Foo - Blu-Ray Wins?

Yesterday Warner Bros who had been distributing both HD-DVD and Bu-Ray said they were going Blu-Ray exclusive starting in May. This means BR has Sony, WB, Fox, Disney & Lionsgate leaving HD-DVD only with Paramount/Dreamworks and Universal. The war could be over.

http://www.timewarner.com/corp/newsroom/pr/0,20812,1700383,00.html

interesting development... the industry can decide all it wants, but my hope is in the consumer...

for me, let's see:

VHS->DVD->Blu-Ray?

nope, i'm going digital storage in an open format... i'm not going to pay for the same movie in a new format all other again... this movement is similar to:

LP->cassette->CD

consumers have decided this issue - digital format wins...

also interesting is that while the movie industry is blowing out titles in the sub-US$10 range in DVD format, the recording industry still tries (in the face of declining sales) to gouge the consumer for rehashed collections of music in the US$10 and over range...

tks for the news update on the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray fight...

but i thought HD-DVD was a superior (backwards compatible) format?

I've been contending for awhile that blu-ray will win. I first thought HD would but i see no way now. Blu-Ray has the age in name recognition by virtue of the fact that it is a more distinguishable name and also by the fact that it was compatible with the PS3.

Blu ray also has the edge in capacity. I see no way that it won't win.

I really was pretty format neutral, but my son has a PS3 and I have been very pleased with its Blu-Ray and regular DVD capabilities with my 1080p display. I enjoy some of the games as well, AVSForum has 87 pages in the thread on this news since yesterday and the consensus is that HD-DVD will have a difficult time overcoming this.

For myself, it took me off the fence, I bought a 40Gb PS3 yesterday for $399 - $100 Sony credit + Spiderman3 and 5 addn Blu-Ray movies included.

As for streaming or downloads, I think it may come to that but copy protection is going to have to get better and we need alot more bandwidth since getting a HD movie plus a Lossless audio track takes a huge amount of space. Have you tried VOD on cable at all, its a mess and rarely works.

That depends a lot on the bandwidth of your local cable system......

We rarely have issues with VOD, and when we do, it's usually a matter of just having to stop and restart the movie.

Either way the consumer gets it up the azzzzzzzzzzz.

Like it was stated I did the LP>Tape>CD deal too and I'm not doing it with DVD's.
I wasn't going to do it with A-CD or DVD-A either.

Sometime they'll probably make it so I can't play new DVD's with my old player.
No worries. I'll do what they want.

I'll go out and purchase a cheap POS player of whatever format takes over from BigLots.
Why hell I might even go to Siu's favorite place to get one :) How bout it Siu, they got any Blue Ray players in those catalogs you get :lol:
Then I'll rent movies.

I'm done purchasing high dollar equipment when all they want to do is redesign it so that we have to purchase a new format again and again and again.

I'm done purchasing high dollar equipment when all they want to do is redesign it so that we have to purchase a new format again and again and again.

You're not going to buy it ever? Look, there's something to be said for waiting for prices to drop but completely ignoring a new technology because you are irritated that it costs you money is crazy. Its like saying..." i did the whole wheel>buggy>horse\buggy thing, there's no way i'm doing the horseless carriage thing."

From coverage on Blu-Ray declaring another victory:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/08/live-coverage-from-bda-press-conference/


Every major CE company in the BDA is also a major provider of HDTV Displays.
5 of the 10 top CE companies have released a Blu-ray player to market.
This is key as those CE companies rely on their penetration of display sales to help move component sales along


The PS3 Advantage.
Sony has shipped 1 million PS3 as of December 31, 2006.
Survey from 10k respondents, indicate that they plan to purchase Blu-ray movies to view on their PS3.
75% of the respondents plan to use their PS3 as a primary device for watching movies.
80% of 1 million equals an installed base of 800,000.
The same source estimates that PS3 will far outsell the XBOX360 HD DVD

and finally...

Blu-ray has 96% of the HD player market in Japan. "In terms of Japan, the game is already over there."

On a negative note, consumers are wary until a format is "officially" confirmed "dead", so we may still see a move to VOD purchases instead of a big increase in BR.


That depends a lot on the bandwidth of your local cable system......

We rarely have issues with VOD, and when we do, it's usually a matter of just having to stop and restart the movie.
OT, but Satellite has solved this and has already been broadcasting and delivering VOD content using the far more effiecent h.264 Video Compression (40% better than standard MPEG-4 and 70% better than MPEG-2). This is a huge reason to switch to Satellite if you are a lover of VOD.

