just saw BD at Circuit City. First time I actually saw one of these in action.
1) PQ- I was NOT impressed. Pirates of the Caribbean was playing and the grain was so bad, it actually hurt my eyes. They showed a bunch of trailers/movie excerpts and the PQ ranged from better than SD (but not earth shattering) to worse than SD.
2) A PC-like hourglass showed between some of the menu changes. ugh
3) the picture skipped. I told the rep about this and he said 'Blue ray is not about being scratch resistant - it's all about picture quality! and then told me that 'you have to be careful handling these things'. Didn't I read somewhere that BD discs were supposedly sturdier than SD?

More interesting was the fact that CC was selling HD DVD discs as well as BD but they were not selling any HD DVD players! The rep could not explain this. But said that BD 'blows away HD'. I asked why and he said 'well, for one - BD is 1080p and HD DVD is only 1080i and you can REALLY see the difference." and the 'audio is better because you need 6 analog cables to get 'the best separation' from BD!

I aske him how can he say that BD PQ was so much better than HD DVD if they couldn't show a side to side comparison, and he said that he 'saw HD once and was not impressed' and that 'BD is twice as expensive because it's twice as good!'

My only comment on this is that CC (at least that store) was SO biased toward BD that I don't know even why they bothered to sell HD discs.

He then said that "BD will win the war because of PS3.' I said I didn't think most people used their gaming consoles to watch movies, and he said he did - he had an Xbox that was his main DVD player. He used it for movies, his kids uses it for games. So maybe he is on to something.

But I did not think this was fair marketing of either product.. just my imho. And if other stores are doing the same thing (either biased to BD or HD ) then I really feel sorry for the average person who is not very knowledgable about what is going on and may blindly believe whatever the rep tells them.

PLEASE END THIS WAR!!!!!

Meh. Salesmen are idiots. I don't know why anyone talks to them anymore. On the rare occasions I enter a store like that, I usually end up laughing at things I overhear.

Over on AVS, someone said that a person at Circuit City said that all movies are on 480i, except for movies on HBO, because HBO owns special cameras and they shoot both cameras on the set at the same time, and that HD DVD uses the transfers from HBO. :lol:

So.....

Oddly enough, Amir isn't disputing these VC-1 rumors.

This is getting interesting.

Umm, maybe because HD-DVD sales are actually better than BD at this point which supposedly wasnt expected.

If they change they are gaining the business of many hd-dvd owners (like myself). So, like WB, they are going to provide both. Not surprising to me.

Whether you like it or not, with the player sales and 360 addon the outlook of hd-dvd is good.

And the rumors continue:

Apparently a Fox exec wanted a private demo of HD DVD at the Javits Center this weekend...

And now this:

This format war could truly come down to Universal and Sony...

And I'll take Spielbergs movies over Sony any day.

If Fox would release on a format destined to be stillborn like D-VHS, I don't know why they wouldn't support both HD DVD and Blu-ray.

Even though I'd miss Spider-Man 2, I'm pretty sure I could do without Sony movies for a long, long time. Universal and Paramount dominate my DVD collection, so I'm pretty well covered.

There are definitely a few Sony titles that I'd be sad to not have in HD: spiderman, close encounters, lawrence of arabia, the dark crystal... but, yeah, I wouldn't miss them enough to buy into a whole format.

Wasn't it a Fox exec a few weeks ago that said they wouldn't be supporting HD DVd for at least 3 years? Damn, these rumors are just getting out of control.

<s>I wonder what would happen to all the BD fanboys if Sony was all that was left.</s>

MOD NOTE: You always have to take things one step further? Just let it go. -namja

I don't see any Blu-rry exclusive studio committing to HD-DVD until next year at the earliest. I think they'll wait til the PS3 is released and see what sort of impact that has on software sales. I'd love to be proven wrong with Lions Gate and especially Disney, but I don't see it happening.

I'll recap some previous points I made on this thread which are relevant, as well.

Studios have 2 goals: 1) move to an HD format and 2) make money. Moving to an HD format gives:

• Resell everything and start a new cycle of double dipping
• Get better copy protection (DVD has been completely cracked)

A format war not only hurts HD sales but hurts SD DVD sales as well which goes against both goals.

The last thing the studios want is a format war. They went BD because it was the path of least resistance. Not only was BD supposedly superior to HD DVD, the PS3 would act as the fait accompli causing mass and automatic adoption of BD. Both goals accomplished in the fastest possible way.

