JimK

All I can say is this. When DVD-Audio and SACD came out, I studied them until the cows came home. Clearly by looking at the specs, DVD-Audio was the clear winner in both audio specs and features. Being a musician it was very important to me to get the best possible audio I could get. I purchased a good DVD-Audio player and as many of these wonderful discs I could. And what happened. Not only did DVD-Audio go the way of Beta, even SACD is losing out to yet another format, Dual-Disc, which is obviously not as good as either format! The demands of the user, and the sometimes unsound choices of manufacturers sticks us in the end. I for one WILL NOT get into either format, HD-DVD or Blu-Ray. Oh I have an HD-TV (have had one for 5 years) and have been iching for something like this. My wife and I love movies. We have almost a thousand DVDs. I adore the shows in HD that I occassionaly watch and I for one know the benefits of an HD format with DVDs, but come on guys, let's see a standard! I'm not going to invest all this money and effort into something that like the lottery, may or may not hit. Beta burned people, DVD-Audio burned me (I still love the ones I have, but am sad there will be no more.) I am not going down that road again. Standardize things and stop taking the consumers for a ride down the road to poverty. Our pockets aren't as deep as the big boys. We can't afford to take such a drastic plunge. In the words of Forest Gump, "And that's all I have to say about that."

Spiky

You'll have to stick with the small studios to get your fix of high-rez audio. They are still churning out both DVD-A and SACD. AIX, Chesky, others. I don't think they will go away any time soon, since they cater to a niche, anyway. They are accustomed to small market share.

Dolby's new lossless format specs are suspiciously close to DVD-A, although using their own lossless codec, not MLP. Perhaps we'll see music released in this format one day.

gimmepilotwings

I agree fully. I plan on upgrading my TV soon, and I wont buy either player right away. It took poker winnings for me to buy a 360, and with a likely war between Blue Ray/HD-DVD, there is no way I will throw away money into a format that might not be around 5 years from now.

DVD is plenty enough quality for my movies at this time. Getting them at around $5 a piece is another huge determining factor for me. If I could not do that, I wouldnt have the 500+ that I have now.

darkside

I question the truth that DVD Audio was the clearly better format. Both sound great and SACD has a feature that kills DVD Audio, backwards compatibility with standard CD players. Done in a much better way than dual discs. However, the DVD features of DVD Audio were pretty cool in many cases and I love my Queensryche DVD audio disc.

Blu Ray seems the winner based on its support right now, but I really think there is a good chance that it may end up like SACD and DVD Audio in a few years with combo players being the norm and studios supporting both formats.

Drexl

I honestly think the reason the audio formats didn't take off had more to do with consumers just not wanting a better audio format. When people are willing to even take a step backwards in quality by purchasing compressed music downloads, it seems that CD was and still is good enough for most people.

stanrozenfeld

I think people exaggerate the risk. I am not made of money, but I can plunk down $450 for an hd dvd player and get to enjoy high def right away, something I've been waiting for a long time. To minimize the risk, I will just rent hd dvds on netflix, until the market sorts itself out... that way, my risk remains at $450 and no more. And then there is the fact that hd dvd player will upscale regular dvds.

I hear 'dvds are good enough' argument plenty, just like I heard 'vhs is good enough' argument when dvd was arriving. I love movies and I do not for a moment believe that dvd is able to communicate a great film's full impact... I doubt that even hd dvd will be able to do that, but it will come damn close!

My hd dvd player is on preorder... it's been confirmed that the dealer will be receiving them today, so I'll have my new toy in the middle of next week.

By the way, I love SACDs, and being a classical music fan, there is so much to choose from, I don't even know where to begin!

filmfreak

Agreed 100%.

darkside

I do as well and I'm not even concerned about buying the discs. $500 is not a horrible amount of money to invest in HD DVD and if a year or two from now it looks like Blu Ray will be the winner I will simply get a combo player or add a Blu Ray player as well and continue to fill in my movie collection. I just don't see a situation where all the HD DVDs will end up coasters. I think the format will sell enough that even in a worst case situation it will live on in combo players. I'm definitely thinking about picking one up in the next few weeks.

