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Studios Face Off in Next-Gen DVD Format War 327

Posted by michael from the early-adopters-get-burned dept.
WaZiX writes "After yesterday's HD-DVD strike, the Blu-Ray Disc format received support from Disney (and its Buena Vista Home Entertainment unit) as reported by ZDNET. As predicted, the format war has only just begun."
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Studios Face Off in Next-Gen DVD Format War More

Studios Face Off in Next-Gen DVD Format War

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  • Is this really news? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Tetsugaku-San ( 717792 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:14AM (#11042130) Homepage
    As before, there will be a short 'format war', maybe even shorter this time, say 6 months - and low and behold every product will sudenly start supporting every format - just like they did when DVD burners became popular.

    Time to comoditisation of products get's shorter every month :D

    • Re:Is this really news? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by OECD ( 639690 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:28AM (#11042253) Journal

      and low and behold every product will sudenly start supporting every format

      No doubt. The real 'war' here is settling which format groups will be able to collect licensing fees from which manufacturers.

    • Re:Is this really news? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Jucius Maximus ( 229128 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:37AM (#11042353) Journal
      "As before, there will be a short 'format war', maybe even shorter this time, say 6 months - and low and behold every product will sudenly start supporting every format - just like they did when DVD burners became popular."

      Except that HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are a lot more dissimilar than DVD+R and DVD-R. (Note: Some people think that + and - are identical after being recorded, but this is false. There are differences in the optics and signal processing techniques.)

      My understanding is that the HD and Blu-Ray formats have notably different data storage sizes and manufacturing processes. The discs are tangibly and physically different in design.

      Compare that to DVD+R and DVD-R. Their designs are almost identical. Even the ancient Panasonic DVD player from four years ago we have in the living room plays both formats even though it was invented before recordable DVD. That's how similar they are.

      Will a first gen HD player read Blu Ray discs? Probably not. I'm not saying that dual format HD/Blu-Ray devices won't come out. I am saying that it will be a longer wait than with +R/-R readers.

  • Yay for bigger DVDs full of commercials! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by garcia ( 6573 ) * on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:15AM (#11042133)
    Blu-ray Discs can store up to 50GB of data on a dual-sided disc. That's significantly higher than the 4.7GB capacity of the DVD format Blu-ray is looking to succeed.

    Yippee! Even more room to store lengthy commercials for other "limited edition gold/platinum" DVDs of re-released animated movies from 40+ years ago. There's nothing I enjoy more than paying money to rent a movie and sitting through 15 minutes of advertisements because the DVD won't allow the player to skip forward through that crap.
    Disney said its plans to release movies on the Blu-ray format are nonexclusive, meaning it could publish movies on other formats as well.

    If other formats can hold more and can lock out the DVD player even better than they wouldn't want to eliminate the possibilities of moving to that format now would they?

    "The studios will come around to the superior format," Peterson said. "Capacity and picture quality are directly related."

    The studios will come around to whatever is cheaper for them to produce/distribute their materials while still being competitive/profitable and staying within their business model (whether that is adding 15+ minutes of commercials to all their DVDs and not allowing DVD players to fast-forward through them or not).

    Also, the larger the capacity the greater the troubles in ripping/modifying/burning the discs. If the discs hold 50GB you need a 100+GB HD to do any modifications to the movie before reburning it. By changing the formats you are less likely to have the hardware to burn that format and thereby lose the ability to do what you did with regular DVDs once the burner prices dropped well under $100.

    I'm sure they figure it will be several more years before blu-ray DVD writers and extremely large HDs will become common enough for everyone to make their DVD viewing experiences on DVDs they purchased acceptable.

    The DVD technology has become the most successful consumer technology ever because of the re-release of older movies on the new format for what consumers have deemed reasonable prices. Are all these movies going to be again released on Blu-ray/DVD-HD for the same prices?

    I see a good possibility that most people won't give a shit one way or the other and will likely keep buying the media that is even more inexpensive. It all depends on your willingness to accept/adapt new technologies and your need for a better movie watching experience. Obviously DVD is far superior to VHS. Will Blu-ray and DVD-HD have a similar quality increase?

