Report: Few Consumers Interested in Blu-ray/HD-DVD

[J_UNTITLED]

From IMDb.com

Relatively few consumers are planning to make the transition from DVDs to high-definition HD DVD or Blu-ray, according to a survey by NPD Group. The researchers said that among owners of HDTV sets, seven out of 10 say they see no need to purchase high-definition players, maintaining that they are satisfied with the quality of their current players. "one of the main challenges for the next-generation" format, NPD Group senior entertainment industry analyst Russ Crupnick told Bloomberg News, "is you have a product out there that is pretty darn good in consumers' eyes."

Sure, we've heard this already a few times before, but that doesn't make the results any less displeasing.

[york weir]

Originally Posted by J_UNTITLED

From IMDb.com

Sure, we've heard this already a few times before, but that doesn't make the results any less displeasing.

I wonder what the industry will do if people aren't interested in the formats.

[RUR]

Originally Posted by J_UNTITLED

Sure, we've heard this already a few times before, but that doesn't make the results any less displeasing.

But you left out other key quotes:

Many said they plan to wait for the format war to end, for prices to drop and movie selection to increase.

The problem to date has been the struggle between the formats

As HD DVD goes the way of the Dodo, consumer concerns about picking the "wrong" format will disappear, resulting in faster adoption. Player prices have been falling and will continue to fall. By next Christmas, if not sooner, we'll be seeing much more affordable player prices. Movie selection will certainly increase, especially once all the studios are on board.

Despite criticism that neither format has grabbed consumer attention, total player sales are ahead of DVD's early growth rate. "So in a sense, one could argue that the uptake has been a little bit better than the DVD," Crupnick says.

Which is a very promising bit of data and, to repeat the observation above, would have been even higher without the confusion associated with redundant formats.

[actionhank]

It's probably cause they've never seen an high definition feed before. I know the only reason I started buying blu-ray was when I downloaded some HD videos on PSN and realized the huge difference.