Yeah it is obviously not the "end of Blu Ray."
I do think the sluggish sales of both really have to do with HD itself just not being overly embraced by the masses. If HDTV is still a niche market to some degree, then obviously it follows that these formats aren't going to be selling like hotcakes too. That seems to be where we're at right now. (Someone very much "in the know" feels that way also, who I spoke with recently).
It could well be that they're holding out titles, waiting to see where sales shake down and what the future for either format holds before going through with some of these -- particularly if this is going to be mainstream embraced or a niche market like laserdisc. It is entirely possible it's going to be the latter, at least for quite a while.
If that's the case then maybe they'll raise prices, add/drop supplements, etc. depending on what the market demands. Maybe that's what they're waiting for.
"Tech" Thread: Blu Ray, HD-DVD, Video Games, HDTV
Get a load of this rumor:
http://videoeta.com/news/2226
Like I said before: Someone needs to step up, make some real shock and awe happen, and get this over with already.
http://videoeta.com/news/2226
^^ I hope this rumor ends up coming true. You want to see the format war come to a swift end? Titles like these make it happen.You own the Star Wars Trilogy on DVD. You may even own the unaltered version of Star Wars released last year. Now it seems George Lucas has yet another DVD edition of Star Wars on which to spend your hard-earned money.
ComingSoon.net cites an AP report on toymaker Hasbro's earnings for the new DVD rumor. Hasbro, the people who produce the Star Wars toys, expects demand for action figures to remain high "with Lucas planning a video release for this year's 30th anniversary."
(The article also mentions next year's Star Wars animated TV series and the live-action series in 2009 as potential drivers of toy sales.)
This year does mark the anniversary of the first Star Wars film released in 1977. Many toys, books, and other Star Wars-related projects have already been announced to honor the 30 year mark.
The vague mention of a "video release" sparks many rumors. For instance, could this mean a high definition release on Blu-ray Disc? Lucasfilm's distributor Twentieth Century Fox is a backer of this new format.
If this Star Wars on Blu-ray rumor is true it would mark an enormous victory for the format over bitter rival HD-DVD. Not only would it drive toy sales but it would drive many consumers to finally buy one of the expensive Blu-ray players.
Like I said before: Someone needs to step up, make some real shock and awe happen, and get this over with already.
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Paul MacLean
- Posts: 7098
- Joined: Sat Oct 09, 2004 10:26 pm
- Location: New York
In the future there will be no new movies. Original ideas will be too much of a risk for major studios. There will only be new and different video formats, which are merely created to justify new releases of old movies.You own the Star Wars Trilogy on DVD. You may even own the unaltered version of Star Wars released last year. Now it seems George Lucas has yet another DVD edition of Star Wars on which to spend your hard-earned money.
New movies will only be made by Robert Rodriguez, who will film (sorry, videotape) every actor separately on a green stage, compositing it all together in post, and every performance will have the emotional resonance of Ewan McGregor saying "I can't look at any more."
Paul
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AndyDursin
- Posts: 34374
- Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2004 8:45 pm
- Location: RI
Eric, I know Blu Ray owners have dreams of that dancing in their heads (and I agree I'd buy into the format asap if it happens), but honestly those are the rumors from a madman.
I believe that hell will freeze over before STAR WARS ends up on either one of these formats in 2007.
Lucas is historically the last to jump onboard any video format...he was the last to jump on VHS, the last to jump on laserdisc, the last to jump on DVD. Why would he possibly grant the release of his movies on a format whose sales haven't really made a blip on the radar yet?
Just how the Spielberg titles vanished from the HD-DVD slate this is a rumor and nothing more.
There WILL be a 30th Anniversary edition on standard DVD, but not Blu Ray, not HD-DVD.
From past experience it will be YEARS before we see it happen, unless somehow he changes his tune totally from how he's worked before. I just see no way why it would happen here with the market being so unimpressive...hell standard DVD had 100X the sales of Blu Ray before Lucas released the Original Trilogy on the format!
I believe that hell will freeze over before STAR WARS ends up on either one of these formats in 2007.
