Any real way to end the Blu-Ray/HD DVD Format wars??

THEHOOLIGANJEDI · Post by **THEHOOLIGANJEDI** » 2005-12-01 04:53pm

Last I heard the prospect of both competing formats Merging fell through. Form what I know now, a format war may well be on the Horizon. Personally the whole prospect of a new format this soon has bummed me out. What I'd like to know is that is there any way to avert the upcoming war.

Personally I thought that the best way to deal with it would be to Let the costomer decide in the easiest way possible. Join forces and create a Drive that plays all optical disc formats. Whether or not it is a plasible solution (or one that they discussed) is beyond me, but would it work??

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2005-12-01 05:09pm

It's a nice idea, but the drive would be hideously expensive to do what you suggest, and by the time you could drive prices down, the format war will have been decided. The only way for this to work is if people largely ignore BOTH Blu-ray and HD-DVD much like they did with SACD and DVD-Audio until manufacturers can create cheap universal players so that the format ceases to matter.

But I really doubt that is going to happen in this case. Blu-Ray and HD-DVD may not take off like DVD did, but they are going to be adopted far more heavily than the high resolution audio formats.

Loner · Post by **Loner** » 2005-12-01 05:13pm

I'm hoping that HVD comes in and face-stomps both formats.

Post by **weemadando** » 2005-12-01 05:55pm

Blu-Ray is all but dead.

Sony folded a week or so back and said that they'd be using HD-DVD format for all of their releases in addition to Blu-Ray.

And due to the prohibitively high cost of re-equipping the entire manufacturing process for Blu-Ray manufacture, its going to be a commercial flop.

Equinox2003 · Post by **Equinox2003** » 2005-12-01 06:05pm

So when is this stuff coming out anyway? I am curious to see how much better an HD or Blu-Ray movie will be compared to DVD.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2005-12-01 07:21pm

weemadando wrote:Blu-Ray is all but dead.

Sony folded a week or so back and said that they'd be using HD-DVD format for all of their releases in addition to Blu-Ray.

And due to the prohibitively high cost of re-equipping the entire manufacturing process for Blu-Ray manufacture, its going to be a commercial flop.

Blu-Ray dead? That's not the perspective of the situation I heard.

Last time I checked, Universal was the only major studio that was still supporting HD-DVD exclusively: virtually all the other major parties involved are now supporting either Blu-Ray or both formats, and because of that, most analysts have decided that Blu-Ray will be the winner.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2005-12-01 07:29pm

I just went poking around for it, but I can't find anything about Sony announcing supporting both formats rather than Blu-Ray exclusively.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2005-12-01 07:39pm

The Kernel wrote:It's a nice idea, but the drive would be hideously expensive to do what you suggest, and by the time you could drive prices down, the format war will have been decided. The only way for this to work is if people largely ignore BOTH Blu-ray and HD-DVD much like they did with SACD and DVD-Audio until manufacturers can create cheap universal players so that the format ceases to matter.

But I really doubt that is going to happen in this case. Blu-Ray and HD-DVD may not take off like DVD did, but they are going to be adopted far more heavily than the high resolution audio formats.

I believe several manufacturers have decided to support both formats. Unlike Betamax Vs. VHS, adding another laser to a device that likely already has two or three isn't as big a problem. Remember, there are at least two versions of rewritable DVD out there, so it is not a unfounded assumption that both could actually stay in the market and neither one bow out for a long time. That would make dual-format a must, and both formats have massive industry backing.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2005-12-01 08:15pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote: I believe several manufacturers have decided to support both formats. Unlike Betamax Vs. VHS, adding another laser to a device that likely already has two or three isn't as big a problem. Remember, there are at least two versions of rewritable DVD out there, so it is not a unfounded assumption that both could actually stay in the market and neither one bow out for a long time. That would make dual-format a must, and both formats have massive industry backing.

When they say they are supporting both formats, all that means is that they will manufacture both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players, not combo devices. The costs associated with manufacturing combo drives at first will be enormous, not just because of the technology but because of the licensing. It's not likely that we'll see combo devices until the format war has already been decided.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2005-12-01 08:21pm

No, Samsung is making dual-format players since they're fed up with this going on. If one of the biggest electronics companies in the world can do it (which they're confident about), then the others either lose out or follow suit. Because that's exactly what happened with DVD+RW and DVD-RW. And DVD players when they first came out cost a grand a pop, the price soon fell.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2005-12-01 08:28pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote:No, Samsung is making dual-format players since they're fed up with this going on. If one of the biggest electronics companies in the world can do it (which they're confident about), then the others either lose out or follow suit. Because that's exactly what happened with DVD+RW and DVD-RW. And DVD players when they first came out cost a grand a pop, the price soon fell.

DVD-R/DVD+R is a different thing since there is no functional difference between the two (from an end customer standpoint) since they both work identically. DVD-Audio and SACD are pretty close to one another technologically (the technology involved in reading is only a single chip) and yet the combo drives commanded a $500 premium at first; the premium for Blu-Ray/HD-DVD will be far greater.

I'm not suggesting that combo drives won't happen, just that they will be too late to matter unless one of two things happen:

1) Neither format takes off for a long period of time. The likelyhood of this is low unless neither side does any marketting for their format.

2) Both formats see similar sales. Possible, but unlikely due to historical trends.

Post by **weemadando** » 2005-12-01 08:31pm

Blu-Ray is going to cost WAY more at retail.

That is what's going to kill it. HD-DVD being manufactured using existing plants and techniques can retail for current DVD pricings.

Blu-Ray requires a new fabrication process, which means re-tooling of all of the plants or construction of new ones. That's a fuck-ton of cost which has to be passed on to the consumer.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2005-12-01 08:33pm

weemadando wrote:Blu-Ray is going to cost WAY more at retail.

