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Microsoft, Intel back HD DVD over Blu-ray
raitchison writes "Reuters is reporting that after months of sitting on the fence in the battle over what will replace the venerable DVD that Microsoft and Intel have thrown their weight behind Toshiba's
HD DVD over the Sony's Blu-ray.
Better compatibility with existing DVD technology as well as lower cost were cited as reasons to back HD DVD.
While this is undoubtedly a significant blow for Sony in their efforts to establish Blu-ray as the next standard it's not likely to be the end of Blu-ray."
Better compatibility with existing DVD technology as well as lower cost were cited as reasons to back HD DVD.
Or to help their XBox sales against the PS3.
So when can I buy HD DVD pr0n?
I was Mr. Sony in the 90s (mini dis , vaio, etc) because I loved their technology. Now, slashdot:Microsoft::dada21:Sony.
Sony has to learn that single party closed standards won't exist for long. We won't see an open standard, but at least a consortium of different markets offers multiple profit-oriented groups some debate.
When members of a consortium debate one another, the debate is "how can I make more money?" But to make money they need not just a cost benefit, but a happy customer in the long run.
Sony alone only sees one customer base, never a good sample of need. Toshiba has two other hard hitters now, offering a larger and more varied customer base to figure out.
One scary thing: software + processor + media format giants can make the worst DRM imaginable. What if Sony pandered to Linux or OS X or just the PS3 market? Plus Sony has clout with the media distributers, whereas MS and Intel bite them in the ass because most "pirates" use MS and Intel products.
From TFA: They said the HD DVD format would make it easier for consumers to copy high-definition movies to computer hard drives. Suuuure.
TFA mentions commitments from media houses, but until I see it, I'm not believing it. If we'll have two formats, my parents will be the deciding factor, not me.
I'm too young to remember that format war, but I'm not young enough to learn the lesson:
Wait until a de-facto standard has emerged. Otherwise, its a crapshoot at best.
"We wanted to choose the format that has the highest probability of this market taking off," said Stephen Balogh, director of optical media standards and technologies at Intel.
When did probability amount to anything in marketing computer components. Either Microsoft and Intel supported them or they didn't. Those that weren't supported didn't do as well intitially.
Marketing has always won out over technical merit - period.
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
That's why I don't buy Sony, but we'll see how this one plays out.
This is such a tough choice for companies. It's more of a practical vs cutting edge thing. HD-DVD "technically" isn't as "good" of a format as B-R. The problem is that with production prices so high in comparison, people would rather buy something cheaper. I think the major issue at hand here is that you have half the industries supporting one and half supporting the other.
If it all goes to market, we're going to have to either have players that play both or two separate players. And you can imagine how confused non-techie people are going to get when their B-R disc doesnt work in their HD-DVD player.
Would anyone have guessed differently? Since MS and Sony are pitted against each other the consol wars their choice was made up for them.
Hello, in the PC market we all know how wonderfully horrible catridges work. Early CD drives with cartridges were slow and bad. DVD-RAM died a painful death, probably in some part thanks to DVD burners getting out quickly there after. While HD-DVD has less storage, I think the industry will find that users want backwards compatibility (something Blu-Ray lacks if I recall). And history isn't on Sony's side, afterall there were the losers in the Betamax-VHS battle, and some people would say that Beta was the better format.
"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."
Would HD DVD be a miss just like SACD and DVDA for audio? I don't think many people will find it appealing enough to invest in this technology for some more pixels on their screens. For data storage it is still interesting ofcourse.
jouwnieuws!
Fine, but what does the **AA think? They're ultimately the supervisors of new technology which must be built around Intellectual Property considerations.
People aren't going to jump on either the HD-DVD or Blue-ray wagon for at least a year or so. The first buyers will be the geeks and peeps with enough money. On top of that, most consumers don't have plasma displays or projectors (although a growing number do have HD-TVs and they're a common item at Wal-Mart. In a few years they'll probably phase out regular TVs just like 900Mhz phones phased out older cordless models).
The quality of existing DVDs is quite amazing and I think most people will be happy with it for a while. The question comes with compatibility. Consumers want to only have to buy one version of something. Will the HD-DVD/Blue-ray they purchase work at their friend's house?
Personally I like the Blue-ray standard. It's a massive amount of data crammed onto a single disc. It's interesting that the article states that "...said the HD DVD format would make it easier for consumers to copy high-definition movies to computer hard drives...". So will HD-DVD have a less restrictive DRM than Blue-ray or are we talking about media size again?
I doubt both standards will stick around like DVD-R/DVD+R, because as I said earlier, people only want one universal format for content they purchase. One will be here five years from now and another, like laser discs, will end up at your local used book store in huge bins selling for $5 a pop.
Tell that to Beta, Laserdisc, etc.
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
The lowest cost and most compatible format would be to stay with existing DVD technology!
If you are creating a new technology that will require new hardware and new investments in manufacturing, why make it an incremental step? There are so many players in this format war I can't keep up, but I know that Blu-Ray is supposed to be higher capacity and will prevent HD movies from requiring a media change (no one liked that with Laser Disc flipping half way through a movie).
I say if the industry is going to expect the public to pay for a format change, we get a complete change, not some semi-compatible almost change that will require yet another change for additional capacity far sooner than the alternative that exists today.
Plus, I read that HD DVD is hitting timing issues that mean it won't be out until Blu-Ray anyway.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
That's just my impression from these two articles...feel free to add a counterpoint. The article did mention Blue-Ray disputes the cost and time-to-production arguments, and some major Hollywood studios back it.
Microsoft has always been in the HD-DVD camp for obvious reasons (Xbox360), so the only real news here is that Intel has jumped on with HD-DVD. Who cares? Intel is a large company, sure, but does anybody really care which optical storage format a SEMICONDUCTOR company supports? This sounds to me like Microsoft begging anyone it can to support their format of choice.
Or just because it's easier to do such things would make it easier to enforce DRM and security measures on users?
Of course they're making their big, benevolent public pronouncements based upon their own strategic interests. In Microsoft's case they're probably doing some short-term thinking about the xbox 360, and how they want to undermine the Bluray capabilities of the upcoming PS3. And who cares about what Intel thinks about DVD drives? Last I looked Intel had close to 0 influence or marketshare in that space. I suspect that someone at Microsoft called up Intel and called in a favour.
Sony are a lame duck when it comes to standards and formats: Betamax, Memory Stick, Minidisc. The fact that BluRay was backed by Sony was enough to kill it dead. You could knock me over with a feather at the advent of this news..
Surely the powers that be can see that a unified front is better for everyone. One reason the take up of DVD was so fast was that it was a single format. Any disc would work on any player, whether it was a budget model or a high end one. People remeber the VHS-BetaMax fiasco, who is going to upgrade their kit and more importantly their DVD library until the winner of the war stands alone? I can see the appeal of upgrading if the tech is better, but i am not going to get stuck with the losing format so i will not be upgrading until then, and i suspect i am not alone.
So Apple is supporting Blu-Ray, while Intel is supporting HD-DVD. Discuss!
