HD-DVD and Blu-Ray Disappointing So Far 469
Dster76 writes "Reuters is reporting that the new format wars are showing signs of underwhelming performance, both technically and financially. In fact, according to the article, the new formats are just not selling. Reuters chalks it up to a current lack of interest. They indicate that as more movies and players become available this autumn, sales should improve. Just the same, the current picture is quite sour." From the article: "'Neither format is selling well or at the level I had expected. I had expected early adopters to step up and other retailers have had the same experience,' said Bjorn Dybdahl, president of San Antonio, Texas-based specialty store Bjorn's. 'High expectations were set. At every meeting with Sony, every demonstration was spectacular,' Dybdahl said. 'Then along comes the first Blu-ray player from Samsung and that's when my expectations were hurt. When we put the disc in, all the sales people looked around and said it doesn't look much better than a standard DVD,' he said."
maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Insightful)
From the article, a quote: "Neither format is selling well or at the level I had expected. I had expected early adopters to step up and other retailers have had the same experience."
I'm an early adopter, have been for a long time. I have always been willing, even eager to "step up" and pay the premium to get new (and great) technology early. Not so here. Another characteristic for early adopters is they tend to be more aggressive in research (those that aren't buying for status), certainly the case for me. The more I researched DVD both HD and Blu-Ray, the less interested I was. There was a certain promise of amazing high quality video, but NOT ONCE was I able to get anyone to give me a demo where I saw convincing evidence this was true.
Add to that the war of the formats and the fact I have to replace movies I already own at outrageous new prices (yeah, early adopter), but each new format is providing a limited and only slightly overlapping selection... wtf? This was the same early problem with CDs. The difference here is, we already have a very high quality, convenient, inexpensive, long lasting option (regular DVDs), and there's nothing compelling in the new DVDs warranting the hassle, the expense, nor the "convenience" (which is less than existing DVDs).
Then there's the specter of DRM and that it's not entirely obvious or clear to me or other early adopters what the final DRM landscape looks like. If we had to guess, it doesn't look hospitable (sp?).
Here's another telling piece of evidence from the article, again a quote: "Often, it has something to do with source material. Sometimes the film itself is shot in a way that may emphasize a grainy look as opposed to a sharp picture," he said. This almost outright concedes the new "high resolution" exceeds what most media will be capable of providing... or, it's an excuse... neither gives me any warm fuzzies about my return on investment for new DVD formats.
Early adopters like new technology when it's new and improved, and are willing to pay for it. In my opinion, someone(s) in some conference room took this thought and ran with it, not considering the early adopters might be a bit more discerning in their tastes. We're not your cash cow toadies.
Maybe that's what's happened to their mysteriously AWOL early adopters... they're not early marks. Lesson learned (not).
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Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're a gamer when was the last time you upgraded your graphics card? It's probably the newest part of your system, right?
Now, when was the last time you upgraded your sound card? Probably never. Yet I do recall a time when decent sound was a big deal - I can still remember firs playing Doom with the chirping onboard speakers as a kid, and later being blown away when we got a new computer that had an actual sound card installed.
Technology peaks. It happens. And when it does, all the early adopters in the world aren't going to make a difference. We aren't easy marks; we have to think there's something for us in the bargin if we shell out for a better system or part.
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:4, Interesting)
I think even discerning early adopters would disagree with you. Using your example it's like we have a chirping PC speaker now, and they're trying to sell us a sound card but all the sound card is doing is making chirps. They're not using the new tech to it's full potential, but we're still being asked to pay the price as if it was. I've seen TRUE HD content through HD cable as well as through examples of the WM9/VC1 codec on MS's website, I've played them through my HDTV and they look spectacular and I would be more then willing to pay $500 for a player that could bring that spectacular image to my DVD collection, unfortunately it hasn't happened yet, they've told me that's what their players can do but I don't see it yet. Blu-Ray is the worse of the two, it costs more and from the demo's I've seen it doesn't look much better then regular DVD, HD-DVD looks better but it doesn't even seem to be at the quality level of what I can get from a HTPC or HD cable. Then of course both formats have the issues of cost and the threat of not being supported if the alternative becomes the standard.
