Blu-ray - What a major disappointment

[JimPullan]

Yesterday, Blu-Ray is a no show at LG's event, Pioneer Elite is having coroprate financial problems, Sony keeps postponing its introduction, movie releases are contunuously delayed, these first players are, at best, marginal, and so on.

Knowing months ago, we were back into a scenereo like VHS vs BETA war, and I was optomistic that the major player in the Blu-Ray Group, SONY would not allow history to repeat itself, especially seeing Sony buy MGM for 3.3 Billion dollars, to enhance their offerings of Blu-Ray DVD's along with their existing libraries. As we moved through the summer months, we here on the Forum were also optomistic, that the Blu-Ray consortium would win the day, have superior products, their players and their movies. As we entered the fall we started seeing problems and issues surface over and over again, while concurrently the HD-DVD group is establishing and gaining a very nice foothold with excellent movie introductions, a player with glitches resolved already, players in abundance from every mass merchandiser nationwide, now they bundle three HD-DVD's with every player sold, will be introducing their 1080p player, the X2A before Christmas, a second generation player, with zero issues and including HDMi-1.3 to boot !!!

Now the excitement has subsided here on the Forum. Sony seems to be placing all it chips on the PS3, not the BDP-S1. Dragging their feet with an introduction date for the BDP-S1 'sometime' in December shows me the utter failure of the Blu-Ray Group to achieve an objective. They have activity, without accomplishment. Failing to capitalize on the holiday shopping season will certainly place Pioneer in risk of survival, and Sony's credibility forever ruined. Even if Toshiba lost the tabletop player war, they will still come out a winner, making HD-DVD drives for computers, being in bed with Microsoft.

It appears that the HD-DVD participants are laughing their way to the bank, other forums certainly are laughing at us, saying I told you so.

Have I missed anything yet ? This Holiday . . . Bah Humbug to the grinch - SONY and PIONEER ELITE . Where's my Toshiba X2A ?


Jim Pullan
Audio Excellence
Ocala, FL

[GaS]

Originally Posted by JimPullan

Have I missed anything yet ? This Holiday . . . Bah Humbug to the grinch - SONY and PIONEER ELITE . Where's my Toshiba X2A ?

I don't see any lack of excitement on this board. PS3 will come out, the other players will come out and HD-DVD will be left with their Toshiba. The people will choose, maybe HD-DVD, maybe BD, and maybe nothing. If you are so down and out, go join the other side.

[Spankey]

It appears that the HD-DVD participants are laughing their way to the bank, other forums certainly are laughing at us, saying I told you so.

Are they?

What did they tell us? Go enjoy your Toshiba and all the Universal titles you can. In the meantime, I'm enjoying Blu-ray and all it has to offer from every studio except Universal. Ta ta..

[Josh]

I'm not sure what you are looking at, but your facts are wrong. The A2 was supposed to be out in October. Its now November and its no where to be found. Does that mean HD DVD is failing?

And with the delay of the A2, what makes you think the XA2 will be out on time, especially when they have said late December/early January this whole time?

The Sony BDP-S1 is a Pioneer product, so they will both be delayed if one gets delayed. The only player Sony is worried about is the PS3.

If anything, with the slew of 4th quarter titles being announced for Blu-ray, the momentum is clearly in their corner while HD DVD sits and waits.

[Jeff®]

[Spankey]

Yeah, I think we need to add barf alerts to some of these posts..

[JTK]

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=3243

LG is a non factor until probably Valentine's Day.

Frankly: Who cares? And yes, I'd say the same thing if they were HD-DVD only. I view LG the same way I view Toshiba: Doesn't mean much to me.



Yeah, I'm really worried and heartbroken about BD and its prospects because a second rate company LG didn't show some player at some rinky dink little show.


The HD-DVD fanboys and zealots are "laughing all the way to the bank" regardless of anything else simply because they believe nothing but lies, delusions, and wishing-upon-a-star fantasies.

I expect a lot better from you Jim than the seeming FUD/Doom and gloom that I feel like I'm reading in this thread.

[JimPullan]

Originally Posted by GaS

I don't see any lack of excitement on this board. PS3 will come out, the other players will come out and HD-DVD will be left with their Toshiba. The people will choose, maybe HD-DVD, maybe BD, and maybe nothing. If you are so down and out, go join the other side.