Lucas is historically the last to jump onboard any video format...he was the last to jump on VHS, the last to jump on laserdisc, the last to jump on DVD. Why would he possibly grant the release of his movies on a format whose sales haven't really made a blip on the radar yet?
Just how the Spielberg titles vanished from the HD-DVD slate this is a rumor and nothing more.
There WILL be a 30th Anniversary edition on standard DVD, but not Blu Ray, not HD-DVD.
From past experience it will be YEARS before we see it happen, unless somehow he changes his tune totally from how he's worked before. I just see no way why it would happen here with the market being so unimpressive...hell standard DVD had 100X the sales of Blu Ray before Lucas released the Original Trilogy on the format!
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AndyDursin
- Posts: 34374
- Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2004 8:45 pm
- Location: RI
According to one article I read, the top selling Blu Ray DVD for the first THREE WEEKS of January was CRANK....with 7,500 copies or thereabouts sold.
The top selling HD-DVD title for that same time was BATMAN BEGINS, which came out in Oct., and sold about 4,000 or thereabouts.
If those numbers are right -- and given this is over a 3 week period -- it means one thing:
NOBODY IS BUYING EITHER FORMAT.
Period.
Those numbers are so laughable for Blu Ray people to start boasting "hey we're winning the format war" with 7500 copies in 3 WEEKS for their #1 title is just unbelievably absurd.
HD-DVD obviously is "Falling behind" but that's relatively speaking since they haven't had a new release more or less in months....and yet they still managed to move 4000 copies of a title that had been out for several months already. If I were them, this format war is still on the table for the taking and no wonder why they're in no hurry to win it now -- because the market IS NOT THERE.
Horrid, just horrid!
The top selling HD-DVD title for that same time was BATMAN BEGINS, which came out in Oct., and sold about 4,000 or thereabouts.
If those numbers are right -- and given this is over a 3 week period -- it means one thing:
NOBODY IS BUYING EITHER FORMAT.
Period.
Those numbers are so laughable for Blu Ray people to start boasting "hey we're winning the format war" with 7500 copies in 3 WEEKS for their #1 title is just unbelievably absurd.
HD-DVD obviously is "Falling behind" but that's relatively speaking since they haven't had a new release more or less in months....and yet they still managed to move 4000 copies of a title that had been out for several months already. If I were them, this format war is still on the table for the taking and no wonder why they're in no hurry to win it now -- because the market IS NOT THERE.
Horrid, just horrid!
^^ And everything you just wrote is why format wars suck, in general.
The industry and most everyone bemoaned this nonsense long before it happened and it just shouldn't have ever happened.
What a pathetic waste it will be if HD optical discs end up going the way of SACD vs. DVD-A. (And I do love these, but still...)
The industry and most everyone bemoaned this nonsense long before it happened and it just shouldn't have ever happened.
What a pathetic waste it will be if HD optical discs end up going the way of SACD vs. DVD-A. (And I do love these, but still...)
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AndyDursin
- Posts: 34374
- Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2004 8:45 pm
- Location: RI
Eric,
I agree on the format wars.
I don't think these formats are going to die, but with the HDTV demand itself not being where they all thought it would be right now (and remember that has a lot to do with this also), it's entirely possible these are going to remain "niche" items like laserdisc -- until the mass public demand for HDTV meets the level that would propel it into the mainstream.
We could be a few years away, possibly, from that happening, if those sales numbers are correct.
BTW I don't blame people for not jumping on the HD bandwagon. I love it but there's not a whole lot of programming available for people right now, and the corporations have done a spectacularly lousy job educating people on why they need it and what's available for it.
I agree on the format wars.
I don't think these formats are going to die, but with the HDTV demand itself not being where they all thought it would be right now (and remember that has a lot to do with this also), it's entirely possible these are going to remain "niche" items like laserdisc -- until the mass public demand for HDTV meets the level that would propel it into the mainstream.
We could be a few years away, possibly, from that happening, if those sales numbers are correct.
BTW I don't blame people for not jumping on the HD bandwagon. I love it but there's not a whole lot of programming available for people right now, and the corporations have done a spectacularly lousy job educating people on why they need it and what's available for it.
