Jay said:MS may have more games available and may be selling more games, but that's because Americans have a never ending appetite for first person shooters, Madden, and Big Macs. Games like Uncharted, LittleBIGPlanet, and Valkyrie Chronicles are real works of art and represent some of the best games from this generation, but nobody's buying them because they believe the PS3 "has no good games yet" thanks to shit articles from the likes of CNN Money.
I can't stand American football in any form, so I certainly don't care for Madden, and I haven't had a bigmac since I was 12. But why the slam against FPSs? It is a style or perhaps a genre of game, and a very valid one too. Sure plenty of crappy FPSs are released every year, but every now and then one comes out that is outstanding and amazing, every bit as much of a work of art as the games you listed. You said you got Bioshock for Christmas? That is one of the most beautiful games I have ever played. So much detail in such a unique world it is taking me forever to get through it because I am always stopping to try to take everything in. It is almost an overload on the senses. It is great.
You said nobody is buying the games you listed because they are being led to believe the PS3 has no good games yet. Of course that isn't why people arn't buying them. Take a look at gamespot, IGN, or any place that reviews video games, those games you listed along with plenty of other PS3 games are getting great reviews. People know there are good games on the PS3. It just isn't enough. The N64 and GameCube also had some of the best games of their generation, but you know how that story goes. A few good games just doesn't do it for that many people. And it is not like the 360 is in anyway lacking in good games, it has got plenty.
The fact is, those few good games that are PS3 exclusives don't weight up to the 360's much larger library, and much cheaper price tag. When you consider both systems side buy side, the PS3 just doesn't hold up in most regards yet. In this day and age when you can play games online with your friends, what your friends own matters. There are a lot more 360s out there than PS3s. The new Resident Evil game will allow two players to play through the story in co-op mode over the internet. Many other games do this too. If someone is on the market for a 360 or a PS3 and they consider this factor, then they are going to want to get what their friends have.
Another interesting antedote, I was looking of a copy of the 360 version of The Orange Box for a Christmas present for a friend. I looked everywhere for a copy, but everyone was sold out. Even Gamestop, which had had a good quantity of used copies the week before was completely sold out. Every store I went to had plenty of copies of it for the PS3 but absolutely none for the 360. They recently stopped producing the game on both consoles and price dropped it from $30 to $20 bucks and they sold like wildfire for the holiday season. That many more people own 360s than PS3s. Target has Fallout 3 on sale for $39.99 (yeah, that is almost a full $20 off the SRP). It was advertised in the Sunday paper, on monday I went in to buy a copy and they were completely sold out of it for the 360, but had tons of copies of the PS3 version (also on sale for $39.99). I used Target's website to search for any local stores that had it in stock, they were all sold out of the 360 version by the second day of the sale, but they all had the PS3 version in stock.
I think as time goes on the PS3 will start to pick up, the price will come down, and the library will grow, and sells will increase. But it'll never catch up with the 360. It is pretty plan to see who won this generation of the console war.
"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape
Jay said:At this point, Blu-ray hardware manufacturers have moved so many units that Blu-ray's future as a format looks very bright. I don't see it ending up like laserdisc at all.
Then you're not paying attention. Blu-ray units moved pretty well when the price was under $200. Now that most places have the players back above $200, sales have slowed again. I haven't been able to find a single profile 2.0 player for less than $250. And with a slowing economy, people just aren't interested in buying something that, to them, doesn't look that much different from their upscaling DVD player.
As much as I would love to see Blu-ray really take off and become more mainstream, it's starting to seem more and more likely to remain a niche format.
Remember that laserdisc didn't die either. But it didn't supplant VHS. It just became a videophile niche format. Even after DVD came out, plenty of places still carried laserdisc.
C3PX said:But why the slam against FPSs?
Because it's the sidescrolling platformer of this generation. It's the 1-on-1 fighting game. It's the genre that has a few outstanding titles surrounded by a sea of trash. And Americans love them, even if they're complete crap.
People know there are good games on the PS3.
Then why do I keep hearing it has "no good games?" Because 360 fanboys like to perpetuate that myth, that's why.
The comparison to the Gamecube is appropriate in some ways. The PS3 is the most powerful hardware from this generation, but it arrived too late in the cycle. That's mostly because MS pushed the 360 out the door with inferior specs and the most horrible engineering in a console since the Saturn, but they're ahead, so whatever.
The fact is, those few good games that are PS3 exclusives don't weight up to the 360's much larger library, and much cheaper price tag. When you consider both systems side buy side, the PS3 just doesn't hold up in most regards yet. In this day and age when you can play games online with your friends, what your friends own matters.
It's easy to be cheap when you keep pushing hardware with a 35% failure rate and morons keep buying it.
And the 360's online "community" is a great reason not to buy it in my opinion. Lots of 12-year-olds playing Halo and shouting obscenities at one another.
Another interesting antedote...
Two games, one of which received a vastly inferior port on the PS3. But the 360 has many more owners, so it's not surprising that the 360 version of common games sells out before the PS3 version does.
I think as time goes on the PS3 will start to pick up, the price will come down, and the library will grow, and sells will increase. But it'll never catch up with the 360. It is pretty plan to see who won this generation of the console war.
Of course they won't catch up. MS had a year and Halo. That's all they needed in today's gaming climate--a mediocre FPS/chat room and cheap, defective hardware to play it on.
MTFBWY…A
Damn Jay,
I agree with everything you say there,ALL my friends that have 360's have ALL had a problem or 2 and sometimes alot more than just 2 problems,I wouldn't mind getting a 360 eventually just to have all systems and play some of the exclusive games,but I am in NO rush to get one,I am very happy with my PS3 and Wii and my old Xbox,but someday I WILL get the elite.
lordjedi said:
Then you're not paying attention. Blu-ray units moved pretty well when the price was under $200. Now that most places have the players back above $200, sales have slowed again.
It's called "the holidays." It's a time when things often sell very well at a reduced price and then slow down afterward. Add the economy into the mix and it's not exactly the best environment to be pushing a new media format.
I understand that you take part in the mass expectation--actually, mass entitlement may be a better description of the national condition--that the products you buy should be cheap right out of the gate. You've been whining for as long as I can remember about Blu-ray being too expensive. Nevermind that Blu-ray hardware is cheaper sooner in its lifecycle than DVD was while offering superior A/V quality and interactivity. You want it cheap, and you want it now. Wal-Mart and McDonald's.
The Blu-ray version of The Dark Knight sold 600,000 copies on its first day and 1 million after its first week. No laserdisc ever came close to that, not even after 16 years on the market. Not ever.
Blu-ray may never achieve the same market penetration as DVD in an age of HD on demand and iTunes, but comparing it to laserdisc is asinine.
MTFBWY…A
lordjedi said:Remember that laserdisc didn't die either. But it didn't supplant VHS. It just became a videophile niche format. Even after DVD came out, plenty of places still carried laserdisc.
Part of that was that LD was only a "play" format. VHS was "play" and "record". The average public wants convenience first, quality second, so LD stayed on the fringes.
