wewantflair

Hopefully, most of the creeps who were attracted to the various forums by the format war will crawl back to the holes from whence they came.

redrum

don't know what to do now.

sell my player and movies?

keep buying hd-dvd until it's a dead format?

my player will always work to watch the movies.

i need money but how much would i even get for this stuff now?

shit.

sbelli

I don't understand why so many people are off to return their unopened HD DVDs. Yes, if you're a dual format supporter, then maybe I can understand why you'd want to get the BR versions.

However, if you're not, why can't you still enjoy the movies in HD until it dies? I got the 5 Harry Potters in recent sales and don't regret it. I'll keep watching them and certainly get my $10/disc worth out of them before my 360 HD DVD add-on croaks.

Shazam

Ah well. Bought an A3 on boxing day. Guess I'll have to buy a BD player eventually, but what irks me is that I'll have to hold off on buying any HD material until then. And watching movies in HD is like smoking crack, except better.

mbs

Well, I'm excited for the clearance sales on HD-DVD media (and players). I hate my A3 as a player (mostly due to bootup "speed" and overall slugishness), but will certainly pickup HD-DVDs when marked down enough.

The Bus

I'm buying any and all HD DVDs for $3 a disc. $3.50 for combos.

Just think... sell me your entire 100+ disc collection and you can buy a Blu-Ray player.

Yavin

Now everyone who is in the red camp (myself included) needs to rethink their entire buying strategy.

When I bought my A3 a month ago, I was planning on sticking to buying films on HD-DVD whenever they were available and DVD whenever they weren't. But now I guess I'll have to quit buying HD-DVDs and stick to regular DVDs, since the newer profile 1.1 BD players are still prohibitively expensive. It's either that or stop buying DVDs altogether until BD player prices come down to the current HD player levels (which I'm guessing isn't any time soon). All of this totally stinks, of course, because it defeats the very purpose for which I bought a new HDTV for in the first place.

Of course I still have 4 days in my return period for my HDTV and A3, but now that I've tasted what HD content has to offer I don't think I can go back to my old shitty CRT. I guess I will keep what I have and do like several others here will be doing ... waiting for HD-DVD movies to come down to those UMD movie clearance levels and start getting whatever deals that can still be had on the format.

The Bus

That's what I'm doing. I've bought two DVDs since I bought an HD DVD player in summer 2006.

wewantflair

Believe it or not, this will increase competition between BD CE manufacturers. I expect MORE dual format players to come out, not fewer, since it will be a great way to get current HD DVD owners to transition to BD.

Shazam

One thing I noticed with my A3 is that the software is open source under the GNU license. I was actually going to write my own custom firmware for it and distribute it.

Does BD have anything like that?

Ocelot

You know, the hd-dvd camp didn't really do much over the past few months. The biggest news was Paramount going hd-dvd exclusive and even that, it was MS's move. Honestly, all i see is hd-dvd supporters/zealots cheering. Region code this and that, have you even look at the price of the imports? Even then i don't give a damn, why? Well, bunch of you said HD is niche niche market. To me, foreign films are a tinier niche niche within the niche niche.

I agree with the higher cost of BD player and that's that. However, please don't compare the PS3 with the A2...

cinten

Because I don't want to support a studio that is ditching me as a customer.

bee_01

Plenty of HD-DVD owners saying this is the end of high def...

DthRdrX

At least we now know what was up with New Line's delay with HD-dvd titles.

nevermind

We just got a BR player on Sunday. Before that we had the HD-DVD addon for the 360 & my wife just got me a HD-A3 for the bedroom for Christmas. While this news sucks, it had to happen sometime.

I am not going to stop buying HD-DVDs, and it confuses me why many people are saying they will be not buying any more in this format (when they own both). The HD-A3 upconverts very nicely and was $179 with 5 free movies. Our first DVD player was $569 on sale (close to $700 in today's dollars).

The one thing this war did was bring the cost of BR down a lot quicker than was planned, and I am very thankful to HD-DVD for that. I wasn't going to buy a PS3 for any reason, and I wasn't going to spend $1000 on a BR player (where they were priced last year). We got our BR player for less than $400 (with 10 movies included). With no competitor, they'd still be at least $700. This is the one thing I fear the most - both the BR movie and hardware costs will not be coming down any more.

kvrdave

And this is what Joe Six Pack thinks as well. So I don't buy the idea of consumers holding out because of the format war.

Deftones

I'm glad I'm dual format now, but it almost makes me want to send back my A3 I got for Christmas. I won't, but it's about pointless now, since I don't own many HD-DVDs. I'll probably keep it since it's a good upconverting player, as others have said.

I just hate that Blu Ray won. I mean, I now own it, but it pisses me off to no end that Sony can continually be so stupid with their products, yet get mass market appeal.

TheMovieman

Thinking it over, if the PS3 comes down to $300 or 350, by next Christmas (basically 1 year), I'll probably go BR. By then we'll have a good idea of how dead HD-DVD is (I'd assume by then Universal would jump ship).

OT: Is the PS3 the best BR option? One of the reasons I chose to go HD-DVD in the first place (behind the price) was my concern over BR standalone players not being able to play certain special features. But PS3 is different, right?

Harry Lime

FATALITY!

Im in heaven right now. Finally a format standard thats not inferior like VHS was to beta.

bee_01

You'll be missed...really.

Qui Gon Jim

I think this is a death blow to the format. Enjoy what you have, get in on the clearances and start saving your pennies for a BD player.

utopianz14

I only got into HD-DVD because of the $100 A2s back in early November. And although I do watch HD movies on it, I've been using it mostly as an upconverting player.

I think what I'll do is keep my A2 as well as all the HD exclusives, and sell off the HD-DVDs that are also available on BD while the selling prices for them are still good.

Oh, and maybe throw a HD-DVD going away party.

David Levine

So if WB would've gone HD-DVD exclusive instead would you still be upset because they'd be ditching a lot of other people as customers?

starman9000

Grrrrreeeaaaat.

I just agreed to a trade on this forum for an A2 and sent off my items today. So I have entered the HD world with non-returnable player and no media. I suppose I should have expected that.

I really hope we get some clearance prices on current titles, but I am guessing the opposite effect may occur. Otherwise, I'll just have to chalk it up as a nice upconverting player like so many others are.

milkdog

Just got an HD-DVD player a couple months ago and have about 20 movies. But as others have said the players and movies aren't going anywhere. My HD-DVD spending will drop (unless HD-DVD starts slashing prices dramatically, which is possible) and I'll be Blu before the year is over, but there's no reason to unload the player or discs or to regret buying them at good prices.

By the time I get around to replacing them it would've been time for the next technology anyway (at least in terms of the player, an A3), so no big deal to me.