Blu-ray and HD-DVD players.

[Lupin]

I think my brothers single Drive is compatable with DVD-R / CD-R/ CD+R and CD-RW for both reading AND writing. ...though I'm not sure. I'll have to ask him.

Yeah, that's how my current drive is now, but way back in the 90's with they had first come out, I had to get seperat DVD-ROM, and CD-R/RW drives if I wanted to use both formats.

[Scott Gardener]

My Toshiba laptop does DVD+RW, -RW, and DVD-RAM. I also have an external drive that does +RW, -RW, and +RW dual layer. I have yet to see a drive that does both -RAM and dual layer. DVD-RAM is an obscure format that's seldom used. (I've never once used it.) I've got one dual layer disc, and I have yet to use it. More discs cost $10 a piece and have about 8 Gigs capacity. A 4 Gig disc costs ten cents. Gee, see why I'm in a rush on getting dual layer support right now. If it were a 50 Gig disc, I might consider paying the extra $9.90 per disc for the convenience of putting my entire music library on a single CD-sized package. But, for the time being, DVD+R is my archive format of choice, and I'm happy with a drive that reads and writes basic + and - Rs and RWs.

As for HD vs. Blu-Ray, I'm guessing if one were to win, it would be Blu-Ray, but more likely, both formats will stick around. Both are coming out at the same time, thus killing the early lead advantage. Samsung already admits plans to release a drive that handles both if Toshiba and Sony can't sort it out, which they appearantly can't. When Sony did that with a DVD+/-R drive and others followed, that doomed the prospect of ending that format war.

Blu-Ray will probably be my DVD+R, the format I personally favor for my collection, while my drive handles all of them:

CD, CD-R, CD-RW, CD-ROM, CD-DA, DVD, DVD-RAM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+R DL, DVD-Audio, Disney DVD, HD DVD, Blu-Ray, HD DVD DL, Blu-Ray Dual Layer, and any objections.

[Figarou]

Well, its hard to believe 2 new formats will soon be out. But why 2? Its going to make my purchase a bit difficult.

Whats good is that Toshiba's 1st generation HD-DVD player won't be that expensive.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060104/tc_ ... shiba_dc_1

Sure, $499 is a lot when you can buy a DVD player for under $70. But when DVDs 1st came out, the cheapest player I found was $600 back in 1997.

HD-DVD will be the 1st one to hit the stores. The race is on. But will HD-DVD keep the lead when Blu-Ray comes out?

Here is something interesting about HD-DVD.

http://www.toshibahddvd.com/


Blu-Ray players will be more expensive. Pioneer's 1st Blu-Ray player will be $1800.

http://dvdexclusive.com/article.asp?art ... ategoryID=

I know they'll have cheaper models later on. You can't grab the market if you're going to have just expensive players. Its rumored the cheapest Blu-Ray will be the PS3 at $499. Thats not bad since it also plays games.


I plan on getting both formats. But I should do more research to see if I can stick to just one. If theres going to be exclusive films to one format, I'm going to be pissed off!! That'll force me to buy the other format if I don't happen to have it.

I'm not sure if I want to be an "early adopter." Its a terrible risk to take. My 1st DVD player was horrible. Spent over $600 for it. It skipped, pixalized, and froze up. Maybe these guys already know what they are doing and I don't have to worry about it since DVD players rarely do that today. But I hate buying a format that will eventually die later on. I spent $800 on CD-I. I thought that was the wave of the future. Nope. Big mistake.

[Scott Gardener]

If the price difference between the two formats is about $1000, then it doesn't matter how much better Blu-Ray will be; you can add it to the list of formats Sony will have killed. Looks like HD-DVD has the lead, afterall.

X-Box 360 will have an HD-DVD, but it's an add-on. If the PS3 has built-in Blu-Ray, then Blu-Ray might survive as a gamer's format for awhile and catch on that way. Still, it seems odd that movies would come out in four different formats, and two of them would be designed specifically for Sony weirdness.

