Archived: Ask the Insiders: Judgment Day Edition

[makingmusic476]

Originally Posted by shamus

I know someone else already mentioned it, but I wonder what Penton is saving his #1000 post for?

Crap, I didn't even notice that! I knew he was close, but damn, 1 away.

Penton, don't bother answering my LotR question. Save this for something big!

Hopefully involving Warner...

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by coolmilo

Paidgeek,

There are many members on Blu-ray.com who purchased Resident Evil 3. There seems to be an issue with the audio where it displays Dolby Digital instead of True-HD. It seems that many of the people who are having the problem are using the Panasonic BD30 and Onkyo receiver. In my case I have the BD 30 and Integra 9.8 and my setup has the audio issue. I have not had any problems with any other Blu-ray disks so far. Do you have an idea for what the problem could be?

TIA

With the BD-30 if you turn on secondary audio for PiP (in the BD30's setup menu) it defaults to the DD track. To get TrueHD back you have to turn off the secondary audio in setup.

[elwaylite]

Originally Posted by TheRealBob

Insider questions:

If there is some truth to the rumors that a lot of people are mistakenly buying HD DVDs thinking they are compatible with DVD players and that a lot of these are returned, how are those numbers counted? Do they subtract off the returns at any point? Or do the sales just get counted and there's accounting for what happens after that?

Not an Insider but can offer insight. My father in law received 3 HD-DVD's over Christmas, all were combo discs which are counted as HDDVD sales. He's also bought two more of them thinking that since he had an upconvert and a HD tv, he could watch them in HD.

The fact they went with the name HD-DVD is just moronic and confusing.

[edge]

Question for both insiders and all.

Do you think that HD DVD combo discs are going to cause a problem ? Can a studio release just the combo and not a DVD to try and maximize dud sales ?

Not a chicken little post, just truly interested/concerned.

[binarymelon]

Originally Posted by edge

Question for both insiders and all.

Do you think that HD DVD combo discs are going to cause a problem ? Can a studio release just the combo and not a DVD to try and maximize dud sales ?

Not a chicken little post, just truly interested/concerned.

They could, but I don't think they would. The increased cost would effect sales too much.

[elwaylite]

Originally Posted by edge

Question for both insiders and all.

Do you think that HD DVD combo discs are going to cause a problem ? Can a studio release just the combo and not a DVD to try and maximize dud sales ?

Not a chicken little post, just truly interested/concerned.

They sure could. People might be po'd because of the price, BUT it would count to HDDVD's favor. I do not feel this is a realistic scenario at this point.

I do feel that any Combo disc total sales number is slightly suspect because of the errors in purchasing.

[stockstar1138]

i think i figured out penton's little riddle yesterday about his customers at the hairdresser place. it probably was nothing, but initially i dismissed it too, cause i didn't think it made sense, but if this was what he was referring too, than its great news and makes perfect sense.

the person getting the highlights is univesal, they want to go neutral

the new customer walking in to change colors, well who is newest guy in the industry, WARNERS NEW CEO, and what does he want, a change in his color (currently red and blu).

[edge]

Originally Posted by elwaylite

They sure could. People might be po'd because of the price, BUT it would count to HDDVD's favor. I do not feel this is a realistic scenario at this point.

I do feel that any Combo disc total sales number is slightly suspect because of the errors in purchasing.

I can tell you now as would others, that if that happens and the disc is only a combo, they would lose a DVD sale from me. I bought the Bourne Ultimatum on regular DVD, if it were a combo disc, I would not have bought it.

[DaViD Boulet]

If there is some truth to the rumors that a lot of people are mistakenly buying HD DVDs thinking they are compatible with DVD players and that a lot of these are returned, how are those numbers counted? Do they subtract off the returns at any point? Or do the sales just get counted and there's accounting for what happens after that?

On the same note, there are some stories that a lot of HD DVD players are being returned. Do those returns get subtracted off the sales?

Are there any stats available on HD DVD vs. Blu-ray returns, for software or hardware?

I'd love to know this too. I'm especially curious how "mis purchases" would be counted that *can't* be returned because of store policy not allowing opened-disc returns (ie, you get Planet Earth on HD DVD for Christmas because your friend thought it was a DVD for your HDTV... you open it and it won't play...and the store refused to take back the opened merchandise. Now what?)

[badboi]

Originally Posted by DaViD Boulet

I'd love to know this too. I'm especially curious how "mis purchases" would be counted that *can't* be returned because of store policy not allowing opened-disc returns (ie, you get Planet Earth on HD DVD for Christmas because your friend thought it was a DVD for your HDTV... you open it and it won't play...and the store refused to take back the opened merchandise. Now what?)

Ebay?

