All over but the crying?

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

If HD-DVD is doing the same then I haven't heard about it. I already sent in my request for the 5 three movies, unfortunately there are only a few good ones to choose from and I think I'm only gonna end up replacing 1 or 2 that I already owned before they were stolen.
Only like 6 more weeks before I get them in the mail. ><

[Omniblast]

Re: All over but the crying?

I saw a sale on a bunch of random titles for blu-ray & HD-DVD up to 30% off on Amazon.com if anyone's interested. Not sure when that sale is over.

Also, by 1/31/08 the 5 free BD disc offer will expire. Is HD-DVD doing a similar tactic?

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

New take on Toshiba's decision today to further price slash their hardware.

http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=205604607

Only one thing:

While continuing its battle, Toshiba could see an increase in sales of its entry-level HD DVD player. That's because the lower price puts it in position to compete against standard DVD players. The advantage of the HD DVD model is that it can play a standard DVD at near high-definition quality, which Blu-ray players can't do. Consumers looking for a standard DVD player could find that feature attractive. "That was clever on their part," Greeson said of Toshiba.

Thats not true, BD players upconvert just like HD-DVD players.

Another theory on why they're doing this is because retailers are pressuring them to so they don't get stuck with truckloads of unsold and fairly useless players.

[Caspian]

Very true, a good portion of the revolutionary leaps in techonology aren't from the big boys but from some kid in his garage. The kicker is making "super broadband" standard. I'm sure someone else here would know better than me, is the current technology (fiber optic phone lines etc.) even capable of streaming at the speeds necessary to make digital downloads worthwhile? (Basically 50+gbs in 5-10 minutes)
On top of that you have hard drive limitations. I personally own a few hundred dvds, while I certainly own more than the average household, I'm by no means the record holder. I really wouldn't want to have to keep downloading movies I've already purchased simply because the hard drive isnt big enough to hold them all.
Lastly, while it seems stupid, a lot of people like the physically holding their movie. Its something you actually own and if you want to go to a friend's house and watch it, just grab the disc and walk out the door. Do they give you an account so that you could go to your friend's house and sign in and download a movie you've already purchased which your friend hasn't? Or does your friend have to pay to download a movie just to watch it once? That adds all kinds of software development issues to keep piracy at a minimum. (One of the big reasons BD was heavily favored out of the gates, its much more difficult to rip than HD-DVD).
While I'm sure we'll eventually reach a point of digital downloads, I'm just not sure its the next step and personally I'd rather not wait several years to watch my favorite movies in HD.
Fyi, CES started last night. Bill Gates was apparently originally supposed to discuss HD-DVD for atleast 30% of his speech, but he didn't touch on it at all. The rest of CES should be interesting and I'm sure we'll see more interesting developments in the weeks after. Btw, BDA execs were asked about maybe helping out HD-DVD supporting consumers by either offering trade-ins for the same title, getting a BD of a title you already own on HD-DVD, or possible price reductions on players for people who bought an HD-DVD player before the end of the year. Could potentially help ease the illwill thats developed over the least year and a half.

EDIT: Apparently Paramount has an escape clause with HD-DVD that if Warner goes BD exclusive, then Paramount can get out of their contract and go BD, too.
Rumors are also saying Paramount will go BD exclusive probably this week, with Universal to follow later this week or next. This format war could be over by the end of this month. Retailers are rumored to be scaling back their HD-DVD sections and giving BD more space. All this is still just rumor, but was leaked by studio insiders. The studios themselves haven't made anything official yet, but I doubt its that far off.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: All over but the crying?

Kitten: The format war certainly wasn't helping. Will BD take off and supplant DVD's? Can't know for sure right now. Its possible. Are we still years and years and years away from downloadable HD movies being commonplace? Damn straight.

That is, of course, assuming that its the leaders of the industry that are going to make the leap for us.

Since when has that happened?

Based on the original Napster, iPod and YouTube, I have some serious doubts about that. I'm pretty sure there's some geek out there that will make HD streaming come a lot faster and we'll see a repeat of Industry vs Napster/YouTube soon enough.

[Feba]

Re: All over but the crying?

You don't need to buy a new TV, just a converter box, and there's at least one gub'ment program out there that will give you some money towards that: https://www.dtv2009.gov/

There's also a fairly good chance your TV already supports it.

[jwalton]

Re: All over but the crying?

Feba has the right idea on why the average consumer will not switch to HD media. We're talking about a consumer base that is for the most part, dumb. Even with all the information there is available to the public, when some of them do finally bring home an HDTV, they watch standard definition television through their cable provider and hook up their game systems and multimedia devices using composite cables.

Most of them don't even know who's campaigning to be the next president of the United States, much less what Blu-Ray or HD-DVD is. Retailers have to deal with moron customers as it is right now with people trying to return HD discs with the complaint that they don't work in their DVD players. The fact that the HD media discs are the same size as a DVD disc is actually a problem, because people are dumb. The assumption they have is that they should just work.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: All over but the crying?

Last I checked, there are no plans to stop broadcasting in SD anytime soon, we're switching from analog broadcast to digital. Although that's not to say that marketing has nothing to do with it; the friendly local cable monopoly has already started talking about how your antenna won't work anymore, but cable will.

Ah, I see. (Guess how much I cared about it that I didn't even bother to look that up? lol.)

Well, it'd still render my TV incapable of receiving off the air signal. Oh no I won't be able to watch local news showing helicopters chasing car chases! Gotta run off and buy new TV! Now!

Not.

Sticking to plan: Will get a DTV when they come free with toaster ovens.

[Feba]

Re: All over but the crying?

