Laserdisc Collecting

[potetoboy]

cool stuff terry, that Ghost In The Shell + Perfect Blue set look awesome!

never had Laserdisc player at our house growing up, but always wanted one, i used to love how they look like giant CD's. anyway, i picked up an "industrial grade" Sony LD player really cheap a few years ago, can't remember the model # but it's huge, gray, and has the auto-flip mechanism so i'm pretty happy with it. I mainly use it to watch old/obscure anime and 80's/90's movies that never made it to DVD for whatever reason. I do have the US Vampire Hunter D LD, and recently picked up the Dragon's Heaven LD which I'm pretty stoked on...

 

[MattBlah]

Some great discs there, Terry. I have that ED2 and Re-Animator.

For Christmas this year my partner got me a Japanese copy of The Protector....



Far from Jackie's best film, but this is a great release. The cover is beautiful and apparently it is the longest cut of the film ever released. Obviously this one wasn't cheap.

Also another great release in my collection is this Cannibal Ferox, that comes with the soundtrack on vinyl and a sick bag!

 

[NeoSneth]

I'm a little jelly of that Ghost in the Shell. It's one of the few LD's I'm still in the market for. I'll probably settle for the US release.

I did score a mint Perfect Blue boxset on ebay about a year ago. It was around $30 if i recall. ...such a steal, and full of goodies. Good stuff can still be had on ebay.

I also forgot that I kept a few old IMAX movies on LD as well.





Here's the ones I keep in my workshop. Don't give me grief about the horizontally stacked LD's. I know it's bad for them, but I'm out of space here. Most of those I'm trying to give away.

 

[T.A.P.]

Is it just the packaging that makes Perfect Blue's LD special?

 

[Arcademan]

While I don't collect LDs, I do of course have some of the Cardcaptor Sakura series in LD. Alas...not all of them as I'm missing a few but the artwork and goodies are a sight to behold.

 

[Black IcE]

I have a bit of a LD collection. Its nothing too impressive as it is mostly stuff I have found locally at thrift stores. My player is a Sony commercial unit that I got from my work. Eventually I would like to get a few more but it isn't fore front in my collecting goals right now.

 

[NeoSneth]

Is it just the packaging that makes Perfect Blue's LD special?

There's a bunch of extras in there and a movie cell. It's kinda hard to fit it all in a single image. LD boxsets often had some amazing swag in them. The lithographs in the Disney sets are top notch.

 

[ChopstickSamurai]

I don't have many LDs left, but I need to find time to snap a few pics of my End of Evangelion box set this weekend for you guys. It's wicked cool with all the extras.

 

[MattBlah]

That Perfect Blue special edition looks great, but I'm guessing it's in Japanese with no subs? Still, be great to own even if you can't really watch it.

 

[neo_X7]

Reason to collect LD's

1) A lot of 70's, 80's, and 90's anime that has not been properly released on a updated format.
2) Horror that has not been properly released on a updated format.
3) Concert and music videos that has not been properly released on a updated format.

I really wish that they would do limited release runs for newer movies like they did for vinyl when CD's where big for shits and giggles.

 

[PublicEnemy]

Anime and horror movies are worth to own on LD with the extras included and better artwork.

 

[Xavier]

B. To get AC3 from a LD you have to have one of three things: 1. A player with an optical out, 2. An old receiver with an RF demodulator built in. 3. An RF demodulator (like a Yamaha APD-1). If not, you get stereo and some Pro Logic encoding.

1. There's always DTS, movies are few and far between and were pricey. Most any newer amp could play it out of the box though. Think I heard something about it being uncompressed versus dvd as well.
2. Pretty sure the optical out is for digital stereo audio and DTS not dolby digital AC3. It's a orange or black/grey single rca connector or rf/coaxial looking thing says AC3 over it.
3. Not sure I've seen any amps that's convert LD AC3 without a modulator.

I tried getting two modulators over the years one was a Onkyo and needed some kind of proprietary connector. Think the second was a Marantz and need an rca plug for each channel (in and out around 12 cables) and an amp that had inputs & outputs for each channel. I said screw it.
Anybody out there wanting this I suggest just getting the Yamaha adp-1 think it is.

I need to get rid of my laserdiscs, haven't touched them in many years with BR and Netflix now.
At least dvd's upscan really easily, PS3 does a decent job. Also all dvd players come with DD standard, that any amp can decode.
They cant take a scratch like a laserdisc can and don't look as cool though.

Also most all LD players will output Dolby Pro logic 5.1, maybe not some 1988 models & older. Main addition to AC3/DD is the the rear channels are discrete.

 

[MattBlah]

I received some new additions to the collection today. I usually go for older (70s/80s) horror, but this seller had some Jackie and Bruce Lee discs I just couldn't resist.

