Blu-ray News & Updates [Revised Title] [Archive] - SoundAndVision Magazine Forums

IrritateGuy

February 7th, 2007, 02:58

<div>Matt hates BluRay and cannot seem to accidentally make statements like this in nearly every post. </div><BR><div>By the way, there are now 5 manufacturers shipping stand alone Blu-Ray players and six other manufactures have announced players which will ship in the next three months. There are 4 manufacturers shipping Blu-Ray drives for PCs with full recording capabilties and 5 others have announced they will start shipping drives in the next 6 months. And while there are no stand alone Blu-Ray recorders in the US market right now, 5 manufacturers have promised to ship recorders by the fall and 7 others have announced plans to ship players when the market is ripe. </div><BR><div>In the HD-DVD camp there is one stand alone player manufacturer shipping three brands and one manufacturer has announced a feature limited combo-player. There is one PC drive manufacturer and no one else has announced PC drive plans. There is only one announced HD-DVD recorder manufacturer. </div><BR>

MatthewB

February 7th, 2007, 13:26

<div>Howard, Hate is such a bad word, I don''t hate BluRay I''m sure I''ll love it when the prices drop another 400.00 (I''m pretty sure I''ll love it actually) I actually was a huge BluRay supporter when talks came out about the technology, It actually wasn''t until both players were out that I started to like HD better. I dislike Sony for it''s sales tactics, The fact they pay all this money to have high visibility end caps in stores (and pass those costs unto the consumer).  The screw up with it''s first generation player and denying that there was any problems to the consumer. Toshiba meanwhile as soon as they aware there is a problem has done everything it can to fix things with firmware updates.  The added grain to films (which to Sony''s benefit they have since stopped D''oh).  I just think HD has been trying very hard to be consumer friendly while Sony hasn''t.  HD-DVD has been saying over and over again that they both can coexist happily together, while Sony has done everything they can to badmouth HD.  Going so far to releasing a "fake" paper at CES stating that BluRay was the winner and that HD-DVD had already lost.  But Howard you already know my feelings on that.  I like both just fine, I''ll just like BluRay when they start catering to the avarage man.</div><BR><div>As far as the comment about the movie, I was taking a jab at how awful the movie was. nothing else. From what I have heard the PQ on Crank is actually pretty good in BluRay (the sound is just okay from what i read.)  But the movie itself. Stinkeroo.</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 7th, 2007, 13:39

<div>I'm just picking on you, Matt. It's fun to take sides and debate these things. I want to get to the point where I can pull a SNL line - "Jane you closed minded whore!"</div><BR><br><BR><div>Just the same, I feel almost eerything you've said is either 100% false, or at least misconceived. </div><BR><br><BR><div>1. Buying end caps is common from all vendors, including Toshiba who paid lots of money to put HD-DVD displays in common everyday grocery stores. Pepsi, Coke, Tide, and other vendors do the same thing and it is much cheaper than buying advertising on TV. So, I am confused as to how buying end caps is a reason to hate Sony when everyone is doing it. </div><BR><br><BR><div>2. Sony didn't make the first generation player and didn't say anything about it. Samsung, however, addressed the issue immediately upon realizing what was wrong. They admitted the flaw and offered a firmware upgrade is record time. </div><BR><br><BR><div>3. There was no added grain to any BluRay transfers. That is a flat out lie. Instead, Sony took the unprecidented route of attempting to perfectly capture what the original film looked like rather than sprucing it up for home viewing. Imagine that! The codecs used by many HD-DVD discs cannot perform such a task, so they de-noise the source film prior to encoding or else there will be light pumping caused by errors in the codec from film grain issues. Kink Kong suffers from this issue in many places. However, The Fifth Element was a travesty, and insiders have publicly announced they are remastering that disc and plan on offering a free replacement to anyone who purchased the original. This may or may not happen in the end, but it is a good sign. </div><BR><br><BR><div>4. HD-DVD is NOT saying the two formats can co-exist. They are fighting just as hard and spending tens of millions of dollars on marketing and selling hardware below cost just to ensure they win. When the BluRay board tried to reconcile with the HD-DVD people on two different occasions, it was the HD-DVD people who refused to budge. BluRay was willing to concede everything except their superior physical disc format (which will cost less to manufacturer in the long run as there are substantially fewer steps in the process). </div><BR><br><BR><div>5. The CES paper was interesting, and perhaps uncalled for, but is it any different than the same sorts of stuff coming from the HD-DVD camp last summer? The constant and repeated lies about codec superiority and lower cost of manufacturing were not exactly fair or honest. </div><BR><br><BR><div>So, Matt, you ignorant slut, this should be oobvious to you. ;-)</div><BR><br><BR>

zod

February 7th, 2007, 14:17

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/7/2007 10:39:33 AM <b>Author:</b> Howard Roark<BR><div>3. There was no added grain to any BluRay transfers. That is a flat out lie. Instead, Sony took the unprecidented route of attempting to perfectly capture what the original film looked like rather than sprucing it up for home viewing. Imagine that! The codecs used by many HD-DVD discs cannot perform such a task, so they de-noise the source film prior to encoding or else there will be light pumping caused by errors in the codec from film grain issues. Kink Kong suffers from this issue in many places. However, The Fifth Element was a travesty, and insiders have publicly announced they are remastering that disc and plan on offering a free replacement to anyone who purchased the original. This may or may not happen in the end, but it is a good sign. </div><BR><br><BR><div></TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>John Lowery talked about this in an interview he did for S&V about three years ago when he was remastering the Bond catalog. John is the brains behind Lowery Digital which was acquired by MGM which Sony owns. Anyway, he specifically talked about grain in older films and that if they removed too much that other picture elements would suffer. So it sounds like Bluray has a nice technical advantage here for those that care.</div><BR>

MatthewB

February 7th, 2007, 14:20

<div>So, Matt, you ignorant slut, this should be oobvious to you. ;-)</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>It appears there is a lot of misinformation out there.  For some reason I have not seen any HD displays in grocery stores anywhere in Phoenix or Tucson. As a matter of fact our Wal-Mart stores have''nt even begun to carry them yet.  Though they do have one copy of Talledega Nights in Bluray with the purchase of a PS3 (granted this is the only Bluray title.)  Heck even our F.Y.E stores don''t even carry new copies of HD or BluRay just used copies for resale.  But so far I have yet to see any endcaps for HDDVD, but sure do see alot for BluRay in any electronic store I go to (so i am biased in that regard).</div><BR><div> Sony didn''t make the first generation player and didn''t say anything about it. Samsung, however, addressed the issue immediately upon realizing what was wrong. They admitted the flaw and offered a firmware upgrade is record time. <br>I know Toshiba has been real good at fixing mistakes.</div><BR><div>As far as King Kong goes my copy is flawless and I haven''t seen any mistakes, yes The Fifth element is horrible looking and I seriously doubt that they will trade in bad copies (I just can''t see JoeBlow going into a store with the older copy and BestBuy going, "sure here take this new copy.".</div><BR><div>#4. I heard it was Sony who backed out at the last minute, you sure about your facts.</div><BR><div>#5 Yeah this battle will go on for awhile I think.</div><BR><div>Ignorant Slut......you beast. I thought we had something special. Brute!!! ;-)</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 7th, 2007, 14:40