So, when Freeborn comes out, which format will you get? I won't know until the market plays itself out, but I suspect I'll get both plain DVD, playable on everything, and one of the two high def formats.

[Lupin]

http://dvdexclusive.com/article.asp?art ... ategoryID=

I know they'll have cheaper models later on. You can't grab the market if you're going to have just expensive players. Its rumored the cheapest Blu-Ray will be the PS3 at $499. Thats not bad since it also plays games.

Yeah, that's a high-end model. You really can't use it to say anything about the regular models. Several companies, like Pioneer, Panisonic and TDK have comitted to producing Blu-Ray computer drives this spring, but nobody said how much they were going to be. With DVD I had a computer drive several years before consoles came down in price.

[Figarou]

If the price difference between the two formats is about $1000, then it doesn't matter how much better Blu-Ray will be; you can add it to the list of formats Sony will have killed. Looks like HD-DVD has the lead, afterall.

X-Box 360 will have an HD-DVD, but it's an add-on. If the PS3 has built-in Blu-Ray, then Blu-Ray might survive as a gamer's format for awhile and catch on that way. Still, it seems odd that movies would come out in four different formats, and two of them would be designed specifically for Sony weirdness.

So, when Freeborn comes out, which format will you get? I won't know until the market plays itself out, but I suspect I'll get both plain DVD, playable on everything, and one of the two high def formats.

HD-DVD will be affordable from the start. I might get that one 1st. As for Blu-Ray, I'll probably use the PS3 for that. I just hope the Blu-Ray drive is not a cheap one compared to what they put in the PS2.

[dnl]

ow please some one is gowing to in hack that in a day. There tons of ways to muniplaty information on a network or the internet.

but thats sony for you.

[Shadow Wulf]

ow please some one is gowing to in hack that in a day. There tons of ways to muniplaty information on a network or the internet.

but thats sony for you.

true. but youlll have to be a very good hacker, so there wont be as much hackers as you think.

[Lone_Wolf]

I'm personally not ready to spend that much on new equipment again. My DVD player is barely broken in. Besides, the reason DVDs took off was because the market desired a new medium that had better quality, and only after VHS was de facto for 20 years (I see DVD's really taking off sometime around 2000ish). I think pushing new stuff too soon will cause a lot of people to ignore both formats.

[dnl]

ow please some one is gowing to in hack that in a day. There tons of ways to muniplaty information on a network or the internet.

but thats sony for you.

true. but youlll have to be a very good hacker, so there wont be as much hackers as you think.

not as few as you think there are plent of people out there if you know the right places to go. "cough" namp would be a good place..

[Figarou]

I'm personally not ready to spend that much on new equipment again. My DVD player is barely broken in. Besides, the reason DVDs took off was because the market desired a new medium that had better quality, and only after VHS was de facto for 20 years (I see DVD's really taking off sometime around 2000ish). I think pushing new stuff too soon will cause a lot of people to ignore both formats.

Out of all the formats ever made by man, DVD is the fastest to "take off."

It has caught on extremely well. So well that VHS is now history.


When Laserdisc came out, it was side by side with VHS. LD wasn't strong enough to take over. But DVD took over LD and VHS!!

I'm not sure what HD-DVD and Blu-Ray will do to DVD. It depends on the consumer.

[Lone_Wolf]

Out of all the formats ever made by man, DVD is the fastest to "take off."

It has caught on extremely well. So well that VHS is now history.


When Laserdisc came out, it was side by side with VHS. LD wasn't strong enough to take over. But DVD took over LD and VHS!!

I'm not sure what HD-DVD and Blu-Ray will do to DVD. It depends on the consumer.

Exactly. Laserdisc is an excellent example. It offered higher quality versus VHS, but was limited to the shadows. What will happen is anybody's guess I suppose. It should be interesting to see what transpires.

