Wow, these guys have a huge archive of web browsers. I'd swear I tested against a 3rd of these when we launched our first corporate web site… via an FTP share on Netcom. 
(That was the era when I emailed Yahoo our new URL, and Jerry Yang replied with a 'thanks!')
Caught on digg
I just added Answers.com ![[Answers]](http://www.mikeyp.com/css/external.gif)
to the list of supported interwiki. Very cool site, and a much faster way to get content from WikiPedia .
The always enlightening PC Magazine columnist Bill Machrone has written about the sound quality on the iPod shuffle. As it turns out, the shuffle has not only the best sound quality of any iPod, but the best of any portable audio player he's tested. And this is coming from a techie guy who's also a musician. Neat!
The more I learn [ipodshufflecar, ipodshufflesound] about the iPod shuffle, the more I like it. The only drawback for me is capacity - I sure wish there was a 2+ GB version.
As the kitchen sink of media players (along with Xine and VLC), MPlayer [mplayer, mplayersilent] could be the ultimate audio helper app on Linux, as it can convert from nearly any media format to any other format. But unfortunately, because it has no true "silent" output option and can't stream to stdout, it can't be used as a practical helper app in shell scripts.
Fortunately, Adrian on the SlimServer developer list created a patch for MPlayer that allows MPlayer to stream PCM audio to stdout, a key requirement for me to use it as a helper app in a Whole-House Music Storage server. The patch allows MPlayer to stream audio from any input format to stdout in PCM WAV format, which is supported by practically every audio device and software.
Adrian's patch works against an older CVS build of MPlayer, so I updated it slightly to work against the official MPlayer-1.0pre6a release.
Here's the patch: mplayer-s.patch
As with Adrian's original patch, this adds two new command line options to MPlayer:
'-silent' suppresses all text output'-aofile -' sends pcm output to stdout when used with -ao pcm
(Sneak peek at future blog entry: using this patch and some other killer software, I now have iTunes on Windows playing WMA Lossless files streamed from my Linux box!)
As I was experimenting with music server software, I noticed something odd with the network config on my Linux box. syslog was constantly reporting this error:
eth0: PNIC2 transmit timed out, status e4660000, CSR6/7 e0406002 / effffbff CSR12 000000c8, resetting…
Uh, hmm. Rebooted the Linux box for the first time in months. Noticed this in syslog:
eth0: Lite-On PNIC-II rev 37 at 0xe800, 00:C0:F0:74:8D:91, IRQ 10.eth0: Autonegotiation failed, using 10baseT, link beat status 10cc.
Half-duplex 10baseT on a full-duplex 100baseTX network ain't gonna cut it. Driver problem? (I'm running kernel 2.4.20-mh18, card uses tulip.o driver).
My driver install log:
ncftpget ftp://ftp.scyld.com/pub/network/ to new dir /usr/src/netdrivers/lib/modules dirmake allns820.cMakefile to remove ns820.o, copied ns820.c to ns820.c.BADmake all, typed make installcb_shim.ocb_shim.o, reran depmod -a, rebootedNo luck, same error in syslog. Discovered card brand and ID: Kingston KNE111TX, freebie from DSL provider, I think. Rummage through box in closet. Find Linksys LNE100TX. Power down. 12 screws later, power up.
Problem gone.
Hmph.
Continued from musicstorage [musicstorage4, musicstorage6, musicstorage1, musicstorage2, musicstorage-solved3, musicstorage3, musicstorage-solved1, musicstorage8, musicstorage-solved2, musicstorage5, musicstorage7]
A few of the potential music-playing devices on my home network support UPnP as their communication protocol, and one device, the OmniFi DMS1, requires it. Unfortunately, the results of my UPnP Media Server testing revealed that UPnP is anything but 'Universal Plug and Play'.
As my goals for a Whole-House Music Storage system are to store and play my music in a lossless format on any conceivable platform, I decided to test some UPnP music servers with an album encoded in the widely supported format lossless WMA9 (specifically, the album Every Step of the Way by the brilliant acoustic guitarist Peppino D'Agostino). The UPnP client I used was the OmniFi DMS1 with latest firmware (2.1.012).
For fun, I also encoded the same album in MP3 using iTunes set at 256Kb min VBR. Via a blind listening test with the OmniFi, I could easily tell the difference in quality between the lossless WMA and lossy MP3, even in a somewhat noisy room.