<div>Every HEB (huge grocery store chain in Texas) which sells electronics had a very prominent HD-DVD display, and I posted dozens of times about it since I first saw it. They were paid to put out the display and keep it up even though they had no inventory to sell. They finally got inventory, but there was nearly two months of advertising with no product to sell. I happen to know a manager at one of these HEBs (husband of a co-worker) and he told me Toshiba was paying more for that display than Coke or Pepsi pay for those huge endcap displays. </div><BR><br><BR><div>I never said Toshiba didn't do a fine job issuing updates. I just pointed out that Samsung did a very good job with their update to contradict what you said about them ignoring it, denying it, and not addressing it - all of which was untrue.</div><BR><br><BR><div>There are lots of threads on the high def video forums discussing the light pumping issues with King Kong. I was present in a formal presentation with some studio experts who demonstrated the pros and cons of all the current HD video encoding processes. They used scenes from the HD-DVD of King Kong to demonstrate the limitations of the VC-1 codec when bandwidth and capacity are limited. They claimed the issues they demonstrated were a product of not having enough capacity on the physical disc for the length and complexity of the movie thus forcing the codec to a bitrate which inherently caused issues. They also showed the weaknesses of MPEG-2 (specifically at low data rates) and H.264. The general consensus from the presentation was that Motion JPEG 2000 was ideal, but required way too much bandwidth and capacity for consumer use, MPEG-2 and AVC were the best, but required higher data rates than "certain" home formats could support, and H.264 and VC-1 were acceptable but compromises. It was a very impressive presenation because it included actual footage from released titles showing them getting right and getting it wrong. </div><BR><br><BR><div>Sony didn't back out of anything. In fact, Sony wasn't and isn't the sole spokesperson for the BluRay group. The BluRay group was open to compromise. HD-DVD guys were not. I have this information directly from a member of the BluRay Board of Directors who participated in the discussions. </div><BR><br><BR><div>This is a good battle, it will be fun to see how it turns out. But if Microsoft gets their way, both formats will fails and their HD download service will win. </div><BR><br>By the way, I'll drop by tonight after the significant others are asleep. What should I bring? Oh, don't tell anyone about us. <BR>

IrritateGuy

February 7th, 2007, 14:43

<div>I want to point out, yet again, that BluRay is not the sole product of Sony. Sony is the most visible member of the BluRay support group, but they are not the only member, and they do NOT control the technology. Do you think for a minute that Sony would release a new optical format which support super-high resolution audio and NOT included DSD??? They have invested hundreds of millions of dollars into DSD technology which resulted in profession audio archival systems, high end editing suites, and the SACD format. Sony would never have abandoned the format if they weren''t forced to by other members of the BluRay founders group, many of which were inventors and supporters of the DVD-A format.</div><BR>

MatthewB

February 7th, 2007, 15:10

Howard, stop teasing me, you big lug. Also thanks for the added info, there is so much info out there good and bad, that it makes it hard to decipher what is right and what''s wrong.  Sounds like AZ is so far behind the times (heck our grocery stores still sell VHS tapes (I shyt you not). <BR>

MDRiggs

February 7th, 2007, 17:18

I think Sony has long since given up on DSD as an audio distribution format. And the fact that you can do everything SACD or DVD-Audio could on HD DVD or Blu-ray with Dolby TrueHD or DTS HD Master Audio -- with video thrown in to boot -- makes the earlier audio-almost-only formats kind of obsolete anyway. But anyhow. The only really big difference between HD DVD and Blu-ray is the physical disc format, and it''s one that doesn''t admit compromise. You pretty much have to choose one way or the other. Everything else I''m sure could have been horse-traded, but everything else was pretty minor in the great scheme of things. Somebody had to give on the disc structure, nobody would, no deal. For someone attached to a particular camp to suggest that his guys were willing to do whatever it took <i>except</i> yield on the disc structure while the other side was unreasonable and intransigent thus strikes me as a tad disingenuous. :-) I''m also skeptical of the idea that data-rate capability is a significant factor with respect to video quality from these formats. After all, HD DVD can do 36 Mbps total and Blu-ray 48 Mbps. Even with multiple high-bandwidth soundtracks and other overhead, you''ve got a really big pipe for video, regardless of codec (For more on this, see <a title="MPEG-2 vs. MPEG-4?" href="http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/hitech/1414/mpeg-2-vs-mpeg-4.html" target=_blank>MPEG-2 vs. MPEG-4?</a>.), especially since the encoders don''t have to operate in real time and can do multiple passes with manual operator intervention where desired. If bandwidth really were an issue, I''d expect poor old live HDTV, with its real-time MPEG-2 coding and measly 19-Mbps max data rate, to look pretty bad, eh? The guys around here who have spent a lot of time with both formats say neither exhibits any consistent image-quality advantage. So it pretty much comes down to marketing now, or possibly multi-format players. HD DVD had the early momentum, but Blu-ray has come back strong over the last few months. Time will tell.<BR>

MatthewB

February 7th, 2007, 17:38

<div>Howard, here''s a pretty good link of what people are talking about with CC and BB and pretty much sums up what I have seen in how both compainies are doing with instore advertising.</div><BR><div><a href="http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=801247">http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=801247</a></div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 7th, 2007, 17:54

<div>MDRiggs - I know DSD was originally suggested as one of the supported audio formats and it was shot down by the other memebers. Sony didn''t bring it up again, but they tried. </div><BR><div>Also, the specific issue with King Kong was the capacity of the disc, not the format''s potential data rate. With the capacity limited to 30GB, the audio being in higher quality, and the quality of the film masters being very complicated to encode, they were forced to compromise in the encoding process and use a lower data rate than would have been ideal. In order to reduce the data on the disc, the VC-1 encoder had to reduce the dynamic range, which is fine for 95% of the frames, but certain smooth transitions from dark to light and the high dynamic range required for that movie in general led to the pumping effect which was demonstrated to us. It was speculated that if they had an additional 5GB for video alone, they could have avoided the whole issue. </div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>Matt - I briefly read over the thread you linked to, and I don''t see anything wrong with what they assume is going on. If Toshiba or other''s from the HD-DVD camp want to get more in store promotion, they can just pay for it. The difference is, BluRay has dozens of supporters with shipping products while HD-DVD has only a couple of supporters with shipping products. That likely means the pool of marketing fund for BluRay is much larger than the pool of funds available to promote HD-DVD. Add to that the fact that HD-DVD sort-of "shot their wad" last summer and in the fall while BluRay waited until they had more products and higher quality products to offer, and it makes total sense. Where was all the complaining when there were displays for HD-DVD last summer? Finally, with Toshiba losing money on players to keep the price down, they have less capital for promotions and marketing. </div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>I think this is a relatively fair fight, but the BluRay side has slightly better technology with higher capacity and data rate, significantly more supporters (all of whom have a vested interest in a massive success for the format), and and the backing of significantly more non-HT product companies. I think in the long run, BluRay is the going to be an obvious winner. But that is only my shallow and uninformed opinion. </div><BR>

