The HDDVD/BluRay debate
Crutchfield says my order is in final processing, so fingers crossed. The price right now on the site is $399.99, and so if my price of $199.99 rings true it will be an awesome deal.
Today of course was the day that Blockbuster announced they would only stock Blu-Ray discs in their stores. My original thought here is man, just in case they want to totally shoot themselves in the foot a litle more this is the way to do it. My second thought was, wow, people actually go to Blockbuster to rent DVDs?
Anyway with a PS3 and soon to be HDDVD player, I will have both. The HDDVD is going to get most of the use though. It is a disappointment that Disney is not supporting HDDVD so I may have picked the wrong horse here, but still $800 for a stand alone player is an insult. Under $200 is a great price point and I just don’t see how you can get 4 HDDVD players for the price of 1 BluRay (3 for a PS3), and yet BD is going to go over better? Whatever.
I have played some BD movies and they do look good on my PS3. I am now looking forward to the HDDVD player and my 5 free movies and see how they will look. Until the BD players get cheaper, and I don’t mean the PS3 here, I just don’t see how it will take off. So if you are one of those people that actually set foot in Blockbuster ask for the HDDVD format, just to piss them off.
June 19th, 2007 at 1:47 am
It was a foregone conclusion that Blu-Ray would eventually win the format war. Blockbuster making this decision is pretty big, although they also made the choice early on to rent Full-Frame DVDs only, but they eventually went Widescreen only.
HD-DVD was on a losing track simply because they only had 1 major studio exclusive to it: Universal. On the Blu-Ray side there is Sony, Fox and Disney exclusively. Warner plays both sides (but there are some key HD-DVD only releases so far like Matrix and Batman Begins).
Unless something devastating was going to happen to the Blu-Ray format, I don’t see Fox or Disney doing double-duty or switching sides, so Universal is the lone one left (although they do have many TV programs, but so does Fox and Disney/ABC as well).
June 19th, 2007 at 6:38 am
As a new PS3 owner, I have been reading a lot about the Blu-ray/HD-DVD debate. One interesting point of view that I have seen lately is that neither format will “win.” Even if Blu-ray continues to sell more movies, the numbers are not even close to SD DVD format movies.
The previous poster makes the best point - Blu-ray has more studios behind the format right now.
I do not plan to “upgrade” my library anytime soon as I did with VHS to DVD. In fact some movies (planet earth) do not have bonus content on Blu-ray and HD-DVD, but they include the extras on DVD.
June 19th, 2007 at 8:07 am
From The Digital Bits (these guys know their sh#@ when it comes to this stuff):
“And all of that experience tells us this: HD-DVD is not going to win this format war. In fact, one of two things is possible right now: Either Blu-ray will win, or neither format will win. But the best HD-DVD can hope for is to just keep hanging in the game as long as possible.”
http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/
soapbox/soap060107.html
June 19th, 2007 at 8:10 am
Yes, it is true that neither format could win. It all depends on what the consumers want. If standard DVD holds onto the percentage it does in total movie sales for many years to come it could very well take over the newer technology.
June 19th, 2007 at 11:02 am
And damn Universal for only supporting HD-DVD at this point. I just want to watch Serenity in HD. I’m not asking for much. I just don’t want to spend $200+ to do it.
Eventually, I’ll end up with a player for both formats though, I’m almost certain of it. It’s just a matter of waiting for the right time.
June 19th, 2007 at 11:38 am
Dan I applaud your decision to make the leap on HD-DVD. For only $199 it’s a wise maneuver and it’s not like the format is going to drop off the face of the Earth altogether if/when Blu Ray “wins”. There are plenty of HD-DVD format exclusives out there that are worth the $199 to pick up.
I hate the “format war” as much as anyone, especially when it is essentially Sony using its marketing and promotional muscle to make sure its own tech wins out in the end…even though it is not the better product, especially when you take into consideration its price being roughly 2X what HD-DVD costs.
As someone who has covered this extensively (I’ve been reviewing discs for years on my site, http://www.andyfilm.com, and cover Blu Ray and HD-DVD titles weekly), I can say both formats can look and sound amazing at their best, no question.
The thing about HD-DVD is that it is just as good a product — in fact better in terms of supplemental content — and does not cost 1/2 as much as what Blu Ray does. So many Blu Ray discs are totally barren, bereft of supplements, and we keep hearing “it’ll change once Blu Ray Java is implemented” in the fall. That said, HD-DVD is a product that has had its act together from the beginning.
To me, the product that is most cost-effective for consumers is going to win. HD-DVD works just as well as Blu Ray, it looks just as good, it sounds just as good, and the players doesn’t cost 1/2 as much as Blu Ray machines.
On the other hand, Sony has brought all these studios on-hand to support its product — even if with all that additional disc capacity they haven’t found a way to show people WHY it is a “better” format. It simply isn’t, not at this point in time. At best it is roughly equivalent, if not perhaps slightly less polished than HD-DVD. (Meanwhile, some studios like Fox have been total no-shows on the Blu Ray side now for months…with delays across every title and no signs of changing things up anytime soon).