Slashdot's first reaction to VMware
This puts Intel and Apple on opposite sides of the fence! Does this mean that the x86 Apple will be HD? or will Intel make a box that will contain BD? Maybe Apple will have support for HD, but not have it stock in their systems. Ohh well. I was hoping BD would eventually "win," this looks more distant now.
-Z
Don't forget their power in the consumer electronics arena!!!
If they want, they can just dig their heels in and stick with Blu-Ray...
I mean, look what happened when they wanted the world to use Betamax, they...
er..
When are the HD-DVD players going on sale??
DVD Dual-layer media is still expensive and rare after ~2 years. How common and cheap will next generation media be? The cheaper, more available media could be the deciding factor.
A lot of articles quote 'cost-saving' as a factor in HD-DVD over Blu-ray. Where exactly are those cost savings? In media or player production? Factory retooling? R&D?
Let's see... sure Sony sells laptops with Intel chips and the Windows OS, *BUT*, they also sell a PS3 with a new cell processor. So let's see... their PS3 competes directly with the XBox and their processor competes directly with Intel's (while also being better and based on open standards). So, Intel & M$ have thrown their weight at the *other*, non-Sony standard. Hello??? MkFly???
XBOX 360 doesn't include a HD-DVD....maybe a future version will (XBOX 720?), but no HD-DVD on the model they are selling this season.
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change."
MS and Intel have a lot of weight. This will probably cause both standards to be released, and then the superior marketing will win.
With MS and Intel backing, superior marketing will likely be HD-DVD, and again we will be left with the inferior format.
Playstation 3 will have Blu-Ray built in. MS didn't put HD-DVD into Xbox 360, it uses standard DVD. It's basically "game over" once the PS3 is released. HD-DVD doesn't stand a chance.
Can firmly support BLURAY.
:)
We may not always be 100% sure in our positions, but we are 100% sure they are the opposite of Microsoft's
The price is always right if someone else is paying.
Is it not possible to have an HD/Blu-ray capable drive in much the same way we have CD/DVD drives? I suspect that this will be that way that drive manufacturers will go, although CD and DVD are not exactly competing media formats. Will MS/Sony try to muscle drive makers into offering only one or the other?
useless sig advice - Read Nabokov.
This article over at Ars Technica, while somewhat one sided has some more information.
Another format war, just what none of us want. It is likely that neither format will take off until drives that do both are common. Blu-Ray has more capacity, and more capacity should mean better, but noooooo!
How ya like dat?
when hell freezes over. even when their older proprietory standards (beta, minidisc) weren't adopted by 3rd parties, they still matured well under sony's care. they ending up as strong competitors to the more open standards like VHS and CD's. BetaSP gave way to digi BETA, and mini disc capacity is getting larger and larger while CD's remain the same. minidiscs allowed people to record digial music long before cd burning came to the masses.
They won't be able to squash the BluRay Consortum... look at their board of directors...
Apple Computer, Inc.
Dell Inc.
Hewlett Packard Company
Hitachi, Ltd.
LG Electronics Inc.
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.
Mitsubishi Electric Corporation
Pioneer Corporation
Royal Philips Electronics
Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
Sharp Corporation
Sony Corporation
TDK Corporation
Thomson Multimedia
Twentieth Century Fox
Walt Disney Pictures
FanFictionRecs.net
Since the Xbox360 ships with a 12x dual-layer DVD-ROM (http://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox360/factsheet.htm) I'm not quite sure where the idea came from that HD-DVD is the Xbox360 format of choice. Could it be, just maybe, that MS (and Intel) actually believe that HD-DVD is the better format? Why is it always a battle of game systems? It's not like anyone needs new game systems, I mean, World of Warcraft is already out.
While these two formats compete some will wonder whether it makes sense to buy DVDs at all. Hi-def PVRs are starting to roll out and it is just a matter of time before you can get hi-def on demand.
I can buy a Sony DVD-ROM drive right now, I cannot find an Intel or Microsoft DVD-ROM drive.
Exactly how does Microsoft and Intel "backing" a format affect my choice in buying a new-generation DVD drive?
The full article is here:
http://www.cdfreaks.com/article/186/3
They said the HD DVD format would make it easier for consumers to copy high-definition movies to computer hard drives.
Two things:
1) Copying content from media to a file is purely software. Neither DVD format should be much harder than the other. This is not a valid point.
2) Since when is copying movies to hard disks OK with large corporations? Again, this is not a valid point.
"I reject your reality, and substitute my own!"
Either way, I'll have to buy the White Album again.
...will be PS3 versus Xbox 360 with HD-DVD, and I think Sony will have the upper hand. The more Xbox 360s sold now without HD-DVD, the less sales of HD capable players. Personally, I think the HD games/HDTV combo will draw a lot of people from high-end PC gaming. 1920x1080 resolution? Hook me up a keyboard and a mouse, and it is a PC game without all the hassle of a PC. Note: I didn't say everyone buying an Xbox360/PS3 will, I'm saying those that spend $$$ on a Geforce 7800 and 1600x1200+ screen might.
My gameplan:
1. Get 1920x1080 LCD screen (Westinghouse, Benq has some nice ones in the < 2000$ range)
2. Get PS3 for games
3. With OO 2.0 final and games covered by PS3, ditch Windows
4. Switch screen input between PS3, (HD?)TV and Linux desktop. Maybe a Media Center/PVR (myth box) for good measure.
It's ironic that Sony (the master of proprietary formats) should be the one helping me switch to OSS, but that's the way it looks now. Of course, this is a bit off still...
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I for one, do not welcome either format. OK, get more data on the discs for console gamers and such, but as far as movies and films go, plain old DVD has more than enough quality for me. I am just wanting to know if there is going to be a point in my lifetime that I will convert to something other than DVD unless I am forced. Is Blu-Ray or HD DVD going to be a step up in actual quality on my current TV and home theater? I doubt it. The conversion from VHS to DVD was needed and gave us more quality and features. Neither of these formats will give us the same kind of bump that DVD gave us, so why convert to a new format so soon after DVD? All I can figure is that all the money makers want some hardcore DRM.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/27/intel_ms_h ddvd/
"Better than Blu-ray because... er... it is, say firms"
"So here's the technical nitty gritty before we drop the graphs n' charts on ya. Both systems use the same kind of 405nm wavelength blue-violet laser, but their optics differ in two ways. Since the Blu-ray disc has a tighter track pitch (the single thread of data that spirals from the inside of the disc all the way out--think grooves on a 12-inch vinyl single vs. an Elvis Costello full-length album), it can hold more pits (those microscopic 0s and 1s) on the same size disc as HD DVD even with a laser of the same wavelength.
The differing track pitch of the Blu-ray disc makes its pickup apertures differ, however--0.65 for HD DVD vs. 0.85 for Blu-ray--thus also making the two pickups technically incompatible despite using lasers of the same type. HD DVD discs also have a different surface layer (the clear plastic layer on the surface of the data--what you get fingerprints and scratches on) from Blu-ray discs. HD DVD use a 0.6 mm-thick surface layer, the same as DVD, while Blu-ray has a much smaller 0.1mm layer to help enable the laser to focus with that 0.85 aperture.