A sample [tiny] picture comparison showing bitrate diferrences is below:

http://www.mainconcept.com/site/fileadmin/product-pics/H264/h264-comparison.jpg

Images top to bottom

MPEG-4, 1.5GB total file size
http://mac.sillydog.org/qt/pix/ss_mpeg4_improved.jpg

h.264, 900MB total movie file size

http://mac.sillydog.org/qt/pix/ss_h264.jpg

A recommentation:

Get satellite if you can and use VOD where possible, but where there are DVD Titles you absolutely must have, go Blu-Ray, balancing your purchases.

You're not going to buy it ever? Look, there's something to be said for waiting for prices to drop but completely ignoring a new technology because you are irritated that it costs you money is crazy. Its like saying..." i did the whole wheel>buggy>horse\buggy thing, there's no way i'm doing the horseless carriage thing."

No I'm not going to completely ignore it. They won't let you do that because they will make what works good right now obsolete.

That means you CAN'T ignore it. Like I said I'll simply purchase the cheap crap players from cheap crap stores and rent movies. I'm not buying anymore DVD'S. FOOOK dat.

I'm buying car and bike parts :D

I don't really buy movies, just a few like the LOTR set that I will watch more than once. For me though the entire theater experience is a waste of time, I pay $7 a ticket, sit in an uncomfortable seat, listening to subpar sound with people talking around me and the picture is not all that great. I much prefer my family room, my recliner, a glass of wine, my 61" HDTV and the sound cranked to my liking. So I almost never go see a movie, I rent and watch at home.

I don't really buy movies, just a few like the LOTR set that I will watch more than once. For me though the entire theater experience is a waste of time, I pay $7 a ticket, sit in an uncomfortable seat, listening to subpar sound with people talking around me and the picture is not all that great. I much prefer my family room, my recliner, a glass of wine, my 61" HDTV and the sound cranked to my liking. So I almost never go see a movie, I rent and watch at home.

+1

- c'mon over... i'll have popcorn and beers...

(we've saved lots of money and have enjoyed movie watching much more since getting an HDTV w/a notebook hookup running the VLC media player)

dammit, I got a HD DVD player! I haven't been paying attention too much but id does seem like there is a much better selection of BlueRay movies.
I should've got the the player that does both HD/BR... well, 7 free HD movies + HDMI cable+ HD player for $180 at Costco is still a good deal. I didn't really loose- plus it upsamples all my old DVD's so they look great...

I'll be on the lookout for a cheap BR player now...

Wow $180? Thats insane.

Walmart had the Toshiba HD-DVD player for $98 the Wed before Thanksgiving and they pretty much sold out in hours. At those prices you can't loose, but those days and all the give aways will be over if the HD-DVD format goes away. I am sure player prices will come down but it is unlikely the mfgs will take a loss on them.

CES will be interesting next week.

EDIT; New Line also announced http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/01/05/new-line-confirms-itll-follow-in-warners-blu-footsteps/

looks like LOTR will be Blu-Ray, I expect that HBO will follow since this seems to be a TW direction

Also CNET is recommending that people Do Not buy a HD-DVD player at this time http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-6463_7-6462511-1.html

I guess the (?) should come off the title

In some ways, BD (Blu-ray) is a better spec. It offers up to three layers, Java capability so someone can do some fairly decent coding for interactive stuff.

Drives have come down in price. $400-$500 will net you a decent BD rewritable drive. However, the media is still expensive compared to single density, or even double density DVD blanks. BD media (especially the 50 gig disks) need to get to $5-$10 for them to be economical.

Blu-Ray as a format seems decently designed. My biggest beef is the DRM and the fact that the BD makers/sellers automatically assume all customers are potential criminals.

Yeah, all technical aspects of Blu-Ray is superior to HD-DVD. They both can be backwards-compatible by putting in a normal DVD-layer on top. It's really the HD layers underneath that's the contention of the standards. The superior storage capacity of Blu-Ray will eventually win out due to the necessary storage-requirements of HD movies.

THe major stumbling block right now is the costs; Blu-ray is significantly more costly than HD-DVD. The best standard doesn't always win in the marketplace. A lot of times, it's the cheapest product (Beta vs. VHS).

I have been using Blu-Ray for about 6 months now and have been very pleased. Awesome image and sound quality plus my LBS (Local Blockbuster Store) carries a ton of titles. I play my BR's through a PS3 and I must say that the PS3 up-converts my standard def DVD's quite nicely.

couple snips from the cnet article-
i hope HD works out but now that I know it's from Microsoft, I wish I got BR! :P


Video quality of both Blu-ray and HD DVD discs varies with the film itself, but titles available on both formats generally have identical video quality.