Sony trumpets their sales and does tons of marketing to convince everyone how well Blu Ray is doing — at the same time the PS3 has been nothing but a total bust in sales in the grand scheme of things. Sure Blu Ray might have a 2:1 advantage, but the sales of BOTH formats have been non-existent. Toshiba at least has been realistic in downsizing sales of HD-DVD players.
And if you believe standalone players are going to win this war eventually, Toshiba is in fine shape as the HD-DVD players (which don’t cost nearly what the Blu Ray machines do) continue to sell at a good clip, and at least FAR better than any of the Blu Ray machines do.
Sony also wants this war over and done with asap…but I think HD-DVD will prove to be the “people’s choice” and despite it fighting an uphill battle against the marketing/promotion of Sony, I think it has a fighting chance because of its cost advantage and also the not-minor fact that it works just as well…if not better.
As it is, both are fine formats, but I think HD-DVD is a bit more user friendly. It’ll be interesting to see the effects of all the Toshiba player sales later this year/early next year, and how that tilts the marketplace.
Andy Dursin
http://www.andyfilm.com
June 19th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
I just can’t get excited about “Hi-Def” dvds (be it HD-DVD or BR). I was excited when DVD came out, replaced my VHS library and bought new DVDs weekly. I just see no compelling reason for me to go Hi-Def.
From what I have seen, the Hi-Def dvds offer a minimal upgrade in picture, nearly double the DVD cost, and a lack of features on these DVDs.
Now if they did something interesting with the new discs, I would take another look. Such as taking advantage of the disc space and give me the entire X-Files series on a couple of discs and one package. Instead of the 50+ DVDs, that I have now, which had to be purchased in individual seasons and take up a complete row of my book shelf. That would interest me, as long as they didn’t try pricing the series for $300.
June 19th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Nate,
It is not a “minimal” upgrade. The best Blu Ray and HD-DVD discs IMO smoke standard-definition DVD…it is not like VHS-to-DVD, admittedly, but it is still a gigantic upgrade just the same…just like standard-definition is to high-definition.
And the larger your set, the more obvious the differences between HD and standard-definition will be also. If you only have a 26′ set, you won’t notice a huge difference.
June 19th, 2007 at 4:13 pm
I do have a large set 51″ Widescreen Hitachi, but it is a Rear-projection that only does 1080i.
Maybe that is part of the frustration, I got this set only 5 years ago and built a nice home theater. Got a nice DVD collection.
I know 5 years is ancient in technology terms.
From what I have seen, I do not feel the visuals alone, of HD or BR, are enough to justify the price of upgrading. Or enough to justify a DVD w/less features being nearly twice the cost. Maybe if I was just starting out, or had just bought a 1080p LCD, this would be different.
To me it feels too soon for a new format and that it is just being shoved down our throats, so the studios can have another big financial explosion (like w/DVD) and push their DRM. With limited benefit to the consumer.
With all that being said, if money wasn’t a concern or I could upgrade my equipment at will, the tech lover in me would be jumping in with both feet…At least until the next pretty tech came along.
June 19th, 2007 at 4:56 pm
I don’t feel that it’s too soon. Hell, didn’t DVD players sit at the $299 price point until some time in 1999? So, we’re talking about a new format at least 10 years after the last one was adopted? That’s not a short period of time.
I guess I wonder when the next format would come along? Are we going to be looking at 1440P or 1920P anytime soon? I don’t think so.
I used to think that there wasn’t a big difference between DVD and HD, until I started looking at screen to screen comparisons. Now I have a hard time going back to watch my DVD collection now after seeing some of the films in HD.
I’ll watch my H.264 conversion of Serenity on my laptop before I’ll watch my standard DVD though. That lets you know how much more I like the HD copy of it.
June 19th, 2007 at 11:26 pm
You need to research your history more.
Sony and Philips gave up their alternate format in the interest of format unity so DVD could come out without format competition.
Toshiba made tons of money off those patents.
Then Chinese manufacturers started to eat the lunch of the Japanese companies with cheap DVD players.
Sony, Matsushita and others convened an informal consortium to work on blue laser technology, in a way where they all share the patents.
Toshiba predictably was the only major company to decline to join this consortium. Instead, they looked for ways to extend their DVD patents to the next format.
Their first idea, along with Warner Brothers which also hold a lot of DVD patents, was to use the DVD disc as-is with Microsoft’s advanced codec to squeeze in HD resolutions in the same amount of space.
The other companies continued to research blue-laser and other disc formats. Only when it became clear that they were going to continue with this did Toshiba and Warner adopt blue laser.
So they came up with AOD, then changed the name to HD-DVD. Not much of an advance in disc capacity, same weakness as DVD in recording. Best of all for Toshiba, they get to keep all the patent money for themselves.
Over a year ago, before E3, there were negotiations to agree on a joint format. Reportedly, the Toshiba CEO was willing to compromise but Yamada, the “father of the DVD” ranted and blocked an agreement.
Since then, Toshiba has made noises about a 45 GB format, in an effort to try to court Disney, which has expressed interest in the higher capacity of Blu-Ray. Disney hasn’t switched and has proceeded to put one of their biggest franchises (Pirates of the Carribean) on Blu-Ray.
Cheap players are one thing but if it’s not getting the titles people want, it will wither quickly enough.
Toshiba giving away players at or below cost along with movies isn’t going to change that.