Remember when DVD first came out? - Blu-ray Forum

Firefox · 01-11-2008, 07:22 PM

My second gen Panasonic DVD player cost me $495, and it still works!!!

Jeff® · 01-11-2008, 08:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Firefox

My second gen Panasonic DVD player cost me $495, and it still works!!!

Cool. That must have been the A310. My 2nd gen Panasonic (Panasonic A110 - about $360) died after approximately one year. ;p

Jeff® · 01-11-2008, 08:26 PM

Does anyone remember this great sale?

800.com's 3 DVDs for $1 (1998)

http://www.remotecentral.com/cgi-bin.../thread.cgi?16

Horhay · 01-11-2008, 09:05 PM

I hardly surfed the net back then as we were still at blazin speed of 56K. It was easier for me to have someone take me to a store plus I used to love looking at all the cool things out there at the time.

Thomasbeau · 01-11-2008, 09:07 PM

Doesn't anyone remember the very early days of DVD when some new titles came out for rental first and if you wished to buy it the DVD would cost about $80.00. Then about three months later it would get a consumer release? This was something that didn't last long but I remember being annoyed that I had to wait to get the "Wrath of Kahn" at a reasonable price.

gandley · 01-11-2008, 09:19 PM

my first DVD player was the Sony, then i bought the pioneer 717. then the pioneer 737 (i think) and a buch of others, had like 10 i think
my last dvd player was the Denon a1XV (5910 in usa)@ £1350 SH. new it would of cost £2500. ($3800 in the usa i think).

Toshiba went too low too soon.

Jeff® · 01-11-2008, 09:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thomasbeau

Doesn't anyone remember the very early days of DVD when some new titles came out for rental first and if you wished to buy it the DVD would cost about $80.00. Then about three months later it would get a consumer release? This was something that didn't last long but I remember being annoyed that I had to wait to get the "Wrath of Kahn" at a reasonable price.

I don't remember that. One of the great things about DVD, and something that I thought helped it succeed so quickly, was the fact that it bypassed the VHS rental windows.

Edit: here's an article that I found re: this:

http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/summ...99-1823393_ITM

BoogalooShrimp · 01-11-2008, 10:18 PM

My parents bought a Toshiba dvd player back in 96/97 for like $599 (or in that price range) at Circuit City. We received between 5 and 10 free dvds I think. The ones that I remember were Terminator 2, Eraser, Twister, Demolition Man, and maybe Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. I remember think it was so cool that a movie was a small disc.

Ukujiku · 01-11-2008, 10:38 PM

I remember when DVD came out and alot of ppl saying that It'll never catch on, and most will just stick too their VCR's. Sounds a little familiar to me.

MotionBlurr · 01-11-2008, 10:39 PM

My 1st DVD player was a PS2. I still have it and it works great.

eclectic taste · 01-11-2008, 10:42 PM

My first DVD Player was a Panasonic A310, cost about $599. My first DVD was Apollo 13, bought it for $15, MSRP $35. The wife was PISSED, but the PQ brought her around really quickly.

Those were the best days to be an early adopter, the combination of a new format and tons of Venture Capital money being thrown at internet startups translated to fantastic deals on new releases. Does anyone here remember

800.com 3 dvds for $1.00 (Yes, ONE Dollar) sale?
Numerous $15/$20$25 off coupons from reel.com (reusable with minor tweaks to your address)
Amazon 50% off already 30% reduced prices?
Stacking coupons with preorder discounts from bigstar.com?
Many, many others

I built a library of hundreds of discs for an average of <$10, when MSRP averaged $30 or so.

It seemed most company's model was just to bring traffic to the site first, worry about profit second. They sold themselves on the idea that advertisers would pay for the number of visitors, regardless of whether they clicked through to the advertiser or not. Didn't hold up for too long.

Banjo · 01-11-2008, 10:49 PM

My father bought his first DVD player back in 1999. It was a RCA DVD player. It was on sale for $449.99. Keep in mind that we were on a budget so we had to try and pick a decent player for the lowest price we could possibly find. $450 wasn't exactly cheap back then and with 15% GST/PST on top of it too as well. I wouldn't really recommend RCA products, though the DVD player we had did play DTS audio tracks and it lasted for years.