[Lupin]

Exactly. Laserdisc is an excellent example. It offered higher quality versus VHS, but was limited to the shadows. What will happen is anybody's guess I suppose. It should be interesting to see what transpires.

Blu-Ray should make a nice data storage format, since it can hold so much data.

[Figarou]

Exactly. Laserdisc is an excellent example. It offered higher quality versus VHS, but was limited to the shadows. What will happen is anybody's guess I suppose. It should be interesting to see what transpires.

Blu-Ray should make a nice data storage format, since it can hold so much data.

Yes.....it would. But Pioneer is already working on something that holds a lot more than Blu-Ray.

[Lupin]

Blu-Ray should make a nice data storage format, since it can hold so much data.

Yes.....it would. But Pioneer is already working on something that holds a lot more than Blu-Ray.

Until it ships, it's just vaoporware.

[Figarou]

Blu-Ray should make a nice data storage format, since it can hold so much data.

Yes.....it would. But Pioneer is already working on something that holds a lot more than Blu-Ray.

Until it ships, it's just vaoporware.

Of course.

But lets see how Blu-Ray and HD-DVD holds out.

We already have SACD and DVD-Audio. Thing is, hardly everyone is buying it. If you go to Best Buy, you'll see a small section of it compared to the large CD section. Also, MP3 players are more popular given the quality is far less than SACD/DVD-Audio. Besides, people rather download songs on thier PC.

[Lupin]

We already have SACD and DVD-Audio. Thing is, hardly everyone is buying it. If you go to Best Buy, you'll see a small section of it compared to the large CD section. Also, MP3 players are more popular given the quality is far less than SACD/DVD-Audio. Besides, people rather download songs on thier PC.

Yeah, but none of those are really data storage formats, which is what I was talking about.

[Figarou]

We already have SACD and DVD-Audio. Thing is, hardly everyone is buying it. If you go to Best Buy, you'll see a small section of it compared to the large CD section. Also, MP3 players are more popular given the quality is far less than SACD/DVD-Audio. Besides, people rather download songs on thier PC.

Yeah, but none of those are really data storage formats, which is what I was talking about.

Sure, data storage. The more the better.

[Lupin]

Sure, data storage. The more the better.

Usually. A good tape can hold more than a DVD, but you can only read from it linerally, which kills access time.

[Scott Gardener]

DVD succeded for several reasons:

1. It got affordable very fast. When it first came out, it was priced out the whazoo, but inside of five years, it was down to around $199--still a lot for a lot of people, but affordable enough for middle class and most working class with some degree of effort. A teenager on an allowance or flipping burgers could save up for one at that price and get it in only a few months. Rich people were early adopters, but the everyday person could get in the game in well under a decade.

2. It was easy to figure out. DVDs could be thought of as "CDs for movies," with the analogy carrying over for a lot of things. (Many people who don't remember Laser Discs probably wondered why the idea didn't come out sooner.) People who are not technologically adept could figure them out fairly easily, except perhaps for the concept of the opening menu. Setup of DVD players was remarkably easy, and superfluous extra features were made available but not intrusive, so day to day use was straighforeward. It wasn't just for technophiles and geeks; it was for everyone.

3. It was marketed brilliantly. People who already have the movie on VHS still had a reason to buy it again--the extra features and deleted scenes. (I've noticed that on more than 3/4 of my DVDs, I've yet to watch anything on there other than the movie. But, I still appreciate the extras.)

4. It was portable and convenient to tote around. LD jackets, the same size as LP records, are bulky, even if flat, whereas DVD boxes are easy to carry and stack on a shelf or drop off at a video store.

By comparison, the appeal to audiophiles like 5.1 or even 6 channel DTS or the NTSC and PAL resolution being twice that of most peoples' TVs was probably not a major factor, because die-hard techies and enthusiasts are a niche market. However, the implication that the medium was intended for them was certainly a marketing point. Same goes today for the promises made by Blu-Ray and HD-DVD. Most people don't have more than two speakers hooked up to their TV, and possibly a subwoofer; home theaters generally belong to richer people and to enthusiasts like Figarou, though that's changing.