    • Disney's Closed Universe of Advertising (Score:5, Insightful)

      by FunWithHeadlines ( 644929 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:20AM (#11042188) Homepage
      "Yippee! Even more room to store lengthy commercials for other "limited edition gold/platinum" DVDs of re-released animated movies from 40+ years ago. "

      Heh, you beat me to it. That was my first thought too. Disney is amazing in its ability to force-feed cross-marketing material at their consumers. I have a couple of young nieces who watch Disney full time, and when I'm over at their house (and thus seeing what's on the Disney channel), I'm always amazed that they exist in a closed universe of Disney material.

      The Disney TV show is interrupted by a commercial advertising another upcoming Disney TV show, followed by a "behind the scenes" look at the filming of the latest Disney movie, interrupted with an "insider's access pass" to the music from the latest Disney DVD, along with ads for Disney theme parks, Radio Disney, and now back to our Disney TV show, but first let's meet the backup singers from the new Disney movie.

      After that I just want to retch in technicolor...

      • In Disney's defense, it's their channel, they can do what they want. They've always shown only Disney stuff with Disney promos for Disney actors. It dates back to when studios basically "owned" actors and they could only work for that studio. Disney has essentially that (Hillary Duff, Raven, etc), and it's a lucrative deal for both parties. Ever since they've had their own cable channel, they've done just that.

        Additionally, I know that Disney isn't going to have a commercial for Trojan condoms or show
        • They certainly can do what they want, no argument there. I just feel badly for the kids who watch and get fed the message that it's all Disney all the time. What about a Trix commercial? Or Lucky Charms? Or Twizzlers? Aren't those kid-friendly? It doesn't have to be condom commercials, but isn't there anything outside of the Disney orbit that they can advertise?
          • I beg to differ.

            Trix, Lucky Charms, and Twizzlers are to kids as cigarettes, alchohol, and caffiene are to adults. They're addictive and harmful substances that should not be consumed by anyone.

            While I wouldn't suggest banning them, they sure aren't "kid friendly". I would, however, favor a ban on advertising such junk food to people of any age.
            • "Trix, Lucky Charms, and Twizzlers are to kids as cigarettes, alchohol, and caffiene are to adults. They're addictive and harmful substances that should not be consumed by anyone."

              Agreed, which is why they would be a natural fit for the Disney channel which does for the mind what Trix does for the body. When I said "kid-friendly," I meant it is something kids would find appealing to see on TV, not good for them.

          • Well, you've kind of proven their point. It profits Disney to let children think there is only Disney. Why allow their competitors to horn in on their captive audience? The only time any media wants to sell commericals to other companies is when they need the ad revenue. Disney has simply set up the Disney-Channel as a way to promote all its own products. Thus, ad revenue is not in their Accounts Receivable department at all.
    • Also, the larger the capacity the greater the troubles in ripping/modifying/burning the discs. If the discs hold 50GB you need a 100+GB HD to do any modifications to the movie before reburning it. By changing the formats you are less likely to have the hardware to burn that format and thereby lose the ability to do what you did with regular DVDs once the burner prices dropped well under $100.

      I think it'll be somewhat like it is today: The smaller number of people with the space/time/hardware to rip+conver

      • Re:Yay for bigger DVDs full of commercials! (Score:5, Interesting)

        by garcia ( 6573 ) * on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:25AM (#11042232)
        I think it'll be somewhat like it is today: The smaller number of people with the space/time/hardware to rip+convert the discs will do the hard work, and then place the smaller files out there in a more universal format to be distributed.

        I'm not talking about downloading and burning movies that originated on Blu-ray. I'm talking about buying a movie on Blu-ray and modifying it so that it is comfortable for me to watch.

        If I buy the Star Wars Trilogy DVD for my fiance for Christmas and it is three DVDs with a 30 minute unskippable intro you can bet your ass that I'm storing the originals and ripping out the crap and reburning to a DVDr.
      • If someone were ripping a movie to a smaller, low res file, it would make more sense to use the DVD as the source instead of the HD-DVD. The big reason for the 50GB capacity is to store video at some insanely high resolution like 1800x1080. By the time DVD's are retired I'm thinking your average PC power user won't blink at 100GB.
    • If you had watched any Disney / Beuna Vista DVD made in the last three or so years, you'd know that it only takes a press of the menu to bypass the trailers, they aren't "locked out".

