Blu-ray - What a major disappointment

[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!