Considering a recent market study suggested there'll be 75 Million PS3s sold by 2010, 'tens of millions' was a conservative guess. I'm not sure if that research is even nearly correct, but even if it's not, a lot of PS3's will be sold. That almost certainly means tens of millions.
We're looking at a very, very developed video game market these days. This isn't the age of the Genesis and SNES - it's mainstream now. A console like the PS3 will sell a shitload even if it's the resounding loser of the generation. And if that gives Sony an extra arm's length in beating out the HD-DVD, then maybe it was worth it? I personally doubt it, but that could well be their reasoning.
But I can't imagine that the PS3 won't have sold at least 10 million by 2010. There are limits to the amount that this unit can fail. I highly doubt that Sony would consider pulling the plug on it.
But I can't imagine that the PS3 won't have sold at least 10 million by 2010. There are limits to the amount that this unit can fail. I highly doubt that Sony would consider pulling the plug on it.
Not really. Everyone loved Sega and look where they ended up.
People need to remember that the video game industry is a harsh mistress. She isn't easily tamed and if you treat her wrong, she'll turn on you without mercy. No one is immune to failure. Nintendo certainly wasn't. Sega most definitely and Sony and Microsoft aren't either.
Considering a recent market study suggested there'll be 75 Million PS3s sold by 2010, 'tens of millions' was a conservative guess. I'm not sure if that research is even nearly correct, but even if it's not, a lot of PS3's will be sold. That almost certainly means tens of millions.
We're looking at a very, very developed video game market these days. This isn't the age of the Genesis and SNES - it's mainstream now. A console like the PS3 will sell a shitload even if it's the resounding loser of the generation. And if that gives Sony an extra arm's length in beating out the HD-DVD, then maybe it was worth it? I personally doubt it, but that could well be their reasoning.
But I can't imagine that the PS3 won't have sold at least 10 million by 2010. There are limits to the amount that this unit can fail. I highly doubt that Sony would consider pulling the plug on it.
Until there is some article that does more than summarise a summary of a report that costs about $2000 to read, I'll take that or any study with a grain of salt and a side order of fries. Keep in mind that to sell 75 mil by 2010, they will have to average 25 mil per year (I'm guessing that's worldwide, by the way). And again, without reading the report, it feels like the PS3 will be 'selling' in a vacuum. As in, no 360 or Wii competition.
In the end, what will drive these numbers? Affordability? Availability? The PS3 is the best system with the best games? The Blu-Ray player is a fantastic bargain at the current (whenever) price? (And as an aside, when will the BR player argument go away? When real BR players are cheaper than a PS3?) The world finally breaks down and decides that, yes, indeed, they do want a single system to be the end-all-be-all home entertainment module?
Maybe SONY 'wins'. Maybe they make a metric assload of cash on system and software sales. And maybe the cost of making a Blu-Ray player will come down in price soon enough to make that kind of difference and quickly. Yes, only time will tell.
But right now, everybody I know or work with wants a Wii. And the only one I know who is even considering a PS3 only wants it for MGS4. Wasn't there a rumor that Konami is considering a cross-platform release anyway? SONY, as well as Nintendo and Microsoft, has an awful long way to go before anybody is crowned the 'winner' this generation.
I'm not trying to crown a winner, I think that's a hopeless argument and not something we can predict. I think we've all moved beyond that. I'm merely trying to explain the price of the PS3 at the moment. I think it's largely because of the Blu-Ray player, and I think Sony have included it in order to have a good shot at winning the High-Def DVD war. That's it.
I'm not trying to crown a winner, I think that's a hopeless argument and not something we can predict. I think we've all moved beyond that. I'm merely trying to explain the price of the PS3 at the moment. I think it's largely because of the Blu-Ray player, and I think Sony have included it in order to have a good shot at winning the High-Def DVD war. That's it.