I tested UPnP Media Servers on both Linux and Windows XP. I tried to only test software that would act as a true hands-free server (unlike the cool Windows Media Player plugin On2Share, for example). Here are the results:
| UPnP Media Server | Version | Platform | Results for WMA Lossless | Success or Failure |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| TwonkyVision MusicServer | 2.7 | Linux | Would not run. Requires GLIBC 2.2, and my older environment is using 2.1 | Fail |
| Intel Micro AV Media Server | Intel UPnP Authoring Tools Build 1725 | Linux | Needed hand-tweaking to compile the source. Plays first few seconds of an MP3 before stuttering badly. Would cause OmniFi to hang. Sees lossless WMA files, but OmniFi displays UNABLE TO PLAY message when trying to play them. Eventually crashes with 'Broken pipe' message. |
Fail |
| SimpleCenter | Unable to verify | Windows XP | Serves lossless WMA perfectly. Heavyweight Java client uses over 50MB RAM. Will not run as a Windows service, therefore requires a logged-in user. No folder view on client. | Success |
| TwonkyVision MediaServer | 2.7 | Windows XP | Sees lossless WMA files, but OmniFi displays UNABLE TO PLAY message when trying to play them. Interesting note: partially served a WAV file to OmniFi, even though WAV is not supported by OmniFi. Very lightweight client at ~7MB RAM. |
Fail |
| Philips Media Manager | 3.2.0.0138 | Windows XP | Software does not see or serve lossless WMA files (even though it claims to support WMA). Very heavy Java client at ~100MB RAM. Is actually a rebranded version of SimpleCenter with video support. Actually disables other installs of SimpleCenter! | Fail |
| Intel AV Media Server | Intel UPnP Tools Build 1768 | Windows XP | Sees lossless WMA files, but OmniFi displays UNABLE TO PLAY message when trying to play them. Proof-of-concept app, requires .NET runtime. |
Fail |
| Windows Media Connect | October 2004 | Windows XP | OmniFi is unable to see WMC, even though it is recognized by WMC server as authorized client device, and latest OmniFi firmware claims WMC support. Runs as a Windows service. Trio of apps totaling ~75MB RAM. Requires .NET runtime. | Fail |
| Allegro Media Server | 1.0.2 | Windows XP | Does not support WMA. Served WAV file to OmniFi flawlessly, even though WAV not supported by OmniFi. Uses only 11MB RAM. | Fail |
The results are pretty pitiful, considering the heavyweight companies backing the UPnP Forum. The only UPnP software that successfully served lossless WMA files to the OmniFi DMS1 was SimpleCenter, an easy-to-use, yet bloated Java app that runs only as a user client on Windows XP. Are the poor results due to server software, hardware, or hardware firmware? There's no way to tell in a single test case like this.
Is all lost here? Not yet. All of the software I tried appears to be in active development, so I expect to see future revisions on a regular basis. There are also several open UPnP APIs available from Intel, CyberLink, and others which will hopefully lead to a new batch of software from other authors and vendors. In addition, I may find some configuration cock-ups on my part that may allow some of the above software to perform better (GLIBC 2.2 for TwonkyVision, reinstall of Philips Media Manager, etc). I'll try again when I'm less frustrated.
The tentative conclusion: UPnP is not an appropriate solution for a Whole-House Music Storage system with lossless music encoding, at least for now.
SimpleCenter Update: My OmniFi DMS1 now inexplicably refuses to play Lossless WMA files from SimpleCenter, displaying the UNABLE TO PLAY message instead.
Windows Media Connect Update: Although the OmniFi DMS1 refuses to see the WMC that is installed on my main computer, it does see the WMC installed on my laptop. However, the OmniFi displays the UNABLE TO PLAY message when trying to play a Lossless WMA file via Windows Media Connect.
SimpleCenter Update #2: OmniFi Tech Support replied that 'The DMS1 and DMP1 do not support Lossless WMA files, and there are no plans to add support for any other file formats.' Either I've gone completely mad or what, because I'm almost positive I was able to play Lossless WMA from SimpleCenter before. I remember because there was a spelling difference in the artist's name between the MP3 and WMA test file (Peppino d'Agostino vs, Peppino D'Agostino), and both were listed on the DMS1 display. WTF?
