A Logical Argument Re: Why FUNi's DBox Quality Will Suffer

[Acid_Reign]

Maybe this is too little too late; I started typing this in the previous topic but it got locked before I hit “Submit”. Just so there’s no mistaking my intentiotns: I’m not trying to antagonize here, but I just felt I should set some things straight, because it’s evident that most of the people arguing about this issue lack a clear understanding of it.

First, some technical mythbusting:

• Apart from the introduction of rewritable consumer discs, DVD technology has not fundamentally changed since its introduction in 1995.
• MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 are the only two video encoding formats officially supported by the DVD specification. The MPEG-1 format was finalized in 1991 and the MPEG-2 format was finalized in 1994; neither has changed significantly since then.
• Because MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 are both lossy compression technologies, there is no such thing as a DVD with uncompressed or lossless video.
• MPEG-2 offers higher resolution and more efficient compression (high quality/space ratio) than MPEG-1 and is thus the de facto standard for commercial discs.
• The only way to get higher resolution/more efficient compression than MPEG-2 from the consumer market right now is from MPEG-4 (which was finalized in 1998) via Blu-ray.
• AC3 (Dolby Digital), DTS, PCM, and MP2 (MPEG-1 Layer 2) are the only four audio encoding formats officially supported by the DVD specification.
• AC3, DTS, and MP2 are lossy compression technologies. PCM is lossless. So you can theoretically have non-degraded audio on a DVD, though this is rare. Because using AC3 frees up more space on the disc, and support for it is mandatory in DVD players, it is the de facto standard for commercial discs.
• Video, audio, menus, and subtitles all take up space on a disc.
• Widescreen is not “larger” than Standard. They have different display aspect ratios, but they are both stored on the disc at the same size (720 pixels wide, 480 pixels tall being the maximum). The only difference is that widescreen movies are “stretched” by the player so that it looks correct on playback. A movie does not take up more space on a disc because of its aspect ratio.
• Cartoons are harder to compress with MPEG than photographed subjects (an Corey pointed out).

To prove my case, I have crunched the numbers on Corey’s example:

DVD-9 = 8,540,000,000 bytes total.
Those particular 6 episodes = 8,327,088,128 bytes used up.

8,327,088,128 / 8,540,000,000 = 0.97506886744730679156908665105386 ≈ 97.51% of the total space used.

Now, we don’t know exactly how much another episode is going to take up, but if we take the average of those 6 episode, we can estimate it: 8,327,088,128 / 6 = 1,387,848,021.3333… bytes (≈ 1.29 GB) for one episode.

Adding that to the previous total, we get 9,714,936,149.3333… bytes (≈ 9.05 GB) for 7 episodes, 1,174,936,149.3333… bytes (≈ 1.09 GB) more than a dual-layered DVD-9 can hold. And that’s still not accounting for the two added audio tracks. The only way they could possibly fit everything they’ve announced onto one disc is through compression.

[MajinVejitaXV]

1.) I love you, man ;p
2.) I hope this thread isn't locked, as I do think it has important information that people should read and understand before continuing to argue.

And thanks for addressing the widescreen/fullscreen "size" issue. I had meant to post about it, but the topic moved from that post rather quickly.

-Corey

[penguintruth]

Why do I feel extremely stupid reading all those statistics?

Layman's terms! Layman's terms, please!

[Kaboom]

Thank you for laying this all out. Hopefully, people will actually read it. I'll be keeping an eye on this thread, either way.

[rereboy]

Loss in quality is only relevant if it is noticeable.

So, either way, everyone is going to have to wait for comparisons between the US Dragon Box and the Japan Dragon Box footage.

There is no point in debating the matter further without knowing that.

[Smooth Criminal]

My only question is to whether or not they will be dropping the JP-track bitrate down to their standard (read: shitty) 96kbps quality. It was 396kbps on the original DBox, no?

This is make or break for me.

[SparkyPantsMcGee]

Wow, this is awesome. It almost answers all my questions. The remaining question for me is since they already HAVE to compresses the video due to the additional episode and now the audio tracks(if the rumor is true) how badly could the video possibly come out?

The other question would be for Funimation but maybe you guys can help. If they need all this space why not just make the Dragonbox's for blu-ray?

[MajinVejitaXV]

Why do I feel extremely stupid reading all those statistics?

Layman's terms! Layman's terms, please!

Summary in plain English: MPEG-2, the method of compression used in DVD's, is an antiquated codec that's been finalized for 15 years. Given the limitations, it's impossible for 7 episodes with 3 audio tracks not to suffer some form of compression (and therefore, quite possibly, degradation) compared to the original R2 releases.

Rereboy is correct in that it's only relevant if it's noticeable, however that will depend on numerous variables. The setup someone is running, their visual acuity, etc.

-Corey

[penguintruth]

Ah.

Well, if it ends up looking like the orange bricks, just uncropped, then it sort of becomes pointless.

[Smooth Criminal]

Ah.

Well, if it ends up looking like the orange bricks, just uncropped, then it sort of becomes pointless.

Yellow box, bro. AND it includes a cool quote. How can you pass up that opportunity to buy the same product yet again?

[SparkyPantsMcGee]

Ah.

