Typical MS. If they cannot gain adoption thru legitimate competitive bid processes, they resort to these kinds of underhanded tactics.
The LA Unified School District just approved a $30 million contract on the first round of iPad purchases, with the eventual goal of providing every student in LAUSD with an iPad over the next two years. The first contract is a pilot program for 47 schools, and the LAUSD already conducted a competitive bidding process with Apple placing the highest. This effectively shuts the district out from purchasing tablets on competing platforms. The funny part of the LAUSD bid is MS whining about how the district should not rely on just one platform. I'm sure that MS is every bit as magnanimous whenever districts decide between different desktop OS platforms.
A Microsoft representative urged the board to try more than one product and not to rely on one platform. Doing so could cut off the district from future price reductions and innovations, said Robyn Hines, senior director of state government affairs for Microsoft.
But district staff countered that Apple offered the superior product. They also said that students and teachers often change schools and should not have to learn a different platform.
MS couldn't win based on its merits, so it now resorts to giving them away by forcing students to use Bing. I suppose that MS views this as a win-win. Recall that MS has millions of unsold Surface RT units that they have already written off the books. Makes no difference to them how that inventory is distributed, so why not give them away? Bing can potentially gain some additional traffic, and maybe MS can get some more write offs to boot. Either way, I guess in their view this is a net gain.
But, this is also just more of their sleazy tricks to try and muscle their way into a market in which they have been excluded based on merit. And their MO is to throw monkey wrenches into the process to try and slow down adoption of a competing platform or format. In this case, LAUSD has already decided that they will standardize around the iPad, and have now made the first purchase. By doing this kind of giveaway program, they can potentially wrangle their way into those classrooms that are not part of the initial iPad pilot program. They don't need to dominate, just insert enough uncertainty into the process to give the district second thoughts about making the iPad the sole tablet that they purchase for students. At least, that's what they think.
This is no different than when MS tried to derail Blu-ray by propping up HD-DVD. In that format war, Blu-ray held a clear cut advantage from the beginning, and Toshiba was well on its way to supporting a unified HD optical format until MS stepped in at the last minute and convinced/bribed Toshiba to engage in a format war. At various steps along the way, MS tried to blunt Blu-ray's momentum (as well as optical HD video media in general) often using sleazy tactics like bribing studios to try and flip support away from Blu-ray. Yet, they were never completely on board with HD-DVD either -- for example, MS never standardized the HD-DVD format into the Xbox 360 console, like Sony did for Blu-ray with the PS3. MS just wanted a prolonged format war that would weaken both optical formats, and pave the way for streaming video, which MS envisioned themselves dominating.
With the video format war, MS' sleazy tactics failed, and this thinly veiled FUD attempt will fail exactly the same way.
"My children - in many dimensions they're as poorly behaved as many other children, but at least on this dimension I've got my kids brainwashed: You don't use Google, and you don't use an iPod." Steve Ballmer
He really wants children to suffer.
Except the wife, she "would thrash them within inches of their lives." Ballmer is cuckold by a Apple-user-wife.
This is no different than when MS tried to derail Blu-ray by propping up HD-DVD. In that format war, Blu-ray held a clear cut advantage from the beginning, and Toshiba was well on its way to supporting a unified HD optical format until MS stepped in at the last minute and convinced/bribed Toshiba to engage in a format war. At various steps along the way, MS tried to blunt Blu-ray's momentum (as well as optical HD video media in general) often using sleazy tactics like bribing studios to try and flip support away from Blu-ray. Yet, they were never completely on board with HD-DVD either -- for example, MS never standardized the HD-DVD format into the Xbox 360 console, like Sony did for Blu-ray with the PS3. MS just wanted a prolonged format war that would weaken both optical formats, and pave the way for streaming video, which MS envisioned themselves dominating.
With the video format war, MS' sleazy tactics failed, and this thinly veiled FUD attempt will fail exactly the same way.
I've got no love (or even like) for Microsoft, but I believe you have a lot of this wrong when it comes to BD vs HD-DVD. From my understanding, Sony killed HD-DVD by throwing money at everyone who supported the format. I'm also not sure what clear-cut advantage you're talking about - I suppose the theoretical advantage was the 30gb vs 50gb limit of HD-DVD vs BD, but from personal experience (I have both players), HD-DVD had a superior interface. I find HD-DVD to be more responsive and its menu system to be more robust and capable.