Fair enough. SONY's inclusion of Blu-Ray may be their biggest shot at winning the HD DVD war. But it seems to me, it's a shot taken with a poorly made slingshot. I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
And if the HD-DVD peripheral is 'only' an extra $200, then how much more expensive is a full featured HD-DVD player with proper HD ports and hookups? While hardly scientific, Best Buy offers this HD-DVD player for $499.99. This Blu-Ray player is $799.99. Consumers vote with their wallets. And right now, the PS3 needs more than a spiffy new DVD format and a half-ass backwards compatibility (where do my memory cards go, again?) feature to move units. 75 million or otherwise.
I'm not sure how relevant this is, but someone earlier mentioned that college students are a large percentage of total gamers. In my experience, this is true. I cannot afford a PS3. I work full time every break, and my parents pay tuition, housing, and food, and I still think: Do I want a PS3, or about 30 cases of beer and a Wii? The answer is simple. Wiibeer.
I'm not sure how relevant this is, but someone earlier mentioned that college students are a large percentage of total gamers. In my experience, this is true. I cannot afford a PS3. I work full time every break, and my parents pay tuition, housing, and food, and I still think: Do I want a PS3, or about 30 cases of beer and a Wii? The answer is simple. Wiibeer.
It might also be worth noting that a great many college students were gamers in the PREVIOUS generation also.
The passage of time has, er, passed, in a linear like fashion. These college aged "gamers" are now "older".
Meaning we have college education fueled jobs. Frankly, $660 wasn't even a thought for me - I wanted a Bru-ray player to go with my HD-DVD player. And as much as mom convinced me that I'm a beautiful snowflake, I doubt I'm unique in this particular regard.
It gets here tomorrow. *shrug* It'll look fine next to the 360 and the Wii, I'm just worried about coming home and finding a group of apes fashioning tools around it and discovering fire.
Once the price drops on the PS3, and some of the titles I'm looking forward to come out, I'm definitely going to pick it up
Me too, if there are enough must-have titles. The thing still is that the price has to go down about 200-300 dollars before I will even consider it. Considering that they can´t forever make the same kinds of losses on the console as they do now, it´ll probably be a long time before the price reaches that level.
Consoles mean nothing to me without games. The PS3 is essentially like buying a TV. It's cool, but it's what you're gonna do with the thing that's important. Price drop or not, there's nothing out there that's really my thing.
There's nothing on the Wii that's really my thing either, right now, so I'm happy saving my money until buying a new console is a "sure thing." Hell, by then you can usually buy the things on eBay including a game for the price of a retail unit.
I went into work today after being off for a few days, and of the 40 60GBs we had in on Sunday, we have 30 left. I guess it doesn't help that we are out of the only game worth buying.
Why the heck does the PS3 need this Blu Ray player anyway??
So sony can claim it's more next-gen than the 360 with its paltry HD-DVD that actually has higher transfer speeds, is harder to scratch, and supported by more capital. But the blu-ray has ten more gigs which aren't even being used so clearly it's better.
Why the heck does the PS3 need this Blu Ray player anyway??
to:
1) provide people with a cheaper means to acquire a Blu-Ray player, than buying a standalone
and 2) help Sony win a format war with HD-DVD, by hoping to get a BR drive into every house on the back of everyone buying a PS3.
It's a nice, circular bout of reasoning going on there.
Kinda interesting, I've noticed in the last month that at least one Samsung Bluray player has dropped below the $600 price point. I think its load times are longer than the PS3's, but still... I'm fully expecting any "I'll get the PS3 as a cheaper BR player" arguments to kinida fall off in the next 6 months.
Why the heck does the PS3 need this Blu Ray player anyway??
to:
1) provide people with a cheaper means to acquire a Blu-Ray player, than buying a standalone
and 2) help Sony win a format war with HD-DVD, by hoping to get a BR drive into every house on the back of everyone buying a PS3.
It's a nice, circular bout of reasoning going on there.
Kinda interesting, I've noticed in the last month that at least one Samsung Bluray player has dropped below the $600 price point. I think its load times are longer than the PS3's, but still... I'm fully expecting any "I'll get the PS3 as a cheaper BR player" arguments to kinida fall off in the next 6 months.
well that's the problem. People don't necessarily want a Blu-Ray player until it becomes the chosen format, which would mean everyone would need to buy a PS3 to help it win that particular war. But gamers are being put off the console because of the price, which is as high as it is mostly due to the Blu-Ray drive as part of the console.
