Well, they really haven't. They're a bit more respectable than the other side.

You're the one who said they had, not me.

Considering that the author of the report the article cites as a source has said that those numbers are outdated and inaccurate, sure.

:horse:
rotfl
I can't believe all you guys keep believing that the media will be any of the following: truthful, capable, unbiased, timely, informed. Pretty much the same thing goes for AVS forum, at least the first 3. Seriously, stop bothering to read and get upset over things that are useless. Mylanta must do great business in your neighborhoods.

I still think it's more credible that Qui Gon Jim's estimate, which can be summarized as, "wow, all these people in two heavily HD-focused forums own an HD player. Therefore, they must've sold tons of them." Even an extremely flawed estimate is more credible than that.

I know you're speaking in a more general sense, but still, there have been much larger and more credible numbers floating around for a good long while now, and that's why I'd imagine so many of us immediately dismissed the ridiculous 5K figure cited by USA Today.

I'd venture a guess that over 90% of HD-DVD owners are on AVS. Thats why it seems like there so many of these players out there, but ive heard less then 20k are sold, and i would agree with that figure. Maybe by end of the year there will be 75-100k sold? Couldnt say. I can speak of Blu-Ray players sold by jan 1st tho =)

HD DVD gets TrueHD 5.1...
 

Several people have already verified that the newest firmware upgrade for the Toshiba (and I assume RCA) HD DVD players enables TrueHD 5.1.

It's nice to have a company that consistently delivers product instead of just promises.

You'd agree with that figure based on what evidence or research?

How many Sony PSPs were shipped on launch? About 1,000,000 units. It was also the fastest selling game console of all time in the UK. How did UMD do?

Based on what shows up to stores, based on how many the #1 seller of the hd-a1 has said hes sold on avs, based on my personal experiences of anyone i'd know buying a hd-dvd player (read: 0).

Didn't I read a quote from a studio exec that said that there were as many HD DVD players sold as there were SD DVD players at the end of 1997?

Good call.

yep.

He seems like the type who comes to a conclusion without doing research, *then* looks for things to support the conclusion.

That's highly unlikely. According to Jim Taylor's DVD Demystified FAQ:

(All non-bold mine)

DVD: First players available March 1997. By the end of 1997, there were:

200,000 players sold into US homes, 500,000 sold worldwide. Not counting the PS3, I find it possible, but unlikely, that we will reach that in the US. With the PS3, that number will be easily surpassed.

But now? There's no way that 200,000 HD-DVD players have been sold. No way. That would be 2x the adoption rate of DVD. (DVD sold 200k March-Dec, HD sold 200k in April through August???)



A library of over 900 DVD-video titles. Absolutely not happening. Right now, between Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, we've got less than half that, and that includes rumored releases, not-yet announced titles, and duplicates across both formats.

They also mention that over the next several years, DVDs will have an installed base of over 600 million. I don't see Blu-Ray or HD-DVD ever doing that. Ever. I'll be surprised if it's over 150 million worldwide.

Looks like we're going to have to dig out the quote :)

A tour promoting HD DVD is launching in September, and Microsoft will be providing its Xbox 360 + HD DVD combo as an example of the experience. Looks like a sign of confidence that the HD DVD extension will be on par with other HD DVD players -- whether the price will also be on par has yet to be seen.

Here are the tour dates:
September 14 - 17: Denver Colorado Convention Center
September 22 - 24: Dallas Plano Balloon Fest (Texas)
September 29 - October 1: Minneapolis, MN
October 5 - 6: Chicago, IL
October 10 - 15: New York, NY
October 20 - 22: Washington, D.C.
October 26 - 28: Philadelphia, PA
November 2 - 4: Richmond, VA
November 15 - 16: Los Angeles, CA
November 24 - 28: Seattle, WA
December 6 - 10: San Francisco, CA

I might try to go to this, though I'm not really interested in an Xbox for the most part.

Just because a studio head says it doesn't mean that it's true. The NPD report said for the six weeks ended July 29, HD-DVD and Blu-Ray had a 0.4% share of all DVD hardware sold. During those six weeks, HD-DVD had 46% of the units sold. Out of the 0.4% that BR/HD shared, 46% of that was theirs. So, out of all hardware sold, HD-DVD players were making up 0.14% during that period.

According to the latest CEA figures, in the six weeks ending July 29, there were about 2.53 million DVD players sold. So, that's about 3,548 HD-DVD units during that time period. Or about 84 players per day. Perhaps this is how the person in the USA Today story came up with the 5,000.

Hey, guess what... NPD and CEA figures aren't bulletproof. There's also the issue of shipped vs. sold I know that. But to arrive at 200,000 in sales already (as of now or whenever the quote was said) is completely asinine. Toshiba said they shipped 20,000 players in the US as of June.

You mean to tell me since June, they've shipped another 180,000?