If this were a game of hold'em it'd be like them asking you to go all in when all you've got in your hand is an Ace and a Two, sure it could go really well but it could also go really poorly. I think even the typical early adopters are holding on to their chips until they have a better idea how things might turn out.
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Insightful)
You may very well be correct in your assessment that they aren't using HD to it's full potential yet. If so, there may very well be a market when and if they do. I won't make a prediction either way, as I do not feel qualified.
But for the average user? They jumped wholesale to DVDs, and it wasn't just the picture quality that did it for them. VCRs are an inferior technology on so many levels - from the need to rewind or fast forward if there is a specific part of the movie you want to see, to the noticable degredation of the tape after only a few years of regular use. DVDs were better in every sense of the word, and early adopters flocked to them, with the average users following shortly thereafter. That isn't happening this time.
Now, will it happen if true HD becomes available? I can't say. But even if that does happen, it will not be on par with the shift from VHS to DVD, if only because it's an improvement in the area of picture quality alone, and not overall usability.
The lesson of the iPod (Score:5, Insightful)
This is "the lesson of the iPod" all over again.
Digital music, in the formats and sample rates that the vast majority of people use, is far inferior to best recorded sources, and inferior to the basic and ubiquitous CD. Digital music is successful because it is convenient to carry around an entire record collection. The iPod is the most successful digital music player line because it is easy to use, especially coupled with iTunes and the iTunes store.
Cable TV offered the convenience of more channels and not having to struggle with an antenna. Cell phones offered the convenience of making and receiving call anywhere. People buy laptops now because they can carry them around their house rather than sit at a desk.
In the end HD and all its accoutrements won't be rapidly adopted because they don't offer any increase in convenience. If people cared about quality, we'd still have big movie theatres playing 75mm films, but people preferred more choices and more show times.
"HD vs SD quality? Who cares!", says the wife (Score:5, Interesting)
I have to grudgingly agree with you. When I got the new HDTV and programming, I was stoked. For a long time, all I would watch were shows in HDTV, because of the amazing clarity. I bragged about it to all my co-workers and friends, and it was always the guys that were in envy.
Of course, my wife barely even notices the difference between HD and SD. It basically looks the same to her. And that's quite amazing, because SDTV on an HDTV looks even crappier than normal. Our old SDTV upstairs still gets a lot of use, because it's more than good enough for her.
Now, try getting her to notice the difference between regular DVD and a high-def DVD (Blu-ray or HD-DVD)? Might as well give up now. Or she may notice a small difference and just not care.
However, what she DOES love is the DVR functionality we got a few years ago. That's definately a sign that convenience > quality for many folks.
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Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Interesting)
When comparing VHS to DVD, the delta in picture quality and sound was VERY large. Just about everyone could appreciate DVD as the superior medium, and the market migrated accordingly.
However, the delta between DVD and these new formats isn't quite as pronounced. Yeah, I'm sure many here could see the difference, but believe me, not everyone can. Plus throw in the fact you need to own a HDTV, and it's just not going to matter to the majority of the market at this time.
To go back to the soundcard comparison, everyone will agree that a sound card will give you better sound than the PC's onboard speaker. But does that mean that everyone here can appreciate the difference between, say, the SB-AWE32 and AWE64? Or, how about the differences between the first and second generations of the Audigy? Would you bother upgrading your Audigy to the Audigy2 (or whatever it's called)? Probably not. The delta between the two isn't worth the extra money.
Video cards still make pretty large strides each generation. Most probably don't upgrade every day a new card comes out, but can agree jumping every 2 or 3 generations is a good idea if you're serious about cutting edge games.
The only way you're going to get people to upgrade is to convince them that the delta is worth the cash. Otherwise, if they won't buy because their current equipment is "good enough."
Of course, issues like: format war, uncertain DRM, expensive players, sub-standard movies, etc. doesn't help things any. After all, it's usually the early adopters who convince their non-early-adopter friends to go buy the thing after seeing it in action at the early adopter's house
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:4, Insightful)
The biggest jump in overall desirability between VHS and DVD and Tape to CDS wasn't the quality, it was the usability.
DVDs and CDS (generally) don't need to be flipped, don't get all messed up with the tape, aren't wiped out by magnets, are sturdier, last longer, have instant seek instead of being a purely linear format, take up less space in multiples, and don't need to be rewinded.
