Invest in a BluRay Player and BluRay or wait for the streaming to get better?

[chander]

Hi all,

Here to pick your brains again and start yet another extremely subjective thread for opinions . I understand the perils of asking for such advice, but I am confused so thought why not let you all in on this dilemma.

I have a fairly decent HT setup, not very expensive or high end, but extremely functional and quite good, the TV and the AVR are both 4K and so it the sources. Now my source is almost exclusively Apple TV 4K, and an Xbox Series S (almost unused - but planning to get rid of it), I have a fairly good quality internet connection 350MBps using Mesh routers Netgear Orbi, which I use hardwired for the one in the HT.

Now there is an issue, streaming - though it has come a long long way from what it was 5 years ago, is no where near as good in terms of sound quality. I know this system is a lot more capable than what it does when I use the streaming services. I have had "sources" for 4K UHD movies locally, that I have used on this system and things like - Color and sound with the exact same settings is a fair bit better. Example would be the BR for Kill Bill, Dunkirk, Dark Knight series, and many many more.

Now comes the question - Should I go ahead and invest in a good BluRay Player and invest in BR of my favorite movies that I do tend to watch at-least once a year Or do I not bother and wait for the streaming services to get better - if there is any chance at all. Please note -

1 - I have no sentimental attachment to physical media, on the contrary I find them cumbersome and a great bother. Atleast that has been the case recently - I do not really care about the physical media anymore.
2 - I am all for convenience and hence my only need for a BR setup is for my super favorites only

Now the investment here is going to be massive, eventually, and if in a year or two all this stuff just shows up on streaming services with all things Hi-Res, then there is no point. Or we are extremely confident it will not happen? Considering BR is digital too .

 

[amrutmhatre90]

Blu Rays will always win hands down, but streaming platforms have started to catch up.

A year back or so Netflix increased the bandwidth of the sound tracks. Your One S has passthrough apps like Apple TV might see a slight benefit.

Few months back I had done AB testing of streaming vs blu rays, dynamic range of blu ray is significant but some people might not even hear it or make out any difference.
I only watch TV shows on streaming platforms, never see movies on streaming platforms.

It all comes down to cost, investing in a blu ray player and discs vs paying for streaming platforms. Also you will still end up taking streaming subscriptions if you go the blu ray route.

 

[sunilkm]

From my experience the audio of streaming platforms ( Using Amazon Prime, Netflix, Hotstar ) is not in par with bluray. Have been watching through bluray player before all these streaming became popular. Even if I play DVD with DD5.1 played in BDP sounds much better than streaming audio

 

[chander]

Cost is the main reason I am not sure about going this way - a proper BR of Kill Bill is around Rs. 1000/- make it two and you have almost 2K just 2 movies I have around 150 absolute favourites I want to own - maybe by the time I am done with the 150 - the number might increase, and we are looking at a fortune of around 3L at this average. Even for the sake of argument I say some of these do not have drool worthy sound effects and streaming of these should be absolutely alright, I am still looking at atleast a 100 of these at around 2L.

And if the streaming services suddenly catch up one fine day I am looking at an inevitable Face Palm moment.

 

[selvaa_pr]

Cost is the main reason I am not sure about going this way - a proper BR of Kill Bill is around Rs. 1000/- make it two and you have almost 2K just 2 movies I have around 150 absolute favourites I want to own - maybe by the time I am done with the 150 - the number might increase, and we are looking at a fortune of around 3L at this average. Even for the sake of argument I say some of these do not have drool worthy sound effects and streaming of these should be absolutely alright, I am still looking at atleast a 100 of these at around 2L.

And if the streaming services suddenly catch up one fine day I am looking at an inevitable Face Palm moment.