      They only did that lockout on a few DVDs, got hit with an angry backlash then never did it that way again. I guess bad information takes years to die, even if it was fixed in a few months, IIRC.
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • Well, you could buy a better dvd player, maybe one with a section skip button that ignores the no skip flag. My apex player will skip anything, including disney movie previews on those 'bad' disks.
        • I've been known to rip my daughter's Dora movies onto DVD-RWs that instant-start without the ads or intro screens. She knows how to put them in the player herself, and it auto-plays, but operating the remote control at the menus is a bit advanced still.
      • Actually, I just watched Spiderman 2 - same BS initially IIRC. I don't pay attention half the time.

        The marketeers have succeeded in making me almost totally oblivious to commercials, so much so that sometimes I tune out of entire shows, when I bother to turn them on at all anymore.

        At least, that was until I got a DVR, with which I can now reclaim 20 minutes of every hour of tv "watching". So, ironically enough, now I watch more tv, and am probably peppered with more advertising, although in more subtle wa
      • I watched something a while back (some kids movie) and it STILL did the thing where, once the previews started, there was no way (other than FF) to skip them. The MENU key didn't work. If you pressed MENU before it started, it would go. I don't remember what this was, but I know it was a new release.
    • You're a bit off the mark. The "bigger" hard drives are here already. I have 4 160GB drives striped for a nice 640 GB volume. Nice mass store device with some halfway decent performance. Cost? $400, including the PC with Gb ethernet they're in. Parts are darn cheap if you want to roll your own "SAN".
    • There's nothing I enjoy more than paying money to rent a movie and sitting through 15 minutes of advertisements because the DVD won't allow the player to skip forward through that crap.

      If you paid attention to the five-second "coming soon" banner preceding the ads, you will notice an unobtrusive plain text message that says "press MENU to start the movie"

      Fast forwarding is disabled, but the MENU button skips over the ads.

      What is worse are DVDs that open with the FBI warning with all skip mechanisms di

      • From my experience, different things work for different movies -which is partly what makes it so annoying.

        One DVD will allow you to just press the Menu button, but fast forward and Next Chapter are disabled.

        Another DVD will have the Menu button disabled, but allow you to hit the Next Chapter button a few times to get through the previews. Fast forward may or may not be enabled.

        The next one will allow fast forward but not chapter skipping or going straight to the menu.

        Some don't allow you to do anything.
    • According to the blue ray web site, blue ray already has PC recorders for it, though they cost about two grand and another twenty-five bucks per blank. Recordable media stores about 25 GB (GB == 2^33 bits?) on a single layer.

      Considering that Sony wants to replace the VHS with this tech, I would expect blank media and recorders to become fairly cheap over the next several years. While the video format might be quite crippled with DRM, I doubt that the PC format will be much different from CD-R and DVD-R, an
    • I know the studios look at the price of manufacture, but what about the fact that they release 3 and 4 DVD sets these days, sometimes 9 or more discs in a package. BD would mean using less discs than HD-DVD for longer movies or collections.

      That's worth quite a savings I'd bet.

  • Hilarious (Score:5, Interesting)

    by kzinti ( 9651 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:23AM (#11042209) Homepage Journal
    I'm laughing at you, Gizmodo, because just a couple of months ago you told us that Blu-ray has already won [gizmodo.com]. Disney must agree with you, but four other big studios don't. Care to hedge your bet?

  • BAH! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Geek_3.3 ( 768699 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:23AM (#11042210)
    I'm just gonna buy my "CD-RW, DVD+/-R/RW, HD-DVD, Blu-ray" drive in 2 years for $70, while reading and complaining about the impending SuperHD-DVD vs ReallyBlu-Ray format war on /.

    NEEEEEXT... :-P

  • I'm curious (Score:3, Insightful)

    by geeber ( 520231 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:24AM (#11042219)
    As predicted, the format war has only just begun.

    How exactly does one claim success here?

    • Re:I'm curious (Score:3, Insightful)

      by rossi ( 5437 )
      Whichever format the porno industry "jumps" for... :-P

    • When you have three times as much shelf space in video rental stores as the competition, you have succeeded. Rental discs are prone to scratching, and HD DVD's thicker layer between the surface and the data may be able to resist scratches better than Blu-ray's.