DVD didn't start to replace VHS until DVD recorders became cheaper. Likewise, when BD players come down and BD recorders go desktop, then DVD will start to be phased out.
My outlook on life - we’re all on the Hindenburg anyway…no point fighting over the window seat.
lordjedi is Blu-ray's bitch....;)
I love everybody. Lets all smoke some reefer and chill. Hug and kisses for everybody.
Jay said:lordjedi said:
Then you're not paying attention. Blu-ray units moved pretty well when the price was under $200. Now that most places have the players back above $200, sales have slowed again.It's called "the holidays." It's a time when things often sell very well at a reduced price and then slow down afterward. Add the economy into the mix and it's not exactly the best environment to be pushing a new media format.
And yet Amazon reported record sales. Only normal retail has reported sales being down. Black Friday actually had high sales, but they were lower than expected, so everyone has reported that sales were down.
I understand that you take part in the mass expectation--actually, mass entitlement may be a better description of the national condition--that the products you buy should be cheap right out of the gate. You've been whining for as long as I can remember about Blu-ray being too expensive. Nevermind that Blu-ray hardware is cheaper sooner in its lifecycle than DVD was while offering superior A/V quality and interactivity. You want it cheap, and you want it now. Wal-Mart and McDonald's.
Uh, wrong. I don't expect anything to be cheap. I expected player prices to be high when there was a format war. That ended in January or February. Player prices dipped slightly after that and then went right back up. Prices showed no signs of dropping until Black Friday. Retailers have been offering steep discounts on everything else except Blu-ray players. Games, clothes, movies, etc, etc. Everything has had steep discounts except those damn players. Even Sony didn't drop the price of the PS3 going into Black Friday. The XBox got a price cut though and saw an 8% increase. Nintendo didn't need to since they've been selling like mad anyway.
When there's no competing format, I want it cheaper sooner, yes. When dual format DVD burners appeared, burner (and media) prices started to drop significantly. Burners went from $300 (dual format) to under $100 within a year.
We also didn't have to worry about getting DVD players that couldn't play certain "future" content due to different profiles. Every DVD player released with the logo had to be able to play all the features in the spec. Even the players that did have problems were updated to work via firmware or by mailing the player in. A Blu-ray profile 1.0 or 1.1 player won't be able to play 2.0 profile content. The only thing I'm aware of that was added to the DVD spec later was mp2 audio since most of the cheap software used that and then those discs couldn't be played on earlier players.
The Blu-ray version of The Dark Knight sold 600,000 copies on its first day and 1 million after its first week. No laserdisc ever came close to that, not even after 16 years on the market. Not ever.
And it sold 13.5 million DVDs. Still looks like a niche compared to the DVD market.
Ziz said:lordjedi said:Remember that laserdisc didn't die either. But it didn't supplant VHS. It just became a videophile niche format. Even after DVD came out, plenty of places still carried laserdisc.
Part of that was that LD was only a "play" format. VHS was "play" and "record". The average public wants convenience first, quality second, so LD stayed on the fringes.
LDs were also huge in comparison to VHS tapes. They took up more space and had to be handled much more carefully.
DVD didn't start to replace VHS until DVD recorders became cheaper. Likewise, when BD players come down and BD recorders go desktop, then DVD will start to be phased out.
You got something to back that up besides anecdotal evidence? Otherwise, I'm calling bullshit. I started building my DVD collection the moment Divx died, burner or not. I had a pretty sizable collection before burners became affordable, as did a lot of people I know.
BD recorders also should have come down by now. They haven't. NewEgg had a one day special on ROM drives for $80, but it was only one day. DVD will start to be phased out when BD players can 1) load discs quickly and 2) players are under $200 brand new and people don't have to worry about firmware updates. The number of players I've read reviews for on Amazon that required updates just to load a disc in under 3 minutes is staggering. The PS3 is the fastest and most expensive player on the market. When it just becomes the most expensive, then maybe Blu-ray adoption will pick up.
Recording ability has nothing to do with buying movies. I didn't say it did. But the reason VHS stayed alive as long as it did was because it could record and DVD couldn't. Once DVD could record, THAT made VHS fully obsolete. Why continue to use tapes that can wear out when you can use discs that don't wear, as well as don't have to be rewound?
Likewise, when BD recorders become commonplace, they'll no doubt record better quality than DVD, which in turn will make DVD obsolete.
It's called common sense. Try it some time.
My outlook on life - we’re all on the Hindenburg anyway…no point fighting over the window seat.
lordjedi said:
And yet Amazon reported record sales. Only normal retail has reported sales being down. Black Friday actually had high sales, but they were lower than expected, so everyone has reported that sales were down.
And Blu-ray hardware sold fine during the holidays, just like everything else. Sales weren't slow at all. Now, prices have returned to where they were and things are slowing down. A totally normal November/December/January sales cycle.
Uh, wrong. I don't expect anything to be cheap. I expected player prices to be high when there was a format war. That ended in January or February. Player prices dipped slightly after that and then went right back up. Prices showed no signs of dropping until Black Friday. Retailers have been offering steep discounts on everything else except Blu-ray players. Games, clothes, movies, etc, etc. Everything has had steep discounts except those damn players. Even Sony didn't drop the price of the PS3 going into Black Friday. The XBox got a price cut though and saw an 8% increase. Nintendo didn't need to since they've been selling like mad anyway.
When there's no competing format, I want it cheaper sooner, yes. When dual format DVD burners appeared, burner (and media) prices started to drop significantly. Burners went from $300 (dual format) to under $100 within a year.
You expected player prices to decrease with no format competition? Seriously? It's precisely because of the format war that you can even find $250 Blu-ray decks. Without HD-DVD, $400 to $500 would be the current price--and much better for the consumer electronics companies trying to turn a profit.
You do understand that the companies making these players need to turn a profit in order to stay in business, right?
And you also understand that a barebones BD drive for a computer is a totally different animal from a self-contained, standalone deck with more materials, hardware decoders, software programming, more parts, more engineering and QA, and higher manufacturing and shipping costs, right?
Finally, you understand that the US dollar is weak at the moment, right?
Of course you do, because these things are obvious to any reasonable individual who understands that there are costs to doing profitable business in a down economy. Unless, of course, Wal-Mart has conditioned you to think you deserve much more for much less.
Maybe the reason you didn't see steep discounts on all those Blu-ray players is because they're already selling close to cost.
We also didn't have to worry about getting DVD players that couldn't play certain "future" content due to different profiles. Every DVD player released with the logo had to be able to play all the features in the spec. Even the players that did have problems were updated to work via firmware or by mailing the player in. A Blu-ray profile 1.0 or 1.1 player won't be able to play 2.0 profile content. The only thing I'm aware of that was added to the DVD spec later was mp2 audio since most of the cheap software used that and then those discs couldn't be played on earlier players.
This argument is getting stale. Everyone acknowledges that buying a Profile 1.1 deck means you might not be able to watch some stupid PIP window during playback.
