Microsoft spreading FUD

[pretender2j]

I'm sorry if this is a double post.

Have you guys seen this?

http://www.xbox.com/en-AU/hardware/xbox360/whyhddvd.htm

It's the same old HD-DVD FUD, but unlike someone who knows nothing saying it on a forum and having no weight to it, this is right there as gospel on the MS XBOX website. Talk about being out of date.

Manufacturing: Concerns developed regarding Blu-Ray's ability to manufacturer the discs at the quality originally intended. In fact, with the Blu-Ray launch in Japan, the discs are being created at single-layer 25 Gigabyte capacity, which is half of the originally intended 50 gigabytes.

Out of date, and who ever said anything about quality of the discs?

Easy to Damage: Because Blu-Ray discs are encoded near the very top layer of the disc with limited protection, the data is literally at higher risk to damage. Conversely, HD-DVD maintains physical protection similar to standard DVD.

Talking about out of date.... They seem to be forgeting the matter of the DURABIS2 protective layer that was developed by TDK.

Copy Protection: Blu-Ray utilizes not one, but two different forms of Copy Protection, adding an extra layer of protection and complexity that just didn't appear necessary.

Don't know where this came from? I thought Microsoft was for copy protection and harsh DRM?

VC1 Compression: While both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD players are required to be compatible with three different compression technologies (including VC1), an intriguing trend has already begun. Content providers (movie studios) for HD-DVD are nearly unanimously using the brand new VC1 compression technology, whereas Blu-Ray providers are sticking with the ten-year-old MPEG 2 compression that has been used on standard DVDs. With VC1, HD-DVDs are able to compress much higher quality video into a significantly smaller package.

Out of date, again. I love this bit 'into a significantly smaller package', yes it is SIGNIFICANTLY SMALLER. Try 20Gb smaller.

Dual Layer: HD-DVDs are already available to manufacturer in both single and dual layer (15 GB and 30 GB respectively), whereas Blu-Ray has not yet made available its dual-layer disc. Moreover, most studios are already using the 30 GB dual-layer HD-DVD disc.

Out of date, AGAIN. Most of these points only apply, if at all, to the first run of Blu-Ray discs. (As I'm sure you all know)

Hybrid Disc: HD-DVD offers the ability to encode both a regular DVD format and HD-DVD format on the same disc. If you purchase a hybrid disc, you can flip to one side and play the movie on any standard DVD Player, and when you do get an HD-DVD player you can flip to the other side and play it in true HD.

They MAY have a point here, but it's a VERY weak one at best. Sure it's nice to be able to buy movie now and play them in HD later on. But the average consumer won't pay more for a movie just for the promise of something in the future. Why buy a $25 dollar movie when the exact same thing is next to it for $15? Would be most useful if DVD's were removed from shelves and we had no ther choice, but I can't see that happening.

In-Movie Experience: Mandatory for all HD-DVD players is a secondary video decoder (not available for Blu-Ray). This allows the disc to play separate video streams, which on its own completely changes the opportunities available for bonus features. That way, you can not only watch the movie, but also "watch" the behind the scenes features that apply to the scene you're watching simultaneously.

I'd like to see an XBOX360 do this. Considering this, 'All 6 of Xbox 360's hardware threads are hard at work while playing back an HD DVD. At the moment, the player software pushes Xbox 360 harder than any other (save, perhaps, Gears of War during some particularly busy parts of the game).' From a Microsoft employee no doubt. (from here http://blogs.msdn.com/xboxteam/archi...gence-day.aspx) Also on this point I have heard that this make an already noisy XBOX360 even more so.

In conclusion, Micosoft should stop spreading FUD and I'm going to go and roll on the floor laughing at MS trying to say the XBOX360 could play TWO HD-DVD streams at once when it can only just play one....... etc.

JB