      • My point was the submitter said that "as predicted, the format war has only just begun." Which implies that the submiter knows how the format war ends.

        My original post was mostly me being anal about imprecise language. Which I use as a form of work avoidance.

  • Big doesn't always equal Right (Score:5, Informative)

    by RobertB-DC ( 622190 ) * on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:24AM (#11042222) Homepage Journal
    As I recall, Disney was a big supporter of the dead-on-arrival Divx format. We know how well that went. Disney may be able to throw its weight around, but if the format doesn't have consumer acceptance, even Mickey's clout won't help.

    A couple of quick Google results:

    +5, Informative: http://www.thedigitalbits.com/editorial/bz21998.ht ml [thedigitalbits.com]

    +5, Funny: http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/divxpress.h tml [thedigitalbits.com]

  • Format wars (Score:5, Informative)

    by jeffkjo1 ( 663413 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:25AM (#11042226) Homepage
    While the format wars are bad for the cutting-edge people that have to purchase something new, they end up being better for the consumer in the long run. Look at Beta VS VHS. The formats competed, and consumers decided which format they liked better. The format that could record a full film onto one cassette won, despite the fact that it was not 'technically superior.' If all of the studios had settled upon Beta from the very beginning, we'd all have to record in LP or EP just to fit a movie on one tape.
    • Damn you really don't know the truth right?

      My family bought a betamax, Used them long after you couldn't buy tapes anymore. Star Wars, yep one movie per tape, 2, 4, 6 hours of recording per tape? yep that was there as well.

      32" tv when your 12 --Fun

      Hooking up your family's whole house stereo to the vcr when your 12 --Fun

      Being able to restore everything in 10 minutes -- Fun

      Watching Scarface with house shakng sound when your 12 -- priceless memories.
      • Star Wars, yep one movie per tape, 2, 4, 6 hours of recording per tape? yep that was there as well.

        Eventually, yes. But they started off with only 1 hr and by the time the players got up to two hrs, it was too late. Plus VHS was then up to 6 hrs.

  • Oh joy, another upgrade treadmill (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Aim Here ( 765712 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:25AM (#11042229)
    Huh? What's wrong with the DVDs I have now? Will the picture be so sharp and crystal clear and picture-perfect that I simply must upgrade? Will the sound on these things really be so good that if I close my eyes I really will think that Will Smith or Keanu Reeves or Sigourney Weaver or whoever massacred an entire clan of godless communist bug eyed alien monsters on my living room carpet? Is it really possible for these things to be as much of an improvement over DVD as DVD was over VHS? Doesn't the law of diminishing returns have something to say about this?

    Oh yeah, I forgot. Someone worked a way round the bogus encryption and region coding and DVD-player vendor lockout last time round, so we've all got to dump our perfectly good DVDs and our DVD players and throw more money at film studio execs and consumer hardware manufacturers. Silly me.
    • Doesn't the law of diminishing returns have something to say about this?

      Don't you mean the law of increasing profits? You yourself said "upgrade treadmill".

      So all of the Star Wars, or LoTR fans who already have multiple redundant DVD's in different packaging formats, will all have to rush out and buy the New! Super! Duper! deluxe exclusive boxed Trilogy on Super-Wizbang-DVD disks that have slightly improved picture quality! And digitally re-re-re-mastered sound from the original analog recordings!
    • Oh yeah, I forgot. Someone worked a way round the bogus encryption and region coding and DVD-player vendor lockout last time round, so we've all got to dump our perfectly good DVDs and our DVD players and throw more money at film studio execs and consumer hardware manufacturers. Silly me.

      Nice. I didn't even think of that. Problem here is that the DVD format is so popular that I really have little expectations for people to immediately upgrade to the latest and greatest thing.

      Most people I know have bee


    • uh? What's wrong with the DVDs I have now? Will the picture be so sharp and crystal clear and picture-perfect that I simply must upgrade?

      It's a pretty big jump from standard definition to high definition. It's something like going from black & white to color.

      I'm pretty tight, so I don't own a HD television, and probably won't until they're much cheaper. But I do lust after better picture quality, and I suspect many other people who have watched some ATSC do also.

