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The HD format war is over?
saint2e
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-dvd5jan05,0,4795448.story?coll=la-home-center
Basically in a nutshell, Blu-Ray now has 75% of the market for HighDef DVD's based on the producers of movies choosing which format they're going to release HD movies on. A lot of folks are saying this is the nail in the coffin for HD-DVD.
My thoughts?
HALLELUJIAH! BluRay is, from what I can tell, a better format, the discs hold more data, and due to a lot of work on Sony and their partners, about the same price as HD players/discs.
I've been holding off buying any HD DVD players mainly for the reason that I wasn't sure who would "win". I'm still going to hold off until HD throws in the towel, but at least it appears the end is nigh.
Unfortunately my Father, who purchased an HD-DVD Player as a Boxing Day doorcrasher, will not be impressed.
What are everyone's thoughts on this?
Basically in a nutshell, Blu-Ray now has 75% of the market for HighDef DVD's based on the producers of movies choosing which format they're going to release HD movies on. A lot of folks are saying this is the nail in the coffin for HD-DVD.
My thoughts?
HALLELUJIAH! BluRay is, from what I can tell, a better format, the discs hold more data, and due to a lot of work on Sony and their partners, about the same price as HD players/discs.
I've been holding off buying any HD DVD players mainly for the reason that I wasn't sure who would "win". I'm still going to hold off until HD throws in the towel, but at least it appears the end is nigh.
Unfortunately my Father, who purchased an HD-DVD Player as a Boxing Day doorcrasher, will not be impressed.
What are everyone's thoughts on this?
saint2e on
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I'm not sure if Paramount's switch is true yet, or if it's simply not exclusive to just HD-DVD anymore.
so... give it a week or two.
This guaranteed right off the bat that three very large and powerful production companies would be Blu-Ray only - Columbia, MGM, and United Artists.
HD, in my opinion, was dead on arrival.
As a poster above commented, given Sony's track record on format wars, the safe money is usually on the other guy.
I guess Sony was finally due one.
Paramount is simply not exclusive.
Really though the amount of studios for either format is not going to decide this. What will decide it is price to the consumer, and cost to make movies.
Given Sony's stance on their proprietary formats and the cost of making the plants to churn out these disks it is not cheaper for the studios. And with blu-ray prices as high as they are well...
The first company that's going to win this is the one that manages to churn out a sub 100 buck player with disk prices as low as standard DVD's. Until that happens it's anyones game.
I also wouldn't call either format better. Both disks are large enough and what really counts is the codecs they use. What blu-ray does offer is slightly better lossless sound (and you better have a couple thousand in audio to use this) and more DRM (joy!).
As long as Blu-Ray prices remain competitive once their main rival has succumbed this won't impact upon me in any great way.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.
From what I heard initially (and made me always "favor" HD-DVD) was that Blue-Ray format was bundled up in some really draconian DRM. Initially I thought it was just FUD, but then again we ARE talking Sony here.
Anyone has a link to a decent rundown of both formats, or care to give bullet points?
There is no benefit to Blu Ray except for capacity and until that capacity is actually used in a way that benefits the consumer, HD-DVD is superior for the above reason.
Basic issues
-blu-ray has more storage space per layer but this doesn't matter for HD movies
-blu-ray has an extra layer of proprietary blu-ray only DRM
-not all blu-ray movies use the best encoding
Two strikes one plus that doesn't really matter.
When I eventually get a 1080p HDTV, it'll be a while before I get a player.
Fuck combo discs, its a great idea in theory but currently there are way to many problems with them including that their more expensive than a normal disc and you don't have a choice between the two. Also that they have a higher chance of fucking up while playing.
Waterlogged: Your 3rd point is true for HD DVD as well and your second point is a strike from a consumer prospective but studios, specifically New Line, choose not to release some stuff on HD DVD due to the lack of it.
Or will there be a market for physical movies in the near future?
The sun shines on a dog's ass at least once right?
My thoughts exactly.
I have no interest in buying a BR player, and considering the current price that I'm seeing for BR movies, I probably won't for some time.
And that's part of the problem. How many people are willing to re-buy their current movie library when an upconverting DVD player looks almost as good... short of having an insanely expensive TV and sound system?
HDTVs aren't that expensive, and expensive sound systems are no more expensive than they were before (you could still spend $40,000 on a good pair of speakers 10 years ago). The difference in quality is hard to describe or show, but it is there. After you watch a movie in HD, it's really difficult to go back.
