Is this the end of HD DVD?

Hacker

Hacker

TPer Emeritus
Suspended / Banned
Messages
7,625
Name
Colin
Edit My Images
Yes
Toshiba have announced that they will no longer manufacture HD DVD.

Linky

Is this where BluRay takes over?

It reminds me of the VHS/Betamax battles from years ago.
 
From the Metro this morning the market was 90% blue ray in Japan, and not far off that in the rest of the world so they are admitting defeat and saving millions of £'s It was likened to the beta/vhs of years ago, but this time Sony came out best!

Not so good for the competition point of view, but if they are that far down they may as well start putting the money into equipment that uses blue ray stuff.
 
susie said:
From the Metro this morning the market was 90% blue ray in Japan, and not far off that in the rest of the world so they are admitting defeat and saving millions of £'s It was likened to the beta/vhs of years ago, but this time Sony came out best!

Not so good for the competition point of view, but if they are that far down they may as well start putting the money into equipment that uses blue ray stuff.
Click to expand...

96% ;)

Roll on a blu ray for the 360!!!
 
I guess it's because they're new technology that the price is so high, They'll come down I'm sure. Blu-ray disc burners are at around £150 now, but the discs are stupid money at between £10 and £50 :eek: Mind you, the more expensive ones do hold massive amouints of data, 50gb or so.

Prices will come down as competition increases and the technology gets older, then I'll buy one :D
 
Looks like Sony has backed the winner this time, unlike the betamax and minidisk.
 
$500 million it "allegedly" cost to get warner on board. The whole things stinks when clearly the poorer format (in terms of it not actually being finished ie profile 1, 1.1 and eventually 2 if we get there!!) has come out top. Personally i'll be sticking with upscaled dvd, more than good enough pq for me. why pay £25 a disc when you can get the same for a fiver? :cuckoo:

The real wars about to begin, bluray vs dvd
 
For those not all clued up on Blu ray yet and the profile thing (mess) they have going on read this a good article from the BBC.
 
jamiefsmith said:
$500 million it "allegedly" cost to get warner on board. The whole things stinks when clearly the poorer format (in terms of it not actually being finished ie profile 1, 1.1 and eventually 2 if we get there!!) has come out top. Personally i'll be sticking with upscaled dvd, more than good enough pq for me. why pay £25 a disc when you can get the same for a fiver? :cuckoo:

The real wars about to begin, bluray vs dvd
Click to expand...

wasnt VHS the poorer format when compared to betamax? its not about quality, its about manufacturer and production company support


Joe T said:
Unless you buy a PS3 (which I dont want to), the blu-ray players seem really expensive?
Click to expand...
not that expensive prices are coming down

http://www.richersounds.com/productlist.php?cda=productlist&sgroup=HDDVD
 
whitewash said:
wasnt VHS the poorer format when compared to betamax? its not about quality, its about manufacturer and production company support





not that expensive prices are coming down

http://www.richersounds.com/productlist.php?cda=productlist&sgroup=HDDVD
Click to expand...


This is exactly my point, that player at richer sounds is only profile 1, 1 of them may be upgradeable ( I think), meaning it is near enough obselete. It can't be upgraded to the new profile 1.1 and when profile 2 comes out in turn can't be upgraded to that. Discs will be re releases to suit the new profiles etc. In short at least vhs and betamax were finished products, as was hd dvd, bu ray however is not. It is misleading for me, you and the public in general and drenched in spin with fantasized figures.

I for one am sticking with my denon upscaling machine and continueing to buy discs at good prices, as I suspect the rest of the average joe public will do, meaning prices won't dramatically come down, unless sony give it a push against dvd, like toshiba did, sustaining losses to enable them to shift volume.

I think HDM as a product will remain niche
 
cheers for clearing that up jamie, i didnt realise any of that.


like you i wont be buying a HD or bluray player in the near future, might buy a dvd player than upscales and leave it at that for now.


that bbc article does suggest that discs supplied for version 1.1 and 2.0 will still play on early players though, however access to certain features wont be available, as the majority of users dont want to "download ringtones and photos" etc that requirement isnt essential to the viewing experience as you suggest, the units wont be obsolete by the sounds of it, as long as the film plays, thats all 90% of users will be interested in
 
i was given a HD add on for the X360 and i have a Sony upscaling DVD player, played the same film on both formats couldnt see much difference at all on my 40 inch 1080p set, the whole blu ray thing sucks, specially with all these formats being non backward compatible.

Betamax and VHS was decided by the porn industry, thats not such a big motivator now as a lot is downloaded now.
 
whitewash said:
cheers for clearing that up jamie, i didnt realise any of that.


like you i wont be buying a HD or bluray player in the near future, might buy a dvd player than upscales and leave it at that for now.


that bbc article does suggest that discs supplied for version 1.1 and 2.0 will still play on early players though, however access to certain features wont be available, as the majority of users dont want to "download ringtones and photos" etc that requirement isnt essential to the viewing experience as you suggest, the units wont be obsolete by the sounds of it, as long as the film plays, thats all 90% of users will be interested in
Click to expand...