By the way, those DVD players you mention? Buggy as hell and more expensive at this point in their life cycle than Blu-ray decks. DVD hardware buyers back then had to tolerate high prices and sometimes shitty performance. The main difference is that firmware updates didn't come every other month and the shitty player you bought in January was still the same shitty player in December.
And it sold 13.5 million DVDs. Still looks like a niche compared to the DVD market.
Please read this topic at AVS. It's the most even-handed debate I've seen regarding Blu-ray's relative success or failure. Of particular interest is the discussion centering around the absurdity of judging Blu-ray's success against DVD, which is the most successful and most quickly adopted consumer electronics product of all time. Interesting point to note: the adoption of color TV and its speed in overtaking black and white would be considered a failure today if held to the same standard.
These debates with you are endless. You expect more for less, have no appreciation for the economics and costs of doing business involved in marketing this type of product, and you make invalid comparisons to other formats and hardware products that have no bearing on the relative success or failure of Blu-ray as a format.
In short, you don't get it. At all.
MTFBWY…A
Jay said:Uh, wrong. I don't expect anything to be cheap. I expected player prices to be high when there was a format war. That ended in January or February. Player prices dipped slightly after that and then went right back up. Prices showed no signs of dropping until Black Friday. Retailers have been offering steep discounts on everything else except Blu-ray players. Games, clothes, movies, etc, etc. Everything has had steep discounts except those damn players. Even Sony didn't drop the price of the PS3 going into Black Friday. The XBox got a price cut though and saw an 8% increase. Nintendo didn't need to since they've been selling like mad anyway.
When there's no competing format, I want it cheaper sooner, yes. When dual format DVD burners appeared, burner (and media) prices started to drop significantly. Burners went from $300 (dual format) to under $100 within a year.
You expected player prices to decrease with no format competition? Seriously? It's precisely because of the format war that you can even find $250 Blu-ray decks. Without HD-DVD, $400 to $500 would be the current price--and much better for the consumer electronics companies trying to turn a profit.
During the DVD/Divx war, prices were pretty steady. Once Divx died and there was a single format for everyone to adopt, prices declined...dramatically. My first player was a $300 Toshiba which had all kinds of outputs and built in decoders (none of which I needed, but I didn't know that at the time). About a year later I got an Apex for about $150. Several years after that, I got a Cyberhome for $50. Both the Apex and the Cyberhome were considered "cheap chinese players". But they still worked.
When there are dual formats competing, people don't buy for fear of having a dead format. When it's only one format, people don't have that fear. Look at the price of DVD burners during their format war. Prices stayed around $300 for a long time because no one wanted to end up with a dead format. Once dual format burners hit the market, nobody cared what type of media they bought anymore and prices started to fall.
You do understand that the companies making these players need to turn a profit in order to stay in business, right?
I understand that Sony seems to be the only company losing money and the best player right now. I have heard nothing about any other company losing money on Blu-ray players and I highly doubt they're being sold near cost.
And you also understand that a barebones BD drive for a computer is a totally different animal from a self-contained, standalone deck with more materials, hardware decoders, software programming, more parts, more engineering and QA, and higher manufacturing and shipping costs, right?
The difference is minimal. The drive still has to be able to read a BD. Beyond that, the computer drive uses software for the decoding while the standalone uses hardware. It's the difference between a chip and a piece of software. Both have a board for the drive to plug into. Other than shipping costs, the differences are minimal.
What I've read recently is that the reason some discs are really slow is because of BD-Java. This doesn't surprise me at all. The Cell processor in the PS3 is very fast, so it can load those discs with no problem. Standalone players don't have such a fast processor, so they take considerably longer (surprise, Java is slow). Looks like Sun pulled a fast one on the entertainment industry with Java. Yeah, you can get more interactivity, but it's slow as hell. This is probably also leading to slower adoption since no one wants to wait several minutes for a disc to load so they can watch the movie. When faster players hit the market, perhaps adoption will pick up.
Finally, you understand that the US dollar is weak at the moment, right?
Every currency is doing bad right now, not just the dollar.
Of course you do, because these things are obvious to any reasonable individual who understands that there are costs to doing profitable business in a down economy. Unless, of course, Wal-Mart has conditioned you to think you deserve much more for much less.
There you go with the Walmart attitude again. Prices were high before the economy slowed down, I've already gone over that. Prices touched record lows on Black Friday and then went right back up (unlike everything else).
Maybe the reason you didn't see steep discounts on all those Blu-ray players is because they're already selling close to cost.
And maybe it's also because people still don't see the need for Blu-ray. I see a lot of HDTVs being sold, but not a lot of Blu-ray players.
We also didn't have to worry about getting DVD players that couldn't play certain "future" content due to different profiles. Every DVD player released with the logo had to be able to play all the features in the spec. Even the players that did have problems were updated to work via firmware or by mailing the player in. A Blu-ray profile 1.0 or 1.1 player won't be able to play 2.0 profile content. The only thing I'm aware of that was added to the DVD spec later was mp2 audio since most of the cheap software used that and then those discs couldn't be played on earlier players.
This argument is getting stale. Everyone acknowledges that buying a Profile 1.1 deck means you might not be able to watch some stupid PIP window during playback.
And the average consumer hears "Some features one new discs might not work with this player." Then they look at the cost of a profile 2.0 player and say "Forget it." When the price comes down (if it does), then they'll buy it.
By the way, those DVD players you mention? Buggy as hell and more expensive at this point in their life cycle than Blu-ray decks. DVD hardware buyers back then had to tolerate high prices and sometimes shitty performance. The main difference is that firmware updates didn't come every other month and the shitty player you bought in January was still the same shitty player in December.
What DVD players? I never had a DVD player that didn't play a store bought disc just fine (other than T2 Ultimate Edition, for which I received a free replacement player). From my Toshiba (bought just after Divx died) to my Cyberhome (finally crapped out after 2 years of use, only ever had a problem with Underworld: Evolution because of something Sony did to it) I've never had a problem with any DVD player I've bought. I've never had a problem with a PC DVD drive either.
And it sold 13.5 million DVDs. Still looks like a niche compared to the DVD market.
Please read this topic at AVS. It's the most even-handed debate I've seen regarding Blu-ray's relative success or failure. Of particular interest is the discussion centering around the absurdity of judging Blu-ray's success against DVD, which is the most successful and most quickly adopted consumer electronics product of all time. Interesting point to note: the adoption of color TV and its speed in overtaking black and white would be considered a failure today if held to the same standard.
The Digital Bits also had an article last Christmas. In it, they spoke with retailers about Blu-ray adoption. The retailers all told them that any new format pretty much has 3 holiday seasons to be adopted or it dies or becomes a niche. They asked them this because they (the bits) were starting to get worried that Blu-ray was going to become a niche during the last holiday season. When the format war ended in February, they breathed a cautious sigh of relief. But it looks to me like Blu-ray may still end up a niche format. With upscaling players looking nearly as good as Blu-ray and costing far less, what reason do most people have to spend even more money on a Blu-ray player? None.
Maybe Blu-ray will pick up speed, but I'm not holding my breath. And when I compare it to LD, I'm only comparing it as a niche format (selling 1 million copies compared to 13.5 million, in my mind, makes it a niche). It may be a much more advanced format, but if the average consumer isn't buying them, then it's not going to catch on.