Just follow the logic. It doesn't make any sense. By its second full month of release, DVD had sold over 60,000 units. Toshiba obviously did not ship 60,000 by the end of their second full month of release (June).

Maybe what the exec meant was that they expect HD-DVD to outpace DVD by the end of the year. That's possible, althought it means HD-DVD sales need to accelerate. Even if HD-DVD sold 5,000 units every week (which it obviously didn't until the end of June), it would still fall back behind DVD (even using Jim Watson's lower 200,000 number).

Let's start to approach these situations in a more practical, matter-of-fact way.

you mean...your way? ;)

I'm just following RoboDad's advice. :)

I made a mistake in my post. It should have read "25>30" not "15>25."

I still stand by my statement that the number of players sold has to closer to 100,000 than 5,000. Sell through v. shipped isn't an issue here; stores can't keep the A1 in stock. I have yet to see a boxed unit in person.

That's a bad comparison. UMD videos were limited to one player and one screen. Its uses were limited, and thus its adaptation was once the novelty wore off. Plus, UMD videos have competition from homeconverted videos on memory stick, which is not something BD or HD-DVD have to worry about anytime soon. BD is just as unlimited as HD DVD in adoption and application to existing home theaters.

"I have yet to see a boxed unit in person," is anecdotal evidence and shouldn't be taken into serious consideration by anyone with a reasonable mind.

However, assuming that every store everywhere has sold out of all Toshiba's June shipments, as of June Toshiba says they shipped 20,000 units. 20,000 is much closer to 5,000 than it is to 100,000. Even figuring that BD sold equally as many, 40,000 is still closer to 5,000 than it is to 100,000.

Based on what?

In June, Toshiba said they shipped 20,000 units. Assuming a 100% sell-through rate, there's still another 80,000 to account for since June. Between more Toshiba shipments and RCA sales (which may or may not be counted in that 20,000 figure), what evidence (besides you not seeing any in stores) indicates these are selling so well?

Yeah. I'd imagine between both HD DVD and Blu-ray combined, you're looking at somewhere in the neighborhood of 30K units sold in total, give or take a few thousand.

HD/BR discs are also limited. As of this year, most people will only have the one player, so it's use is limited. You certainly can't do anything with it in your existing DVD players, or your portables ones, or your PC, or your Navigator's TV system. Next year, and the year afterward, will be different. But not this year.

HD/BR is also limited in that in addition to the player, you need a TV. Not any TV, an HDTV. And not any HDTV, but one with HDMI. The whole ICT issue has made others worry that their current non-HDMI TV is not "good enough" --- something the media has been saying in every article for the past year. Not true, but that is the perception. This will change down the road.

If HD/BR was the first way to get HD-quality content, then that would be something. But free OTA HD has been around and most cable/sat systems give you HD. There is some competition as people say, "For now, whatever is on these HD channels is good enough." Again, that will change.

My point is that right now (2006), HD-DVD and Blu-Ray could appear to be very much like UMD/Laserdisc/SACD/DVD-A.

Just read the lead article in the new Sound & Vision on Blu-Ray. They got to compare the "defective" samsung against a new one that has the chip turned off to make the picture better. Both guys conclude that there was some improvement. One thought a fair amount, and the other thought it was fairly minimal. They conclude that there is still a mystery as to why the discs don't look better. On the plus, they say that the sound on Blu-Ray, especially the uncompressed tracks, are the best of any they have ever heard. But in terms of picture, they still need to go a ways to catch up with Hd-DVD.

My point is only that sales of a game console don't automatically trigger movie sales. The attachment rate is what is important.

I know that BD supporters hypothesize that the PS3 will be different because of the reasons you list, but, IMO, that's pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking.

BD supporters can say that PS3 is different until they're Blu in the face, but there isn't a single example of a game console that defined a movie format. The PSP, however, is an example of where a game console could not define/support a movie playback format (for whatever reasons). Oh, and the PS2 didn't "make" DVD like the Blu crowd asserts, either.

You really need to take LD out of there. People keep making this mistake. LD lasted for over 2 decades and had thousands and thousands of titles available. If HDDVD/BD do that, I'll be very happy. They're already cheaper than LD.

UMD is still very much different from Laserdisc/SACD/DVD-A and HD-DVD/BD. All the latter formats had multiple manufacturers and players, UMD doesn't. All the latter players can be showcased on a multitude of audio/video systems (and BD/HD-DVD don't need an HDTV, although there's little advantage to getting them if you don't have one). UMD can't.

And while right now most people will have limited access to their HD media, there's the assurance that it won't always be the case. PCs already exist with drives for both formats. While someone may have only one player now, they can get more for their other TVs. Portable players are an eventuality.

Add to it that HD-DVD/BD offer an improvement in video/audio quality among disc formats, while UMD was actually a decrease in quality for the sake of use in one limited fashion, and the differences are great.

