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Blu-ray Disc or HD-DVD?

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Lately I stopped buying movies on DVD because I don't want to have to rebuy them in the future in HD. I'm not going to buy a HD-TV and HD player yet, first the price has to come down. But I read a lot about Blu-ray and HD-DVD to see what I like best. I still can't believe we are in a format war again! I'm pretty sure I like Blu-ray more. I also read there will be players that can play both formats, that will make things much easier. Have you decided yet?
Fez: I am so excited about Star Whores.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.
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Nope, but after reading a recent article on the Digital Bits, I think I'm a Blu-Ray convert. It appears that Universals exclusive use of HD-DVD may not have anything to do with the format and may indeed be just because of kickbacks or something else (note that this is conjecture on my part). Apparently someone asked a Universal exec about the whole thing and about getting Spielberg's movies (specifically Jaws) on HD-DVD and they said that Spielberg hadn't committed to either format. That was a week before the CE3K announcement at Comic-Con. Also, apparently Universals parent company, GE, is not happy about their exclusive use of HD-DVD.

So it seems to me that yes, Universal either needs to adopt Blu-Ray in addition to HD-DVD or switch to Blu-Ray all together. I'm also pretty sure that multi-format players will be out this Christmas, which will effectively end the format war. If I can find a reasonably priced dual format player (reasonably priced being something under $500, preferably under $300), then I'll gladly upgrade. Until then, I'll continue enjoying DVDs on my HDTV (yes, I know they aren't as good, but there's also no chance of getting stuck with something that won't work in the future).
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Multi-format player is already out,Best Buy has had them for a while now,they are about $1200 bucks.

DJ
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Blu-ray is going to emerge dominant (well, it already has, to be honest), and eventually will take over almost completely. It's by far the superior format anyway.
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Originally posted by: ChainsawAsh
Blu-ray is going to emerge dominant (well, it already has, to be honest), and eventually will take over almost completely. It's by far the superior format anyway.


You got that right.



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well if that hybrid player comes out that can playback HD-DVD's exlusive bonus material features as well as blu ray is not the whole format war a joke?

though i do favor blu ray for it's technical aspects and amount of data space HD-DVD is cheaper and more user friendly and allows use of imported titles and does not have the high end encryption.

should hacks crack blu ray like they did dvd, then i can watch region 2 japan titles on blu ray but until that happens i'm sticking with dvd

Plus right now HD-DVD is getting heroes and star trek exlusively, that should boost sales if it was not for greedy paramount charging over 200.00 for the first season of trek remastered

“Always loved Vader’s wordless self sacrifice. Another shitty, clueless, revision like Greedo and young Anakin’s ghost. What a fucking shame.” -Simon Pegg.

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Connect these dots and the Universal issue and source of kickbacks may become crystal clear:
1) Universal and NBC are the same company (they have been since 2004).
2) NBC and Microsoft have been in bed together since the formation of MSNBC in the 90s.
3) Microsoft has been a major supporter of the HD-DVD format for its own, non-movie-related reasons.
I am fluent in over six million forms of procrastination.
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Originally posted by: ChainsawAsh
Blu-ray is going to emerge dominant (well, it already has, to be honest), and eventually will take over almost completely. It's by far the superior format anyway.
Is Blu-ray really dominant? I really hope so! I think if the companies got together in the first place and decided on one format, players would be much cheaper. Plus with all these format exclusive titles who wants a player that can only play one format?

Originally posted by: skyjedi2005
though i do favor blu ray for it's technical aspects and amount of data space HD-DVD is cheaper and more user friendly and allows use of imported titles and does not have the high end encryption.

should hacks crack blu ray like they did dvd, then i can watch region 2 japan titles on blu ray but until that happens i'm sticking with dvd

But HD-DVD has this DRM/AACS crap.
I'm hoping it will be easy to make a player region free.

Fez: I am so excited about Star Whores.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.
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Originally posted by: Arnie.d
Originally posted by: ChainsawAsh
Blu-ray is going to emerge dominant (well, it already has, to be honest), and eventually will take over almost completely. It's by far the superior format anyway.
Is Blu-ray really dominant? I really hope so! I think if the companies got together in the first place and decided on one format, players would be much cheaper. Plus with all these format exclusive titles who wants a player that can only play one format?

Originally posted by: skyjedi2005
though i do favor blu ray for it's technical aspects and amount of data space HD-DVD is cheaper and more user friendly and allows use of imported titles and does not have the high end encryption.

should hacks crack blu ray like they did dvd, then i can watch region 2 japan titles on blu ray but until that happens i'm sticking with dvd

But HD-DVD has this DRM/AACS crap.
I'm hoping it will be easy to make a player region free.