Herein lies the issues associated with the higher cost of Blu-ray discs. This thinner surface layer is what makes the discs cost more; because Blu-ray discs do not share the same surface layer thickness of DVDs, costly production facilities must be modified or replaced in order to produce the discs. A special hard coating must also be applied to Blu-ray discs, so their surface is sufficiently resilient enough to protect the data a mere 0.1mm beneath--this also drives the cost up. The added benefit of keeping the data layer closer to the surface, however, is more room for extra layers.
Still with us? No? Blu-ray discs are more expensive, but hold more data--there, that's all."
look at minidisk, UMD, and memory stick. Sony LOVES having it's own standard that doesnt work with anything else.
Check out this opinion piece about the manufacturing costs of Blu-ray vs HD-DVD. It definitely makes more sense to create HD-DVDs than Blu-ray discs. http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/hardware/ne xt-gen-dvd.ars
They also said that HD DVDs would be cheaper to produce, resulting in lower prices for consumers.
Fantastic. That must be why DVDs are cheaper than VHS and CDs are cheaper than audio cassettes, and online music is almost free. I am sure that the only price difference between the HD disks and DVDs will be the marginal cost.
Intel does not make DVD players for consumers. In fact, the most consumer friendly company that will be a customer of Intel's next year is Apple...and Apple backs Blu-Ray.
Microsoft may pay lip service to HD-DVD, but they won't be shipping the Xbox360 with an HD-DVD drive. That is why many people online are tagging the eventual phenomenon of the Playstation3 oblitterating the Xbox360 as "getting Dreamcasted" considering Sega launched the Dreamcast early in an effort to get to the market first before the Playstation2 and consequently shipped without a DVD drive. Many consumers held out in purchasing the Dreamcast because the lack of the DVD drive, especially since Sega kept on vacilating in public comments whether an updated Dreamcast with a DVD drive would ship later. It did not happen and the platform crumbled. Similarly, Microsoft backed DVD+R over the objections of the DVD Forum and their annointed standard DVD-R yet DVD+R did not usurp that standard and the whole issue became moot when combo drives eventually shipped.
Sony backs Blu-Ray, and it will be standard in the PS3. Since Sony backs Blu-Ray, so does Sony (Columbia & Tri-Star) Pictures, Sony Pictures controlled MGM, Disney, and 20th Century Fox. Yes, Paramount, Warner Home Video (Warner, Turner, New Line) and NBC Universal supposedly support HD-DVD but all parties are holding off releasing any titles for this upcoming holiday season. Furthermore, the only strong supporter amongst the three is Warner because they wish to preserve the patents they hold on the original DVD format which means they would still be receiving royalties on HD-DVD whereas their payments would be greatly reduced if the industry moves to backing Blu-Ray (which is one of Sony's motivations).
Truth be told, HD-DVD is only good for the studios because they don't have to buy new equipment to press the discs. It is not better for Joe Public because HD-DVD has less storage capacity than Blu-Ray and consequently, HD-DVD will not support 1080p due to its limitations. I am excusing the fact that currently Blu-Ray has more DRM capabilities than HD-DVD and thus is less friendly to the public because I believe the HD-DVD format will quickly adopt similar technologies in an effort to woo fence-sitting content owners.
I hope Microsoft's explicit backing of HD-DVD will encourage Sony & Company to dump AV-1 (Windows Media 9) as an official codec supported by Blu-Ray because H.264 is superior and thus dumping the other codec would reduce royalty payments and thus encourage the equipment and discs to be marketed cheaper to the consumers whereas HD-DVD will foolishly retain AV-1 because Toshiba is sucking up to Microsoft despite the codec offering much less capabilities than H.264. Let those foolish enough to purchase HD-DVD products pay the "Microsoft tax" for inferior performance.
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
The formats wars never really ended. While ultimately betamax died out in the consumer world, in professional circles it continued (and is still used in many quarters). Ditto for the DVD format wars. Name your poison -R, +R, +RW, -RW or Ram. Most drives now on the market support all or most formats. While blu-ray may be different than HD-DVD, you will ultimately see dual drives (and burners) if blu-ray makes it to market.
This is a fights for dollars at the corporate level. As a consumer you can either wait for a dominant consumer player, or for a multi-unit. As for game machines, you buy those for the games you want to play and not necessarily for the label on the box.
Neither format uses catridges! How many times does this need to be said?
http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2004Mar/gee20040 301024062.htm
Microsoft's codec is one of the 3(!!!) codecs that HD-DVD manufacturers will have to license and support in their players. As far as I know, they've backed it for a while now. Of course they don't like Blu-ray, since no one's going to license their codec if it dominates the market.
http://www.masturbateforpeace.com/
Microsoft officially chooses HD-DVD over Blu-Ray Tuesday September 27, @08:36AM Rejected
The NSA: The only part of the US government that actually listens.
I hope the HDDVD vs. Blu-Ray format war wages on for a decade, and as a result, next generation DVD technology in general fizzles out.
This will allow us to continue enjoying the current DVD technology, whose weak DRM has already been cracked. At the very least, it will allow DVD Jon a few extra years to break the next generation of DRM.
If one of these two new technologies "wins" in the marketplace, then the industry could move to it en masse, effectively locking the free world out of its use. Do you want that to happen? I don't.
Don't buy either one. Encourage the format wars. And of course, keep supporting the Electronic Freedom Foundation. In fact, take the money you might have spent on an HDDVD or Blu-Ray player, and donate it to the EFF instead. It will be money well spent.
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
Silly people. Blu-Ray wins because it's a way cooler name. End of thread.
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
"Who cares? Intel is a large company, sure, but does anybody really care which optical storage format a SEMICONDUCTOR company supports?"
The average consumer cares. You could say that 4 out of 5 Dentists reccomend HD-DVD to their family's and the consumer's would buy it. Perception is what matters, not truth.
I have yet to see someone mention that HD-DVD is _much_ faster than Blu-Ray, in the gaming industry that means lower load times, which are a _huge_ problem. Besides, who here really wants to see sony get supported anyway? I have seen too many people screwed over with their crappy low-quality products (think playstatiom 2 and anti-aliasing).
What day is it? Could you please tell me?
It's like the Betamax all over again.
Ryan - http://www.thecosmotron.com/
In approximately three to four years, there will be 40 million households with Blue Ray players, thanks to the PS3. As the Xbox 360 does not ship with HD-DVD (and I'm assuming neither will the Revolution), the Blue Ray format will not be facing any significant competition for the next half a decade while growing the userbase exponentially.
The HD-DVD format simply cannot win. Even if a whole slew of non-game consumer electronics ship with HD-DVD drives, they will not be able to compete with the PS3 userbase, even collectively.
As soon as the PS3 launches, expect much of the Sony film library (which is sizable) to be released for Blue Ray. You will see a ton of advertising for films released in this format. Thus, there will be a player for these discs, and there will be a large film library to make use of this format.