Agreed 100 percent.AndyDursin wrote:Eric,
I agree on the format wars.
I don't think these formats are going to die, but with the HDTV demand itself not being where they all thought it would be right now (and remember that has a lot to do with this also), it's entirely possible these are going to remain "niche" items like laserdisc -- until the mass public demand for HDTV meets the level that would propel it into the mainstream.
We could be a few years away, possibly, from that happening, if those sales numbers are correct.
BTW I don't blame people for not jumping on the HD bandwagon. I love it but there's not a whole lot of programming available for people right now, and the corporations have done a spectacularly lousy job educating people on why they need it and what's available for it.
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AndyDursin
- Posts: 34374
- Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2004 8:45 pm
- Location: RI
And the good times keep rolling for Sony...what I love about this article is that Blu Ray was first mentioned to me ALSO in the mid '90s up at Sight & Sound (laserdisc mecca of the northeast near Boston) as being in development by Sony.
12 years later, they're still trying to work out the kinks!
Meanwhile, the Wii continues to kick the PS3's behind!
From Fortune Magazine (via CNN.com):
The trouble with Sony
Fortune's Brent Schlender explains why smart companies can be too smart for their own good.
FORTUNE Magazine
By Brent Schlender, Fortune Magazine
February 22 2007: 2:07 PM EST
(Fortune Magazine) -- It's not every day that you see successful corporations humiliate themselves. But it happens. In the case of high tech, it usually occurs when a company can't resist the urge to launch a moon shot, a Herculean but overly ambitious and inevitably misguided effort to come up with some ultimate new thing.
Sony, no stranger to embarrassment (remember the exploding batteries?), has not one but two big, expensive potential flameouts: the PlayStation 3 game console, and the Blu-ray DVD format.
Don't get me wrong. Sony is not run by numbskulls. There are good reasons for shooting the moon. For one thing, technology keeps morphing, and you have to keep up lest some upstart changes the rules of the game, as Microsoft (Charts) did to IBM (Charts) in days of yore. Then there's the natural urge to outdo the competition. And it takes a whopper of a product to goose growth when you're as big as Sony (Charts).
The problem with moon shots is that you have to get the trajectory and the timing exactly right, or you wind up lost in space. Sony, despite spending billions on Blu-ray, missed. Not by much, but by enough to call into question whether its massive investments will ever pay off as it had hoped.
I visited Sony's lab in Atsugi, Japan, in 1995 to see an early demonstration of a blue laser. Blue laser light is special because it has a much shorter wavelength than the red lasers in conventional CD and DVD players, and thus can discern much denser data on a disc, something absolutely necessary for showing video in high definition.
I never did see the demo that day - the engineers reneged because the prototype was so finicky. But company officials bragged that it was a shoo-in to power the DVD players of tomorrow. Sony would, they assured me, be the sole owner of a new video format for the first time since Betamax.
Alas, Sony soon learned that its marvelous blue lasers didn't last long enough to make a reliable consumer product. So in 1999 it turned to Nichia Corp., a little-known Japanese electronics maker that had devised a more durable blue laser - and took out 800 patents to protect the technology. A chastened Sony had to license Nichia's approach, and even so there was nothing to prevent Nichia from selling its own lasers or licensing Sony's rivals to make them too.
Not surprisingly, a group led by Toshiba seized the chance to propose its own standard. Indeed, Toshiba's HD DVD format beat Sony's Blu-ray player to the living room by several months, and now both sides are in a full-fledged format war. Shades of Betamax vs. VHS.
Also, because Sony waited to put Blu-ray technology in its PlayStation 3, Microsoft got its Xbox 360 to market nearly a year earlier. Even more humiliating, the PS 3 has been upstaged by Nintendo's Wii, a lower-tech but much hotter-selling machine. Some moon shots.
What has to dismay Sony the most is the possibility that consumers won't care about Blu-ray. This month LG, a charter Blu-ray supporter, broke ranks and released a universal high-def DVD player that can display any kind of disc you throw at it - plain old DVD, Blu-ray or HD DVD. It's the ideal device for anyone who couldn't care less about formats and just wants to watch the damn movie. I tried one out, and even ordinary DVDs looked great. If an obsessive gadget freak like me can't get excited about Blu-ray, can anyone?
