Unfortunately there are no consumer Blu-ray DVD recorders at the present. The only way for consumers to record Blu-ray DVDs is to get a Blu-Ray DVD burner which is designed to work with a computer. There are HD DVRs (Digital Video Recorders), the TiVO Series 3 stand-alone units, and units which you can lease or purchase from your cable or satellite company.
The main concern is digital rights management, the buzz phrase for “Hollywood doesn’t want consumers to have the capabilities to make collections of their own videos unless they pay us.” An HD DVR will only let you record a limited number of hours of recordings which you can timeshift and view at your leisure. If you had the capability to burn your own high quality high definition DVD recordings then you could build your own library which you could watch again and again. Worse yet from Hollywood’s point-of-view you could loan them to your friends or even sell them. The same concerns existed when home VCRs first came out in the 1970s, but is far more serious with digital recordings because there’s no degradation in quality with each transfer or duplication. With analog recordings each successive generation loses a bit in quality. But true digital duplication results in identical copies without any degradation.
Eventually there may be some kind of compromise where serial numbers and passwords will permit you to create high definition recordings for yourself, but they won’t play on other units.
If you have a source for high definition videos (ones you’ve recorded on a high def camcorder, high def animations you’ve made or downloaded on your computer, high def movies on your computer, etc.) there’s several shareware and commercial programs for burning Blu-ray DVDs.
The only way to record high def cable or satellite signals at the present is to make analog recordings of the standard resolution versions of the high definition programming. In some ways they are superior to ordinary recordings from a standard resolution source but they are not high definition recordings by any means.
Blu-ray players are now available under $300. They’ll play high definition Blu-ray DVDs, and also upconvert your existing standard definition DVDs. A handful of units will also play HD DVDs.
Prerecorded Blu-ray disks are about 30% more expensive than ordinary DVDs. In some cases the Blu-ray disks have additional special features to make them more appealing to the consumer. For example, the 1950s classic “The Day the Earth Stood Still” on Blu-ray includes “Interactive Theremin: Create Your Own Score” and “Gort Command!: Interactive Game” in addition to a handful of features which are also on the standard DVD.
The most important thing to remember when getting a Blu-ray player is while your current DVD collection will play at upconverted video quality, you still need to replace your existing DVDs with Blu-ray versions to get true HD resolution.
There are many cases where it really doesn’t make sense to pay a premium price for high def DVDs such as cartoons, talking heads, other low resolution source material. If something was originally recorded in NTSC format, 8 mm, etc. Blu-ray is not going to be significantly better looking than an ordinary DVD. A transfer must come from a high-resolution source (35 or 70 mm. film, high def video recording, etc.) to benefit from high def.
The good news is many television shows which were aired in standard definition were designed for high resolution and are coming out on Blu-ray.
The original 1960s “Star Trek” series was shot on 16 mm. In 2007 CBS/Viacom came out with remastered versions with enhanced digital special effects. The first season came out on double-sided DVDs – normal DVD on one side and HD DVD on the flip side. But by the time they were ready to release the second season HD DVD was dead. Unfortunately they made the corporate decision to release the second and third seasons only on DVD and have ignored Blu-ray for the time being. Certainly at some point in the future they will be released in Blu-ray, the only question is when. It’s likely the later “Star Trek” series will eventually be enhanced and released in Blu-ray. The only “Star Trek” series which was intended from the start for high definition was “Enterprise” so it will certainly look the best in high definition whenever Blu-Ray disks are released.
High definition Blu-ray DVDs are a relatively inmature technology. They’re still far more expensive than existing DVD players and disks and only offer incremental improvements in quality. Certainly in the future the cost of Blu-ray players will come down, the difference in price between Blu-ray and standard DVDs will decrease, the cost for blank Blu-ray media will come down, and maybe consumer Blu-ray recorders will become available.
Blu-Ray DVD players
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Star Trek remastered DVDs
Crutchfield has an excellent website with information about Blu-ray DVD players.
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