Failure Imminent for HD-DVD? Microsoft Hopes So.

Max · Post by **Max** » 2006-02-20 01:53pm

I didn't see this...so forgive me in advance if it was brought up.

Does MS want HD-DVD to fail?

Posted Feb 17th 2006 11:30AM by Christopher Grant
Filed under: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
Ross Rubin, an analyst with NPD Techworld, has an interesting theory in his latest weekly Engadget column. It goes something like this: Microsoft's adoption of HD-DVD was intended to increase the viability of the less-popular format and, in turn, be a foil to Sony's Blu-Ray format. The goal was never to emerge victorious but to weaken Blu-Ray, muddying the possibility of any dominant next-gen optical format. Why? Rubin's fictional "Disc Bloat" informant spills his guts:

"Simple. Microsoft really has nothing to gain from either format winning. Just listen to any of Gates' recent interviews and how he talks about discs as a necessary evil until the world is ready for media-free distribution. That said, Microsoft has much to gain from both formats losing. Think back to the format war between DVD-Audio and SACD. Both formats lost and it was a computer company that stepped in to become the new center of the digital music universe."

Like Apple's dominance in digital music, Microsoft wants to sell you things like portable media centers running their software, or Xbox 360s with the capability to HD movies-on-demand. In his recent Engadget interview Gates said, "In terms of movies, I often say that this is the last format battle there will ever be, because everything is going to go online -- you're going to download it."

Until the great format battle of 2008 when competing holographic storage manufacturers vie for interplanetary dominance.

Joystiq

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2006-02-20 02:51pm

That's hilarious, given Australia's perpetual shortage of bandwidth and the millions of Americans living in rural areas without access to broadband internet.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2006-02-20 02:52pm

Sounds like something Microsoft would do. Want to get people to buy in to your media-free distribution? Do your best to confuse and hurt consumers by promoting a format war and get people to eventually drop disk formats all together.

Seriously though, I know lots of people with no access to anything but dialup, and people who don't need/can't afford anything but dialup but still watch DVDs so need physical formats, and people whose PC's aren't powerful enough for anything serious so they don't use PCs for movies and stuff like that.

I know way too many people who would be alienated if the industry started dropping physical formats, and who might be confused if Microsoft deliberately starts a format war to kill the formats.

I'm hoping this isn't true.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2006-02-20 03:27pm

Given 100% of the UK can get broadband now, it'd appeal here, but not elsewhere.

Netko · Post by **Netko** » 2006-02-21 08:34am

Meh, it sounds a bit too tinfoilish for my tastes. Yes, Microsoft has hedged some bets and didn't really push its prefered standard (HD-DVD) as much as Sony has pushed its (BR). On the other hand, it isn't realistic to expect content to be downloadable at HD quality or even true DVD quality thru an online general-purpose site (ie. not something your ISP or cable operator is running) any time soon outside of the nordic countries, South Korea and Japan because the connections are just not there for enjoyable viewing.

Let's take an example of, say, an 1mbit connection. This is a farily low end connection for broadband but any numbers derived from it can be scaled quite nicely. With such a connection you can play almost all current streaming content available and even 700kbps streams, which are usualy the best that is offered, are not even classic tv broadcast quality. On the other hand, downloads, with all their inefficiencis, give you something like 300-400 mb per hour. For a DVD movie thats at least 12 hours to download it (this is with taking 400 mb and only a single layer DVD). Probably more. Downloading a movie that takes up a single single-layer HD DVD would take close to 2 days. Even if we take the 2 CD DVD rips as a baseline acceptable quality, it takes at least 3 hours to download the movie.

That is not acceptable for general public use. And its unlikely that things will improve significantly in that respect in the next couple of years. Espcialy if HD content is enbraced and such quality expected by consumers. One day, we will get there, but we simply aren't there yet.