The first movie I bought was "There's Something About Mary". I believe it was $23.97 plus taxes when I bought it.

JasonR · 01-11-2008, 10:57 PM

My first was a Pioneer, forget what model. It was 300 dollars, I still use it in my office. The only problem with it is when you open the tray, it opens then closes. (You have to be pretty fast) First DVD was Full Metal Jacket.

WickyWoo · 01-11-2008, 11:01 PM

Quote:

Doesn't anyone remember the very early days of DVD when some new titles came out for rental first and if you wished to buy it the DVD would cost about $80.00. Then about three months later it would get a consumer release? This was something that didn't last long but I remember being annoyed that I had to wait to get the "Wrath of Kahn" at a reasonable price.

That never happened. That was VHS rental windows. A big factor in the fast adoption of DVD was the fact that like LD before it, it bypassed those windows. By the time they realized DVD had killed the rental period, it was too late to do anything about it.

Wrath of Khan was actually the first "consumer priced" VHS tape, at I believe $39.95

broganreynik · 01-11-2008, 11:13 PM

When I was in high school we were given planners with random facts in them. There was one that said paraphrased "on this day in 19?? the first VCR was sold for....something like $2,000" So blu-ray is cheap, especially when you think about inflation.

g.k. · 01-12-2008, 12:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeff®

Cool. That must have been the A310. My 2nd gen Panasonic (Panasonic A110 - about $360) died after approximately one year. ;p

My first DVD player was the Panny A300, during the seven city DVD launch, but I returned it because it was terrible at scaling 16:9 DVDs for a 4:3 screen. I got the Sony DVP-S7000 when that came out, it was a great player, except it couldn't do DTS.

I sold that several years later for $500 or so, it was still in demand because it had region and macrovision defeat switches.

GreenFlash06 · 01-12-2008, 12:37 AM

All I remember is being angry that we just dropped a whole lot of cash on a LaserDisc player and a few LDs. Then we bought a LD/DVD player. Which wasnt cheap either. Hey thanks for the memories.

Weez_Dawg · 01-12-2008, 12:28 AM

I got my frist DVD player for $289 at walmart and that was the least expensive one out.

mr2bob · 01-12-2008, 12:32 AM

My first DVD player was a first gen Toshiba, about $500. OMG I can't believe I admitted to that. It was a piece of junk and keep freezing up all the time. Took a hammer to it long ago.

Weez_Dawg · 01-12-2008, 12:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Weez_Dawg

I got my frist DVD player for $289 at walmart and that was the least expensive one out.

Oh yeah and my first DVD is the same as the first Blu-ray I got, Blazing Saddles!!

01-11-2008, 09:19 PM	#6
gandley Special Member Member since:Feb 2007 Location:The Drowning Pool	my first DVD player was the Sony, then i bought the pioneer 717. then the pioneer 737 (i think) and a buch of others, had like 10 i think my last dvd player was the Denon a1XV (5910 in usa)@ £1350 SH. new it would of cost £2500. ($3800 in the usa i think). Toshiba went too low too soon. Last edited by gandley; 01-11-2008 at 10:24 PM.

01-11-2008, 10:42 PM	#11
eclectic taste Junior Member Member since:Nov 2007	My first DVD Player was a Panasonic A310, cost about $599. My first DVD was Apollo 13, bought it for $15, MSRP $35. The wife was PISSED, but the PQ brought her around really quickly. Those were the best days to be an early adopter, the combination of a new format and tons of Venture Capital money being thrown at internet startups translated to fantastic deals on new releases. Does anyone here remember 800.com 3 dvds for $1.00 (Yes, ONE Dollar) sale? Numerous $15/$20$25 off coupons from reel.com (reusable with minor tweaks to your address) Amazon 50% off already 30% reduced prices? Stacking coupons with preorder discounts from bigstar.com? Many, many others I built a library of hundreds of discs for an average of <$10, when MSRP averaged $30 or so. It seemed most company's model was just to bring traffic to the site first, worry about profit second. They sold themselves on the idea that advertisers would pay for the number of visitors, regardless of whether they clicked through to the advertiser or not. Didn't hold up for too long.

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01-11-2008, 07:22 PM	#1
Firefox Active Member Member since:Dec 2007 Location:Sunny SoCal	My second gen Panasonic DVD player cost me $495, and it still works!!!

