DVD Player Chipsets To Support Windows Media Files 407
An Anonymous Coward writes: "According to this article in EETimes, Microsoft previewed its next generation Windows Media technology, and said that chipset makers that account for 90% of home DVD players will be including the technology in their upcoming chipsets. I hope the various courts looking into Microsoft's monopoly examine this closely, there is a lot of potential for Microsoft to extend its monopoly here. The next logical step would be for them to pay movie studios to produce Windows Media format movies that are available before or cost less than regular DVD format, that is, if they are made available in regular DVD format at all! This would also be a neat way for studios to force us all to upgrade our existing DVD players use the now-cracked CSS." Ton van der Liet points out this article on ZDNet, writing: "Microsoft touts the advantages of Windows Media, such as longer playback. Wasn't MPEG-4 supposed to do this? And aren't the newest Windows Media codecs based on a draft of the MPEG-4 standard?"
I DO NOT want WMP technology in my DVD player... (Score:4, Funny)
I'll refuse to buy one that includes.
You DVD manufactures listening to me? I *know* you read slashdot.
Stand Up For Your Beliefs and Rights - Use your $$ (Score:4, Informative)
Before I get flamed - I'm not totally against Microsoft as I use some of their products in my daily life, I'm just getting really tired of them trying to "control all that you see and hear" to borrow a phrase.
Re:Stand Up For Your Beliefs and Rights - Use your (Score:2, Funny)
Since Microsoft couldn't even do the DVD CSS correctly with their XBox, how would they come up with their own format.
I hope that I'm not the only one to spot just how ironic this whole thing is.
Re:Stand Up For Your Beliefs and Rights - Use your (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, right.
Re:Stand Up For Your Beliefs and Rights - Use your (Score:2)
So the closest you can do is vote with your money by buying DVD players that don't support WM, HDTVs that don't support HDCP, etc.
No, the closest thing you can do is not buy one at all.
I don't own an HDTV.
I don't own a DVD player. (Ok, technically I have one in the TiBook work bought for me, but I've never watched a DVD on it and I don't own any DVDs.)
I don't own an MP3 player, especially not one that has content restrictions.
Contrary to popular belief, you can live without these things. Saying "Oh, I came close" is just a cop out- kinda like we hear the /. regulars constantly talk about being free of the Evil Empire yet somehow they manage to play Windows-only games.
Eric
Re:Stand Up For Your Beliefs and Rights - Use your (Score:2)
Re:I DO NOT want WMP technology in my DVD player.. (Score:2, Insightful)
so boycott it, and I and half of slashdot will do the same until they've forgotten about it (should take about a week going by past experience) and we can all feel good but its not going to make a blind bit of difference.
sorry to play the pessimist
Re:I DO NOT want WMP technology in my DVD player.. (Score:2, Funny)
Re:I DO NOT want WMP technology in my DVD player.. (Score:4, Insightful)
It's is pretty annoying to hear everyone cheering "boycott the mpaa and DVD", only in the very next article to here about all the cool features that are going to be available on the Star Wars Phantom Menace release with everybody cheering "I can't wait!"
Re:I DO NOT want WMP technology in my DVD player.. (Score:4, Funny)
would you WMP with a mounse?
I would not buy them in the rain,
I would not buy them on a train,
I would not could not with a mouse,
I would not could not with in a house,
I DO NOT want WMP technology in my DVD player... sam I am!
I'm pleased... (Score:4, Insightful)
Now, honestly, you don't think the studios are going to start producing WMV versions of movies instead of standard MPEG-2, do you, just because some of the players will be able to do it? There's just too much market penatration right now for the MPEG-2 based players. Look at how few and far between movies are with DTS (and most of them have simultaneous DD), even though it's present in many receivers and DVD players.
I expect this means that people will be able to burn CD-Rs with WMA and WMV format media and play them on their DVD player. From where I'm standing, that's a good thing, not a bad thing. One wonders why Apple wasn't jumping right into this kind of thing to make sure QuickTime was playable there, too...
Re:I'm pleased... (Score:2, Informative)
It'll be interesting to see if Ogg Vorbis comes up with a better codec to compete against the WMA 8 format.
Re:I'm pleased... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I'm pleased... (Score:5, Informative)
http://ff123.net/128test/instruct.html [ff123.net]
This test is actually being analysed properly, using the insights gained from his previous 128kbps test, whose results you can find here [ff123.net]). You can see the preliminary results here: http://ff123.net/128test/interim.html. In particular, look at the results of the last of the three test files. With overall 95% confidence we can say that on this test clip: [ff123.net]
mpc is better than xing
ogg is better than xing
lame is better than xing
aac is better than xing
mpc is better than wma8
ogg is better than wma8
lame is better than wma8
aac is better than wma8
Aside from this, listening tests have previously shown that WMA8 is better than WMA7 at the low end (sub 64kpbs), at the expense of being worse at the middle to high end (112kpbs upwards). For listening to music on anything that costs more than $10, you would do best to stay away from WMA (and, looking at the other results on the page I previously mentioned, from Xing encoded MP3s as well...).