Blue Ray is the future, whether you like it or not. If you're an investor, I would suggest to you right now to put as much money as you can into the companies that are supporting this format and dump stock is those who are backing HD-DVD.
UNIX: A computer user is defined as a programmer. WINDOWS: A computer user is defined as a consumer.
...but does anybody really care which optical storage format a SEMICONDUCTOR company supports? The average consumer would. The average consumer just has brand-name recognition and sees it with a new thing. To them, HD-DVD is a new technology, and Intel is a technology company. To them it doesn't matter that Intel has little to no actual interest in the product. Unless, that is, it comes laced with DRM...
Wow, Microsoft is backing HD-DVD. So what does that mean?
Neither Intel nor Microsoft make boxes diretly. Do you think Microsoft will explicity break blu-ray support from vendors that include said drives? No. Furthermore why would consumers choose an HD-DVD burner when they could have a blu-ray burner which holds more data.
When sony releases the PS3, suddenly millions and millions of people will have blu-ray players, thus jump-starting the sale of media in that format. At the same time or slightly before Microsoft will (I'm sure) release an HD-DVD version of XBox 360. But even if they release said 360 with a special HD-DVD version of Halo 4, they still are not going to sell nearly so many HD-DVD 360 units because the hard-core fans will all have base 360 models and be reluctant to shell out for a new 360 so soon after launch (less than a year at that point).
So the scenario is that the PS3 releases selling an order of magnitude more units than all other HD-DVD consumer players combined (since it has dual use, playing games in addition to blu-ray discs) then the media sales follow, which lead to the virtuous circle of more media coming in Blu-Ray as sales in that format take off. Movie studios are not stupid and will release movies in formats that are selling.
If the XBox 360 had released with HD-DVD players there might be a real fight. As it stands there's simply no contest when one format is destined to sell an order of magnitude more players so early in the adoption cycle.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I think you are incorrect. People all ready invest in technology to get HDTV because HDTV is that much better than SDTV and the same can probably be said for HD DVD.
As long as the drives exist, both Microsoft Windows and Intel based PCs will support both of these formats.
.. can switch from providing Blu-Ray drives to HD-DVD drives at the drop of a hat. And their customers can change to HD-DVD drives reasonably easily as well.
When comparing the stakeholders in this battle, the PC manufacturers (and their customers) are the least influential. The content providers and consumer electronics manufacturers are far more important, as they will be much more reluctant to switch directions once they have made a decision on which way they will go.
The camp that gets these companies on board and producing faster and cheaper will be the winner in this battle.
Look at the tomato! Isn't it sad? He can't dance! Poor tomato!
Your mastery of English fails it.
When all is said and done, HD-DVD will win. Based off of ONE reason. People will think BLU-RAY is something new and weird, but HD-DVD is just a new version of DVDs. Consumers are stupid, which makes HD-DVD the default winner. It's the one consumers are going to know what it is and buy it.
Consumers would benifit most from a 'dual support' system. From what I understand, Blu-ray uses a very intense holographic type system to allow the higher amount of storage. There won't be any 'blu-ray' consumer burners for a LONG time (if ever). Where as HD-DVD could have consumer burners pretty quickly.
Why not allow for something like toshiba is doing where you could have a BLU-RAY reader and HD-DVD reader/burner?
If that isn't the solution, consumers are going to suffer. One format will win in the end (remember beta vs vhs) and a group (either HDDVD or Blu-ray) will be left with a bunch of worthless media down the road (ie. beta).
if no one is going to go to Blu-ray, then who cares if the PS3 has it?
Ahh, but you know Sony is going to sell millions upon millons of units very quickly just based on past console success alone (even if the initial games are not all that special).
So that means suddenly you have millions of people with Blu-Ray players, vs perhaps a few tens of thousands with (still expensive) HD-DVD players. If any kind of decent percentage of PS3 owners buy Blu-Ray media, sales in that format are going to be much better.
To say no-one is going to buy Blu-Ray is to ignore how many people will buy the PS3 regardless of Blu-Ray support, but then balk at buying HD-DVD because they already have an HD player in the PS3.
There's a very real argument to be made that the PS2 substantially increased the rate of adoption for DVD players. I know a lot of people for who the PS2 was the first DVD player they had - the PS3 looks to simply follow the same pattern. History would indicate it will be a success especially with the XBox not releaseing an HD-DVD model until later (undoubtedly at the same time as the PS3).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If any more major Hollywood studios jump off the HD DVD bandwagon and join the BD camp then I suspect that will probably decide the winning technology. Consumers will go for the medium with the most and best film titles. The feature sets of both technologies will result in a similar experience for consumers, or at least at first until the authors can figure out how to really get the best out of the platform. Personally I think BD's use of Java is a bit silly - lots of flexibility and power, but DVD authors aren't programmers.
All of this is a moot point. Consumers will not be buying the next-gen DVD discs for the following simple reasons:
1) DVD has not even been in the market for ten years. It came out basically in 1997. People are *just now* buying more DVDs than VHS. I think people know the industry is just trying to put out a new format to get them to buy the same movies all over again.
2) The HD-DVD does not offer enough benefits over DVD. The transition from VHS to DVD was easy (better picture clarity, form factor, don't have to rewind), but the advantage of HD-DVD over DVD is just better resolution. Most idiots look at a DVD playing on a plasma and say "wow, HD!".
--- witty signature
Does this mean that the linux crowd will insist on supporting Blu-Ray?
As others have pointed out, the fatal problem with (any) DRM is that all keys have to be accessible from the same host. Which means, sooner or later (probably sooner) it will be cracked.
Evolution is a fact. Darwinism is a joke.
On cost, I would note that media costs are independant of sale prices. That's why CD's are still so expensive.
On manufacturing costs, that is a good point but with millions of PS3 players being around and sold at cut-rate prices that negates the advanatge there.
On speed, true HD-DVD will be in first but in smaller quantities - and since the PC market will really be backing both players (no reason why a consumer can't buy either one and have it work with a computer) I think a lot of people would opt for the formayt with substantially more storage - Blu-Ray. I see no reason to get an HD-DVD burner when Blu-Ray burners are so close. I'd rather have higher storage capacity even if the media costs a bit more. In fact even if the media were twice as much to store 1.4x the amount of data I'd still prefer it as I really want to lower the number of discs required for backup of large HD's.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
www.highdefxxx.com
not that I'd watch any of it, I just shot and edited it
Take a look lower at the list of companies in the Blu-Ray consoritum. It is substantial and really a more impressive overall list than the HD-DVD camp.
Blu-Ray is hardly a Sony solo effort, and is technically superior to boot. If one had been more open with less DRM I would say a choice could be made based on that but from the DRM standpoint both suck equally; for data backup from a computer Blu-Ray holds more and is a clear winner.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Since when, in the RIAA/MPAA world, has "cheaper to produce" ever manifested as "lower prices for consumers"?
The media cartels said the same thing about tapes vs. CDs.
