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So I got an HD-DVD player..

spacerobotspacerobot Registered User regular
edited February 2008 in Help / Advice Forum
So I got an HD-DVD player, and I didn't even know it. I actually got a laptop, that came with an HD-DVD player. This happened very recently, as in three days ago. I was pretty disappointed when I realized that it was an HD-DVD instead of blu-ray. My computer is an HP special edition something or the other, and I bought it at Best Buy.

So my question is: Is there anything I can do about it? Can I take it back to Best Buy and tell them that I was expecting blu-ray for high definition instead of HD-DVD? It's kind of like buying a TV-VCR combo, and then realizing that you got a TV-Beta Max combo instead.

Can anyone give me any pointers? Will Best Buy fix this problem? I feel slightly deceived, since HDDVD is going out.

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Posts

  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    There's not a lot you can do there. You can return it, but more than likely best buy is going to charge you a 10% restock fee (they're one of the few places that stil ldo that).

    Blu-Ray is still really expensive, and not really built in on new laptops yet. I doubt that it was printed as being blu-ray, so either the guy selling it to you was misinformed, which might help you return it without the restock fee, or you were misinformed when buying it.

    However, you've still got a DVD burner there, and there's 400 HD-DVD titles that are currently already 50% off, and will keep dropping over the course of the year to next to nothing, so I say stick with it.

    edit: Best buy isn't going to "fix" anything though. They didn't advertise it as blu-ray from what it seems like.

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  • mooshoeporkmooshoepork Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Here in Australia we have more laptops with bluray than HD DVD. You might be right, I'd take it back.

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  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    mooshoepork wrote: »
    Here in Australia we have more laptops with bluray than HD DVD. You might be right, I'd take it back.

    That's pretty cool, they're still "fuck-all" expensive and rare here.

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  • corcorigancorcorigan Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Acer stuck HD-DVDs in loads of their laptops. Ones with sub-HD (well ok, you could get a non-native 720p on it) screens and only VGA-out. I was impressed by some people's foolishness/lack of research in buying.

    It was a way of them adding £300 onto the price of an otherwise mediocre laptop.

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  • MustangMustang Arbiter of Unpopular Opinions Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Och! Sucks to be you, probably not much can be done about it, except return it without some kind of penalty fee. Either that or you could lump it and swap it out with a BR-ROM when they come down in price.

    Mustang on
  • spacerobotspacerobot Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    yeah, I guess there isn't much i can do about it at this point. It wasn't advertised specifically with a Blu-ray, but I don't think it was advertised specifically with HD-DVD either.

    Someone mentioned that theres a library of over 500+HDDVD titles, which isn't too bad... and I don't buy many DVD's anyway, so i'll survive.
    how long do you think HD-DVD's will continue to be sold?

    Other than that one thing, It's a very nice computer, and I'm extremely happy with it. So I think I'll keep it.
    Thanks for the advice though!

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  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    HD DVD's are no longer being produced, save for what's already at the printers over the next month or so tops. There's about 500 out now, and by the end of the year most of them will be about five bucks or less if you dig online. The only catch there is that it's a dead format now, so you're going to need to eventually rip them to a hard drive and burn them to a blu-ray disc (we're talking YEARS down the road here) if you want to watch them, since digging up an HD-DVD player in three years is going to be kind of tough.

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  • kathoskathos Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    I just bought a 360 HD DVD drive, it was $50 and a fun accessory to own. :D

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  • FallingmanFallingman Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Check the ports on any HD/blue ray laptop. A friend of mine was looking at one only to find it didnt have an HDMI port... That seemed really odd to me.

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  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    kathos wrote: »
    I just bought a 360 HD DVD drive, it was $50 and a fun accessory to own. :D

    Those are a very worthwhile investment if you have a 360

    1) Extra drive to play games and movies on so you're not overheating your 360 or tearing up discs.

    2) Huge library of movies for cheap

    3) It will hook up to a macbook air or work as a general external drive.

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  • Local H JayLocal H Jay Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Wait wait wait... that drive will play 360 games too?
    Dude.

    Dude.
    What happens if you put a game in both drives at the same time?

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  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Local H Jay wrote: »
    Wait wait wait... that drive will play 360 games too?
    Dude.

    Dude.
    What happens if you put a game in both drives at the same time?

    Maybe I was misinformed? I know it plays and upconverts DVD's, so I assumed you could run your games from it as well.

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  • VeeveeVeevee WisconsinRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    amateurhour wrote: »
    Local H Jay wrote: »
    Wait wait wait... that drive will play 360 games too?
    Dude.

    Dude.
    What happens if you put a game in both drives at the same time?

    Maybe I was misinformed? I know it plays and upconverts DVD's, so I assumed you could run your games from it as well.

    It does not run the games, just movies. It does work as an external DVD drive on PC though.

    As for movies, I would recommend only getting the throw away movies we all purchase. The ones you watch once and never see again. That way when you do get a Blu-Ray drive, it wont hurt to replace your movies as you wont care about the ones you currently have. I would normally recommend getting Planet Earth, but you will regret purchasing it twice when you finally get Blu-Ray

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  • MustangMustang Arbiter of Unpopular Opinions Registered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Funny thing is they're still slogging top price for HD-DVD titles at my local....you'd think they'd be trying to dump the stock asap.

    Mustang on
  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Mustang wrote: »
    Funny thing is they're still slogging top price for HD-DVD titles at my local....you'd think they'd be trying to dump the stock asap.

    It's coming. The players are going to hit rock bottom before the DVD's, since the profit margin is lower on a dvd.

    I'm getting the 360 drive just so I can rip all the HD-DVD's to my PC, and not have to buy them all on blu ray for $30 a piece when they eventually get re-released.

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  • CreepyCreepy Tucson, AzRegistered User regular
    edited February 2008
    Is the drive modular? It might be and then down the road you can swap it out for a Blu Ray drive if it turns out you actually need one.

    I still think Blu Ray is going to take a couple years to catch on with mainstream consumers so in the meantime it's still a dvd drive/writer, etc.

    Just don't go and buy any HD-DVD movies.

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