Edit: Make that pick one up today.

kvrdave

Excellent post. Especially for a new member that has been here nearly 7 years.

digitalfreaknyc

Be that as it may, the movies I want to see are coming out on Blu-Ray and not HD-DVD. So although I'd love to plunk $500 down on an upconverting player, the movies I want are coming out on the other format.

The Bus

Correct.

JimK

In light of thinking of the future and combo players. Belive me, ask my wife, I am no dummy when it comes to audio and electronics, DVD-Audio was the clear winner. It came out what, 4 or 5 years ago? Already, to find a player that even does DVD-Auido, at least the 6 channel output that was originally done and the way my receiver accepts it, is rare. Combo players? There were few. Can you find one now? Perhaps. In the 6-channel output configuration? Rare. If my current player dies, will I have to upgrade the player AND my receiver? That stinks. My system wasn't cheap. Don't hedge your bets that what you are hoping to find even a few years from now will even exist. I am a computer programmer and have been fighting standards in computers my whole life. Even a video card I purchased 4 or 5 months ago doesn't exist today. I guess all I am hoping for, and spreading the word for is to the industry that to help the consumer and come out with one standard. Beta/VHS, DVD-Audio/SACD, PCIe/AGP, remember there was even a different form of CDs originally called I think Divix. When will it end? When all of the consumers are broke? No, $500 won't break me, but it isn't chump change either, it will put groceries on my table for some time. I read all of your responses. Everyone is following the companies to aid in their decisions. The companies follow only one credo, to make money. Their credo should change. Create the ONE best technology, bring it to the public and a reasonable price and help people enjoy America for what it stands, not what companies decide it should be.

kvrdave

Assuming that they don't end up coming out for both. If the HD-DVD sells well, most companies will rush to put their stuff on it because they go where the money is, and won't want to wait another 6 months for the BR to maybe be a winner....especially if they can still put them out of BR. The exception might be Sony, but if HD-DVD has any kind of legs, they won't hold out forever either.

OliverB

With everyone talking about waiting out these format wars and seeing which emerges the victor... I'm honestly curious as to how anybody expects either to be distinguished successful if nobody is jumping on the boat?

And I'm not posting this in any way to seem critical as I have no intention whatsoever as becoming an early adapter. I'm personally not happy with the direction either seem to be taking.

But I just don't understand how any format can succeed over the other when nobody seems to be interested in buying into either at this point...

?

digitalfreaknyc

I already made a thread involving this very question.

http://forum.dvdtalk.com/showthread.php?t=460449

Qui Gon Jim

I think most people will eat their words. What you'll see is many people making the impulse buy and grabbing a deck in the next couple months. Heck, even a few of the BR die-hards are talking baout buying one of the new Tosh decks to check it out.

But you bring up a good point, and if HD with it's early window and lower price captivates a dominant portion of early adopters, that could be bad for BR.

Blitz6Speed

Super simple!

Let early adopters go HD-DVD and sell a whopping 5-10k units by the time BR comes out. PS3 gets released and overnight, there are now millions of BR players in homes all accross the world. End of story.

Josh Z

Assuming, of course, that Sony can actually get decent numbers of players to retail within the first 6 months, and won't have production shortages like the introductions of every other videogame console.

And of those millions that will supposedly buy a PS3, a whole 5-10 thousand of them will use it for Blu-Ray playback. The rest will play videogames on their 4:3 SD TVs and never think twice about HD of any sort.

darkside

Sony will be lucky to ship 200,000 PS3 units by years end much less millions. Demand will make those impossible for most to own until a few months into 2007 I would bet. I've said all along I think Blu Ray has the advantage with its great support and I agree the PS3 can definitely help put Blu Ray on top. That is not going to prevent me from enjoying HD DVD today though.

I want to enjoy HD movies in April so something happening in November is not going to stop me. I will not pay $900+ for a Blu Ray player and I will not rely on a video game console to anchor my home theater. If Blu Ray wins the battle I will be more than happy to buy a player in 2007 when prices are in line with what I want to pay.