I did find it odd that Microsoft's own support for HD-DVD was limited to a (barely-promoted and not-so-readily-available) external drive. If your assertion is correct, that Microsoft's actions were to thwart support for optical media to force a transition to digital distribution, then Apple can thank Microsoft. Despite their efforts with the Zune and Xbox Marketplace, Microsoft is a tiny player in the digital distribution game. I'd bet that even Vudu has them well beat. Personally, I'm a big fan and have more content on my hard drives and in the cloud than I have on BD and HD-DVD (after BD won the format war, I was kinda done and have only purchased a handful of titles in physical form).
The *games* are highly addictive. If Surface had a killer function/App, they'd be selling like...hahaha. No one wants a surface but dancers who give PowerPoint presentations to their friends.
Actually the whole ECO-SYSTEM itself is addictive. There's a lot of great content on X-Box Live from ESPN to MLB and so on. The Pizza Hut app is great when in a long session of gaming
This is what you call the best product Microsoft makes these days?
"My children - in many dimensions they're as poorly behaved as many other children, but at least on this dimension I've got my kids brainwashed: You don't use Google, and you don't use an iPod." Steve Ballmer
He really wants children to suffer.
Hmm. Let's see. Was I talking about a system THAT HASYET TO COME OUT or was I speaking of the ORIGINAL X-Box and the 360? smh......
I've got no love (or even like) for Microsoft, but I believe you have a lot of this wrong when it comes to BD vs HD-DVD. From my understanding, Sony killed HD-DVD by throwing money at everyone who supported the format. I'm also not sure what clear-cut advantage you're talking about - I suppose the theoretical advantage was the 30gb vs 50gb limit of HD-DVD vs BD, but from personal experience (I have both players), HD-DVD had a superior interface. I find HD-DVD to be more responsive and its menu system to be more robust and capable.
I did find it odd that Microsoft's own support for HD-DVD was limited to a (barely-promoted and not-so-readily-available) external drive. If your assertion is correct, that Microsoft's actions were to thwart support for optical media to force a transition to digital distribution, then Apple can thank Microsoft. Despite their efforts with the Zune and Xbox Marketplace, Microsoft is a tiny player in the digital distribution game. I'd bet that even Vudu has them well beat. Personally, I'm a big fan and have more content on my hard drives and in the cloud than I have on BD and HD-DVD (after BD won the format war, I was kinda done and have only purchased a handful of titles in physical form).
Sony was actually not the sole beneficiary of Blu-ray, they were simply the most prominent proponent. In actuality, the patent pool for the format shows a lot of players involved, some of whom stood to benefit financially more than Sony if the format succeeded.
The clear-cut advantage that I referred to was the industry support, and studio support in particular. Toshiba pretty much stood alone in its support of HD-DVD, which in reality represented their last chance at a financial windfall from their DVD patents (Toshiba and Warner had the biggest financial stake in the DVD format), since HD-DVD was more of an extension of the DVD format than anything.
The structural advantage of Blu-ray was in place before the first players even hit store shelves. Among the major studios, Sony, Fox, and Disney were Blu-ray exclusive, and only Universal was HD-DVD exclusive. Everybody else (Warner and Paramount/Dreamworks) was neutral and released titles in both formats. This ensured that Blu-ray would have a larger selection of the most in-demand titles. And everyone knew that once Sony released the PS3, Blu-ray would also gain an insurmountable advantage in the installed base as well. Toshiba saw this, and as the launch date neared, they came close to an agreement with the Blu-ray coalition on a unified HD optical format. Microsoft stepped in at the 11th hour and basically sabotaged the entire process by throwing their weight behind HD-DVD, thus ensuring a format war.
Aside from slowing down adoption for optical HD video discs, MS also wanted to worm its VC-1 (Silverlight) format into the industry standards for digital video, and slow down the market momentum behind the MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 standard. On that front, MS actually succeeded (at least at first), because HD-DVD would standardize around VC-1, due to its more aggressive compression (necessitated by HD-DVD's smaller disc capacity). This forced the neutral studios to push for VC-1 to become a mandatory supported format in Blu-ray, since that would allow them to do one encoding run for both Blu-ray and HD-DVD disc releases.