There are rumors that a future version of the Xbox 360 will ship with an HD-DVD drive.
I thought the reason Microsoft loved HD-DVD was because it already had movie studios willing to make the discs using their VC-1 codec. Googling for clarifation, I see that both formats support the codec so perhaps the only thing MS has to lose is the current support for their codec on HD-DVD.
The winner of the format wars will be determined by which format gets hacked successfully. When that happens, word will spread and there will be a rush to purchase that technology. The DVD player became popular because everybody's little brother figured out how to copy a storebought movie on the PC. To share the movie with the family, the family goes out and purchase a DVD player.
Whether M$ chooses HD-DVD or Blu-ray, who cares? Why don't we ask why they need to "choose" anything? We haven't reached the end of DVDs by any means. There are very few people indeed who would be able to notice the increases in resolution and quality that Blu-ray or HD-DVD could offer. As a data storage medium, they are intrinsically important, but there are few who need to store more than 8.5 gig of data on a single disc. However, as a media storage medium, they are a poor attempt of the movie industry to recover after their pathetic CSS encryption on DVD's was cracked. Why else would they be in such a hurry to get a product and new standard out in the market? They naively believe that, this time, they'll make a format that is uncrackable!...and we the consumer gets to pay for it as they phase out DVDs in favor of this new unneeded format.
I figured size mattered up until that article a few weeks ago that said that Blu-Ray players will have to "phone home" to report usage and get permission to play every disc. Sounds like !$#%^ DiVX (the original one, not the kewl new video file format) all over again. Any player that works that way is a loser in my book, and I won't touch it with a 10-foot pole. Getting a hot new game console shouldn't even be enough justification to put up with that shit, if you care about your civil rights.
Now if they mess up HD-DVD the same way, then I don't know what to say... it's getting to be a longer wait each time, before the hackers get us back our fair use rights after having them temporarily stripped by any new technology. Besides the fact that the hackers have to work in places like Norway and Russia now because of the !@%%@#$ DMCA.
But I'm thinking maybe MS and Intel have decided that extreme DRM is not cool and maybe prefer the one that's less work to make it useful on PC's. So maybe it won't be quite so bad as Blu-Ray is turning out to be. Hopefully even if the movie discs end up totally fubar, at least we can use the writers for a bigger backup format. And if people in general don't want to quit buying DVD movies, then they will probably continue to be manufactured for a long time. If they make the DRM too tight on _both_ new formats, I bet that's what will happen.
I do not think it to be the case, but I had wondered if UMD discs were somehow Blu-Ray compatible.
Even if not, I can't help but think the PS3 will also read UMD discs making them a little more pracitcal. If they were really smart Sony would let you burn your own UMD media from the PS3 which would be pretty interesting.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I think the movies are remastered from the original source and not just DVD's - as noted you can REALLY see a difference between those HD movie feeds and the DVD's.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
People keep saying this over and over. Listen up: Boatloads of people will be buying a PS3. The success of the PS3 is almost assured. Therefore, those blu-ray discs will always be playable because new PS3s will be available until the PS4 comes along. Maybe HD-DVD will win on the content production side or maybe it won't. But the people who buy HD-DVD discs are the only ones taking any risk.
Cow Cube
Many movies being shown in HD are derived from the original Film. In fact, every saturday night premier of HBO movies are in pure HD. When I watched Star Wars: Attack of the Clones, I thought - wow. Also, recently WB premiered Lord of the Rings - Two Towers in HD - amazing.
It doesn't matter what the Xbox360 has; it only matters what Sony's upcoming PS3 has. PS3 has Blu-Ray, and MS wants to hurt Sony, so MS has backed HD-DVD.
Blu-ray will be more cost effective in the long run because it has a lot more capacity than HD-DVD. They could put a ton of content on Blu-ray disks and still have room for future expansion.
HD-DVD just isn't very impressive from a capacity standpoint. It could be obsolete in another five years, after its intro, then we'd be looking at another format soon anyways.
Micro$oft and Intel are the only big backers of HD-DVD. The backer list for Blu-Ray is far more impressive.
That was fixed long ago - read the link the other poster provided. Basically Blu-Ray is using a new coating that is almost impervious to scratches. You can even take steel wool to the discs now without harm... You can still bend or break them but everyday use should not scratch them. It also makes the format better for the rental market than DVD's.
Not sure but I think HD-DVD is also adopting the same coating.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
How about dropping the licensing costs. If HD-DVD gets picked, then sony not only fail to get any money, but also they will have to pay their competition for using their standard.
Count the money as lost, and spike their competitors' wheel while helping consumers. Drop the licensing costs.
Blu-Ray DVD players will ship with a Java VM. The interactive menus on Blu-Ray titles will be written in Java. I don't think MS is going to back a standard that puts a Java VM in everyone's living room.
Didn't Sony want to club MS to death with licensing costs? Something absurd like $130 per unit, right? I'd back the competing technology too.
I like the DVD format as much as any other geek. But I have to say, I'm not looking forward to this next generation of DVDs at all.
What does the consumer gain from Blu-Ray or HD-DVDs? Improvements in video quality that won't even be noticeable on 90% of TVs?
And what do consumers stand to lose? The next gen of DVDs are sure to have harsh DRM and artificially high prices. They'll be harder to back up or copy, because it'll take 5 DVD-Rs or half your hard drive to copy a single disk. And most annoying of all, if the manufacturers push the format hard enough, we'll all be FORCED to go buy new high-def drives/players to watch new movies, and they'll be pushing re-re-releases of all the older movies we've already paid for twice.
Frankly, I hope these next formats crash and burn harder than Laserdisk and Betamax combined. Let consumer demand drive the market, for once.
I'n not supprised if the get $$$ for every HD DVD produced in H.264 format, I'd back it too if they were paying me.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
thats fucked up.
And that's when the fun begins. The content providers have made known their intent to cripple players whose keys have been compromised, by revoking their keys on new media. The task for the free information counterculture becomes obvious - compromise and release as many keys for as many best-selling players as possible, to face the content providers with the choice of either abandoning their DRM aspirations or incurring the wrath of the proletariat.
Here is why HD-DVD is better according to MS and Intel...
----------------
Microsoft and Intel cited the following consumer and industry requirements of any successful next-generation optical format for high definition, which is reflected by what HD DVD delivers today:
- Managed Copy: A first for DVDs. Managed Copy is a guaranteed feature within HD DVD that gives consumers the freedom to make copies of their discs to a hard drive or home server, including Media Center PCs using Intel Viiv technology, and enjoy them in every room of the house over their home networks. HD DVD discs also will allow copies of the movie to be played on portable devices.
- "Future-proof" compatibility. Using proven HD DVD "hybrid disc" technology, a single disc can store both high-definition and standard-definition versions of a film, allowing consumers to immediately enjoy the standard-definition movies stored on these discs on today's DVD players, while HD movies can be replayed later on the HD DVD platform. This is an opportunity for consumers to buy discs at launch that future proof their collections -- in other words, helping assure customers that the discs they buy will remain viewable in the future.
