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Red vs. Blue Lasers Complicate DVD's Future

Posted by timothy on from the outlook-hazy dept.

bnavarro writes: "The EE Times is reporting that the DVD Forum's Steering Committee voted this week to approve the use of low-bit-rate compression for high-definition DVD. The DVD Forum's decision, made at a meeting Tuesday (Feb. 26) in Tokyo, to stick with a red-laser-based scheme but switch to low-bit-rate compression, came only a week after nine of the world's biggest electronics companies agreed to promote a blue-laser-based format for next-generation video and computer optical disks."

3 of 185 comments (clear)

  1. DVD standards are a mess... by dpbsmith · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...does Joe Six-pack understand the differences between DVD-RW, DVD+RW, DVD-RAM? Do _I_ understand the differences between these formats? Do you? Does the recent el-cheapo DVD player I bought play 2-layer disks? Do I know? WILL I know until I try to put one of them in and find that it won't play?

    And now we're going to have TWO competing high-definition DVD formats? And HDTV itself, or do I mean "digital TV," is six or is it eight different formats, which are high-definition, except when they aren't, that is they are high-ER definition but not HIGH definition, only you can't get the high definition, and all the digital TV formats are about to become obsolete...

    Anyone who buys ANY HDTV or DVD gear until the dust settles has gotta be nuts.

    But you sure have to be amazed at the complexity and ingenuity the industry is using to shoot itself in the foot.

    --

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    1. Re:DVD standards are a mess... by nathanh · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Does the recent el-cheapo DVD player I bought play 2-layer disks?

      ALL DVD-V (DVD Video) players must support RSDL discs. It's been part of the specification for a very long time.

      Whether the general public understands the details is almost irrelevant. They almost certainly didn't understand the details behind the various CD formats - CD-DA, CD-i, CD-MO, CD-RW, CD Extra, VCD, CD Plus, CD-XA (1 and 2), CD-RFS, CD-UDF - but this didn't stop CD from becoming a hugely popular format. You probably don't know (or care) that your Playstation uses CD-XA while your discman uses CD-DA. You simply buy a Playstation CD for a Playstation and an Audio CD for your discman.

      The public knows that "DVD players" will play their "DVDs" from BlockBuster. They don't know or care that it's DVD-V. They just know that "DVDs have movies on them". People interested in the more exotic formats (DVD-A, DVD-RAM) will learn what they need to know. The system will look like chaos to people who know the details, but the general public won't give a flying crap.

  2. Why is something needed so quickly? by donglekey · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I think it would be great if a high-def DVD format came out in the next year, but it probably won't. Why limit things while still using 9GB DVD's? I don't understand the immediate need. DVD's are doing wonderful, and DVD's in progressive scan look great. We can wait 2 years for blue laser players to become a reality, it won't hurt anything to keep DVD's going longer, people are going to be mad about switching anyway.

    The solution of the Red laser camp seems to be better compression (good) better post processing (good) but on the same size disc (bad). Switching formats is a hard transition for everyone, why don't they really switch formats and go for something that will be good enough to last for 10 years. Put blue laser discs, Mpeg 4, and good pre and post processing together and you have something that just may stand the test of time, like CD's. CD's are the first technology that I can remember that could possibly be called 'good enough'. I still want DVD-Audio and SACD to do well, but CD's are the first consumer technology that was really limited by how well they were made and the equipment used to play them back then by the format itself. These technology companies have the chance to do that now, with video, but it doesn't look like they are going to take it.

    Look back in history to other formats that were just better use of the same space. SVCD, HDCD (20 bit CD) SVHS, the list goes on. They didn't do too well did they? What makes these companies think that 7 Mbit Mpeg 4 is going to look good enough to make people want to switch? There will compression artifacts all over at high resoltuions. Now 1080p 24fps, that is a beautiful thing and will make people drool.

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