These debates with you are endless. You expect more for less, have no appreciation for the economics and costs of doing business involved in marketing this type of product, and you make invalid comparisons to other formats and hardware products that have no bearing on the relative success or failure of Blu-ray as a format.
Yes, I do expect more for less. I expect to get a new video card for the same or lower price as my previous one and that it'll perform better (shock, it always does). I expect a new car for about the same price as my last one, but with better features (never failed here either). Same goes for everything. The cost of the new item might be the same as the cost of the old item when it was new, but we get more for the same money. So we do get more for less. With Blu-ray, I'm not seeing that happen.
The original high cost of Blu-ray was said to be because they had to retool all their production facilities for the new format. That was 3 years ago. I would've expected the cost to make a Blu-ray player to have come down sharply by now. Just like everything else, once you know how to make them and how to do it efficiently, prices generally drop. Again, I'm not seeing that happen. Players are the same price today that they were 3 years ago. Only used players have dropped in price (shocked). The PS3 is the only one that costs more, and it still seems to be the best one.
Also, it's a fact that the CEO of Sony Electronics stated we wouldn't see $200 players this year (2008). Why not? Maybe in 2009 and with a global downturn, that may have to happen if they want people to buy them. It's also a fact that the BDA won't license the tech to the Chinese for fear of "piracy" and "cheap chinese players". Why not? Cheap chinese players got DVD adopted rather quickly. The expensive non cheap ones are better, but most people don't want those.
I know two people that have Blu-ray players. One of them has a PS3, the other has a PS3 and had a standalone. The person bought the standalone during a Black Friday sale and it has since crapped out on him (he returned it for a refund since they wouldn't exchange it). Everyone else has upscaling DVD players since they look just as good at a fraction of the cost.
Jay:
Don't get me wrong. I want to see Blu-ray succeed. I want to see it take off as the next format. I do not want to see it become a niche. If it becomes a niche, then player prices will stay high. If it takes off though, player prices will come way down (they should be down already, but whatever). I would love nothing more than to buy a Blu-ray player right now, if the price was lower (under $200). When that happens, I'll be the first in line to buy one.
Blu-Ray is a niche format that will eventually become a standard format, because HDTV is a niche format that will eventually become a standard format.
DVD players didn't come down because the format war ended or because recordable players emerged; I don't think most people even knew about the format war, and no one uses recordable DVD anyway. They came down because cheap chinese players infiltrated the marketplace and forced the big manufacturer's to compete. Prices were still falling--my first player was a $280 Toshiba in 2001 and six months later it was already down to just over $200 because a lot of people adopted that year--but once Acer and obscure brands like that started putting out players that were $100, companies like Sony and Toshiba had to stay competetive so they began slashing the prices dramatically. With this, disk prices fell dramatically--I remember when $32.99 was the norm for a new DVD, regardless of whether it was a "Special Edition" or not, and this wasn't seen as expensive either because it was a newer and better format, but by 2004 or so when all the prices were in free-fall you would see $22.99 for new DVDs, and now its not uncommon to see new disks for $15. It really traced back to the surge of cheap, non-brand name asian players that caused an industry-wide price crash, which lead to cheaper disk prices as the format replaced VHS.
But thats not necessarily going to happen again. I think people just take the incredible success and disgustingly cheap prices of DVD for granted. In 1995 I was paying $20 for VHS tapes, and now people pay almost the same for a lot of Blu-Ray titles, yet they still complain; our family bought a top-quality VCR in 1987 that cost us almost $300, and you can buy Blu-Ray players for much less today. I don't really know what people are expecting. I think its actually cheapened the home video industry a bit that you can go to the store and get a $50 DVD player and own a recent Hollywood blockbuster on DVD for $6, its sort of made home video a bit disposable but I guess thats just the way its gone.
As for Blu-Ray--here's the thing. I don't think anyone ever expected it to replace DVD, so why are people disappointed that its sales are not as good as DVDs? DVD was a success that had never been seen in home video, and probably won't be ever again, at least in our lifetimes. DVD you could just hook up to your TV and be blown away by the quality, but Blu-Ray requires you to have a completely different television set, and jump between Blu-Ray and DVD isn't nearly as dramatic so there's not as much drive for "you gotta see THIS!!". So, of course Blu-Ray isn't going to be The New DVD. It could never be, because most people are incapable of watching HD content anyway. So it is, and will continue to be, a semi-niche format. A lot of people that have HD sets have a Blu-Ray player, but most people still don't have HD sets.
However, Blu-Ray isn't going to die. It will stick around for the time being. And what will happen--and HAS been happening--is that more and more people will buy HD televisions sets. HD will supplant standard-def TV within the next five years. Its hard to find standard-def TVs at some retailers now, and HD sets are continuing to fall steeply in price--when an LCD set thats the same size as my TV at home was priced at over a grande three years ago people stayed away, but not only are prices competitive with standard-def sets but it costs less to get an HD set now than it did to buy a standard-def set 10 years ago. And as more people get HD sets, they'll slowly pick up Blu-Ray. Along the way players will continue to fall in price. Your average consumer isn't going to go ga-ga over it the way they did with DVD, but theres still a massive quality difference, and as people get used to the detail of an HD image they'll start noticing that their DVDs look a lot softer and fuzzier by comparison, and they'll get interested in Blu Ray. I'd say Blu Ray will be the standard home video format by about 2016, if it can hang in there for the next two years or so. But its not losing money, and every year more people adopt, sales are strong and should continue to be, so theres not much chance of companies or retailers abandoning the format. Even if the format was failing places like Best Buy need a format to go along with the fancy HD Tvs they are hocking so they'd keep it on shelves.
I'd say the success of Blu Ray will have more to do with the infiltration of HD sets than anything. Your average person doesn't have much interest in Blu Ray, its true, but only because your average person doesn't have an HD set so why in the world would they be interested in something they cant get. Eventually, people without an interest in HD sets will be buying them anyway because when they walk into Best Buy thats all there will be, and they will be more affordable than the last TV they bought anyway, so they will shrug and say "okay, fine." And as Blu-Ray continues to grow, these people will eventually start adapting anyway, just like all the people today who would probably still be watching VHS if it wasn't for the fact that everything had gone DVD anyway so they just went with the flow.
lordjedi said:
...
I'm not going to respond to all that point-by-point because, frankly, it's tiresome, and only Tiptup and yourself have that kind of endurance. I'll just respond by saying that pretty much everything you said is wrong, especially the part about the differences between a standalone deck and BD computer drive being minimal. Take them apart, break them down piece by piece, understand the engineering and testing that goes into each part, then get back to me.
The only difference is hardware decoding vs. software? You really have no clue what you're talking about on this.
I'm bowing out of this topic now.
MTFBWY…A
Jay said:C3PX said:But why the slam against FPSs?
Because it's the sidescrolling platformer of this generation. It's the 1-on-1 fighting game. It's the genre that has a few outstanding titles surrounded by a sea of trash. And Americans love them, even if they're complete crap.