      And when I do own such a set, I'l

    • I WANT THESE (Blu-Ray) (Score:5, Informative)

      by DumbSwede ( 521261 ) <slashdotbin@hotmail.com> on Thursday December 09, 2004 @11:20AM (#11042774) Homepage Journal
      On a 32" inch set you are right DVD is good enough.

      I have a 120" front projection system, and let me tell you the difference between HDTV and DVD isn't just minor but HUGE. A good HDTV source (and the quality on this front varies greatly depending on production) is better seen on my system than any Cineplex movie I've seen in the last 5 years (granted our local Cineplexes are crap).

      Not many consumers today have 120" screens with high-end data grade projectors (I'm homebrew), but the quality of consumer TV Gear is improving at a phenomenal rate. 100"+ systems under $1000 will be the norm in 2 or 3 years time. Given how crappy (or expensive for passable) HDTV offerings were 5 years ago (with no channels to watch anyway) this is a bit of a surprise.

      True 1920x1080 is finally a true movie going experience. When you see stuff shot in True 1080i with a good HDTV camera directly your jaw drops. Most stuff is still shot on 35mm and scanned in. This is superior to DVD, but not the huge improvement of direct to digital. There is something about the grain of most 35mm film that makes HDTV transfer kind of muddy and muted (granted scanning technologies will improve).

      Instead of more pixels we now need higher scan rates (something I've brought up in other discussions). Instead of shooting movies in 24fps they should be shot in 60fps. 1080p at 60fps would be awesome and Blu-Ray has the capacity to pull it off. If you have ever noticed the choppiness of a fast sideways scroll of Text or Action at a Movie, you know what I'm talking about. Regular 35mm at 60fps could be marketed as IMAX35 or something to indicate a bump up in quality (though not true 70mm IMAX).

      When you have the equipment to show the true difference (which I repeat is HUGE) you will notice and you will care.

  • Okay, so the last 'format war' with betamax / VHS

    We had a superior product backed by sony (betamax, blue-ray)

    We have an inferior product that's baked by a few major studios, and gaining momentum..

    Will this turn out the same as the betamax debauchle? Only time will tell!
    • What made Betamax superior ?

      When VHS was introduced, it had 2x the recording capacity. I just read a link (posted in this article's comments) talking about the beta vs vhs debacle. Apparently the quantititative difference between vhs and beta equipment from a pq and audio standpoint was not detectable on normal equipment, and generally, the variance from one machine to another of a given type was more than the difference between the two types of machines.

      I don't see at all what makes Blu-Ray superior.

  • Too Soon? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by ytsejammer ( 817925 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:26AM (#11042236)
    Personally, I still think it is too soon. I can understand the usefulness for next-gen gaming machines, but I don't see the average consumer wanting to buy into a new format so soon after upgrading an aging VHS collection to DVD.

    I know this technology is still a ways off before it hits the shelves en masse, but I just can't see it getting a great response.

    In the end, it probably won't even matter which format which companies support. Just like Betamax, Laserdisc, and Minidisc, if the consumer doesn't support it (no matter what the quality increase is) it will fall by the wayside.

    I may be completely wrong, but thankfully, I'm sure you'll tell me if that's true.

    • I don't see the average consumer wanting to buy into a new format so soon after upgrading an aging VHS collection to DVD.

      Silly you. That is why they must be forced to "buy into" the new format. Key word being "buy" and profits.
  • and I don't mean the codec, but the ill-conceived "pay to watch a disc you also purchase on a player you purchase too" [cedmagic.com] concept that didn't last 9 months. If there's a format war, I'm not exactly sure what the Disney company's clout will buy.

  • Or as Yoda would put it... (Score:4, Funny)

    by eldimo ( 140734 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:29AM (#11042266)
    ...begun the format war has!

  • I'm with Blu-Ray, as well (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Corellon Larethian ( 833606 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:30AM (#11042278)
    Simply for it's increased storage. 25 GB (Blu-Ray) vs. 15 GB (HD-DVD). The disparity is far too great, and people buy DVD's by the truck load simply for the larger storage space.

    HD-DVD might win out for players. But I'm betting Blu-Ray dominates the personal computer market.