Yeah sorry, they will still play, but the thing there trying to sell BR on is the extensive interactive features. I for one won't even use them so it isn't a problem. Also the new profiles supprt new sound formats for surround sound encoding etc, once again the majority of people won't need this. It's all a bit of a mess worth leaving alone to me. The difference just isn't there like there was for the jump from vhs to dvd, where the advantages were clear for all to see. This time round the difference just isn't there imo.
 
IanC_UK said:
i was given a HD add on for the X360 and i have a Sony upscaling DVD player, played the same film on both formats couldnt see much difference at all on my 40 inch 1080p set, the whole blu ray thing sucks, specially with all these formats being non backward compatible.
Click to expand...

The problem is that they need the average viewer like you and me to notice a noticable difference that really just isn't there. To really appreciate hd you need to own a 50"+ screen of a projector setup, and yes then the improvements are noticeable, but for average joe, it's a minute difference for a massive amount, leaving most, like you with a bad taste and feeling distictly ripped off.
Look on the bright side, at least you didn't fork out for it!! Imagine how dissapointed alot of people must be :)
 
whitewash said:
true :) ill probably spend my pennies on a better tv and an upscaling dvd player
Click to expand...

That's the way i've looked at it, got a nice new panny plasma and a denon upscaler. DVD as a media will be around till downloads take over, i'm convinced of that. Besides, use this time to get bargains on dvd while some go and pop £25 on transformers on BD:cuckoo:
 
I'm very surprised that Matty hasn't commented in this thread yet...... The he vs Blu ray has been his most common topic of conversation for an age now :D

I'm another who'll be sticking to an upscaling DVD for the fore seeable after previous flops. I had minidisc and I had laserdisc.... Botha were killed by other formats within 2 years of buying into the format
 
Sony were always going to win this, the PS3 was a slow starter because of the price and being late to the market, but it's gaining ground fast now, why buy a stand alone blu ray player when the PS3 will be so much more over the next few years:shrug:
 
wack61 said:
why buy a stand alone blu ray player when the PS3 will be so much more over the next few years:shrug:
Click to expand...

I don't have one but I hear they are pretty noisy, which isn't something you want for watching films on.
 
21jc7pf.gif


Yep, HD DVD loses it.
 
Snake Man said:
Looks like Sony has backed the winner this time, unlike the betamax and minidisk.
Click to expand...

surprisingly betamax and minidisc were industry standard in broadcasting right up until as late as last year for minidisc!

IanC_UK said:
Actually Sony bought the winner, they paid off all the big studios "allegedly" which is why they have won, Toshiba invented HD-DVD and if they are pulling the plug thats it game over.
Click to expand...

toshiba paid off paramount and dreamworks last summer to the tune of $150m, paramount didnt deny it either. Warner say they received no such payoff, though incentives and deals for replication etc probably came into it, but the numbers given are likely fantasy

digitalfailure said:
I'm very surprised that Matty hasn't commented in this thread yet...... The he vs Blu ray has been his most common topic of conversation for an age now :D

I'm another who'll be sticking to an upscaling DVD for the fore seeable after previous flops. I had minidisc and I had laserdisc.... Botha were killed by other formats within 2 years of buying into the format
Click to expand...

been to busy unfortunately!

FUD busting time. :suspect:

Profiles
profile 1.1 - final standard profile
this is the standard BD profile that is now mandatory, picture in picture and snazzy menus.

profile 2.0 is an OPTIONAL profile for manufacturers, it includes additional storage and the ability to connect to the interwebnet.

Contrary to rumours, ALL disks will play in ALL machines, the early samsung was a bag of nails, but otherwise all is fine. Each disk uses java to interegate the player and get its spec level and runs accordingly, so no flash menus if the player cant do it.

People use the term obsolete to describe profile 1.1 players, the only thing obsolete is HDDVD, even 1.0 players will play the film, as long as it isnt the samsung, as they cant seem to get firmware updates out quick enough
 
ps3 is not too bad at all, less noisy than my tower unless ive been playing on it for a while. but with a film, stays low.
 
wack61 said:
I have one and it's not noisy at all :shrug:
Click to expand...

matty said:
ps3 is not too bad at all, less noisy than my tower unless ive been playing on it for a while. but with a film, stays low.
Click to expand...

Thats good to hear. Now there is a "winner" making a choice of which platform to go for has been made easier. And the PS3 does seem to be one of the cheapest options.
 
Microsoft have said they have no intention of a making a blueray player for the 360 and will instead focus on hd content donwloads on xbox live
 
I have to say I find the PS3 quieter for watching films on than the 360 hd dvd.
 
Sony Lost out in the betamax stakes so its tghere turn to win this time
 
Blue%20Ray.jpg


I know! Sooooooo juvenille.
 
Have to say, Ilove the 2 day startup time of all these hd players :D
 
the ps3 boots very fast, its what the other makers should be aiming at, they should have just sold the guts to the others and put it in a nice case.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top