There is a problem with the testing method... (Score:2)
In order to be completely blind, the original recordings should have been included in the test, to eliminate listener bias (If one person consistenly rated the original as worse than the encoded samples, then that person's results should be taken with a grain of salt.)
But it is a far step ahead of the other "test".
Re:I'm pleased... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I'm pleased... (Score:2)
Well, I can dream can't I?
re: (Score:2)
I'm no expert, but I believe MS did this to get Windows consumers to use their "movie editting" product. I don't think it is intended to be used by the major studios. Seen in this light, MS avoids the problems of burning DVDs that currently plague Apple's DVD - playback on consumer devices.
MS neatly avoids having to support MPEG-4 and the battling standards to determine which DVD recordable format wins. They win regardless since Windows users will be using WMP formats, not any kind of open standard format such as MPEG 4.
As for Apple and Real licsensing QuickTime and Real respectively, it doesn't really matter. QuickTime is the basis of MPEG-4 and Apple is expected to have the next version of QuickTime support MPEG-4, beating many competitor's to the punch. Real recently said they'd support MPEG-4.
Nope, I think MPEG-4 will be the default DVD recording format in the near future. MS neatly avoids the implmentation problem by going to the manufacturers. Its a great business move to prevent Windows users from having to watch their home movies on their computers, but the real impact probably won't be known until DVD recorders are widespread.
Who cares? (Score:4, Interesting)
That woudl be a good thing.
Re:Who cares? (Score:5, Interesting)
The complaint isn't about players supporting additional formats, or about them "suck"ing because they support WMA. It is that this smacks of another attempt by MS to take over a new chunk of the market of digital stuff. Maybe they are just trying to "participate" in it, but it is naive to think that they are going to suddenly behave differently in this market than they have in others.
This is something like the other file formats (.doc,
To answer your question directly, I care.
Oh, and VCD is an MP* format. (In exactly the same way that DVD is an MP* format. Namely, there is a separate standard for how the files are managed, but the data files are MPEG.)
-Peter
Re:Who cares? (Score:2, Interesting)
Many DVD players now supprt MP3 media. It would not surprised if M$ would say that WMA can only exist in players that do not support MP3. I say this because havent they developed their own, new, 'better' media format to compete with/displace MP3?
I'm just skeptical and trust that company as far as I can throw Bill Gate's net worth in a single roll of small bills.
More likely... (Score:2)
After they have sufficient penetration, they just increase the price differential until effectively everything is WMA only. Any agreements to not create MP3 players would probably be verbal only (and along the lines of "You're such a great customer that why don't we give you this special price discount. We really like the way that you have kept your WMA players free of interference from extraneous software. It makes things so much more efficient." This would probably allow them to get off without penalty even if the agreement came to light).
Re:Who cares? (Score:2)
First migrate WMF into players. After a while, pressure/entice movie studios to release in WMF format (better copy protection, whatever). When critical mass is obtained on WMF encoded films, enter clauses into WMF contracts that to license WMF, the player must not be able to play any format compatible with anything but Windows, nor interoperate with anything but Windows (sole exception being MPEG-2). Then phase out MPEG-2 capabilities, also through contracts preventing shipping of chips and/or players capable of anything but WMF.
After critical mass is reached they wont have a choice; either cater to 70-80 percent of the market which is by then WMF, or you dont get to sell WMF capability at all. Which vendor do you think is gonna care about a few thousand complaining customers when their alternative is that their players wont be able to play the format that most films get released in at that point?
The customers or people with older dvds... well, they are just gonna have to buy their stuff again (if it's buyable by then, probably it will all be pay-per-view).
By the time players start going Only-WMF it will be far too late to change anything. At that point the only recourse will be ten to twenty years of trustbusting court litigation... if even that will change anything.
Re:Who cares? (Score:2)
eh (Score:2, Funny)
This could be a good thing... (Score:2, Insightful)
If DVD players include WMV formats, then they could very start using flashable ROMs or some other method of updating codecs by the end user. If this happens, then DVD players could become much more powerful by adding support for the latest greatest technologies.
Re:This could be a good thing... (Score:2)
Probably the only thing preventing this would be the fact that DVD video quality is more than good enough for consumers, so there's consumer appeal to slightly-increasing video quality due to upgraded codecs. Also, if you think there's DVD/DVD player compatibility problems now... it would probably be even more insane if things went this way.
Long runtime, low quality; HDTV the real taget (Score:5, Interesting)
Any new format to replace DVD will likely have to deal with HDTV, a high bit rate high resolution video format. What MS is doing is positioning themelves to supply that new format; they aren't really trying to replace DVD. That'll put them in control of a very lucritive format for decades.
Re:Long runtime, low quality; HDTV the real taget (Score:2)
-Benjamin
DOA (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:DOA (Score:2, Interesting)
buy the others (Score:4, Insightful)
Hey Slashdot editors, why not make yourselves useful for a change and start tracking and informing us of the producers that resist assimilation, so we can support them in the only meaningful way there is, with our wallets, and keep them viable?
It's for a new version of WMP (Score:5, Informative)
Re:It's for a new version of WMP (Score:4, Funny)
You only get 5.1 sound if the movie was recorded that way, and most DVD's (at least in my collection) are already 5.1 sound (assuming the movie was recorded with the eoncoding).