I agree that HD-DVD/BD could both be limited to a niche product for the near, or even far future. However, the differences between them and UMD are too great for the latter to be used as any form of accurate comparison.

A blast from the past...
 

I was searching for something and found this exchange between Blitz6Speed and darkside... funny stuff in retrospect. This was from 5/21/06.

:lol:

And that is unkown at the moment. But to predict it to be identical to UMD is to ignore that PS3 isn't going to be the only machine capable of playing BD.

And to assert it's going to be the same as UMD is head-in-the-ground wishful thinking.

That doesn't make it impossible.

The reasons are what are important though. If I cited betamax as an example of why HD-DVD will fail, I'd have to outline the reasons behind the example. Otherwise examples are meaningless.

It may not have "made" DVD, but when Sony can make statements like "Forty-six percent of PS2 owners say PS2 was the first DVD player they owned, and 93 percent of PS2 owners played DVD movies on their PS2s," then that's something to take into consideration.
http://www.emedialive.com/Articles/R...rticleID=11503

Especially the 93% part, since it shows that consumers aren't afraid to use a game system as a movie-viewing device. Even if only 2% of PS3 buyers become regular BD video consumers, if Sony ships the amount they claim by the end of the year, that's 80,000 BD video consumers. HD-DVD will have to sell 3 times as many players as they had by June by the end of the year to meet that number.

So, PS3 may not cement BD as the one-and-only HD disc format, but its a force to consider.

LD had, comparably, zero penetration. LD took 20 years to amass 3 million players. DVD did that in about two years. At its peak in sales, DVD sold more in a month than LD ever did.

I do agree that an LD-level library for HD/BR would be phenomenal.


rotfl


Correct.

Well, "One hundred percent of PSP owners say PSP was the first UMD player they owned..."

Just saying that the success of the console doesn't imply the success of the movie format.

Yea, PS3 has turned into Blu-rays Great White Hope. I'll be glad when they finally release the thing so that myth can die, too. Originally they said they'd have 10 million units in homes by end of year 2006. Now we know that they have not even started production yet and their new estimate is 2 million units worldwide by end of year 2006. Another fumble.

But I'm sure all of Sony's other promises about the PS3 will come true--

I noticed you failed to quote or comment on the second part of that quote, "93 percent of PS2 owners played DVD movies on their PS2s," which was the part I focused on. Care to comment on why you think PS3 will be different than this in some way?

Can you cite where you got that number from? A quick web search brings up articles mentioning Microsoft making claims of 10 million X-box units by the end of the year, not Sony.

At the time of the PlayStation 2's launch, DVD had 11.7 million units as home sets (in the US) and ~23 million DVD-ROM drives in the US. DVD had been established as a format for three and a half years.

2000 PS2's share of DVD (Players / Players and DVD-ROM): 0% / 0%

PlayStation 2 sales reached the 10MM mark (worldwide, or about ~5MM stateside) in about a year (Nov 2001). There is a strong possibility that the PS2 did affect home DVD sales. Sales in November 2000 were down about 400,000, or 33%, from the previous month. If this was indeed due to the PS2, the effect was short lived: by the next month, sales were almost double and never dropped again during the holidays. By November 2001, the installed base of DVD included 26.6 million players and 45 million DVD-ROM drives.

2001 PS2's share of DVD: 16% / 6.5%


By the end of November 2005, the PS2 had sold 40 million units in the US. DVD had sold 100 million players in the US and at least that many DVD-ROM drives (~125MM). The Xbox had sold about 10 million in the US.

2005 PS2's Share of DVD: 27% / 17%

That's all well and good. There's a lot more you can read into this.

Here is my point though.

Earlier we established that HD-DVD was selling about 3,500 units based on the little evidence we have. We know Blu-Ray outsold HD-DVD during that period but quickly trended down after the launch. Let's assume that Blu-Ray sells 20% better than DVD on it's release. A very high, probably impossible number. That's 375,000 units.

Sony plans to sell 4 million PS3s by the end of this year. Optimistically, half of those will come to the US. Let's say they also sell 200,000 BD-* drives.

2006 PS3's Estimated Share of Blu Ray: 87%

If Blu-Ray catches on at the same pace as DVD (again, not likely), we will see very similar numbers in 2007 as well, and probably 2008. If it catches on slower, that ratio increases. For better or for worse, the PS3 is going to be the main Blu-Ray playing device for a while.

"We are still on schedule to ship 2 million units for our mid-November 2006 launch and additional 2 million units by the end of the year for a total of 4 million units." - SCEA, 8/22/06

Well, I knew those numbers. I was looking for awmurray to cite where he got his numbers of Sony originally planning 10 million units, or even his claimed new Sony projection of 2 million by the end of the year. Either one, he's way off.