Microsoft has been forced to acknowledge that a substantial number of PCs running the new version of its Windows operating system will not be able to play high-quality DVDs. The Vista system will be available to consumers at the end of the month. However, in an interview with The Times, one of its chief architects said that because of anti-piracy protection granted to the Hollywood studios, Vista would not play HD-DVD and Blu-ray Discs on certain PCs.
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Member since:2005-07-06
Your attempt to lump this all on to the content provider is laughable in the extreme, but represents the perfect party line that Microsoft is taking ;-). The fact of the matter is that when a content provider specifies something, it is Vista which will block the user from watching or listening to something on their computer.
At the request of the application, not outside of it. That's the key point. If the application developer is using content that requires no protections, the media plays unprotected, i.e., if you have HD content that is unprotected for whatever reason, Vista will happily play it without adding protections.
For protected content, Vista does not decide what actions to take for that content, the ISV does based on the requirerments they must offer for the particular media they support. In the case of HD-DVD/BluRay, if either consortium or AACS demands that ISVs only output over protected paths, ISVs must implement that or break their agreements with the consortiums. Vista follows what the app developer tells it. It does not act on its own. Simple facts.
S/PDIF has enough for two channels of PCM and compressed multichannel. For so called premium content, it could easily be downmixed for those who've spent good money on a nice sound system as well as through HDMI, but it won't be.
It is downmixed (or a DD/DTS track is included for compatibility). If you're satisfied w/ compressed, lossy audio, fine, you have that choice. Again, S/PDIF is not disabled. Many buying HD formats will choose uncompressed/losslessly compressed, multichannel tracks.
Member since:
2005-07-06
If you check the link I provided in the post above yours, you'll find that article to to be false. Output protections are application controlled
Your attempt to lump this all on to the content provider is laughable in the extreme, but represents the perfect party line that Microsoft is taking ;-). The fact of the matter is that when a content provider specifies something, it is Vista which will block the user from watching or listening to something on their computer.
The article is not false, it's just that you simply do not understand it, or want to paint over what it actually means.
From your link:
All these choices are up to the PLAYBACK APPLICATION. They're NOT built into the OS. All the OS does is to provide services to the playback application that it can use to make decisions.
Absolutely false. The playback application, via Vista, will make a decision to restrict playback of content on the user's own computer and Vista will jump and carry out that order.
It doesn't get around the fact that the capability for stopping that is in the OS. It's that simple, and it's a pretty feeble response.
S/PDIF would not be disabled because it is necessary for output of PCM or DD/DTS.
S/PDIF has enough for two channels of PCM and compressed multichannel. For so called premium content, it could easily be downmixed for those who've spent good money on a nice sound system as well as through HDMI, but it won't be.
The higher quality lossless formats (TrueHD, et al.)
Whether they make a difference to anyone but audiophiles is yet to be tested.
Edited 2007-01-09 23:08