So the format war is over

[hypr]

Toshiba formally announced today The Story

that they have ended the Format war by resignation this comes after the past few weeks when Time Warner moved to Blu-Ray as did Wal-Mart. But since Blu-Ray is now the standard, what does this mean for those who already have the HD-Players?

Those who have X-Box 360's? I assume Microsoft lost lots of money as now they plan on doing a Blu-Ray player for X-box 360

But anyways any thoughts on this?

 

[Ron Overdrive]

People with HD players still have the porno industry, but even they are gonna be forced to switch to blueray so pretty much they're SOL.

 

[net-cat]

I had kind of hoped HD-DVD would pull though, as it's the cheaper, more consumer friendly format.

It doesn't really matter to me, though. I don't own any HD equipment and have no intention of changing that until I absolutely need to.

As for Xbox 360, I know there was talk of making a 360 with an integrated HD-DVD. I don't know if that ever materialized. I'll be mildly amused to see a 360 with integrated Bluray, though...

 

[Tudd]

I thought because it was cheaper HD DVD would win. But I never bought into it, I just got my PS3 and went about my buisness picking up BD's here and there. Kinda glad now that I don't have to buy a player anytime soon.

 

[Wolf-Bone]

Anyone who even participated in this "war" was a fucking idiot in the first place. Seriously, regular DVD as it is hasn't even been around that long. People with huge VHS libraries have spent a great deal of money finding their old favorites on DVD, and now all of a sudden we're supposed to switch AGAIN? FUCK -- YOU.

 

[hypr]

true, I wasn't sure who was gonna win at the start, I was on the sidelines, people expected it to go on for five years, remember photo storage media it was a 5 way tie if I remember correctly.

 

[Tudd]

Hey Wolf-Bone! Thank god you don't attempt to keep up a gaming PC.

The people who participated in this war are the people who buy a new release DVD every week. They are the A/V pursuists who were willing to risk the usefulness of their hardware to enjoy HD movies for a year and a half. That and PS3 users. You have to factor in that people who buy this stuff have HDTV's, front projectors with 100"+ screens, home theatres etc. To them the $500-1000 was worth the risk for 1.5-2 years of hi def movies. Its like calling someone an idiot for buying SACD or DVD-A. The people who buy them typically are looking for higher quality music than what CD offers. Same people who spend thousands on turntables. Theres a million and one execptions to what I've mentioned above, but to them its just a hobby, not a life alternating choice. If that qualifies as idiot in your opinion then so be it.

OT remotely: The "audiophile" can be considered a fool though... "These monster cables make my speakers sound so much clearer, transparent, powerful and *insert "audiophile power" word*!" Right... but you could have got better quality cables for half the price online cut to the length you need. But they're not THX certified so they must be garbage. As everything in life, there are those who don't know what they're doing and those who think they know what they're doing. But who are the idiots?

 

[ADF]

I’m just glad a format was picked; now it is safe to actually buy a next gen disk drive.

Though I have to say this war being decided on movies is BS; there are allot more applications for optical media than movies, games and storage for instance. I haven’t backed up my HDD stuff in several years, not by choice but because it would take a stack worth of DVDs to do it. Since Blue-Ray has the largest capacity I should be able to do it with only a few disks, which shows some merit in Blue-Ray taking the market.

This is also somewhat amusing since people expected Blue-Ray to fail simply because it was owned by Sony, just goes to show people shouldn’t always rely on the past to predict the future.

As for Xbox 360, I know there was talk of making a 360 with an integrated HD-DVD.

Jeez what is it with consoles these days? I remember if you bought a GameCube, PS2 or Xbox you were set. Now they keep releasing new models to compete on different grounds, bitch slapping everyone who bought one previously.

The whole point of consoles is you buy it once and you’re set; having multiple different versions with various features and HDD sizes detracts from the benefit, plus it creates a sense of loss for previous buyers who thought they were getting the full system.