I don't think that is completely true. I see plenty of crappy FPSs but I don't see so many people eating them up even when they suck. At least not more so than any other kind of game. Tons of FPSs are pooped out by game companies every year, and few of them are outstanding, but the vast majority get mediocre reviews or worse. But how is that unique to the FPS? What genre isn't it this way with? Seriously, can you name one? The RTS? The RPG? The racing games? All those shitty sports games? How about all those GTA clones? Also I can tell you that Americans are not the only ones who like FPSs. It has very little to do with nationality and a whole lot to do with taste and personal preference.
People know there are good games on the PS3.
Then why do I keep hearing it has "no good games?" Because 360 fanboys like to perpetuate that myth, that's why.
If people are moronic enough to seriously think there are absolutely no good games on the PS3 simply because of some 360 fanboy conspiracy to keep the world from the PS3, then they really don't desrve the air that they breathe, let alone to be playing video games. Obviously when people say "The PS3 doesn't have any good games" they mean that in much the same way we'd say "The N64/GC/Wii doesn't have any good games." Fact of the matter is all those systems (PS3 included) have some really, incredibly outstanding games that are not availble on any other system. The problem is, that miniscule library of brilliance doesn't justify $399.99 in many gamers minds.
And the 360's online "community" is a great reason not to buy it in my opinion. Lots of 12-year-olds playing Halo and shouting obscenities at one another.
So the PS3's online community is so much better? You are talking about issues with other users now, which is pointless, you can't convince me PS3 doesn't have the same thing. Plenty of 12 year olds own PS3. Are PS3 owning twelve year old that much more sophisticated? So what if twelve year olds want to play Halo and swear at each other? More power to them I say. Funny thing is, you don't have to play it with them if you don't want to. Not sure exactly how this is in any way a reason not to get a 360. I can think of plenty of reasons not to buy a 360, but this one baffles me.
Another interesting antedote...
Two games, one of which received a vastly inferior port on the PS3. But the 360 has many more owners, so it's not surprising that the 360 version of common games sells out before the PS3 version does.
That was my point, the 360 has many more owners. Its games are higher in demand.
Of course they won't catch up. MS had a year and Halo. That's all they needed in today's gaming climate--a mediocre FPS/chat room and cheap, defective hardware to play it on.
I have barely played Halo 1 (not a bad game, but way over hyped), and have never played 2 or 3. I really don't see anything wrong with people liking, them, and I really doubt Halo 3 is what caused so many people to buy the 360.
I definitely agree on the MS hardware issues, MS made a serious screwup on that one, and it took them a long time to get it under any sort of control. The newer models finally run rather cool, and therefore should not be as prone to the problems of the last few year's systems. But clearly, MS's failure rate was monumental. Of course, if we skip back to nearly ten years ago, the PS2's first models had more than their fair share of issues, and even the newer slimline model PS2s are retarded enough to melt the plastic lens that protects their lasers when trying too hard to read a scratched or smudged disc.
"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape
again,
i'm #&*$&#*$&(# giving in, (selling out,etc)
today, we're going out to buy one of the higher end samsung BD players,
and some discs...along with the 52inch tv...
we won't have our sound system installed yet..
but i plan on giving the blu-ray player a big workout, and see HOW well
it performs, its quirks, etc..... should be interesting to jump into a new format..
(of course, since i'm not paying for it, i can try to be more impartial to it, i hope)..
later
-1
[no GOUT in CED?-> GOUT CED]
negative1 said:again,
i'm #&*$&#*$&(# giving in, (selling out,etc)
today, we're going out to buy one of the higher end samsung BD players,
and some discs...along with the 52inch tv...
we won't have our sound system installed yet..
but i plan on giving the blu-ray player a big workout, and see HOW well
it performs, its quirks, etc..... should be interesting to jump into a new format..
(of course, since i'm not paying for it, i can try to be more impartial to it, i hope)..
later
-1
Awesome. I got a 23 inch lcd for my comp this christmas. Then, after an impulsive whim, I went and got an LG blu-ray drive too (there was just something about holding the DVD version of Batman in my hands for 20 minutes that made me think..."fuck it!"). I needed a new videocard, but a got a supremely badass one. I've been watching blu-rays for a few days now. Simply love it. I have my friends over, and we all toss on headphones and watch HD movies. Pretty tight.
I got the blu-ray drive for only $120. I know it's just a drive and not a player, but it's definitely a great addendum to my system. And for a little over a hundred, it seems like a good sign concerning prices, at least in some aspect.
Hey, negative1, what movies you getting? :)
zombie84 said:Blu-Ray is a niche format that will eventually become a standard format, because HDTV is a niche format that will eventually become a standard format.
I know far more people that have HDTVs than have Blu-ray players. I'd say that HDTV is not a niche format. People can buy an HDTV for very little (as you say below), hook it up to their HD cable or satellite, and enjoy a stunning picture right away. And if they have an upscaling DVD player, their old DVDs will now look even better than they did before.
DVD players didn't come down because the format war ended or because recordable players emerged; I don't think most people even knew about the format war, and no one uses recordable DVD anyway.
I knew several people at the time, that were not technical at all, that knew about Divx. One of them even bought a player because he felt it was the better buy, despite all the drawbacks.
I also saw plenty of people at places like Fry's that were buying recordable media, but they could only buy one type (no dual format burners at the time). These people were probably not that technical, they just wanted to be able to backup large amounts of data. But I'd agree that DVD player prices didn't come down due to dual format burners. Player prices came down due to exactly what you said.
Remember that DVD came about just before Tivo hit the market. DVD came out in 1997, Tivo hit in 1999. Once Tivo came out, VCRs were rendered practically pointless. Why buy something that only records 6 hours of video, has to be set for the right time, and has to have the tape changed when you can buy something that allows you to tell it what program to record and never needs anything changed? The DVR is a godsend to anyone who ever had trouble with a VCR not recording their show or just plain setting it up right.
So in short, with the advent of DVD and the DVR, DVD didn't even need to be recordable at the time.
But thats not necessarily going to happen again. I think people just take the incredible success and disgustingly cheap prices of DVD for granted. In 1995 I was paying $20 for VHS tapes, and now people pay almost the same for a lot of Blu-Ray titles, yet they still complain; our family bought a top-quality VCR in 1987 that cost us almost $300, and you can buy Blu-Ray players for much less today. I don't really know what people are expecting. I think its actually cheapened the home video industry a bit that you can go to the store and get a $50 DVD player and own a recent Hollywood blockbuster on DVD for $6, its sort of made home video a bit disposable but I guess thats just the way its gone.
Actually, I have no complaints about the price of Blu-ray discs. The discs have fallen to within a few dollars of DVDs. I'd even be willing to pay $10 more for the hi-def disc if I had to.
Yes, the home theater arena has become affordable for a lot more people. You almost sound like you think people shouldn't be able to have home theaters without spending thousands of dollars. I think it's fantastic that you can get an HDTV with a 5.1 receiver and speakers for about $2000.