It's potentially a good situation, that's so-far going rather awry.
Why the heck does the PS3 need this Blu Ray player anyway??
So sony can claim it's more next-gen than the 360 with its paltry HD-DVD that actually has higher transfer speeds, is harder to scratch, and supported by more capital. But the blu-ray has ten more gigs which aren't even being used so clearly it's better.
To pick some nits, but I believe the 360 is not native HD-DVD. Yet.
Why the heck does the PS3 need this Blu Ray player anyway??
to:
1) provide people with a cheaper means to acquire a Blu-Ray player, than buying a standalone
and 2) help Sony win a format war with HD-DVD, by hoping to get a BR drive into every house on the back of everyone buying a PS3.
It's a nice, circular bout of reasoning going on there.
Kinda interesting, I've noticed in the last month that at least one Samsung Bluray player has dropped below the $600 price point. I think its load times are longer than the PS3's, but still... I'm fully expecting any "I'll get the PS3 as a cheaper BR player" arguments to kinida fall off in the next 6 months.
:shock:
Really? That fast? Didn't it start out at at least $800 when it was released just a few months ago?
Wow. Has any drop like that happened in any other successful new format (say, DVDs in the late 90s)? If not, it could be easy to read into that that regular consumers really don't care enough about next-gen DVDs...
Really? That fast? Didn't it start out at at least $800 when it was released just a few months ago?
Wow. Has any drop like that happened in any other successful new format (say, DVDs in the late 90s)? If not, it could be easy to read into that that regular consumers really don't care enough about next-gen DVDs...
I believe it's called economies of scale. The expensive parts are being manufactured in huge quantities now that the PS3 is out and gobbling them up. Because more are being produced overall it makes Samsung have to pay less for their parts. And yes, the same thing happened with DVDs when they started taking off (read as: when blockbuster decided they needed a DVD section). Blockbusters throughout most of America are now stocking blu-ray and not HD-DVD. The war is all but over, really.
Really? That fast? Didn't it start out at at least $800 when it was released just a few months ago?
Wow. Has any drop like that happened in any other successful new format (say, DVDs in the late 90s)? If not, it could be easy to read into that that regular consumers really don't care enough about next-gen DVDs...
I believe it's called economies of scale. The expensive parts are being manufactured in huge quantities now that the PS3 is out and gobbling them up. Because more are being produced overall it makes Samsung have to pay less for their parts. And yes, the same thing happened with DVDs when they started taking off (read as: when blockbuster decided they needed a DVD section). Blockbusters throughout most of America are now stocking blu-ray and not HD-DVD. The war is all but over, really.
I don't know about the war being over, per se. I think we've entered stale-mate land. Format neutral players, exclusive studios and an apathetic audience could make this very expensive (both fiscally and from a content standpoint) for everyone involved.
The initial Blu-Ray transfers in MPEG2 where horrendous. HD-DVD came out of the gate swinging with a lower entry point and more titles
The Blu-ray release list over the next few months is almost triple that of HD-DVD.
The solution? Buy all formats. Consume, Consume, CONSUME!! (the last line should be read in a Dalek voice, if possible).
I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
How does HD-DVD/Blu-Ray compare with regular DVDs being upscaled to 1080p?
I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
How does HD-DVD/Blu-Ray compare with regular DVDs being upscaled to 1080p?
This is 1080i vs 480i but upscaled DVDs won't look much different than there 480i counterparts because they aren't designed to run in 1080p.
There are, sadly, problems with both of those "solutions" to the war. Dual format players aren't exactly legal, since it's not allowed in the formal blu-ray spec (or so I have been told). That means Sony could sue anyone that made and marketed one. The hybrid discs will be a challenge as well, since you'd only have half the space on a dual layer disc for either format. Any more layers and the current players for both formats won't be able to read the discs. Do we really want to reduce the quality of our hi-def content?
