflix and LoveFilm is similar.

[Bill]

I need to get myself a new AppleTV, mine will only handle 720p... but the bank account is still trembling from having the garden landscaped from scratch 

And I want to upgrade my speakers too, got my eye on a couple of KEF Q900s

[Technical Ben]

I've decided to stay, and requested a move to the 100GB package as soon as it's convenient 

Funny thing is, my usage for the last few months has dropped to the point where I could safely have dropped to a lower (old) package- for various reasons my intentions to do a lot more movie streaming etc didn't pan out as I expected.

But I still think it's likely to happen and 100GB should be plenty.

More HD nature programs! (With the sound off, cos I get annoyed at some of those commentators)

[Bill]

More HD nature programs! (With the sound off, cos I get annoyed at some of those commentators)

I've got a technique for those... I watch in HD, record in SD and if I really like it, buy the Blu-Ray and delete the recording. I've only got 2.5TB of HDD on the PVR and it's filling up!

[psp83]

HD quality from iTunes is 1080p, the resultant PQ is excellent and it's about 4-5Gb per film. The other bonus is the surround sound. I presume Netflix and LoveFilm is similar.

Xbox 360:
Netflix = 1080p, 5.1
Lovefilm = 720p, Stereo

PC:
Netflix = 1080p, 5.1
Lovefilm = 1080p, Stereo

Sony Bluray:
Netflix = N/A
Lovefilm = 720p, Stereo

So for quality and sound, Netflix wins.

I will look through the library soon to see what lovefilm offer.

[pctech]

Lovefilm do have some obscure stuff in their library.

Watched a film called Rubber about a tyre that goes on a killing spree.

[Rik]

I knew I shouldn't have split the tread.

[Glenn]

Your smiley is bald

[pctech]

This thread is really running on flat now.

[Bill]

I knew I shouldn't have split the tread.

Brought to light an interesting "feature" of the forum software- I wasn't subscribed (for email notifications) to the new thread even though I apparently started it!

[Bill]

That's OK- iPlayer on my PVR does that (haven't tried it on the PS3).

Tried it this pm- the PS3 buffers the programme rather than downloading the whole lot as fast as it can, so less worries about changing my mind after watching part of it.

Oddly, iPlayer on the PS3 won't let me select the BBC HD channel (says that "HD is not available"), but if a programme on one of the other channels is also in HD it will happily let me play it that way. Anyone else seen this or, more importantly, know any way to fix it?

[Niall]

Is there a big diff in HD quality between Netflix & Lovefilm?

I signed up to Netflix through Quidco. you get £5 back just to sign up and then an extra £15 back for becoming a paying member for 3 months.

Can cancel any time though, so can easily change over to lovefilm

Oddly enough, a lad in work posted on Facebook last night about the Lovefilm quality. I won't repeat what he said here Basically he said that if Lovefilm call that HD, he must have cataracts

[psp83]

Lovefilm HD quality is worse than Netflix HD and you can notice it.

I've also had a good look through the Lovefilm library and to be honest, I liked more films on Netflix than I did on Lovefilm.

So I think at the end of the month I will be cancelling Lovefilm and keeping Netflix.