Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD (2006) - Page 46

awww no, we'll miss his crazy rants!!!





http://www.engadget.com/2006/11/30/s...n-on-the-outs/

This is an extremely important point. Neither format can make it as more than a niche product until there is a critical mass of machines out there and in use, and this means adoption by the mass consumer market. Besides newness, price and availability, two things are keeping consumers holding onto their credit cards-- lack of critical mass of HDTVs in use and competing formats, which turns consumers off.

HDTVs are selling well and prices for flat panels are dropping, but it's still going to take a couple of years until prices reach affordability for most people. Even if one of the formats drops out next year, it's still going to take several years to see if consumers will go for the survivor or stay with the good old DVD format.

What I look to happen is both formats limping along for the next 2 - 3 unless, of course, one of them reaches a point where losses become company-threatening and they throw in the towel. Which raises the question as to who has the deepest pockets. By the end of that time there should be a clear idea whether consumers are going to accept a form of HD DVD and which one.

In my own case, I recently went from a 36" 4x3 CRT to a 50" Panny plasma and the experience going from watching HD TV on the CRT to the larger plasma was mind blowing. It makes me more receptive to one of the HD DVD formats. I went from laserdisc to DVD when the price of a DVD player dropped to $400. However, even though I can afford to, there's no way I'll buy into competing formats.

I must say though that the reviews on the PS3 as a BR player are very tempting. On the AVS Forum's BR board there was a thread from someone very affluent who tested all the BR players and found, much to her surprise, that the PS3 outperformed the 3 stand-alone players. She ended up using the PS3 in her main HT and one of the stand-alones in her smaller one. If there wasn't a format war, I'd be tempted to buy one of the HD/BR players even if it becomes a niche format. But with the format war, no thanks.

Yah...but for $200 once someone gets HD-DVD support into OSX I'm willing to buy a 360 HD drive. $500? No. But I've got a couple $200 upconverting DVD players that didn't really work out all that well so I guess for me $199 is my threshold of pain.

Vinea

FYI, today is the last day for the Circuit City $40 coupon. I'm sure the xbox add on or the stand alone HD-DVD rom may cost less, however, the initial batch will contain King Kong Movie and the media center remote for free.

Mmmmmm....must resist or wife will kill me for buying an accessory for a toy I don't even own.

Wait, I can claim its a christmas gift for one of my cousins! No, that wont fly...

Vinea

LOL......... You may need a WAF class, there are few WAF certified HD-DVD movies that may justify the risk but still doesnt guarantee anything. I'm supposed to watch Casablanca in HD-DVD tonight with wifey, I'll report back whether the dose is strong enough.

no one here is saying the PS3 is doomed, people were just sick and tired of hearing sony's camp hyping the system too far beyond reasonable expectations, or i guess beyond the ability to deliver on those promises.

sony does this all the F*ing time and people are sick of it!

not to mention sony was the only one constantly throwing trash at their opponents while at the same time copying them.

Who's the little boy here?

I must have my toys....LOL. I'm just glad I'm not too old to enjoy all the new toys.

http://www.ps3land.com/article-1044.php


//Larry Probst, CEO of Electronic Arts, believes that Sony managed to ship approximately 200,000 PS3 units to North America. Although EA predicted Sony would fall short of its 400,000 unit target, the actual figures came as a "surprise".//


ok

so you HD-DVD guys are saying players are around $400 ?? thats about £200 in UK money...

plus no PROPER Gran Turismo till 2008 http://www.ps3land.com/article-1046.php

give it another 6 months and i think im IN for a HD-DVD player... and a Wii this xmas this is a serious balls up for sony.. the Wii has shipped 600,000 to the US and 400,000 to japan thats a million right there... sony has nothing... no volume of hardware equals no incentive to program for the platform.

by 2008 the hardware will likely have fallen.. IF GT is still released for the PS3 then MAYBE ill get one with the game.. or pick up a used one!

no wonder Ken has gotten pushed sideways

Trendannoyer, nevertheless it is still in high demand regardless of how many Wii's there are. Adult gamers (which is the majority) are not that interested in a Wii. Wii looks like a toy comparatively.
Even if Sony has some issues with numbers people have already decided if they want one or not, and many are willing to wait until the demand goes down. The point is Sony is still producing as many units as they can, and for every unit they produce (and that's way beyond 1,000,000.00) there is going to be a buyer.