Blu-Ray and HD-DVD are going to have to offer the same advantages if they're going to have any chance of catching on, and their rival incompatabilities could undermine adoptation of either format. One hurtle that could overcome this is a seamless crossover device that reads both discs without prejudice. If either format has glitches or problems, or a scandal like Sony's root kit fiasco, it's dead against the other.

Which brings up the next point. People want to be able to record their shows and copy them. Most people aren't pirates uploading to P2P networks, and they resent having stuff with built-in crippling. Those who are have already gotten DVD-ripping software that can bypass the CSS copy-protection scheme on DVDs, and they'll be reluctant to switch over to something that has the more advanced and aggressive copy-protection that these formats have threatened to include, such as HDTV "watermarks" that cause the recorder to refuse to record a show, or hardware "trusted platform module" appliances that physically prevent connecting recording devices. In short, if you can copy, recopy, and archive a DVD but can only play a Blu-Ray or HD-DVD with an executive order from Parlament or the White House, then most people are going to keep their DVDs.

Finally, the format war is in a race against time against its own obsolescence. If there's already an even higher resolution format in the works--and there is--most people might skip a generation or two, the way I didn't upgrade from Microsoft Office 2000 to XP, but instead held out for another two years and got 2003. (Most people are waiting even longer. In the example of Office, Microsoft is its own worst competitor, as a large number of businesses are running Office 97 today, and Microsoft can't seem to interest them in upgrading.) Furthermore, the concept of movies on discs may be in jeopardy, as people are already seeing music and now TV shows being sold on iTunes as downloads. (Sure, the TV shows are in crappy resolutions fit only for iPod screens, but they see where this could go in a year or two.) They also hear about illegal pirating of DVD content, so they know higher quality material can be delivered online, and probably will, pretty soon, and pretty cheap. If an album that costs $17 at Sam Goody's costs $10 on iTunes and can be bought without leaving the house, then it's not a big stretch to see downloading a $10 movie before the end of the decade.

[Figarou]

OK..after doing some research, I plan on getting a Pioneer Blu-Ray player. I'll look into HD-DVD later on.


I still need to do some research on the player. I'm hoping it has a built in DTS-HD 7.1 decoder. Yup...its a new surround format from DTS.

Here is some info on it.

http://www.dtsonline.com/company/press/ ... 3&yID=2005


My receiver has 7.1 channel inputs. If the Blu-Ray player has a built in DTS-HD decoder, I'm ready for it.


Here is the player in question.

[Figarou]

After doing more research, I have no choice but to get both formats. That or stick with DVD.


Turns out Universal is only putting thier films on HD-DVD. Disney is only putting theirs on Blu-Ray. The others "might" put them on both.

Not only that, Dolby has a new surround format called "Dolby True HD." Its the same as DTS-HD.

Info here.
http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/trueHD.html

Whats odd about Dolby True HD is that its been selected as the mandatory format for HD DVD. Its optional for Blu-ray Disc. Makes me wonder if DTS-HD is only for Blu-Ray.

To make things even worse. Its possible that the component output won't carry the HD signal. Only HDMI will. I don't have HDMI on my HDTV set. Its a 1st generation model. If its true, then it'll be a waste of money if I get either format.

Man, it sucks being an "early adopter."

[Lupin]

Ooh, they're starting to give dates and prices:

http://www.i4u.com/article4992.html

[Figarou]

Ooh, they're starting to give dates and prices:

http://www.i4u.com/article4992.html

Yikes!! I won't be able to play HD movies on my PC if I get that Blu-ray burner.


Yes, I know Lupin. You just want the capacity.

[Lupin]

Yeah, like you said. I don't really care about blue-ray video. DVD video on my monitor is fine for me. On the other hand, in the past four days, my fileserver has transfered a little under 16 GB of data.