AllenW

February 7th, 2007, 18:40

<div>Not having a vested intrest in either I have the feeling each is doing whatever they figure they can get away with to make their format win, good luck to both...well except Sony, not one of their fans either.</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>Matt, don''t feel bad about HR, he''s been ripping my Soundblaster card for the last 35 years or so, I figure he''s jealous.</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>This whole thing reminds me of the buddy of mine that came home with a brand new 8 track player and about 30 tapes and said he was set....I think less than a month cassettes came out....he still played them 8 tracks for a long time, player finally broke and he went to cassettes....we know what happened then.</div><BR><div>He, like others including me, will wait and see what comes out next, then when our current player dies, or the latest greatest gets cheap enough, we can upgrade, we''ll change over.</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>Al....who also had a 8 track....and a cassette...and a CD player....and who knows what else</div><BR>

cws_kahuna

February 7th, 2007, 22:49

<div>Maybe I am a sucker but I am very happy with HD-DVD. Most likely I'll end up with a Blu-Ray player too once the prices come down a little more. If one wins out over the other I am pretty sure there will be plenty more players like the new LG Blu-Ray that also happens to play HD-DVDs. Bottom line for me is I have moved on from DVD which is still a very good product but what can I say except I want my HD. As for sales being greater for Blu-Ray discs right now, I believe the release list has a lot to do with it as there is a lot of new Blu-Ray titles coming out right now. </div><BR><br><BR><div> </div><BR><br><BR><div>I am hoping that consumers in the market for a new DVD player will hopefully consider a HD-DVD or Blu-Ray machine. The HD-DVD players do a wonderful job of upconverting DVDs and from what I have read most of the Blu-Ray players do too except maybe the Samsung which may or may not have improved since it has come out. I just can't imagine why anyone would want to buy a DVD player for $500 + anymore unless they want a killer sounding universal player for SACD & DVD-A, but even then with those formats about 5ï¿½' under you can find a much cheaper option.</div><BR><br><BR>

botomfeeder

February 8th, 2007, 00:30

<div>Wow, Howard is really getting into this. Well I will say that I have an HD-DVD add -on for my 360 and 16 movies already since I bought this thing early January. I love what I have seen so far with the technology and performance. BUT, I am worried about the future of the format greatly the more I look at it. </div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>Here''s why:</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>The HD-DVD brand has very few supporters in terms of hardware right now and I don''t see a ton of that changing, Toshiba is very nearly by themselves with hardware sales, not counting the 360 add-on. Blu-ray has lots of support with BD players being made by Sony, Panasonic, Pioneer, Samsung and others. </div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>Even more important than the number of hardware manufacturers is the number of movie studios putting out movies on the format. BD once again has a massive advantage, Fox is announcing and releasing titles like crazy and Disney is going to putting out some big titles very shortly. The HD-DVD side has only one exclusive studio with Universal and on that note Universal has hardly announced a title other than maybe 5 or 6 which are still a few months away, and nothing really big. In the meantime BD is getting everything that HD-DVD has except Universal''s offerings. BD is getting huge titles like Casino Royale, Cars and the Pirates movies. This is exactly the time when HD-DVD needs Universal to announce stuff like Jurassic Park and Jaws with street dates. But no they haven''t and these titles could be very far off and ultimately be way too late to try to help the format. Universal has stated that they are commited to releasing movies on the HD-DVD format with a lot of filmmaker support in terms of special features. My argument with this is that they could easily just put out the HD version of the movie and almost say forget it to special features and the double dip later with a special edition of the film with more extras. Most of us early adopters are just wanting a movie to watch at this point and not worrying about extras. A lot of BD''s movies are very slim when it comes to extra content, but hey they have movies to watch.  I just can''t see how HD-DVD can survive with the lack of studio support and the void of big releases from it''s one exclusive studio.</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>I think the next 3-4 months will be extremely telling in what will end up happening long term for the formats. </div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>I want to keep buying movies and supporting the format(hd-dvd)that I invested in, but it seems that I could be pouring money into a format that very well may not exist in a year. I have The Hulk ordered from Amazon and it should be showing up on Friday, I fear it very well may be the last HD-DVD that I purchase. For the next 3 or 4 months I will probably just sit back and watch what happens with the repsective formats and make a decision on what to do long term. If HD-DVD doesn''t get Universal to release some of their absolute biggest titles in the next 4 or so months and no film studios go multi-format that were only on the BD side then I see no future for HD-DVD. </div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>I know there is a fair bit of people on the internet that have said that they prefer HD-DVD''s performance so far over BD, there have also been some that have said the opposite. I have not really seen a whole lot of BD stuff to make a true comparison myself. This is most likely going to be a format war where the winner will be the one that is pushed the hardest from a hardware/software perspective by the big companies and lots of heavy marketing and maybe not the one that is actually putting out the best performance.(this is not a knock against BD as I haven''t seen much and it very well maybe even better) Blu-ray is the hands down favorite if that is really how it will be decided. It is starting to become more and more one sided the further this goes on.That my fellow A/V enthusiasts is my honest opinion, and that''s from someone who has already invested in HD-DVD.</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div> </div><BR>

MDRiggs

February 8th, 2007, 00:48

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/7/2007 2:54:36 PM <b>Author:</b> Howard Roark<BR><div>MDRiggs - I know DSD was originally suggested as one of the supported audio formats and it was shot down by the other memebers. Sony didn''t bring it up again, but they tried.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>I think that was a poker chip. Sony stopped pushing SACD before some of its partners did.</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div><BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD>Also, the specific issue with King Kong was the capacity of the disc, not the format''s potential data rate. With the capacity limited to 30GB, the audio being in higher quality, and the quality of the film masters being very complicated to encode, they were forced to compromise in the encoding process and use a lower data rate than would have been ideal. In order to reduce the data on the disc, the VC-1 encoder had to reduce the dynamic range, which is fine for 95% of the frames, but certain smooth transitions from dark to light and the high dynamic range required for that movie in general led to the pumping effect which was demonstrated to us. It was speculated that if they had an additional 5GB for video alone, they could have avoided the whole issue.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>Or they could have gone to an additional disc. I agree that capacity is a Blu-ray advantage for certain titles -- not very many, but definitely for some. Blu-ray''s biggest advantage is the one you mention later (not quoted here), which is its depth of support. (Someone at JVC once said that the reason VHS won out over Beta was that JVC developed it, Panasonic built it, and RCA sold it.) Numbers help.</div><BR>

OGPooh

February 8th, 2007, 03:54

<div>I really don't care which format wins this war, so much is that it's decided quickly. My tax refund is coming soon, and we're getting a little more than double what we got last year, so I'm itching to buy a new piece of gear. I would love to jump into the hi-def player world, but I refuse to at this point. I may take a look-see at the "universal" player that LG is offering, but I'm much more likely to wait because the powers that be can't get their s**t together (and because I want a player slightly more hi-end than LG). I wonder where we'd be had there been a competing DVD format? Probably with VHS still taking up the majority of shelf space at Best Buy, that's where. We'll continue to move very slowly into the future, as long as we're bogged down in the trenches of ridiculous format wars. I guess I'll just get a new receiver.</div><BR>

