Blu-ray Vs. HD DVD not as close as expected... (Official- HD-DVD Dead)

[Draug]

The copy protections of both blu-ray and hd-dvd are cracked, and have been for a long time. You can easily find complete images of both formats on the groups already.

[SarichFan]

Can you find HD-DVD burners though? I know you can Blu-Ray.

[MaDMaN_26]

Originally Posted by Draug

The copy protections of both blu-ray and hd-dvd are cracked, and have been for a long time. You can easily find complete images of both formats on the groups already.

ya but still - <$600.00
http://www.memoryexpress.com/Product...15394(ME).aspx
or
< $50.00
http://www.memoryexpress.com/Product...16356(ME).aspx

For now, although it won't be long before the whole point of these new formats is moot, at least from the corporations perspective... but we will be able to burn at full resolution which is nice because today unless you use dual layer, you must compress at least some of the DVD usually.

It's like the RIAA, DEA etc... good luck with that... there must be a better way to spend billions....

[MaDMaN_26]

Originally Posted by SarichFan

Can you find HD-DVD burners though? I know you can Blu-Ray.

Just did a quick search but if this is true then it can't be impossible...

http://www.tech.co.uk/computing/mobi...eid=1747657928

[Dr. Evil]

Originally Posted by ernie

both formats remain insignificant and will continue to do so for quite some time. The sales of the best selling Blu-ray and HD-DVD disc is dwarfed by even the worst movie on regular DVD.

Movie sales are about a 60:40 split right now for Blu-ray...certainly not numbers you win a format war with. And there are on going rumblings that Fox and Disney may soon support HD-DVD as well.

The end result is that at this time it is very much a niche market and if it remains a niche market for an extended period of time, there is a good chance manufacturers are going to choose the technology that fits the current factory footprints and can be retrofit into current production technology. That is the huge feather in HD-DVDs cap that may allow them to win the war.

How much more did VHS outsell DVD in the year or so after launch? There are reasons people aren't moving up to HD media, and 2 formats is one of them. Go to your local Futureshop or Best Buy and ask the "knowledgable" employees there about both formats, and see what info you get from them. Half of them can't even tell you what 1080p vs 1080i means, or that there is a difference. The guy who treid to sell me a BluRay player told me I should check out Transformers in HD, it's soooo amazingly cool.

Disney and Fox are NOT EVEN CLOSE to thinking of adopting HD-DVD, and at the BluRay expo recently Warner reps were making comments about viewing the 4th quarter results to pick a side. Funny that they started off as HD-DVD exclusive, then adopted both, and now are talking at a BluRay event about picking one "winner". Furthermore, the $99 Toshiba HD-DVD player is going to all but hit the final nail into the HD-DVD coffin. It's a product dump, and at below manufacturing cost, as a last ditch effort to get people to buy in to their camp. Hit the consumer with a blazing deal of a player for 99 bucks, but then tell them they can't watch Cars or Rattatoulie in HD, and forget about Spider-man. So now they just dropped 99 bucks for another DVD player, though it upconverts (if they know what that means and how to use it) fairly well. Between the 150 million payout of Paramount and now selling players for less than it costs to make them how exactly is HD winning anything?

Read the Bits if you don't want to take my word for it. Take it from the guys who live and breath this stuff, and have looked at the entire "War" from the outside making their opinions and judgements by what they seeing going on. They actualy like the HD-DVD format, but called it long ago as the loser and each new event in the war further proves it.

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/#mytwocents

It boggles the mind to think that any reasonable person can still believe at this point that the HD-DVD format represents a viable long-term business. Even if Toshiba's strategy has the desired effect (which seems primarily to be garnering splashy headlines in the press), what do they ultimately win? A tie? The best case for HD-DVD, even if Warner were to be so impressed by this sale that they go HD exclusive, would be to effectively create a 50/50 split in terms of studio support. In other words, a total quagmire. High prices were the number one reason most surveyed consumers cited for staying away from high-def discs in the recent NPD Group survey, but the existence of two competing formats was not far behind. And just as many people who said that price was their chief concern also said that they're happy enough with current DVD to have no interest in upgrading to high-def discs anyway. So all this seems to be more a battle waged for the press and PR spin than the actual hearts and minds of consumers.

Also to try and argue that because currently consumers don't have enough HDTV's is rather stupid. Once analog TV is gone and people are forced to upgrade even their 13" B&W tv's they will suddenly realize their DVD movies don't look as good as their TV broadcasts. Might not happen tomorrow, but it is coming and a lot sooner than many people think. Hands up for those here who run on a 286 with 4 megs of RAM...... thought so.

[Kjesse]

Bill Hunt of the Digital Bits has spent a lot of his reputation pushing Bluray, and he's been paying for it. He was THE guy back when dvd was making its push in 1997/1998, but now he's just another hack picking sides.

I don't care who wins this format war, though at this rate they'll both lose. To suggest blu-ray somehow is inevitably going to win based on current trends is as stupid as when the HD crew proclaimed their early lead was a sign of things to come.

