A shotgun marriage for Blu-ray and HD DVD?

[Namelessv1]

January 5, 2007, 4:00 AM PT

The key number in the battle between the Blu-ray and HD DVD camps is 250,000.

That is the number of players for both formats that the Computer Electronics Association has said likely shipped in 2006, the first year of global sales. Earlier, the organization had anticipated 750,000 players would ship for the year.

Consumer fears about buying the wrong piece of equipment--combined with high prices and other factors--have crimped sales of the next-generation movie players and prompted the beginning of a thaw in the standards battle. Earlier this week, for instance, South Korea's LG Electronics formally announced it would release a combo Blu-ray/HD DVD player after months of flip-flopping on the issue. It plans to provide details on Sunday, the eve of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Component manufacturers such as NEC and others have begun to prepare parts that could be used in combination players. Hitachi, which has announced a Blu-ray camcorder, said in October that it wants to look at the issue again.

Meanwhile, Time Warner has said it will promote an alternative format, called Total HD, that can be used in either Blu-Ray or HD DVD players.

"There have been gradual signs of a thaw from the hinterlands," said Stephen Baker, an analyst at NPD Techworld. "Sales have not met expectations. Even the early adopters, who you would think would storm the beaches on something like this, have said 'Ehhh. I'm not going to do this.'"

Blu-ray and HD DVD are high-definition, high-density optical disks. Blu-ray disks can store more data, which will allow studios to add more behind-the-scenes information, say backers. HD DVD advocates, however, say their technology better leverages the DVD infrastructure. Thus, the players will be cheaper.

Taking sides
Sony, Philips, Panasonic and others back Blu-ray. Microsoft, Intel and Toshiba back HD DVD.

Various studios have lined up behind one format or the other. Some have agreed to support both, but the customer confusion angle continues to exist. Consumers have to remember to buy a particular disk for their particular format.

Make no mistake: the arguments and competition continue. Last month, Sony Electronics President Stan Glasgow said that combination players can be technically difficult to design and that a combination player would likely be prohibitively expensive.

In October, Kazuhiro Tsuga, an executive officer at Matsushita, which backs Blu-ray, characterized the possibility of a combo player as "stupid," largely because of the high price tag such a device would have.

Engineering one-upsmanship aside, combo DVD players will likely be costly, at least initially. Standard Blu-ray players cost $600 or more, and HD DVD players go for $400 or more. The lasers used in Blu-ray players also remain in tight supply. That limitation played a role in Sony's PlayStation 3 shortage as the game consoles--which contain a Blu-ray player--went on sale late last year. A combo player would have duplicative or more specialized parts and thus cost even more.

Another factor adding cost is royalties. Manufacturers that build combo players have to pay fees to both the Blu-ray and HD DVD organizations. Although LG has said it will ship its combo player in the first quarter, it won't reveal the price until Sunday, a spokesman said.

The Total HD disc likely faces similar barriers to acceptance. Studios would have to agree to adopt it and many have already invested in Blu-ray or HD DVD.

Still, history shows that resolving standards issues helps sales. The DVD world had to contend with different recording standards. Sales for recordable DVD drives accelerated and prices declined after multiformat technology emerged.

A lingering standards war would also likely create more headaches than normal for consumers. PC makers are starting to bundle the drives with computers and, predictably, many are taking sides.

As a result, some consumers may not want to buy a particular brand of PC because the manufacturer supports Blu-ray and the consumer owns an HD DVD player, or vice versa. Returns and customer service calls would become inevitable.

NPD Techworld's Baker, though, added that not all of the problems can be attributed to the standards war. Many of the early high-definition players have had problems. Many potential customers also have older TVs still that can't showcase the benefits of the new players.

"This has been a difficult transition," said Baker.

[shakey_snake]

People should keep one thing in mind:
Blu-Ray = Rootkits

[zootm]

Originally posted by shakey_snake
People should keep one thing in mind:
Blu-Ray = Rootkits

Could I have a clarification on this? I just don't know what you're referring to and it sounds interesting.

Oh, and I think this report is kinda what everyone was expecting.

[rockouthippie]

I dunno about this next gen technology. It looks like we are going to lose a lot of functionality that we've traditionally had.

With the encryption and broadcast flags, I doubt things like Tivos and VCRs will be very useful. Except for PBS, it doesn't look like they'll be transmitting much programming "in the clear".

I haven't heard anything about root kits.... but basically XP and Vista are a root kit.

