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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."

2 of 185 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Why is the red being promoted? by shoppa · · Score: 0, Redundant
    I don't see a benifit especially in storage space for the red laser format.

    Of course not - there is no such benefit. The "new red laser format" doesn't actually put more bits on the disk, it just uses more compression to (supposedly) get more out of each bit.

    The benefit is to the companies making DVD disks; red lasers are cheaper so that more folks will buy DVD players and thus buy more DVD disks.

    OTOH, the electronics companies benefit from the blue laser format, since blue lasers are still Really Expensive. Guess which format the electronics companies are pushing?

  2. Re:But blue lasers are still expensive by SilentChris · · Score: 1, Redundant
    "But DVD companies are not in the business of selling blue lasers - they're in the business of selling content."

    Actually, DVD companies are more interested in selling hardware. Better visual quality, better sound - it's the same principle as hardware upgrades for the PC (get the consumer to buy new stuff every 3 years).

    The only people who care about content are the content providers like movie studios, and they can care less what color laser you use (or even if there ends up being substantially more room on the disc). They cater to the mainstream (those who don't want to buy new DVD players every so often) and they're having a hard enough time filling the 4.7 GB they're being given now. Plus, it's at some companies advantage to use the limited space to create 2 DVD sets (for example, Star Wars 1) which they can sell for more money.