Cheering The Death of HD DVD

ir0nw0lf said:
Some pretty narrow minded thinking in some of the posts above, sorry to have to say it folks. The price drop issue is *not* a matter of IF, it is a matter of WHEN. The price of the players needs to come down sooner rather than later. I won't begin my switch to this until the players get down to sub-$200 or even sub-$150, the latter which is the price point I got my HD-DVD player.

You people saying there won't be a price drop need to stop the FUD lol.
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Why is your subjectivity any better than that of others?
 
DaiKa said:
Well there is work being done on 1tb discs
Not blu ray, I think they're using purple lasers or something like that.

http://broadcastengineering.com/storage_networking/mempile-1tb-disc-storage-0405/
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Heh.

The company said its technology was suitable for home and office use, and would enable users to permanently store 1TB of data on a single, removable DVD-size disc at a fraction of the price of alternative solutions on the market.
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Permanently? So the substrate on the 1TB discs won't degrade and corrupt over time? :D
 
The problem here is the BluRay "Tax". The MFR's can't beat each other over the head with this one and it will always establish a baseline cost of doing business with Sony.



Az Syndicate said:
I get what they are trying to say. Now we have a standard, everyone can use it and drive down cost.



What was DVD's competition? Look how cheap players became. BlueRay is a format that should have many manufacturer's competing against each other. As the article attempts to point out, hopefully now that a single standard has won, all the manufactures should be able to drive cost down via more streamlines processes.
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TechLarry said:
The problem here is the BluRay "Tax". The MFR's can't beat each other over the head with this one and it will always establish a baseline cost of doing business with Sony.
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What is this "tax" you speak of?
 
Ah, yes the ever bitching over the cost of high-def dvd players and movies. I remeber being a wee boy of about 13 when dvd players were released at about $500 and up. I remember watching the people looking through the dvd movies and player and thinking how I wish my parents could afford one of those. Damn paren'ts thinking it was better to pay bills and buy food than buy electronics. Even looking right now I can find an article talking about how to determine which DVD player to get. They mention how your good quaility ones cost $500, the cheap ones are $300 and the ones with the best quality are $1000+


Jump forward to today. These are pretty much the prices we have seen with current high-def players so they aren't really any more expensive than normal DVD players when the came out. Considering they are newer technology that makes sense. Same goes for movies. DVD where always more expensive than VHS, same here.
 
I think they got it a bit wrong... the only reason HD DVD players were affordable was because Toshiba was taking a loss on every one and wouldn't have done it if there wasn't stiff competition from Bluray.

Now that there's no direct competition, none of the BluRay members will be motivated to sell their players at a loss, only Sony with their PS3 has incentive to do this because they get a huge royalty (estimated at ~$10) for every PS3 game sold. I don't know if BluRay consortium members get royalties for each BR disc sold, but even if they do, they can't hope to get more than a cents per disc sold because of the lower price of BluRay movies (~$25 compared to ~$60 for games) and the number of consortium members (many vs. 1).

Production prices will definitely drop because of more volume, but there is no incentive to sell at a loss now with no direct competition. So no sub $200 standalone players any time soon.
 
bbf said:
Now that there's no direct competition, none of the BluRay members will be motivated to sell their players at a loss, only Sony with their PS3 has incentive to do this because they get a huge royalty (estimated at ~$10) for every PS3 game sold.
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Yup and at $10 a game, they are probably getting close to the $1000 mark in royalties. ;)
 
Exavior said:
Ah, yes the ever bitching over the cost of high-def dvd players and movies. I remeber being a wee boy of about 13 when dvd players were released at about $500 and up. I remember watching the people looking through the dvd movies and player and thinking how I wish my parents could afford one of those. Damn paren'ts thinking it was better to pay bills and buy food than buy electronics. Even looking right now I can find an article talking about how to determine which DVD player to get. They mention how your good quaility ones cost $500, the cheap ones are $300 and the ones with the best quality are $1000+
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DVD players came out at around $1000 and remained at a much higher price range than these HD players for much longer. It only took a year for HD players to be reasonable, much faster than DVD players.
 
Az Syndicate said:
I get what they are trying to say. Now we have a standard, everyone can use it and drive down cost.



What was DVD's competition? Look how cheap players became. BlueRay is a format that should have many manufacturer's competing against each other. As the article attempts to point out, hopefully now that a single standard has won, all the manufactures should be able to drive cost down via more streamlines processes.
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This is hilarious. Blu-ray's major competitor wasn't HD-DVD's, nor was HD-DVD's main competitor blu-ray. The main competition HAS BEEN AND WILL BE regular old DVD's. DVD's are still selling at astronomically higher rates than blu-ray, HD-DVD, and digital distribution COMBINED. Sony, er, blu-ray ... still has to compete with DVD sales. Customers must see enough of a benefit to upgrade their TV (whether hi def or standard def) to 1080p or at least enough of a benefit for blu-ray over their upconverts to justify the price premium in order for Blu ray to really take off. I do indeed hope that more manufacturers will be willing to invest in and manufacture blu-ray, now that they know which hi-def format is currently the winner. If that happens, and production costs go down, we'll at least see players become much less expensive. As far as the movies, I wouldn't mind spending a few $$ extra for the huge improvement in quality over regular DVD's, assuming you have a 1080p set to play them on. That's another problem, only 25%-30% of american homes (which by no means is representative of the whole world, which has an even lower overall percentage) has a hi definition television, and even fewer of those are 1080p. I imagine many of their owners are perfectly happy with their upconverts and are still waiting for prices to drop.