These are the facts to date. I have always been a Blu-Ray supporter and will acquire the BDP-S2 next year when it comes out. Down and out has nothing to do with seeing the disappointing start of Blu-Ray. As important as this is to both Sony and Pioneer, you would have thought they would have had their ducks in a row, done things right from the onset, been on time, and blown away the competition. This did not, and as up to today, has not occured. Can and will they recover ? . . . . Time will tell.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by JimPullan

Yesterday, Blu-Ray is a no show at LG's event, Pioneer Elite is having coroprate financial problems, Sony keeps postponing its introduction, movie releases are contunuously delayed, these first players are, at best, marginal, and so on.

Mostly fact at the beginning with nebulous and subjective opinion at the end.

Knowing months ago, we were back into a scenereo like VHS vs BETA war, and I was optomistic that the major player in the Blu-Ray Group, SONY would not allow history to repeat itself, especially seeing Sony buy MGM for 3.3 Billion dollars, to enhance their offerings of Blu-Ray DVD's along with their existing libraries. As we moved through the summer months, we here on the Forum were also optomistic, that the Blu-Ray consortium would win the day, have superior products, their players and their movies.

As we entered the fall we started seeing problems and issues surface over and over again, while concurrently the HD-DVD group is establishing and gaining a very nice foothold with excellent movie introductions, a player with glitches resolved already, players in abundance from every mass merchandiser nationwide, now they bundle three HD-DVD's with every player sold, will be introducing their 1080p player, the X2A before Christmas, a second generation player, with zero issues and including HDMi-1.3 to boot !!!

Now the excitement has subsided here on the Forum. Sony seems to be placing all it chips on the PS3, not the BDP-S1. Dragging their feet with an introduction date for the BDP-S1 'sometime' in December shows me the utter failure of the Blu-Ray Group to achieve an objective. They have activity, without accomplishment. Failing to capitalize on the holiday shopping season will certainly place Pioneer in risk of survival, and Sony's credibility forever ruined. Even if Toshiba lost the tabletop player war, they will still come out a winner, making HD-DVD drives for computers, being in bed with Microsoft.

It appears that the HD-DVD participants are laughing their way to the bank, other forums certainly are laughing at us, saying I told you so.

Have I missed anything yet ? This Holiday . . . Bah Humbug to the grinch - SONY and PIONEER ELITE . Where's my Toshiba X2A ?


Jim Pullan
Audio Excellence
Ocala, FL

Which Blu-Ray forum have you been on?

Furthermore: Any of BD's issues were way back in the summer and it's been getting noticeably better, on every front, since late September thereabouts.

Most of their QA issues have already been eliminated and the Sony and Pioneer players are coming out late November, early December and hopefully, their QA will be excellent and certain futureproofing will be in place.

I'm sure I don't need to get into the potential impact the PS3 will have starting in a few weeks and the plethora of great software that's already been coming out from most of the major studios.

So I ask you again: Where is this doom and gloom coming from?

No offense, but your thread title kind of has that FUD glow going for it and sets a tone that maybe you weren't looking for here.

[JimPullan]

Calm down JTK. Every Forum member has the right and priveledge to voice he's or her opinion ragarding contemporary issues, rightly or wrongly perceived, understood or misunderstood. Yes, with that right to convey what one feels, is the responsibility for such communication. Other members can comment on that post, countering with their opinion, supporting their position as they feel led. This does not however provide open season on the forum poster, his intelligence, his personality, or his mental state. Your comments and opinions are welcomed and valued. Please just keep away from the personal attacks. I'd appreciate it. Thank you . . . . . [Jim]

[JTK]

Couldn't be less personal or emotional.

I just took exception to what I perceived being some suspect opinions being passed off as facts. I feel like maybe you started off on the wrong foot with the thread title.

Maybe I read wrong.

[JimPullan]

Originally Posted by JTK

Believe me: A person has to be on illegal substances to be any calmer than I am on a regular basis, including now.





No one has said or suggested otherwise.

The problem occurs when a person tries to pass of misinformation and opinions as facts.




And when people try to pass off opinions and FUD as facts they are going to get responses that they definitely aren't going to be thrilled with, and rightfully so.

That's the only "open season" that has happened here.




It all speaks for itself.

There's certainly has the appearance of something off kilter on occasions. Post and thread histories speak for themselves to that end.







No personal attacks have happened here, at least by me.

The only person who's had problems with personal attacks around here in the past, as I linked to one prominent example, is you.

Please don't try to deflect off the subject matter in this thread in a discussion you're doing very poorly in by trying to turn this on me. It just isn't going to work.