HD DVD is at a price I want to pay now. There is no way I'm waiting and I think the sales will be much higher than the 10K units you are thinking. I won't be surprised to see HD DVD player sales closer to a million world wide by years end.

Blitz6Speed

Ive never seen such wishful thinking before. If this launch was that awesome, why did every best buy get only 3 units? Are you kidding me? 3 Units per store, and 3 films? Yes, i forsee millions sold soon. That was pure and utter, unadulterated, sarcasm, btw.

Honestly, J6P has 0 idea HD-DVD even launched, everyone i talked to hadnt a clue about it till i told them, and i speak to quite a few people a day, and most are tech savvy. So yah, i have no faith in hd-dvd, and this launch helps assure my thoughts as fact vs fiction.

Also, no matter how many units sony has for sale on launch, hours after its for sale, it will trump the # of HD-DVDs in homes. Could be 500,000, could be 2 million, i dont know as im not Miss Cleo, but i do know theres no way hd-dvd is going to move any significant # of units till then, especially after such a paultry launch.

Qui Gon Jim

Latest news on PS3 is that the are still shopping for parts. If this rumor is true, the window is rapidly closing on getting enough units together for a major launch.

IF PS3 launches this year, it will be like the 360 Launch was last year, with units scarce. Probem is is the price tag is huge, and quantities are scarce, parents may decide to spring for one of the cheaper, more readily available alternatives (360 and Rev).

I also think that this "Trojan Horse" stuff neglects to consider that software sales may be more important than installed base. Let's say Toshiba sells 100K units this year, and so does PS3. Studios and retailers will know that all 100K HD units will buy films for the format. The same can't be said for a every PS3 player. I'd say a majority of PS3 systems will not be used for BR DVDs at all, just games.

Finally, I wouldn't call HD's launch paultry. I think that they are being pretty smart about it. They need to walk the fine line between keeping hardware available but not too available so it doesn't look like a clearance waiting to happen. Also, releasing a few discs each week is smart because it will keep a certain percentage of people buying every piece of software that comes out. Trickle the titles out, and people will keep buying them. Of course, a better selection would be nice, but I am sure by the time BR launches, there will be a pretty good selection of discs available.

I'm sure that hardware quantites will be similar when BR launches.

darkside

Yeah, how dare Toshiba launch without hundreds of titles available. Close to a million is wishful thinking, but I still wager they will be in the hundreds of thousands by year end. If they can sell a few hundred thousand they will start to build more support from studios and that library will fill in quickly.

Also player prices for the holiday season will probably be under $300 giving them a chance of building up some nice holiday sales compared to Blu Ray which will probably still be over $500 come holiday time.

digitalfreaknyc

Do you really? In 2 months? I've seen the list of movies and it's not like they're making releases every week. Most of the (few) other studios haven't even announced theirs yet. This looks like shit at the moment.

Coral

Come November (if released) the PS3 production line will not yet be optimized, so expect some slow output and major shortages.

Also, just because the hardware is out there it doesn't guarrantee that people will purchase the software for it (in this case BR movies). Apparently there are around 10 million players sold that have SACD playback. We all know how few SACDs are being sold.

In the meantime, HD-DVD has the lead in release date and price.

Blitz6Speed

I dont know a single person that ive met or spoken to in my entire life that ever wanted or cared or needed SACD's. CDs sound fine in my car. The same cannot be said about the intrest of High Def films. People who buy a PS3 are people with HDTV's. Thats a pretty safe bet, as why buy a powerhouse HD Gaming system and play on your 19" tv? Doesnt happen, and the ps3's price point wouldnt allow that to happen easily. So if those people who own a HDTV + a PS3, well then guess what, all it takes is a trip to the store to pick up some Blu-Ray titles that come out on release day (Something like X-Men 3 on BR for 14.99 at best buy would definetly move to most ps3 owners, IMO.). They wouldnt have to buy a HD-DVD Player to watch High Def films, they already have the player in hand.

Honestly, i just dont see HD-DVD players flying off the shelf from normal consumers, all the audio/video junkies are getting them just because its now available, not because its the format they prefer. Thats called settling, and in the end, people will purchase what they want.