Both formats have DRM/AACS junk, but I believe Blu-Ray has not fully implemented it yet. It is part of the spec though.

As for regions, I'm pretty sure that both formats did away with regions.

Originally posted by: dark_jedi
Multi-format player is already out,Best Buy has had them for a while now,they are about $1200 bucks.

DJ


Yeah, but isn't that the LG player that doesn't fully take advantage of all the HD-DVD features? What I was referring to is a combo player that plays both formats to their fullest.

The format war has been a joke from the beginning. These companies come out with competing formats, then they wonder why adoption is so slow. Time and time again they come out with two different formats and time and time again adoption is slow. It happened with VHS and Beta, it sort of happened with DVD and Divx (but to a much lesser extent) and it really happened with DVD+/-R (until dual format burners emerged). So we'll either get a fully capable dual format player or the "war" will be long and drawn out.
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You are disciplined but tolerant; a true American.

Pissing off Rob since August 2007.
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I'm probably going to end up buying a blu-ray player. Or wait until dual format players that are worth a damn come out.
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I have the Xbox 360 HD-DVD player and it's awesome. It's only $180 or something, it's quiet, and it's small. So small I have it tucked away behind my tv so you can't even see it. Even if HD-DVD folds (which it eventually will) it's not like my player will stop functioning. I was thinking of picking up a PS3, but since I'm not really interested in it I'm just going to get a stand-alone blu-ray player. I'm hoping by T-giving/Christmas the prices come down at least a little bit, though.
40,000 million notches away
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Is Blu Ray region coded? And if so why would HD-DVD not be? And why would dvd's still be region coded? What is the point of that today (with region free players and hacks) except to screw less knowledgeable people who just want to bring their dvd's overseas for a vacation.

Take back the trilogy. Execute Order '77

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So a PS3 can play every blu-ray movie?

So the movies on the Blu-ray or HD-DVD formats can vary from 480i to 1080p but does anyone know what the framerate specifications are? It would be so cool if all movies would be 24fps 1080p. No more freaking NTSC jaggies and PAL speedup!
Fez: I am so excited about Star Whores.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.
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I'm pretty sure the hi-def movies don't vary from 480i to 1080p. Maybe 720p to 1080p, but I'm pretty sure they don't go down to 480. That's SD DVD territory.

The dual format player I was referring to is this one http://www.homemediaretailing.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?sec_id=2&&article_ID=11043

And yes, a PS3 can play every Blu-Ray movie. A PS3 is a Blu-Ray drive after all.
F Scale score - 3.3333333333333335

You are disciplined but tolerant; a true American.

Pissing off Rob since August 2007.
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Originally posted by: lordjedi
I'm pretty sure the hi-def movies don't vary from 480i to 1080p.

Yeah, I said it wrong I meant 480i compatible (since the formats support Mpeg2).
Fez: I am so excited about Star Whores.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.
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Originally posted by: lordjedi
It happened with VHS and Beta, it sort of happened with DVD and Divx (but to a much lesser extent)
For the record, Divx was not a competing format to DVD. It was basically a DVD rental gimmick Circuit City came up with to try and get people to "rent" their own DVDs every time they wanted to watch one of them. Divx discs were DVDs with special coding that made them unwatchable except on a Divx player that had the movie activated. Players played regular DVDs as well. (This also had nothing to do with the DivX video codec we all know and love.)

Looking at the technical specs, I really hope Blu-ray wins the war. It'll be so much more fun to author Blu-ray discs with the extra disc space and data transfer rate. Having to squeeze as much as possible into a 4.7 or 8 GB DVD is certainly a challenge, especially when the maximum transfer rate is 10Mbps. Being able to put 50 GB on one disc and having 54Mbps to play with could really net some incredible projects.



My Projects:
[Holiday Special Hybrid DVD v2]
[X0 Project]
[Backstroke of the West DVD]
[ROTS Theatrical DVD]

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Originally posted by: Zion
Originally posted by: lordjedi
It happened with VHS and Beta, it sort of happened with DVD and Divx (but to a much lesser extent)
For the record, Divx was not a competing format to DVD. It was basically a DVD rental gimmick Circuit City came up with to try and get people to "rent" their own DVDs every time they wanted to watch one of them. Divx discs were DVDs with special coding that made them unwatchable except on a Divx player that had the movie activated. Players played regular DVDs as well. (This also had nothing to do with the DivX video codec we all know and love.)


