HD-DVD is Dead (was: First Signs of Blu-Ray Dominance)

[Orius]

*yawn*

Wake me when the format war is over. I don't have the money to sink into either format to risk watching it go obsolete in two years. Besides, DVD is still good enough for me at this point.

 

[Glyfair]

But, you can't take PS3's out of the equation. They play the discs and do a fine job of doing so.

Indeed, for months the Blu-Ray discs have been outselling the HD-DVD discs about 2-1. The conventional wisdom has been that HD-DVD was losing. It seems likely that this decision by Warner is the point where HD-DVD is going to be all downhill.

 

[Bront]

They really are different markets for the time being, especially with the buy-in cost of HD. DVD saw it's first drop in sales last year, if that makes any difference.

I atribute that to more of a dip in spending overall.

The problem is, that neither of these right now drive the market. There isn't a lot of extra features that the average joe is clamering for, and I can buy an upconverting DVD player for $50-100 that plays all my current DVDs in HD (And some apparently do a very nice job at that). This isn't like VHS vs Beta, since neither is something entirely new, different, and useful. I wouldn't be suprised if this lingers on for ANOTHER 2-3 years.

Or maybe we can hope someone comes out with something like Super HDDVD that makes both formats obsolite with no cost difference from current HDDVD/BR.

 

[Bront]

That's the rub.....whether I spend $35 on a copy of Pirates of the Caribbean in HDDVD or in Blu-Ray, Disney would still get my money for instance. Same thing with Transformers.

It's a matter of production costs and inventory.

Idealy, a company would like to make exactly however many units of it's product people will buy, and no more. Some err on the side of too little (Consols often do this), most err on the side of too many, because of the value of bulk production.

Now, with DVD, there was 1 format, and everyone was happy. Now, we have HD, BR, and DVD. Most people have DVD, so I need to produce those. it will cost me money to produce BR or HD, and even more to produce both. If I do both, I'll likely have to over produce by quite a bit to be able to price it competitively, and sit on a lot of stock, and I'm admitting that one of these production lines will not survive into the future (longevity cuts costs).

So, it's saner business sence to aim for one or the other in a smaller, niche market, for the most part.

 

[Ron]

I really think this battle was already decided a few months back when Blockbuster decided to give much more support to Blu-Ray than HD-DVD. Still, I pretty much satisfied with normal DVD quality and, thus, I have no hurry to buy a new player or to replace my DVD collection.

 

[Aus_Snow]

Hehe.

As predicted by me, more than a year and a half ago.

I'm not sad, either: more storage capacity = good.

 

[Thanee]

I could also not care less about that currently. DVD is fine for now. When they have ironed out a true standard, I will start thinking about upgrading.

Bye
Thanee

 

[John Crichton]

I atribute that to more of a dip in spending overall.

Is that compared to holiday season 06? I didn't see any numbers (not that there aren't any) that indicate a significant drop in people buying stuff.

The problem is, that neither of these right now drive the market. There isn't a lot of extra features that the average joe is clamering for, and I can buy an upconverting DVD player for $50-100 that plays all my current DVDs in HD (And some apparently do a very nice job at that). This isn't like VHS vs Beta, since neither is something entirely new, different, and useful. I wouldn't be suprised if this lingers on for ANOTHER 2-3 years.

The HD formats don't need to drive the market. The reason this is a big deal is just that: wew are closer to one HD format.

Upconverting DVD players are great and some movies/shows look really good with them. However, when you compare a movie upconverted on a true HDTV with a decent sized screen to a BR/HD-DVD, the upgrade is significant and obvious. Upconverting worked for me until I was able to acquire the equipment needed to watch real HD. And down the line folks will be able to get the HD formats at much better prices. There will be no reason to not get the new formats.

Or maybe we can hope someone comes out with something like Super HDDVD that makes both formats obsolite with no cost difference from current HDDVD/BR.

With this news, there most likely won't be much of a need if BR wins.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

I don't care but until they settle down on a single industry standard format I'll just stick with what I've got and use DVD or pirated if those aren't available.

 

[Darth K'Trava]

*yawn*

Wake me when the format war is over. I don't have the money to sink into either format to risk watching it go obsolete in two years. Besides, DVD is still good enough for me at this point.

I agree with you. Get you a damn good computer monitor and run DVDs thru your computer. The quality is awesome! Granted I had better resolution on my old 17" CRT monitor than I do on my 17" widescreen LCD monitor....