Looking for a user forum for OmniFi devices? You can find an active one (and apparently only one) on Yahoo at http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/omnifi/.
Apparently, OmniFi closed down their own user forum a few months ago. After googling like crazy, I couldn't find another OmniFi forum anywhere. Finally, I noticed a post in the woot forum that linked to the Yahoo group. Is it me, or is Google starting to suck a little bit?
Sure, you could read a review of the book Flanimals before you buy it. But wouldn't you rather watch a video description of the book instead? No? What if the video was a monologue by the book's author, Ricky Gervais, star of The Office on the BBC? Yes! Now we're talking.
Head to the product page for this book and click on the link to watch Amazon's exclusive video clip. I can't describe it in any other way than pure genius.
Twinoo, a cool little DHTML game, is billed as the first Mono MultiPlayer Game, that is, a game that you play against yourself. It pits your right brain versus your left brain, with subjective versus analytical thought. Twinoo is surprisingly addictive, but it actually gives me a headache!
The manual for my Audi A4 says that I should use 0w30 oil, and when that isn't available, use 5w30. Naturally, I can never find 0w30 anywhere. In an effort to understand the advantages and disadvantage of both oils, I did some googling. Along the way, I found a nice, plain-english site describing everything practical you need to know about motor oil. Check it out at http://www.nordicgroup.us/oil.htm.
Wow, thinking about it now, I haven't crawled under a car to change the oil myself in almost a decade.
I made some slight modifications to Jason Silver's smilefie plugin to support emoticons in writebacks. ozean asked me to post my mods, so here they are.
You can get the modified smilefie by clicking here. (I left credit to Jason, as my mods aren't really that significant.)
I've hacked on Rael's writeback plugin too much to provide a download at this point. I promise that I'll clean it up and provide it some day. In the mean time, to use the new smilefie plugin with writeback, open writeback in your favorite text editor, look for the function sub story, and add this line directly after the line that reads my $writeback = &$blosxom::template...
if ($blosxom::plugins{smilefie} ) {$param{comment} = &smilefie::smilefie_this($param{comment})};
The whole code block should look like this:
if ( $line =~ /^-----$/ ) {
my $writeback = &$blosxom::template($path,'writeback',$blosxom::flavour)
|| '<p>... BUNCHA HTML IN HERE...</p>';
if ($blosxom::plugins{smilefie} ) {$param{comment} = &smilefie::smilefie_this($param{comment})};
$writeback =~ s/\$writeback::(\w+)/$param{$1}/ge;
$writebacks .= $writeback;
$count++;
}
That's all there is to it. Note that I force smilefie to run 'late' and writeback to run 'early' by renaming the plugin files to 99smilefie and 00writeback.
Good luck!
I've been looking for a decent RSS reader to use either on my PalmOS Zodiac or on my phone, but none of the apps out there right now seem to be ready for prime time. Since I can access the internet from anywhere on my Zodiac via bluetooth or WiFi [idlesandiskwifi, sandiskwifisd], all I want is a basic reader that can grab my latest feeds and display them in clear text. It would be a real plus if it could sync with my list of feeds on bloglines [bloglinesplummer, bloglines, bloglinesfeedfixed].
Well lo and behold, bloglines has a mobile view of their site! All I need to do is fire up http://bloglines.com/mobile in my PalmOS browser, and I've got all my feeds, ready to read in a mobile-viewable format. Perfect!
When the iPod shuffle was released this year, lots of people complained about the lack of a display on the unit. The head of Creative even called it technology that is five generations old. But my brother-in-law Robert pointed out something almost genius about the device that I didn't realize: you don't need to look at it to operate it. The controls are so simple that you can run the thing without ever removing it from your pocket.
I think this is a big deal for those of us adding mp3 players to our cars. As someone who's hacked up iPod inputs for my cars, I can tell you that operating a standard iPod in a moving vehicle can be a bit dangerous at times because you must look at the display to use it. The iPod shuffle is a great, safer alternative here.
Of course, I'm still going to install my OmniFi DMP1, but hey, that's a geek tax that I must pay.
It seems so obvious to build with current tech that I absolutely knew somebody would make one. And they did!
Siemens is releasing a real live bluetooth Com Badge that you can clip to your jacket pocket. Yep, voice commands and everything. Sign me up. Now.
This was linked from all over the blogosphere, but I caught it on Gizmodo.