A new media format alone cannot add sound that's not in the recording. Anyone can remaster the sound track and add the other channels with current media formats.
Better quality? I dont see how it's possible to get better picture quality with same antiquated technology that is inside most people's TV.
Everyday I think M$ is turning out to be more analageous (sp) to Taco Bell in the movie Demolition Man.
Re:Double the Quality (Score:2)
I've always wondered, how do they measure "double the quality"? Is there a heuristic comparison they can run on the decompressed and original images to determine quality loss? (I say heuristic because perceived quality is most definitely not the same thing as information loss -- which is the whole basis behind the psychoacoustic models used for MP3s. Do they use similar things for video?) Can they say, "this new codec is only 1.8 times the quality of the old one"? Or is there some guy watching the video who goes, "that looks twice as good!"?
Further, wouldn't twice the quality in half the space be translatable to some single measure, such as four times the quality in the same space, or equal quality in one quarter the space?
Sounds like marketing crap to me, but I could be wrong.
-Puk
Erosion (Score:4, Interesting)
It hasn't worked. It broke. Damn!
This may give them an out. Just start to release to the new standard gradually - dual release (with extra 'extras') to start, then early release, then exclusive release. DVD players are cheap - a lot of people on this site would upgrade if a 20 DVD Star Wars set came out in the new format - you think Bill couldn't persuad George?? "HOW many zeros???"
I don't think this is the format that will do it - but in the next 2 or 3 years a new DVD format will come along with WAY tougher restrictions.
Actually. I think 10-view DVDs will be the next big thing from the studios. They'll sell those babies for $5-10 and you'll only be able to play them 10 times (they put a film on the disk which goes opaque in the laser). Then its useless. They'll push them through rental shops to start with.
Re:Erosion (Score:2)
Re:Erosion (Score:2)
Yeah, and then they could make it only work for 48 hours. I wonder what they could call it? Maybe DIVX? [fightdivx.com]
Re:Erosion (Score:2, Insightful)
The DVD format has only been on the market for about 4 years. Don't expect any 'super-DVD' formats to gain any popularity at all until maybe 2015 or so.
As for your limited-viewing degrading DVD concept, you do remember the Circuit City DivX debacle, don't you?
Re:Erosion (Score:2)
Re:Erosion (Score:2)
Screw limited viewing, if they ever get pay per play movies on cable, that's the only way you could get this sort of limited view on your home box.
Re:Erosion (Score:2)
I do. I think what buggered them was the need to open an account, and the fact it was annoying to have a different format. And a lack of wholesale support from the major studios.
But I think a system which PHYSICALLY stops you watching a disk, doesn't involve registration, and just kinda happens without you noticing for a year in the hire shops is FAR more likely to succeed.
You don't need different hardware, software, or anything to watch a physically degrading DVD. This alone, fo me, makes them a more attractive option to the studios.
For the Video hire shops this is great news. You log onto blockbuster.com, pick a disk - they mail you a 5, or even a 2 view, degradable disk. You never have to return it. They just buy enough to ship em out - they're disposable! Immediately removes half of the man-hours required to handle the media! THATS the back door these little fuckers will enter by!
Re:Erosion (Score:2)
It's to some extent an attempt to perpetuate the situation existing with video tape. But crafted more towards maximisation of publisher profits than whatever hack engineers came up with 40 odd years ago to transmit colour TV whilst maintaining compatability with monochrome systems which existed at the time.
Actually. I think 10-view DVDs will be the next big thing from the studios. They'll sell those babies for $5-10 and you'll only be able to play them 10 times (they put a film on the disk which goes opaque in the laser). Then its useless. They'll push them through rental shops to start with.
Except to be workable the rental outlet would probably need to be able to produce these on site. (Thus have some non degradable copies.)
Let alone that this comes back to the whole DRM myth. Which is that if you can either have a media which can be watched/listened to xor one which cannot be copied. At some point or other you need to present the data into a form usable by human senses, at which point it can be captured and copied.
Oh well... (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, I'm sure they'll hear about this, but will they care, no. The problem here is the focus of the anti-trust suits focus on the Windows OS and abusing that monopoly. Microsoft isn't extending themselves into the DVD market (and the console market) by abusing they're monopoly position in the OS market. Remember, MS is allowed to compete in as many markets as it likes, as long as they compete in a fair (and I use the word loosely) manner, and they don't gain a position in that market due to a monopolistic position in another market.
Re:Oh well... (Score:4, Insightful)
Same is true of the X-Box. For example, their most hyped game is Halo, right? Halo started as a game for Windows, but MS somehow convinced the developers to both develop for X-Box and delay work on a Windows release so that they could sell more X-Boxes. Again, leveraging their monopoly unfairly.
On the plus side, I think that neither X-Box nor this DVD idea will see much market penetration. Current wave of DVD players are too prolific for the publishers to avoid. While it may be a standard feature for many future DVD players, I doubt you'll be going to the store to pick up
Re:Oh well... (Score:2)
They convinced Bungie by buying them out. They didn't leverage their monopoly status, just their very large sums of cash on hand.
