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Gizmodo Declares Blu-Ray Winner
13.7BillionYears writes "Gizmodo has a special feature covering the many details of the Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD battle based on the technical, financial, and commercial merits of the two contenders. They conclude that Blu-Ray is the clear winner on all three fronts. Hopefully the movie industry and electronics manufacturers will see the same logic and avert a format war."
Gizmodo probably has it right, with respect to Blu-Ray, but their article is so incredibly biased that it is difficult to lend it any credibility. It's not an objective article at all. They follow a high-school writing class "compare and contrast" format. However, for each feature that they discuss, they trash it for HD-DVD and then argue valiantly and gushingly for Blu-Ray. I would rather read an article written by a dispassionate science writer. They should stick to regurgitating press releases rather than trying to take on serious analysis. I like Gizmodo as a great place to make one stop to learn about new gadgets but I don't go there for any sort of analysis or good editorial content.
http://www.busyweather.com/
I like having my optical media encased in some sort of protective barrier. it saves me from myself.
As an American Slob(tm), I have a really slack attitude towards my optical media. Mostly due to how I can get away with it with everything else.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Hopefully it turns out just like the VHS vs. Beta war of the late 70's/early 80's. Beta is better quality and deserves the title it so successfully....WAIT A MINUTE!!
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77 77 77 2e 6d 65 6c 76 69 6e 73 2e 63 6f 6d
Who are these people and why should I care what they think? At first glance Gizmodo seems like a geek hanging out in EB down at the local mall expounding on why the PS2 is better then the xbox to anyone foolish enough to enter his rant field.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
You're new to this business aren't you?
Trouble making decisions? Just flip for it.
How feasable would it be to have devices support both formats, the same way most DVD-writers now are +/- R. Are blu-ray and hd dvd too different or could we end up seeing the same kind of thing where both formats are supported by most devices.
The masses will ultimately decicde who wins But then again, the masses could easily be persuaded and influenced. Most of the time, there will be a winner by default, not necessarily by it's own merrit or quality, etc. I can only hope that the better system wins. Be it Blu-Ray or HD-DVD Then again, I'm leaning against any camps that blindly adopts technology, such as Microsft's. notice the word "blindly" didn't see it? well blindness might be a factor.
It seems that the more data that you throw onto a 5" disc the less resilience to scratches there are. I understand that a lot of these discs will use redundancy to counteract the increased sensitivity to scratches. I would assume that would cut into the amount of data that can be stored on the disc. Am I wrong in assuming that being that the discs are 72x the capacity of a CD ROM that the information density is 72X more. If the discs have 72x the amount of information in a given area, wouldn't the disc be 72x more susceptible to scratches. I've noticed this when comparing CD to DVD's.
So why dump the cartridges?
Seriously, isn't there a bit of a credibility gap? I love Gizmodo and all, but are they really the end-all-be-all of format reviewers? Let's see Tom's or Anandtech's opinions.
gizmodo.com and fleshbot.com are run by the same people, and written in the same style, it's no surprise that these guys vote for whatever gives them an erection.
Will it be the new h.264 or something else?
And does anyone with a preview release of Tiger have any information on how fast it codecs a file?
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
Did you read the bit where he said HD-DVD has NO web page yet?
And resistant to consumer damage - What the hell does that have to do with ANYTHING? It comes down to hardware/media price and avialiablity.
If 33%+ of the movie libaries are availiable in Blu-Ray, and NONE are availiable in HD-DVD - which would you image might be a more attractive purcahse? Even if HD-DVD discs can be run over by a truck and the Blu-Ray discs have to be kept in nitrogen cannisters between playing, the format that will get consumer marketshare is blindingly obvious.
Finally, I would say that he did give a numbre of details for technical advantages of the HD-DVD format - which have then been met and worked around by the Blu-Ray companies.
Sometimes an underdog is really, well, just a dog.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Ok, I know this sounds naive, but get this: If we all decide right now that Blu-Ray is the winner, and we cling to that idea in spite of any future arguments then it will be the winner. The masses have spoken. We don't have to go through another period of format instability. It's a wonder of the Internet, a snap decision by millions.