Continued from musicstorage [musicstorage4, musicstorage6, musicstorage1, musicstorage2, musicstorage-solved3, musicstorage3, musicstorage-solved1, musicstorage8, musicstorage-solved2, musicstorage5, musicstorage7]
Taking a different view on file format and codec support than what I've found on the client side, here is the software that I've used or am aware of on the server side.
| Communication | WinXP Server | Linux Server | Lossy | Lossless |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Rendezvous | iTunes | daapd or mt-daapd | MP3, AAC | Apple Lossless, WAV, AIFF |
| SMB | Directory Share | Samba | All Formats | All Formats |
| UPnP | SimpleCenter or Windows Media Connect | TwonkyVision | MP3, WMA9 | WMA9 (also WAV, LPCM on TwonkyVision) |
| HTTP | SlimServer | SlimServer | MP3, WMA9, AAC, Ogg Vorbis, DTS | WMA9, WAV, FLAC, Apple Lossless, PCM |
Note 1: There are many other solutions for HTTP streaming, such as Icecast and Shoutcast.
Note 2: RokuLabs has a nice breakdown of different servers on their web site.
Like the client side, there is universal support for MP3. And again like the client side, everyone but Apple supports lossless WMA9. However, all servers seems to support WAV, which is interesting.
If I want to rip my music to a lossless format on a Digital Audio Storage server, there appears to be only two solutions to support playback on all possible clients:
the digital audio on-the-fly, either from WMA9 to Apple Lossless and MP3, or Apple Lossless to WMA9 and MP3Noting the storage requirements for 350 CDs, there shouldn't be an issue with storing a duplicate copy of my music in MP3 (other than automating the maintenance of two copies). However, it seems really inefficient to store two lossless copies.
Next step: I need to figure out which server software would be the easiest to configure for transcoding. mt-daapd looks very promising… 
Justin Clark at O'Reilly blogged today about a cool little PowerPC-based Linux box called KuroBox. It's being pitched as a DIY NAS device, but with a price of $160 for a 200MHz CPU, this could be a neat platform for a Whole House Music Storage device.
I use the Xbox HDTV AV Kit to connect my Xbox to my HDTV. With it, you can run any Xbox game at its max resolution, whether it is 480i, 480p, 720p, or 1080i.
The Peter Molyneux game Fable runs in 480p. But every time I tried to run the game, the graphics would be completely corrupted, rendering the game unplayable. I've never seen this in any other Xbox game.
Turns out, the game can't deal with the Xbox dashboard when it runs in 480i (say, when you use Xbox Live ). The solution? You can force the dashboard to run in 480p. The dashboard looks so much better that way anyway. But I could've sworn older dashboard versions would run at the highest supported resolution. Or was that just on dev kits?
BTW, I'm not sure I would recommend this game at full price, since Fable is a bit… clunky. But at twenty-something dollars, it's worth considering, just to see the results of a legendary PC game designer's first attempt at a console game.
Continued from musicstorage [musicstorage4, musicstorage6, musicstorage1, musicstorage2, musicstorage-solved3, musicstorage3, musicstorage-solved1, musicstorage8, musicstorage-solved2, musicstorage5, musicstorage7]
To understand which file formats (actually codecs ) a Whole House Music Storage system would need to support, I've compiled a list of music-playing clients that I own or plan to use, the most common file formats they claim to support natively as of today, and how they access digital audio data. Many support plug-ins to add additional file format support, and many have announced future support for other formats, but for now I've decided not to take that in to consideration.