If it was just a higher quality but still on tape, it wouldn't have caught on as well as it did, I don't think. And what we have now is a higher quality but still on disc. Other than picture and sound quality there is no additional benefit, and this is why people just simply aren't caring about HD DVD and Blu-Ray.
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Easy. The film is 35mm wide = 1.38 inches, so the horizontal resolution of the scanned image is then just over 5,500 pixels. I would say that should look just fine in 1080p. Or even higher resolution. Definitely no need for new equipment! Filming something in IMAX format and then transferring it, even to HD-DVD would be total overkill.
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I think at this point players are just too expensive. And they need to come out with a player that plays both DVDs and HD-DVDs, and which sells for $99. Then it wil take off. Once more movies are released for HD-DVD, we will begin seeing more sales. Also, this stupid format war also is slowing things down. Most people dont want to be stuck with
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Interesting)
So, I fully agree that these new formats aren't sufficiently better than DVDs to justify their cost and drawbacks. That was my point
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The soundcard was a big improvement over the sound chip built into computers.
Actually, you missed his point. His comparison of chirps to soundcards was analogous to vhs vs dvd. When he said earlier, "When was the last time you upgraded your soundcard?", he was making the point you missed.
DVDs are 90% good enough for even the early adopters.
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Yeap, I think we are in the same boat. You want to hand my that paddle? I bought my HDTV in 2001. I don't regret it for one second, but the best part for me has been the 52" 16:9 picture ratio instead of the HD aspect. Granted my tv is going on 6 years old now and starting to show its age, but I'm not about to replace its not compatable with HD-DVD.
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Insightful)
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I believe you are entirely correct in that assessment.
I was an early adopter of DVD (got mine in '99 as I recall) because at the time it was a huge improvement over VHS, and I couldn't see spending money on any more VHS while I slowly build my
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Beware, you should now expect a flurry of posts from Slashdot'ers who feel it necessary to inform you that they owned a DVD player several centuries before you.
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I've also noticed that a lot of the DVD Recorder units are big and bulky. They can also work towards making them smaller.
Well, that and they're HD (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, true, but it's also a significant point that these are HD formats. The TV industry seems to be doing pretty well right now. Everybody I know has their eye on SOME kind of TV lately, be it plasma, LCD, or what-have-you. The government is actually fuelling this fire with the promise that, sooner or later, everybody will be forced to upgrade to a
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Nope. Nobody has an HDTV. (Score:3, Insightful)
The Wikipedia article on HDTV says that by the end of this year, 10% of US TVs will be HDTVs.
Ten percent. Real soon now.
When VHS and DVD launched, everybody had an SDTV. But Blu-Ray and HD-DVD have nothing to appeal to 90% of potential (US) customers. And they have to split the potential market they do have between two incompatible formats.
You do the math.
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I agree. I have a Hitachi 32 inch that was 'new' in '95. I bought it used from a friend of mine in 2000. To this day it still has one of the best tube pictures that I've ever seen. I've looked at getting a new TV a few times, but to match the picture I currently have I would have to spend way more money than I would want to. Especially
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I liken these two formats to LaserDiscs. They were out there, they were superior to tapes, but they were large, clunky, and no one really adopted them except those that
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:5, Interesting)
I have no desire or intention to pay for anything more than once. Taxes are bad enough at doing that why should I buy a player that only makes it harder for me to escape that idiocy? Better quality? Well I have a 42in plasma.. and yes it looks great with hdmi connections and Hi Def... but there's not enough hi-def content for me to appreciate it fully yet. Dvd's look good and i'm happy with them so far. I still don't have a compelling reason to buy anything incrementally better. I'm not paying for a screwing regardless if your a hooker in Mexicali or Sony in Japan.
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Of course, back when I was a kid, we didn't have VCRs, let alone purchased movies, so I really cannot symapthize
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Well, I've seen clips shot with a $1200 HDR-HC3 th
Re:maybe, a scan line too far (Score:4, Insightful)
Even if you hand a director a HDTV camera and tell him to shoot the thing in HD, it may well end up that the ultimate product doesn't benefit from the additional resolution, or it could even be worse: you might start seeing visible makeup, or clogged pores, or set issues; because the director is 'thinking' in standard-def, the additional information might end up just being extraneous and confusing. The new output format requires a rethinking of the whole process.