Well, if it ends up looking like the orange bricks, just uncropped, then it sort of becomes pointless.

I am more than sure this is going to look better than the orange bricks. I really don't think the compression would be that noticeable. I think they should just have the original audio and then the English dialog with original music. That would take the least amount of space and would still keep fans of both sides happy.

[penguintruth]

Ah.

Well, if it ends up looking like the orange bricks, just uncropped, then it sort of becomes pointless.

Yellow box, bro. AND it includes a cool quote. How can you pass up that opportunity to buy the same product yet again?

Luckily, I didn't buy the orange bricks the first time, thanks to this very site. If I'm getting that with this release, I might as well have, though.

[MajinVejitaXV]

Wow, this is awesome. It almost answers all my questions. The remaining question for me is since they already HAVE to compresses the video due to the additional episode and now the audio tracks(if the rumor is true) how badly could the video possibly come out?

Well, to alter a popular phrase, the ground is the limit ;p

The video could be godawful with or without the tracks, it's just that the inclusion of more variables to take up space makes the ceiling for the video quality lower.

The other question would be for Funimation but maybe you guys can help. If they need all this space why not just make the Dragonbox's for blu-ray?

As far as we know, the DragonBoxes weren't telecined in HD. So, any Blu-ray release would just be upscaled, which is basically a waste of time in my opinion. You don't gain any detail, and the only real advantage is that lossless audio is more common on Blu-ray releases (and since DBZ is monaural, you gain nothing there either). Plus, the production expenses for a Blu-ray release (authoring, replication, etc) are higher than it would be to just bump the disc count up by one.

-Corey

[Kaboom]

My only question is to whether or not they will be dropping the JP-track bitrate down to their standard (read: shitty) 96kbps quality. It was 396kbps on the original DBox, no?

This is make or break for me.

Same here. This is as important to me as the video quality, if not more.

I mean, the subtitled Japanese track is the default option on these sets. If they're doing that, they HAVE to make it sound as good as they possibly can.

[SparkyPantsMcGee]

Ok, so regardless of what they do there was going to be compression? Without the additional audio we were already losing video quality and it already wasn't up to par with that of the Japanese version due to minor compressions, so why are people now complaining? I know what you mean when you say by adding the audio it would just make the roof lower but I would think the addition video would do more damage then additional audio, but I could be wrong.

Someone in the other thread said that the new Bardock DVD only had the English with original music option as an alternative. So, how bad would compression need to be if that was the case with the Dragonbox? I mean I'm assuming the dialect and music are separate files being stored on the disc but by eliminating the Falconer music how much higher could the roof possibly go?

Thanks for the help in understanding all this btw.

[Bussani]

Ok, so regardless of what they do there was going to be compression? Without the additional audio we were already losing video quality and it already wasn't up to par with that of the Japanese version due to minor compressions, so why are people now complaining? I know what you mean when you say by adding the audio it would just make the roof lower but I would think the addition video would do more damage then additional audio, but I could be wrong.

Someone in the other thread said that the new Bardock DVD only had the English with original music option as an alternative. So, how bad would compression need to be if that was the case with the Dragonbox? I mean I'm assuming the dialect and music are separate files being stored on the disc but by eliminating the Falconer music how much higher could the roof possibly go?

Thanks for the help in understanding all this btw.

I'm not the expert, but I've picked up a few things from our good friend godofchaos. Apparently it's not only about the space on the disk, but the bitrate -- that is, the bandwidth that data can be sent through going from the disk to your TV. The more audio track and video track options you load in, the more of that bitrate is taken up, leaving less free for when a really detailed piece of video needs that bitrate. That's when quality drops are most noticeable.

As far as I understand it (and I'm probably only understanding it in layman's terms), what you need to keep in mind is even if an additional sound track is just an 'alternative', it will be taking up the bitrate all the time.

Of course, that's a different subject to what AR and Cory are describing, which is more about actually fitting everything onto the disk itself. I just wanted to bring this up since you mentioned throwing on more music tracks.

[Innagadadavida]

Yes yes yes. I've said it before and I'll say it again. The most logical choice in this matter is to increase the disc count by one. End of story.

There is more video in the Dragon Box too. With those next episode previews. Even if they're only a minute in a half each, multiply that by seven and you get 10.5 minutes of footage. Which is almost half an episode! Of course, there's only one audio track for those so that'll save space... And FUNimation is pretty good about cutting back on disc space by only including one opening and closing on each disc.

[Captain Awesome]

And FUNimation is pretty good about cutting back on disc space by only including one opening and closing on each disc.

One of the features they advertised was the opening and closing credits, they wont be ditching those.

[Innagadadavida]

And FUNimation is pretty good about cutting back on disc space by only including one opening and closing on each disc.

One of the features they advertised was the opening and closing credits, they wont be ditching those.

Of course they wont, but they only need one opening and closing on the disc. They have the episodes revert back to that one opening each time. You can check it on the "Info Pane." It goes back to Title 1 Chapter 1 (or whatever title and chapter FUNi puts it under) each time it plays the opening.

[bkev]

But if these truly are the dragon boxes that won't be an option, considering that (unless creditless versions are always used) different credits may appear on each episode.