Do you see digital as the future and if so, does that spell the nd for dedicated HT?

[Steedeel]

As the title says, digital and OTT is ideal for portable devices. Do you see HT dying out as more and more people switch to smartphones for movie watching.

[crackinhedz]

Will Playstation & Xbox disappear with the use of games on the iphone/android apps? ...no chance.

I cannot forsee my family and I huddled around my phone to watch movies, of course the HT will always be around.

My opinion of course.

[crackinhedz]

However I do see them complimenting each other, as I like to stream from my portable device occasionally or control my HT with the phone/tablet.

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by crackinhedz

Will Playstation & Xbox disappear with the use of games on the iphone/android apps? ...no chance.

I cannot forsee my family and I huddled around my phone to watch movies, of course the HT will always be around.

My opinion of course.

Going into more depth, I think people are becoming so attached to their mobile devices that the family viewing scene will completely disapear within the next decade. Each person will have discreet buds and a phone/tablet or Even a smartwatch.

I hate what digital could potentially do to the HT scene.

[OI8T12]

Never. I will never give up my home theater. Sound effects to me are just as important to me as the movie itself. I suppose you can use headphones, but nothing compares to a nice rumble from the subwoofer. How are you going to produce the sound of bullets flying around the room? It ain't happening.

[crackinhedz]

I think you mean portable rather than digital. Sure digital means easier portability, but it wont signal the end of HT.

Big screens will always dominate the movie experience.

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by crackinhedz

I think you mean portable rather than digital. Sure digital means easier portability, but it wont signal the end of HT.

Big screens will always dominate the movie experience.

I see them as the same thing. Digital means smartphones and tablets (soon smartwatches) to me.

[crackinhedz]

Originally Posted by Steedeel

I see them as the same thing. Digital means smartphones and tablets (soon smartwatches) to me.

Digital is 1's and 0's, binary code.

Smartphones and Tablets are portable devices enabled by the technology of digital processing.


In that same sense my Plasma is digital, my PS4 is digital, my HTPC is digital etc.

But they're not portable.

I do get what you're trying to say, and who knows in the future we could all be watching movies from a smart-chip in our brains.

smart-chip

...but in this lifetime I don't see the HT experience going away any time soon.

[bigshot]

I think home theaters as in TV sets and blu-ray players is going to go away, but watching programs in the home on a big screen isn't. TV, home audio, gaming and computer will all merge into one thing, and instead of sitting on the couch to watch TV and sitting in a desk chair to access the internet, it will morph into a comfortable chair with a lap desk for the wireless input devices.

I think you'll see these media centers in the home become a hub for music, movies, games and the internet that streams programming to mobile devices. Those mobile devices will just be simple "dumb" streaming receivers / controllers. They won't have a lot of storage or complex functionality because the media server will be doing all the hard and heavy work.

The content on these home media servers will be monetized and sold on a pay per view or subscription basis with a single click. The media providers will offer subsidized discounts on the server hardware and screen just to get it into the home, the way phones come at a discount if you sign up for a contract.

Eventually, this will become a medium unto itself, and the content won't be seen as "movies" "tv shows" or "games" any more. The programming will be interactive and not so linear in the way people view the programs. They will be more like apps than movies.

And of course, porn will be a big business for this new medium at first.

[joie]

Everything now known will become obsolete when we can see video projected directly onto our retinas, with the ability to sit (virtually) at any distance from the screen and configure (virtually) the screen's size.

edit: there might also be a semi- transparent mode, so we could drive or walk around while watching a movie. You heard it here first! The future is just around the corner!

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by crackinhedz

Digital is 1's and 0's, binary code.

Smartphones and Tablets are portable devices enabled by the technology of digital processing.


In that same sense my Plasma is digital, my PS4 is digital, my HTPC is digital etc.

But they're not portable.

I do get what you're trying to say, and who knows in the future we could all be watching movies from a smart-chip in our brains. smart-chip

...but in this lifetime I don't see the HT experience going away any time soon.

You misunderstand me. I know what digital is, all I am saying is that is what it represents to me when I think of Digital. I see it a a threat to home cinema and big screen tv. I think tablets and smartphones will be the dominant way of watching digital media (streaming media). Hope to goodness I am wrong.

[iank]

No I don't think so.

[roar]

I don't see home theatres going any where until commercial theatres go away. If commercial theatres go away then eventually I think home theatres will as well, it may take a number of generations to fade, but eventually they will become a thing of the past. Out of site out of mind as far as I'm concerned, sad, but in my mind true.

[ZoetMB]

There have been some exceptions, but in general, new technologies co-exist with older technologies at least for a time. Go to a place where lots of older people live and you'll still see plenty of CRT TVs and VHS machines in spite of the fact that these same people have smartphones and Pads. And look how vinyl has come back. It's been overhyped and sales aren't actually that great (13.2 million U.S. units in 2014), but every artist thinks they have to have a vinyl release now.

