looks like hd-dvd is dead.
long live blu-ray
heres a link for some info
engadget.com/2008/02/18/tosh … stop-sale/
This is so old.
Honestly, Blu-Ray wins the distinction of being the next Super-VHS. Who cares?
Every media seems to go through a new and improved model just as its being made obsolete.
Ask yourself how many Super VHS tapes you own? None, because by the time Super VHS came out, you had a DVD player. How many APS cameras do you own? None, because by the time APS came out, the writing was on the wall: film was dead, and photography was going digital. Got any 2.8 MB Floppies? 250MB Zip disks?
Sure, there’s awesome HD content on Blu-Ray disks, but why bother? It’s not a quantum leap in usability, convenience or technology over normal DVDs. Besides, if you want to watch an HD movie, you can watch it on your PVR, AppleTV, computer, Satellite, pay-per-view, etc. Why even bother with the disk at all?
It’s telling that Apple has been part of the Blu-ray consortium from the beginning, but has yet to put a Blu-ray in any of its computers. Why bother? Microsoft included the HD-DVD option on the Xbox 360, but really pushed the watching of HD movies online instead.
So yeah, don’t rush out to get a blu-ray player expecting it to be the next big thing, because it’s just an incremental improvement over normal DVD. If you’re in the market for a player, might as well make it Blu-ray, but otherwise…
meh…
I remember yngwie saying something about this taken over along time ago, but no
one thought it would.
Yep, and i told lots of people at work that it was going to win too, Sony makes some nice players, the BDPS300 and BDPS500 are very nice players, The only thing i hate about blue-ray / HD-DVD is they take forever to load up and get going, GRR…
They’ve won an irrelevant contest really, because most people will choose convenience over quality.
mp3 wins over CD, despite it being worse quality. Who would have predicted that Apple would sell millions of music players that have worse audio quality than CDs, or that they would sell 4 billion, yes 4 billion songs of a worse quality than CD?
Well, the same thing is happening with video. Who cares how much better blu-ray is than normal DVDs? In fact, people are opting for even worse quality, as long as it’s convenient (or cheap). Check out some of the torrent sites and you’ll see that people will prefer to download a normal 700mb DVD rip of a movie rather than the 3 or 4gb HD version.
There are a lot of HD (and SD) options out there that are not Blu-Ray and are much more convenient. Heck, a recent survey of PS3 owners showed that a majority of them didn’t even realize they had Blu-Ray players.
Well that sure puts the whole thing into perspective…
Found these on the net tonight that amplify Mig’s points…
I especially like the quote in the msnbc article, kind of puts it all into a nice easy explanation–
Even at $400, that’s about twice the price most consumers are comfortable with — the “I-don’t-have-to-ask-my-wife’s-permissionâ€
Blue ray will come down in price just wait a few more months, It was 900$ for a player now they are about 300-400$.
Sure, but that still doesn’t explain why people will pay for less quality if it’s more convenient.
Why is everybody downloading mp3s onto mp3 players when CDs are better quality?
Answer that and you’ll know why it doesn’t matter how cheap Blu-ray gets – the future is the mp3 version of video – video downloads. DVRs, on-demand cable, satellite HD, pay-per-view, downloading torrents, etc.
Besides, the average consumer is so confused with HD, digital, etc, that giving them more options has the opposite effect. Like start talking about how Blu-Ray’s bitrate is better than your average HD Cable channel or talk about digital compression artifacts and watch people’s eyes glaze over.
Tell them they can click “rent movie now” and start watching a HD movie for $2.99 and they’ll understand that.
Shit, people are still saying “upconvert” with a serious face and you expect these people to know about bit rates and stuff like that?
Nah, people want simplicity, not confusion. Your average joe doesn’t even know you can play a normal DVD in a Blu-ray drive.
As for quality, “good enough” always wins.
MiG nailed it! Having been brought up on peasant vision, VHS was a dream come true. DVD’s were awesome. I have to ask ‘How much is enough?’ I can hear the difference between CD’s and MP3’s for now, but not by a lot. I have never watched Bluray to my knowledge and have no idea of what to expect but will sit tight until the next “latest greatest” technology hits.
My rear projection wide screen is getting old and tired but I won’t buy a LCD or Plasma as Laser is supposed to be so much better and just around the corner.
The obscene beauty of this day and age of electronic technology is anything you buy is out of date before you leave the store. I dread the day of ‘Smellivision’. 
Actually, organic led will be the next best 
it will be about 1/4" if that thick, then you will tack it on the wall after unrolling it like a poster, and youll connect a small cable to the corner then put it on the wall, oh wait these are already being used, but much smaller tho 
Oh crap! I’ll just go back into my cave and practice my hieroglyphics. 