The only people who won't like this are the people who are supporting the other standard, you know DVD-whats_its_name, you know- the losers.
which standard has the less patents attached? I would chose that.
...just a random thought, but I would suspect that the one whose copy protection is the easiest to break may end up "winning" as that is the one many people would find to have the most "freedom" to use how they wish without all the tacked on restrictions (warranted or otherwise).
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change."
Because "HD DVD" is too hard to say. Blu-Ray is easy and quick to say. 2 syllables: Blu, Ray. It's even easier to say that DVD, which is 3. Blu-Ray is a pronounciation dream. HD DVD is an acronym nightmare. Nobody wants to deal with that mess.
Since most people will recognize HD-DVD must be somehow better than DVD while Blu-Ray could be anything from enhanced color laundry detergent to insecticide. Without a ton of marketing and consumer education Blu-Ray will simple lose when the average couch potato goes to buy a new player from the local electronics megabarn.
While this has little to do with why BetaMax (nor why every other Sony proprietary standard has failed), Blu-Ray has some serious marketing problems to over come.
Obviosuly either side is going to make discs that won't die when you sneeze.
But in fact a funny point sis that durability could be a major strike AGAINST HD-DVD. Did you read the part about Blu-Ray discs printed on paper? That could mean a lot more opportunity for throw-away discs in magazines or cerial boxes or wheverer. That is a huge draw to media types, to be able to push media through more channels.
So again, I would say the duribility of the format has nothing to do with sucess. Ease of use, yes - to some extent (which is why they aren't giving any cart-based players to the masses). The primary factor will be the one with a majority of media companies getting behind it and making things people want to buy. If there were a split between some media supporting one format, and some another, then there might be more of a fight - but it looks to be an absolute domination the part of Blu-Ray, as they said from any standpoint you care to look that would indicate future sales potential.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I think whichever standard the porn industry decides to use will be the winner.
50GB of Jenna Jameson...WOW!!
Fortunately the wonderful thing about DVDs being a fully digital and cracked medium is that it will be very easy to copy them over to BluDisc-R whenever that becomes a commodity product.
article on H.264e /
http://www.guidetohometheater.com/news/062804appl
According to a few articles, Microsoft is endorsing HD-DVD for the adoption of WMV9 codec
here
here
here
here
then again, Paul Thurrot is to Microsoft as Rush Limbaugh to The Republicans
YIKES!!!!
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If Gizmodo is so biased, how did they get the pretty Excel graphs to prove their point??
Just find out which format Sony is backing, and pick the other one.
Have you read my blog lately?
That would be because BetaCAM and BetaMAX are not the same thing in the slightest.
Hate to say that it won't be decided on technical merit, but businesses have a history of choosing an inferior standard if it benefits their bottom line. (Think VHS vs. Beta.)
It's good to use your head, but not as a battering ram.
What makes you think the movie industry will see logic? They haven't been too hot on it before...
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
I bet someone here can answer this question for me. Why are all these optical discs (aside from the venerable Laserdisc) manufactured with the same dimensions as the Compact Disc?
Soon we'll have three or four 120mm discs. Why not make the Blu-Rays a little wider, so there's no chance of them being inserted into a non-Blu-Ray device? (and the side benefit of a few more tracks == more space) Backward compatibility would be maintained, of course.
Is it just because it's cheaper to reuse some of the manufacturing equipment from the CD assembly lines?
// I will show you fear in a handful of jellybeans.
"Hopefully the movie industry and electronics manufacturers will see the same logic and avert a format war."
Why?
Look what happened with DVDs. Computer DVDs were pushed back for a long time while we waited for the movie industry to work out their copyright stuff. What if the computer industry and movie industry chose different standards this time? Wouldn't that allow the computer industry to move ahead with new technologies instead of waiting for the movie industry to catch up?
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Here is a good intro: http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/blu-ray.htm/
Battle Over Next DVD Format
Ko Sasaki for The New York Times
By KEN BELSON
Published: December 29, 2003
TOKYO, Dec. 28 - When Hisashi Yamada pulls back his bow, he thinks of only one thing: Hitting the bull's-eye 92 feet away.