I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
How does HD-DVD/Blu-Ray compare with regular DVDs being upscaled to 1080p?
Not even close. You can't magic up the missing information in a standard DVD, you can only make it look smoother.
Having said that, my Denon 1930 upscaling DVD does enough of a decent job at it that I don't feel the need to buy all of my movies again, just my absolute must have classics.
At the moment the first batch of HD-DVD's are generally acknowledged as looking better than the first batch of BD's. Most AV sites I've been to seem to agree. I've not come across a BD that's been encoded with VC1 (like HD-DVD uses; rather than high-bitrate MPEG-2 for the initial BD flicks) although they are starting to hit now, as are dual layer BD's.
There are, sadly, problems with both of those "solutions" to the war. Dual format players aren't exactly legal, since it's not allowed in the formal blu-ray spec (or so I have been told). That means Sony could sue anyone that made and marketed one. The hybrid discs will be a challenge as well, since you'd only have half the space on a dual layer disc for either format. Any more layers and the current players for both formats won't be able to read the discs.
Oh, I absolutely see problems with these solutions, but the ide of them intruiges me enough to want to see more (thank goodness CES is soon).
I remember reading something about the Sony BR dual format thing, but it doesn't seem to be stopping them if true and they are supposed to be showing it off at CES. It seems odd that they would bother if they were just going to get sued over it.
I brought up the same thing about the hybrid disc issue, but according to charpunk who said he did some reading up on the hybrid discs, they are actually supposed to support dual layered discs on each side, so you could have a 30GB HD-DVD on one side, and a 50GB BR on the other. Seems like they would run into production problems with this, but if they can get it to work like this, it would be interesting. I guess we'll find out more next week . . .
I brought up the same thing about the hybrid disc issue, but according to charpunk who said he did some reading up on the hybrid discs, they are actually supposed to support dual layered discs on each side, so you could have a 30GB HD-DVD on one side, and a 50GB BR on the other. Seems like they would run into production problems with this, but if they can get it to work like this, it would be interesting. I guess we'll find out more next week . . .
I hadn't thought of dual sided (like old DVDs used to be...one side widescreen, other side 4:3). That's interesting, although it sounds possibly prohibitively expensive.
I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
I'd read that somewhere (quality loss through USB port). Maybe it was just 'potential' quality loss.
I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
I'd read that somewhere (quality loss through USB port). Maybe it was just 'potential' quality loss.
Quality lost through the USB port?? Like, the 1s and 0s go missing along the datastream? It's digital - There is no quality lost through USB. If anything you may have some quality degradation through component video or VGA - but it would be negligible.
That being said, the video output from both the PS3 and the 360 add-on are top notch. I prefer my stand alone HD-A2 for HD-DVD as it outputs the audio as full bitrate DTS to my receiver (1.5mbps v the 640kbps put out by the optical throughput on the 360). The PlayStation 3 does indeed have an advantage here as it outputs uncompressed PCM audio via HDMI to compatible receivers. Hopefully we'll see a firmware update to enable DTS-MA HD in the future.
I believe the HD-DVD addon for the 360 costs about $200. While it's not going to give the best possible picture due to having to connect to the 360 through the USB ports, it's still supposed to be better than standard DVDs.
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
I'd read that somewhere (quality loss through USB port). Maybe it was just 'potential' quality loss.
Quality lost through the USB port?? Like, the 1s and 0s go missing along the datastream? It's digital - There is no quality lost through USB. If anything you may have some quality degradation through component video or VGA - but it would be negligible.
That being said, the video output from both the PS3 and the 360 add-on are top notch. I prefer my stand alone HD-A2 for HD-DVD as it outputs the audio as full bitrate DTS to my receiver (1.5mbps v the 640kbps put out by the optical throughput on the 360). The PlayStation 3 does indeed have an advantage here as it outputs uncompressed PCM audio via HDMI to compatible receivers. Hopefully we'll see a firmware update to enable DTS-MA HD in the future.
I think I read somewhere that this was confirmed for the March update.
