The main problem that this card addresses
You can't bitstream the HD sound from your PC to your receiver. PCM is limited to 48kHz/16 bit for copy protection reasons and it can't bitstream DTS HD, Dolby Digital Plus or Dolby TrueHD

Also when you decode in your PC to PCM it outputs to whatever speaker layout is defined in Windows. If you want to apply EX decoding or whatever to it you can't. If you were bitstreaming it then you don't have this problem

The card is PCI Express unlike the Xonar Slim which is PCI. TMT/Xonar still has some issues e.g it still downsamples PCM audio even though it is a protected path, it doesn't bitstream DD+ (very rare anyway) but at least it is some competition

I thought Jurassic Park only had a half bitrate version (768kbps) on DVD which is less than the LD. I own the Star Wars Trilogy on LD (three copies), the 1995 version which is the theatrical version is surrounded encoded but is a PCM stereo track. The 1997 special editions are Dolby Digital encoded but Greedo shoots first!

The Xonar card and Arcsoft TMT are PAVP compliant, this means that the need to downsample to 48kHz/16 bit is no required.

Hopefully they'll use the spectrum left spare after the analog transmitters are turned off for some HD channels. Although if there is money to be made selling it off you can see the UK government flogging it to the highest bidder

It does offer bitstream output over HDMI which some people prefer to get it done in the AVR, with the PS3 can only get decoded output. Hopefully it is near silent which is an advantage and the PS3 doesn't fit in with my kit (they are all seperates)

The Ultimate Matrix DVD was 10 DVDs
1 for each film with a revisitied disc
The Animatrix
The Burly Man Chronicles
The Roots of the Matrix
The Zion Archive
24 page booklet

The HD DVD edition was 5 discs
The films were combos with the film in HD DVD on one side and the
other was the Revisited disc in DVD
2 double sided DVDs labelled The Matrix Experience which are The
Animatrix and The Roots of the Matrix on one disc and The Burly Man
Chronicles, The Zion Archive on the other (exact same footage as the
DVD)
no booklet

It looks like the Blu-Ray discs for the movies is combined with the
revisited footage
The Animatrix in 1080p on Blu-Ray
Some if not all of the following on a single Blu-Ray disc (The Roots
of the Matrix, The Burly Man Chronicles, The Zion Archive) and
something on two normal DVDs (digital download disc and maybe some
part of the matrix experience?)
Booklet (the artwork looks the same as the included with the DVD set)

It is strange that Torchwood was in HD but Doctor Who isn't. Hopefully Formula 1 will be which BBC have from next year. I can't say that I watch much on BBC except Top Gear

PS3 v BDP-S350

Hopefully the S350 is quieter, has a decent remote and allows bitstream output. For me the styling is hugely important, the player is a seperate and stackable and would fit into my system

Since the spec is already written in stone then Blu-Ray players can't take advantage of a higher bitrate. All you can get is a much longer playing time, at the highest bitrate you can get at least 14 hours (the extended Lord of the Rings trilogy on one disc). It would be cheaper and easier to just use multiple discs although I can see a possible needs for triple or even quad layer, 16 layers is just to proove a technology. Also burning a 400GB disc at x4 will take 12 hours!!!

A higher bitrate would need a new BluRay spec e.g Blu-Ray 2 and this could be used with new codecs, lossless video, higher resolutions, 3D and anything else they can think of.

I guess that they are leaving the £10 per month charge in place if you want HD over SD. They used to have this charge for the Sky+ service which was eventually dropped, when they drop it for Sky HD then the service might become attractive (the number of HD channels is still poor)