Chander, We should never compare the cost perspective of Physical media vs Streaming services. They to two different extremes. I too have a collections of 100+ blu-ray disks. But, they are something like very much loved movies for their SQ and sometimes the Extras. For example, I love LOTR and have the extended edition Bluray. We can watch those movies in Amazon prime. But, the Sound dynamics the disk and loads of extras are always unique to physical disks. But, in the streaming services for example, I have Prime Video, Disney (Son's choice), and Zee5 (part of my mobile post paid) and there are loads of content there. I used to pick some random movies over the weekend. But, once in a while, I pull a Bluray and pop into my Sony UBP-X800 Region Free Bluray player (bought in US from a store) and enjoy that. That's another sort of fun. Just thought sharing my point.

 

[chander]

@selvaa_pr I absolutely agree with you on most points!

However, my point is cost being a major deciding factor, and BR being a digital format, is it possible for the streaming services to catch up eventually to the 4K UHD disks on BR? And as formats keep changing all the time - DVD < BR < 4K UHD disks < god knows what, the BRs might eventually need upgrade again. That's a huge upgrade cost yet again.

So waiting a couple years actually make sense? Or we are never going to see the quality of the physical media? I am sure we will, but here for the opinions of those who know a lot more than I do.

 

[selvaa_pr]

@selvaa_pr I absolutely agree with you on most points!

However, my point is cost being a major deciding factor, and BR being a digital format, is it possible for the streaming services to catch up eventually to the 4K UHD disks on BR? And as formats keep changing all the time - DVD < BR < 4K UHD disks < god knows what, the BRs might eventually need upgrade again. That's a huge upgrade cost yet again.

So waiting a couple years actually make sense? Or we are never going to see the quality of the physical media? I am sure we will, but here for the opinions of those who know a lot more than I do.

True. No doubt about it. Blurays have the bed layer tracks whereas the UHD disks are loaded with objects based tracks. IMO, they are more of marketing trick. How much we enjoy on the atmos/dts-x is very specific and subjective..

 

[Nagaraj S]

I will stop buying Blu-rays when Netflix (and others) start streaming audio at the maximum Dolby Atmos bit rate, which is 18,000 Kbps (or sounds as good as a BR). Currently, Netflix streams Atmos at around 750 Kbps. So, it’s going to be a while before the audio on Netflix catches up, especially if you consider many Netflix users most likely don’t care, need a higher bandwidth Internet connection, and Netflix may not see a business case for this anytime soon. Until then, Blu-ray it is. It’s expensive, but remember we are in to an easily avoidable hobby

 

[chander]

Easily avoidable indeed. Those lucky ones who could escape the lure of the promise of "better", oh those I envy.

 

[dextrostar]

Easily avoidable indeed. Those lucky ones who could escape the lure of the promise of "better", oh those I envy.

Well I had this dilema couple of years back and I finally started building up my BR collection.
If you carefully monitor Amazon deals from time to time you will be able get 150 titles within 1.2L which is based on my purchase experience.
IMO I don't think streaming quality for audio isn't going to come at par with BR for atleast next 3-4yrs.
Do also note that with proper handling of BRs they will last for ages.
Then again if you can evade that upgrade allure then you can play that 'wait n watch' game.

Cheers

 

[chander]

I am in this dilemma now - I watched the Kill Bill 1 & 2 and Saving Private Ryan with promises of hi-res on streaming services and it wasn't as good as my "local version". Sound is substantially better than what we have on the streaming and colours too, more natural in the "local version". I am practically a glorified accountant and for me there is always a "value" associated to each purchase/decision. I would hate to spend a bunch of money knowing that a few years of wait can get me what I want. I just hate being torn between the passion and practicality, but in all fairness it has served me well.