As indicated, I don't think MS actually wanted HD-DVD to succeed, so much as they wanted to mire Blu-ray down in a format war. That's why they never integrated HD-DVD drives into the Xbox 360. It was only when Blu-ray looked on the verge of winning that format war quickly that MS stepped in yet again and basically bribed Paramount into dropping Blu-ray and going HD-DVD exclusive. At that time, sales on identical titles showed Blu-ray with more than a 3-to-1 advantage, so Paramount's decision was obviously not market-driven.
Rumor has it that MS also offered a large sum for Warner to drop its support of Blu-ray and go HD-DVD exclusive. But, Warner looked at what was happening in the market, and decided that the only way for the HD optical disc to succeed was for the industry to unify behind one format. Warner looked at Sony and Disney's intractable support for Blu-ray, and decided to go Blu-ray exclusive. This was a huge blow to Toshiba, because they'd been joined at the hip with Warner since the beginning of the DVD format, and Warner had the largest share of HD-DVD sales by a wide margin. Only after losing their long-time partner did Toshiba finally give up on HD-DVD.
You're right in that MS' efforts largely went for naught, since Apple became the dominant player in movie downloads and Netflix is battling a slate of competitors, not including Microsoft, for streaming video. But, also Blu-ray winning the format war when it did also ensured that the format would have some success. It's not the runaway hit that the DVD became, but it has steadily maintained double-digit growth as DVD sales declined. Blu-ray remains my preferred viewing, simply because 1080p downloads and "HD" streaming cannot come close to matching its picture and sound quality. I realize though that the networked options are probably good enough for the mass market (after all, DVDs still hold the majority of optical disc sales).
But, the streaming market is probably going to fragment into a bunch of entrenched camps, with the movie and TV titles divided between Netflix, Amazon, Google, and whoever else wants to enter the fray. The problem is that no single service can afford to pay the rising content fees with all of the major studios, and streaming is quickly headed towards the situation we see now with different premium cable channels each having exclusive access to different sets of titles. That's why Netflix has been dropping titles from its library, and why a title available today won't necessarily be there after the current contracts expire. At least with a physical disc, you know it's always going to be available.
You're right in that MS' efforts largely went for naught, since Apple became the dominant player in movie downloads and Netflix is battling a slate of competitors, not including Microsoft, for streaming video. But, also Blu-ray winning the format war when it did also ensured that the format would have some success. It's not the runaway hit that the DVD became, but it has steadily maintained double-digit growth as DVD sales declined. Blu-ray remains my preferred viewing, simply because 1080p downloads and "HD" streaming cannot come close to matching its picture and sound quality. I realize though that the networked options are probably good enough for the mass market (after all, DVDs still hold the majority of optical disc sales).
But, the streaming market is probably going to fragment into a bunch of entrenched camps, with the movie and TV titles divided between Netflix, Amazon, Google, and whoever else wants to enter the fray. The problem is that no single service can afford to pay the rising content fees with all of the major studios, and streaming is quickly headed towards the situation we see now with different premium cable channels each having exclusive access to different sets of titles. That's why Netflix has been dropping titles from its library, and why a title available today won't necessarily be there after the current contracts expire. At least with a physical disc, you know it's always going to be available.
Definitely interesting reading in your post. There's a lot of history I was unaware of. I'm one of those mass market folk who find the convenience of digital media so compelling that I generally settle for an inferior product. I have my collection of movies (both SD DVD and HD media) ripped and available via Plex which offers me the convenience of streaming to any number of TVs and computers in my house via Plex clients, computers outside my house via MyPlex, and offline transcoded content to iOS devices via PlexPass. The availability of content no matter where I am, even when I'm at 37,000 feet, is so convenient that I accept the degraded quality for most videos. I also have a fair bit of content purchased via iTunes and a 1st-gen AppleTV. I still watch some of the "more desirable" content via HD-DVD and BD and do notice the difference.
Of course, my primary TV is older and only capable of 720p. It may mask the diminished quality enough that I'll have to switch over to physical media after I upgrade to a newer display
Comments
Typical MS. If they cannot gain adoption thru legitimate competitive bid processes, they resort to these kinds of underhanded tactics.