"When I concentrate on the target," said Mr. Yamada, a champion archer who demonstrates his skill dressed in the traditional blue-and-white hakama, "I forget about everything else."
In his regular job, Mr. Yamada, a 60-year-old electrical engineer, is putting that same single-minded focus to work for the Toshiba Corporation, which is battling like a Japanese samurai warrior of old in a fight to the finish over whose format will be used in the next generation of DVD's.
The discs, which have been under development for several years, will hold four to five times more digital video and audio data than those now on the market. They are needed because broadcasters and movie studios are planning to take advantage of the spread of high-definition television screens to produce more digital programming with multitrack sound and much better resolution.
The new discs and their players will not be widely available until at least 2005, but already the world's largest electronics, computer and entertainment companies are embroiled in a multibillion-dollar fight over whose technology will become an industry standard.
The arguments are in many ways reminiscent of the Betamax-VHS showdown in the 1970's and the clashes over digital audiotape, compact discs and the original digital videodiscs released in 1997. As in those battles, technology is just the starting point for debates filled with emotion and industry politics.
Beyond the technical details like tracking speed and tilt is a serious tussle over how to divide - and protect - the billions of dollars in royalties from the licensing of this technology and the content sold on the discs. Also at stake is an effort by electronics makers to prevent emerging Chinese rivals and well-established Silicon Valley computer makers from making significant inroads into the home entertainment business.
"This is a very intense conflict over intellectual property," said Warren N. Lieberfarb, a driving force behind the development of the original DVD format. It has the added overlay, he said, "of the Japanese, Korean and European consumer electronics industries fearing China's aggressively emerging consumer electronics industry as well as the PC industry."
At the technological level, the combatants are divided roughly into two camps. Under Mr. Yamada's leadership, NEC and Toshiba have formed a group that has developed the HD (high definition) DVD, a disc that is 0.6 millimeter thick and made with machinery similar to that used for today's DVD's. On the other side is the 10-company Blu-ray Group, led by Sony and Matsushita, whose best-known brands are Panasonic and JVC. That group has developed a disc only 0.1 millimeter thick that can hold more data but needs additional investment to be produced. Information on the discs can be overwritten after it is recorded, something that is not possible with the HD DVD's now.
At 12 centimeters in diameter, both discs are similar to today's offerings, though Sony's discs are protected from fingerprints, dust and scratches by square plastic cartridges when not in use. The HD DVD group has developed a single lens that emits red and blue rays to read both current and next-generation discs. The Blu-ray machines require two separate lenses.
While the discs are still at least a year away from mass production, both sides are expected to be out in full body armor trying to win new allies at the big Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Jan. 8 through 11, where they are planning to show prototypes of their devices.
There are many battles left to fight, though, before these new DVD's hit the shelves, and it is entirely possible that the camps will never reach a consensus, forcing consumers, retailers, movie studios and others to adapt, at least ini
The movie industry beleives people won't buy their discs if "DVD" isn't in the name. That's why. Quality is irrelevant in this case.. ;)
I appreciate the humor of what you are saying, but I really see these paper DVD's being in more temporary things like magazines or cerial boxes or in mailings (imagine all AOL CD's on paper instead of what they do now!!!).
So for that reason I think it's pretty exciting and is a good reason to support it. I'm assuming the paper discs are relativley biodegradble though I have nothing to back that up with beyond the word "paper" and implications from that.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
In my various netflix mailings, I have seen some DVD's that looked like utah seen from space - but they still played. I think if you
re seeing those kinds of issues it would more likley be the player having problems.
I still find player oddnesses from time to time that I think are fringe implemntation differences of the DVD menu sysetm. U2's "elevation" is the worst in this regard, I've had problems with portions of it on a number of DVD players. I was kind of hoping with a new standard like Blu-Ray they had a better defined menu spec to go with it.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Talking about Blu-Ray & HD-DVD, didn't Steve Jobs say that Tiger (OS 10.4) is going to have QT with H.264 which is compatible with HD-DVD and how you can resize the window without any loss of resolution and other cool features. Now I donot know much about H.264 but if they can do that and cannot do with Blu-Ray than Blu-Ray has a disadvantage there.
