So far I can only remember seeing supporters of BD being banned on this forum, regardless of the behaviour of certain other members (whether baiting or insulting). Considering the prefference of the mod carrying out these actions this trend can't fail to look bad. But feel free to allow this "free-for-all" until you decide you dislike the opinions being voiced.

I found that article right before reading your post, and am reading it now
Very informative, and in plain language.

It's coincidence that the two members I've banned have been Blu-ray supporters. There's no grand conspiracy. The rabid HD DVD folks bug me about as much, but there haven't been any that consistently crossed the line, and I get far, far, far fewer 'report this post to a moderator...' complaints about them.

Good article. As usual, Evan does a nice, even analysis. Esp nice to see the analysis of the codecs, and why bitrate is no longer an issue.

If Universal is being told they can't produce titles in-house it doesn't really matter what the reason is. The fact is they are not being allowed to do what they want is enough not to support Blu-Ray. BTW, the little tidbit about the BD+ stampers and cost estimate was either in CED or a trrade journal last year. I'll see what I can find.

Connect the dots! Sony did not have the kind of sayso on who pressed CDs and dvds like they do right now with Blu-Ray. Because of their BD+ restrictions they have limited replication business to a few big players. They will make more money this way. For example, think about how much more money Pizza Hut and Dominoes would make if all the small pizza joints closed up overnight. Not only this issue exists, but it is well known that Sony is not doing replication business with every company that wants to press discs on Blu-Ray. I'll leave that in the adult forum though.

Sure, street dates and whatnot. Replicators know in advance of the press releases what orders they are getting, how many units to fill, whats on them ect ... I can see exactly why a studio woudln't trust Sony with any of their financials.

Well lets place Blu-Ray as the one and only "unified" format. Hd-dvd never came out. Sony would then have no reason to get BD50-rom working because there is no competition. Why should they subsidize discs for other studios if BD25 is the only game in town? If certain studios are really supporting Blu-Ray due to the extra storage space then they are going to be pretty upset. Thats enough reason to leave support in place for HD-dvd until BD50 is working. I will say what I have believed from day one. Time Warner can end the entire issue with one simple press release that they are dropping support for HD-dvd. Universal can't hold a format by itself.

BTW, I wouldn't say dvd didn't have an option B. Last I checked dvd WAS option B for Fox! Divx was pushed heavily by a few in the industry.

Sony screwing up the PS3 release production numbers has nothing to do with the BDA. It's all on Sony. If you make a business deal you either honor it or back out. You don't keep playing guessing games like Sony has been within the industry. If Sony tells Fox they will subsidize a working BD50 launch, and when they knew they couldn't do it, then it's all on Sony.

Thats exactly true. The problem with BD50 is it can be a complete fabrication, as Amir said, when Microsoft decided to go against Blu-Ray. Some things don't have solutions. We're not talking about a technology that just sprang about overnight. They've been fiddling around with double layer Blu-Ray discs for years. And as I said before, the BDA's solution to the Samsung player "prehaps" not being able to read the final BD50 discs was not a solution, it was a means of protecting themselve from a product that wasn't ready for launch.

It probably won't matter as Amir said long ago 30gbs is enough and the enitre subject of BD50 was pointless. If I had to choose between 25 or 30 I'd still take 30 though. I can tell you that the sweet spot for D-VHS MPEG-2 was in the 20-26mbps range. I'd prefer VC1 over 16-18mbps MPEG-2

I forgot about Columbia actually. I figure New Line will support both after Christmas and LionsGate will support both within the next year. Disney will probably come around to supporting both if BD50 doesn't work out. It's going to take a long long time for Fox . Something strange is going on with the entire deal regarding Sony and MGM are letting Fox have distribution rights to the MGM titles.

That's a really good article that summarizes the technical differences, as well as saying whether the differences are relevant or not.

However, I do have a few minor quibbles with the article. First, the author writes too much about dual-sided HD-DVDs as a feature advantage of that format. He writes about dual-sided double-layer HD-DVDs already existing, when the hybrid HD-DVD/DVD discs are actually only single-layer on the HD-DVD side. Also, I don't think there's anything preventing BD from making double-sided discs. Studios don't seem enamoured over a DL/DS HD-DVD in any case, since MI3 is going to be two discs instead of double-sided.

Also, the author is overly optomistic about the future pricing of HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. There's very little to suggest that player prices are going to drop as quickly as DVD prices, since neither format is going to sell as well as DVD. On the other hand, competition between the formats might accelerate price drops a bit.

Finally, I'm not as optomistic as the author that having two formats is actually a good thing. Studios may have released FF and WS versions of DVD, but that doesn't translate to them being "happy to" do it. Consumers also aren't going to be happy either buying both formats or choosing between studios they want to watch. Even if all studios suport both formats, there's still going to be confusion on which format is "best" to buy, especially since by that point the differences may be minimal.

Give me a break. If you can't understand why the two banned members were given the boot, I don't know what to say.

The rabid HD folks can be almost as bad as the BD crowd, but certainly these two members took it further than HD v. BD into the realm of user v. user. They weren't banned because they loved BD likee Gollum loved the precious, they were banned becuase of their behavior.

Mods- you guys are doing a great job, keep it up. Those of us that are truly impartial know there is no BD witchhunt.