It's not until enough people have HDTVs that the people actually making the content will think in those terms when they're working, but people aren't going to get HDTVs until there's really well-designed content for them to watch.
So you're correct that it's a chicken-and-egg situation, or rather a solution seeking a problem that people don't realize they have and/or don't care too much about. HD content can be pretty amazing when it's done right, but there's really not too much of that out there. The stuff I've seen in HD that's really impressive are mostly recordings of actual events (e.g. sports) where the more detail you have, the better it gets; but that more=better isn't always true with other content, unless that level of detail has been anticipated and planned for through the production process.
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Give me a format that I can copy it to my computer by dragging and dropping. Then let me play it on my XBox 360 over
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I was an early adopter with CDs (showing my age here). I bought one of the first Phillips players (I still have it). I got a free CD with it, "The Pure and Perfect Sound of Phillips Compace Disc", and a catalog with all the CDs currently available, three on each page, with a colour photo of the cover, and paragraph review of each album, there's under 100 in the catalog.
When
What a shocker (Score:4, Insightful)
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To summarize... (Score:5, Informative)
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(Because the HDTVs sold to date mostly have component inputs, and no HDMI input)
I'll go one further. Unless your HDMI input and your TV and your cable and your output support HDCP encryption, you get nothing, and must down-convert to Analog.
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Blu-ray and HD DVD do not allow 1080p60; it would require the decoder chips to be twice as powerful.
This article points out that your computer will probably out-perform any DVD player you can buy
Not in HD, where PC playback is being held back by the DRM morass.
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Quick, name one player that uses ICT? Anyone? That's because the studios agreed to not use it for quite a while (2010 or 2011 I believe), and even then they still may not. If you were an early adopter with only component inputs, but then you'll probably have something new with HDMI inputs, but this isn't a valid reason sin
Re:To summarize... (Score:4, Insightful)
You misspelled "disk." The player is required to support ICT as a part of the AACS spec. If the studios want to release a few unimportant disks with ICT turned off to sucker us in, they might find we will not buy in.
but when the source is 24 fps
Cable and broadcast HDTV already support 60fps. I would think you would understand, since you own a 1080p HDTV. If you already own a player, fine. I'm going to wait for one that can decode 1080p60. Your computer can already do that.
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Now, HD-DVD/Blu-Whatever, they promise up to 4x the resolution of normal DVD's/VHS, which is damned significant. If you can't tell the difference
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Ever think that most people can tell the difference between SD and HD, but simply don't care about the higher definition? There's a lot of things that I'd rather be doing than watching tv, especially if it requires a tv that costs more tha
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Disappointing (Score:2, Informative)
No selling points (Score:3, Informative)
Why would anyone buy this stuff? There's few positive selling points about it. Movies are on DVD for as long as anyone can foresee, and computers can record on these formats and play on setops. What are the market-accepted details for the new formats? Nobody can decide.
Peh, I'd love to see the capacities go up, but DRM fouled both these formats. Nobody's going to wipe the stink off them, and so we must let them die. Perhaps a company will simply go for capacity and format without mucking around with anything else.
The Mess (Score:4, Insightful)
Yea.Early adopter.They expect them to buy a player each - One to play HD-DVD;Another to play Blu-Ray; And then they will keep the user guessing as to which one will become the standard.
They created the confusion.They are paying for it.Why should consumers too?
Too much confusion (Score:4, Insightful)
Hybrids may be the only real winner (Score:5, Insightful)
Sony are control freaks and absolutely obsessed with their own proprietary formats (no matter how many times this has burned them). But if they don't blink on this one, it could take BOTH formats down.
-Eric
Re:Hybrids may be the only real winner (Score:5, Insightful)
But if they don't blink on this one, it could take BOTH formats down.
I don't see any problem. Keep your fingers crossed.
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Heck, we may never see another format like DVD, HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, because we'll all download movies over ultra fast broadband, but I'm a believe it when I see it kinda guy on that front.
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They've already been forced to license it in China, due to widescale piracy of the tech. At least, according to Fortune [fortune.com] and the Wall Street Journal [wsj.com]. Showed up in an interview with the Scottish CEO of Sony and then followup articles in the WSJ.