So it goes with moon shots. Ford had its Edsel, Coca-Cola its New Coke, and 15 years ago IBM gave Microsoft its big break when it dragged its feet developing a graphical operating system for the PC. Microsoft got antsy and gave the world Windows. Now Microsoft has delivered Vista, a much-hyped operating system that has elicited mostly yawns.
And there's a good chance another big launch - Apple's elegant iPhone, out this summer - could sputter as well. Why? Because, as Apple (Charts) and Sony - creators of two of the greatest small wonders ever, the iPod and the Walkman - should know, giant leaps for high tech aren't usually moon shoots. They're an accumulation of small steps.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/ ... 05/8401297
12 years later, they're still trying to work out the kinks!
Meanwhile, the Wii continues to kick the PS3's behind!
From Fortune Magazine (via CNN.com):
The trouble with Sony
Fortune's Brent Schlender explains why smart companies can be too smart for their own good.
FORTUNE Magazine
By Brent Schlender, Fortune Magazine
February 22 2007: 2:07 PM EST
(Fortune Magazine) -- It's not every day that you see successful corporations humiliate themselves. But it happens. In the case of high tech, it usually occurs when a company can't resist the urge to launch a moon shot, a Herculean but overly ambitious and inevitably misguided effort to come up with some ultimate new thing.
Sony, no stranger to embarrassment (remember the exploding batteries?), has not one but two big, expensive potential flameouts: the PlayStation 3 game console, and the Blu-ray DVD format.
Don't get me wrong. Sony is not run by numbskulls. There are good reasons for shooting the moon. For one thing, technology keeps morphing, and you have to keep up lest some upstart changes the rules of the game, as Microsoft (Charts) did to IBM (Charts) in days of yore. Then there's the natural urge to outdo the competition. And it takes a whopper of a product to goose growth when you're as big as Sony (Charts).
The problem with moon shots is that you have to get the trajectory and the timing exactly right, or you wind up lost in space. Sony, despite spending billions on Blu-ray, missed. Not by much, but by enough to call into question whether its massive investments will ever pay off as it had hoped.
I visited Sony's lab in Atsugi, Japan, in 1995 to see an early demonstration of a blue laser. Blue laser light is special because it has a much shorter wavelength than the red lasers in conventional CD and DVD players, and thus can discern much denser data on a disc, something absolutely necessary for showing video in high definition.
I never did see the demo that day - the engineers reneged because the prototype was so finicky. But company officials bragged that it was a shoo-in to power the DVD players of tomorrow. Sony would, they assured me, be the sole owner of a new video format for the first time since Betamax.
Alas, Sony soon learned that its marvelous blue lasers didn't last long enough to make a reliable consumer product. So in 1999 it turned to Nichia Corp., a little-known Japanese electronics maker that had devised a more durable blue laser - and took out 800 patents to protect the technology. A chastened Sony had to license Nichia's approach, and even so there was nothing to prevent Nichia from selling its own lasers or licensing Sony's rivals to make them too.
Not surprisingly, a group led by Toshiba seized the chance to propose its own standard. Indeed, Toshiba's HD DVD format beat Sony's Blu-ray player to the living room by several months, and now both sides are in a full-fledged format war. Shades of Betamax vs. VHS.
Also, because Sony waited to put Blu-ray technology in its PlayStation 3, Microsoft got its Xbox 360 to market nearly a year earlier. Even more humiliating, the PS 3 has been upstaged by Nintendo's Wii, a lower-tech but much hotter-selling machine. Some moon shots.
What has to dismay Sony the most is the possibility that consumers won't care about Blu-ray. This month LG, a charter Blu-ray supporter, broke ranks and released a universal high-def DVD player that can display any kind of disc you throw at it - plain old DVD, Blu-ray or HD DVD. It's the ideal device for anyone who couldn't care less about formats and just wants to watch the damn movie. I tried one out, and even ordinary DVDs looked great. If an obsessive gadget freak like me can't get excited about Blu-ray, can anyone?