So, there's blu-ray's real competition. I hope that and a combination of more manufacturers serve to drive down costs of blu-ray to very competitive levels with regualr DVD's. If they do, then we will see the market share shift more rapidly in favor of our new lovely format.


... in the mean time, I'm enjoying my $50 HD DVD player on my HTPC :cool:
 
I just looked at the MSRP of the newest Blu-Ray players:

Panasonic DMP BD-50 (Profile 1.1) ~ $599 (Q2 08)
Denon DVD-3800BDCI (Profile 1.1) ~ $1999 (March 2008)
Marantz BD8002 (Profile 1.1) ~ $2099 (March 2008)
Pioneer Elite BDP-05FD (Profile 1.1) ~ $999 (Q3 08)
Samsung BD-P1500 (Profile 1.1) ~ $499 (June 2008)
Sasmung BD-UP5000 (Profile 1.1/plays HD DVDs) ~ $599 (May 2008)

I'm just gonna hold off and wait till 1st and 2nd gen Blu-Ray players are around $100 in maybe 2-3 years.
 
bfellow said:
I just looked at the MSRP of the newest Blu-Ray players:

Panasonic DMP BD-50 (Profile 1.1) ~ $599 (Q2 08)
Denon DVD-3800BDCI (Profile 1.1) ~ $1999 (March 2008)
Marantz BD8002 (Profile 1.1) ~ $2099 (March 2008)
Pioneer Elite BDP-05FD (Profile 1.1) ~ $999 (Q3 08)
Samsung BD-P1500 (Profile 1.1) ~ $499 (June 2008)
Sasmung BD-UP5000 (Profile 1.1/plays HD DVDs) ~ $599 (May 2008)

I'm just gonna hold off and wait till 1st and 2nd gen Blu-Ray players are around $100 in maybe 2-3 years.
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Great. Are you for real? What's your source, bro. The sony player which seems to work quite well right now sells for only $400 at Best Buy, and doesn't have the compatibility problems that our Samsungs have had. We put one of the new samsung dual format HD/Blu Ray players on display in our store and it wouldn't even play one of the new Disney movies (blu-ray)! We tried opening a second just to see if it was the disc, but it didn't work either ... (the guy that opened the first one never thought to try it in another player before wasting another copy .. DUH!) The movie plays fine in the Sony $400 model, as do other movies we've tried. I suppose samsung deserves their little lawsuit they're going through right now.
 
Sony is bringing out its first 2.0 Profile Blu-ray players, at the 400USD mark, with another at 500USD (almost same specs). Link
 
SirKronan said:
Great. Are you for real? What's your source, bro. The sony player which seems to work quite well right now sells for only $400 at Best Buy, and doesn't have the compatibility problems that our Samsungs have had. We put one of the new samsung dual format HD/Blu Ray players on display in our store and it wouldn't even play one of the new Disney movies (blu-ray)! We tried opening a second just to see if it was the disc, but it didn't work either ... (the guy that opened the first one never thought to try it in another player before wasting another copy .. DUH!) The movie plays fine in the Sony $400 model, as do other movies we've tried. I suppose samsung deserves their little lawsuit they're going through right now.
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Look, the future players came from a chart of Blu-Ray of both current/future players compliled from Blu-Ray enthusiasts in AVSForums. The current Sony players don't have full audio codec support but for most people it doesn't matter if they don't hear the difference or have the receiver to support it.
 
bfellow said:
Look, the future players came from a chart of Blu-Ray of both current/future players compliled from Blu-Ray enthusiasts in AVSForums. The current Sony players don't have full audio codec support but for most people it doesn't matter if they don't hear the difference or have the receiver to support it.
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Yeah. For now I'll just sit tight. I'll either get the PS3 or wait for a sub $300 standalone.
 
Blu Ray movies at my local Walmart are $18, including some new releases. I'm going to buy an entry level Blu Ray drive for my HTPC and use that. I love HD-DVD and will build my collection, but I also love HD media, regardless of format.

On one hand, I'm pissed that BluRay won, and HD-DVD died. I seriously think that HD-DVD is better for the consumer. But, on the other hand: we have a winning format. Consumers will concentrate on buying that, with no competition. Now, it's all ONE product choice. HD media will be one format. Consumers will buy ONE. So, in a year or two, I expect ~$100 Blu Ray players.

Even my father in law is wanting a high def player. And he doesn't know shit about anything like this. And, I had to talk him out of HD-DVD (sad, I was!). But, he had a HDTV and might as well have some high def media. He doesn't have ANYTHING HD.