The only reason I did it is because Best Buy was offering any 5 Blue-Ray movies under $34 free, and you get another five through the mail when you buy the player.
So, 10 Blue-Ray movies at approximately 30 bucks a piece, on a 400 dollar player... it seemed stupid not to do it.
Here's the thing... there's no reason to replace your DVD collection... why would anyone do that? The Sony Blue-Ray player upconverts DVD's, so the quality will still be better. Regardless... I hate Sony, and now I kind of hate myself.
I don't believe downloadable movies will become mainstream anytime soon, comparing to music is kind of a shitty example, but Itunes has been around since 2000 and online music sales aren't even at 50% of the market share. I'd also prefer to have physical copy as I see zero advantages to have it online.
You don't need to rebuy, the majority of movies sales come in the first couple of weeks and if a new format can capture those sales they have it made. I'd say being backwards compatible is a huge advantage preciously so people don't have to rebuy any of their old movies if they don't want to. Upconverted DVDs to do not almost look as good. They aren't even fucking close to the same quality unless you have a shitty TV. TVs are coming down in price and a sound system is only as expensive as you want it to be.
I prefer not to have sex with my combo discs. That can be ruinous to both the discs and my genitals.
To address your point, though, uhm I don't really care how much they cost to produce as long as the consumer cost is the same. Currently, Combo HD-DVDs cost the same as Blu Ray discs. As the offering between a non-Combo HD-DVD and a Blu Ray disc is exactly the same right now, a combo HD-DVD offers more to a consumer. It's simple math.
Also, can you please explain what this even means? "including that their more expensive than a normal disc and you don't have a choice between the two." Don't have a choice of what? What do you mean by choice? The combo disc GIVES you a choice.
Also, there is no "higher chance of fucking up while playing." That is silly.
The cost to the consumer isn't the same though. Non combo discs normally come out at a price point $5 cheaper than combo discs and that was what I meant by you don't have a choice since movies are released either as a combo disc or as a normal HD DVD not both. Also maybe its just rumors but my experience and reading AVSforum seems to lead that combo discs have a much higher chance of not playing correctly.
I have many of both kind and a first-generation HD-DVD player. It's most likely rumors.
And I don't find the price difference between combo and non-combo discs to be true either. In fact, I've paid more for a single non-combo disc than a combo disc in some cases. Perhaps it's not very easy to quantify as movies seem to have arbitrary prices anyway.
The only thing the upconversion can do is sharpen the picture up a little. There's nothing it can do about all of the information lost because of the much higher compression. It's especially noticeable when watching a movie with a lot of nighttime scenes, the shadows on regular DVD look terrible, very pixelated. Whereas on any HD style of disk they look correct.
I only repurchase disks of my favorite movies, otherwise I netflix whatever I want. They carry just about all of the HD/Blue movies. The only proplem is with rereleases, they don't always get them.
I was kinda rooting for Sony on this one, I was interested in grabbing a PS3 and it would have sucked if the reason it was so expensive ended up being the loser, you know?
I have a 1080p TV, but all the players that can output to 1080p are still $300+. I'm waiting for $150 or less before taking that plunge.
This guy:
http://www.digeo.com/culture_management.aspx?id=1
Back in 2003, from a Sony press release:
While he's not there anymore, he works for Paul Allen now, he was a key guy in promoting Blu-Ray and as soon as I get married, he'll be "Uncle Mike".
I consider that outstandingly awesome.
Not even an issue, and it won't be an issue for at least 10-15 more years.
You may have phat pipes and a computer/360 to show these without downloading for 5 days, but the majority of the country is still on 56k.
And I don't think anybody's talking about repurchasing their entire collections this time around. The move will simply happen with people starting to buy HD discs exclusively, and maybe their favorites. I know the only BDs I've bought that were movies I already owned in one form or another were Blade Runner and The Fifth Element. Everything else I just purchased BD instead, like the new Die Hard, Crank, The Departed, etc.
JCRooks in the G&T thread on this topic says broadband is at 50%.
IIRC, neither of the formats currently support 1080p content. Your TV already has internal scalers that upconvert lower-res content to 1080p, so there's really no reason for you to pay for it twice.
Yeah? I wasn't aware of that. Definately some good news, and I'll probably be picking up a player, sooner, rather than later.
Probably still be HD-DVD rather than blu-ray. Battlestar Galactica is on HD-DVD. And I know I'll have a PS3 at some point, so there doesn't seem to be a reason to buy a stand-alone player.