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I think sony is going to get handed their ass on this one. Sony doesn't have a good track record when trying to release a competing standard. Betamax vs. VHS anyone? PSP against the Nintendo DS? From what I read most of the DVD manufacturing companies would rather go with HD-DVD than BR. because they don't have to reduce their manufacturing lines. They can just up grade the equipment that they make DVD's on. Where with BR they will have to buy all new equipment, buy it from Sony that is.
Another thi
Quoted For Truth (Score:5, Insightful)
The important part: "...doesn't look much better..."
I would be the first to agree that HD does look better. But does it look better enough to toss my current DVD player and TV? Is it worth the headache of the format rivalry and all the DRM connectivity issues that I'm not sure a new set will be compatible with in two years?
No.
I'll continue to sit on the sidelines for a while longer.
still confusing (Score:2, Funny)
I wonder how this is going to effect the PS3 as well. It's al
Hmmm. 1% better, heavy DRM and too $$$$ (Score:5, Funny)
DVD's look great on screens up to 55".
DVD's can be backed up and are very cheap.
DVD players are dirt cheap.
HD/Blu ray are
1) expensive
2) heavily drm'd
3) havn't chosen the best movies to start with.
4) Not that much better on the screens joe average can buy.
5) DO NOT EVEN WORK CORRECTLY on HD MONITORS if they are more than about 7 months old (downsample if the player doesn't detect a secure connection to the monitor)
I can't imagine why consumers are not flocking to these--
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Everybody should want one!
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Re:Hmmm. 1% better, heavy DRM and too $$$$ (Score:5, Insightful)
2) $500 is very expensive. A person making a great living pulls in about $4k after taxes. So there went 1/8 of your monthly income for a player (vs 3 hours). If you are making a managerial or doctor's salary then cool. I also don't drive around a dodge viper (only about 3x a normal car price in its day) or wear armani suits (about 7x a decent suit). And HD/blu ray are no where near better a DVD than a dodge viper/armani suit are than their counterparts.
3)I paid about $1,200 for a phillips 57" HD monitor with tuner. It is a great monitor. When I can get a bluray or hd player for $99, then I'm there. I agree, average joe can get a crappy monitor for less. I agree videophile can get an EXCELLENT monitor for about $2800 (plus 600 service plan plus 340 taxes plus 120 delivery and setup or about $4000 total with misc cables and crap). I looked long and hard at the $2800 level which IS better (and DVD's look great on that format). I love the look and form-factor of 57" LCD screens. But I don't want to eat dog-food when I retire to have one. And I think they will drop by over $1000 in the next 12 months to a more reasonable $1,800 for the same quality.
4) As the other person already pointed out- businesses make promises all the time that they do not keep- the capability IS there. They will use it before 2010 if they can get away with it.
I agree with all your other points about why no one wants it.
---
There is NO point in being a first adopter these days. Used to be, that gave you a BIG edge over everyone else. You might be 12 to 24 months ahead of them and be "cool" for a long time. These days- if something is going to be successful it is probably ubiquous within 6 months. Why keep paying a 10x premium? I purchased 80% of my dvd library for about $5 to $7.50. As a result, I have 99% of what my friend's have AND then I have a bunch of stuff they can't afford because they are all paying $20.00. (Why pay $80 per xfiles season when THIS week you can now pay $20 per season! ($180 total)).
There is such a huge glut of entertainment now- I can't possibly watch or keep up with it. So I fell behind and noticed how much money it was saving me to be just 3-4 months off the leading edge. So then I pushed it to 6 months and the savings were even bigger. Now i push it to 6 months + next major holiday nad the savings are almost always 60% or more vs what my bleeding edge buds pay.
It would be *different* if HD/BLU was NIGHT and DAY, hands down, fabulous, life changing, emotion wringing, bud attracting (hey let's all go over to Maxo's house- he has HD/BLU!) better. But it is not.
It's a teensy bit better for normal people and MUCH more expensive AND heavily laden-- no CRIPPLED-- with DRM format which was stupid and gives us 50/50 odds of picking the format which will have the movies we want.
There isn't just ONE reason to crush the sellers on this- we need to crush them so bad, their entire departments will be fired and they will have to leave their respective countries in shame.