AllenW

February 8th, 2007, 12:01

<div>Couple of good points brought up.</div><BR><div>Which one actually is better, if they were side by side would the average consumer be able to tell the difference?</div><BR><div>Will we end up with 2 major formats and have to decide, which brings up the queation of dual format players and will we see them?</div><BR><div>And...how long will this nonsense go on?</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>Al</div><BR>

cws_kahuna

February 8th, 2007, 15:01

<div class=IBBQUOTE><b>Date:</b> 2/8/2007 9:01:59 AM <b>Author:</b> Allen W<br><BR><div>Couple of good points brought up.</div><BR><br><BR><div>Which one actually is better, if they were side by side would the average consumer be able to tell the difference?</div><BR><br><BR><div>Will we end up with 2 major formats and have to decide, which brings up the queation of dual format players and will we see them?</div><BR><br><BR><div>And...how long will this nonsense go on?</div><BR><br><BR><div></div><BR><br><BR><div>Al</div><BR><br><BR><div></div><BR></div><BR><br><BR><div> </div><BR><br><BR><div>As for which is actually better side by side it's kinda hard to answer as different people see things differently. From almost every review I have read for the same titles available on Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the overall picture quality seems to go to HD-DVD as most people feel it has a slighty sharper picture (probably due to VC-1 vs. Mpeg-2) and Blu-Ray seems to be slighty softer. They do seem to get the same scores for video though so the differences are probably pretty mild. </div><BR><br><BR><div> </div><BR><br><BR><div>There already is a dual format player, LG makes it.</div><BR><br><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 8th, 2007, 15:15

<div><b><font color=#8b0000>HD DVD PQ SQ TOTAL </font></b> <font color=blue><b>Blu-ray PQ SQ TOTAL </b></font><br><font color=darkred>HighDef 3.91 3.68 3.80 </font> <font color=blue>HighDef 3.94 3.87 3.91 </font><br><font color=darkred>HTSpot 4.02 3.90 3.96 </font> <font color=blue>HTSpot 3.85 4.23 4.04 </font><br><font color=darkred>DVDTalk 3.65 3.50 3.57 </font> <font color=blue>DVDTalk 3.51 3.67 3.59 </font><br><font color=darkred>HTForum 4.13 3.66 3.90 </font> <font color=blue>HTForum 4.18 4.04 4.11 </font><br><font color=darkred><b>Totals 3.86 3.68 3.77 </b></font> <font color=blue><b>Totals 3.79 3.93 3.86</b><BR><div> </div><BR></font></div><BR>

MDRiggs

February 8th, 2007, 15:16

<div><BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/8/2007 12:01:45 PM <b>Author:</b> CWS_Kahuna<br>From almost every review I have read for the same titles available on Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the overall picture quality seems to go to HD-DVD as most people feel it has a slighty sharper picture (probably due to VC-1 vs. Mpeg-2) and Blu-Ray seems to be slighty softer. They do seems to get the same scores for video though so the differences are probaly pretty mild.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>I expect pretty much every movie released on both HD DVD and Blu-ray was mastered with the same codec for both. Doesn''t make much sense to go through that whole process twice.</div><BR>

MDRiggs

February 8th, 2007, 15:20

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/8/2007 9:01:59 AM <b>Author:</b> Allen W<BR><div>Will we end up with 2 major formats and have to decide, which brings up the queation of dual format players and will we see them?</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>See <a title="LG to Launch First Blu-ray/HD DVD Combo Player" href="http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/features/2025/lg-to-launch-first-blu-rayhd-dvd-combo-player.html" target=_blank>LG to Launch First Blu-ray/HD DVD Combo Player</a>.</div><BR>

AllenW

February 8th, 2007, 15:50

<div>Thanks CWS and MDR, at $1200 I''ll pass for now, but like everything else it seems, wait a bit and they''ll get cheaper.</div><BR><div>Al</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 8th, 2007, 16:44

<div><a href="http://www.dvdempire.com/index.asp?userid=99365225826712&tab_id=60&site_id= 69&site_media_id=0">http://www.dvdempire.com/index.asp?userid=99365225826712&tab_id=60&site_id= 69&site_media_id=0</a></div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>02/08/07</div><BR><div><u>Format:      BluRay       HD-DVD</u></div><BR><div> </div><BR><div>Week       51.83%        48.17%</div><BR><div>Month      60.57%        39.43%</div><BR><div>Year         57.27%        42.73%</div><BR><div>__________________________</div><BR><div>Titles:          167              165</div><BR><div>Studios        18                19</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div> </div><BR>

akula

February 8th, 2007, 17:01

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/8/2007 12:50:31 PM<BR><b>Author:</b> Allen W<BR><div>Thanks CWS and MDR, at $1200 I''ll pass for now, but like everything else it seems, wait a bit and they''ll get cheaper.</div><BR><div>Al</div><BR></TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE><br><br>At $1200 for a combo, I''ll spend $200 for the HD-DVD player for my 360 and then get a PS3.  It''s still cheaper.  Then when those systems are broken or obsolete, I can go ahead and get a combo unit for $3.95 in a few years.<br><br>

IrritateGuy

February 8th, 2007, 19:09

<div>Latest updates on reviewers'' opinions (02/08/07):<br></div><BR><br><BR><div><br><BR><div dir=ltr style="TEXT-ALIGN: left"><font color=darkred><b>HD DVD  PQ   SQ  TOTAL   </b></font><font color=blue><b>Blu-ray     PQ   SQ  TOTAL </b></font><br><font color=darkred>HighDef    3.91  3.68  3.80        </font><font color=blue>HighDef    3.94  3.87  3.91 </font><br><font color=darkred>HTSpot    4.02  3.90  3.96        </font><font color=blue>HTSpot    3.85  4.23  4.04 </font><br><font color=darkred>DVDTalk 3.65  3.50  3.57        </font><font color=blue>DVDTalk  3.51  3.67  3.59 </font><br><font color=darkred>HTForum 4.13  3.66  3.90        </font><font color=blue>HTForum  4.18  4.04  4.11 </font><br><font color=darkred>UpDisc     4.03  3.87  3.95       </font><font color=blue>UpDisc      4.00  4.20  4.10 </font><br><font color=darkred><b> Totals     3.89  3.71  3.80        </b></font><font color=blue><b>Totals      3.81  3.96  3.89 </b></font></div><BR><br></div><BR><br><BR>

hoops

February 8th, 2007, 20:12

<div>Howard, you will single-handedly steer Blue Ray into the winner's circle through sheer force of will.  That is my prediction.</div><BR><div>hehehe.</div><BR><br><BR>

MatthewB

February 9th, 2007, 16:53

<div><img alt="" src="http://gizmodo.com/assets/resources/2007/02/bluhdwar2.jpg" border=0></div><BR><div>Sorry Howard, I just had to post this.  ;-)</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 9th, 2007, 17:00

<div>That''s funny, but terribly flawed. Apple is a supporter of BluRay and Microsoft supports HD-DVD. </div><BR><div>So, it appears whoever made that thing had part of it backwards. </div><BR>

MatthewB

February 9th, 2007, 17:43

<div>Don''t worry Howard, I like this one also.</div><BR><div><img alt="" src="http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y175/hurricane22/sonyps3.bmp" border=0></div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 10th, 2007, 13:09

<div>Someone has done the research on the costs to product the two formats'' discs:</div><BR><div><a href="http://wesleytech.com/blu-ray-vs-hd-dvd-replication-costs-revealed/">http://wesleytech.com/blu-ray-vs-hd-dvd-replication-costs-revealed/</a></div><BR><div>$2.25 $0.045 per GB for Blu-ray DL (50GB)<br>$1.59 $0.064 per GB for Blu-ray SL (25GB)<br>$1.69 $0.056 per GB for HD DVD DL (30GB)<br>$1.45 $0.097 per GB for HD DVD SL (15GB)</div><BR><div>The per disc costs are between 10% and 33% cheaper for HD-DVD.</div><BR><div>The per GB costs are between 24% and 52% cheaper for Blu-Ray. </div><BR><div>Considering that most BluRay titles are single layer and most HD-DVD titles are dual layer, the typical price different between these formats is 10ï¿½ cheaper for BluRay (6% cheaper per disc).</div><BR>

