All over but the crying?

[Feba]

Re: All over but the crying?

Then again, wasn't PS2's launch success partly due to its popularity as a DVD player in Japan domestic market?

I'm pretty sure it was DVDs that succeeded in Japan because of the PS2, not the other way around.

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

I wonder how long before the shareholders start putting the squeeze on Toshiba to end this stupid thing.
Toshiba profit drops, wary on chip outlook | Reuters

25% loss....ouch.

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

Sony's done really well keeping up with the firmware updates on the ps3. 2.0 players should be coming out in the coming months.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: All over but the crying?

Really should pay more attention to the format war; it totally took me by surprise that there are multiple version of Blu-ray now. (1.0, 1.1, and now, 2.0.)

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080118-new-nlu-ray-2-0-spec-makes-ps3-the-most-future-proof-player.html:

This is quite the odd turn of events: it was assumed when the PS3 launched that the gaming system would be the Trojan horse that brought Blu-ray into the homes of the mass market. Now? The inexpensive and future-proofed Blu-ray functions of the PS3, matched with the high-quality upscaling the system brings to normal DVDs, may be the Trojan horse bringing gaming to home theater enthusiasts.

PS3 is the best Blu-ray player on the market, apparently, being the only BD2.0 player there is. ._. Nice bonus that it can play a few games, too. (Then again, wasn't PS2's launch success partly due to its popularity as a DVD player in Japan domestic market? I suppose history is just repeating itself.)

[TheGrandMom]

Re: All over but the crying?

Consumers are not going to pay near $50 for a movie.

Wow, I remember back in the day when VHS/Beta/Laser movies were $50+. God, I'm old.....

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

Found this commentary in reference to the link jwalton posted.
Most notable is the quote from Fox's VP.

As it happens, I've actually spoken about this today with Fox's senior VP of corporate and marketing communications, Steve Feldstein, who echoed something Warner's Ron Sanders has also said in recent days: "The kind of money they're talking about [in these stories] isn't worth jeopardizing a multi-billion dollar business." In other words, payoffs would not have impacted Fox and Warner's decisions. Feldstein also told me that when The Pittsburgh Post Gazette piece broke, he contacted Lindich immediately to let him know that he was being misled by someone. When Don posted the same piece on his own blog, it was edited to reflect this. Specifically, the references to $120 million and $500 million payoffs were gone - something that's worthy of note

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

Moral of the story: Glueing two things together and sticking them in a machine to spend at super high rpm's isnt the best idea in the world.

[Icemage]

Re: All over but the crying?

Also heard of a LOT of problems with them not working properly. Something to do with basically gluing the backs of two discs together. I think I recall hearing Sony did that on a BD with the same results.

Wasn't Sony. Actually I think it was Panasonic or JVC who were trying to develop a BD-Twin disc format where you could have a disc that acted as a DVD OR a Blu-ray on the same side. They eventually gave up on it as being not economically feasible, however.

Combo discs for HD DVD ride that line hard as well - the failure rate is absurd. Even with the testing they do, the estimates I've seen just from random polling indicates ~10% of combo discs fail, which is just stupidly high for a mass market product.


Icemage

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

Also heard of a LOT of problems with them not working properly. Something to do with basically gluing the backs of two discs together. I think I recall hearing Sony did that on a BD with the same results.

[jwalton]

Re: All over but the crying?

The combo discs were an awful idea. The concept was to ease consumers into the HD generation by selling discs that were HD-DVD on one side and DVD on the other, so that when they'd finally get an HD-DVD player, they wouldn't have to buy all-new discs. Unfortunately, they lost the memo on the concept of transferring the savings to the consumer and not to the manufacturer, and charged a fair bit more for those discs, making HD-DVD look like the more expensive option in its early days, probably a strong part of why it was slow to be adopted even though it was first. Consumers are not going to pay near $50 for a movie.

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

So according to the source site (which Gizmodo butchered in reposting) WB was going to go HD-DVD if Toshiba could steal a studio from BDA. Fox was looking like they were going to, then backed out. So WB went BD. Assuming its true, they're more than vague on sources, I still don't care. It puts an earlier end to the format war and helps establish a clear winner.
As for the writer for the Post-Gazette, he recommends HD-DVD because players are cheaper? Pick the format with fewer studios and titles because you can get a player for $100 less? He then sites the fact that many HD-DVDs were sold in December. Congratulations, so did DVD and BD. Its the holiday season, everything sales better. The truth is HD-DVD picked up at most 1 or 2 points on its sale ratio compared to BD. But tbh, there's not a lot of difference between 65:35 and 63:37. You're still getting smoked nomatter how you look at it.
I don't know how much it really affected sales, but I also heard nothing but horror stories about HD-DVD's combo discs. Would it really have killed them to sell the DVDs separate from the HD-DVDs?

[Omniblast]

Re: All over but the crying?

boo site is blocked at work. I guess I'll have to remember to read that when I get home.

[jwalton]

Re: All over but the crying?

http://gizmodo.com/344680/the-real-reason-warner-went-blu+ray

[Caspian]

Re: All over but the crying?

I know they are doing it with the 360 HD-DVD add on. I bought my godson one for Christmas and the offer for 5 free movies came with it. Poor kid didn't like any of them though. lol

Yeah, the BD selection sucked. The only good movies were all in the same group so you could only choose one of them. The only movies I'll actually watch that I'm getting for free are Pirates 1 and The Patriot. I decided not to opt for "The Devil's Rejects"

[TheGrandMom]

Re: All over but the crying?

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

I know they are doing it with the 360 HD-DVD add on. I bought my godson one for Christmas and the offer for 5 free movies came with it. Poor kid didn't like any of them though. lol