As for Blu-Ray--here's the thing. I don't think anyone ever expected it to replace DVD, so why are people disappointed that its sales are not as good as DVDs?
I don't know where you got this idea. Every article I've ever read since Blu-ray's inception has made the case that Blu-ray is so much better that it was going to replace DVD.
DVD was a success that had never been seen in home video, and probably won't be ever again, at least in our lifetimes.
Never going to need more than 1 MB of RAM either, huh?
DVD you could just hook up to your TV and be blown away by the quality, but Blu-Ray requires you to have a completely different television set, and jump between Blu-Ray and DVD isn't nearly as dramatic so there's not as much drive for "you gotta see THIS!!".
I don't know where people get this. A Blu-ray with 1080p is over double the resolution of a 480p DVD. DVD was double that of VHS (usually around 240 lines). Sure, it's best viewed on a screen larger than 32", but I was never really blown away by the quality of a DVD on my 27" TV. What blew me away was the ability to freeze frame without the frame jumping, select scenes at random, and high speed skip through the movie. Add in the commentary and other extra features and I was hooked.
I'd say Blu Ray will be the standard home video format by about 2016, if it can hang in there for the next two years or so.
2016? By that time, I expect HD streaming to become common place. Verizon already streams the DVR over the FiOS link. If they can do that today, there's nothing stopping them from streaming an HD video directly to a media center that is either leased or owned.
Jay: I really don't care how much different you think a hardware vs software player is. Beyond the necessary chips to decode the Blu-ray content, the differences aren't major. DVD players have hardware mpeg2 decoders. PC DVD drives don't because the software does the decoding. It's pretty much the same thing with Blu-ray.
I also wasn't trying to point out that PC Blu-ray players were cheap, so standalones should be cheap too. I was merely pointing out that NewEgg had a one day sale and the prices are back to where they were (it wasn't a Black Friday sale either).
lordjedi said:Jay: I really don't care how much different you think a hardware vs software player is. Beyond the necessary chips to decode the Blu-ray content, the differences aren't major. DVD players have hardware mpeg2 decoders. PC DVD drives don't because the software does the decoding. It's pretty much the same thing with Blu-ray.
I know I said I wasn't coming back, but your stubbornness on this point and your inability to accept and process new information borders on autistic.
BD computer drives are completely different from standalone decks because your PC is there to do the rest of the work. Your PC provides the software decoder application (and all the licensing fees that entails), the hardware to run it on (CPU, RAM, video card with DVI or HDMI), a power supply, and a fancy GUI.
These are all things that must be built into a standalone deck, and that's not including other hardware like the IR receiver for the remote, the remote itself, etc. We're not talking about a DVD player here either because the processing power required for smooth 1080p playback/fast forward/rewind is much higher than 480p.
This is why Toshiba sold the first HD-DVD players at a huge loss; they basically crammed a PC into a standalone form factor.
Have improved engineering and parts consolidation led to lower manufacturing costs? Yes. Have costs gotten low enough to provide a decent profit margin when selling a deck at $200? I highly doubt it.
You may not have been trying to assert that standalone decks should be cheap because BD drives are cheap, but you were trying to tie discounts on BD drives into discounts on standalones; one has nothing to do with the other. You might as well compare holiday discounts on toasters and microwaves because they both heat up food.
MTFBWY…A
Jay said:BD computer drives are completely different from standalone decks because your PC is there to do the rest of the work. Your PC provides the software decoder application (and all the licensing fees that entails), the hardware to run it on (CPU, RAM, video card with DVI or HDMI), a power supply, and a fancy GUI.
These are all things that must be built into a standalone deck, and that's not including other hardware like the IR receiver for the remote, the remote itself, etc. We're not talking about a DVD player here either because the processing power required for smooth 1080p playback/fast forward/rewind is much higher than 480p.
And since a standalone drive doesn't have to do all the other things that a PC does, all of that is built into a few chips. A standalone drive needs a chip to decode the video and display it. A standalone drive is far less complex than a PC because it only needs to do one thing: play Blu-ray discs. Everything from the disc menu to the movie is all handled by the disc and then interpreted by the machine.
It might surprise you to know that the $150 Apex I mentioned was nothing more than a DVD-ROM drive connected to an IDE port with an mpeg2 decoder chip on a board. That's all. I would expect a Blu-ray player to be similar but with an mpeg2, AVC, and VC-1 decoder chips. Hook it up via SATA and be done. Of course, it ends up costing more due to all the "copy protection" bullshit that they have to load into the players. That cheap Apex let me change the region code any time I wanted. I'm betting you can't find a single "hackable" Blu-ray player on the market yet, mostly because they won't let the Chinese build any.
Have improved engineering and parts consolidation led to lower manufacturing costs? Yes. Have costs gotten low enough to provide a decent profit margin when selling a deck at $200? I highly doubt it.
Of course not, because they won't license the tech to the Chinese where the players can be made for cheap. Instead, they're choosing to keep the tech in markets that have higher costs. That is my gripe.
You may not have been trying to assert that standalone decks should be cheap because BD drives are cheap, but you were trying to tie discounts on BD drives into discounts on standalones; one has nothing to do with the other. You might as well compare holiday discounts on toasters and microwaves because they both heat up food.
All I was trying to show was the similarity between discounts of ROM drives to that of standalone drives. I was trying to show that both got discounted heavily leading up to Black Friday and the whole thanksgiving weekend and then went right back up in price. I fully expected the ROM drive to go back up since it was a one day deal. I honestly didn't expect standalone players to go back up as much as they did.
I think my head just caved in.
The things you think you know dwarf your actual understanding on this point.
MTFBWY…A
lordjedi said:zombie84 said:Blu-Ray is a niche format that will eventually become a standard format, because HDTV is a niche format that will eventually become a standard format.
I know far more people that have HDTVs than have Blu-ray players. I'd say that HDTV is not a niche format.
By virtue of the fact that it only represents a minority of the television market it is a niche, just like Blu-Ray is by virtue of the fact that it also represents a minority of the home video market.
People can buy an HDTV for very little (as you say below), hook it up to their HD cable or satellite, and enjoy a stunning picture right away. And if they have an upscaling DVD player, their old DVDs will now look even better than they did before.
Then thats exactly the same as how people can buy a Blu Ray player for extremely little and just hook it up as well. How is this relevant as far as the asserted failing of Blu Ray is concerned?
DVD players didn't come down because the format war ended or because recordable players emerged; I don't think most people even knew about the format war, and no one uses recordable DVD anyway.
I knew several people at the time, that were not technical at all, that knew about Divx. One of them even bought a player because he felt it was the better buy, despite all the drawbacks.
Well, despite your own personal experience, i thought it was common knowledge that like 90% of people out there had no idea it was going on. Most people didn't even know of DVD itself until around 1999. I guarantee you if you go up to someone and say "DivX format" they'll think your talking about the computer codec, if they even know what you are talking about at all. Especially outside of the US, DivX is about as well known by your average person as the RCA video disks.
As for Blu-Ray--here's the thing. I don't think anyone ever expected it to replace DVD, so why are people disappointed that its sales are not as good as DVDs?