- Proven low-cost, high-volume manufacturing. HD DVD discs use essentially the same manufacturing equipment as existing DVDs, meaning that production of HD DVD can ramp up easily and with lower costs.
- Superior capacity. HD DVD-ROM discs will offer dual-layer 30GB discs at launch, compared with BD-ROM discs, which will be limited to 25GB.
- Superior interactivity. HD DVD discs will offer greater interactivity using iHD technology, allowing for enhanced content, navigation and value-added functionality for high-definition films. For example, HD DVDs can offer advanced picture-in-picture capability so that other video, such as a director's commentary, could play on top of the movie.
- Superior format for notebook PCs. The compatibility of HD DVD with standard DVD facilitates and simplifies development of slim disc drives for integration in notebook PCs, one of the fastest-growing segments of the PC market.
Actually, this was taken out of context. The first list is the board members of Blu-Ray. The following is the list of HD-DVD board members.
Memory-Tech Corporation NEC Corporation Sanyo Electric Co.
Yep, just three, as opposed to the 16 board members of Blu-Ray. In comparison, the supporting member companies for BluRay total more than 119 members as opposed to the 100 for HD-DVD. Yes, both have a lot of support, but you were comparing apples and oranges, and it doesn't work that way. Try it on an even playing field next time. Blu-Ray has a much larger core of board members, and as you said, "some companies are in both sides". For a more detailed listing, see this site.
Microsoft Sucks, F/OSS Rocks. I get mod points now right?
I would at least give a point to reset that, to offset the bad mod if I had mod points. .....I think that makes sense?
Stay tuned for new sig...
On what axis do you consider Blu-ray to have superior performance?
Bear in mind that, at launch, HD-DVD will have higher capacity, since HD-DVD dual-layer is much farther along. So for at least as year, HD DVD will be at 30 GB while Blu-ray will be at 25 GB.
Also, for the case of movies, both formats are easily big enough for Return of the King: EE in full 1080p with multiple high bitrate audio tracks, etcetera.
Now, there might be reasons to like Blu-ray the physical format for other reasons, but they're both well beyond "good enough" for movies.
My video compression blog
Is this a case of the 'technically superior' product battling against the 'good enough, cheaper and backward-compatible' alternative?
Itanium vs. Opteron anyone?
ext3 vs. jfs/xfs/reiser?
Posted from my Android phone. Oh, I can change this? There, that's better...
HD-DVD and Blu-Ray will both die horrible deaths (if they are not already still born) because of DRM.
:-/
Everyone loving their shiny new HD-DVD drive in their system will sh1t themsleves when they discover that the PC has to call M$ everytime you want to play a movie on your PC.
It will be even funnier when some M$ lousy bug ridden server thinks your latest HD-DVD movie you just bought for $35 is pirated and decides to erase the firmware off your HD-DVD drive (thus permanently disabling it) because you have been labeled a pirate.
Yeah, it really makes a difference which format wins
-- Mean People Suck
(I *know* you know what Vivid is).
Let's face it: Americans pull out their wallet for the format with the best pr0n.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
They also have the broadcast market. That's the people that make television programs.They've already made this thing http://pro.sony.com.hk/product_showprod.php?path=f ormat,5,subformat,8,product,125&id=125, wich uses blue-ray, and a number of other products. And those hve sold pretty well.
In other words, they already have a market for blue-ray. It won't be killed by microsoft and intel. It might have less of an impact than it could but it'll still make syne a hefty wad of cash.
The Euclidean path integral over all topologically trivial metrics can be done by time slicing and so is unitary when an
One solution for this I've been thinking a lot about is using the Blu-ray and HD-DVD binary formats on a red-laser DVD-9 media. That would let high-end computers with today's hardware play the content back with a software player.
For a typical 2.25 hour feature, that would allow 8 Mbps video, with in 2-pass VBR looks quite good at 1080p24 with modern codecs. Not much for extras, but they could go on an extra disc.
Basic story - you could get about the same runtime in HD with modern codecs on today's media as you can get out of DVD. So LOTR: ROTK: EE would still need two discs for the feature. But in HD you could play today!
My video compression blog
I think Apple will move to Intel on this just like they did with the chips. Perhaps Intel will give them a financial incentive (ie lower chip prices) to make the change to the HD DVD format
Since when has Apple ever decided to change its opinion based soley on another companies opinion.
FanFictionRecs.net
Most peeps here look at the single companies involved and miss the main two issues in the Entertainment technology world:
1. Who can license and who can manufacture the technology
2. IT vs. CE philosophy
The traditional CE manufacturers are all in the BD camp and they fear two enemies:
Chinese manufacturers that can manufacture and sell for far less and who have destroyed the traditional CE business (think CD players for $500 in the 90s and $49 DVD players in the 00s).
They also fear Intel and Microsoft for bringing media technology to the PC. Their vision is to have a harddisk recorder with a BD slot and a 100Gig disk sell for $1000. In the PC world all this is manageable for $300.
So the CE camp prefer closed style platforms, signed Java code on encrypted engines, etc.... Something that should run on designated hardware, but not in software and protected, so the hardware cannot be done in low-cost countries such as China.
So... the morale of this is: Intel and MS will always follow what can be done in a CPU and where the rest of the hardware apart from a CPU and OS can be low-cost....
The CE camp wants higher hardware prices to protect their own manufacturing power (similar to any Western country)....
All the new drives that come out have a pretty slow read speed at first. CDs were 1x for years, DVD were 1x,2x, for a long time.
If the PS3 blu-ray is slow (1x or 2x), then it doesn't matter how much data it stores, it will provide irritating game play. I believe the Xbox 360's dvd drive can handle dual layer at 16x... its tiny compared to blu-ray, but could be much faster.
Does anyone know what the speed of the ps3 blu-ray drive will be? I think that could have an impact on people's impression of the technology, and potentially slow adoption.
except by now it'll have turned gray.
Science : Proprietary , Knowledge : Open Source
"What does the consumer gain from Blu-Ray or HD-DVDs? Improvements in video quality that won't even be noticeable on 90% of TVs?"
Same thing could have been said when going from vhs to dvd's. But its also higher quality sound. Lossless compression for dolby digital is a big plus.
"The next gen of DVDs are sure to have harsh DRM and artificially high prices."
Just like 1st gen dvds.
"They'll be harder to back up or copy, because it'll take 5 DVD-Rs or half your hard drive to copy a single disk."
Instead of the 6-7 cdroms or half of your HD when dvd's came out?
"And most annoying of all, if the manufacturers push the format hard enough, we'll all be FORCED to go buy new high-def drives/players to watch new movies, and they'll be pushing re-re-releases of all the older movies we've already paid for twice."
Just like now with normal dvd's. You don't HAVE to buy the new format if you don't want to. No one is forcing anyone to do anything.
I'm looking forward to hidef discs of some type. I hope blue-ray wins out. Everything that folks are stating now also applied years ago when dvd was brand new. Funny how people forget things like that. Going from low resolution of vhs to 480p of dvd's was a big jump. Going from 480p of dvd to 1080i of hidef dvd's is going to be another huge jump.