 

[Love4sound]

I had a blu ray player nd currently using a nvidia shield. Using Kodi and a subscription called real debrid you can stream blu ray remux files. You won’t find any difference with a Bluray disk. I have done side by side comparisons with movies like pacific rim, man of steal and many more

 

[insane79]

I will stop buying Blu-rays when Netflix (and others) start streaming audio at the maximum Dolby Atmos bit rate, which is 18,000 Kbps (or sounds as good as a BR). Currently, Netflix streams Atmos at around 750 Kbps. So, it’s going to be a while before the audio on Netflix catches up, especially if you consider many Netflix users most likely don’t care, need a higher bandwidth Internet connection, and Netflix may not see a business case for this anytime soon. Until then, Blu-ray it is. It’s expensive, but remember we are in to an easily avoidable hobby

I agree, Netflix is amazing for TV Shows, as the Dolby Atmos it uses is Dolby Digital+ & not TrueHD. I love Netflix for TV shows but for my fav movies its 4k Blu-ray for me. The difference is too much for me in both Visual & Audio, 4k Blu-rays are still untouchable by any streaming service, when it comes to movies, granted your setup is decent.

 

[Doomster69]

Personal opinion —

Blu ray picked up bit slower than the way it was intended to.. With mobility being priority from a tech perspective, streaming is expected to see the bulk of investments in the future

So if you wish to be future ready, an investment in streaming with option for upgrades is the way to go.. Its cost and real estate effective

 

[jbkar]

Since a Bluray player doesn't cost a bomb, you can go go for it at least for flexibility. I have tried Sony and Philips entry level BD Players. Philips supports a wide range of Codecs. and offers much better navigation than Sony. Picture quality is same or better than Sony (Yes I was surprised). I have paired with my projector.

 

[Silencer]

Blu-ray, of course.

But let us agree that streaming is the future. And Blu-ray may still be available as an enthusiast option. A collector's item like Vinyl or ACD, I don't think the format will die. It may get upgraded. Like old formats. Not necessarily.

Most of the consumers do not have a setup where they can fully utilise the high quality Blu-ray content except their latest tvs, of course. And I don't think many care about the dynamic range. The proponents of uncompressed audio are only enthusiasts. The ones who prefer a FLAC or MQA over a 320kbps mp3 file. Most have a soundbar + tiny subwoofer setup, and hardly know how good a Blu-ray can sound.

All are getting used to the convenience of streaming and the sheer amount of content. Even the content makers and platforms are aware of that.

How many knows or cares about the channels or the objects in an Atmos track or the bitrate it needs to sound good. Well, how good is good enough is another subject.

The other day I was searching for an old Tamil film and couldn't find it anywhere, and my friend had a copy in his collection. It had a 6 channel audio and the bitrate was 160kbps !!!

And he says it sounds so good. What can I say?

So I will suggest getting the discs while one can and make a copy for our collections. Or one day all we will be at the mercy of the Netflix catalogue.


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[reignofchaos]

Just buy a Playstation 5 or Xbox Series X console. It will play all types of blurays and when bluray discs for film go extinct, you can use it just as a game console. Win win both ways.

 

[raptor77]

Chander, this is a very interesting question. My answer would be that streaming services are years away from offering high quality streams that come close to what your BDs sound and look like today. It has happened in music though - Tidal and the rumoured Apple Music HD are just two examples of services for music buffs who want a CD-like experience and are willing to pay for it. But as many people have pointed out, the market for high res AV (movies) may just never make business sense to a Netflix or Amazon.

So I would say build a basic collection of BDs with a player. We can hope that we get a Netflix TrueHD one day but don’t hold your breath.

I went through this same dilemma a few years and started picking up movie BDs on sale at Amazon.

 

[ankitbhargava]

My reason of sticking with Streaming (mostly Netflix) is immediate availability of the content
You could forego a compromised (but still very impressive) sound quality when you use the HT setup very frequently.

 

[Mahi]

I had a blu ray player nd currently using a nvidia shield. Using Kodi and a subscription called real debrid you can stream blu ray remux files. You won’t find any difference with a Bluray disk. I have done side by side comparisons with movies like pacific rim, man of steal and many more

What brand & model no bluray player you have sir?? Very interesting both r same quality audio & video, ?? Waiting for your valuable reply sir