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We're looking at a very, very developed video game market these days. This isn't the age of the Genesis and SNES - it's mainstream now. A console like the PS3 will sell a shitload even if it's the resounding loser of the generation. And if that gives Sony an extra arm's length in beating out the HD-DVD, then maybe it was worth it? I personally doubt it, but that could well be their reasoning.
But I can't imagine that the PS3 won't have sold at least 10 million by 2010. There are limits to the amount that this unit can fail. I highly doubt that Sony would consider pulling the plug on it.
Not really. Everyone loved Sega and look where they ended up.
People need to remember that the video game industry is a harsh mistress. She isn't easily tamed and if you treat her wrong, she'll turn on you without mercy. No one is immune to failure. Nintendo certainly wasn't. Sega most definitely and Sony and Microsoft aren't either.
In the end, what will drive these numbers? Affordability? Availability? The PS3 is the best system with the best games? The Blu-Ray player is a fantastic bargain at the current (whenever) price? (And as an aside, when will the BR player argument go away? When real BR players are cheaper than a PS3?) The world finally breaks down and decides that, yes, indeed, they do want a single system to be the end-all-be-all home entertainment module?
Maybe SONY 'wins'. Maybe they make a metric assload of cash on system and software sales. And maybe the cost of making a Blu-Ray player will come down in price soon enough to make that kind of difference and quickly. Yes, only time will tell.
But right now, everybody I know or work with wants a Wii. And the only one I know who is even considering a PS3 only wants it for MGS4. Wasn't there a rumor that Konami is considering a cross-platform release anyway? SONY, as well as Nintendo and Microsoft, has an awful long way to go before anybody is crowned the 'winner' this generation.
And if the HD-DVD peripheral is 'only' an extra $200, then how much more expensive is a full featured HD-DVD player with proper HD ports and hookups? While hardly scientific, Best Buy offers this HD-DVD player for $499.99. This Blu-Ray player is $799.99. Consumers vote with their wallets. And right now, the PS3 needs more than a spiffy new DVD format and a half-ass backwards compatibility (where do my memory cards go, again?) feature to move units. 75 million or otherwise.
It might also be worth noting that a great many college students were gamers in the PREVIOUS generation also.
The passage of time has, er, passed, in a linear like fashion. These college aged "gamers" are now "older".
Meaning we have college education fueled jobs. Frankly, $660 wasn't even a thought for me - I wanted a Bru-ray player to go with my HD-DVD player. And as much as mom convinced me that I'm a beautiful snowflake, I doubt I'm unique in this particular regard.
It gets here tomorrow. *shrug* It'll look fine next to the 360 and the Wii, I'm just worried about coming home and finding a group of apes fashioning tools around it and discovering fire.
Me too, if there are enough must-have titles. The thing still is that the price has to go down about 200-300 dollars before I will even consider it. Considering that they can´t forever make the same kinds of losses on the console as they do now, it´ll probably be a long time before the price reaches that level.
Maybe by the time I'm a lawyer and making plenty of money I'll consider getting a PS3. It should hopefully be $400 by then. I hope.
I have a Wii and probably will have a 360 within a year's time to tide me over.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
There's nothing on the Wii that's really my thing either, right now, so I'm happy saving my money until buying a new console is a "sure thing." Hell, by then you can usually buy the things on eBay including a game for the price of a retail unit.
Awesome.
Why the heck does the PS3 need this Blu Ray player anyway??
Team Fortress 2 Backpack: Someone you love
1) provide people with a cheaper means to acquire a Blu-Ray player, than buying a standalone
and 2) help Sony win a format war with HD-DVD, by hoping to get a BR drive into every house on the back of everyone buying a PS3.
It's a nice, circular bout of reasoning going on there.
So sony can claim it's more next-gen than the 360 with its paltry HD-DVD that actually has higher transfer speeds, is harder to scratch, and supported by more capital. But the blu-ray has ten more gigs which aren't even being used so clearly it's better.
Sony makes money off every Blu-ray movie sold, since they have a sizeable stake in the format.
Team Fortress 2 Backpack: Someone you love
It's potentially a good situation, that's so-far going rather awry.