I don't know where you got this idea. Every article I've ever read since Blu-ray's inception has made the case that Blu-ray is so much better that it was going to replace DVD.
Well, true there are a lot of uninformed morons out there, and whenever any format comes out theres all sorts of people that just swoop in and proclaim it the next big thing. But no one who ever properly understood the reality of the business expected it to replace DVD in the same way that DVD replaced VHS (ie a seemingly-rapid pace and instant adoption). Most people didnt even realise that DVD started off relatively slowly compared to its later reputation. Blu Ray could never replace DVD in the same way DVD replaced VHS because it requires HD sets, so before that happens you have to ask yourself "when are HD monitors going to replace SD ones?" This process has to occur first. But those people are probably correct in that, IN THE LONG TERM, Blu Ray will be the next DVD in that it will be the next home video standard. But it wont happen until HD supplants SD, and that is still a few years off. The common sentiment I've always found, at least from anyone with an opinion worth listening to, is that BR will inherit the mantle of DVD in the sense that it will be the next-level video standard but not in the sense that DVD will become (literally) obsolete right away.
DVD was a success that had never been seen in home video, and probably won't be ever again, at least in our lifetimes.
Never going to need more than 1 MB of RAM either, huh?
While it is possible, IMO it is very unlikely that the success of DVD will be seen again. It was a completlely unlikely coalescing of elements that enabled it to grow with the speed and infiltrate the market in the manner in which it did, and they are entirely accidental. VHS didnt happen like this, neither did Laserdisc, CED, Blu Ray, HD-DVD, VHS-D or any other format. The reason is because the sheer number of coincidenes and circumstances that would allow them to supplant the reigning format with DVDs speed are so unlikely that just based on probabibility it is unlikely to be seen again in the next few decades (as far as traditional, hard-copy, retail-based media goes).
DVD you could just hook up to your TV and be blown away by the quality, but Blu-Ray requires you to have a completely different television set, and jump between Blu-Ray and DVD isn't nearly as dramatic so there's not as much drive for "you gotta see THIS!!".
I don't know where people get this. A Blu-ray with 1080p is over double the resolution of a 480p DVD. DVD was double that of VHS (usually around 240 lines). Sure, it's best viewed on a screen larger than 32", but I was never really blown away by the quality of a DVD on my 27" TV. What blew me away was the ability to freeze frame without the frame jumping, select scenes at random, and high speed skip through the movie. Add in the commentary and other extra features and I was hooked.
VHS also had lots of noise and tape distortion and things of that nature as well--DVD was the first time people got a really clear, sharp picture, and THAT was really what hadn't been seen before. Now that people are accustomed to that, the increase in resolution doesn't seem as dramatic as that jump from low-quality magnetic tape. But it also had to do with the plethora of supplemental features like digital surround sound and commentary tracks and animated menus that added to the wow factor, as you pointed out. Now that thats all common, BR really just comes down to resolution in terms of its appeal, which isn't as dramatic.
I'd say Blu Ray will be the standard home video format by about 2016, if it can hang in there for the next two years or so.
2016? By that time, I expect HD streaming to become common place. Verizon already streams the DVR over the FiOS link. If they can do that today, there's nothing stopping them from streaming an HD video directly to a media center that is either leased or owned.
People will still want disk-based media. Streaming will replace the rental market one day, probably, but people still want to have a hard-copy with a nice package that they can put on their shelves, appreciate, bring with them places. Especially because of DVD, the home video market is a market of collectors, and I'm talking about much of the average consumer fanbase, not just the real collectors that pick up the deluxe limited pressings and such. Look at the music industry, not only are CDs still alive and selling more than they were during some years in the 90s but vinyl records have made a huge comeback. People have always been hard-copy collectors because its satisfying to have that physical library on a shelf--whether it is books, vinyl records, CDs, VHS tapes or DVDs. Streaming, in the near future at least--who knows how consumer trends will be in a decade and a half for now--is just a sort of lazy, "lets see whats on" type of rental/television thing, not a replacement for the buyers market.
Exactly. I have tons of books that I will only read once in my lifetime, yet I take great pride in displaying them nicely on the many bookshelves located around my house. No matter how good ebook readers get in the future, and no matter how much more practical they are, they will never quite cut it for me. Same thing goes for my DVD and my CD collection. I have a tower where all my music CDs are displayed, downloadable music will never replace that, no matter how good the quality gets. I can't remember the last time I watched many of the movie I own on DVD, but they look quite nice lined up on my shelf, and I am proud of the films I own. Half the fun of having these things is the fact that you have them and can organize them nicely, displayed nicely for your own satisfaction or for any visitors who might happen to take a glance over at your collection to see what you have (I know I do that when visiting others).
Nothing will ever replace physical media for me, and I know I am not the only one who feels this way. I just got a 360 not too long ago, and I have bought a few things off of LIVE. It is nice how it displays them nicely with their cover art in your game library, but it just isn't the same as being able to reach out and touch them.
"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape
Jay said:I think my head just caved in.
The things you think you know dwarf your actual understanding on this point.
I will concede that a standalone player will cost more than a ROM drive. However, if I can put together a "standalone" player for $357 (I just priced it out), I would expect manufacturers to be able to make and sell one for about half that. I can't find one anywhere for half that price.
I can build a DVR for $500 (probably $400 now). Or I can buy a Tivo for $200. Tivo can build (and sale) the same thing I can for less than half the cost and make a profit. The manufacturers of Blu-ray players can do the same thing. The only reason they haven't come down in price is because they don't have the "cheap" Chinese players to compete with. Hopefully that'll change this year.
zombie84 said:People can buy an HDTV for very little (as you say below), hook it up to their HD cable or satellite, and enjoy a stunning picture right away. And if they have an upscaling DVD player, their old DVDs will now look even better than they did before.
Then thats exactly the same as how people can buy a Blu Ray player for extremely little and just hook it up as well. How is this relevant as far as the asserted failing of Blu Ray is concerned?
The difference is that when someone's in a store, they can see a Blu-ray player and an upscaling DVD player side by side. To them, they probably don't see a difference. So why spend almost twice as much when you can't see the difference? Not only would they need to buy the more expensive player, but they'd also need to replace their whole collection in order to take advantage of the "better looking" player.
DVD players didn't come down because the format war ended or because recordable players emerged; I don't think most people even knew about the format war, and no one uses recordable DVD anyway.
I knew several people at the time, that were not technical at all, that knew about Divx. One of them even bought a player because he felt it was the better buy, despite all the drawbacks.
Well, despite your own personal experience, i thought it was common knowledge that like 90% of people out there had no idea it was going on. Most people didn't even know of DVD itself until around 1999. I guarantee you if you go up to someone and say "DivX format" they'll think your talking about the computer codec, if they even know what you are talking about at all. Especially outside of the US, DivX is about as well known by your average person as the RCA video disks.