So it goes with moon shots. Ford had its Edsel, Coca-Cola its New Coke, and 15 years ago IBM gave Microsoft its big break when it dragged its feet developing a graphical operating system for the PC. Microsoft got antsy and gave the world Windows. Now Microsoft has delivered Vista, a much-hyped operating system that has elicited mostly yawns.
And there's a good chance another big launch - Apple's elegant iPhone, out this summer - could sputter as well. Why? Because, as Apple (Charts) and Sony - creators of two of the greatest small wonders ever, the iPod and the Walkman - should know, giant leaps for high tech aren't usually moon shoots. They're an accumulation of small steps.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/ ... 05/8401297
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AndyDursin
- Posts: 34374
- Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2004 8:45 pm
- Location: RI
I agree Eric I love watching a HD movie at home...
In the meantime here's a Video Business article basically saying the same thing, that Blu Ray's "success" is relative to the PS3 off to a horrid start at the moment, which is bigger in the grand scheme of things.
I do believe this has something to do with HD-DVD not in any hurry to release new titles, though I assume things will be picking up as the weather warms up!
http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6419351.html
No high-def winner yet
FEB. 23 | WITH ALL DUE respect to the folks at Sony and other Blu-ray Disc backers, it seems a bit early to be declaring victory in the high-def format war.
The latest evidence for their claim is the ratio of software sales in January, when BD movies outsold HD DVD movies by 2-to-1. But the number of titles released on Blu-ray last month outstripped titles released on HD DVD by better than 2-to-1, so the greater total software sales—by itself—doesn’t tell us much about BD’s relative popularity.
Moreover, BD software sales in January also likely benefited from the 600,000-700,000 PlayStation 3 consoles sold in the U.S. in December, each of which came packaged with a $15 coupon for a BD movie.
We won’t know whether that PS3-propelled spike in sales will be sustained until we have a few months-worth of data.
If you look at lifetime data of the two formats, total software sales are about even, while BD has nearly a 5-to-1 lead in the installed hardware base if you include PS3 consoles. That suggests the overall attach rate of discs per player is far lower for Blu-ray than for HD DVD.
Insofar as PS3 is considered critical to the success of BD, in fact, it’s hard to see why anyone in the BD camp is feeling optimistic.
THE REAL NUMBERS story in January was not the strength of BD but weakness of PS3.
Sales of Nintendo’s Wii nearly doubled those of the PS3 in the month, while Microsoft’s Xbox 360, despite being on the market for more than a year, bested Sony’s console by 20%.
Even Sony’s own PlayStation 2 outsold the PS3.
Since their respective launches, in fact, the Wii has zoomed by the PS3, selling more than 1.5 million players in the U.S., compared to 933,000 PS3 consoles.
The Xbox has piled up sales of 4.8 million since launch.
PS3 sales have been slowed by (BD-induced) production delays, of course, which, presumably will be resolved. But I don’t see why that should bring any comfort to BD supporters.
For PS3 to be a decisive factor in the high-def format war, it first has to succeed in the game-console wars, and right now, it is not.
Apart from being caught flat-footed by Nintendo in the U.S., Sony seems to be going out of its way to limit its success in Europe and Australia.
With the PS3 set to launch in those territories March 23, Sony let slip this week that recent tweaks to the European model will severely limit the console’s backward-compatibility with PS2 games.
“Rather than concentrate on PS2 backwards-compatibility, in the future, company resources will be increasingly focused on developing new games and entertainment features exclusively for PS3,” Sony Computer Entertainment Europe president David Reeves told Reuters in a statement.
That means gamers will be limited to the 25 or 30 PS3 titles Sony expects to have available at launch.
For that more limited compatibility, PS3 buyers in Europe and Australia will have to shell out the equivalent of about $790 for the high-end PS3, compared to $599 in the U.S.
The high-end Xbox console sells for about $390 in Europe; the Wii for about $240.
While PS3 pre-orders in Europe are high, getting beyond those early enthusiasts is likely to prove daunting with a console that’s twice the price of its competitors.
The longer it takes PS3 to reach mass market numbers, moreover, the longer Sony will continue to bleed cash on the consoles, further undermining its competitive options.