The end result is, the majority of consumers refuse to buy in. These little discs (HD, blu ray, and standard dvd) will all be obsolete in 5 years anyway, I look at my massive dvd collection and wonder what I was thinking. Besides a few top titles, my purchases were a complete waste.

[Dr. Evil]

Originally Posted by Delgar

Bill Hunt of the Digital Bits has spent a lot of his reputation pushing Bluray, and he's been paying for it. He was THE guy back when dvd was making its push in 1997/1998, but now he's just another hack picking sides.

I don't care who wins this format war, though at this rate they'll both lose. To suggest blu-ray somehow is inevitably going to win based on current trends is as stupid as when the HD crew proclaimed their early lead was a sign of things to come.

The end result is, the majority of consumers refuse to buy in. These little discs (HD, blu ray, and standard dvd) will all be obsolete in 5 years anyway, I look at my massive dvd collection and wonder what I was thinking. Besides a few top titles, my purchases were a complete waste.

So you are an expert then? Gotta love how everyone tosses around the term hack with absolutely no credibility of their own. Hunt hasn't just picked sides, he and his site have evaluated everything that's gone on. From the begining they were actualy more inpressed with HD-DVD. But I guess he's just a hack now like anyone else who's got so much time invested in the subject

[Thor]

Originally Posted by Delgar

Bill Hunt of the Digital Bits has spent a lot of his reputation pushing Bluray, and he's been paying for it. He was THE guy back when dvd was making its push in 1997/1998, but now he's just another hack picking sides.

I don't care who wins this format war, though at this rate they'll both lose. To suggest blu-ray somehow is inevitably going to win based on current trends is as stupid as when the HD crew proclaimed their early lead was a sign of things to come.

The end result is, the majority of consumers refuse to buy in. These little discs (HD, blu ray, and standard dvd) will all be obsolete in 5 years anyway, I look at my massive dvd collection and wonder what I was thinking. Besides a few top titles, my purchases were a complete waste.

I was part of the online war way back then with the DVD vs Divx war which was an absolute joke/insult to the consumers.

Good guys won back then, now its harder to pick sides. I think unlike back then when it was much easier to choose sides now its about most early adopters angry that they can't just pick a format and move on.

We got all the electronic companies back then to agree to a DVD format, then last minute DIVX appears. Now they won't even try to find common ground and ultimately the consumer loses as we have to delay the advance of this format and people waste money on either formats.

Its ridiculous this still keeps going.

[ernie]

Originally Posted by Dr. Evil

How much more did VHS outsell DVD in the year or so after launch? There are reasons people aren't moving up to HD media, and 2 formats is one of them. Go to your local Futureshop or Best Buy and ask the "knowledgable" employees there about both formats, and see what info you get from them. Half of them can't even tell you what 1080p vs 1080i means, or that there is a difference. The guy who treid to sell me a BluRay player told me I should check out Transformers in HD, it's soooo amazingly cool......

continuation of some sort of rant.......

BTW you're little quote says pretty much exactly what I said.

"And just as many people who said that price was their chief concern also said that they're happy enough with current DVD to have no interest in upgrading to high-def discs anyway. So all this seems to be more a battle waged for the press and PR spin than the actual hearts and minds of consumers."

People don't care.

[Bobblehead]

Well, contrary to the original post of this thread, I'd say HD-DVD is starting to edge ahead.

K-Mart announces it will NOT carry Blu-ray this holiday season.
http://www.betanews.com/article/Kmar...ice/1193854397

[MaDMaN_26]

Originally Posted by Dr. Evil

So you are an expert then? Gotta love how everyone tosses around the term hack with absolutely no credibility of their own. Hunt hasn't just picked sides, he and his site have evaluated everything that's gone on. From the begining they were actualy more inpressed with HD-DVD. But I guess he's just a hack now like anyone else who's got so much time invested in the subject

From the guy who can't spell Secret...

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by Dr. Evil

So you are an expert then? Gotta love how everyone tosses around the term hack with absolutely no credibility of their own. Hunt hasn't just picked sides, he and his site have evaluated everything that's gone on. From the begining they were actualy more inpressed with HD-DVD. But I guess he's just a hack now like anyone else who's got so much time invested in the subject

But experts are not the ones that choose which format wins this war. It's the consumers. Maybe I've got Tipping Point on the brain, but one of these formats needs something to push it over the edge. Now I've only very loosely followed these formats. But for all intensive purposes they are basically in a tie. One isn't dominating yet. You may disagree, but why are their movies that I can only buy in HD-DVD and others in Blu-Ray? Clearly one hasn't taken over. It's interesting that you saw the cheap Toshiba players as a product "dump" I saw it the complete opposite. Mass produce your new product and sell it on the cheap to get more people to buy your format. The more people that have your product will buy your format. I'm not buying a Blu-Ray player for several hundred dollars when I can buy a HD one for $100. But back to my original point. One of these products needs something to push it ahead of it's competition. I've haven't seen anything yet for either product, but maybe this cheap player will be that tipping point for HD-DVD.

[RyZ]

I'm in the camp that thinks that consumers just don't care enough about HD content to make this an issue right now. Outside of internet message boards I have never even heard a single person talk about HD movies. Not even my video game junky friends.