Seeing as how DIVX was started in 98 and died in 99, that's not surprising:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Video_Express
Anyone that walked into a Circuit City at the time would know there was a format war going on. When Circuit City announced they were killing it, I told my whole family that it was now time to get DVD. I picked up a player probably two weeks after that and then started buying movies.
As for Blu-Ray--here's the thing. I don't think anyone ever expected it to replace DVD, so why are people disappointed that its sales are not as good as DVDs?
I don't know where you got this idea. Every article I've ever read since Blu-ray's inception has made the case that Blu-ray is so much better that it was going to replace DVD.
Well, true there are a lot of uninformed morons out there, and whenever any format comes out theres all sorts of people that just swoop in and proclaim it the next big thing. But no one who ever properly understood the reality of the business expected it to replace DVD in the same way that DVD replaced VHS (ie a seemingly-rapid pace and instant adoption). Most people didnt even realise that DVD started off relatively slowly compared to its later reputation. Blu Ray could never replace DVD in the same way DVD replaced VHS because it requires HD sets, so before that happens you have to ask yourself "when are HD monitors going to replace SD ones?" This process has to occur first. But those people are probably correct in that, IN THE LONG TERM, Blu Ray will be the next DVD in that it will be the next home video standard. But it wont happen until HD supplants SD, and that is still a few years off. The common sentiment I've always found, at least from anyone with an opinion worth listening to, is that BR will inherit the mantle of DVD in the sense that it will be the next-level video standard but not in the sense that DVD will become (literally) obsolete right away.
I don't expect DVD to become obsolete right away. I do think that people are switching from HD to SD, for the wrong reasons. Remember that the US switches to digital only broadcasting on February 17th. How many people equate HD with digital broadcasting? A lot. So a lot of people have gone out and bought new HD sets (especially this year). Even though those same people only need a digital converter box, they've still gone out and bought HD sets. In short, a lot more people now own HD sets than did last year. Maybe HD hasn't replace SD sets just yet, but I'm betting it's very close.
DVD was a success that had never been seen in home video, and probably won't be ever again, at least in our lifetimes.
Never going to need more than 1 MB of RAM either, huh?
While it is possible, IMO it is very unlikely that the success of DVD will be seen again. It was a completlely unlikely coalescing of elements that enabled it to grow with the speed and infiltrate the market in the manner in which it did, and they are entirely accidental. VHS didnt happen like this, neither did Laserdisc, CED, Blu Ray, HD-DVD, VHS-D or any other format. The reason is because the sheer number of coincidenes and circumstances that would allow them to supplant the reigning format with DVDs speed are so unlikely that just based on probabibility it is unlikely to be seen again in the next few decades (as far as traditional, hard-copy, retail-based media goes).
Coincedences and circumstances? Oh give me a break. VHS had slow growth in the beginning because of a format war. Laserdisc was, afaik, essentially just a giant CD so you could fit video on it. DVD had to compete with DIVX, but not for very long. VHS-D was a joke (ooh, you can buy this digital VHS tape that you can only play, after DVD has been on the market for how long?). HD-DVD had at least a partial chance since it was created by the DVD Forum. The only real reason it died is because WB went Blu-ray only, which caused everyone else to jump ship.
DVD also had so many more advantages over VHS and Laserdisc that it was a no brainer (at least to me and everyone else I know). Smaller size, easier to store, doesn't wear out like a VHS tape, no tracking, quick scene skip, so on and so forth. DVD was like a breath of fresh air to anyone that heard about it. "You mean I don't have to rewind it? You mean I can skip right to my favorite scene? The box is smaller? I don't have to worry about broken tapes?" All of those things led to fast adoption.
DVD you could just hook up to your TV and be blown away by the quality, but Blu-Ray requires you to have a completely different television set, and jump between Blu-Ray and DVD isn't nearly as dramatic so there's not as much drive for "you gotta see THIS!!".
I don't know where people get this. A Blu-ray with 1080p is over double the resolution of a 480p DVD. DVD was double that of VHS (usually around 240 lines). Sure, it's best viewed on a screen larger than 32", but I was never really blown away by the quality of a DVD on my 27" TV. What blew me away was the ability to freeze frame without the frame jumping, select scenes at random, and high speed skip through the movie. Add in the commentary and other extra features and I was hooked.
VHS also had lots of noise and tape distortion and things of that nature as well--DVD was the first time people got a really clear, sharp picture, and THAT was really what hadn't been seen before. Now that people are accustomed to that, the increase in resolution doesn't seem as dramatic as that jump from low-quality magnetic tape. But it also had to do with the plethora of supplemental features like digital surround sound and commentary tracks and animated menus that added to the wow factor, as you pointed out. Now that thats all common, BR really just comes down to resolution in terms of its appeal, which isn't as dramatic.
I can only partially agree with this. When shown side by side, Blu-ray is obviously superior. Unless you're seeing a DVD on an upscaling player, then Blu-ray wins hands down. And again I think it really comes down to the cost of the player.
I'd say Blu Ray will be the standard home video format by about 2016, if it can hang in there for the next two years or so.
2016? By that time, I expect HD streaming to become common place. Verizon already streams the DVR over the FiOS link. If they can do that today, there's nothing stopping them from streaming an HD video directly to a media center that is either leased or owned.
People will still want disk-based media. Streaming will replace the rental market one day, probably, but people still want to have a hard-copy with a nice package that they can put on their shelves, appreciate, bring with them places. Especially because of DVD, the home video market is a market of collectors, and I'm talking about much of the average consumer fanbase, not just the real collectors that pick up the deluxe limited pressings and such. Look at the music industry, not only are CDs still alive and selling more than they were during some years in the 90s but vinyl records have made a huge comeback. People have always been hard-copy collectors because its satisfying to have that physical library on a shelf--whether it is books, vinyl records, CDs, VHS tapes or DVDs. Streaming, in the near future at least--who knows how consumer trends will be in a decade and a half for now--is just a sort of lazy, "lets see whats on" type of rental/television thing, not a replacement for the buyers market.
Vinyl records have made a comeback yes, but looking at sales data, people aren't buying CDs or Vinyl nearly as much as they're buying mp3s. iTunes sales are skyrocketing. The average Joe has an iPod with his entire collection stored on it. No one seems to care for physical media anymore. They just want to hear the music. I see the same thing happening with movies. Once you can buy a movie for about half what the DVD costs, who cares if there's no box? If it's got all the same features, there's no need for a box or packaging. Stick it on a portable USB drive and you can take your entire movie collection with you whereever you want to go instead of picking just a few to travel with.
Sure, that's not the norm right now, but as more and more people own iPods, it's going to become more and more the norm.
PaulisDead2221 said:Hey, negative1, what movies you getting? :)
well, they're not too into sci-fi (but i will show them star wars!), so they'll probably get more of the action/drama/suspense type movies.. just for kicks, i started them off with indy 4, (Which i actually liked).. but anyways, one thing i did notice at the store, is that tv's that have the 120HZ processing make the picture look 'different', like its 'live' or something else, it gives it a strange video effect that's hard to describe.. has anyone else noticed this? the picture doesn't blur either, and that's a nice change.. later -1
[no GOUT in CED?-> GOUT CED]