You made some very poor arguments and commentary and tried to pass those off as facts. That's where you went wrong. Nothing more, nothing less.

Couldn't be less personal or emotional.

OK, thank you for your comments

[Josh]

Calm down guys. Jim should know that posting anything against Blu-ray in a Blu-ray forum is going to cause an uproar. Just try to keep it civil and on topic (not saying it has gone here yet, but I am predicting it might).

[JimPullan]

Originally Posted by JTK

I don't care if he posted something "against BD" or not. Both formats have their ups and downs and I think most of us know that.


The only exception I'm taking here is that he basically posted some FUD and doom and gloom commentary/opinion and tried to pass the whole thing off as fact.

That's it. Beyond that, it's all good.

Jim has had plenty of great outings around here. This just isn't one of them, at least thus far.

I will not withold any of my comments or opinions as I feel led to share, but I will in the future, for the benefit of yourself or others, preface and conclude my comments with "IMO" so if you choose to bypass them, that's the alert to do so.

Again, thank you for your contributions, I've enjoyed them very much and will continue to do so.

Jim

[JTK]

Originally Posted by JimPullan

Again, thank you for your contributions, I've enjoyed them very much and will continue to do so.

Jim

You, too. Everyone has hits and misses.

[iceman]

I think the momentum is clearly back on Blu-ray's side (has it ever been on HD-DVD's side?) with several recent BD quality releases.

Blu-ray
-------
* X-men, Kingdom of Heaven coming soon.
* PlayStation 3 coming soon.
* Pioneer and Sony's standalone players coming soon.
* Look at the CE support.
* Look at the movie studio support.

HD-DVD
--------
* New player coming soon(?) for $1000.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by Iceman

I think the momentum is clearly back on Blu-ray's side (has it ever been on HD-DVD's side?)

To be fair: Yes.

When they launched back in March/April they were basically uncontested until June/July.

Then BD had its early stumbling and bumblings with some fo the early discs (mostly first party Sony discs) and the Samsung players with the faulty NR issue.

So thanks to all those things: Hd-DVD has had a nice 5-6 months out in the sun.


But what I don't appreciate is when people (no one here) are disingenuous to keep things in a time warp like we never moved past June.

Things are worlds different now already for BD than they were back in June and that contrast is only going to increase steadily from this day forth.

So yes, NOW I daresay: Momentum is cleary with Blu-Ray regardless of whether or not LG wants to bother with first gen or come in later.

LG may very well come in for second gen and bypass first gen altogether. Who can blame them?


But I'm FAR more interested in seeing where companies like Denon/Marantz and Onkyo/Integra finally land, since they're technically listed under both formats.

... with several recent BD quality releases.

Blu-ray
-------
* X-men, Kingdom of Heaven coming soon.
* PlayStation 3 coming soon.
* Pioneer and Sony's standalone players coming soon.
* Look at the CE support.
* Look at the movie studio support.

HD-DVD
--------
* New player coming soon(?) for $1000.

HD-DVD has two new rushed Toshiba "second gen players" and that's it. There's simply no other concrete, big news for them whatsoever. RCA will probably whip up some clones again. Some decent things going on in the PC side with Lite-On and HP, but really...what else is there?


They have some nice titles to be sure, but unless something amazing happens, that 40 percent studio support is going to be stretched after a point.


Contrary to the completely unsubstantiated rumors and gossip that HD-DVD zealots believe like Gospel on this concept of Disney and/or Fox supporting HD-DVD anytime soon...I'd easily place good money on the table that says Universal will start supporting both formats within the next 6-12 months.

Universal blinking is far more highly probable than Fox or Disney blinking.

[Rob Tomlin]

Originally Posted by JimPullan

Yesterday, Blu-Ray is a no show at LG's event, Pioneer Elite is having coroprate financial problems, Sony keeps postponing its introduction, movie releases are contunuously delayed, these first players are, at best, marginal, and so on.

Wow, lots of stuff in your first paragraph!

Yes, it was a surprise that LG didn't have a BD player, or even an announcement at their event. But how big of an issue is this? I guess there are some people that were waiting for LG to release a BD player in the hope that it would be cheaper than the currently available BD players, so I agree that this is obviously not exactly good news for BD. But it certainly isn't devastating either.

As for Pioneer- what do their "financial problems" have to do with BD? Non issue.

Sony's repeated postponement of their player- I agree, bad for BD. Bad for Sony. Get it out already!