You didn't need to wait for BlueRay.

I have not bought an HDTV yet and given a lack of logical programming options, it's not likely anytime soon.

I can think of a million reasons not to accept this technology and only a couple that make it interesting.

For one thing, the only truly HDTV source currently aree broadcast TV and disks. Satellite and cable are operating at bit rates low enough to significantly downgrade the HDTV signal. From what I've seen, you might be able to claim EDTV (dvd rez) quality.

That isn't much better than my conventional TV can display.

In the war between which becomes the standard HDTV or Blueray. The adopted standard will be the one that gets hacked first.

[zootm]

Originally posted by rockouthippie
I haven't heard anything about root kits.... but basically XP and Vista are a root kit.

Please refrain from uninformed ad hominem like this. It just looks stupid.

I think Shakey might be referring to HDCP (the content protection used on HD products) as a "rootkit", which isn't technically true, but it does have to extend to a hardware and OS level (by design). But it's certainly not localised to Blu-Ray, since HD-DVD uses the same scheme. For the time being, though, I think that most (if not all) movie studios have said they will not be using the content protection for at least the first few years of the technology. They rope 'em in

Originally posted by rockouthippie
For one thing, the only truly HDTV source currently aree broadcast TV and disks. Satellite and cable are operating at bit rates low enough to significantly downgrade the HDTV signal. From what I've seen, you might be able to claim EDTV (dvd rez) quality.

That isn't much better than my conventional TV can display.

I think you underestimate compression technology, and the bandwidth available to satellite and cable. I've seen both side-by-side, DVD doesn't come close to HD broadcast. On the other hand, you do need quite a big, expensive TV to really get the value out of HD for the time being, so it's not something I'm gonna be looking at for the foreseeable future.

[rockouthippie]

Originally posted by zootm
Please refrain from uninformed ad hominem like this. It just looks stupid.

That was just zootm bait.

I think you underestimate compression technology, and the bandwidth available to satellite and cable. I've seen both side-by-side, DVD doesn't come close to HD broadcast. On the other hand, you do need quite a big, expensive TV to really get the value out of HD for the time being, so it's not something I'm gonna be looking at for the foreseeable future. [/B]

I looked at an upsampled DVD played on a Toshiba 62" recently. I don't know the model, but it would do the 1080p. I also watched DirectTv. Then I tried the off the air HDTV.

The upsampled DVD and DirectTV all showed visible compression artifacts. Off the air TV didn't.

And I hate to mention it, but most of the source material for TV is still beta-dv tape (480i) .... So again HDTV doesn't matter.

As for underestimating compression schemes, I'm not. Why do you think BlueRay and HDTV disks are such high capacity.

8-14 megabits is what is getting used by DTV. That doesn't cut it. I get the same reports from friends using ATT cable.

In 2009, we won't have a choice but to at least upgrade the tuners. Actually, I was looking into that, because even on a conventional TV the digital signal beats FM.

From the Portland towers 12 miles away, I can get 6 channels of uncompressed HDTV.

There is one thing that tempts me. My JVC weighs 200 lbs and takes up too much room. Do I dislike that $1500 worth?. Not yet.

EDIT: Just a little observation, but I think HDTV could well be a renaissance of broadcast television. Football at 1080p uncompressed is indeed impressive.

If a guy needed a TV, the new sets are cool. But I don't think this is a must have yet.

So if my JVC blew up tommorrow, I'd have one tommorrow night, but I'm just not tempted that much ..... yawn ....

[shakey_snake]

Originally posted by zootm
Could I have a clarification on this? I just don't know what you're referring to and it sounds interesting.

Oh, and I think this report is kinda what everyone was expecting.

If you support Blu-ray, you are supporting paying (loads of) royalties to Sony, which is something I try to do at all costs, because they do not care about their customers.

[zootm]

Originally posted by shakey_snake
If you support Blu-ray, you are supporting paying (loads of) royalties to Sony, which is something I try to do at all costs, because they do not care about their customers.

Ah. I don't really consider Sony any worse than any other company on the whole, so this doesn't bother me.

[k_rock923]

Well, I'm of the camp that I don't care so much which format wins. However, I won't buy any equipment until there is a clear victor.

[mistermeow]

Unless you have the money to test things out, and are an all around techie, its best to wait and see. Prices will drop eventually and things will be sorted out.