SONY’S PS3 PROBLEMS, of course, do nothing to help HD DVD land more studios. The format’s supporters, in fact, seem to be turning to new gimmicks to try to lure smaller producers into releasing product on HD DVD.
For instance, Eclipse Data Technologies, a maker of encoders and premastering software for HD DVD, recently announced a free upgrade that will let its customers master titles in the 3X DVD configuration, which marries the HD DVD file format and copy-protection with a standard red-laser DVD.
“We want to give our customers a low-cost way to experiment and learn the process,” Eclipse VP of sales Bob Edmonds said.
Using the VC-1 or H.264 codecs, the 3X spec allows for up to 135 minutes of HD DVD content on a DVD-9.
Similarly, DCA Inc., recently announced that it had successfully mastered and replicated the industry’s first 3X DVD-ROM disc at Sonopress’ replication facility, part of a joint project with Sonic Solutions.
“Several manufacturers are looking to 3X DVD-ROM as a low cost entry into the HD video market,” DCA said in a statement.
Whether that will be enough to rescue HD DVD from oblivion remains to be seen.
In the meantime here's a Video Business article basically saying the same thing, that Blu Ray's "success" is relative to the PS3 off to a horrid start at the moment, which is bigger in the grand scheme of things.
I do believe this has something to do with HD-DVD not in any hurry to release new titles, though I assume things will be picking up as the weather warms up!
http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6419351.html
No high-def winner yet
FEB. 23 | WITH ALL DUE respect to the folks at Sony and other Blu-ray Disc backers, it seems a bit early to be declaring victory in the high-def format war.
The latest evidence for their claim is the ratio of software sales in January, when BD movies outsold HD DVD movies by 2-to-1. But the number of titles released on Blu-ray last month outstripped titles released on HD DVD by better than 2-to-1, so the greater total software sales—by itself—doesn’t tell us much about BD’s relative popularity.
Moreover, BD software sales in January also likely benefited from the 600,000-700,000 PlayStation 3 consoles sold in the U.S. in December, each of which came packaged with a $15 coupon for a BD movie.
We won’t know whether that PS3-propelled spike in sales will be sustained until we have a few months-worth of data.
If you look at lifetime data of the two formats, total software sales are about even, while BD has nearly a 5-to-1 lead in the installed hardware base if you include PS3 consoles. That suggests the overall attach rate of discs per player is far lower for Blu-ray than for HD DVD.
Insofar as PS3 is considered critical to the success of BD, in fact, it’s hard to see why anyone in the BD camp is feeling optimistic.
THE REAL NUMBERS story in January was not the strength of BD but weakness of PS3.
Sales of Nintendo’s Wii nearly doubled those of the PS3 in the month, while Microsoft’s Xbox 360, despite being on the market for more than a year, bested Sony’s console by 20%.
Even Sony’s own PlayStation 2 outsold the PS3.
Since their respective launches, in fact, the Wii has zoomed by the PS3, selling more than 1.5 million players in the U.S., compared to 933,000 PS3 consoles.
The Xbox has piled up sales of 4.8 million since launch.
PS3 sales have been slowed by (BD-induced) production delays, of course, which, presumably will be resolved. But I don’t see why that should bring any comfort to BD supporters.
For PS3 to be a decisive factor in the high-def format war, it first has to succeed in the game-console wars, and right now, it is not.
Apart from being caught flat-footed by Nintendo in the U.S., Sony seems to be going out of its way to limit its success in Europe and Australia.
With the PS3 set to launch in those territories March 23, Sony let slip this week that recent tweaks to the European model will severely limit the console’s backward-compatibility with PS2 games.
“Rather than concentrate on PS2 backwards-compatibility, in the future, company resources will be increasingly focused on developing new games and entertainment features exclusively for PS3,” Sony Computer Entertainment Europe president David Reeves told Reuters in a statement.
That means gamers will be limited to the 25 or 30 PS3 titles Sony expects to have available at launch.
For that more limited compatibility, PS3 buyers in Europe and Australia will have to shell out the equivalent of about $790 for the high-end PS3, compared to $599 in the U.S.