MatthewB

February 10th, 2007, 13:22

The Fry''s Electronics insert this weekend is stating they are having a BluRay DVD sale, all BD-DVD''s are 19.99 and if you buy one you get one free.  Wondering what that''s all about. Either very smart marketing by Sony, or a last ditch effort to try and get the word out. Either way smart move for Sony.  I hope HD-DVD follows suit very quickly, that way i can stock up on some movies.<BR>

IrritateGuy

February 10th, 2007, 13:35

<div>I also stumbled across some data on the audio soundtracks used for the BluRay format:<br></div><BR><div>Out of about 84 titles, here are the soundtrack formats used (in order of technical superiority):</div><BR><div>LPCM       =  31  (37%)<br>DTS-HD   =  16  (19%)<br>DTS-ES    =    5   (6%)<br>DD AC-3  =  26  (31%)<br>DTS          =    6  (7%)</div><BR><div>I don''t have similar data on HD-DVD discs, but if anyone does, it would be interesting to compare. </div><BR><div>I also discovered the specifications for DTS-HD on the two formats:<br><img alt="" src="http://www.dts.com/media/2007/MandatoryTechnology_v2.jpg" border=0><br><a href="http://www.dts.com/dts-hd/dts-on-bluray-and-hddvd.php">http://www.dts.com/dts-hd/dts-on-bluray-and-hddvd.php</a></div><BR><div>As you can see, BluRay offers higher data rates for DTS-HD across the board:</div><BR><div><u>      Format                                         BluRay         HD-DVD</u><br>DTS-HD High Resolution Audio  =    6.0Mbps        3.0Mbps<br>DTS-HD Master Audio               =  24.5Mbps      18.0Mbps</div><BR><div>For the typical soundtrack data, BluRay offers double the bandwidth as HD-DVD. For pure audio discs, BluRay offers 36% higher data rate. These are both extremely significant differences. </div><BR>

MatthewB

February 10th, 2007, 13:47

Howard, but if my memory serves me right the players themselves are having problems processing those higher bit rates, or are limited somehow. So people are not getting the full DTS bit stream.  (I may be wrong, I've been at work now for 21 hours staright and I still have three more to go, so my mind is a little punchy right now) But I think i read that somewhere.  Correct me if I'm wrong.<br>p.s. DTS-HD Master audio hasn't been released commercially yet in either format.<BR>

IrritateGuy

February 10th, 2007, 13:47

<div>I haven''t heard any such thing about players not being able to playback the full audio bitstream. I have watched some engineers test about five BluRay players for compatibility with all of these audio formats and the specified potential video data rate to confirm they could do it and measure the results. All of the BluRay players passed those tests with flying colors. </div><BR><div>What is happening is most of the DTS-HD titles are from Warner Brothers and they are not re-encoding the audio for BluRay. So, both BluRay and HD-DVD are getting the lower data rate audio. </div><BR>

MatthewB

February 10th, 2007, 14:15

Thanks for clarifying that HR, I knew it was something like that, man i need some coffee right now.<BR>

MDRiggs

February 10th, 2007, 16:30

At 3 Mbps, the sound through a good perceptual codec should sound identical to the original. Dolby Digital gets very close even at 448 kbps.<BR>

botomfeeder

February 11th, 2007, 14:50

<div>I'm sure Howard Roark being a Blu-ray supporter will be happy to know that I just bought a 60GB PS3 last night.  Along with 6 Blu-ray movies(Enemy of the State, Pearl Harbor, Tears of the Sun, Speed, Behind Enemy Lines, and Black Hawk Down).</div><BR><br><br><BR><div>I bought the machine for a few reasons.</div><BR><br><BR><div>1)I am 80% sure that Blu-ray disc will now be the winner of the format war. HD-DVD is just merely slowing it down a bit.</div><BR><div> </div><BR><div> 2)My XBOX 360 is constantly having technical problems and is currently sent back to MS to be replaced....for the 3rd time! Enough is enough already. I don't have a gaming machine a lot of the time because it's always in the process of being replaced.</div><BR><br><BR><div>3)There are games on PS3 I want to play ie; Resistance, MotorStorm, Gran Turismo and Lair.</div><BR><br><br><BR><div>Now I also have the HD-DVD add on for my 360 which I can't currently use, surprise, surprise. I find the PQ and SQ of Blu-ray to be right up there with HD-DVD, but the main difference for BD is there is a huge amount more of movies that are coming that HD-DVD will never see ie; Casino Royale, The Prestige, Rocky Balboa, Cars, Pirates 1 and 2, Master and Commander, Man on Fire, ID4, The Rock, Crimson Tide  etc, the list goes on and on. I just can't see HD-DVD holding off an onslaught of killer movies like that with only Universal to put out exclusive movies for their format.</div><BR><br><BR><div>I will also note that the PS3 is a fantastic BD player. Great PQ and SQ. I will note that it is VERY quiet, especially compared to a 360 while playing an HD-DVD. </div><BR><br><BR><div>From now on I will pick up all my hi-def movies on Blu-ray and probably not get hardly any on HD-DVD, maybe Children of Men on March 27th.</div><BR><br><BR><div>I'm buying The Departed on BD on Tuesday. Oh yeah!</div><BR><br><BR><div>EDIT: Resistance is a fantastic game.<br></div><BR><br><BR>

MDRiggs

February 11th, 2007, 15:29

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/10/2007 10:35:11 AM <b>Author:</b> Howard Roark<BR><div><u>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; BluRay&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; HD-DVD</u><br>DTS-HD High Resolution Audio&nbsp; =&nbsp; &nbsp; 6.0Mbps&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; 3.0Mbps<br>DTS-HD Master Audio&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; =&nbsp; 24.5Mbps&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; 18.0Mbps</div><BR><div>For the typical soundtrack data, BluRay offers double the bandwidth as HD-DVD. For pure audio discs, BluRay offers 36% higher data rate. These are both extremely significant differences.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>I forgot to get into this yesterday. DTS HD Master Audio is supposed to be a lossless compression format, so you either have the necessary data rate or you don''t. Unless the spec''d bandwidth differences affect the number of such soundtracks that can be included, I can''t see how they matter. Especially since the data rate for eight full-range channels of <i>uncompressed</i> 96-kHz/24-bit PCM is only a little more than 18 Mbps. If you assume something more reasonable, like six channels of 48-kHz/20-bit audio, the data rate for uncompressed PCM is less than 6 Mbps. With lossless compression, that should drop to around 3 Mbps.</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 11th, 2007, 15:46