I think the average consumers would wait until the price would go down on PS3 prior to replacing their existing gaming console. The price is the driving factors for most consumers. The initial demands are limited, and I would think the post sales demands from 1 million initial units would slow down significantly. $499/$599 is still a lot of money for any parents to spend on a gaming console. However, $499/$599 as a BD player would be highly demanded, but smaller number of HT enthusiasts would get PS3 as main or a second unit in the housewhole. Unfortunately, if more PS3 is sold soley as BD player instead gaming console, Sony would be out of business sooner than expected.

are you not taking into account Nintendos strategy of aiming for the NON-gamer?

what i am saying is that despite being inclinded towards a PS3 i look at the LACK of units avalible (PS3) campaired to Nintendos Glut of consoles IN STORE and i assume, that unless Sony exceed production that the Wii and the xbox are more numerous.. software houses are increasingly faced with LARGE development costs... the Wii is apparently easier to program for, and the PS3 is harder to program for.... if a game coded for the Wii costs less to make, and sells more... what are you going to code for?

it REALLY WILL be interesting to see what sales are like in the new year

if i can get my hands on a Wii for xmas i think i will, but if i dont, or dont get one in the new year, it will be very interesting to watch the PS3 story unfold until march (im in the UK) its a buyers market the 360 is not something i want... the PS3 is not something i "need" and the Wii if at the very least is considered a "toy" is something i can get as a treat... if it proves itself as more that a mere treat, then why would i bother about the other two? somthing i neither want nor need?

and im an adult \ 8)

Over in the AVS forums the PS3 is getting a lot of good buzz as a Blu-ray player, with reports that it's as good as if not better than the stand-alone players. The $499 PS3 looks like an afordable entry into B-R and if availabilty and competing formats weren't a problem I'd be seriously interested.

Here's something for you nerds to chew on:

Blue Ray Hacked on PS3

This is how Sony's shooting themselves on the foot. PS3 taking sales away from CE BD player manufacturers by undercutting on the price, but at the same time, Sony's losing more money from PS3 especially when sold solely as BD player instead. The CE BD market is still a niche market and taking BD player unit sales away would be detrimental to BD hardware market as as whole. Soon, no one would build a CE BD player and try to sell it $1000+, because no one would pay such price when many budget oriented HT enthusiasts would chose to get $499/$599 PS3 instead. This would lead to hardware vendors pulling out of the market and supporting the other side. This would be written in history as suicide strategy that killed Sony and BD DVD.

an interesting post i found on another board puts into words what ive been thinking RE HD-DVD and its apparent large attachment rates

its from october so the figures are a bit old but the point is still valid

//I don't dispute HD-DVD is going well now, but they've sold what? I think online estimates are around 45-50,000 players (with about 10,000 returns apparently). Still that's well over the 10,000 for the Samsung player. I understand Warners is pressing 25,000 discs for the more popular titles, and generally selling out. HD-DVD has a high attachment rate (understandable, because it is selling to Home Theatre enthusiasts. I believe it is currently about 20-25 titles per player, but this will drop as more and more are sold to casual buyers).//

Well, I just declared my allegiance to HD DVD and bought a stack of discs from Amazon. I haven't ordered a player yet; I'll see what the reviews of the second-gen Toshiba players are like (hopefully next week, if the $499 model is shipping).

Now to figure out how to plug two component devices into one set of plugs on my TV, since the stupid players won't upconvert standard DVDs over component...

Something to keep in mind though, HT enthusiasts are the type of people who couldn't care less if there's a format war as they'll be buying both format's players and discs.

Cool I'm looking at the A2 as well. What movies did you buy and what 3 movies are you going to choose with the offer from Toshiba.

I'm getting

Blazing Saddles
We Were Soldiers and
Seabiscuit

I'll probably order my A2 from Robert Zohn from Value Electronics for 450.00 and get another two movies from his special.

If you're looking for a cheap, but decent AV switcher, you can find one at local Walmart or Target for about $20. Philips or RCA makes one that is 5 to 1 or 4 to 1 manual AV switcher which also works wonderfully for multi 5.1 analog audio sources. There are few different kinds, but get the one that allows 6 plug RCA switching. I'm sure you can find something in $100+ range as well if you want brand name.

Marzetta7

Come on you're not actually quoting from that idiot HD-DED are you?