Re:Oh well... (Score:2, Insightful)
What the dreamcast showed is that you have to have good marketing, and not look like a company that is going to collapse in a few years. From what I've seen, MS don't match that pattern. Sad but true.
Re:Oh well... (Score:2)
But you know, who's to say that a company that makes money from one product is not allowed to reinvest that money in another product, whether it be through original R&D, buying/licensing another company's R&D, or buying another company outright? I don't think Microsoft plays by unfair business rules like that... I think it's just good business, and I don't see why anyone should be bitter or upset in this case. I'm sure the original owners of Bungie are FAR from upset about the whole thing...
Re:Oh well... (Score:3, Interesting)
That will be MS's argument, but is it true? MS is leveraging their existing operating system in the Xbox because they tout the development tools already available to target the software/hardware. They are also leveraging the fact that it is easier to port a Windows PC game to Xbox (and vica versa) because the Xbox is basically a specialized...Windows PC!
The same scenario occurs with DVDs, albeit more arguably. MS attracts support for their codecs because they are already implemented in their OS...distributers can release a DVD that plays in every Windows system with no new software. In reverse, WMA format movies enhance the Windows monopoly because the proprietary format cannot be used in other operating systems.
Re:Oh well... (Score:2)
I don't think you quite understand what leveraging means, and how it is bad.
Leveraging a companies ability to more efficiently create something, is not what the Sherman anti-trust law was about. Efficiency in production and lower expenses are pro-consumer.
When they speak of leveraging, it means things like forcing anybody who wants to buy Windows XP to also buy an X-Box, thereby more than doubling the cost of Windows XP. These types of activities are generally not condoned. It's sort of like if you take a loan out from a bank, the bank can't force you to also buy life insurance. Banks used to do that, but it's now explicitly illegal. Why? Because it's anti-consumer as it forces the consumer to buy something they don't want to get something they need.
Besides, claiming WMA is proprietary and MP3 is not is not at all accurate. They are both proprietary formats, and like MP3 I'm sure Microsoft would be very happy to license the technology to you if you wanted to encorporate it in your product.
Also, Microsoft does create a WMA capable player for the Macintosh, so you can hardly say it's not used in other operating systems.
Re:Oh well... (Score:2)
As far as MP3 vs. WMA, I think the real story is in the video realm, since the existing multichannel DVD audio specs are also proprietary (DD, DTS). The difference here is that MPEG-2 is an open standard. Developers can (with some jumping through hoops--see tsunami mpeg encoder) fairly easily encode and playback MPEG-2 on Windows, Linux, and their toaster if they feel like it. This is very different than Microsoft having total control, and throwing some scraps to Macintosh operating systems, etc. I believe it remains to be seen if the Mac will ever get this 5.1 channel 96kHz audio codec, let alone the video codecs. (Please correct me if I am mistaken)
way too late (Score:2)
Last Christmas everyone and their mother got a DVD player. DVD already has serious market penetration, and it's set to last the next 10 years or so. People are not going to go out and buy new DVD players any time soon.
Re:way too late (Score:2)
Last Christmas everyone and their mother got a DVD player. DVD already has serious market penetration, and it's set to last the next 10 years or so. People are not going to go out and buy new DVD players any time soon.
What if the price of a DVD/WM{a,v} player is $80? Would you buy a second one and put the old one in the bedroom?
Why bother? (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, I'm quite jaded on this issue. First, did you know that the MPAA gets cuts from every DVD sold? (You did)... not surprised. But did you also know that the MPAA gets liscensing fees for DVD tech from about $1,000,000. There's a reason China created the standard of SVCD. I'd rather not contribute to an orginazation that makes draconian 'rules' and essentially legislates thier tech to us. Instead of a DVD player, I invest in svcd's and have a tv in/out 500 mHz athalon for our movie purposes at home. VHS is just fine for us.
Josh Crawley
There is only ONE bad thing about this.. (Score:2)
The problem is the format, which is closed, proprietary and patented. It gives Microsoft total control over it. This can only contribute to increasing their already dominant monopoly situation.
I just cannot understand what would be so wrong about Microsoft having to release all of their protocols and formats under royalty-free licenses (Or RAND for commercial entities). Closed protocols and formats have ABSOLUTELY no benefits to the consumers whatsoever.
Re:There is only ONE bad thing about this.. (Score:2)
I'm sorry to be so absolutist here, but anything that is to be called a standard must not cost to use. Not anything. (I suppose that a percentage of the profit would be acceptable. There is an argument for that. But even that is highly dubious.)
This is true no matter what the company. This would be true if it were the Debian cooperative. Just imagine how much more true it is if the company is Microsoft. Microsoft has a history of making secret changes to it's "standards". Microsoft has a history of abusive leveraging of it's monopoly position to destroy competition, potential or real.
Nothing which is privately controlled (in the sense of "I can say whether or not you can use this, and how much it will cost you") can be even considered as a standard. That's pure monopoly fodder, nothing less.
.
Has to do with XP and beating out Apple (Score:5, Insightful)
Stop. Ponder that. Consider that Apple is now pushing their own OS's ability to capture, edit, and burn DVD video. In MPEG2 no less.