A perfect example is the Iomega Zip Disk. Instead of buying a Zip drive, I took a chance on the "Imation 120 meg super disks". Little 3.5 inch drives and thicker 3.5 inch disks. Not as clunky as zip disks, which were widely used back in the late 90's.

Anyway cheap writeable CD roms came along, and that was the end of zip disks, and all the other similar formats.

So with the two DVD formats, battling it out here, there is no telling what could happen.

[rockouthippie]

Originally posted by mistermeow
A perfect example is the Iomega Zip Disk. Instead of buying a Zip drive, I took a chance on the "Imation 120 meg super disks". Little 3.5 inch drives and thicker 3.5 inch disks. Not as clunky as zip disks, which were widely used back in the late 90's.

I threw away a zip drive I paid $300 for. Perfectly good, not even a scratch. Perfectly useless too. With an expletive and seeing that they were selling for $4 on ebay...... it got tossed..... I also had a beta VCR

So abandonware is something a guy oughta be looking at when buying anything.

[sgtfuzzbubble011]

I've still got a couple Zip drives and a small stack of Zip disks on my big shelf of hardware.

And BluRay can suck it.

[gaekwad2]

They can both suck it. I'll only get one as a replacement for my DVD-RW drive (when they're down to €50).

[xzxzzx]

Originally posted by shakey_snake
People should keep one thing in mind:
Blu-Ray = Rootkits

Ahhh, shakey_snake brand FUD.

That was a good one, particularly considering most people have little idea what a "rootkit" is.

[shakey_snake]

I try.

[rockouthippie]

Originally posted by gaekwad2
They can both suck it. I'll only get one as a replacement for my DVD-RW drive (when they're down to €50).

Give it a couple years. HDTV is an example. It looks like TVs have gotten better and cheaper than they ever were. 40" sets are under a grand. Tube sets were more than that.

So, you'll get your $50 BlueRay or HDTV disk eventually. And the player will be $100.... just like HDTVs are now as cheap as the conventional sets were.

I think the challenge right now is to find content. 99.99999% of everything that was ever recorded happened before last year. Those films are on beta dv or dvd. So while, you'll get the HDTV remaster of a lot of films, I doubt you'll see a lot of difference in your viewing experience for a lot of stuff.

Frankly, I'm not seeing the screen resolution as the biggest advantage to HDTV. I think the neatest thing is the digital tuner.

I don't have cable. A tree grew up in my satelite path, so I quit Directv years ago and just never bothered again.

I rent DVDs and then I buy them used later from Blockbuster, so I've got no change there. None of us has ever ripped a DVD to watch later ... , but I don't see that as a problem really...... maybe inconvenient.

My main concern is: With this broadcast flag crap, am I gonna have the same functionality I have now. Can I record my off the air shows w/o a hassle?.

I watch public television and movies mostly. If I watch sports, I go to PGE park and watch our baseball team get their ass kicked.

I think the high-def terrestrial broadcasting is interesting. Like I said, I think this could be a rennaissance in terrestrial broadcasting. One thing is sure, you can cram a lot more spread spectrum channels in the TV band than there are now.

That is the one compelling reason for me to buy an HDTV. The local channels are digital. No Ghosts. No interference. Sweet.

I am wondering if I can find an ATSC tuner?. I think then I'd just use my old TV for a while longer.

[MonKeyRum]

I bought an HD TV just because I moved and needed a TV for upstairs. Nothing top of the line, but I'm pretty please with it. I pretty much watch a bunch of public television and it's sweet that out of the one I get 5 digital ones, the other thing I watch is sports. I can say if your watching hockey or football HD is the only way to go.

As for HD DVD or Blu Ray I'm not going to buy either one until one wins. One of them is for sure going to go the way of the video disk (was that what the 12" size media the movies were on were called?).

[fc*uk]

[0.02]

ROH pretty much hit the nail on the head...

[/0.02]

[k_rock923]

Originally posted by xzxzzx
Ahhh, shakey_snake brand FUD.

That was a good one, particularly considering most people have little idea what a "rootkit" is.

It's some sticks that you can arrange to make either a 4 or a -4 amirite?












Oh, I guess you meant API hooks and such.

[rockouthippie]

I looked at a Blueray player at Circuit City. Holy catfish Batman!. The thing is HUGE!. It's as big as an old top loader VCR.

Must be full of root kit goodness

[shakey_snake]

You know it is.
If you're not careful, it will shard yr purplez, too.

[xzxzzx]