Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!think.com!mintaka!wookumz.gnu.ai.mit.edu!rjc From: rjc@wookumz.gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray Cromwell) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy Subject: Re: CDTV News Message-ID: <1991Jun15.092250.28773@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu> Date: 15 Jun 91 09:22:50 GMT References: <1991Jun14.214105.1414@ncsu.edu> <1991Jun15.025015.13046@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu> <1991Jun15.064926.27796@ncsu.edu> Sender: news@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu Organization: The Internet Lines: 82 In article <1991Jun15.064926.27796@ncsu.edu> kdarling@hobbes.catt.ncsu.edu (Kevin Darling) writes: >In article <1991Jun15.025015.13046@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu>, Ray writes: >>>[ stock CDTV is ] bad enough for color and fleshtones, but also consider >>>B&W photographs... and then think about the limited greyscale of stock CDTV. >> >>Well, if CDTV is "inadequate" for fleshtones and B&W, so is CD-I. > >Bogus conclusion. In many cases, 64 grey levels are considered sufficient >(and necessary). CD-I has 256 shades of grey available per pixel, but >CDTV has only 16. What we have to wait and see, is if it's true that >CBM plans to make a DCTV adapter available to Photo-CD customers. It's not a bogus conclusion. Neither CDTV nor CD-I are suitable for still-photo-color quality images because NTSC isn't. Nothing you can say will change it. Dump a HAM pic to tape once using the A520, the quality looks no worse than normal television, but it will nowhere near 35mm film. >>> "The Photo CDs will also produce high quality photographic display >>> on Philips' new Compact Disc Interactive (CD-I) players." >> >>Assuming CD-I gets a revised chipset. NTSC can hardly be considered >>"high quality" when compared to 24-bit megapixel. By the time CD-I >>and Kodak's system hits the market CDTV could already have the DCTV >>set which lets you rival CD-I's image quality. > >True, obviously NTSC can't show all the Photo-CD pixels. But then, >you'd need a workstation to do that, wouldn't you? The majority of >people will be viewing them on their home TV, for which CD-I is ideal. >Kodak's idea is that players will zoom and pan around the image. Exactly my point, the majority of people will be using TV's. Nuff said. HAM pictures dumped to a tv look good. The average consumer isn't going to complain about HAM, he won't even know. >And don't compare DCTV to CD-I's DYUV. They are not the same at all. >DCTV has only a quarter of the color range, only half the horizontal >color resolution, and only half the vertical luminance resolution. >Not to mention that the higher res chipset planes used for DCTV would >further slow down the CDTV cpu, something DYUV does not do on CD-I. DCTV usings 3 or 4 plane hi-res images. 3 hires planes=6 lo-res planes hence DCTV takes the same CPU time as a HAM picture. in 4 plane mode it will eat more CPU, but I doubt it will be much of a loss considering DCTV's purpose. Care to tell me how you calculated DCTV's color range vs CD-I's? Any don't bother comparing it against the 24bit CLUT modes because they are going to get downgraded in the rgb->composite conversion. DC keeps their image format propriertary so I'd like to know how you know this. CDTV isn't automatically a failure because CD-I has better specs, the average joe doesn't even care. Lately, people have had the annoying habit of defining what is "ample and adequate" to exclude the Amiga and CDTV. As far as I know, noone has ever published a rule book stating what is adequate for computers. (I get the picture most people arguing here define their needs like this: Quality of picture needed to represent human flesh=!HAM Quality of resolution needed to do WP/DTP=!whatever_the_amiga_has If the Amiga ever comes standard with a 1024x1024x24 display, I bet someone will state that it's not adequate because some $20000 workstation has something better) I think CD-I is going to have a run for its money. CDTV is out, possibly 8 months before CD-I will hit the market in force. By the time CD-I does hit the market CDTV will have a substantial consumer base. I don't think the interactive video market is a unary market, there is room for more than 1 standard. I wouldn't be surprised if C= adds CD-I compatibility in the future. > - kevin BTW, I am dissapointed that neither CDTV nor CD-I live up to their promised features. As you stated kevin, CD-I still doesn't sport real-time 30fps full-screen animation. -- / INET:rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu * // The opinions expressed here do not \ | INET:r_cromwe@upr2.clu.net | \X/ in any way reflect the views of my self.| \ UUCP:uunet!tnc!m0023 * /