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/11/2007 12:29:37 PM <b>Author:</b> MDRiggs <b>Date:</b> 2/10/2007 10:35:11 AM <b>Author:</b> Howard Roark<BR><div><u>&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; BluRay&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; HD-DVD</u><br>DTS-HD High Resolution Audio&amp;nbsp; =&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; 6.0Mbps&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; 3.0Mbps<br>DTS-HD Master Audio&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; =&amp;nbsp; 24.5Mbps&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; 18.0Mbps</div><BR><div>For the typical soundtrack data, BluRay offers double the bandwidth as HD-DVD. For pure audio discs, BluRay offers 36% higher data rate. These are both extremely significant differences.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>I forgot to get into this yesterday. DTS HD Master Audio is supposed to be a lossless compression format, so you either have the necessary data rate or you don''t. Unless the spec''d bandwidth differences affect the number of such soundtracks that can be included, I can''t see how they matter. Especially since the data rate for eight full-range channels of <i>uncompressed</i> 96-kHz/24-bit PCM is only a little more than 18 Mbps. If you assume something more reasonable, like six channels of 48-kHz/20-bit audio, the data rate for uncompressed PCM is less than 6 Mbps. With lossless compression, that should drop to around 3 Mbps.</div><BR><div></div><BR><div>That''s true, but DTS-HD is touting 24-bit audio and 8 channels (7.1), which at 48kHz sampling would come to approximately 9.2Mbps uncompressed, or 4.6Mbps lossless. </div><BR><div>No studio I know if is offering this right now, but DTS would really like it if they did as it makes their format look really good on paper. </div><BR><div>Of note to me is the large number of BluRay titles with 24-bit LPMC soundtracks. No compression and full fidelity and no licensing fees to pay to DTS. That seems like a win/win situation for everyone. Of course, like you said, 8 channels of LPCM audio at 24-bit would require a ton of bandwidth, but it appears BluRay is up to the task, so far at least. </div><BR>

MDRiggs

February 12th, 2007, 15:08

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/11/2007 12:46:58 PM <b>Author:</b> Howard Roark<BR><div>That''s true, but DTS-HD is touting 24-bit audio and 8 channels (7.1), which at 48kHz sampling would come to approximately 9.2Mbps uncompressed, or 4.6Mbps lossless.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>DTS-HD is DTS''s high-bandwidth lossy codec (similar to Dolby Digital Plus), and DTS HD Master Audio is its lossless codec (like Dolby TrueHD). Requirements for and capabilities of DTS HD Master Audio and Dolby TrueHD should be virtually identical. If history is any guide, I expect Dolby Digital Plus is much more efficient than DTS HD, but capabilities should be very similar, and certainly neither should ever really require more than 3 Mbps. Anyhow, the data rate for uncompressed 48-kHz/24-bit 7.1-channel PCM would actually be a little over 8 Mbps, because the LFE channel is only 120-Hz wide.</div><BR><div><BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD>Of note to me is the large number of BluRay titles with 24-bit LPMC soundtracks. No compression and full fidelity and no licensing fees to pay to DTS. That seems like a win/win situation for everyone. Of course, like you said, 8 channels of LPCM audio at 24-bit would require a ton of bandwidth, but it appears BluRay is up to the task, so far at least.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>It looks like the same thing could be done on HD DVD if a studio wanted to; the available bandwidth seems to be adequate. But it would eat more disc space, and Blu-ray has more of that to burn. The thing is, I just don''t see anything to suggest that either format has any sort of performance advantage over the other. Blu-ray does have a capacity advantage, however, and apparently this does not entail any drawbacks other than the increased difficulty of making multiformat drives and the initial capital cost of the disc-manufacturing facilities. (I was worried in the beginning that the very shallow depth of the data layer on Blu-ray Discs would make them excessively sensitive to smudges and fingerprints on the surface, but I haven''t noticed any complaints about that, so the developers must have done a good job of dealing with that potential issue.) So I think it''s strictly about marketing now.</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 12th, 2007, 15:26

<div>I still see lots of comments about the costs of manufacturing HD-DVDs being significantly lower than the costs of manufacturing BluRay discs. However, the chart I posted earlier clearly points out the difference is relatively minor, and on a per GB level, BluRay is cheaper. </div><BR><div>What I don''t get is why people are still talking about the costs of making the discs. If cost were a serious concern, then WB wouldn''t be promoting THD, which is going to be significantly more expesive than either native format. </div><BR>

botomfeeder

February 12th, 2007, 21:54

I guarantee you THD will be a flash in the pan. That format will go down faster than a Thai hooker.<BR>

MDRiggs

February 12th, 2007, 22:50

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/12/2007 12:26:18 PM <b>Author:</b> Howard Roark<BR><div>I still see lots of comments about the costs of manufacturing HD-DVDs being significantly lower than the costs of manufacturing BluRay discs. However, the chart I posted earlier clearly points out the difference is relatively minor, and on a per GB level, BluRay is cheaper.</TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>This may depend on what is being counted as cost of manufacturing. Do the Blu-ray numbers figure in the capital cost? If so, how is it being amortized? Or, to put it another way, what do you choose to subsidize, the discs or the players?</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 13th, 2007, 01:39

The prices I posted are what the customer pays the replicator for the finished discs. So, the cost of machinery is either built into the cost of the discs, or the cost is being subsidized by some other income group. Either way, the cost to print and sell a BluRay disc is nearly identical to printing and selling HD-DVD discs. <BR>

THEDIRTMERCHANT

February 13th, 2007, 19:58

Looks like Blu-Ray is ahead...<br><br><a href="http://www.dvdempire.com/Content/Features/hidef_wars.asp">http://www.dvdempire.com/Content/Features/hidef_wars.asp</a><br>

IrritateGuy

February 17th, 2007, 00:26

<div>In Australia Toshiba/Sony aren''t even trying, it seems. </div><BR><div>The press has already declared BluRay the winner. </div><BR><div><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/news/home-theatre/hooray-for-bluray-its-looking-like-a-winner/2007/02/15/1171405337968.html">http://www.smh.com.au/news/home-theatre/hooray-for-bluray-its-looking-like-a-winner/2007/02/15/1171405337968.html</a></div><BR>

MatthewB

February 17th, 2007, 08:34

<div>I read that article also, seems a little Orwellian to me, with a country dictating what they can or cannot buy. Don''t get me wrong as long as anyone is buying any format of HD it makes me happy, knowing that the technology won''t die out (like DVD-A or SACD). But seems sad that it''s just one and not both. I keep reading more and more that Bluray is finally surpassing HD-DVD (which is the story of my life considering the first HT item I ever bought was a Sony Betamax (when I was 12) looks like history is about to repeat itself, but I figure I ''m not out too much money and if worse comes to worse at least I have a great upconverting player and don''t have to worry about "upgrading" for a couple of years now.</div><BR><div>I still prefer HD-DVD just because it is more price friendly, but all I have to say is that this format war SUCKS!!!!!!</div><BR><div>I liked the Thai hooker analogy LMAO.</div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 17th, 2007, 14:08