What BD movie releases are being delayed? Several HD-DVD releases have been delayed as well.

The initial BD players are "marginal"? Compared to what? The Toshiba's? I think not.

Knowing months ago, we were back into a scenereo like VHS vs BETA war, and I was optomistic that the major player in the Blu-Ray Group, SONY would not allow history to repeat itself, especially seeing Sony buy MGM for 3.3 Billion dollars, to enhance their offerings of Blu-Ray DVD's along with their existing libraries. As we moved through the summer months, we here on the Forum were also optomistic, that the Blu-Ray consortium would win the day, have superior products, their players and their movies. As we entered the fall we started seeing problems and issues surface over and over again, while concurrently the HD-DVD group is establishing and gaining a very nice foothold with excellent movie introductions, a player with glitches resolved already, players in abundance from every mass merchandiser nationwide, now they bundle three HD-DVD's with every player sold, will be introducing their 1080p player, the X2A before Christmas, a second generation player, with zero issues and including HDMi-1.3 to boot !!!

Whoa! Where to start? Why would you say Toshiba will introduce their 1080p player before Xmas with "zero issues"? How could you possibly know that? The player isn't even released yet.

Look, I agree that Sony has dropped the ball on several issues, including the continued delay of their BD player, the less than stellar quality of their early BD releases, and the fact that they are lagging behind in terms of the number of movies that they have/will release this year. I want them to do better. But it isn't the end of the world either, much less the end of the format war!

You say that Toshiba "had its glitches resolved already". I don't think so. People are still having issues with it locking up/skipping. Firmware releases have NOT helped in this regard.

Now the excitement has subsided here on the Forum.

It has?

Sony seems to be placing all it chips on the PS3, not the BDP-S1. Dragging their feet with an introduction date for the BDP-S1 'sometime' in December shows me the utter failure of the Blu-Ray Group to achieve an objective. They have activity, without accomplishment. Failing to capitalize on the holiday shopping season will certainly place Pioneer in risk of survival, and Sony's credibility forever ruined.

Again, this is a valid criticism. Who isn't disappointed that the BDP-S1 has been continually delayed? But, unlike HD-DVD, there are several other BD players to choose from! The Sony player will get here, it's just a matter of patience. Something that I agree is hard to have when it comes to getting a new BD player.

Even if Toshiba lost the tabletop player war, they will still come out a winner, making HD-DVD drives for computers, being in bed with Microsoft.

Point?

It appears that the HD-DVD participants are laughing their way to the bank, other forums certainly are laughing at us, saying I told you so.

What are you talking about? "Laughing their way to the bank"? I don't get it. "Saying I told you so"? Told us so about what? Is the format war over? Did I miss that?

Have I missed anything yet ? This Holiday . . . Bah Humbug to the grinch - SONY and PIONEER ELITE . Where's my Toshiba X2A ?

Yes, I think you missed quite a bit. That said, again, I understand being disappointed in having these players delayed. But it isn't reason for complete doom and gloom, and for thinking the format war is over, either.

Enjoy your X2A!

[Gastown]

Originally Posted by JTK

HD-DVD has two new rushed Toshiba "second gen players" and that's it. There's simply no other concrete, big news for them whatsoever. RCA will probably whip up some clones again. Some decent things going on in the PC side with Lite-On and HP, but really...what else is there?


They have some nice titles to be sure, but unless something amazing happens, that 40 percent studio support is going to be stretched after a point.

Hello

New to this forum but not the HD DVD/Blue Ray Format war. Thought I would join this forum and get some perspective.

Regarding this post when you mentioned "what else is there?". What about the 360 add on and the fact that its supported by M$ which could buy and sell sony 100 times over? Not to mention that regardless of Toshiba's marketing plan M$ has a large budget to promote this format. I think its reasonable to assume if M$ really doesnt want to loose they have the power to put a big fight.

Is it reasonable to assume that someone who buys a 360 add on is more likely to buy a HD DVD then someone who owns a PS3 is to buy a BD tittle? That logic comes from that fact that a 360 add on only serves one purpose...to watch HD DVD. At this point by all accounts Add on preorders are through the roof.

Consider me neutral on this war at this point, but this cant be overlooked.

[JimPullan]

Originally Posted by Rob Tomlin

Enjoy your X2A!

You made valid points. Thank you. Yes I'll be enjoying both formats hopefully soon. Hopefully soon, hopefully soon, hopefully soon.