Yeah, I know, but the Divx "extension" still really annoyed the hell out of me. The President of the company I worked for during the whole thing picked one up because he thought it was cool. I tried to explain why it was bad, but he thought it was kind of neat. Oh well.

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Yeah, I worked at CC during the short life of Divx. They had a great employee discount on the players so we ended up picking one up. My parents still had it well after Divx was over and done with. I think we owned a total of 4 Divx movies compared to a good 20 or so DVDs. I knew CC was getting desperate when they wanted us to mention Divx to anyone in the store - even the elderly people shopping for vacuums and refrigerators.

My Projects:
[Holiday Special Hybrid DVD v2]
[X0 Project]
[Backstroke of the West DVD]
[ROTS Theatrical DVD]

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Well that is certainly interesting. Sigh, the end of the war has now been put off a few more months. I wonder how much payola was involved to get that deal.

Its worth noting, however, that the first Spielberg film to be released on hi-def will be on Blu Ray though...
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Originally posted by: zombie84
Well that is certainly interesting. Sigh, the end of the war has now been put off a few more months. I wonder how much payola was involved to get that deal.

Its worth noting, however, that the first Spielberg film to be released on hi-def will be on Blu Ray though...


I think it's worth noting that Spielberg's films will probably only be released on Blu-Ray, especially since that's practically what the press release said.

The end of the war hasn't been put off for a few months. No, if anything, the war would have ended in a few months. Now, we've got Shrek the Third and Transformers coming exclusively to HD-DVD. Go read some of the latest columns over at digitalbits. This will do nothing but prolong the war. They, and others, are speculating that this could even cause Warner Brothers to go exclusive to HD-DVD. If that happens, the formats will be evenly split between all the studios.

Two things can happen if that happens. Either low cost dual format players hit the market, which consumers will happily snap up, or hi-def totally dies. If there are no low cost players and two competing formats in the next couple of years, hi-def will go nowhere. No one wants to invest in one format only to end up with obsolete hardware. All this is going to do is prolong the war, to everyone's detriment.

For the record, it's being reported that Microsoft gave them (Paramount and DreamWorks) $150 million dollars to go HD-DVD exclusive. Make no mistake though, this could end up killing both formats. Without a low cost player (probably sub $300) or a single format, hi-def will end up a niche market, similar to DVD-Audio and SACD. I'm summarizing most of this from digitalbits, but I think they're spot on. Well, except for the part about a dual format player. I think if a cheap dual format player comes to market this Christmas, it won't matter won't format a movie is on. Of course, even if the player debuts at $500, the not so early adopters will snap it up so they can play both formats and then the price will do nothing but drop. That's exactly what happened when dvd+r and dvd-r were at war. The burners were expensive until dual format ones hit the market. Now you can find them for $30 (my first dual format drive was $250).

If hi-def formats die, the next big thing will be hi-def downloads direct to media center PCs. More and more people are installing those and as long as you can connect it to your TV, you don't really have to worry about formats. Divx, Xvid, MP4, WMV, VC-1, they can all be played through the computer as long as the right codecs are installed.
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Pissing off Rob since August 2007.
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Originally posted by: lordjedi
Of course, even if the player debuts at $500, the not so early adopters will snap it up so they can play both formats and then the price will do nothing but drop. That's exactly what happened when dvd+r and dvd-r were at war. The burners were expensive until dual format ones hit the market. Now you can find them for $30 (my first dual format drive was $250).

I remeber when I wanted to buy my first dvd burner, but I couldn't decide between -r and +r. Then Sony came with a dual format burner and from that moment everybody started producing dual format drives and prices dropped. So I'm kind of hoping the same will happen with HD.

Fez: I am so excited about Star Whores.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.
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Originally posted by: Arnie.d
Originally posted by: lordjedi
Of course, even if the player debuts at $500, the not so early adopters will snap it up so they can play both formats and then the price will do nothing but drop. That's exactly what happened when dvd+r and dvd-r were at war. The burners were expensive until dual format ones hit the market. Now you can find them for $30 (my first dual format drive was $250).

I remeber when I wanted to buy my first dvd burner, but I couldn't decide between -r and +r. Then Sony came with a dual format burner and from that moment everybody started producing dual format drives and prices dropped. So I'm kind of hoping the same will happen with HD.


Exactly. I almost picked up that burner myself. I ended up getting an NEC from Costco that was a little cheaper.
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You are disciplined but tolerant; a true American.

Pissing off Rob since August 2007.
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I read Michael Bay is pretty pissed at Paramount. He wants people to be able to view his movies in the best possible quality. He even threatened to not make Transformers 2 if Paramount goes (stays?) HD-DVD only.
Fez: I am so excited about Star Whores.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.