PowerDVD
From DigiWiki
PowerDVD is a multimedia player specialising in software based DVD playback and, new in the Ultra edition of PowerDVD, the ability to play Blu-ray discs (and HD DVD discs in PowerDVD Ultra 7.x).
Editions
PowerDVD 8 comes in three editions: Standard, Deluxe and Ultra. The differences between the three editions are listed below, with the features that are new to PowerDVD 8 (as compared to PowerDVD 7) highlighted in bold:
These features are new to all versions of PowerDVD:
- MPEG-2 HD support
- TrueTheater™ Lighting (replaces CLEV)
- TrueTheater™ Stretch (replaces (CLPV)
- TrueTheater Surround (replaces CLMEI-2)
- HDMI support
- Movie Remix
- Movie Collection Manager
The Deluxe version adds the following to the Standard version:
- MPEG-4 AVC (H.264) support
- DVD-Audio support
- DivX Pro support
- Dolby Pro Logic IIx support
- Dolby Virtual Speaker support
- Dolby Headphone support
- Dolby Digital EX (7.1 ch) decoding
- MPL decoding
- DTS 96/24 Decoding
- AAC decoding
- UPnP File Sharing
- CPRM/VCPS support
The Ultra version then adds the following on top of the features of the Deluxe version:
- Blu-ray disc support
- AVCHD support
- SMPTE VC-1 support
- SPDIF Mixing
- Dolby TrueHD (7.1-channel) decoding
- Dolby Digital Plus (5.1-channel) decoding
- DTS-HD (7.1-channel) decoding
- DTS-ES Matrix and DTS-ES Discrete; DTS Neo:6
PowerDVD 8 HD DVD Controversy
PowerDVD 7 Ultra featured full HD DVD playback. PowerDVD 8 Ultra, released after Toshiba announced the withdraw of support for HD DVD, removed the legacy HD DVD playback function in the release version. Previous version 8 beta versions all featured HD DVD playback.
It was later discovered that the retail version of PowerDVD Ultra 8 could indeed be re-enabled for HD DVD playback, using some files from the beta versions and the 7.x version.
