Discussion: HD downloads are not a threat to Blu-ray

[superdynamite]

Originally Posted by brent98

... I said that kind of technology is many years off and I do not dl movies or watch ppv for that matter. Thats why I use blu-ray. But I think DDs are the future, and I do look forward to a future without discs. Sorry about the misunderstanding, Im looking years off into the future, and youre talking present day.

How many years away is a portable HD Home Theater do you think?

In my HD Home Theater I have a 54" LCD, TrueHD, PS3, etc.

How many years off is that from being portable like an IPod? I'm only asking because portability makes Downloaded Music better than Discs. In my opinion, Home Movie Theaters will NEVER be portable unless you have one built into the back of a large truck.

What do you think? How many years off are portable Home Movie theaters? Because on that date, Blu-ray, DVDs and all disc media will be obsolete for movie purposes.

[Teazle]

Originally Posted by brent98

... disc media is no more permanent than DLs, if you dont back up your DLs you lose them just like not taking care of your disc's.

I don't think this is a meaningful comparison as stated. On the one hand there's data, on the other the media they're stored on.

Optical discs aren't subject to wear like a HDD, though an optical disc drive is. Commercially pressed discs _are_ more permanent than HDDs: if you care for them properly they'll never wear out. Whereas even the best--cared-for HDD can't last indefinitely -- sooner or later the motor goes or some other damage occurs.

[mightypen]

Originally Posted by superdynamite

How many years away is a portable HD Home Theater do you think?

In my HD Home Theater I have a 54" LCD, TrueHD, PS3, etc.

How many years off is that from being portable like an IPod? I'm only asking because portability makes Downloaded Music better than Discs. In my opinion, Home Movie Theaters will NEVER be portable unless you have one built into the back of a large truck.

What do you think? How many years off are portable Home Movie theaters? Because on that date, Blu-ray, DVDs and all disc media will be obsolete for movie purposes.

This is currently possible. An ipod afterall is an external harddrive. What prevents me from taking it to a friends and, assuming they have the correct connection equipment, from enjoying my high-def downloads there? My external hd that I mentioned earlier is the size of 3 dvd cases, easily transportable.

[mightypen]

Originally Posted by Teazle

I don't think this is a meaningful comparison as stated. On the one hand there's data, on the other the media they're stored on.

Optical discs aren't subject to wear like a HDD, though an optical disc drive is. Commercially pressed discs _are_ more permanent than HDDs: if you care for them properly they'll never wear out. Whereas even the best--cared-for HDD can't last indefinitely -- sooner or later the motor goes or some other damage occurs.

Very true, and I hope whatever system is eventually in place, the companies will treat them like virtual console or live arcade games, meaning that you can delete them and redownload whenever wanted. If that option is not there, then I would personally be very very hesitant to do anything more substantial than a 4 dollar rental.

[Flea77]

Originally Posted by brent98

I can back up the music on my hard drive pretty easily, so theres a good chance I wont lose any of it, even if my hard drive crashes....Also I can take my entire collection with me and play it in a friends car, I cant take my entire CD collection. Theyre just more convenient.

Please tell me how I can do this with my SACD and DVD-A collection! I of course converted to HD audio before I converted to HD video, so most of my collections are all HD now.

I await with bated breath.

Allan

[Blu-Dog]

Originally Posted by brent98

iTunes and Amazon (and other downloading services) have about 90% of the music I want, and I can get it instantly, whereas my nearest best buy is a 30 minute drive. Also I can take my entire collection with me and play it in a friends car, I cant take my entire CD collection. Theyre just more convenient.

Well, my sympathies for having to listen to iTunes compressed audio, and el cheapo downloads from Amazon.

I have all my music stored in WMA Lossless, from the original masters. All of it comes along, in every vehicle. Get one of these:

http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PU...rs/DEH-P7900BT

Then hook up any sized USB device you like. Hard disk, thumb drive, whatever. Doesn't have to be a $400 iPod; it can be an $80 drive. Hook it up to your PC. Hook it up to your car. Hook it up to anything with a USB port.

