At the moment (and until high-definition DVDs come along), all DVDs are made with just 480 horizontal lines per frame, just like standard-television broadcasts. If the digital master is made from a high-definition scanning or a 2K or 4K scan, it has to be remastered at 480 lines (a process called "down-rezing," to indicate a reduction of resolution) before it can be transferred to DVD. Once high-definition DVDs start coming out (later this year), you will be able to see HD-scanned DVDs as they were meant to look (at least if you have a high-definition television set). A Japanese lab has designed a TV monitor that displays 4,000 lines, but it will be many years before such a product can be manufactured and priced for even the high end of the mass market. Still, the higher the resolution (i.e., the higher number of lines) of the original source, the better the disc will look even if it's ultimately processed at a lower resolution. An analogy: A photograph shot by a Nikon looks better than one taken by a Kodak disposable camera, even if they are printed on cheap paper in a mass-circulation magazine.