Blu-ray enjoyed an early lead in studio support and still has more makers putting out players, but the players are more-expensive than HD DVD and the studio support has eroded to the point where the two formats are about equal.


With the support of Microsoft, the decision by studios Paramount and DreamWorks Animation to abandon Blu-ray, and the relatively affordable prices of its standalone players, the HD DVD format now looks just as strong as Blu-ray, and isn't going away anytime soon.

couple snips from the cnet article-
i hope HD works out but now that I know it's from Microsoft, I wish I got BR! :P

Those snips are old and irrelevant based on recent developments.

Most here probably don't realize that one of our fellow FOOsters was going to use the name Siu Blu Ray.

Unfortunately, an injunction and court order forced her to change her screen name.
:p

When Disney said they were going with BR the battle was over. Screaming kids win all the time in buying decisions.

In the past, porn drove the VHS win over BetaMax because of the BetaMax licensing fees that have to be paid to Sony. Early thoughts were that HD-DVD would win out because the free HD-DVD vs. licensed Blu-Ray would again be driven by the porn industry. However, with porn readily available over the Internet without having to venture into "Adult" video stores, the drive in HD-DVD sales just isn't there. Also, how many porn stars' pores do you really want to see anyway.

So your saying I should stop my search for Blu Ray porn? :mad::mad:

edit: just found

http://www.goflix.com/images/goflix/th/th/large_447647_863742.jpg

I came across this article -

January 4, 2008 6:52 PM PST
The party for HD DVD is over, literally
Posted by Michael Kanellos
War is hell, particularly when you want to schedule cocktail parties.

The HD DVD Promotional Group had scheduled a cocktail party and a press conference this Sunday evening in Las Vegas to tout the "progress" it has made in high definition video and the ongoing format war with the Blu-ray consortium.

On Friday, however, the group sent out a note terminating the event because Warner Home Video earlier in the day said it would switch exclusively to the Blu-ray format.

"Based on the timing of the Warner Home Video announcement today, we have decided to postpone our CES 2008 press conference. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause," the cancellation read. "We are currently discussing the potential impact of this announcement with the other HD DVD partner companies and evaluating next steps. We believe the consumer continues to benefit from HD DVD's commitment to quality and affordability--a bar that is critical for the mainstream success of any format."

The original invite was a lot more upbeat:

"Please join us as we present exciting news and a sneak peak at what's to come for 2008," it read, "featuring executives from the HD DVD Promotional Group: Intel, Microsoft, Paramount Home Entertainment, Toshiba, Universal Studios Home Entertainment, and Warner Home Video."

Warner leaving the group probably wasn't the exciting sneak peek they had in mind. But you have to wonder, why cancel? Was Warner bringing the food? Springing for the drinks? If they had any guts, the remaining members could have bought a keg and held a party in the parking lot.

We've all faced rejection, and the way to deal with it is to get shamelessly drunk and loud in public, after all. Where did these people learn their manners? The upside is that you will probably see a lot of derelicts walking around the strip with "HD DVD 2008" shoulder bags that they found in a dumpster.

The cancellation also marks two bad CESes in a row for Toshiba. Last year, the company abruptly canceled plans to show off its SED TVs at the show. Subsequently, it tossed responsibility for SED to Canon.

Ironically, HD DVD players have outsold standalone Blu-ray players. At Ceatec last October, Blu-ray execs said that their group would become more aggressive in late 2007 in promoting the format and try to gain an advantage by the first quarter of 2008.

In the past, porn drove the VHS win over BetaMax because of the BetaMax licensing fees that have to be paid to Sony. Early thoughts were that HD-DVD would win out because the free HD-DVD vs. licensed Blu-Ray would again be driven by the porn industry. However, with porn readily available over the Internet without having to venture into "Adult" video stores, the drive in HD-DVD sales just isn't there. Also, how many porn stars' pores do you really want to see anyway.

Where the hell is your mind at :D

"and finally...

Blu-ray has 96% of the HD player market in Japan. "In terms of Japan, the game is already over there."

this is likely the deciding factor of how the battle plays out. for me, i picked up an HD player because there are so cheap and do an excellent job at upconverting standard DVDs. so at worst, i end up with an excellent cheap upconverting DVD player.

i plan to pick up a BR player too. i would think we shall see their prices drop a bit at the end of this month. later.

Where the hell is your mind at :D

That's just stuff I read in some AV forums. :D

That's just stuff I read in some AV forums. :DThere's a forum for pron? Please share...