Actually, the audio is AC-3, aka Dolby Digital, in some souped up variants compared to what's on DVD. There are also lossless audio modes, which I personally think are a waste.
All the HD disc formats support H.264 (which has contributions from Apple, but is far from MAINLY developed by them), VC-1 (WMV9 Advanced Profile) and MPEG-2. As for VC-1 being underperforming, it does quite nicely compared to H.264 Main (they're neck in neck in compression efficiency in most implementations) and is more lightweight to decode. So VC-1 has the advantage of easier software player implementation for HTPC, for example.
However, I agree with your overall point that neither HD DVD or Blu-ray is truly a closed format. They're fully documented, but patent encumbered.
My video compression blog
MS & Intel are supporting HD DVD, but Dell & HP, that use their code & chips, and control around 55% of the market, are supporting Blu-Ray.
Is MS saying they'll actively break Blu-Ray drives in Vista? *That'll* drive migration up next year. Is Intel threatening to break Blu-Ray in their mainboards? How fast would Dell be on the phone to AMD? How much faster would HP dump Itanium? Gimme a break.
This one will, for better or worse, be decided by the studios bludgeoning one another into a common standard. I'm standing on the sidelines until then. I recommend you do the same.
If you want to see some samples of what we're talking about,
m g.torrent?1C6B407CD6671B2BB03F55C49D67CEB584A74D90
o ding+Tests_m2v.torrent?ABE9BEFF514525B8B0B4EE4FEEF 5681178B14F50
S C.ts.torrent?7C824F8B9AF6D35B4EE0B78F5B208EBD5F55A A30
Here's a test HD DVD I made with Apple's DVD Studio Pro 4. It plays back in Apple's DVD Player 4.6 on G5. I've heard folks have been able to get the video to play back as well on Windows, although there isn't an available player with UI yet.
http://216.99.212.233:6969/torrents/HD_DVD_TEST.d
Also, here's a test looking at what quality could look like with a hybrid HD-DVD/DVD, using MPEG-2 (obviously the HD quality would be better in a real title, using H.264 or VC-1, but it's not bad at all hear with a 10 year old codec). These use bitrates appropriate for a 2.5 hour movie with 448 Kbps audio.
http://216.99.212.233:6969/torrents/HDDVD-DVD_Enc
And lastly, here's a file I made of "The Island" trailer indicating the video and audio the HD disc formats could provide. It's ATSC compatible, and plays great in VLC on a reasonably high end machine.
http://216.99.212.233:6969/torrents/The+Island+AT
My video compression blog
I've nary seen anyone use their game console as a full time DVD player in the past several years in which they've had them. A couple people do, but most buy a seperate player because it's a pain in the ass using a game controller to use something that should be very simple.
Now, since Blu-Ray might be the only HD format disc available at the time of the PS3 launch, it might get a "first to market" advantage. There might be HD-DVD players already on the market by then, I don't know. First to market doesn't necessarily make a winner though.
I think it'll be the consumer players and their costs that make more of an initial impact, plus a lot of other little factors. Sure, the PS3 including Blu-Ray might help the standard a bit, but you make it sound like the PS3 has already decided the battle. We can never know this until the end. Obviously, it'll be the one with the more titles eventually.
I don't personally care which one 'wins'. They're both DRM infested crap. I mean, I'll end up with one just like everyone else, because we'll have no choice for HDTV discs. But I won't go as far as hoping one or the other is the one that becomes the major standard. (If anything, I think HD-DVD has an advantage because of the name, but that might be just as silly as the PS3 argument.)
As far as the PS3 is concerned, I'm not really interested anyways. Nor with the Xbox 360.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
Some mod on drugs (a Microsoft employee perhaps) moderated the above as troll, when it is obviously nothing of the sort.
I'm letting Netflix and Blockbuster decide. Whatever they choose to stock will be the player I choose to purchase.
helping assure customers that the discs they buy will remain viewable in the future
So does that mean they plan on releasing a player that won't play current generation dvds?
I used my PS2 as my only DVD player for quite some time after I got it, and it's still working today (I bought at launch). I would say the use of drives to watch movies would be far lighter than games, which uses the drive for much longer periods and with far more random access which would wear the drives out quicker.
If the drives can handle games, movie playing is not really an additional burden to speak of for them.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Managed Copy is a guaranteed feature within HD DVD that gives consumers the freedom to make copies of their discs to a hard drive or home server, including Media Center PCs using Intel Viiv technology ... to a hard drive or home server running Microsoft operating systems using Microsoft's strong DRM and Intel's hardware DRM support, I suspect they mean...
Just because Blu-Ray was going to support some networking aspect does not mean it is required for all players and all content.
To put it simply; requiring net access to play movies will kill the format. Sony and other companies know this.
Both formats support key revocation in new media. In short both of them are screwing you equally. So then; do not buy that DRM crippled media if you do not like it. Instead burn your own content on writable Blu-Ray discs and play from that on the PS3. Blu-Ray (and HD-DVD) are just storage mediums with DRM tacked on; You do not have to make use of it as simply put there is no way they are locking out user content. Sony is very eager for consumers to have reasons to buy the new, expensive, HD-DVD camcorders.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Depends on how serious Microsoft and Intel are.
The second Intel issues a new matching-dollars marketing campaign where the specs for the system include HD-DVD, or Microsoft adds HD-DVD to the "Made for Windows Vista" logo requirements, you'd see Dell and HP leave the Blu-Ray camp. With them would go everyone making optical drives for PCs, and the new DVD standard for computers will be locked into HD-DVD-compatible drives.
Hmmm....
Microsoft and Intel -- computer companies.
Sony -- entertainment company.
How about this: Hollywood can release movies on Blu-ray. The computer industry can use HD DVD for its data format. Then they can't make us pay those stupid taxes on blank media by claiming that we're pirating their stuff.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
For consumer-level movie viewing, there will be no market for either of the new formats. This is like the question of whether SACD or DVD-Audio was going to replace CDs. The answer was neither. Internet distriubution did, or at least is in the process of doing so. Blu-Ray and HD-DVD may find niche markets among "videophiles", but these formats are both going to end up being next-generation DVD-ROM formats for data. Even if mass-market internet-based movie distibution were not viable (and i think it will be soon), the average Joe doesn't perceive the existing DVD movie format as lacking enough to make him go out and buy the "next great thing".
There are 0x40000000 types of people: those who understand 32-bit IEEE 754 floating point, and those who don't.
Based off of ONE reason. People will think BLU-RAY is something new and weird, but HD-DVD is just a new version of DVDs. Consumers are stupid, which makes HD-DVD the default winner.
Doesn't that give Blu-Ray the advantage? Wouldn't consumers rather buy something new, instead of yet another DVD player?
Engadget also has coverage of the plans.