God forbid MS would just *use the existing standards* that are in place and working-very-well-thank-you-very-much. I guess they get to claim this move as an 'innovation.'
exactly.. Its all about WMF as a defacto standard (Score:5, Insightful)
And only creatable on Microsoft PC's. Very clever indead. Although they may be too late to the party.
How long till these are playable on Xbox too.....
What bitrate are they using? (Score:4, Insightful)
Ok, I might believe that windows media compresses 20% better than DVD. But I refuse to believe that using windows media format, you can fit ALL the Godfather movies on ONE CD.
Godfather 1 [half.com]: 175 minutes
Godfather 2 [half.com]: 200 minutes
Godfather 3 [half.com]: 170 minutes
Total = 545 minutes. Even on a 700 meg CD, that's 1.28 megabytes per minute for audio and video, or 23 KILOBYTES per second. . I wonder how good that's gonna look?
KiloBITS vs. KiloBYTES (Score:3, Informative)
Lets assume you can fit 7GB (as opposed to 700MB) on a DVD.
No, lets assume you can fit 8 GB (8.4 billion bytes) on a dual-layer DVD. This is 8 * 1048576 kilobytes. Divide that by 32,400 seconds (9 hours) for the Godfather trilogy, and you get about 256 kilobytes or 2 megabits per second. (For comparison, the binary code for the NES game Super Mario Bros. 3 fits into 3 megabits.)
So now instead of 23kb/s you can get 230kb/s. Holy fucking shit, that's barely enough for a stereo mp3 stream!
You confuse kilobits with kilobytes. An average MP3 data rate of 24 kilobytes (192 kilobits) per second is enough for transparent reproduction of stereo audio according to r3mix.net, and even 5.1 channel Dolby Digital uses only 48 kilobytes per second. This leaves 212 kilobytes per second average for video, and MPEG-4 DivX video can easily do DVD quality at this data rate.
Apple beat them to the movie industry. (Score:3, Interesting)
"The next logical step would be for them to pay movie studios to produce Windows Media format movies that are available before or cost less than regular DVD format, that is, if they are made available in regular DVD format at all!"
Apple's already there. They have major licensing deals with movie studios to ONLY release new movie trailers in Quicktime format. It's a PITA to see these trailers if you don't want Apples newest nag-soft. (Pay for QT? Let me get this straight, I'm gonna pay so that I can have the priviledge of watching commercials? Yea!)
As far as the hardware goes, I think it's a great idea. A lower-bandwidth higher-quality codec built into chips? I salivate over the idea of DVD-Quality Video at DSL bandwidth speeds. (And you can't even begin to tell me that uber-lossy-DIVX is DVD quality.)
Geeze guys, as long as some card manufacturers make linux drivers, why complain?
failure before it starts? (Score:2, Interesting)
So this is probably only good for playing your pirate copies of movies on your TV.
Kerberos, etc (Score:2)
I can only hope that the proposal in the courst right now for the MS settlement case goes through, the MS be prohibited from issuing "breakware" stuff that breaks other companies systems, software, etc.
I have said this many times before, but I used to like MS stuff alot, but now it seems the everything new thring they do just makes me more and more cynical of them. They have lost my trust long ago and far away.
Yawn (Score:2)
Re:Yawn (Score:2)
WMV is no longer based on MPEG-4 (Score:4, Informative)
are no longer based on MPEG4.
Re:WMV is no longer based on MPEG-4 (Score:4, Informative)
wmvdmod.dll implements ISO MPEG-4.
There are different versions of these :
Microsoft MPEG-4 Standard Video Codec
Microsoft MPEG-4 Video Codec v1
Microsoft MPEG-4 Video Codec v2
Microsoft MPEG-4 Video Codec v3
wmv8dmod.dll implements the new
Microsoft Windows Media Video v8
Who is this Anonymous Coward Kidding (Score:2, Informative)
Is there a threat to existing DVD players? (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a serious question. DVD has certainly taken off, and people expect that DVD players and movies to be the hot item on the Christmas shoppers' lists this year; I've read that up to now, about 5 million homes have DVD players; now that they've surprassed the $100 market, they expect to see upwards of 10 million homes to have them. That number could easily double in the next year alone.
With that well-established market, will the movie companies and electronics markets shoot themselves in the foot by releasing DVDs that solely use the 'new' format and thus completely blocking off 5 million players from watching it? I don't think they're that stupid. There's parallels to the copyright scheme used by the RIAA studios to prevent CDs from being copies or ripped on computers, but RIAA understands that only a "small minority" (from 0 to 50% of the consumers) would be affected by this, and in most cases, these affected consumers have another option in which to listen to the music (stereo rack or portable CD player). Here, we're talking about complete unplayability of the disk without going out to buy a second DVD player.
(Note that there are specific cases of some DVDs being incompatible with certain players. However, these tend to be isolated cases; a single DVD may fail to work on a certain model of player, and rarely does the entire line of DVDs from a specific studio fail on a specific player if one DVD doesn't. In many cases, this are fixed with firmware updates by the makers or similar deals.)