Diminishing Returns (Score:2, Interesting)
Talk about whining. (Score:2, Insightful)
Display requirements (Score:3, Interesting)
They don't mention exactly what they watched it on. If it wasn't some 1080p wonderdisplay, then it brings out what I think the major failing of these hd formats will be (at least this first gen). The great thing about dvd was that you saw immediate benefits both from the medium and the content on your _standard_tv_. You didn't need the latest lcd/dlp/plasma display to appreciate what you were getting. The jump from tape -> dvd was massive, both in quantity and quality of content and the convenience of the medium itself, and it was available to anyone. Now we have only an incremental increated in the convenience of the medium (saves having multi-disk sets) which really doesn't mean much for most viewers and the improvements in quality only applies to a much smaller audience.
Same applies to 360 and PS3 consoles (Score:5, Insightful)
The great thing about dvd was that you saw immediate benefits both from the medium and the content on your _standard_tv_. You didn't need the latest lcd/dlp/plasma display to appreciate what you were getting... Now we have only an incremental increase in the convenience of the medium (saves having multi-disk sets) which really doesn't mean much for most viewers and the improvements in quality only applies to a much smaller audience.
When it comes to the new consoles, both MS and Sony have bet the bank on the television market being saturated with big HD sets that would justify an "investment" in a game console that would display in HD on them. In a few ways -- cost of game development, size of their potential market as you say here -- both companies appear to have lost track of the market, or to have projected it wrongly. Market penetration of huge HD screens just isn't there yet. Maybe it will be during the lifespan of these consoles, maybe not.
Meanwhile a competitor that tries to jazz up the game experience on "your _standard_tv_" is out there, phrasing its admittedly not-cutting-edge technology in ways that DO mean something to most game players.
Good for screen cappers...maybe (Score:4, Interesting)
But then again, I don't even know if I'd be able to take screen captures from a computer, with all the DRM they have.
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I suppose I should have put a disclaimer that I was already aware of issues with fair use, editorial use, the percentage of a work that qualifies as fair use, etc.
The only real problem is whether DRM prevents using them with programs that are capable of screen captures, or even with computers at all.
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What bothers me is that the "screencap" protection has actually gotten worse. In MacOS 9, you could take a screencap with a DVD playing and the DVD image would just be blanked out. In OS X, you can't take a screencap at all without quitting DVD Player. Which is a royal PITA when I want to take a screencap of something in World of Warcraft and I happen to have a DVD playing on the other monitor. Thanks
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Maybe Apple uses similar hardware acceleration for DVDs?
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Early adopters aren't stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Did nobody in either camp stop and look at how they had royally screwed every early adopter of HDTV? The promise of content that never occured. The delayed, and delayed, and delayed rollout of OTA. The jumble of formats that caused event the best CE to falter under the load of options. The incompatibilities between components. The ubiquitous component interface that every early adopter had on their display sets which are now utterly obsolete due to the need for "content protection" - a perfectly good $7000 50RP set which may be relegated to 480p at the whim of the broadcaster. The promise of 20Mb HD that got chopped into subchannels to rerun Andy Griffith and the Golden Girls in SD simultaneously, at the expense of HD. The iron fist approach to preventing transferring DVDs to Media Servers.
No, the industry has drawn a line, and the early adopters are on the other side. We're the ones who are most adversely affected by the content protection and market jockying. Don't come to me with your hand out for your improved shovel right after you run over my dog. The industry has, through their anti-piracy efforts, significantly alienated a large portion of their first-run consumers. They've managed to eliminate the initial cash infusion that covers the R&D part of the CE process, and now they're stuck with trying to add enough volume to get every household to buy the product just to cover the engineering costs.
The early adopters want to buy this stuff, but we want to play with our new toys, not see how womebody else want us to play with them. Give us back our control, and we'll open our wallets. 'Til then, go fuck yourselves.
Re:Early adopters aren't stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Before I sink any money into either format, I'd want to see a clear winner, and something that wouldn't require me to upgrade my TV every 2 years to keep up with.
Until then, my older Panasonic RP-82 works just fine w/ regular (or SuperBit) DVDs. I already get full resolution HD from my cable company.