One of the *VERY* bad things about blu-ray is that If you play a legal dvd after watching "pirated" content, software on the disc can upgrade your player's firmware to disable the hack. That is just totally not cool, it's bad enough that data is encrypted with the "advanced access content system" and the whole watermark thing, but updating firmware without the end user being asked... totally not cool.
If there were any practical alternative to buying Blu-Ray for backups I would use it.
But nothing else matches the size, convienince, and cost benefits of discs.
Basically if there's nothing else like it, I can be annoyed by having to support DRM and thus raising the cost of the thing I am buying. However that aspect is irrelevant if my day to day use of the thing is not hampered by DRM.
In my opinion though boycots (which are what you are really proposing) are incredibly stupid, and accomplish nothing. What will change if you or I do not buy these players? Nothing except it's harder for me to back up things. In very few cases can enough people get together to make a boycot work, but for something like this there is no practical way for a boycot to succeed.
So then how to fight DRM when a boycot wlll not work? Simple; marginalize the DRM. Help people download movies and burn them to discs (I see that as a form of civil disobedience). Support media sold on Blu-Ray that does not take advanatge of the DRM (just as there are regionless discs today). Make use of the format for personal data storage. Support players that eliminate some aspect of the DRM (do you think Europe will accept region coded players? Think again! HD-DVD is going exactly nowhere until the region free players come out there, and then anyone can get them).
You need to think of ways to make a fight effective rather than just whining and ditting there with your thumb up your nose loudly proclaiing how stupid everyone on earth is for buying into the format. You are supporting DRM indirectly through ineffective vectors of attack.
Think of judo, use the weight of the money they have against them. Money is a powerful tool but also blinding to those that wield it.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So it doesn't really matter to me which one anyone goes with. Catch-22.
On top of that, Sony has been making some really poor marketing decisions, as of late. I cannot tell you the last good product they produced...I think the Walkman was their last decent one. All the audio amplifiers, cd players, headphones.
Wait. Isn't the "Trinitron" their design? That was pretty good for monitors and TV's. I was wrong. My bad.
The Trinitron tube was their last decent product.
"Superior capacity. HD DVD-ROM discs will offer dual-layer 30GB discs at launch, compared with BD-ROM discs, which will be limited to 25GB."
That's straight BS. That is to say, it's hands down false. Single layer Blu-Ray disks are 25; Double layer is 50, and TDK has actually developed a 100 GB prototype for Blu-Ray. A double layer HD-DVD is just 5 more than a single layer Blu-ray. So fuck you, MS and Intel. Goddamn liars.
The second Intel issues a new matching-dollars marketing campaign where the specs for the system include HD-DVD
Sure, but unless Intel starts making HD-DVD drives, or the HD-DVD consortium hands them a big fat check, they have zero incentive to do so.
Interesting that Apple are firmly in one camp whereas Intel are quite solidly in the other...
Neither of these companies are the primary force behind either of the respective products, but with them recently jumping into bed together, I wonder if one of them will "Switch" =)
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
This guy must have been TRYING to get it wrong. How could anyone be so incredibly ignorant that they get absolutely everything wrong?
/. already. CmdrTaco, are you listening?
Please stop these moderators in M2. We're getting way too much crap moderation on
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Well if you read what I said it would be a FINANCIAL incentive in terms of the Intel chips and perhaps other components. Yes, not on the opinion, but on financial pressure....I think they will do the same on the iTunes/record company pricing contracts which are due to expire. They will bow to financial/contract pressure and increase the prices. Look at what has happened to FireWire vs. USB. They've moved towards the Windows/Linux USB model and become more integrated to better compete.
This very well may be the last optical format war. By the time there is need for a new one, the net should be fast enough, and availability should be ubiquitous.
A live net uplink is also the foundation for the best DRM possible, by the way.
I assume the key phrase here is 'at launch'.
The task for the free information counterculture becomes obvious - compromise and release as many keys for as many best-selling players as possible, to face the content providers with the choice of either abandoning their DRM aspirations or incurring the wrath of the proletariat.
I can't wait to see the angry mobs of people returning devices at Circuit City because the new movie they just bought won't play on their model player. YOU try explaining to them how this is "protecting them from the evil pirates."
Good times will be had by all.
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I think the concerns about the HD-DVD versus Blu-Ray formats may be true in the past, but now that TDK has developed a new, nearly-scratchproof plastic for optical discs, when Blu-Ray arrives in the USA in 2006 they won't need the disk caddy protection that Blu-Ray discs sold in Japan need now.
As such, since both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray can use essentially an improved variant of the DVD+/-R drive mechanism, who's to say that by the end of 2006 a company like Plextor would offer a combo drive that supports both formats using ATA-100 or Serial ATA interfaces? That would mean by 2007 we would see console players from a number of companies that play back either format, meaning there is no real advantage to either format.
This somes up the corporate world so well. Its not about the best standard for the consumer or the best standard for the media its about providing people with a cost effective solution even if the product is inferoir. At the end of the day the industry ends up worse off because we then have to trade in all our products again in a few years when HDTV runs out. I doubt that the HDTV standard will have the same life cycle that the CD has had over the last few years especially as we are so interested in space for media and graphics. I find it even more amusing that its another case of Intel and Microsoft going with inferior technology just look at many of the Microsoft Products and the pentium 4 processors.
Everything you just said applies equally as much to Microsoft which this whole slashdot article is about. In addition to pushing their own proprietary formats and not following set standards, ms is also notorious for taking credit for other organisations work (ms tcp/ip in windows anyone?), derailing standards (opengl) and changing their own implenmentation of a standard so its not a standard anymore (ms java, html, etc).
You make it sound like everyone else is backing the 'other standard' while only sony is backing blu ray when blu ray has the most support and hd-dvd (the only other feasible next gen disc format rival) has far fewer. If you set your bias for sony aside for a minute you may realize that it is ms here that is not following the next gen disc format that has the most support. Seems to me like ms trying to derail a 'standard' again.
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Anyone know if HD-DVD will only be usable with an online connection? That was a major downer for me when I heard that was to be an included requirement in all Blue-Ray players. So much for watching DVD's on a portable player somewhere (airplanes, in the park, in the car...wherever...).
...*yip*...not that they ever make anything that seems to appeal to my tastes, but that's not the point!). When I found about the online verification nonsense...BluRay became "Evil-blue-ray-of-death" in my mind....not that I see things in black and blue or anything. (!?non-seq!).
It's bad enough they don't let you backup the media and make the media extremely delicate/prone to damage (not to mention the "manufacturing defective DVD's, that just delaminate and die over time), but now they will tell you where you are allowed to watch it -- must be connected, somehow, somewhere, on the global internet...and Blue-Ray users will have their viewing preferences "validated" (stored and recorded) each time they play.
Do you really want someone to have a log of every movie you watch, everytime you play it?...as that seems to be the Blu-Ray solution to copy protection and detection of player tampering.
Just haven't heard how Draconian HD-DVD will be about this.
FYI, I _was_ a supporter of Blue-Ray (higher capacity = more good; the XXX industry was said to prefer the higher capacity format so they could include more "angles"
-l