And another thing, nice to see another fight between MS & Apple with BR & HD-DVD.
Wow, pitiful counter-spin mr HD-DVD member company president.
Blu Ray Wins (cause we already said so)
No, they said they wanted to outline why on three important criteria Blu-Ray did better, and use that conclusion to pick Blu-Ray as a winner. If Blu-Ray were really far ahead in all areas, do you not think that would be a good conclusion?
Technical
Blu Ray has larger capacity
Blu Ray doesn't have backwards compatability, but thats a feature not a weakness!
Blu Ray may have a lower production cost, we don't know for sure, but thats still a plus for Blu Ray
Neither Blu Ray or the other one (we try not to mention the losers name) are going to use catridges. Point for Blu Ray
You don't think twice the potential capacity is a little more important? One reason VHS won out was that it was a little longer, for example. And fitting a whole movie on a DVD was certainly nicer than the laserdisc flipping - even autoswitching.
How did they say backwards compat was a feature? Instead, if you read the article again you'll find instead that they said pretty much all Blu-Ray players and various part makers were making stuff that supported both standards, making the issue moot. How it that saying non-compat is a feature? Instead they are saying it's been worked around.
The rest is just kind of silly on your part since you seem to interpret a natural bias toward blue-ray even in the periods at the end of sentences.
Financial
Blu Ray group has 70 members, the HD DVD forum has 220 members, but we saw this poster somewhere that only had 47 companies in support of HD DVD. So Blu Ray wins!
The economic size of the Blu Ray members is bigger. Except for Microsoft. But you know. Microsoft may change its mind and support Blu Ray. Blu Ray wins this one as well! Wow go Blu Ray!
Hey, I'll take three pro basketball players and put them up against ten of your friends! I'm sure superior numbers alone are all that matter!
Microsoft support - yeah, they sure have whooped Sony!! Apart from taht whole PS2 market being an order of magnitude larger and all. And the point there was the Microsoft could ALSO support Blu-Ray in the OS. Do you think it unlikely to do so? Id so, why?
Commerical
Blu Ray has 30% of the commerical resellers market! HD DVD has 0%! It is quite obvious that the 70% currently undecided will chose Blu Ray, because we said it won already!
Hey, ever hear of momentum? If more players sign into the market, what do you think is the probabilty of ALL of them being HD-DVD at this point?
Furthermore compounded by the media industry being like a group of scared pigeons. They tend to flock. So if 30% of the industry is going one way, and you are a flightly brainless media exec trying to decide which format to go to, you choose.... ?
Compounded even FURTHER by media companies being burned by DIVX. Do you think many companies are going to go through THAT again? Not that HD-DVD is all that similar to the DIVX situation, just that it adds to their anxiety about making bad choices.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I just spent a few minutes trawling unsuccessfully on the Wal-Mart site to locate them, but they do exist. Basically, a stretchy piece of clear plastic sized to fit snugly on a CD and remain in place until removed. (My searches are coming up blank on the site kk.org/cooltools, too, and I'm sure I saw a review there. If not, maybe I'll buy some today and write one ;).
However, I swear they're real, I just can't swear that they work (because I've only seen them). A set of 5 costs $5, I think -- which sounds like a fair amount, since blanks are quite cheap, but if it's a disk you'd rather hang onto, a buck isn't that much.
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
Both formats have announced mandatory player support for:
MPEG-2
MPEG-4 AVC/H.264
VC-1 (aka Windows Media Video Advanced Profile)
So, a content creator can make a disc in either, and all players will support all three. Not a win for either format here.
As for encoder speed, one implementation, especially one in alpha, doesn't mean much. Since an encoder simply needs to make a legal bitstream, different encoders can vary hugely in speed. I certainly have MPEG-2 encoders that are more than 20x faster than other ones, or 10x faster than themselves when comparing slow, high quality mode and fast draft mode.
The really important thing is how fast it can decode the worst-case legal bitstream, since that determines how fast a computer or DSP is required for reliable playback.
My video compression blog
'BLUE' HAS AN 'E' IN IT!!!
Thank you. I feel better now.
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