From: B.King@ee.surrey.ac.uk
Newsgroups: rec.video
Subject: LaserDisc vs VCR
Date: 14 Sep 92 07:47:24 GMT
Reply-To: B.King@ee.surrey.ac.uk
Organization: The Internet

in rec.video/VIDEOTECH Kurt <singg@alf.uib.no> asked:

>- Is the max. playing time per side 30 minutes ?  (so you have to
>  disc-jockey 2 or 3 times during a film) ??

only for Active Play (CAV) discs - most films come in Extended
Play (CLV) which can manage just over 1 hour per side.  The
side break can be supprisingly welcome.

>- What is CX encoding(/decoding) ??

an analogue audio enhancement process analogous to the Dolby 'C'
process for audio cassettes (without so many adverse artifacts).
Irrelavent on most modern discs which have a digital soundtrack,
which doesn't use the process.

>- What is CAV ??

Active Play - literally Constant Angular Velocity.  The disc
rotates at a rate of one revolution per frame, making it
easy for the player to jump from track to track allowing
slow motion, freeze frame etc.

>- What is CLV ??

Long (or Extended) Play - literally Constant Linear Velocity.
The disc slows down as it reaches the outer edge, covering
the same distance for each frame, which as the radius of the
tracks increases becomes fewer revolutions.  Because the
next frame start is not in a known place, CLV cannot do
freeze frames or slow motion.

>- What's the difference between Widescreen and Letterbox ??

Not much.

>- What's the average price for a film ??

US$24.95

>- Is the picture quality (resolution,color,etc.) better than VHS ??
>If it is: how close is it to SuperVHS (SVHS) ??

LD is about 10% better resolution wise than SuperVHS, and with
considerably fewer artifacts.  The signal to noise is better,
colour shift is non-existant, stability is far better...

>- Are the discs easily damaged ??

Treat them with care, as you would a CD.  They aren't
particularly fragile.

>The Pioneer 1450 can play both PAL and NTSC discs on PAL TVs, but
>can you copy NTSC discs to PAL video with it??

The CLD1450 has been discontinued.  The CLD-1750 replaces it,
with all the same features and a few more.

The CLD-1750 is suitable to feed a TV standards converter, and
PAL tapes can be made that way.  The "on a PAL TV" function
relies on the TV locking to a 525 line/30 frames per second
signal and is not recordable by a PAL VCR.

Other similar multi-standard LaserDisc players include the
Sony MDP-650 and the Philips LDP-600WS.

>Whould you recomend a Laserdisc player ?

Without Question.

I run a mailing list for European LaserDisc users, mail me if
you want more details.

Regards, Bevis.

Bevis R W King,                    | Email:  B.King@ee.surrey.ac.uk
Computer Systems Support Officer,  | UUCP :  B.King@uos-ee.UUCP
Dept of Electronic & Electrical    | Voice:  +44 483 300800 ext 2272
Engineering, University of Surrey, | Email list for European LaserDisc Users:
Guildford UK GU2 5XH.              | europe-ld-request@ee.surrey.ac.uk to join.
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Newsgroups: rec.video