Read description:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Planet-Earth-HD-...QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.com/Planet-Earth-The...QQcmdZViewItem

[stockstar1138]

Originally Posted by edge

Question for both insiders and all.

Do you think that HD DVD combo discs are going to cause a problem ? Can a studio release just the combo and not a DVD to try and maximize dud sales ?

Not a chicken little post, just truly interested/concerned.

good question, but the answer is this isn't something to worry about. in fact, its already been done and was no big deal. Toshiba/MS have already thought of this and approached the studios and asked them to do this. Warner and Universal laughed in their faces, paramount was obligated by contract i believe to do a test run of just issuing a combo. it was for star trek season 1, it sold 7000 copies, no big deal at all. it flopped and paramount never has to do it again.

as far as a blockbuster goes, money will deter this. lets say a blockbuster movie sells 5 million copies at an avg. street price of $19.99, bump the price up to $29.99 (standard for a combo) and tell me how many sales you expect to lose because of the increase in price. i don't think it would be unreasonable to say 400k people simply won't pay $29.99 for a dvd, remember these are the people still not forking over the $ for an hdtv, a lot of them won't buy $30 dvds. next, are the people who know not to buy the red ones or blu ones, and will simply not get the news that the combo is the only release of the movie, look for it on dvd, not see it there and leave. id say at least 200k would do that. then you got the people who would say, im paying for something that i don't need, i won't buy that. well just say 300k. then there are the blu boys who would buy it on dvd, but won't buy this one. well say 50k. all the sudden they missed out on 1 million dvd sales, or 20 million dollars in dvd revenue, no hd dvd company this late in the game is willing to fork over that type of $, simply so that they can skew the numbers, because thats all they would be doing.

also, i would question if hd dvd has the infrastructure to produce that many hd dvds, they would be producing more dvds for this blockbuster combo than they have sold so far.

its not going to happen, don't worry about it.

[Innerloop]

Originally Posted by edge

Question for both insiders and all.

Do you think that HD DVD combo discs are going to cause a problem ? Can a studio release just the combo and not a DVD to try and maximize dud sales ?

Not a chicken little post, just truly interested/concerned.

Not only COULD they, they already HAVE. The Star Trek box-set was only released in HD-DVD Combo format.

The impact on sales was... not much.

But if they did this on a Day&Date big release it could be huge. But I don't expect them to do that.

[edge]

Originally Posted by Innerloop

Not only COULD they, they already HAVE. The Star Trek box-set was only released in HD-DVD Combo format.

The impact on sales was... not much.

But if they did this on a Day&Date big release it could be huge. But I don't expect them to do that.

Because of price point ? And forcing of format ?

[JasonS]

Originally Posted by edge

Because of price point ? And alienation of consumers ?

Price point is an obvious one. But replication is the biggest determinate. Transformers sold over 8 million copies on SDVD in it's first week. That would be more hi-def discs sold than both formats combined since inception. HD DVD cannot product that many discs right now, there's just no way that would be a viable option.

[edge]

Originally Posted by JasonS

Price point is an obvious one. But replication is the biggest determinate. Transformers sold over 8 million copies on SDVD in it's first week. That would be more hi-def discs sold than both formats combined since inception. HD DVD cannot product that many discs right now, there's just no way that would be a viable option.

Ahh, understood, that makes sense.

[Elandyll]

Plus as of now, adding the HD DVD part to a combo DVD / HD DVD disc wouldn't make sense and take profit from the DVD (alone) potential sale.
As long as the HDM market hasn't reached mass level, combos are mostly a gimmick (probably expensive one at that).
In the end, strongly promoting dual format can only further the adoption of HDM vs DVD, so I don't really think that's the road we want to take...

[john_nemesh]

Found this in another thread posted by Borris...

I know that they are DUD exclusive, but they just launched a website dedicated to what they are doing at CES at http://www.nbcuatces.com/. If you're at the show I would encourage you to stop by and be one of the thousands of people that ask them when they are going to go blu. Interesting note about their web site: they mention Blu-ray being a notable product introduction back in 2003...oddly from the Uni camp it and the Nintendo back in '85 are the only two that show up in bold on the site.


Read the last bit, and it really sounds like something is going down! Anyone have any thoughts on this?

[MerrickG]

I hope Penton has something exciting to say for his 1000th post!!!

[JasonS]

Originally Posted by merrick97

I hope Penton has something exciting to say for his 1000th post!!!

I wouldn't get your hopes it. It will probably be more flirtations with Mystik.

[mystiksuicide]

Originally Posted by JasonS

I wouldn't get your hopes it. It will probably be more flirtations with Mystik.

Hey what can I say I told all the other SG's on the site that I have either a studio executive or a hairdresser not sure which one in my fan club.

Either way I win I either get inside information or my hair done.