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"Fleet of the Strongest Women" is generally considered just an unaired/unbroadcasted episode. It's actually still part of the core Macross 7 franchise (usually bundled with the two main "Encore" episodes) and not Dynamite 7; see: http://macross.anime.net/wiki/Macross_7_Encore .

Right, it's during the scene where Hikaru chooses Misa over Minmay, instead of chasing after the later. Misa's DYRL vs. TV design is quite a bit more distinct than most other characters. Compare the last two Misa cels valkyrie13 posted to the first one posted; you should be able to discern a difference. As for the Max and Millia hanken, here's the douga for it (Mokman's already seen this):

Screenshots of the newly released version: You can see it has some banding issues at the bottom. There's also a small commentary by the capper at the end.

I watched that one live; it was rather exciting. As for the price, it may be high, but: - It's a 3-piece set - It's a huge close-up (see the CD for reference) - It's Minmay As long as it's Minmay, it'll fetch a high premium. What's interesting though is that the winner is the one who broke the seller's steep reserve of Y170,000. What's odd, though, is that the same seller had similar Hikaru and Misa 2-piece sets that were reserved at Y210,000 and Y160,000, respectively. Hikaru being worth more than Minmay is rather odd, but it's possible the seller wanted to move his final piece (Minmay), as the first two never met their reserved prices. What's scary is that the presumed main competitor won about $500, give or take (or maybe more), of assorted Macross TV cels an hour or so earlier that night (5 of the 7 cel/sketch auctions), so that gives you an insight into the amount of money some of these collectors have. As for the winner's collection, you can click on his feedback and check the most second most recent feedback for a sample (the most recent being this one). Browsing the feedback list, you can see he's primarily focused on Macross, but Yahoo! Japan has removed links to the older auctions. From what I've seen, this collector bids on fewer items (arguably on more exclusive, high-end items) and is willing to dish out, though he does lose a fair bit.

Context, and name of the song, courtesy of Random Curiosity: "The Macross Frontier website has updated with information about the Ranka Lee/Nakajima Megumi mini-live occurring this weekend at the Odaiba VenusFort. The website also now features a video showing Ranka’s moves while singing her debut song, Seikan Hikou."

The screenshots I posted were from the Quantum-Raws DVD-rip I mentioned, since I won't be able to get the DVDs themselves on hand for a while; so, I unfortunately can't really tell you about the extras. You'll have to ask TheLoneWolf for his opinion. Nonetheless, the gamma is set to 1.8 on my Mac. As for the DVD region lock issue, my drive firmware has been flashed to RPC-1 (region-free) with Region X used for switching. If your Mac has a Matshita drive, headway was made not too long ago for a fair number of them, so you may be in luck: http://forum.rpc1.org/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=43082 . (Dangard Ace, the left side is from the R2 discs, as the right side has some of the AnimEigo split-screen comparisons: http://www.animeigo.com/images/macross.t .)

I've just secured the 25th anniversary set for roughly $250 myself, but I probably won't be able to review it for a while. Nonetheless, Quantum-Raws did release some of the extras from the set including the combined episode 1 and 2 initial broadcast. While I'm uncertain if that extra itself was remastered, here are a few screenshots from the file alongside the official AnimEigo remastering images.

Really, I think the "thing" is just about as sharply defined as the official website image of it on the VF-171: http://www.macrossf.com/mechanic/mecha04.html Given that certain liberties are taken in the animation (you'll notice that Kathy's insignia usually never has the horizontal line), it's similiar enough.

Okay, let's try to put this to rest. With some image processing you can see that the teardrop is enclosed in the same rounded rhombus of the N.U.N.S. insignia:

I'll lend some help on the NUNS debate, with Kathy's arm for reference. You should be able to clearly see the uneven cut of the teardrop.

Try Wikipedia.

Judging from the replies here, it seems fairly common and fanbase complaints likely don't have much to do with it. A couple of other series that were retouched for DVD were Yomigaeru Sora - RESCUE WINGS - and The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya.

I'd use Nome; Big West/Victor is selling the CD single rather than just advertising it. Plus, a Google search for "Sheryl Nome" yields 17 times more hits than "Sheryl Norm."

On the CD single art it's Nome:

While we wait for episode 5 to air, here's an amazing fan art of the Pixie Squadron:

Anyone notice that Alto's damaged leg switches sides after he destroys the Vajra? He also becomes left-handed as well. Simple mirroring mistake for Alto's Valkyrie, though Klan-Klan is still (appropriately) on our right side.

Well, the translation tools that azrael has listed in the News Thread do a good enough job for small things like character summaries, in particular Nifty and Excite for ease of use. Google's own Language Tools isn't bad, either.

She's the Monster's pilot and a lieutenant, part of Ozma's Skull Squadron. She's also trained as a medic and doctor, with a proper medical license. The official Macross F website has been updated today, for everyone's information.

Yes, the first is the OST, and the second is the ending theme single. The following is the single for opening theme, Triangler: Amazon JP - Triangler

I think you just missed the subtle plugs that Pizza Hut does in that series. Read the paragraph before the comments at this post from Random Curiosity for a screenshot in the series and a link to a Pizza Hut Japan page that features Code Geass R2. Pizza Hut is simply playing both sides and getting the best of both worlds.

I'd check Nipponsei first, if you're going for the "you found it here first" angle. Of course, a different group might broadcast their rip on Tokyo Toshokan first; Nipponsei, however, I've known for a long time (before it evolved into the powerhouse it is now) and is pretty much tried and true for lossy rips.

Judging by Ranka's acting in her jingle, it should have been kept "nyan" - Japanese onomatopoeia for "meow." They probably had different translator working on it, who wasn't familiar with the onomatopoeia and tried to work the Chinese restaurant angle.

Besides, we really don't know much about Leon from the anime, yet. Other than his hairstyle, he seems to be extremely competent at his job.

Short of asking fansub encoders to either encode using a smaller resolution or different codec, there probably isn't a solution. You'll note that from Apple's recommendations a G4 is good enough for a 480p H.264, but once the resolution bumps up to 780p, only a G5 or higher is recommended. (Dio, sorry I didn't get back to you but it's the resolution bump that's causing the most problems rather than the 24 fps, since most things are encoded using at least 24 frames per second.) An alternative maybe Shinsen-Subs' releases since they've recently argued that the "HD" (780p) raws out there aren't true HD and are just upscaled encodes, so they may be releasing in lower resolutions. They've just released the broadcast version of episode 1 in XviD, 704x396. (I see Shouta made the same comment concerning the non-HD quality a couple pages back.)

MPEG-4 is simply a container like Matroska (mkv). What you're having problems with is most likely H.264 decoding (what AiA's release uses); unfortunately, a lot of guys with older computers are having the same problem. Afterall, you can read Apple's blurb on MP4: http://www.apple.com/quicktime/technologies/mpeg4/. And Apple's comments on H.264 decoding with further elaboration here: http://www.apple.com/quicktime/guide/hd/recommendations.html