That is what's going to kill it. HD-DVD being manufactured using existing plants and techniques can retail for current DVD pricings.

Blu-Ray requires a new fabrication process, which means re-tooling of all of the plants or construction of new ones. That's a fuck-ton of cost which has to be passed on to the consumer.

Maybe, but Sony is obviously going to dump a ton of money into getting Blu-Ray into the PS3 (it'll be a huge loss, even for them) which is going to drive a huge install base. Unless the PS3 flops (highly unlikely) we're going to see roughly 10 million Blu-Ray players within the first six months of release, something that won't happen with HD-DVD. Economics of scale based upon Blu-Ray's install base will probably make up for the increases in manufacturing costs.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2005-12-01 08:35pm

I have heard rumours in tech magazines that other companies feel threatened by the Samsung plan. If they manage to pull it off, it offers some flexibility (provided the package is cheap in the future) to milk both markets and not favour one format that could eventually die over another. Some say Blu-Ray won't be winning over HD-DVD quickly, if at all, but others have doubts on that as well. In other words, without this nice merger we expected, people are split more than ever over this and I don't think the consumer wants to be fucked over again like in the '80s. So, either someone declares a winner PDQ when the formats are released and the loser vanishes and causes little grief (except to the schmucks who invested in it), or whoever gets cheap to make, affordable dual-format players suddenly has an advantage.

Of course, you'll probably get others that simply wait for the next next generation format like Sharp's 100 gig discs. But if you keep that up, you'll never upgrade, though people hate having to buy a new damn piece of hardware every couple of years too.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2005-12-01 08:38pm

weemadando wrote:Blu-Ray is going to cost WAY more at retail.

That is what's going to kill it. HD-DVD being manufactured using existing plants and techniques can retail for current DVD pricings.

Blu-Ray requires a new fabrication process, which means re-tooling of all of the plants or construction of new ones. That's a fuck-ton of cost which has to be passed on to the consumer.

Like The Kernel says, while it could seem logical to dismiss Blu-Ray, it is Sony, and they have a lot of capital to throw at this especially given their PS3 will be the flagship for next-gen media brandishing their name. I don't think Sony would let it die without one collosal fight, which is why I'd sooner see dual-format players and recorders becoming the norm despite cost before one side admits defeat and slivers off. Betamax, even after a firm trouncing, stuck around a long time before people finally got the hint and even then the die hards loved it like Philips CD-I.

Arthur_Tuxedo · Post by **Arthur_Tuxedo** » 2005-12-01 11:04pm

Given that less than 10% of the population has an HDTV, IIRC, I don't expect either format to pose a serious threat to DVDs for at least 2 years. By that time, holographic discs could very well have made a joke of these formats.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2005-12-02 12:15am

Arthur_Tuxedo wrote:Given that less than 10% of the population has an HDTV, IIRC, I don't expect either format to pose a serious threat to DVDs for at least 2 years. By that time, holographic discs could very well have made a joke of these formats.

Only if they offer something that these formats do not. And I fail to see anything they can add aside from higher bitrates and more stuff packed onto a disc, neither things that Hollywood is going to give a crap about. Higher resolutions aren't going to happen either, not when every HDTV on the market is limited to 1080i/p.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2005-12-02 07:19am

We already have experimental TVs that surpass the resolution possible for the eye anyway, the drawback being that bandwidth to supply channels on these sets would be enormous and not doable without going back to just half a dozen channels of TV. As with certain bitrates of lossy music formats, there is a point where no one can hear or see any difference. HDTV today is pretty much perfect since I don't see any possible gain with higher resolution that doesn't cost phenomenally more and stresses the networks. And bigger discs can only mean more features, since I doubt studios will start putting whole collections on one disc for a set price.

We do have flash memory coming down in price and rising in storage capacity, so you can get your Tivo or portable media player and put whatever DVDs and music you want on them without the companies.

Arthur_Tuxedo · Post by **Arthur_Tuxedo** » 2005-12-02 01:50pm

True, assuming that the price of holographic discs never comes within spitting distance of the blue laser ones. If they never do, then the home player market will probably be dominated by HD-DVD / BD combo drives, and the computer drive market will most likely be a mix of blue laser and holographic drives, assuming that a combo is impossible.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2005-12-02 05:00pm

Fox believes that Blu-Ray will win. Based on the strength of the PS3.

Reuters wrote:Decrease text size

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Fox Filmed Entertainment sees the Sony-led Blu-ray high definition DVDs winning the next generation DVD technology battle on the back of widespread Hollywood support and the release next year of the PlayStation 3 video game console, Fox's co-chairman said on Thursday.

"In terms of the number of companies involved, the PS3 (PlayStation game console) momentum and the level of content that is committed to Blu-ray, it does seem to have a pretty strong lead," James Gianopulos, co-chairman of Fox Filmed Entertainment, said at the Reuters Media and Advertising Summit in New York.

"We believe that Blu-ray not only has the superior technology and backing in terms of strength to market but also the superior content protection," Gianopulos added.

The media and technology industry is racing to offer next generation DVDs that offer higher definition video amid a spike in sales of flat screen high definition television sets, but many in the industry are concerned the dueling new DVD standards will confuse consumers and slow early growth.

The Sony <6758.T>-led Blu-ray DVD technology, which will be built into Sony's PlayStation 3 video game console next year, is fighting a consortium that includes Toshiba Corp. <6502.T> that has developed the HD DVD format.

Gianopulos said Fox has no plans to release movies in HD DVD.

With that and a dollar, Sony can buy itself a can of Coke.