Blue Ray questions ... - Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community

Bingo · 07-18-2008, 08:05 AM

1. Is the Blue Ray vs HD DVD battle dead with Blue Ray winning or will their be more players that play both?

2. Is it possible PC/notebook to writte to Blue Ray?

McMack · 07-18-2008, 08:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bingo

1. Is the Blue Ray vs HD DVD battle dead with Blue Ray winning or will their be more players that play both?

2. Is it possible PC/notebook to writte to Blue Ray?

It's over, but with Blu Ray players still costing around $400, I don't think you are going to see tons of people running out to buy them any time soon.

You can buy a Blu Ray burner, but it is pricey.

FYI, you can get a combon Bly Ray HD reader DVDROM for your PC for as little as $130.

Esoteric · 07-18-2008, 08:16 AM

It's over. There are no more HD-DVD's being made.

Buy a PS3 as your Blu-Ray player. Best bet, since it's the easiest to upgrade to new firmware versions. It's also one of the cheapest, and best on the market. Plus, you get access to a whole bunch of new games, and an internet browser.

Cliche · 07-18-2008, 08:20 AM

Also, companies may be making an end run around Blu-ray with download services such as the itunes, netflix(360 announcement: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25680004/) and other cable boxes that will be controlled by companies that will no longer work if they go bankrupt. (RE: http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2008/04/30/eff-blasts-msn-music-shutdownJ)

RW99 · 07-18-2008, 08:52 AM

The market just sucks right now. All those promotions when both formats were battling have dissapeared and prices haven't dropped since.

PS3 is a nice option, but for me it's a no go. Like many others that are a 'one remote' Logitech person, the stupid bluetooth only PS3 and it's form factor stops me from buying it. I have no use for the game system.

What really sucks is that I don't want to keep buying DVD's either, so I haven't even bought a movie in over a year

arsenal · 07-18-2008, 11:03 AM

I went the PS3 route. But then I like my video games. It just seemed like the best option. I look at it this way. I bought a $450 game console, and got a blu-ray player thrown in for free.

Not sure about the pc/notebook options... I haven't kept up with hardware too much.

OilKiller · 07-18-2008, 11:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RW99

The market just sucks right now. All those promotions when both formats were battling have dissapeared and prices haven't dropped since.

Welcome to a format ruled by Sony.

I bought an HD-DVD player pretty early on. Paid $550 for it. At the time, the best price for a Blu-ray player was $999 (Sony). I told Sony they could jump. I wasn't going to pay almost $500 more for a player. If the BD camp had their way, players would still be $800+. Competition from Toshiba at least brought the prices down.

Now that the war is over, prices are still pretty damn high and I don't see Sony giving anyone a break.

Think I will personally wait for digital downloads now. I just can't see myself putting money out for another HD player, now that I have a $550 doorstop. Sure, it still plays the (HD-DVD) movies I bought, but I'm still pretty ticked off about the whole thing.

Personally I think the wrong format won, and no, not just because I picked HD-DVD, but because of prices, dual format discs, etc.

BTW, Best Buy has the Insignia (yeah, not great brand) BD player on sale for $299 right now.

Human Torch · 07-18-2008, 12:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by OilKiller

Welcome to a format ruled by Sony....

Would there be a difference if toshiba had won?...I doubt it. And it's not like sony was alone in the whole thing....sharp, samsung,pioneer etc are part of it too.

Esoteric · 07-18-2008, 12:49 PM

Even if you don't want to play games, the PS3 is an amazing investment for a home theater system.

Not only does it play Blu Ray movies, and up convert DVDs, it can also stream Music, Movies and Photo's from your computer, or play them off an external data source.

You can also store media on your system, as removing the hard drive and swapping it for a larger one is a piece of cake.

The only downside is that it isn't compatible with a universal remote, but I found that easy to look over.

And buying Blu-Ray movies isn't all that expensive, it's about the same price as DVD's were a few years ago. Most movies are between $15-25, you just have to shop around for the deals. Costco and Wal-Mart offer great prices, while places like Futureshop, Best Buy and HMV frequently have 2/$40 or $2/$50 type deals.

You can find a PS3 right now for $400. News is, they are removing the 40 GB model with a cheaper 80 GB, so you may find a $50-$100 price cut to clear out the 40 GB models in the near future.

OilKiller · 07-18-2008, 12:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Human Torch

Would there be a difference if toshiba had won?...I doubt it. And it's not like sony was alone in the whole thing....sharp, samsung,pioneer etc are part of it too.

Toshiba was the first format to drop prices and actually created some real competition in the format war.

Sorry...not a fan of Sony and their high prices. I think there would indeed have been a difference if Toshiba won.

RW99 · 07-18-2008, 01:12 PM

JVC had VHS and that went fairly well after the war with Sony's Betamax.

llama64 · 07-18-2008, 01:54 PM

My DVD player still works pretty good. Plus, the video store stock is nearly 90% DVD anyway.

I think I'll skip this whole blueray thing and wait for digital distribution when I get around to upgrading my TV set.

Kipper is King · 07-18-2008, 03:23 PM

I won a blu ray player and 10 blu ray movies from Samsung!

The downside: I don't yet have an HDTV!

BlackEleven · 07-18-2008, 03:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bingo

2. Is it possible PC/notebook to writte to Blue Ray?

No one seems to have answered this one yet.

Yes, you can write Blu-Ray. But its expensive.

From a notebook, you'd likely have to buy an external Blu-Ray writer, which you can connect to the notebook via USB (it would likely cost ~$600). For a PC you could buy an internal one for probably closer to $400.

Marvelous · 07-18-2008, 04:27 PM

If you are willing to take the time to program the Logitech, you can get the PS3 to work with it. You will need to buy a third Party PS3 remote control that has a infrared dongle.

I bought the $7 PS3 remote from Superstore and got it to work. Can't use the remote to turn it on though but since I have to walk over to the PS3 to place the disc in, it didn't matter

Human Torch · 07-18-2008, 05:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by OilKiller

Toshiba was the first format to drop prices and actually created some real competition in the format war.

Sorry...not a fan of Sony and their high prices. I think there would indeed have been a difference if Toshiba won.

I don't think so because toshiba doesn't have a system involved in the console war(actually they did help sony make the ps3). The console war will force sony to keep dropping the ps3 price which will in turn drop the price of other blu ray players. There was a time when the ps3 was the cheapest player on the market and even today for what you get including the blu ray player I still think it's the best overall deal.

*edit actually i forgot about the xbox add on so this console argument is a wash

OilKiller · 07-18-2008, 06:40 PM

Toshiba still offered the best prices overall for standalone HD-DVD players. Standalones still became cheaper because of Toshiba and the format war. If you watched closely, as soon as Toshiba announced they were pulling out of the war and stopping production for HD-DVD, Sony actually UPPED the price on their BD players. Again...not a fan of Sony at all.