The fact is that to 99% of the common population, HD-DVD and Bluray don't offer enough of a jump for people to buy new hardware and ditch their old SD-DVD collections. People aren't ready for it yet. The companies pushing the tech should save some $$$ and not jump in for a couple of years yet. Not until at least 75%+ of the TV sets out there are HD to begin with.

[Juventus3]

Originally Posted by RyZ

I'm in the camp that thinks that consumers just don't care enough about HD content to make this an issue right now. Outside of internet message boards I have never even heard a single person talk about HD movies. Not even my video game junky friends.

The fact is that to 99% of the common population, HD-DVD and Bluray don't offer enough of a jump for people to buy new hardware and ditch their old SD-DVD collections. People aren't ready for it yet. The companies pushing the tech should save some $$$ and not jump in for a couple of years yet. Not until at least 75%+ of the TV sets out there are HD to begin with.

TBQH, it doesn't matter what people want. Corporate America decides what people buy, not the people. Within 2 years or so one of these formats will come out on top, and we'll start to see movies come out just on the HD format, and not at all on DVD. Just like VHS, cassette, vinyl (well you can still buy those), etc.

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by RyZ

I'm in the camp that thinks that consumers just don't care enough about HD content to make this an issue right now. Outside of internet message boards I have never even heard a single person talk about HD movies. Not even my video game junky friends.

The fact is that to 99% of the common population, HD-DVD and Bluray don't offer enough of a jump for people to buy new hardware and ditch their old SD-DVD collections. People aren't ready for it yet. The companies pushing the tech should save some $$$ and not jump in for a couple of years yet. Not until at least 75%+ of the TV sets out there are HD to begin with.

C'mon, don't you want to see "The Bert" in HD?

[TurnedTheCorner]

It can't be stressed enough that Bill Hunt is a foaming at the mouth lunatic. No one should get that worked up over a "format war". He makes videogame fanboys look like sensible, measured, reasonable people.

[Dr. Evil]

Originally Posted by MaDMaN_26

From the guy who can't spell Secret...

Oh, are you trying to insult my dyslexia that pops up when I attempt to type fast? Gee, classy.

HD-DVD being the only format at K-Mart means very little. It's FAR from any sort of edge when K-Mart won't be selling HD versions of Cars, Pirates, Spider-man etc. People in the US will just go to Walmart then.

Soon enough people will care. Thinking otherwise is rediculous. If you don't believe there's enough of an advantage between DVD and either HD format you haven't seen them demonstrated properly. Furthermore, as I previously stated, when your local news looks so much better than your brand new DVD you are going to care.

Cheaper HD-DVD players aren't going to win HD-DVD anything. To begin, they aren't selling all HD players for 99 bucks now, only one model. At that they are only selling the ones they have already made and could not sell for $500. Furthermore, the supply isn't near as massive as the advertising leads you to believe. When you don't get to the store first thing the morning of the sale and end up not getting a player at all, that's going to hurt the HD reputation. When the supply is gone and players are again $300+ then what? It's a firesale to move product that can't be sold for the price it should be. Add to that the problems with all the HD-DVD/DVD combo discs and consumers are getting shafted.

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by Dr. Evil

HD-DVD being the only format at K-Mart means very little. It's FAR from any sort of edge when K-Mart won't be selling HD versions of Cars, Pirates, Spider-man etc. People in the US will just go to Walmart then.

...where they are selling the Toshiba HD-DVD player for less than $100 (older model) or the more recent HD-A3 for $199 (with 7 movies).

Agree that the Disney are a big motivator for people to get Blu-ray, but since Blu-ray players aren't supposed to drop below $400 I would think people would believe the difference between a cartoon on DVD or High-Def isn't worth $200.

Originally Posted by Dr. Evil

Soon enough people will care. Thinking otherwise is rediculous. If you don't believe there's enough of an advantage between DVD and either HD format you haven't seen them demonstrated properly. Furthermore, as I previously stated, when your local news looks so much better than your brand new DVD you are going to care.

And this is just arguing DVD vs High-Def. I'm not sure I would go as far as you, but with the hastening demise of CRT TVs, the dropping prices of LCD, and the conversion of the US TV spectrum from analog to digital in '09 (which will probably spur a bunch of TV replacements, even though set-top boxes will be supplied) I think HDTV will invade living rooms faster than previous technological changes.

[SarichFan]

DVD will not be replaced in my opinion. But this HD market will be niche for years to come.

[Bertuzzied]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

Well, contrary to the original post of this thread, I'd say HD-DVD is starting to edge ahead.

K-Mart announces it will NOT carry Blu-ray this holiday season.
http://www.betanews.com/article/Kmar...ice/1193854397

Wow K-Mart is the turning point? i should just donate my ps3 to the electronics recycling program. hehe.

Maybe if walmart stopped carrying blu ray players it might have more of an impact.

Oh and kmart is still carrying bluray dvds. just not the players. actually that is false too they are still selling ps3s.

Anyone want to goto Woolco with me tonite?