 

[Renian]

One problem that some people fail to realize is that Sony is the only current Blu-ray producer and probably has the technology pattened. Unless they are willing to share the plans with other electronic producers and if HD-DVD is phased out completely, they will probably have anti-monopoly and trust government lawsuits to deal with as they will esentally be the only home video media on the market.

 

[Ron Overdrive]

One problem that some people fail to realize is that Sony is the only current Blu-ray producer and probably has the technology pattened. Unless they are willing to share the plans with other electronic producers and if HD-DVD is phased out completely, they will probably have anti-monopoly and trust government lawsuits to deal with as they will esentally be the only home video media on the market.

I think Sony is aware of this and they'll probably start licensing out the technology to Toshiba and a few others shortly. Toshiba stated that they have to look into a new route to follow (aka Blueray) so they're probably trying to strike a deal as we speak.

 

[Digitalpotato]

And the world turns on like normal.
Who has the money to buy a Blu-Ray player and a TV to justify it? Without an HD-TV, Blu-Ray is just another DVD with more storage space for all that excess junk nobody cares about. (Except the outtakes)

Oh look...I can view the original trailer of this movie in English, Spanish, German, French, Japanese, Chinese, Thai, Sign Language, and Morse Code!
AND I can see featurettes on how each and every scene was produced!
AND I can play flash-game-quality games!
And they decided to add the movie on Disc 2 as a bonus feature.

 

[Tudd]

Best part is, all of those extra features were one of the main selling point of HD DVD over BD. But even PS3 and 360 don't look that much better unless you're playing on an HDTV. But ever walk into your local electronics stores? Theres only a couple non-HD tvs for sale.

 

[hypr]

its hard to find a tube based TV around here, I have one but its like 9 or 10 years old (maybe older) a Toshiba, but I am gonna use it until it doesn't run anymore or until the colors mess up on it like the old cabinet TV, lets say playing GTA Vice City had some very bad results.

 

[Digitalpotato]

Best part is, all of those extra features were one of the main selling point of HD DVD over BD. But even PS3 and 360 don't look that much better unless you're playing on an HDTV. But ever walk into your local electronics stores? Theres only a couple non-HD tvs for sale.

And the non-HD TVs are the ones with the price tags the average video gamer will be able to spend, or WILLING to spend at least. How much do HD TVs cost?

 

[Tudd]

How does $300 sound? Here or here. Thats the cost of the 360 core so its not nearly as far out of the price range of the average gamer as it may seem. Now if you want a "good" and/or "decently sized" set then the price goes right up.

 

[Renian]

One problem that some people fail to realize is that Sony is the only current Blu-ray producer and probably has the technology pattened. Unless they are willing to share the plans with other electronic producers and if HD-DVD is phased out completely, they will probably have anti-monopoly and trust government lawsuits to deal with as they will esentally be the only home video media on the market.

I think Sony is aware of this and they'll probably start licensing out the technology to Toshiba and a few others shortly. Toshiba stated that they have to look into a new route to follow (aka Blueray) so they're probably trying to strike a deal as we speak.

My guess is that unless the other companies are willing to pay a bunch of money for licensing rights, Sony will try to keep as many of the other companies out of the market for as long as possible until they are forced to share the technology which would likely be when their patents for it expire or they are forced to release schematics. After all, it is much more profitable to be the only company in a market because there is no need to worry about direct competition.

 

[Lord Eon]

But since Blu-Ray is now the standard, what does this mean for those who already have the HD-Players?

I guess it means all they've got now is a very expensive paperweight.

Personally, I abstained from taking sides in this format war, mostly because I don't know anything about HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. Well, not enough to know which is better anyway.

Although, considering the prevailing popularity of the DVD format, does anyone else think the corporations picked a side just to make sure that they didn't both fail, in which case we wouldn't all suddenly have to replace our DVD collections?

Personally, I'm hanging onto DVDs until I have no choice but to embrace the new format. And even then, I'll keep my eyes open for a player that can handle both. At least with videos, I had a reason to replace them, but none of my DVDs have suffered any loss in quality since I got them, and I haven't bought a new video since 2002.

I have a lot of DVDs now...