Re:Early adopters aren't stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
It is obvious that this new HD-DVD and Blu-Ray market is only to serve the media companies. They want two things 1) control over the content, and 2) consumers to buy all their movies all over again. Ok, so they're getting those two things with this new format. But what do we, the actual customers, get out of it? Nothing worth upgrading for.
I'm usually first in line to buy new technology, but I'm completely skipping this round. Come back to me when I can download a movie for a few bucks, play it on my component-input HDTV, and keep the movie file around as long as I want to. Right now the pendulum is swinging way too far to the side of company greed, so I'll wait.
Well, duh (Score:2)
Where's the software? (Score:2, Insightful)
What do you expect? (Score:5, Interesting)
-S
No Shit? (Score:2, Flamebait)
I've been saying that for 2 years. I was able to put a HD movie and a DVD side by side back then. I could barely tell a difference and that was only when I looked. Granted there are some programs that are breath taking in HD. Some of the PBS nature shows are like looking through a window. But I have yet to see a HD movie or TV show that has that level of effect.
Fill the blanks (Score:5, Funny)
Wonder why [new format with uncertain future] isn't selling?
Remember [format that flopped]? We do.
Signed, the buying public.
The tactile changes are missing (Score:4, Interesting)
The only obvious benefit from HD-DVD and Blu-Ray is image quality, it doesnt really look different, its no more durable, and for most it just seems like a scam to get people to buy their movies over again.
Increased resolution is a benefit but most people still dont have HD tv's and probably more than half that do only have them because there are very few tv's that arent HD for sale anymore. You can further reduce the total by subtracting the ones that dont know how to hook it up properly and arent recieving HD anyway most of them are now disillusioned by HD through their own stupidity. That leaves a very tiny fragment of a market that actually sees any advantage to HD formated DVD's. I do think eventually one of the formats will stick but they would be better off doing hyrid disks with one format on one side and standard dvd on the other that way they can snag the replacement buyers not just rely on folks willing to make an upgrade most see as not necessary.
Psst (Score:2)
Dont forget there was also the early promise that the media would eventually be cheaper (even though it never happened)
That will happen in just a few years when these HD DVD players start gaining popularity. Then hopefully you will be able to get new release DVD's for $5. Keep your fingers crossed, and don't tell the media execs you're waiting for it, or it will never happen...
Human Limitations (Score:3, Interesting)
Unsurprising (Score:3, Insightful)
What does surprise me is that it seems both sides are mostly selling these products on higher quality video, rather than capacity.
I look at the early releases for these two and only see movies.
I can't really tell the difference between DVD and Blu-Ray or HD-DVD in terms of video quality, but I can easily tell something quantifiable like having one piece of media for a whole season of a TV show vs. 4 or 5 DVDs. That convenience is why I like single DVD games over 5 CD games for my PC.
HD, bah (Score:3, Insightful)
not priced for target (Score:3, Informative)
EVD standard (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: EVD standard (Score:5, Insightful)
And, for that exact reason, it will never be allowed to be successful in North America.
The content lobbyists will introduce a tarriff on foreign players. Then they'll say that even with the tarriff those players need to be outlawed since they probably encourage piracy by people. Afetr all, if it will play anything, then it will probably play pirated versions.
It would simply be impossible for an unencumbered product, not championed by someone who is paying law-makers and lobbyists to be either distributed or become successful in the current climate.
And, that makes me sad. Because (even though I'm not familiar with it) the product you describe may well be technologically superior -- or at least superior to standard TV stuff without the liminations of the newest stuff that Sony wants us to buy.
Cheers
Re: EVD standard (Score:4, Interesting)
Technologies like this just don't seem to cross-pollinate from Asian markets into Western markets. Presumably this has to do with the Western media companies' loathing and distrust for Asian technologies, given the Asian markets' traditional indifference toward Western intellectual property standards.
It seems likely that some format similar to EVD will emerge, however
P.S. This seems like a pretty good FAQ [digital-digest.com] on the various available formats, including EVD and FVD.
Travel back to 1973... (Score:5, Insightful)
'Music for Royal Fireworks' Sounded Better in an Early Stereo Version
Whatever its ultimate artistic and technological merits may be, quadraphonic sound understandable has the classical-record business rubbing its collective hands together with glee. The classical repertory has its limits, after all, and the standard pieces have been recorded to death in stereo. Now, at long last, a new gimmick is at hand.