Ita: Last I checked, there are no plans to stop broadcasting in SD anytime soon, we're switching from analog broadcast to digital. Although that's not to say that marketing has nothing to do with it; the friendly local cable monopoly has already started talking about how your antenna won't work anymore, but cable will.

I really don't think marketing is going to have much luck getting many people but the Bragging Assholes and A/Vphiles to switch though. The sort of people that wouldn't know about what they're replacing would be the kind that don't really care-- my grandparents only got a VCR a few years ago, for example, and that's mostly for watching home recorded video and such.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: All over but the crying?

Marketing will win.

US population will be force to upgrade to "HD" TV, and marketing will be there to convince us to let of of grandpa's generation of optical storage technology and upgrade our "disc player" along with the TV.

* * *

I'd toss the TV when they stop broadcasting "SD signals" (even though I already ignore them for the most part), but I think my sister still wants to play FFXI on PS2. >_> Plus, I may want to play Tekken or Soul Caliber now and then--if I can ever pry her away from the TV...

HD TV can come home with me when the stores start giving them away with every purchase of toaster ovens. =b

[Feba]

Re: All over but the crying?

Icemage: Of course they're the same size. DVDs are teeny compared to VHS. Blu-Ray has absolutely no advantage over DVD in the size factor as far as watching movies goes. The hard coating part is interesting, but it's a much smaller improvement than going from an easy to tear or damage strip to a disk. Yes, Blu-Ray is in HD, but DVD was a much larger improvement than VHS than HD over DVD. VHS to DVD practically eliminated scratchiness in the picture, sound problems, off colors. DVD to BluRay just moves from "Very good" to "Even better". Most people will not notice a large difference between HD and SDTV unless they're watching them side-by-side or looking at something where resolution will make a large difference (scenes with a lot of plant closeups or small text, for example). A significant amount of people with HDTVs probably don't even have their equipment set up properly to display HD signals. As for content, I'm not sure what you're talking about. I've never had annoying pauses while watching DVDs unless I'm using something like those "push a hidden button in the middle of the scene" things. I picked up the Simpsons Movie recently, and if you listen to the commentary it pauses and continues their discussion at some points, with no noticeable pause. I've also had commentaries on some show DVDs that have the commentary continue on after the credits without any problems. Blu-Ray might be a little bit smoother in it's transitions than DVDs, but again, it's not the huge leap in ability that DVD was over VHS.

As to your last bit, I'm not really sure why that matters-- DVD has the exact same stuff.

[Icemage]

Re: All over but the crying?

I honestly don't think HD-DVD or Blu-Ray could ever replace DVD, though.
I mean, to the average consumer, the benefits of DVD over VHS were many:

DVDs were smaller
DVDs were harder to damage
DVDs were much much higher quality
DVDs could have more dynamic content.

Now, with HD media, pretty much all you gain is "More stuff", which I don't think will be enough to get people to switch. If Blu-Ray becomes popular, it will likely be when a PS3 and Blu-Ray disks cost the same as a DVD player anyway, which is years away.
Really, I believe that either flash carts or digital distribution is going to be the next major shift in media.

Actually three of the four reasons you stated are true for Blu-ray versus DVD.

- Blu-ray has the exact same size and form factor as DVD.

- Blu-ray discs are harder to damage, due to a mandatory hardcoating. I can personally attest to how good it is. None of my 55 movies or 17 PS3 games have anything even vaguely resembling a scratch, and there's no way that many discs being handled - even carefully - wouldn't have at least some minor blemishes by now if they were DVDs.

- Blu-ray discs have six times the resolution of a DVD. Granted, non-HDTV users can't see "that" much of a difference, but as more and more households get HDTVs, this becomes an increasingly powerful selling point.

- Blu-ray discs can have much more dynamic content than DVDs. My Spiderman 2.1 Blu-ray lets me pick which cut of the film to watch, and has zero pauses at "break" scenes, unlike the annoying pause you get with DVDs (even when it's tried on that format). There's also no irritating "layer change" pause on Blu-ray like there is on DVD.

I've got Blu-ray discs with games on them, fully interactive extras, and other neat goodies like camera-angle shifting at concerts (Nine Inch Nails: Beside You In Time).


Icemage

[Pai Pai Master]

Re: All over but the crying?

BD will never replace DVD. It'll become the HD-alternative to DVD, and then to VoD.

But yes, HD-DVD is pretty much dead. Dual-format partners are no more, and Toshiba got the short end of the stick.

What matters to me is that Warner and other BD formats hurry up and release the films they've been holding back on. Give me my 1080p Lord of the Rings, Star Wars and Disney classics goodness.

The sooner Toshiba packs up their bags, the better for the industry.

[Feba]

Re: All over but the crying?

I honestly don't think HD-DVD or Blu-Ray could ever replace DVD, though.

I mean, to the average consumer, the benefits of DVD over VHS were many:

DVDs were smaller
DVDs were harder to damage
DVDs were much much higher quality
DVDs could have more dynamic content.

Now, with HD media, pretty much all you gain is "More stuff", which I don't think will be enough to get people to switch. If Blu-Ray becomes popular, it will likely be when a PS3 and Blu-Ray disks cost the same as a DVD player anyway, which is years away.

Really, I believe that either flash carts or digital distribution is going to be the next major shift in media.

[jwalton]

Re: All over but the crying?

What the HELL were they thinking?!

It's called compromise. Neither Sony nor Toshiba were willing to budge an inch when they were in talks prior to the HD formats releasing. Toshiba was willing to go Blu-Ray if Sony went with HDi instead of BD-J for the software, but HDi is a Microsoft thing and Sony wouldn't budge. And it was stupid, because HDi is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay further along than BD-J for interactivity features and ease of programming.

In the end, both Toshiba and Sony can get bent. I'll continue watching upscaled DVDs and wait for the next format.