    Which is larger?
    • I'm betting the Blu-Ray will do well in the PC market only when Blu-Ray drives can produce whatever format everyone's players will be playing.

      As an HD TV owner, I'd love to get a player that could truly exercise my TV, as the picture is already great with DVDs, but think how much better it would be in HD-DVD!

  • Excellent Summary... (Score:4, Informative)

    by applemasker ( 694059 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:32AM (#11042297)
    Slate.com [msn.com] covered this a couple of days ago, ultimately giving the Blu-Ray the nod over HD-DVD. The article also links to this useful comparison chart [disctronics.co.uk].

    • Unlike HD DVD, Blu-ray has "a reduction in the cover layer from 0.6 mm for DVD to 0.1 mm." Of course Disney would approve, as a reduction in the cover layer makes it easier for a scratch to do real damage and makes it harder for scratch repair products such as Skip Dr to work properly, forcing parents to re-buy copies of animated movies that the kids scratched up.

      • Assuming the disc itself is also 1/6th the thickness, it also means that a 50-spindle of CDs/DVDs would hold 300 blue ray disks in the same space. It would also takes 1/6th the raw materials to make (so long as the packaging is ont a significant portion of the total weight, probably true if you buy a 100-pack of recordables, but not for pre-recorded media). They do claim that there is a scratch-resistant coating applied to the disc.

        What I'm more worried about is the discs breaking or warping. Is 100 um eno

  • As predicted, the format war has only just begun. (Score:3, Funny)

    by brian0918 ( 638904 ) <brian0918.gmail@com> on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:33AM (#11042309)
    Don't mention the war... I mentioned it once, but I think I got away with it.

  • Slate Has a Much Better Article (Score:5, Informative)

    by Schlemphfer ( 556732 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:33AM (#11042310) Homepage
    Slate just posted an interesting analysis [slate.com] of the differences between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. The article indicates that Blu-Ray is a far superior standard, and the only reason that some studios are lining up behind HD-DVD is to spare the expense of buying new production equipment. HD-DVD disks can be made using existing production machinery, whereas Blu-Ray requires all-new equipment to manufacture.
    • Not saying that the research behind this article is biased at all, but at a first glance the title is: HD-DVD Must Die Sony's Blu-ray is the better next-generation DVD.

    • The article indicates that Blu-Ray is a far superior standard

      That's not what I've read:

      the only significant difference is in the coating. Blu-ray disks have a coating that's one-sixth the thickness of the outside layer of a DVD or an HD-DVD. Blu-ray's data layers are thus closer to the surface, allowing the laser in a Blu-ray player to read data that's encoded with smaller markings.

      How would this affect durability in the face of scratched discs?

    • Why re-tool?

      Seems braindead from my perspective to abandon everythig we work from.

      Everyone thought AMD was stupid for 64bit X86, but its worked, and so well that Intel is following soot. No code retooling necessary unless you want specific new features - allowing a smooth migration path and a cost-effective solution.

  • Do consumers really want these? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by saddino ( 183491 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:35AM (#11042330)
    As someone who watched the SACD v. DVD-Audio format war with a keen interest (I'm sold on high-def multichannel music) I eventually invested in a player that supported both formats, thinking I couldn't lose. But - to my amazement - I did end up losing, not because consumers perferred one format over the other, but becuase most consumers had no interest in the new formats. The result? A dearth of SACD and DVD-Audio reissues and releases. High def audio seems to be dead.

    The problem was that remixing old music in multichannel is expensive, so many discs we're simply released in stereo. For most consumers, the audible difference (due to the higher sampling rate) didn't seem quite worth the price (for a new player, for a new disc).

    And now here we see a new format war for a high def video. You might think video is different because high def allows for massive content (at DVD quality). But does anyone really believe the studios are going to do this? It's hard to get a consumer to pay a lot of money for just one disc.

    If the studios instead focus on delivering HDTV quality movies, then the superiority of the format (over DVD) will only be apparent to those who own HDTVs...a scenario which mirrors the problems with high def audio.

    I guess my point (and worry) is: just like high def audio, there will be players that support both formats. And just like high def audio, nobody will care except for videophiles and gadget freaks. So in the end, the "format war" doesn't matter.