At least, I can't see this forced upgrade happening in the next 5 years. Consumers would backlash harshly against it, with complacency with the VHS format in which all new tapes continue to work with the oldest players. However, we have the HDTV switch looming in 2006; while this might be delayed, it's going to happen at some point, and with studios and stations fighting for encryption of the signal from reciever to screen, the DVD market players may start pushing this forced upgrade as to remove the older DVD players from the market. But if they try to do this at the same time that people are forced to buy $100 converter boxes or $1000+ TV sets, they're going to find even more consumer backlash.
Instead, I expect that maybe we'll have a decade before "DVD Enhanced" movies are released, forcing those older players to be removed, and thus getting the market saturated with players tha support this WMP encoding in addition to any other changed the DVD spec may offer. This is not necessarily unreasonable, but again, given that VHS systems from 1990 are still usable today, this might be taken poorly by the consumer. Of course, by that point, the DVD-recordable models may be predominate and sufficiently low cost (less than $200) as to make it attractive to upgrade anyway.
(*) I beleive that this move is more an attempt to capture the market that Apple has with the ease-of-use video editing and DVD burning that it has built into the MacOS system. If MS can offer a similar path through intergration with XP and WMP, and avoid the encryption via MPEG-2 (a licensing nightmare), they'd have a low cost opponent against Apple's dominance in this area.
Re:Is there a threat to existing DVD players? (Score:2, Interesting)
We now have BLUE laser diodes available (though long life versions are still a few years away) so by the time a format switch is really viewed as a good thing, dvd size disks storing a hundred GB may be possible using the blue lasers. This would be a good time to introduce a new DVD format, (Imagine putting an HDTV 8 hour epic on a single disk).
Any future player would have to be backward compatible with older DVD's and CD's. The players will wear out before the disks and customers will want to be able to keep their old disks.
The upgrade from LD to DVD was painfull because I have to keep the old LD player running or replace the disk collection. If DVD formats change and I only have to replace the player. I won't mind this (they drop in price within 2 years after introduction to a reasonable level).
Re:Is there a threat to existing DVD players? (Score:3, Funny)
Something like that?
You are WAY off on your numbers and the point. (Score:2, Insightful)
According to this chart [thedigitalbits.com] DVD player sales in the US are already above 22 Million, not including DVD ROM drives. Granted, some homes (including mine) have more than one. Conservatively, 15 million homes have DVD players.
Now,you totally missed the point. The point is not "legacy" DVDs. It's "next-gen" DVDs. Whatever the pundits say, Microsoft is doing a great job working on HDTV technologies. The X-box supports HDTV resolutions. The simultaneously released Game Cube does not. This new technology supports HDTV resolutions as well. This is simply a business trying to get ahead of the curve!
So, you slam Microsoft for "unscrupulous business practaces" when they release competing projects, and then slam them when they try to bring something new to the marketlpace.
Cory
(apparently, a microsoft apologist, today.)
It's Called... (Score:2, Insightful)
http://www.opensource.org/halloween/halloween1.ht
Longer playback... (Score:2, Insightful)
Microsoft is offering a solution to a non-problem that weakens the benefits of DVD v.s. previous technologies.
Lol (Score:2, Funny)
Attempting to download decompressor, please wait..
Could not download decompressor.
Attempting to download decompressor, please wait..
Could not download decompressor.
Attempting to download decompressor, please wait..
Could not download decompressor.
Attempting to download decompressor, please wait..
Could not download decompressor.
And then you get audio only. I for one can't wait.
The MS software DVD player shipped with 2K doesn't work properly. Windows Media Player is dodgy as f*** and now they want to combine the two into DVD players that can't even be patched when they realise the players won't play or crash when you try to skip etc.. Hah. What farce.
At least when Sony DVD players crash they have the decency not to show you a bluescreen.
I've opted for a tiny PC by the TV to use as DVD player. At least I can patch / update / get cracks for the necessary software so that I can actually watch the DVDs I've paid lots of money for. Heh.
Lowest Common Denominator (Score:2, Interesting)
Media companies are generally conservative, and are not going to jump to MS's new standard, even if it is MS and if it is twice the quality (or whatever whiz-bang other features it has). People don't upgrade their DVD players like they do their PCs, they aren't designed that way. DVD players play movies: 10 years from now, it's still going to take you 2 hours to watch a 2 hour movie, there really is no reason for upgrading. If you're a media company, and want to sell the most movies you can, you're going to want your movie to work in the widest number of players possible - if you're releasing software and (ignoring development costs) want to make the most money possible, you're not going to require Windows XP just because it has the newest features.
My favorite part of EETimes article.... (Score:3)
I already do.....I use something called.....MP3. It's a standard (well a default one anyway). Until something comes along that will improve upon this, noone will buy it(well just for that feature alone). Anyone remember the Music industry trying to put out stuff on Minidisc's? It flopped because CD's were a standard (although the MD was superior since it could have track names attached). Now, MP3 is the standard. Yeah it ain't open like OGG, but ask your mom what a MP3 is and she will know. Ask her what a OGG or WMA is and she probably doesn't know. I don't think of this as a bad thing until Windows Media only players are developed and are the only ones sold. I look at this as just another cool thing a DVD player could do along with VCD and MP3 on most common ones available today.