The LA Unified School District just approved a $30 million contract on the first round of iPad purchases, with the eventual goal of providing every student in LAUSD with an iPad over the next two years. The first contract is a pilot program for 47 schools, and the LAUSD already conducted a competitive bidding process with Apple placing the highest. This effectively shuts the district out from purchasing tablets on competing platforms. The funny part of the LAUSD bid is MS whining about how the district should not rely on just one platform. I'm sure that MS is every bit as magnanimous whenever districts decide between different desktop OS platforms.
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jun/18/local/la-me-0619-lausd-20130619
Quote:
A Microsoft representative urged the board to try more than one product and not to rely on one platform. Doing so could cut off the district from future price reductions and innovations, said Robyn Hines, senior director of state government affairs for Microsoft.
But district staff countered that Apple offered the superior product. They also said that students and teachers often change schools and should not have to learn a different platform.
MS couldn't win based on its merits, so it now resorts to giving them away by forcing students to use Bing. I suppose that MS views this as a win-win. Recall that MS has millions of unsold Surface RT units that they have already written off the books. Makes no difference to them how that inventory is distributed, so why not give them away? Bing can potentially gain some additional traffic, and maybe MS can get some more write offs to boot. Either way, I guess in their view this is a net gain.
But, this is also just more of their sleazy tricks to try and muscle their way into a market in which they have been excluded based on merit. And their MO is to throw monkey wrenches into the process to try and slow down adoption of a competing platform or format. In this case, LAUSD has already decided that they will standardize around the iPad, and have now made the first purchase. By doing this kind of giveaway program, they can potentially wrangle their way into those classrooms that are not part of the initial iPad pilot program. They don't need to dominate, just insert enough uncertainty into the process to give the district second thoughts about making the iPad the sole tablet that they purchase for students. At least, that's what they think.
This is no different than when MS tried to derail Blu-ray by propping up HD-DVD. In that format war, Blu-ray held a clear cut advantage from the beginning, and Toshiba was well on its way to supporting a unified HD optical format until MS stepped in at the last minute and convinced/bribed Toshiba to engage in a format war. At various steps along the way, MS tried to blunt Blu-ray's momentum (as well as optical HD video media in general) often using sleazy tactics like bribing studios to try and flip support away from Blu-ray. Yet, they were never completely on board with HD-DVD either -- for example, MS never standardized the HD-DVD format into the Xbox 360 console, like Sony did for Blu-ray with the PS3. MS just wanted a prolonged format war that would weaken both optical formats, and pave the way for streaming video, which MS envisioned themselves dominating.
With the video format war, MS' sleazy tactics failed, and this thinly veiled FUD attempt will fail exactly the same way.
Quote:
Originally Posted by bobborries
"My children - in many dimensions they're as poorly behaved as many other children, but at least on this dimension I've got my kids brainwashed: You don't use Google, and you don't use an iPod." Steve Ballmer
He really wants children to suffer.
Except the wife, she "would thrash them within inches of their lives." Ballmer is cuckold by a Apple-user-wife.
Surface RT funeral.
That was my exact thought. Microsoft should be banned from damaging children's minds.
And the sound of the splash results in a swirling floater in the toilet bowl!
I totally agree.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Woochifer
This is no different than when MS tried to derail Blu-ray by propping up HD-DVD. In that format war, Blu-ray held a clear cut advantage from the beginning, and Toshiba was well on its way to supporting a unified HD optical format until MS stepped in at the last minute and convinced/bribed Toshiba to engage in a format war. At various steps along the way, MS tried to blunt Blu-ray's momentum (as well as optical HD video media in general) often using sleazy tactics like bribing studios to try and flip support away from Blu-ray. Yet, they were never completely on board with HD-DVD either -- for example, MS never standardized the HD-DVD format into the Xbox 360 console, like Sony did for Blu-ray with the PS3. MS just wanted a prolonged format war that would weaken both optical formats, and pave the way for streaming video, which MS envisioned themselves dominating.
With the video format war, MS' sleazy tactics failed, and this thinly veiled FUD attempt will fail exactly the same way.
I've got no love (or even like) for Microsoft, but I believe you have a lot of this wrong when it comes to BD vs HD-DVD. From my understanding, Sony killed HD-DVD by throwing money at everyone who supported the format. I'm also not sure what clear-cut advantage you're talking about - I suppose the theoretical advantage was the 30gb vs 50gb limit of HD-DVD vs BD, but from personal experience (I have both players), HD-DVD had a superior interface. I find HD-DVD to be more responsive and its menu system to be more robust and capable.
