Blu Ray may have already won high definition disc battle

[erdega79]

before it began
NIce summary on why blu ray will be the next big thing.

http://www.gizmodo.com/archives/blur...won-023974.php

[Kitsunebi]

Some potentially bad news for ya...

http://businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnfl...5297_db002.htm

[erdega79]

That article appears to be more sensationalist than anything of substance really.
The said article wants to present the so called format war in far more even and dramatic terms than it really is in order to make up a story and a conflict.

One of the misinformations in the article is that hd dvd is similar to dvd while the implication is that blu ray is not which is simply false. As of now both of these formats can play legacy dvd's but none of them can play in dvd players. But if you are asking people to upgrade their hardware and buy and invest in new technology it makes sense to make a full step upgrade which is blu ray especially with its versatility of being upgradeable for the future as oposed to halfway technology which is hd dvd which is fixed and limited. To make my point more illustrated, when going from vhs to dvd which was a full step upgrade , consumers didn't settle for halfway technology upgrades such as laserdisc because frankly it wasn't worth it.

Another misinformation is the cost. I am not sure about hd dvd but blu ray is supposed to be of similar cost to today's dvd. I am not sure about initial cost and even if we accept that blu ray would cost more in the initial phase , it woule be worth it given it's larger capacity. Currently they maxed out at 30GB AND 54GB for hd dvd and blu ray respectivelly which obviously means that you have to stick almost 2 hd dvd's for one blu ray, not to mention that blu ray is expendable in multilayers going from 100GB anf further in the future

The 3 studios mentioned have annonymously said that they would support hd dvd but no where do they say that they won't support blu ray which makes perfect sense since blu ray has far more active supporters right now.

But if and when Blu Ray is accepted as one format for next generation discs they would all have to support blu ray as it's far more versatile and supported technology .

[Kitsunebi]

That's why I only said it was "potentially" bad. :wink:

Toshiba is still touting HD-DVD advantages that no longer exist, but just because it's the inferior format doesn't mean people wont buy it. Beta was clearly superior than VHS after all. Most people don't know anything about these new formats (heck, many of them think DVDs are already HD quality and they are in for a disappointment).

If Blu-ray and HD-DVD both show up on store shelves, people will instantly know what HD-DVD is. Toshiba and NEC still have a shot at suckering the market in, but I recognize that Blu-ray has a tremendous amount of support from quite a few hardware makers.

I still think HD-DVD is dead in the water, however HD-DVD isn't going to give up without a fight. Also, we can't forget that the movie industry isn't always eye-to-eye with the consumers' concerns and I wouldn't put it past them to support the format that provides the least benefit to the consumer directly. We also have to consider that the vast majority of consumers out there don't have a clue.

Even the early adopters are split. Some want the superior format, others want to support the principal of the DVD Forum. At this point I'm not truly worried, but all things should be considered.

[iceman]

Even if Blu-ray is the better format, HD-DVD can still win since they can produce both the discs and the players cheaper. Both Hollywood and consumers like to think with their pockets...

And as mentioned, DVD is already an established term, so consumers will recognize "DVD" in "HD-DVD". The last big advantage that I can see that HD-DVD has, is that it will most likely be backed by Warner.

The battle will probably go all the way to the stores, with both HD-DVD and Blu-ray players/movies available. In the stores consumers will choose between price and what movies are available. The price is an advantage for HD-DVD, but the movies for Blu-ray (if the Hollywood contracts are non-exclusive).

[Marwin]

The initial costs of producing BDs might be higher than HD-DVDs, as they will need to upgrade/replace existing production lines, while HD-DVD can make better use of existing lines. However, if Blu-ray can get their volumes up quickly this will not become much of an issue.

If the players/recorders will be cheaper still remains to be seen. Remember that the Blu-ray products currently on the Japanese market are recorders, and the prices HD-DVD has stated publically is for players, which should be cheaper to make.

I agree that the name HD-DVD looks really nice, and as it includes the term DVD it should be easily recognizable. However, try to say it out loud and you will notice how hard it is (5 syllabels!). Compare this to Blu-ray or BD (2 syllabels), HD-DVD just doesn't flow as naturally.

The studios will definitely be one of the most important factors in deciding the winner, and Warner will probably line up with the HD-DVD camp. However, as long as the other studios don't make their movies exclusive to HD-DVD, Blu-ray will have an advantage if they make their Columbia Tristar/MGM titles exclusive to Blu-ray. Another factor is how aggressive the various movie studios will be when the formats are launched. Some of the movie studios don't really care which format wins, and they are happy selling DVDs, so they might hold off until one of the formats starts to dominate before releasing any of their better titles. Whoever has more well known movies in the beginning will surely get a head start, and I think that Sony will make sure that Blu-ray starts off with a lot of good movies.