Blu-Ray competing standard

[markw]

I'm really excited to see this blu ray technology. I did recently buy a dvd recorder since I know I can't way for blu ray to catch on to get away from videotape. Still I look forward to this and figure by 2005 or so it will be down in price and more commonplace and with HDTV also getting cheaper and more common it should start to catch on. I know some people say blu ray will never catch on but I think it will unless some other standard (such as a 100 gig standard) comes out at a good price before it has a chance to catch on. Plus I'm excited about it being built to record so there won't be problems like the current -r/+r and not knowing what if either will work on each player. I assume pc drives will come out as well and maybe like with the +/- dvd's they will be cheaper and more commonplace first.

Anyway, before I ramble on too much how do most people feel about the competing standard from Toshiba/NEC? I hope we don't see two standards with this and I know it could be more of a problem than the current +/- standards. It seems Tohsiba/Nec won't require a cartridge which I kind of like since it takes up most space but the cartridge would protect it so much. Also, I hear it'll hold 40 gigs. Something tells me those this 'competing standard' won't ever catch on.

[markw]

I did some reading on this on the internet and from what I see the competing AOD standard is the one the DVD Forum adopted. The only bad thing I see with this is with their backing maybe it will emerge as a 2nd standard. I am sure both of these standards have their good and bad but seems the DVD Forum wants to work together with BluRay to come up with a single standard but hopefully it won't turn into two standards. One advantage is it seems AOD won't be out for sometime next year and that it has less backing (only two companies if I remember right)

[flyingdutchman]

Just wondering where you are from markw. Do you live in Japan? If not, how does your recorder work outside of Japan?

[VanDerDekken]

I hope that all the companies involved come up with ONE standard. We, the consumers, really have enough of competing standards. Moreover it is sometimes bad bussiness practice. In the past Sony killed its own Betamax and today we are stuck with 2/3 DVD-standards

It is costings us heaps of time to research the net and all kinds of magazines to find out the cons and pro's. In the DVD struggle now Sony and LG and others come up with a mult-format DVD. Waste of time and money and not cheaper for us.

Of course info-magazines and info-website love this controversy as this gives them a hot item to write about.

It is, by the way, interesting that the Blu-Ray recorder of Sony can stomach DVD-R and not DVD+R. Mmm, seems to me that perhaps the way to go is a DVD-R/RW drive.

My 2 Cents,
VanDerDekken

[James]

I'm pretty excited about this format, been following it for a while now.

Marc, the AOD standard, as far as I know, has not been adopted by the DVD-Forum. However, it has been presented to the forum for consideration. Blu-ray was not presented to the DVD-Forum as the companies argue it is not a DVD. Which is true!

Also, the AOD format has less capacity than Blu-ray, you mentioned 40GB but that would be dual layer - Panasonic has already shown a prototype for a 50GB Blu-ray disc.

I think Blu-ray will win against Toshiba/NEC with the AOD as Blu-ray is already out - ie the standard, licensing and now a product. Also, with names like SONY and Panasonic backing the stardards, it will have a larger penetration into the consumer market.

The thing I am concerned about is a new format developed by SONY that's based on Blu-ray but is a PC drive for backup. Not sure on compatability issue on that.

I agree, that the only done side with Blu-ray is that it's a cartridge (ie bigger), so will have trouble extending it's marketability into consumer items like laptops.

[Bob the Gerbil]

Hi all !!
Well i have to admit, Blu-ray is something very special, but my only concern is what's next. With all these companies tring to make things bigger and better, when is it all going to stop. I'm not against progress, we all have to move forward, but sometime i think we move too fast for ourselves.

Look how far pcs have come in the past 30 years, who would have thought they can do so much and be part of our existance, maybe all this technology advancement is stopping us from evolving as normal people, but then again, computers, e-mails, pda's are normal.

You spend you money on the latest thing, only to see it superceded in a few weeks time and have old technology, bit like "Keeping up with the Jones's"

Sorry if it sounds like a grumble, it's not, i love technology, i sell it, but lets keep our feet on the ground and the human touch about us.

[Anonymous]

Also, the AOD format has less capacity than Blu-ray, you mentioned 40GB but that would be dual layer - Panasonic has already shown a prototype for a 50GB Blu-ray disc.

AOD is 40 GB dual layer Single Sided
BD is 50 GB dual layer Single Sided

That's not that much of a difference. AOD is going to be a lot cheaper than BD with regards to player/recorders AND media. It's using existing DVD infrastructure. AOD will be compatible with HD-DVD out of the box.

[Anonymous]

Contrary to popular belief or hopes, AOD supports SIGNIFICANTLY less data capacity for those readonly kind of dual-layer discs that would be released by Hollywood studios. Yes, up to 20GB per side recordable format, but apparently only 15GB per side for movies that hollywood might print.

So if an when both technologies start printing movies, we tend to compare to today's
DVD9 discs (single-side, dual-layer). And in that comparison, DVD9 is 9GB, AOD is 30GB and Blu-Ray is 50GB.

Generally, DVD9 from Hollywood can be de-interlaced to produce roughly 24-fps of progressive visual quality at around 640x480 resolution. HD "DVD" will give us 3 to 6 times the visual resolution/detail, giving 1280x720 or 1920x1080 .

So here are some general rules. The *DATA-RATE* for high def is up there... and blu-ray is designed to support it, as well as AOD. But consider capacity, and rough calculation and here is what hollywood gets to do:

AOD 30GB: holds 2.22 hours of video or probably 2 hours video + audio
BLU-RAY 50GB: holds 3.70 hours of video or easily 3 hours video + audio

so, throw in EVERYTHING else on these DVDs and you have an easy rule for the industry. Blu-Ray sports 2-hours per disc no problem. AOD does not. You would have to make "superbit" like prints without extra feature to hold 2 hours. That means the studio then gets to decide "ok, we're 20 minutes over budget, let's make it a 2-disc set" which is more expensive, especially in the early years of any new format. BLU-RAY will only mkae that a question for anything over 3 hours.

Go blu-ray. My only questions is, screw the recorders, where are the players?

[Anonymous]

Good point about the differences between AOD and Blu-ray.

I'm glad someone else realises this.

The only thing going for AOD is that it's cheaper to set up - ie slight modification of existing DVD lines. Both are backward compatible, though not sure how the cartridge things gonna work!

Hurry up and bring it on! I'm ready and willing to purchase into Blu-ray.


James.

[Poya]

Originally Posted by markw

I'm really excited to see this blu ray technology. I did recently buy a dvd recorder since I know I can't way for blu ray to catch on to get away from videotape. Still I look forward to this and figure by 2005 or so it will be down in price and more commonplace and with HDTV also getting cheaper and more common it should start to catch on. I know some people say blu ray will never catch on but I think it will unless some other standard (such as a 100 gig standard) comes out at a good price before it has a chance to catch on. Plus I'm excited about it being built to record so there won't be problems like the current -r/+r and not knowing what if either will work on each player. I assume pc drives will come out as well and maybe like with the +/- dvd's they will be cheaper and more commonplace first.

Anyway, before I ramble on too much how do most people feel about the competing standard from Toshiba/NEC? I hope we don't see two standards with this and I know it could be more of a problem than the current +/- standards. It seems Tohsiba/Nec won't require a cartridge which I kind of like since it takes up most space but the cartridge would protect it so much. Also, I hear it'll hold 40 gigs. Something tells me those this 'competing standard' won't ever catch on.

It was certainly worth it.