| Client | Lossy | Lossless | Sync / Stream | Communication |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| iTunes for Windows | MP3, AAC | Apple Lossless, WAV, AIFF | Stream | Apple Rendezvous, HTTP |
| Windows Media Player 10 | MP3, WMA9 | WMA9, WAV | Stream | HTTP, SMB |
| OmniFi DMS1 | MP3, WMA9 | WMA9 | Stream | UPnP |
| OmniFi DMP1 | MP3, WMA9 | WMA9 | Sync | USB, WiFi |
| Roku PhotoBridge HD (HD1000) | MP3, AAC | WAV, AIFF | Stream | HTTP, Windows Media Connect (UPnP AV), SMB |
| Roku SoundBridge | MP3, WMA9, AAC | WMA9, AIFF, WAV | Stream | Apple Rendezvous, HTTP, Windows Media Connect (UPnP AV), SMB |
| Apple iPod | MP3, AAC | Apple Lossless | Sync | USB, FireWire |
| Media Center Extender For Xbox | MP3, WMA9 | WMA9, WAV | Stream | UPnP AV, Windows Media Center Servers only? |
| Linux mplayer | MP3, WMA9, AAC, Ogg Vorbis | WMA9, WAV, AIFF, FLAC | Stream | HTTP, SMB |
| Tapwave Music Player | MP3 | N/A | Sync | USB |
| SlimDevices SqueezeBox | MP3, WMA9, AAC, Ogg Vorbis, DTS | WMA9, WAV, FLAC, Apple Lossless, PCM | Stream | HTTP |
In addition to 100% support of MP3, it is very interesting to note the near universal support of Windows Media Audio, except for Apple products. It's also interesting to note the total mish-mash of communication methods used by all of the different clients. A Whole House Music Storage system will need to communicate in everything but the binary language of moisture evaporators.
continued from musicstorage [musicstorage4, musicstorage6, musicstorage1, musicstorage2, musicstorage-solved3, musicstorage3, musicstorage-solved1, musicstorage8, musicstorage-solved2, musicstorage5, musicstorage7]
To support my original goals for a Whole-House Music Storage system, it looks like I'll need to support two methods to access my music: streaming and syncing.
Music players that are connected to a LAN or the intarnets can stream digital audio directly from a storage location. Streaming bandwidth would range from the >1Mb/s LAN/WiFi speed to <128Kb upstream DSL/Cable Modem speed. Over the LAN, digital audio can be streamed uncompressed or via lossless-compression, but via upstream internet, lossy-compression is required.
Portable music players and other devices that are not always connected to the net (such as in-car players and cel phones and PDAs with SD Cards) would need to sync digital audio from the storage location to be played later offline. Today, most of these devices have limited storage capacities which requires the use of lossy-compression. (In the near future, this will not be necessary). Many players use a variety of proprietary compression formats, but fortunately, nearly all offline devices support the mp3 lossy-compression format.
Continued from musicstorage [musicstorage4, musicstorage6, musicstorage1, musicstorage2, musicstorage-solved3, musicstorage3, musicstorage-solved1, musicstorage8, musicstorage-solved2, musicstorage5, musicstorage7]
The cheapest and most efficient way to acquire and store uncompressed digital audio is to buy it on a CD… and leave it there. For each CD you buy, you are basically buying a 650MB (give or take) disk preloaded with digital audio, so you end up with an unlimited amount of non-volatile digital audio storage. Get it?
If I want to copy all of my digital audio from CDs to, say, a big hard drive, how much space will I need? I'll assume each CD averages 650MB of digital audio, so 350 CDs contain about 288GB of data. If I use a lossless-compression file format for storage, and I assume that I achieve an average compression rate of 2:1, then I could compress 350 CD's worth of data down to 114GB, and still maintain bit-perfect audio quality.
For comparison, the import settings I'm using in iTunes (256Kb/s minimum VBR mp3, lossy-compression) achieves about a 7:1 compression ratio. That setting requires about 42GB of storage to hold 350 CD's worth of digital audio data.
Continued from musicstorage [musicstorage4, musicstorage6, musicstorage1, musicstorage2, musicstorage-solved3, musicstorage3, musicstorage-solved1, musicstorage8, musicstorage-solved2, musicstorage5, musicstorage7]
In the days of 33.6KB dial-up and 20GB hard drives on personal computers, the mp3 lossy-compression music format solved a problem: how to store and transmit a reasonable amount of digital audio and still preserve an acceptable level of sound quality. The use of lossy-compression is a trade-off: audio quality is sacrificed for the sake of smaller data size. Today, this data size problem still exists on portable music players that have limited capacities, such as 512MB flash players and the 4GB iPod mini.
However, with today's ubiquitous broadband access and hard drives exceeding 200GB, we've reached an interesting milestone on PCs: there is now no need to use lossy-compression for music on a PC. That means that there is no need to sacrifice sound quality to store and listen to music on a PC. To take this further (thinking along the lines of Moore's Law), by this time next year or so, there will be no need for lossy-compression on portable audio devices either. Every music-playing device will have plenty of capacity to store lots of digital audio that is either uncompressed or stored in a lossless-compression format (a format that preserves the original digital audio perfectly bit-for-bit). Excellent!