01-11-2008, 08:26 PM	#3
Jeff® Active Member Member since:Sep 2006	Does anyone remember this great sale? 800.com's 3 DVDs for $1 (1998) http://www.remotecentral.com/cgi-bin.../thread.cgi?16

01-11-2008, 09:05 PM	#4
Horhay Expert Member Member since:Jun 2007 Location:San Pedro, CA Home Theater Gallery:3 Blu-ray collection:352 Trading Score:2	I hardly surfed the net back then as we were still at blazin speed of 56K. It was easier for me to have someone take me to a store plus I used to love looking at all the cool things out there at the time.

01-11-2008, 09:07 PM	#5
Thomasbeau Member Member since:Dec 2007 Location:Moosup, CT 4K collection:12 Blu-ray collection:275	Doesn't anyone remember the very early days of DVD when some new titles came out for rental first and if you wished to buy it the DVD would cost about $80.00. Then about three months later it would get a consumer release? This was something that didn't last long but I remember being annoyed that I had to wait to get the "Wrath of Kahn" at a reasonable price.

01-11-2008, 10:18 PM	#8
BoogalooShrimp Special Member Member since:Jan 2007 Location:Las Vegas, NV Blu-ray collection:454	My parents bought a Toshiba dvd player back in 96/97 for like $599 (or in that price range) at Circuit City. We received between 5 and 10 free dvds I think. The ones that I remember were Terminator 2, Eraser, Twister, Demolition Man, and maybe Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. I remember think it was so cool that a movie was a small disc.

01-11-2008, 10:38 PM	#9
Ukujiku Senior Member Member since:Dec 2007 Location:Safety Harbor, FL Blu-ray collection:88	I remember when DVD came out and alot of ppl saying that It'll never catch on, and most will just stick too their VCR's. Sounds a little familiar to me.

01-11-2008, 10:39 PM	#10
MotionBlurr Active Member Member since:Oct 2007	My 1st DVD player was a PS2. I still have it and it works great.

01-11-2008, 10:49 PM	#12
Banjo Blu-ray Guru Member since:Dec 2006 Location:Ontario, Canada Blu-ray collection:143	My father bought his first DVD player back in 1999. It was a RCA DVD player. It was on sale for $449.99. Keep in mind that we were on a budget so we had to try and pick a decent player for the lowest price we could possibly find. $450 wasn't exactly cheap back then and with 15% GST/PST on top of it too as well. I wouldn't really recommend RCA products, though the DVD player we had did play DTS audio tracks and it lasted for years. The first movie I bought was "There's Something About Mary". I believe it was $23.97 plus taxes when I bought it.

01-11-2008, 10:57 PM	#13
JasonR Super Moderator Top contributor Member since:Nov 2007 Trading Score:12	My first was a Pioneer, forget what model. It was 300 dollars, I still use it in my office. The only problem with it is when you open the tray, it opens then closes. (You have to be pretty fast) First DVD was Full Metal Jacket.

01-11-2008, 11:13 PM	#15
broganreynik Blu-ray Guru Top contributor Member since:Sep 2007 Location:Nebraska Home Theater Gallery:60 4K collection:124 Blu-ray collection:2113 DVD collection:111 Blu-ray reviews: 4 Trading Score:46	When I was in high school we were given planners with random facts in them. There was one that said paraphrased "on this day in 19?? the first VCR was sold for....something like $2,000" So blu-ray is cheap, especially when you think about inflation.

01-12-2008, 12:37 AM	#17
GreenFlash06 Active Member Member since:May 2007 Location:Otisburg Blu-ray collection:12	All I remember is being angry that we just dropped a whole lot of cash on a LaserDisc player and a few LDs. Then we bought a LD/DVD player. Which wasnt cheap either. Hey thanks for the memories.

01-12-2008, 12:28 AM	#18
Weez_Dawg Active Member Member since:Apr 2007 Location:New Mexico	I got my frist DVD player for $289 at walmart and that was the least expensive one out.

01-12-2008, 12:32 AM	#19
mr2bob Member Member since:Jan 2007 Location:Central California	My first DVD player was a first gen Toshiba, about $500. OMG I can't believe I admitted to that. It was a piece of junk and keep freezing up all the time. Took a hammer to it long ago.

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