If you're going to do any sort of scientific analysis you have to normalize against something. Simply looking at the ratings for the last 10 movies and avg them out does not speak to quality because the movies are different. Now if the movies rated where identical then you'd have something.

Yes you find the rating equal which is congruent with two formats that share the same codecs. It's a bit disingenous to say that Blu-ray looks superior. Your post just points to the last 10 Blu-ray releases being centered around movies that are newer and thus have cleaner Masters for the most part.

I will agree with you that some HD DVD fans have rode the "HD DVD looks better" mantra a wee bit too hard. We've normalized the codecs so the only real differentation that we can see is higher bitrate/bandwidth usage.

I think if you just bought an Xbox 360 and a HD DVD add on you'd be much happier

Well.... I'm not surprised. This isn't the first time I've seen similar claims. I also saw an idiotic post like this over at AVSforum under BD Software and it got locked:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...7&page=1&pp=30

thanks that also sums up a LOT of the BALLS spewed on a LOT of the posts in this thread.

my winkies bigger than everyone elses...cos,cos,cos..it IS just! SO!!!!

BTW, here's link to another $40 Coupon from Circuit City. I believe you can use it towards xbox360, xbox360 HD-DVD add on, or even on PS3.

http://rapidshare.com/files/5842095/...tback.zip.html

Not to out myself as a complete geek, but I bought "Superman Returns," "Batman Begins" and "V for Vendetta." My three free discs will be "Chronicles of Riddick" (a terrible movie but it's slim pickings), "Constantine" and "Sky Captain."

I know (because it disappeared from my wish list) that someone bought me "Reds" for Christmas and I'll probably pick up "Troy" and "Phantom of the Opera" by the time I get a player.

I fully expect this format spat is going to drag on for at least another year, if not longer (unless a universal player emerges), and as some wise soul said earlier, why sit on the sidelines when you could be enjoying "Batman Begins" in high definition? I'm not inclined to wait.

haha, you just pwned him

I wasn't much impressed with Superman Returns in term of movie or the PQ. Actually, Sky Captain is also very soft as intended and I would not double dip if you already own SD version. I just finished watching Harry Potter GOF on HD-DVD (from amazon.uk) and it will make a great demo material for PQ as well as the TruHD audio really shines on some of the scenes.

The V4V, BatB, along with King Kong makes a great action pack on the HD-DVD exclusive side along with many other great titles... Anyway, I'm pretty much done for this year's HD-DVD orders.... I have Ant Bully amimation on order from amazon and I'm pretty much done for this year. I was hoping to see Matrix Trilogy along with Harry Potter Series release in Dec., but it didnt' happen. I'll start next year by picking up Mummy Returns & Sting and hopefully we'll start seeing Disney/Pixar titles on the first quarter of 07.

BTW, Target seems to have Cinderella Man HD-DVD on sale for $13.98........ I tried my local store without a success, though.

oops.... i didn't mean to. I just wish people would post something more credible to debate about.

I was going to say that the review of "Superman Returns" I read said it was demo-quality, but I checked again and he was talking about the audio. Oh well. It's not a brilliant movie, certainly not compared to "Batman Begins," but I liked it much better the second time I saw it. "Sky Captain" is one of the free discs Toshiba is offering; it's either that or the first "Lara Croft" movie, and I already own that on DVD as well. It boils down to which one I think I'd watch more.

I just saw "Kong" in HD on Cinemax and was reminded of how. long. every. scene. drags. on. It was a great 100-minute movie that unfortunately had another really horrible 90-minute movie grafted onto it. I worship Peter Jackson, but I won't have that disc in my house.

When I get another PS3 I'll be looking into getting : V for Vendetta, and Sin City. I can't think to much past those two as absolute must owns. Maybe the Pirates of The Caribbean Trilogy when It's available, and Star Wars (again) King Kong (which I'd probably only watch once) Wouldn't be bad to own, and neither would the extended LOTR Movies.

dear me no matter WHICH toy has "best" stamped on it, someone always ends up shouting "Power Rangers are BESSSTEST-ER"

give it six months FFS

You're right...those folks on the AVS/BD Software forum are mostly consist of extremely biased BD fanatics. However the differece between BD fanatics on this forum and the AVS forum is that most of them on AVS/BD software forum already own stand alone BD player or a PS3 to tinker with at home and they found the claims to be fraud, hence the thread was locked. So, at least some BD supporters have common sense and not so gullible to idiotic claims online.