    IMHO, high def DVD will more likely make its mark as a huge storage medium for PCs and game consoles.
    • But - to my amazement - I did end up losing, not because consumers perferred one format over the other, but becuase most consumers had no interest in the new formats.

      Why is this amazing? Standard CDs and DVDs pushed the technical quality to the point that satisfies the typical consumer. I'm a complete gadget freak, and even I question the necessity to squeeze another fractional improvement out of picture or sound quality.

      I'd rather the world put more effort into creating compelling content or improving

    • Absolutely. I'm glad I'm not the only person who sees this.

      Your average consumer does NOT care about "higher resolution." At least not by itself.

      DVD was so successful because it was an evolution beyond VHS is pretty much every way possible. Better picture, better sound, more convenient, easier-to-use, and of course, Extras.

      Here, what do the HD formats really give you? Better picture. That's it. Oh, and I suppose the ability to watch Return of the King without having to disc swap, but that's not a

      • "Your average consumer does NOT care about 'higher resolution.'"

        I agree, if high resolution, by itself, is so important, consumers would be staring out their windows in droves. You certainly cannot get better resolution than reality. People are not staring out of their windows because there is no content to see.

    • There are couple of problems with your argument.

      Firstly, High-Def DVDs are not as expensive to make, because they do not have to be "remixed". Video Cassettes and existing DVDs are just down-sampled versions of higher resolution film. Movie studios just need to record the original onto the new format, make some minor tweaks, and they're done.

      Secondly, HDTV is easier to notice then high def audio. CD-quality audio is good enough for most people, and there are very few people who can appreciate improvemen

  • We, the consumers, can put a stop to this (Score:5, Insightful)

    by HarveyBirdman ( 627248 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:36AM (#11042339) Journal
    What if they held a format war, and no one bought anything?
    • I want a high-definition format for video. I don't want them to produce only HD versions of videos, and they won't for a few years (think VHS when DVDs came out). However, DVD quality blows compared to going to a theatre, and for those of us who want to stay home and watch with our families, HD-DVD or BD is going to make that happen.

  • Easy solution (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Tomahawk ( 1343 ) * on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:37AM (#11042356) Homepage
    Hybrid player

    Most likely, 3rd party hybrid players will appear on the market just as soon as either or both formats start being released. Then, the likes of SONY and Toshiba will start to make hybrid players also.

    From an end user perspective, this makes sense. Then, it won't really matter what format your Disney or MGM title is, as it will just play on your player.

    That's the way:
    - multiregion players have gone;
    - DVD writers have gone (I have a DVD+/-R(W) drive, for example).

    To be honest, the end user doesn't really care about which format wins, or which is better, so long as they can watch the movie, or play the game, or listen to the music.

    T.

    • No hybrid from Sony? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by SimReg ( 99053 )
      Based on Sony's stance with SACD vs. DVD-Audio, I doubt we'll see any hybrid players from Sony. Sony doesn't produce any DVD-A players (to my knowledge). Only when their high end digital cameras started getting some semi-professional usage did they include a CF slot. And only on their high end cameras.

      Sony likes their (propietary) formats.

  • It's going to be an exciting war.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @10:41AM (#11042393) Homepage
    The HiDef DVD market is at first going to be dominated by videophiles and collectors. Here I think Blue-Ray has the quality edge. As it approaches "prosumer" levels with HDTV owners, HD-DVD has the price edge. What can Blue-Ray do in that time window?

    Because seriously, I've watched DVDs, and I've watched some HDTV samples (no, hdtv-lol is not HDTV, that's downscaled rips from a HDTV source) and the difference isn't *that* big. It is certainly superior, but VHS->DVD was like Tape->CD, while this is more like CD->SACD.

    Personally, I suspect the players (and thus format) with best support for playing CD/DVDs with similarly compressed video will win. You can make a helluva impressive *cough*legal home*cough* video with 4.7/8.5 GB of MPEG4-video (4.3/8.0 GiB).

    Kjella
  • 50 GB is a lot of space. The current DVD format is large enough for normal movies. Naturally this larger format could be used for one disk collections of some famous director.

    The other use would be high definition video, this of course what the developers have in mind.