<div>All of my ranting has really been geared toward encouraging people to either wait or recognize the fact that BluRay is more likely to win the battle. I am not saying I know it will win, but the evidence suggests it will. I hate seeing people spend their hard earned money on something that may be a doorstop in two years. BluRay is technically superior, and it has more industry support. It will soon be just as cost effective as it follows the traditional trends of becoming a commodity and the economies of scale kick in. </div><BR><div>I am reminded of DIVX DVDs which were WAY more affordable than DVDs, and how the first generation of DVD players all sold for over $1,500. DVD title were mostly selling for greater than $20. Yet, in the end DVD prices came down, the inherent flawed licensing model in DIVX killed it (despite broad industry support and the massive marketing by Circuit City). HD-DVD is a vastly superior product over DIVX, but the idea that price alone will win a war may be unfounded. </div><BR><div>DIVX was expected to win the war because it had the backing of some huge CE companies (Zenith, Thomson/RCA, Matsu****a/Panasonic/Technics), and ALL of the major studios were supporting it. </div><BR><div>Here are the last few paragraphs about the demise of Divx from an online history:<br><a href="http://members.shaw.ca/the-doa/Pages/DoaDivxHistory.html">http://members.shaw.ca/the-doa/Pages/DoaDivxHistory.html</a></div><BR><div><i>In mid-June of 1999, shortly after Divx's one-year anniversary, Circuit City chief Dick Sharp had had enough. On June 16th, he ordered the plug pulled on Divx development and marketing, with the news being broken to the Divx employees via a mass e-mail that morning. The billing system would be phased out over a two-year period, during which existing customers could play their discs and add and subtract players from their accounts. Officially, no new customers were to be registered, although some exceptions were made, and $100 refunds were made to those who had purchased players prior to June 16, 1999; customers who had converted discs to unlimited play (DivxSilver) were given the choice of either refunds or using their unlimited play discs for the remainder of the phaseout period.</i></div><BR><div> </div><BR><div><i>Prices on players were slashed to where they were substantially below their DVD-only equivalents, while disc prices dropped from $4.49 to $1.99, and then to 99 cents. Discs still unsold at Circuit City stores at the end of the summer 1999 were destroyed. By Christmas of 1999, the stocks of new Divx-compatible players were gone, although used ones would appear from time to time. Divx users were on their own, and turned to second-hand sources like eBay.</i><BR><div> </div><BR><i>In June of 2001, two years after Divx marketing and development ceased, there was still plenty of consumer interest in Divx, but Circuit City stuck to the phaseout timetable. Six days after the official cutoff date of July 1, 2001, all Divx accounts expired, and Divx became just a fond memory its legions of users, bringing one of the most colorful eras in the history of home video to an end.</i></div><BR>

IrritateGuy

February 17th, 2007, 14:18

<div>A large OEM/ODM manufacturer in Japan has announced the availability of a cheap BluRay player for companies to put their names on:<br><a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/129106-1/article.html?tk=nl_dnxnws">http://www.pcworld.com/article/129106-1/article.html?tk=nl_dnxnws</a><br><a href="http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/02/16/funai-getting-into-the-blu-ray-player-game-courting-the-budget/">http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/02/16/funai-getting-into-the-blu-ray-player-game-courting-the-budget/</a></div><BR><div>While they claim they aren't taking sides, they are not announcing a similar HD-DVD player. That makes six BluRay manufacturers making their own players. HD-DVD has two manufacturers, Toshiba and the soon to be released LG combo player.</div><BR>

dentman

February 17th, 2007, 15:06

HR come on , we all know you own over 100,000 shares of stock in companies with an intrest in Blue Ray . Enough already Martha !!!   lol<BR>

IrritateGuy

February 18th, 2007, 21:02

<div>As I mentioned in a previous post, the geniuses behind the bot so good transfer on the original Fifth Element release are planning an informal replacement program for people who were disappointed in the first release. Customers will be able to replace their first version of The Fifth Element for a newly remastered version to be released in the next few months. </div><BR><div> </div><BR>

yromj

February 19th, 2007, 02:20

<BLOCKQUOTE><TABLE BORDER=1><TR><TD><b>Date:</b> 2/18/2007 6:02:44 PM <b>Author:</b> Howard Roark<BR><div>As I mentioned in a previous post, the geniuses behind the bot so good transfer on the original Fifth Element release are planning an informal replacement program for people who were disappointed in the first release. Customers will be able to replace their first version of The Fifth Element for a newly remastered version to be released in the next few months. </div><BR><div></div><BR><div></TD></TR></TABLE></BLOCKQUOTE></div><BR><div>S&V mentioned this in their original Samsung/BD article a few months ago as well.  They mentioned it from the perspective of it being a shame that more care was not taken to get it right the first time, not as any kind of desparegement toward the technology.</div><BR><div>John</div><BR>

ProCinemaGuy

February 21st, 2007, 07:24

I missed that sale! I wanna setup my own sound system too.<br><br><br><BR><br><BR>___________________<br><BR><a href="http://www.who-sells-it.com/cy/definitive-technology-1471/procinema-800-1000-systems-5861.html">Definitive Technology ProCinema 1000</a> - ProCinema 800 & 1000 Systems Catalog by Definitive Technology<br><BR><br><BR><br><br><br>

IrritateGuy

February 23rd, 2007, 21:22

<div>According to the article link below, as of Feb. 18th the total number BluRay discs sold has surpassed the total number of HD-DVD discs sold. Since HD-DVD was released to the market 2 months before BluRay, this is significant. </div><BR><div><a href="http://www.videostoremag.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?article_id=10323">http://www.videostoremag.com/news/html/breaking_article.cfm?article_id=10323</a></div><BR>

Barney

February 23rd, 2007, 21:46

Well, the new Pioneer BDP-HD1 Blu-ray player ($1500) will not play CD''s & no support for the advanced audio codecs (DD Plus, DolbyTrueHD, and DTS-HD). As COF is suggesting....I''m waiting...<BR>

IrritateGuy

March 7th, 2007, 13:34

<div>BluRay titles are selling at a sustained rate twice as high as HD-DVD titles:</div><div> </div><div><a href="http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=MD05FSCFBJZCQQSNDLRSK H0CJUNN2JVN?articleID=197800833" target="_blank">http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=MD05FSCFBJZCQQSNDLRSK H0CJUNN2JVN?articleID=197800833</a></div><div> </div><div>BluRay accounts for 65% of all high definition disc titles sold between Jan 7th and Feb. 18th. During the same period HD-DVD took the other 35%.</div><div> </div><div>BluRay passed HD-DVD in total titles sold since both formats releases back in February as well.</div>

Jomari

March 7th, 2007, 16:49

im trying. like hell im trying to wait till this thing is over. but my darn fingers are getting itchy to pull the trigger. **bleep** its quite difficult to stop fiddlin when you've got some spare money in your pocket, and want to test out the whole hd/blu ray experience with a great pj working up top...<br><br>i want the blu ray, believe me, but i also know that its too expensive (or in socal words, Hella expensive!), and the hddvd players are already hittin 500clams.<br><br>id love to get a 360, but the add on hd-dvd player is another 200 clams, equalling the price of a ps3. ps3? tsk tsk, i doubt im buying into that immediately, will wait for the second batch. besides, the controllers dont rumble!

AllenW

March 7th, 2007, 18:30

<div>I still could care less who wins, just get it over with please.....</div><div>Just wondering how the average joe is gonna react to having to dish out at least $500 for a DVD player when he/she/it can buy a good progressive scan unit for under $200 now, well under 200.</div><div>Personally I'll wait till the cows come home or it gets a lot cheaper.</div><div> </div><div>Al...yes ...call me tightwad, but not late for supper....;)</div>

Jomari

March 8th, 2007, 14:57

<div>yeah i hear you.</div><div> </div><div>its going to be a long summer...</div>

BWD

March 8th, 2007, 23:01

I have the 360 add on, it's pretty nice, not really what I was expecting. It's a little bit better PQ than my Denon 3910, but not much.