Acadamia Land Grab (Score:4, Insightful)
And this is bad how? (Score:2)
Cooking up new technology that will be used by millions is another plus. Why is this a bad thing? Because YOU tend to HATE microsoft? Get a life.
Ch ch ch Chia! (Score:2, Funny)
Bill Gates twitched (Score:2, Insightful)
Ever consdier how much time and energy you waste watching every move MS makes. How much free press you give MS in your ranting and raving. Rule one of marketing is make sure people talk about you no matter if it is good or bad. Because the public has a short memory for detail and only remember they heard something about MS. So later when at the store buying software, they get MS, because they remember hearing about it a lot.
As many other have pointed out spend your time talking the benefits of open source, FreeBSD and Linux, not why MS is bad. You talk about MS more than you talk about yourselfs.
What about audio disks?? (Score:2, Insightful)
Question (Score:3, Insightful)
Kinda like MP3's, huh... (Score:5, Interesting)
Come on, guys, is this so bad? Yes, I'm a conspiracy theorist, too, but I hardly think DVD manufacturers would go with WMV as their de facto format. It's not *that* good. As /. pointed out before, they are even looking into MPEG-4 as the new format.
Besides, how is this different from DVD players now? Ours at home supports MP3's, VCD, etc. etc. It's just another format to throw into the mix. I see no harm in that. I like playing MP3's on my DVD when I'm away from the computer, working on housework or something like that. Hack, even firing up those Christmas tunes in the living room while setting up the tree is nice. With this, it's just another format you can play on your DVD systems.
There's something you're forgetting. (Score:2)
Consider these three facts:
1. New copy-protected CDs come with Windows Media tracks for your computer instead of regular audio tracks.
2. People are complaining that these new CDs won't work in their DVD players.
3. Thus, the MPAA encourages Microsoft to put WMA support into DVD players so that people will stop whining about their CDs being unplayable.
Once 90% of the people can play the CD on their Windows computer, and most of the others can play it on their DVD player, very few people complain about copy protection.
Microsoft and the MPAA undoubtedly have larger intentions here, but this small facet of the whole WMA deal has been completely overlooked.
Keep complaining about copy protection, and please try to buy a nice high-end DVD player NOW, rather than later. We don't need copy protected CDs, and we can make them fail, but not if we keep buying the technology that makes them work.
O please... (Score:2)
Like the world is gaining anything with that. Why is it so hard for some people to realize sometimes actually something good and usable is created by that 5 billion $$$ research budget.
WMA ~ CSS (Score:3, Interesting)
Assume that the average consumer purchases a non-upgradable DVD player containing CSS and WMA decoding algorithms. The consumer also buys a disk containing a non-changing image.
With both images static, if WMA is cracked, the cat is out of the bag. Again. And it's only a matter of time.
So bring it on...
Interesting side effect... (Score:3, Insightful)
This means that WMA is no longer a moving target for anyone who wants to reverse engineer the format and put together a compatible player. Undoubtedly the Evil Empire will unleash swarms of lawyers at the first person who does it, but the effort could be lead overseas (that is, until Microsoft realizes that buying the US government wasn't enough and begins to start buying other governments as well).
First MS target: DiVX (Score:3, Insightful)
The absolutely obvious solution to all this is to lure a DVD manufacturer to make a player that can read DiVX. Technically, it would even be legal with DiVX4. Mark my words: if this doesn't happen, the "best" movie trading group in two years will be alt.binaries.movies.wmv. I don't want this kind of future, but I don't see how to prevent it.
Possible salvation: some sane soul makes a linux-based living room DVD player that doesn't have a DVD decode chip but instead a bona fide CPU (Duron? Crusoe?) to do decoding. It also has an ethernet port and can play movies stored anywhere on the home network, and can upload and install new codecs at will--including, of course, DiVX. People, we have the technology to do this now. Please! Please! Can't you hack an X-Box into one of these things? In any case, I promise you I'll buy the first such player that costs US$500 or less.
Security concerns, "advanced" streaming format (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe there's security measures in place... I do not know, but given Microsoft's history of security conscious design (lack thereof), there's probably a very interesing WMA/WMV security alert or virus opportunity (depending on the shade of one's hat, I suppose). It'd be really amazing if consumer DVD players had a typical Microsoft security hole in them.... but since they're not networked it's hard to imagine it becoming a major problem. However, consumers have much higher quality standards and generally expect warranty coverage for their DVD player components (something Microsoft doesn't know much about from their buggy-software perpetual-upgrade business model). It's not clear if these new DVD players will just execute code from Microsoft or if the manufactures will re-implement the WMV/WMA "standards".
Anyway, I thought I'd pass along this little tidbit, which I really don't know anything about (but hey, this is slashdot....) It I'm totally off-base, just mod me down.
Re:uhm yeah, right, they're gonna put moves out wm (Score:4, Insightful)
Face the facts: Microsoft has enough money to outright BUY a movie production house, several directors, and a DVD manufacturer. One big blockbuster of a movie (the "killer app" phomenon), and Microsoft formats suddenly exist on every new DVD player sold. Some kickback (in the form of "reduced-cost licensing") to the non-MS DVD makers to start dropping support for non-MS formats, and guess what? New DVD producers will begin to only make movies in the MS format.
2 + 2 = 4.