But reality is BD is floundering along and HD DVD has taken a large lead. To continue to support BD exclusively would not only alienate most of the HD disc market, but obviously prolongs the format war.

The fastest way to accomplish both goals at this point is to at least go neutral. They may not be able to abandon BD completely (yet) because of contracts or obligations, but by supporting both formats they essentially kill Blu-ray.

Let what go? I wasn't even responding to anything because, as you WELL know, Josh is blocked for me. But regardless, It was an honest question and I wasn't referring to anyone specifically.

I think you need to back off.

http://www.twice.com/article/CA6381702.html

Interesting coming from the BD side.

You need to look at this at a higher level. BD & HD DVD sales are 0.1% of the optical format movie sales. They aren't missing anything right now. And in order for Blu-Ray to fail, you are talking about not only Sony going out of business, but also the top electronic manufacturers losing their butts across the board. Its just not going to happen. There is just too much support.

I dont get why you are making this so difficult....your making it a hd-dvd versus bd argument....why cant these companies just want to provide their products to hd-dvd owners?? Economically, if it makes them money (even small profits) why not do it?

Currently, they are alienating hd-dvd owners. I dont see why you cant understand that.

Forget being bluray exclusive, just think of it from the hd-dvd side of things.

In order to be fair, you need to look at the reverse of the situation. Ask the question again, but look at it from the many companies and studios who support Blu-Ray:

Why can't Toshiba and Universal just want to provide their products to Blu-Ray owners? Economically, if it makes them money (even small profits) why not do it?

I think I'm looking at the right level. The goal is to move to an HD disc format. A format war is bad for this goal. The studios will follow the path of least resistance to acheive said goal. By not supporting HD DVD certain studios are ignoring most of this market. Studios will follow the money. If you follow the money you end up at HD DVD.

Remember this was in response to your question of 'what do the studios gain by going neutral?' It doesn't really matter what the current overall market share is... they're building a new market which will replace the DVD market. They want to get to that point ASAP.

If/when Blu-ray fails, Sony certainly won't go out of business. Some folks will lose their jobs, I'm sure (like Ben Feingold did), but the company won't be going out of business. Certainly not with people buying Blu-ray discs when they don't even have a player.

Businesses lose lots of money on bad decisions all the time. Are you saying that Pioneer's or Panasonic's investment in Blu-ray to this point would sink them if they abandoned it now? I don't think so. Plus they could recoup that cost in short order by producing HD DVD players.

Are you saying that Blu-ray can't fail? Can I quote you on that?

True. But that wasn't the topic, Josh. If you want to talk about Toshiba rumors, you'll have to find some first. Or start one.


Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Sony say a long time ago that it would be using MPEG2 on BD until they developed other encoders? I don't see this rumor as being anything crazy, we were talking about this very subject when news first came out that they would be exclusively MPEG2 for awhile. What, 6-8 months ago?

Actually, he has a point. They still make Minidiscs, you know. Sony will use BD as long as they want to, certainly as long as the PS3 is around.

1) Their solution is better (its implementation if you want to get technical)
2) Their product is cheaper and delivers better quality
3) They own most of the market and therefore are leaving far less money on the table than the BD only companies-- a sure recipe for disaster in a war of attrition.
4) Their competition is looking silly and trying to emulate their success (sony abandoning MPEG-2 for VC-1 is the latest example)
5) If BD dies, they get the whole market and momentum is going their way.

True, Blu-ray will be around for a long time because the PS3 requires them. Obviously Blu-ray could fail as a movie format and Sony wouldn't be in any danger of going under, though.

Going neutral extends the format war. Something you say is bad (which I agree). Getting to the point where people adopt HD is when there is one format - at this point, the "path of least resistance" is for Universal to support Blu-Ray and end the war, rather than have Disney, Sony, Fox, and LG all support HD DVD.

Yes. Blu-ray can't fail. Quote me.

For Blu-Ray to fail, PlayStation 3 has to fail. Dreamcast type of failure. Sony wll have to stop making them. That won't happen. If it did, Sony would be ruined and would have to close shop - there is no doubt in my mind about that. If the other CE companies abandoned their investment this prematurely, I would surely encourage their stockholders to bail. You don't spend millions of dollars and years developing something only to throw it away after 4 months.

1) Short term, yes. Long term, maybe not.
2) Better quality? Compared to what?
3) If the market is too small, percentages are misleading.
4) VC-1 has been part of the spec for a long while. The trasnsisition was inevitable.
5) If HD DVD dies, they get the whole market and momentum is going their way.