No worries. The problem is DRM. Broadcasters can't even get CableCard technology right; and that's been honking the horn for three years.

Forget it, you won't see downloads coming through your DSL line for a long, long time.

[PeteS]

Originally Posted by superdynamite

How many of these drives would you need to save 875 movies with full features, each at 80GB average? also, how much does each drive cost?

On the order of 40TB = $US12,000 for modestly reliable stuff.
In our business (custom DV) we rely on a lot of storage. It has been our experience that most hard drives fail after about 10 years of constant service (some after 5). Hard drives will reach the 100TB size, but unless we change the tech completely, we'll still be facing the MTBF issue. IBM has promising tech in solid state magnetic storage - perhaps 5 years away; and then there's the holographic (perhaps 15 years away) or quantum storage (still classified, so 20 years?) (and that doesn't mean they'll be affordable).

But today if folks establish home HD video libraries on hard drives there's going to be bitter tears when (not if) their drives fail. As someone counseling people on preservation of their precious home movies (irreplacable memories) we absolutely have to recommend optical media and Blu-ray does better than DVD.

To me, many of my entertainment discs are also important enough not to lose to a hardware failure. I do purchase downloads of episodic TV (I like Stargate) but even those are archived on DVD and (data)BD-R and you can bet as soon as the official Blu-ray versions are out, that's how I'll preserve them.

[crystal_sun]

If they continue to push download movies, then I'm sure there will be plenty of site out there to offee FREE download.

So, I hope studios are smart enough. If I can't buy the physical discs of a movie, then I have no other option to find it for FREE. I don't want to pay to download anything.

Yes, I can find places to download movies today for free, but I choose to support them by buying them. If they cut that off, then that's not my fault.

[jopemoro]

Pretty good post by Duncan Riley, share it with anyone who thinks DD are taking over the world by this time next year...

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/17...-kill-blu-ray/

"Blu-Ray will likely be the last big/ mainstream physical media technology ever and it will have a strong future. The various factors needed for mainstream digital downloading and viewing will eventually combine to finally kill Blu-Ray (and the domination of all physical media) sometime between 2010 and 2020."

[TheTenth]

- a Blu-ray or DVD media will remain
- a HDD can be corrupted, simply die because it was not well manufactured, get a virus, a power surge, be partly or totally accidentally wiped by a user (and many more I don't think now)

[Danger Duck]

hummm.... 2010 eh?

[bambam1901]

As far as I'm concerned, blu-ray is already giving us picture and sound that is as close to a studio master as possible or necessary. I would be content if there was never another physical media for film or TV in the home. I'd hate to have to give up BD quality and start downloading movies to a hard drive. If i wanted 720p PQ and DD sound, I'd download movies from XBL or cable. I want a physical disc, that I own forever, that I can whip out whenever I choose and pop it into my BD player. After 1080p PQ and 7.1 lossless sound, why would I want to go backwards? Even if the day comes when that quality can be delivered to an HDD, I'd still want the damn disc!

[hc666]

I hate downloads.

Rrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

[DetroitSportsFan]

Originally Posted by Danger Duck

hummm.... 2010 eh?

It will be much closer to 2020.

[blu-backer]

Originally Posted by jopemoro

Pretty good post by Duncan Riley, share it with anyone who thinks DD are taking over the world by this time next year...

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/17...-kill-blu-ray/

"Blu-Ray will likely be the last big/ mainstream physical media technology ever and it will have a strong future. The various factors needed for mainstream digital downloading and viewing will eventually combine to finally kill Blu-Ray (and the domination of all physical media) sometime between 2010 and 2020."

Wow, they're going out on a limb there, saying it could happen sometime within 10 years.