TheNewWazoo
Re:uhm yeah, right, they're gonna put moves out wm (Score:2)
craziness (Score:2)
While MS does have a considerable amount of cash (not a crime), they would never ever ever buy a movie production house. Why? Well as you know this would put them in direct competition with other big IP companies, which they are *desparately* trying to court. The "we won't compete with you" argument has so far been very successful, landing them deals with Disney, NBC, etc. Steve Ballmer even stated recently that, if they had it to do over again, they wouldn't have done the MSNBC deal, for exactly the reason I stated.
For the moment, I'll ignore your misuse of the monopoly leverage claim.
Re:WMF Based on MPeg-4 (Score:2, Interesting)
Also an issue is when, as is almost always the case, they charge $400 for a printed copy of the standard. Because 'it's so expensive to come up with standards' as I am sure the ANSI people are eager to tell us.
Standards should all be published openly online. ALL of them. It shouldn't be a rich-man-club that can afford to read them.
Until that day, interests like Microsoft will always be able to pre-empt 'standards' with things that become the defacto standard.
Re:Hmm (Score:4, Insightful)
DVDs, VCD's and music CD's are the most commonly played thing on DVD players right now. MP3 CD's are probably trailing a little, but many DVD players now support them as well.
Think of the codecs that are the most popular after these -- and like it or not, Windows media are pretty high up there. After this, they'll probably be looking at Quicktime, Realmedia and divx. Of course, the movie industry probably hates divx, and so if they're going to discriminate against anything, they'll probably discriminate against divx. On the other hard, the same DVD player companies that make region free players and players that can turn off Macrovision probably know that we'd want divx too and would probably give it to us :)
Windows media files are already being supported by many (most?) mp3 players. Like it or not, they're becoming a standard -- and they have the `content control' (translation: copy protection) that the industry wants.
This is not anti-competitive in the slightest (Score:2)
Re:Hmm (Score:2)
Re:Hmm (Score:4, Interesting)
> And what will Apple do about it?
>
> What's their market share again? Maybe 5% in a good sales month?
What did Apple do about the plan to include copy protection in hard drives? They opposed it, and together with several other companies, put a stop to it.
What did Apple do about the Microsoft settlement plan to dump $1 billion in MS software and reconditioned hardware on our poor school systems? Jobs and Apple screamed 'bloody murder!", and the judge in the case is at least listening. This is the first time in five years that Jobs has personally and forcefully spoke out against Microsoft.
Apple's influence does not match its marketshare. Microsoft is usually too busy copying them for that to be true. Apple's size is also very temporary. At one time, they had 40% of the market. They are getting set up to retake that marketshare. They are one of the only desktop computer makers to be firmly in the black, and hiring instead of doing massive layoffs. Given their 26 stores, OS X, and the new hardware coming out possibly as soon as next month, they will finally be ready. The December 3rd Time ad, "The only thing we have a monopoly on is complements", was a gauntlet tossed directly at Microsoft. 2002 is going to be a *very* interesting year for Apple. And remember, any increase in Apple's marketshare, whittles away at Microsoft's core monopoly: Windows. Without that monopoly, Microsoft has no power and no teeth.
Apple does have a concern about this issue. Not only does this hurt QuickTime, but also iDVD, DVD Pro, and Apple's superdrive. Do you think they will not care about the Mac's DVD authoring capablilities? Do you think Apple will like using Microsoft's formats instead of their own?
Come on, Tok Wira, these sharks have got to pay!
New Kirk calling Mothra, "We need you today!"
The heroic, wonder-working deity returns, in TWO days!
Re:Why are MPEG standards so slow to develop? (Score:2, Informative)
MPEG-1 Finalized 1992
Digital storage at rates up to 1.5 MegaBits per Second (Mbits/s). Essentially a toolbox; it is up to the user (or whomever) to decide which tools to incorporate.
MPEG-2 Began 1990, in 1992 expanded to include coding of HDTV and thus the proposed MPEG-3 (HDTV) format was abandoned. Finalized 1994. Data rates below 10 Mbits/s. Special consideration of interlaced and scalability incorporated.
MPEG-3 Abandoned, see MPEG-2.
MPEG-4 Began 1994, and evolved with standards issued and refined 1996, 1997. Up to 2Mbits/s. Incorporates TV/film, computer and multimedia needs. High error tolerance, interactive functionality and compression efficency are key components. Includes all functions in MPEG-1 and -2.
MPEG-7 (2001, further evolution possible). An all encompassing standard. "... MPEG-7 [4] is intended to describe audiovisual information regardless of storage, coding, display, transmission, medium, or technology. It will address a wide variety of media types including: still pictures, graphics, 3D models, audio, speech, video, and combinations of these (e.g., multimedia presentations). Examples of MPEG-7 data are an MPEG-4 stream, a video tape, a CD containing music, sound or speech, a picture printed on paper, or an interactive multimedia installation on the web.
* D-Lib Magazine
September 1999
Volume 5 Number 9
ISSN 1082-9873
MPEG-7
Behind the Scenes
Jane Hunter
Distributed Systems Technology Centre
University of Queensland
jane@dstc.edu.au
Re:Lets see (Score:2)