Unfortunately, there is an issue: there are several uncompressed and lossless-compression file formats, and none are as universally supported as lossy mp3. So if you want to store your music collection in a bit-perfect format, and use it on a variety of playback devices, what file format should you use? I'll document my thoughts as I investigate the options.
First in a series of musicstorage [musicstorage4, musicstorage6, musicstorage1, musicstorage2, musicstorage-solved3, musicstorage3, musicstorage-solved1, musicstorage8, musicstorage-solved2, musicstorage5, musicstorage7] entries.
I have a problem that I think exists in many households today. I own about 350 music CDs, and I want to be able to access that music any time I want from anywhere in the house, on a portable device, in the car, and remotely via the internet.
However, sound quality is of the utmost importance to me. Wherever possible, I want the music to be perfect bit-for-bit copies of the music originally on the CD. I will not settle for lossy-compression (read: mp3) when I don't have to. I will also not settle for any copy restrictions, such as those found on Napster and the iTunes Music Store.
Note #1: I do not plan to use SACD, DVD-Audio, or multi-channel audio sources in this scheme. I'm fine with using those solely in a tuned listening environment… for now.
Note #2: I rarely buy music online. Paying $0.99 per song for compressed music with dubious sound quality and restricted copying simply doesn't make sense to me.
So here's what I want:
I am going to find or create a solution to the above requirements. Stay tuned.
On Wednesday, the PS2/GameCube game Alien Hominid deservedly won three awards at the Independent Games Festival at GDC. Alien Hominid is a tribute to classic side-scrolling shooters like the type you'd see back on the NES and particularly the PC Engine. But its unique hand-drawn comic-book art style and genuinely ass-kickin' weapons and explosions give it an excellent fresh take on the shooter genre. Hard to believe it was originally a web-based flash game.
Alien Hominid is the first game in years to give me a sore case of joystick thumb. A must-play!
I was fortunate enough to see the legendary game designer and screenwriter Hal Barwood give a talk at this year's GDC. During his talk, he mentioned a game he did a few years ago called RTX Red Rock. That one slipped under my radar at the time, so I decided to look for it today. Turns out that you can buy it for less than 10 bucks at Amazon (actually Toys R Us), or you can buy a bundle of the PS2 game, CD soundtrack, and strategy guide directly from LucasArts for $9.95. Nice price for a Hal Barwood game, eh?
I know, I'm like a year and a half late, but I finally started playing Crimson Skies on the Xbox. This game is fantastic, with a really intuitive flight model and control scheme. The production value is top notch (well, for late 2003), with excellent explosions, a respectable storyline, cut scenes that are worth watching, and best of all, nicely mixed 5.1 surround sound.
To top it off, Crimson Skies is a real blast to play on Xbox Live. I haven't had this much fun in an online dogfight since I played Red Baron back on the Sierra Network Online / INN. And that was over a decade ago!
I only wish it supported HD resolutions beyond 480p.
If you're like me and missed this game when it first came out, grab it now with the under $20 price tag, and meet me online!
This evening I stopped by my local liquor store to purchase a sophisticated adult beverage. When I placed my bottle on the counter to pay, the cashier looked at me and said,
Alright, finally! Somebody I don't need to ask for an ID!
Uh, thanks, I guess.
Apparently he'd been getting a bunch of teenagers with fake ID's and such all night. At the time, I figured either my hair follicle deficit or the gray fur on my chin was the clue that I was decades past needing an ID. But on my way home, I realized what the true giveaway must have been:
Squidge just posted a new beta of FrodoZ, the Commodore 64 emulator for the Tapwave Zodiac. The coolest new feature in this version? Sound! It felt great today to hear the classic intro theme to M.U.L.E., even if the song was playing a tad… slow.
FrodoZ is a nice piece of work - I can't wait to see some future revs.
Fred Kaplan at Slate has written a well-informed article about the picture quality on Warner Bros. recent DVD releases. He calls WB the new Criterion, as they seem to be going out of their way to re-release classic films with the best scanning and bit-rate possible. I love seeing popular media finally understanding that picture quality matters.
As someone who owns the first DVD release of Casablanca as well as Warner's new special edition, I can vouch that the picture quality of the new version is indeed absolutely stunning.