    The problem with this is that people in general doesn't have any display units that handle that quality, and it will take a long time for that to get common.

    A 50GB writable DVD would be great for backups though.
  • I think it was the -R camp but I can't tell since media can still be had for both formats.
  • Here's what I want to know:

    Which format is more likely to get cracked and stay cracked first? Because if one's more secure, then it's damn skippy that I want the other.

  • Buy it again, sucker! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Mark4ST ( 249650 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @11:06AM (#11042615) Homepage

    Tommy Lee Jones, as Agent K [imdb.com], picks up a strange little disk (about 1" in diameter) and says with some distain, "These are going to replace CDs. Looks like I'm gonna have to buy The White Album again."
    How do the Blu-Ray discs differ from Toshiba's DVD/HD-DVD Discs? The DVD/HD-DVD hybrid disc will play on today's DVD players, and tomorrow's. The Blu-Ray thingies might be great, but they will necessitate buying Disney's Aladdin on yet another format.

    You see, Disney has this habit of withholding their products from the public. They're a little like an old rattlesnake, which will conserve it's precious venom for when it will be most useful: it will withhold it's venom until it wants to kill something.

    Before Blockbuster Video squashed all the independent video rental shops, I was a clerk in one of those petite shops. Lots of VHS Disney titles were missing from the store, listed on the computer (a brand-new 486) as rented, and never returned. This was because Disney would only offer its titles (like "The Little Mermaid") for short periods of time, and after that time the only way a person could get that title would be to steal it in one way or another.

    I won't pretend to have comprehensive knowledge of Disney's marketing voodoo, but it seems to me that Disney would like nothing better than a new video format, even though there may not be a good technical reason for it. They just want you to buy yet another copy of "The Little Mermaid" on yet another format. Blech.

    • That's just FUD.

      Its been well established that most BluRay players will be able to play both DVDs and BD format discs. You won't have to buy new DVDs at all, just your new BD DVDs will be in a higher quality format.

  • Funny, funny. . . (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Zobeid ( 314469 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @11:33AM (#11042898)
    This is what I found funny, in a sad sort of way:

    "The studios will come around to the superior format," Peterson said. "Capacity and picture quality are directly related."

    It's been a long time since I was naive enough to imagine the studios care about picture quality. If they care at all, it's because they see high quality as a minor disadvantage: something that encourages piracy.

    And to be fair. . . They have to look at consumer response. Consumers mostly rejected S-VHS because most of them "couldn't see any difference" from regular VHS. Consumers mostly rejected Laserdisc because they couldn't record on it, despite the superior picture quality. History shows the majority of people don't give a flying flip about picture quality -- which is a source of endless frustration for the minority who do.

    Also funny. . . People complaining because people aren't ready to replace their DVDs, since it's still a new format. And worse, asking whether BlueRay will offer any significant improvement over DVD.

    DVD is a new-ish format, but it basically offers the same audio and video performance as Laserdisc, which was introduced in . . . 1978, if I recall right. Both of them will output basically what NTSC can display.

    As for some form of high-def videodisc, I don't think it's too soon -- I think it's way overdue! Seriously, I believe this is the main thing holding back adoption of HDTV. You can buy HD sets, you can buy HD satellite receivers, and even Tivo-like recorders that will handle HD. The element that's missing is any HD videodisc. HDTV fans have been waiting and waiting and *waiting* for this, and the companies just keep dragging it out.
  • Right now, one can fit approximately two "close-enough" DVD quality DVDs on one DVD using software like AutoGordianKnot to go to XviD and TMPGenc and other assorted programs to go back to DVD. I should know, I've got DVDs with up to 3 full movies on them, all with a nice little menu I made so I can select what I want to see.

    CAM quality videos make up the ones with 3 movies on them, which explains why I have a DVD with National Treasure, Saw, and The Incredibles in the menu selection.

    With this new format,

  • My Solution (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Nom du Keyboard ( 633989 ) on Thursday December 09, 2004 @12:11PM (#11043319)
    I'm not buying either until there's either a single, unified standard, or a dual format player at a reasonable (~$150) price. It's just too expensive being an early adopter.

    Oh, and I'm not buying one until I have a television system supporting hi-def also.

    Am I the only one who feels this way?

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