[bluearth]

I laugh at those who say downloads will Kill Blu-ray

Even at 250kbs a second download it still takes multiple hours to download low bit rate 720p 4-5 GB video

At best downloads may exist side by side as a low quality rental option with whatever physical format we have in 2020 or later

[TransAm22]

I'm not a big fan of HD Downloads; I personally like buying the movie for myself and being able to watch at anytime on any player that works with the disc without having to worry about waiting on the DL, DRM or any of the other crap. Bandwidth isn't there yet for a good part of the country, however we all know that Microsoft is eventually wanting to push this.

With a win to BD, MS could start becoming even more animate about HD DLs being the future as oppossed to a next-gen media (seeing that they are rumored to be considering a BD add on for the XB). Me thinks that PS3 needs to release PSN Home ASAP and start making movie downloads and content available with it, as they've mentioned would be part of (or via PS Store). Then they get a head start on the hype and still control BD. Microsoft has a bad habit of making deals with the 'other side' just to prolong their objective: remember the deals they made with Novell when they (Novell) aquired Suse Linux? Also been speculated this is why they backed HD-DVD; to prolong the format war to produce their own solution......

[joeorc]

this was entertaining at least to read...

TheDaddy
Sunday, February 17, 2008, 08:56 AM
Mr. Dumas

Good morning.

I really wouldn't bet on downloads on a mass adoption scale as the ISPs and local Telcos just don't have the bandwidth capacity for the masses.

If we are simply talking about SD DVD PQ/AQ downloads then yes but HD DVD / Blu-Ray quality downloads on a MASS scale...no.

Just isn't possible unless the ISPs & Telcos add Hundreds of Thousands to Millions of TBs of capacity that cannot be cost justified. It would NEVER get by the shareholders.

I will give you an example. I work in Telecom, a call center customer of mine just ordered a DS3 [45mbps connection] from Verizon. There were no facilities in the customers area, the CO [Central Office] servicing them did not have the capacity. It cost the customer around $15,000.00 for the build out plus the DS3 [loop] runs $3500 monthly plus the usage [since it is Voice not DIA] at $0.0109 cpm interstate. They have around $30,000 in voice usage [2.5 million minutes] monthly so the $15k was a lesser number then the actual cost because Verizon subsidized it based on the usage & the term [3 years]. If it was a DS3 of dedicated internet access it would run around $4500 monthly total but the build out would have been VASTLY more expensive since their actual usage monthly would be so much smaller [-$29,500.00]. There would not have been any subsidy and the customer would have been paying double or triple for the DS3 build out / install.

What I am getting at is if it costs $15,000 - $45,000 to drag a 45mbps connection 2.5 miles how much would it cost to run 100,000 TBs end to end through a local footprint? In a Tier 1 metro area in the hundreds of millions to billions of dollars. Keep in mind we are talking about extensive engineering, pulling permits, boring / boaring [not sure on the spelling but this is the correct term] under roads, cracking concrete, trenching...fiber goes in the ground not above it. And it requires special conduits to run through this is all VERY, VERY EXPENSIVE.

Downloads will be more of a NICHE then HD DVD / Blu-Ray by far as it can never be mainstream & deliver HD DVD / Blu-Ray PQ/AQ.

Just my opinion, which has nothing to do with HD DVD or Blu-Ray but my actual Telecom Network experience. 100% based on the last mile connection between the end user & the service provider.
http://www.tvpredictions.com/forum/c...y080215-140632

digital downloads....

[superdynamite]

Originally Posted by Jumong

If they continue to push download movies, then I'm sure there will be plenty of site out there to offee FREE download.

So, I hope studios are smart enough. If I can't buy the physical discs of a movie, then I have no other option to find it for FREE. I don't want to pay to download anything.

Yes, I can find places to download movies today for free, but I choose to support them by buying them. If they cut that off, then that's not my fault.

Piracy has no place in movie the business.

Blu-ray security will put an end to that.

[andyn1080]

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/play...26721&src=news

this stupid abc reports says "sonys victory maybe short lived b/c of hd movie downloads".............im speachless, hd-dvd dies and now this lady say this crap, she must have a hd-dud player at home

so what do you think? will hd downloads become a big thing or just be a thing in blu's shadow?