The high-end Xbox console sells for about $390 in Europe; the Wii for about $240.
While PS3 pre-orders in Europe are high, getting beyond those early enthusiasts is likely to prove daunting with a console that’s twice the price of its competitors.
The longer it takes PS3 to reach mass market numbers, moreover, the longer Sony will continue to bleed cash on the consoles, further undermining its competitive options.
SONY’S PS3 PROBLEMS, of course, do nothing to help HD DVD land more studios. The format’s supporters, in fact, seem to be turning to new gimmicks to try to lure smaller producers into releasing product on HD DVD.
For instance, Eclipse Data Technologies, a maker of encoders and premastering software for HD DVD, recently announced a free upgrade that will let its customers master titles in the 3X DVD configuration, which marries the HD DVD file format and copy-protection with a standard red-laser DVD.
“We want to give our customers a low-cost way to experiment and learn the process,” Eclipse VP of sales Bob Edmonds said.
Using the VC-1 or H.264 codecs, the 3X spec allows for up to 135 minutes of HD DVD content on a DVD-9.
Similarly, DCA Inc., recently announced that it had successfully mastered and replicated the industry’s first 3X DVD-ROM disc at Sonopress’ replication facility, part of a joint project with Sonic Solutions.
“Several manufacturers are looking to 3X DVD-ROM as a low cost entry into the HD video market,” DCA said in a statement.
Whether that will be enough to rescue HD DVD from oblivion remains to be seen.
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Carlson2005
This week it's Blu-ray:
HD Movie Cracks Top Ten List
For the first time, a movie in a high-definition DVD format has broken into the top ten among best-sellers. Amazon.com said Tuesday that Sony's Blu-ray HD version of Casino Royale debuted at #8 on its list. The standard-definition/wide-screen version of the movie topped it. The full-screen version came in at No. 10.
HD Movie Cracks Top Ten List
For the first time, a movie in a high-definition DVD format has broken into the top ten among best-sellers. Amazon.com said Tuesday that Sony's Blu-ray HD version of Casino Royale debuted at #8 on its list. The standard-definition/wide-screen version of the movie topped it. The full-screen version came in at No. 10.
I should be getting my BD of Casino Royale today. Looking forward to it.Carlson2005 wrote:This week it's Blu-ray:
HD Movie Cracks Top Ten List
For the first time, a movie in a high-definition DVD format has broken into the top ten among best-sellers. Amazon.com said Tuesday that Sony's Blu-ray HD version of Casino Royale debuted at #8 on its list. The standard-definition/wide-screen version of the movie topped it. The full-screen version came in at No. 10.
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AndyDursin
- Posts: 34374
- Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2004 8:45 pm
- Location: RI
Well let it be said I am trying to remain objective -- my Blu Ray player just came in from Ebay (the Philips BDP9000, which is supposed to be pretty good, and supports Blu Ray Java).
I updated the firmware and am enjoying a bunch of titles I just picked up from Amazon...the upscaling is pretty good too (now if it just did region free for standard DVDs, I'd get rid of my Oppo).
For the record I wouldn't have done this ordinarily, but I'm getting enough Blu Ray product for review that spending time sampling it here and there at my friend's place just isn't fair.
Besides, I got a nice price ($330) and it's brand new -- even if it didn't come with the remote and DID come from "Jim's Super Pawn" in Mobile, Alabama!
I also dumped my Xbox 360 drive on Ebay, and have the Toshiba A20 coming in, hopefully in a few weeks.
Then I will not spend any other $$ this year.
I updated the firmware and am enjoying a bunch of titles I just picked up from Amazon...the upscaling is pretty good too (now if it just did region free for standard DVDs, I'd get rid of my Oppo).
For the record I wouldn't have done this ordinarily, but I'm getting enough Blu Ray product for review that spending time sampling it here and there at my friend's place just isn't fair.
Besides, I got a nice price ($330) and it's brand new -- even if it didn't come with the remote and DID come from "Jim's Super Pawn" in Mobile, Alabama!
I also dumped my Xbox 360 drive on Ebay, and have the Toshiba A20 coming in, hopefully in a few weeks.
Then I will not spend any other $$ this year.