My dad, though. He's an early adopter, too. :D I wonder where I get it from. Of course, I want his home theater setup. Damn.
 
I'm cool with hd dvd being "dead" , it just means cheap prices for hd dvd movies. Thier are still plenty of hd dvd's that I still want which I don't yet own. I'm not buying into bluray until they are done "finalizing" the format. Bluray players are still to damn expensive in my opinion.

I have to say, it sure is odd that the superior , cheaper format lost. That really doesn't make sense to me. Oh well, I can always just download hd movies for free and burn them onto dual layer dvd's in h264 format for my xbox 360...
 
Well that brand new $16,900 Blu-Ray player took a million step backwards in mainstream adoption, hope there is a "similar" player for $16,800 less.
 
bfellow said:
Well that brand new $16,900 Blu-Ray player took a million step backwards in mainstream adoption, hope there is a "similar" player for $16,800 less.
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http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106227


how about a 129 dollar 4x BD drive that has firmware updates from Lite-On?

Thats in most peoples price range now.

Granted im interested in cheaper standalones, but for every1 bitching about prices, there have been some major price drops in the internal BD drive market over the past 2 weeks.
 
4saken said:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106227


how about a 129 dollar 4x BD drive that has firmware updates from Lite-On?

Thats in most peoples price range now.

Granted im interested in cheaper standalones, but for every1 bitching about prices, there have been some major price drops in the internal BD drive market over the past 2 weeks.
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I know. They've got $400 burners now, too. They've even got a USB external blu-ray burner now for $450. And $130 is not bad at all for a next-gen reader for an HTPC. You can get the ATI 3450 for like 60 bucks and hardware decode that BR shizzle.
 
Yeah, even the Blu Ray/HD-DVD combo drives with BR burner are getting relatively cheap now. Price is going to so not be a factor pretty soon, these things will be disposable by the end of the year. The drop in price over the last year on these things is much faster than that of CD burners a decade ago.
 
bfellow said:
Well that brand new $16,900 Blu-Ray player took a million step backwards in mainstream adoption, hope there is a "similar" player for $16,800 less.
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That player wasn't for mainstream adoption. That player was for rich people who want to blow their money on overbuilt products that can display a smooth picture during an earthquake just because they can.

You can also get a DVD player for $10,000, an amplifier for $100,000, and speaker for close to $1 million.
 
4saken said:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106227


how about a 129 dollar 4x BD drive that has firmware updates from Lite-On?

Thats in most peoples price range now.

Granted im interested in cheaper standalones, but for every1 bitching about prices, there have been some major price drops in the internal BD drive market over the past 2 weeks.
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I came in here to eat crow. 4saken, I thought HD-DVD was going to win eventually b/c of its lower player pricing, but the studios dropping support just killed it. :(

But I always give credit where credit is due.... You WON, I lost. Should have made the bet official... for money.

What really surprised me is how fast it happened. B/c the "war" had been dragging on so slow forever, I thought it still had a year or 2 to go.
 
chrisf6969 said:
I came in here to eat crow. 4saken, I thought HD-DVD was going to win eventually b/c of its lower player pricing, but the studios dropping support just killed it. :(

But I always give credit where credit is due.... You WON, I lost. Should have made the bet official... for money.

What really surprised me is how fast it happened. B/c the "war" had been dragging on so slow forever, I thought it still had a year or 2 to go.
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I honestly thought that combo players were going to be the rule in a year. I was really surprised when circumstances came around in January (movie studios moving from cross platform to BR) that forced Toshiba to fold so fast.
 
Filter said:
trust me will be a long time before blue ray reaches dvd prices if at all.
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Since I first saw DVD players show up in stores, it took about 10 years before they were cheap enough that I would buy them (about last year, ~$30-40 for a burner). If blue-ray takes that long, then it will be a fairly consistent decade of dissapointment, as hard-drive storage increases, and optical back-up media falls short.
 
I'm certainly not cheering the death of HD-DVD, but only because I (as did many others) didn't think things would be over with quite so quickly. Knew it was a gamble, knew it might be a losing one, just didn't think it would only be ~3 months between buying my HD-A3 and the format throwing in the towel. Damn! But do have some nice movies for it, exisiting discs prices are/going to drop like mad and the player does a great job of upconverting to 1080p/24 to boot.

As for BluRay... well... maybe I'll repurpose this Shuttle SFF I have lying around for BR use now that I've seen that "cheap" LiteOn BR player. Just need to figure out if the li'l beastie is adequate enough and what the cheapest AGP card is that can be used in conjunction with a DVI>HDMI adapter to feed my 60" Sony LCoS set the proper signal. (Yes, go figure, my TV is a Sony, but I honestly didn't think/want Sony to win the format war... what a world. :p) I freely admit to loving animated movies (ie - Cars, Ice Age, you get the idea) and they're all BR only... as will be 99.8% of all future releases! That is until the NEXT format comes along and fucks everything up once again. LOL.
 
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