Blu Ray High-Def Video - A Better Movie Night at Home

Have you ever visited a friend who had a home theater system and wondered how you could ever go home to your regular TV set up? Well you are not alone. Technological advances have really propelled home movie night into an entirely different experience. With large screens, high definition and surround sound who needs or wants to pay $15 for theater ticket, when you can have the same experience while relaxing on your couch with a big tub of popcorn that does not cost you $10!

With the economy in turmoil many people just do not have the budget for expensive nights out for the family and home entertainment is one of the best and most viable options to alleviate those budget blues. And, those who cannot afford the full home theater setup can still enjoy great movies in high-def with Blu Ray high definition video technology.

What is Blu Ray? Blu Ray is now the standard for high definition video and all new releases of movies and blockbusters are being released in this format. While for sometime Toshiba battled Blu Ray to become the standard with their HD-DVD format, that battle was lost and all studios, and major retailers of movies, such as Netflix, Blockbuster, Wal Mart and Best Buy are now using Blu Ray as the standard for high def.

The Blu Ray disk is named after the blue color laser that is used to create the disk. This format of disk is much hardier than DVD disks, and does not degrade or scratch as easily as DVD disks and so they last a lot longer. The crisp picture quality and high resolution provides for the best in high-def viewing with clear and vivid picture quality as well as high quality sound.

Blu Ray Players Blu Ray players come in many different models with various price tags. They have features far beyond that of DVD players. First, of course is the benefit of high-def, but besides that there is Bonus View and BD-Live, which many players come with.

Bonus View The Bonus View features plays back picture-in-picture content, which allows for a second video and audio stream.

BD-Live BD-live supports Internet-connected activities such as social networking and interactive gaming as long as there is an Ethernet connection to the player. This is also great for streaming movies directly to the player from video services like Netflix.

Another benefit is that DVD disks are compatible with and can be played on Blu Ray players, so your entire movie collection need not be replaced.