:shock:
Really? That fast? Didn't it start out at at least $800 when it was released just a few months ago?
Wow. Has any drop like that happened in any other successful new format (say, DVDs in the late 90s)? If not, it could be easy to read into that that regular consumers really don't care enough about next-gen DVDs...
I believe it's called economies of scale. The expensive parts are being manufactured in huge quantities now that the PS3 is out and gobbling them up. Because more are being produced overall it makes Samsung have to pay less for their parts. And yes, the same thing happened with DVDs when they started taking off (read as: when blockbuster decided they needed a DVD section). Blockbusters throughout most of America are now stocking blu-ray and not HD-DVD. The war is all but over, really.
I don't know about the war being over, per se. I think we've entered stale-mate land. Format neutral players, exclusive studios and an apathetic audience could make this very expensive (both fiscally and from a content standpoint) for everyone involved.
The initial Blu-Ray transfers in MPEG2 where horrendous. HD-DVD came out of the gate swinging with a lower entry point and more titles
The Blu-ray release list over the next few months is almost triple that of HD-DVD.
The solution? Buy all formats. Consume, Consume, CONSUME!! (the last line should be read in a Dalek voice, if possible).
Based on reviews there is no loss in quality with the 360 HD-DVD add on. According to the most recent review of MI:3 being played on the same TV, flipped back and forth, between PS3 and 360 both running 1080p there is no noticeable difference (though supposedly the 360 actually does a better job with blacks, or some shit).
This is 1080i vs 480i but upscaled DVDs won't look much different than there 480i counterparts because they aren't designed to run in 1080p.
There are, sadly, problems with both of those "solutions" to the war. Dual format players aren't exactly legal, since it's not allowed in the formal blu-ray spec (or so I have been told). That means Sony could sue anyone that made and marketed one. The hybrid discs will be a challenge as well, since you'd only have half the space on a dual layer disc for either format. Any more layers and the current players for both formats won't be able to read the discs. Do we really want to reduce the quality of our hi-def content?
Not even close. You can't magic up the missing information in a standard DVD, you can only make it look smoother.
Having said that, my Denon 1930 upscaling DVD does enough of a decent job at it that I don't feel the need to buy all of my movies again, just my absolute must have classics.
At the moment the first batch of HD-DVD's are generally acknowledged as looking better than the first batch of BD's. Most AV sites I've been to seem to agree. I've not come across a BD that's been encoded with VC1 (like HD-DVD uses; rather than high-bitrate MPEG-2 for the initial BD flicks) although they are starting to hit now, as are dual layer BD's.
Oh, I absolutely see problems with these solutions, but the ide of them intruiges me enough to want to see more (thank goodness CES is soon).
I remember reading something about the Sony BR dual format thing, but it doesn't seem to be stopping them if true and they are supposed to be showing it off at CES. It seems odd that they would bother if they were just going to get sued over it.
I brought up the same thing about the hybrid disc issue, but according to charpunk who said he did some reading up on the hybrid discs, they are actually supposed to support dual layered discs on each side, so you could have a 30GB HD-DVD on one side, and a 50GB BR on the other. Seems like they would run into production problems with this, but if they can get it to work like this, it would be interesting. I guess we'll find out more next week . . .
I hadn't thought of dual sided (like old DVDs used to be...one side widescreen, other side 4:3). That's interesting, although it sounds possibly prohibitively expensive.
Quality lost through the USB port?? Like, the 1s and 0s go missing along the datastream? It's digital - There is no quality lost through USB. If anything you may have some quality degradation through component video or VGA - but it would be negligible.
That being said, the video output from both the PS3 and the 360 add-on are top notch. I prefer my stand alone HD-A2 for HD-DVD as it outputs the audio as full bitrate DTS to my receiver (1.5mbps v the 640kbps put out by the optical throughput on the 360). The PlayStation 3 does indeed have an advantage here as it outputs uncompressed PCM audio via HDMI to compatible receivers. Hopefully we'll see a firmware update to enable DTS-MA HD in the future.
I think I read somewhere that this was confirmed for the March update.