I did find it odd that Microsoft's own support for HD-DVD was limited to a (barely-promoted and not-so-readily-available) external drive. If your assertion is correct, that Microsoft's actions were to thwart support for optical media to force a transition to digital distribution, then Apple can thank Microsoft. Despite their efforts with the Zune and Xbox Marketplace, Microsoft is a tiny player in the digital distribution game. I'd bet that even Vudu has them well beat. Personally, I'm a big fan and have more content on my hard drives and in the cloud than I have on BD and HD-DVD (after BD won the format war, I was kinda done and have only purchased a handful of titles in physical form).
Quote:
Originally Posted by jungmark
The *games* are highly addictive. If Surface had a killer function/App, they'd be selling like...hahaha. No one wants a surface but dancers who give PowerPoint presentations to their friends.
Actually the whole ECO-SYSTEM itself is addictive. There's a lot of great content on X-Box Live from ESPN to MLB and so on. The Pizza Hut app is great when in a long session of gaming
Quote:
Originally Posted by bobborries
Let me get this straight...
This is what you call the best product Microsoft makes these days?
"My children - in many dimensions they're as poorly behaved as many other children, but at least on this dimension I've got my kids brainwashed: You don't use Google, and you don't use an iPod." Steve Ballmer
He really wants children to suffer.
Hmm. Let's see. Was I talking about a system THAT HAS YET TO COME OUT or was I speaking of the ORIGINAL X-Box and the 360? smh......
Perhaps he has some really good blackmail material?
Quote:
Originally Posted by djames4242
I've got no love (or even like) for Microsoft, but I believe you have a lot of this wrong when it comes to BD vs HD-DVD. From my understanding, Sony killed HD-DVD by throwing money at everyone who supported the format. I'm also not sure what clear-cut advantage you're talking about - I suppose the theoretical advantage was the 30gb vs 50gb limit of HD-DVD vs BD, but from personal experience (I have both players), HD-DVD had a superior interface. I find HD-DVD to be more responsive and its menu system to be more robust and capable.
I did find it odd that Microsoft's own support for HD-DVD was limited to a (barely-promoted and not-so-readily-available) external drive. If your assertion is correct, that Microsoft's actions were to thwart support for optical media to force a transition to digital distribution, then Apple can thank Microsoft. Despite their efforts with the Zune and Xbox Marketplace, Microsoft is a tiny player in the digital distribution game. I'd bet that even Vudu has them well beat. Personally, I'm a big fan and have more content on my hard drives and in the cloud than I have on BD and HD-DVD (after BD won the format war, I was kinda done and have only purchased a handful of titles in physical form).
Sony was actually not the sole beneficiary of Blu-ray, they were simply the most prominent proponent. In actuality, the patent pool for the format shows a lot of players involved, some of whom stood to benefit financially more than Sony if the format succeeded.
The clear-cut advantage that I referred to was the industry support, and studio support in particular. Toshiba pretty much stood alone in its support of HD-DVD, which in reality represented their last chance at a financial windfall from their DVD patents (Toshiba and Warner had the biggest financial stake in the DVD format), since HD-DVD was more of an extension of the DVD format than anything.
The structural advantage of Blu-ray was in place before the first players even hit store shelves. Among the major studios, Sony, Fox, and Disney were Blu-ray exclusive, and only Universal was HD-DVD exclusive. Everybody else (Warner and Paramount/Dreamworks) was neutral and released titles in both formats. This ensured that Blu-ray would have a larger selection of the most in-demand titles. And everyone knew that once Sony released the PS3, Blu-ray would also gain an insurmountable advantage in the installed base as well. Toshiba saw this, and as the launch date neared, they came close to an agreement with the Blu-ray coalition on a unified HD optical format. Microsoft stepped in at the 11th hour and basically sabotaged the entire process by throwing their weight behind HD-DVD, thus ensuring a format war.
Aside from slowing down adoption for optical HD video discs, MS also wanted to worm its VC-1 (Silverlight) format into the industry standards for digital video, and slow down the market momentum behind the MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 standard. On that front, MS actually succeeded (at least at first), because HD-DVD would standardize around VC-1, due to its more aggressive compression (necessitated by HD-DVD's smaller disc capacity). This forced the neutral studios to push for VC-1 to become a mandatory supported format in Blu-ray, since that would allow them to do one encoding run for both Blu-ray and HD-DVD disc releases.