The Weinsteins did bring the Dimension "label" to their new company. However, it looks like all the previous films done under the Dimension label are still owned by Miramax, and thus Disney. Disney also gets a cut of any new films based on franchises established by Dimension while at Miramax.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dimension_Films
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Weinstein_Company
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/st...4193758&EDATE=

Let me make it clear that if I ever step over my bounds, a mod would let me know. However, I don't get into personal attacks over something as stupid as a format war and if I've personally offended anyone here, feel free to email me or PM me and tell me that I've hurt your feelings.

That said...there's more to life than this board.

My interest in HD DVD, as I've stated before, is not so biased that I wouldn't be able to admit that BD has actually done something good. Thus far, they haven't.

To those who clearly call me out or have some childish vendetta against me, I say "welcome to my ignore list."

Carry on.

In fairness, though, that street runs both ways; HD DVD would've been a much, much less attractive format if not for the spectre of Blu-ray.

They never have before, why would they now? (at least not Adam) As an example, about half the posts you made responding to me this year have been personal attacks. Then you get all wiggy when I respond in kind. News flash, people don't like being called idiot, foolish and all the other (apparently minor, is that ok then?) insults you favor.


Make up your mind for once. PM has been off on this board for years, btw.

There are two obvious reasons for that. The first is that there are very few BD fans bothering to post on this site anymore, while the second is that there's no point complaining if nothing is going to be done about it. There was clearly concerted baiting of Blitz on this forum, much of it outside this "free-for-all" thread. It's an ugly thing, and may partially explain the lack of insider participation on this site.

Agree on that. Dual-sided is highly overrated. I'd much rather have two single-sided discs than one double-sided disc.


Perhaps. But just remember that about a year ago, everyone thought that HD DVD was dead, and look how it fluorished. I agree with Evan that "there is plenty of room for both of them in the marketplace, and there is no reason for either one to monopolize it."

Obviously I'd have to respectfully disagree.

unless a dual-format player comes out, there's zero reason to have two formats.

And even if a DF player comes out, there's still no reason.

I thought that I read somewhere that double sided BD discs was impossible due to some technical limitation. Thickness maybe?

Does anyone remember this? I dont remember where I read that. Probably on avs.

Vague memory of something like, 'the depth is all wrong for dual sided'. Although that was true for CD, but they managed to make Dual-disc, anyway.

Yeah, I think it had to do with the thickness of the coating.

They are having enough trouble with double-layered right now, so attempting double-sided might be a feat.

Also, vague memory of it not being an issue. Supposedly they can do 8 layers on one side, so who needs another side? Still waiting for 2 layers to work, of course.

I don't think we lost much, if any, readership, though. There were quite a few vocal Blu-ray supporters; it's just that many of them are now HD DVD supporters.

As I've said before, I'm not anti-Blu-ray, and I don't champion HD DVD. If the quality of Blu-ray's hardware and software get to where they should be, I'll be first in line when the quality stuff is available. It's just that that hasn't happened yet, and the arrogance of some people in the Blu-ray camp has made that format seem all the less appealing.

DVD Talk as a whole has very little insider participation. I doubt the atmosphere here has anything to do with it. It's just that there are more popular, more established HD-centric message boards where those insiders were already participating.

I've posted quite a few "hey, cut it out"s after DNY's posts. I agree that perhaps I should have done more. I'm as sick of the baiting and bickering as anyone.

agreed. Especially since, for the past few years at least, you could get the FF or WS version of a disk for about the same price, and play them both on the same player, which you could get for less than 200 bucks. And there's a difference between being forced to buy FF or WS, if that was the only version, and still being able to play it, versus not being able to watch The Fifth Element in high definition because you've only got a 500$ HD player, and not a 1000$ BD player. I think part of the speedy success of DVD, apart from the PS2 and its pricing, was the fact that it was reasonably easy to use, and you knew what you were getting; they would work with pretty much any TV, and if you bought a "DVD" in a US store, there was 99.99% chance it would play on your dvd player. Having a format, that requires a large chunk of initial investment outlay to even use, then requiring people to either choose one format and be limited to only certain movies, or buy two pieces of hardware for triple the cost of just one to be able to access the whole library, is a barrier to either format's widespread acceptance, imho.
And the prices would have to drop *a lot* for people other than fanatics or enthusiasts to buy both sets of hardware, so the price competition may not be as strong as it is when lots of products are competing for the same audience. As a semi-interested enthusiast, and hopefully educated consumer, I would definitely prefer one format to choose from, with lots of players and titles to choose from.
and yeah, I think there is baiting/trolling/flaming on all sides, though maybe to different extents.

I believe that the charts MS released show about 5 million for the end of the year. They have been on the market about 8 months I think.

Adam,

As I said, feel free to call me out if I say something inappropriate (via email, if possible). Although I appreciate the love, I'm not here to cause any more problems than are necessary.

We discussed it outside. I don't think you'll see any more problems between us. At least, we'll try.

I was talking about last year. I could have sworn that they stated 3 million or so would be shipped before Jan 06...but production problems hampered that and I dont think they even shipped 1 million before that time.

This year, they plan to have sold 10 million by the end of the year. Who knows if they will reach that.

EDIT: They shipped 1.3 million by the end of last year. They planned 2.75 million though in the first 3 months.

http://www.xb360info.com/xbox/news/257
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2006/01...0_hibernation/