Even at the height of the "hi-fi" era, owning a high quality receiver and speakers was relatively esoteric, although far more people owned them than today.

But I don't think people are giving up their big screens anytime soon, at least not for their primary set.

While younger people are willing to watch movies and other programming on portable devices, part of that is because they're always on the move and if they're still living with their parents, don't want to be at home.

But once they move out, settle down and become couch potatoes, especially if/when they have kids, they'll want the big screen experience as well. But I think they'll be fewer second and third sets. The second and third sets will tend to be a portable device.

People still go to theatres (even though overall movie attendance is in decline) when the screen action warrants a big screen experience. Even though I personally think the series is worthless trash, "Furious 7" broke all kinds of opening week records this past weekend. It sold an estimated $143.6 million in tickets in North America and another $240.4 million overseas. And that's in just three days. I bet that's better than Star Wars VII will do. And recently, there was a special showing of two episodes of the last season of "Game of Thrones" in theatres that actually did relatively well.

As for the use of the term "digital", unfortunately, the industry has settled on the term digital to represent streaming and downloaded media (and even though CDs, DVDs and Blu-rays are digital). Even the RIAA refers to industry revenues as "physical" and "digital". IMO, they should have been called "physical" and "virtual". They sub-categorize "digital" into "Digital Permanent Downloads" and "Digital Subscription & Streaming".

Back in the 1950s-60s, originally quality sound systems were referred to as "Hi-Fi". When Stereo came in "Hi-Fi" generally referred to mono, which was completely incorrect. So when people saw magazines like "Hi-Fi Stereo Review", they interpreted that as "Mono/Stereo Review". This always bothered me - weren't stereo systems also "Hi-Fi"? So the industry has used wrong or confusing terminology before - just like they used vertical resolution to determine Full HD, but they're using horizontal resolution for UHD. And even though DVD originally meant 'digital videodisc', the industry insisted that either it stood for nothing or that it meant 'digital versatile disc'. The industry has always been screwed up in this regard.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by Steedeel

Going into more depth, I think people are becoming so attached to their mobile devices that the family viewing scene will completely disapear within the next decade. Each person will have discreet buds and a phone/tablet or Even a smartwatch.

I hate what digital could potentially do to the HT scene.

Oh for the love it...it's not bad enough you have to drag this into thread after thread. Now you're giving it its own thread?

TVs are not going to be replaced by watches.

They're just not.

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by octagon

Oh for the love it...it's not bad enough you have to drag this into thread after thread. Now you're giving it its own thread?

TVs are not going to be replaced by watches.

They're just not.

Let's just group watches with mobile devices. Still means the same in terms of the devastating scenario of tiny screens ruling the roost.

[mogwai_macabre]

Digital? Yes.

Death to the home theater? No.

I didn't stop listening to music on a stereo just because I went digital, but I also listen to music on my phone.

I watch VUDU and Netflix on my projector at home...and on my tablet at the airport.

I do think physical media will dwindle down to a pricier niche, but that's not going to kill the home theater. If nothing else, people will continue to buy big screens and sound systems to watch sports, and then also use them for movies.

[atlantajoseph]

I think the switch to digital foreshadows the advent of mega-size 150" TVs. After all, I watched analog stuff on a 32" TV and now I'm watching digital on a 58". The future is clear. Do not resist the big screens.

[Chiefy]

I'd love the idea of wearing glasses that would give the illusion of a monster screen. I remember reading about this some years ago.

[CuriousGamer]

Originally Posted by Chiefy

I'd love the idea of wearing glasses that would give the illusion of a monster screen. I remember reading about this some years ago.

This has been a reality for at least a decade now but they have always been bulky and not brilliant quality. OLED, Oculus Rift, Morpheus, etc stand a better chance now.

As for "digital", streaming and downloaded movies/TV can be on the bleeding edge quicker than physical media. There is no reason why we can't get similar quality to Blu-Ray from streaming media, HEVC can produce smaller file sizes for the same quality video as H.264 (blu-ray) and with the saving in space/bandwidth there is no reason why a HD audio stream couldn't be included.

HT is here to stay but streaming/downloaded media will be come more a part of that as the quality in video and audio improves. Just have to wait for the Internet to catch up to reality. Being able to easily have the same content on multiple devices is a plus.

Personally I rip my new blu-rays (not re-encode) and load them onto my HTPC to make things easier. I get the same quality video and my HTPC is capable of outputing the HD audio streams to my AVR. The downside is that at an average of 30GB I don't have room for that many even on the 4TB HDD.