As indicated, I don't think MS actually wanted HD-DVD to succeed, so much as they wanted to mire Blu-ray down in a format war. That's why they never integrated HD-DVD drives into the Xbox 360. It was only when Blu-ray looked on the verge of winning that format war quickly that MS stepped in yet again and basically bribed Paramount into dropping Blu-ray and going HD-DVD exclusive. At that time, sales on identical titles showed Blu-ray with more than a 3-to-1 advantage, so Paramount's decision was obviously not market-driven.
Rumor has it that MS also offered a large sum for Warner to drop its support of Blu-ray and go HD-DVD exclusive. But, Warner looked at what was happening in the market, and decided that the only way for the HD optical disc to succeed was for the industry to unify behind one format. Warner looked at Sony and Disney's intractable support for Blu-ray, and decided to go Blu-ray exclusive. This was a huge blow to Toshiba, because they'd been joined at the hip with Warner since the beginning of the DVD format, and Warner had the largest share of HD-DVD sales by a wide margin. Only after losing their long-time partner did Toshiba finally give up on HD-DVD.
You're right in that MS' efforts largely went for naught, since Apple became the dominant player in movie downloads and Netflix is battling a slate of competitors, not including Microsoft, for streaming video. But, also Blu-ray winning the format war when it did also ensured that the format would have some success. It's not the runaway hit that the DVD became, but it has steadily maintained double-digit growth as DVD sales declined. Blu-ray remains my preferred viewing, simply because 1080p downloads and "HD" streaming cannot come close to matching its picture and sound quality. I realize though that the networked options are probably good enough for the mass market (after all, DVDs still hold the majority of optical disc sales).
But, the streaming market is probably going to fragment into a bunch of entrenched camps, with the movie and TV titles divided between Netflix, Amazon, Google, and whoever else wants to enter the fray. The problem is that no single service can afford to pay the rising content fees with all of the major studios, and streaming is quickly headed towards the situation we see now with different premium cable channels each having exclusive access to different sets of titles. That's why Netflix has been dropping titles from its library, and why a title available today won't necessarily be there after the current contracts expire. At least with a physical disc, you know it's always going to be available.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Woochifer
You're right in that MS' efforts largely went for naught, since Apple became the dominant player in movie downloads and Netflix is battling a slate of competitors, not including Microsoft, for streaming video. But, also Blu-ray winning the format war when it did also ensured that the format would have some success. It's not the runaway hit that the DVD became, but it has steadily maintained double-digit growth as DVD sales declined. Blu-ray remains my preferred viewing, simply because 1080p downloads and "HD" streaming cannot come close to matching its picture and sound quality. I realize though that the networked options are probably good enough for the mass market (after all, DVDs still hold the majority of optical disc sales).
But, the streaming market is probably going to fragment into a bunch of entrenched camps, with the movie and TV titles divided between Netflix, Amazon, Google, and whoever else wants to enter the fray. The problem is that no single service can afford to pay the rising content fees with all of the major studios, and streaming is quickly headed towards the situation we see now with different premium cable channels each having exclusive access to different sets of titles. That's why Netflix has been dropping titles from its library, and why a title available today won't necessarily be there after the current contracts expire. At least with a physical disc, you know it's always going to be available.
Definitely interesting reading in your post. There's a lot of history I was unaware of. I'm one of those mass market folk who find the convenience of digital media so compelling that I generally settle for an inferior product. I have my collection of movies (both SD DVD and HD media) ripped and available via Plex which offers me the convenience of streaming to any number of TVs and computers in my house via Plex clients, computers outside my house via MyPlex, and offline transcoded content to iOS devices via PlexPass. The availability of content no matter where I am, even when I'm at 37,000 feet, is so convenient that I accept the degraded quality for most videos. I also have a fair bit of content purchased via iTunes and a 1st-gen AppleTV. I still watch some of the "more desirable" content via HD-DVD and BD and do notice the difference.
Of course, my primary TV is older and only capable of 720p. It may mask the diminished quality enough that I'll have to switch over to physical media after I upgrade to a newer display