 

[GohanX]

I don't even have a LD player and I want that Enter the Dragon.

 

[neo_mao]

If I could be any kind of disc it would be a laser disc

 

[MattBlah]

I don't even have a LD player and I want that Enter the Dragon.

Looking forward to having a Bruce Lee laserdisc evening some time soon. I'm not sure what film I'm getting with The Chinese Connection, bloody American distributors swapping and changing all the titles. I could google it but that's no fun.

 

[Tripredacus]

I have a LD player that I bought "As is" from Ebay for $10... and it worked fine. I only have a couple of discs but I found my main complaint about them is that they do not stop at the end. I can understand they act more like a record, where you have to flip it over when a side is done. But for mine, when it gets to the end of a side, it just starts over from the beginning again. Is that normal?

 

[MattBlah]

I have a LD player that I bought "As is" from Ebay for $10... and it worked fine. I only have a couple of discs but I found my main complaint about them is that they do not stop at the end. I can understand they act more like a record, where you have to flip it over when a side is done. But for mine, when it gets to the end of a side, it just starts over from the beginning again. Is that normal?

I suppose it depends on the player, but mine doesn't do that. When it gets to the end of side A it will flip to B but then at the end of B it stops.

 

[SignOfGoob]

I'm a huge fan of LD. The Internet has made it possible to track down titles I never really seriously thought I would own, and that's cool.

Sadly, it also brings the dumpster diving, wannabe capitalist trailer trash with the cries of "worth" and "value" and "rare", stinking up eBay and LDDB.com with thier stupid LD selfies and infinite feedback loops of gouging ignorance. Ultimately though, I can't see these jerks actually managing to ruin LD like they ruined video games because I just can't see LD ever being worth anything again. It's a buyers market, probably forever, so that's cool.

 

[SignOfGoob]

Regarding stopping at the end of a side: I've never had a player made before 1987, so maybe that was normal during the Discovision days when the discs often said "Side 1 End" or whatever. Its never been the case with any player I've owned in the last 20+years. It should just stop like a CD player or repeat, if repeat is on.

 

[NeoSneth]

what's interesting is this thread shows more interest in LD than the laserdisc subreddit and most of the internet.

I also kinda steer clear of LDDB. They have a rather skewed view of laserdiscs. It's a very Vinyl like following for them.
I bought some of the recommended video hardware based off feedback on LDDB, but I didn't realize the devices were the size of 1990 computers. I just tossed that junk in the trash as it had little value and weighed a ton. I wasn't trying to build a rack of hardware to get slightly better PQ.

 

[MattBlah]

I find LDDB useful to keep track of my collection and to check different releases and information. My collection is mostly boxed up at the moment so sometimes it's hard to remember exactly what releases I have, LDDB makes it easy to check.

Regarding the prices, it seems like in the US you have loads of people dumping collections (like VHS) meaning you can pick up all sorts of films for pretty much nothing. We don't really have that over here in the UK because Laserdisc barely took off over here. You can still pick up a lot of discs pretty cheaply though, but it's not quite the same as what you seem to find over where most of you are. Also, unfortunately for me, horror films have mostly held their value and the most sought after ones don't come cheap.

If anyone's interested in my collection you can have a look here... http://www.lddb.com/collection.php?action=list&user=mattblah

 

[SignOfGoob]

what's interesting is this thread shows more interest in LD than the laserdisc subreddit and most of the internet.

I also kinda steer clear of LDDB. They have a rather skewed view of laserdiscs. It's a very Vinyl like following for them.
I bought some of the recommended video hardware based off feedback on LDDB, but I didn't realize the devices were the size of 1990 computers. I just tossed that junk in the trash as it had little value and weighed a ton. I wasn't trying to build a rack of hardware to get slightly better PQ.

Wow. You must HATE Neo Geo then.

 

[GohanX]

what's interesting is this thread shows more interest in LD than the laserdisc subreddit and most of the internet.

I also kinda steer clear of LDDB. They have a rather skewed view of laserdiscs. It's a very Vinyl like following for them.
I bought some of the recommended video hardware based off feedback on LDDB, but I didn't realize the devices were the size of 1990 computers. I just tossed that junk in the trash as it had little value and weighed a ton. I wasn't trying to build a rack of hardware to get slightly better PQ.

You bring up an interesting point. The massive size of some LD players has been a turnoff to me. Are there any recommended players with a smaller footprint?

 

[Neo Ash]

You bring up an interesting point. The massive size of some LD players has been a turnoff to me. Are there any recommended players with a smaller footprint?

Not really. There were some "smaller" players. However, there's just no getting around the size of the disc.