Which is what I sad. BD will probably end up being for gaming...and possibly storage. That's it.

I wouldnt care if they did....Wasnt it Toshiba who was trying to get Sony to seek a compromise before the launches? I remember reading that somewhere, but dont know if it was true.

Anyways, I just want high quality hd content on disc....im really sick of the hd-dvd vs bd argument. I would love to see all studio releasing on both and let consumers decide which format.

Given that, both formats are gonna be around a while so some of the studios are probably beginning to realize that and thats probably behind the change in philosophy.

I believe they tried to twice. Sony wouldn't have any of it. <s>It's their fault because of their arrogance.</s>

MOD NOTE: Okay, we discussed this already. -namja

Here's some info from the Apple camp linked below. While it's from a rumor site, it makes valid points and if you don't want to read the link, says that Apple might be supporting both camps, not just BD.

http://www.thinksecret.com/news/0610brieflyhddvd.html

The 'path of least resistance' applies to the consumer which has overwhelmingly supported HD DVD. Not to big corporations trying to push a format on us. The market has spoken. If every studio went neutral right now, HD DVD would own a decisive market share and it would end the war.

There is a reason we are hearing strong rumors of LG and Disney moving to support HD DVD, but no rumors of Universal switching to Blu-ray.


How about Blu-ray can't fail as a movie format? then ;)?

Can we put money on it?

Or better yet....posting privilages? ;)

Sure, I'll put up my posting privilages saying that Blu-Ray will not fail as a movie format.

And for the record, it was Toshiba would wouldn't back down from using smaller discs.

I think you're grasping here, but I'll try:

It's always a definitive maybe with BD isn't it? Can we deal with here and now for a minute?

Uh, the competition. Business 101. HD DVD has set the quality bar. BD is only recently matching it. Never exceeding it. And please don't come back with the PQ is equal stuff because the HD DVD releases for the most part have loads of extras which makes them a direct replacement for their SD DVD counterparts. Those extras are part of the quality, too.

BD is playing catch up. Therefore, their competition has a quality advantage.

Not in this case. The goal being to establish an HD market. The consumer is choosing HD DVD. Yes, it's small in relation to DVD, but we're replacing DVD. DVD will have a much larger marketshare for quite a while regardless of BD/HD DVD.

Didn't Sony want VC-1 out of the BD spec? Regardless, Sony said that they didn't need VC-1 and that MPEG-2 was plenty good enough. Moving to VC-1 implies they were wrong.

Grasping desperately:
See Post #279 in this thread:

Sure. Reality is that BD has 4 exclusive studios and HD DVD has 1 exclusive studio. That is a huge advantage.

Hmm... my Warner releases are the exact same versions as the HD DVD version, extras and all. Not sure what you are refering to here. Of course, extras have absolutely nothing to do with PQ, as you suggest.

Yup, so why make billion dollar decisions over a market that can't break a million sales for a long time to come?

No, they made a deal with Microsoft (which Amir just spoke about the VC-1 thread at AVS). As Spiky already mentioned, Sony has always said MPEG-2 was temporary - not that it matters.

You have no idea what an "if" statement does, do you?

Ironically, Sony ends up putting out (drum roll, please): SMALLER DISCS!!!

That's why BD50 is important (although you've categorically stated that you don't think so).

Ironically, Toshiba was arguing that 25GB was too much for a disc, and they end up putting out (drum roll, please): LARGER DISCS!!!

Consumers don't need to store so much data on discs, yet the primary delievery tool is larger than what you were criticizing?

I'm being told that BD-50 being used on a large scale is still 6-9 months away.

Yes they did. Tried to get it out.

And the rumor that started all of this is that the reality may quickly change to 2 exclusive BD studios.

Straw Man Argument. No matter which format wins, the HD market will still be billions of dollars. Note that you imply that to go HD DVD they're somehow making a billion dollar decision (as if to say they somehow lose billions by not going Blu).

Note that this same statement ("billion dollar decision") can apply to Blu-ray as well. After all why support it when it has ZERO sales (back before release). A textbook straw man argument.

Of course I do. "If" is the foundation upon which BD is built, after all. However, you'll notice that "if" doesn't appear in your quote: "No arguing that".

Oh, yea, forgot... Whatever you do, don't bet your ass! (***cough***jimmy***cough***)

I thought you didn't like 'maybes'? Change your mind?

There are costs involved. If they have so far executed to their plans, changing those plans now would cost additional funding.

Re-read what I actually wrote, not what you want to interpret.