Not only it is presumed that the American public will spend millions on equipment, but all the hoary old warhorses and hi-fi spectaculars can be done over again in four-channel sound....
---
Truth in advertising... Rockwell acknowledges he was listening to the new release in "plain old stereo." A March 12, 1972 review by an audio reviewer, Don Heckman, listening in quad is, however, only slightly more encouraging:
"Just what was there to hear on all this gleaming new electronic exotica? Ah, there's the rub. Until just a few months ago, quadraphonic disks were dominated by the sound effects of falling trees, puffing choo-choos and gurgling whirlpools... [now there are more and] in some cases the rewards can be quite spectacular... a room-filling, near-concert-hall effect.... Pop music programs like Joan Baez... [and] Barbra Streisand are straightforward presentations in which one is less aware of a four-dimensional effect than of a kind of opening up of the sound.... [In one track on a Vanguard demonstration disk] the organ sound is quite extraordinary.... Switched-On Bach will probably have its sales surge as listeners discover that it sounds even more fascinating when these weirdly-distorted and re-timbred snippets of Bach go whipping around four, rather than two speakers."
This is going to be a long slow battle... (Score:2, Informative)
Now we have the battle of the HD formats. This will probably be in length of time much like the VHS versus Betamax battle. And add to that the fact that not everyone will be jumping righ
Interoperability? (Score:2)
They just don't get it - Need HDMI to see in HD (Score:5, Informative)
MiniDisc vs DCC (Score:5, Insightful)
When people talk about BluRay vs HD-DVD and compare it to VHS vs BetaMax, I am not so sure, since at least video tapes had a reasons to be taken up. I really believe it is like MiniDisc vs DCC, since few people really care. Drop the DRM and the region encoding and I will be willing to consider them.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Which are trivially defeatable. I don't buy a lot of DVDs, but I would buy exactly zero if I couldn't rip them. Likewise, if Blu-ray or HD-DVD gets cracked as fully as DVD, I'll consider them.
Popular Mechanics (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
With regards to Blu Ray - saw an instore demo, and it looked so awful, I'd prefer to watch a normal DVD. There were more compression artif
The frame rate is too low (Score:4, Insightful)
One big problem with HDTV is now becoming apparent - the frame rate of movies is too low. 24FPS at 1080p with the screen in front of your face looks awful when the camera is panning.
Sports, especially football, compress badly. Football is almost the worst case for motion compression - the camera is moving relative to the background, the players are all moving in different directions, their body parts are all in motion, there's lots of detail that's important to the viewer, and there's no central character that dominates the scene. Viewers are likely to rerun parts of the game in slow motion, which brings out all the compression artifacts. When you have a 50-inch screen in front of you, all those problems really stand out.
Good greif. All 3 player support the same codecs (Score:5, Informative)
So, what's the end result? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's correct. However, the end result is the same. Films released on Blu-Ray format in mpeg2 look noticably worse than films released in mpeg4 or VC1 on HD-DVD. I was shocked at the difference in image quality between the two. So, perhaps blu-ray players do support modern codecs (avsforum has had a good deal of discussion on this matter at their blu-ray forum) - but the upshot is that blu-ray releases look terrible compared to HD-DVD. And Blu-Ray drives cost twice as much.
What would *you* buy? (well, *I* would buy neither - and wait for the format war to finish).
Re: (Score:2)
They took WAY too long to get to market. If the players
had been available somewhere around 2000 to 2003, they
could have sold to MANY people who were going DVD for the
first time as most people were finally abandoning VHS.
IF they had been priced reasonably, I believe many people
would have bought HD-DVD as 'better' given the choice
between that and regular DVD for their first player.
These guys are going to have to wait another couple of
years until all the
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
First that the PS3 will be a sell out huge success. Whereas it will sell a lot of units, many people are predicting that it will not be that great, and in fact could cause Sony to really scuttle itself.
Second, you're treating all those PS3's like they're being used as Blu-ray players, when in fact all they will really be capitalizing on is the storage capacity. Most of those PS3's are NOT going to be hooked up to anything doing HD video of any kind. They