IrritateGuy

March 9th, 2007, 08:30

<div>The guys at "The Register" have declared BluRay the eventual winner.</div><div> </div><div><a href="http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/03/08/blu_ray_price_cuts/" target="_blank">http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/03/08/blu_ray_price_cuts/</a></div><div> </div><div>I think they are WAY overstating the impact Sony's new $600 player will have on the market.</div>

Jomari

March 9th, 2007, 11:31

<div>howard, any chance you can give me a linky to follow to see where i can find such player?</div><div> </div><div>thanks.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 9th, 2007, 12:37

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>howard, any chance you can give me a linky to follow to see where i can find such player?</div><div> </div><div>thanks.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>The more affordable Sony BluRay player was announced but isn't shipping, yet.</div><div> </div><div><a href="http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8NHIQL80.htm" target="_blank">http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8NHIQL80.htm</a></div><div> </div><div>You can still buy the Samsung player for $499:</div><div><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-BD-P1000-Blu-Ray-Disc-Player/dp/B000F99FDE/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-8815215-9667019?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1173461514&sr=8-1" target="_blank">http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-BD-P1000-Blu-Ray-Disc-Player/dp/B000F99FDE/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-8815215-9667019?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1173461514&sr=8-1</a><br></div><div></div>

Jomari

March 9th, 2007, 13:05

<div>Thanks Howard. you have a pm btw.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 9th, 2007, 13:27

<div>I am waiting for the next, next generation BluRay players.</div><div> </div><div>But, man, I am totally wanting something right now -<br></div><div>... must... resist..... temptation.......</div>

Jomari

March 9th, 2007, 15:19

<div>the wierd part is, we dont have the 'smaller' companies producing any of these blu-ray/hd players. becha its the cost.</div><div> </div><div>i do try to look em up on ebay....</div>

IrritateGuy

March 9th, 2007, 15:29

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>the wierd part is, we dont have the 'smaller' companies producing any of these blu-ray/hd players. becha its the cost.</div><div> </div><div>i do try to look em up on ebay....</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>This is cutting edge, high tech, brand new stuff. Small companies are never on the forefront of bleeding edge technology. The lasers needed to build both BluRay and HD-DVD drives are in short supply, so the costs of the parts are still rather high. As more and more companies dedicate resources to produce components to get into this field, the supply will increase, and the prices will come down, and everything will commoditize to the point we are paying $80 for a high definition player.</div><div> </div><div>Keep in mind that both of these technologies are significantly lower cost than DVD when it was released (taking inflation into account) and the sales are significantly higher than DVD when it first came out. This is all good! We just need to be patient.<br></div><div></div>

Jomari

March 9th, 2007, 16:41

<div>i know. its just something y'know these small 'made in taiwan' companies are able to come up with at a dimes worth. hehehe...</div>

Jomari

March 9th, 2007, 22:21

COf, went to the local compusa here, and guess what, the samsung blu-ray player was at 699. i know i know, its still expensive, also knowing its on sale at 499.<br><br>i just was drooling over it for quite sometime. and want it. badly. compusa was shutting down here :( and was giving a 10% discount off em. sad.<br><br>walmart also had ps3's. wanted that too. but looked at the games it had.<br><br>three.<br><br>great.<br><br>now before matt throws me out of the window, im just saying... hehehe.<br><br>for what its worth, i wanted the hd-dvd player too. *ahem*.

Jomari

March 10th, 2007, 12:48

<div>if you dont mind me sidestepping on the subject in hand,</div><div>but would this also mean a slow enduring death is at hand for standard dvds?</div><div>consider that once blu-ray/hd does settle in, will this mean a little demise for our standard dvds?</div><div>id hope not, due to the vast collection most of us already have.</div><div>albiet possible, it may be meaning us buying dvds over again...</div><div> </div><div> </div>

IrritateGuy

March 10th, 2007, 13:14

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>if you dont mind me sidestepping on the subject in hand,</div><div>but would this also mean a slow enduring death is at hand for standard dvds?</div><div>consider that once blu-ray/hd does settle in, will this mean a little demise for our standard dvds?</div><div>id hope not, due to the vast collection most of us already have.</div><div>albiet possible, it may be meaning us buying dvds over again...</div><div> </div><div> </div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>The demise of DVD will be similar to the demise of VHS, Beta, and LaserDisc. These transitions have happened many times in the history of this hobby, so I wouldn't be concerned. If you recall the history of home audio, we went from wax cylinders > shellac 78s > wire recorders > LP > reel to reel > 45 singles > cassette > 8-track > Elcasette >CD > SACD/DVD-A. In general, I think we have coped with all those transitions pretty well.</div><div> </div><div>There is one HUGE difference with the transition from VHS/Beta/LD to DVD and the transition from DVD to BD/HD-DVD.... the new HD players can all play standard DVDs. This means your back catalog of DVDs is safe from obsolescense. The same is true for 78s, LPs, and 45s. They could all be played on the same record player, so they all survived rather well over the decades.<br></div><div></div>

Jomari

March 10th, 2007, 13:40

<div>true, true true...</div><div> </div><div>i guess we have to 'retrain' our eyes to notice the difference in both Standard dvds and HD/Blu-ray dvds... once you go HD, its difficult to go back to Standard formats. although, all or most of my movies are in standard format. especially my imports.</div><div> </div><div>my current oppo 970 player is awesome, but once i saw hueys post (albiet questioning the source,display unit et al) its still a reflection of how superbly beautiful HD players can perform. of course this depends on the display unit as well, in my case a Pj...</div>

IrritateGuy

March 10th, 2007, 14:06

<div>For me, if the entertainment is excellent, the format is inconsequential. I watch several shows I record from BBC-A which are high budget, film-like stories (Doctor Who, MI-5, Robin Hood), and the quality of the picture and sound are far from good. In fact, the quality if far less than I get OTA for SD channels. But, because I enjoy the stories, acting, and even the production quality (what I can make out), I still greatly enjoy the shows.</div><div> </div><div>The same goes for home media formats. There are old, scratchy, hissy LPs and Cassettes I own with music on them I cannot get on CD. But, I enjoy the music so much, I don't care that is sounds less than ideal (polite term, right?). I made my own digital copies of those albums in order to preserve them, and I listen to them all the time.</div><div> </div><div>So, while I would prefer to have all my movies and audio available to me in the highest possible resolution, I am happy to live with the limitations of what I have instead. I generally don't watch discs just for the image and sound quality. If the story, acting, music, or other core entertainment aspect sucks, I don't care how breath taking the images can be.</div><div> </div><div>But, that is just me.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 10th, 2007, 16:59

<div>The New York Post wrote an article which essentially declares BluRay will win the format war within a year:</div><div><a href="http://www.nypost.com/seven/03082007/entertainment/blu_ray_ascending_entertainment_lou_lumenick.htm?p age=1" target="_blank">http://www.nypost.com/seven/03082007/entertainment/blu_ray_ascending_entertainment_lou_lumenick.htm?p age=1</a></div><div> </div><div>There are some interesting points made in the article.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 10th, 2007, 17:06

<div>Here's another article in Video Business about BluRay versus HD-DVD:</div><div><a href="http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6422898.html" target="_blank">http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6422898.html</a></div><div> </div><div>"T<span>otal disc sales since the debut of both formats remains close. About 650,000 HD </span><span>DVD</span><span> discs have been sold since the formatâ€™s April debut compared to more than 675,000 Blu-ray discs sold, according to one studio source."</span></div>

ThumpinSub

March 10th, 2007, 19:39

<div>While I too think that Blu-ray will ultimately be victorious, I find it interesting that the inferior format is superior in acceptance.</div>

MatthewB

March 10th, 2007, 20:22

Thumpin, I'm not when videotapes came out, I saved up for a year (I was 12) to buy a Beta machine, I took into account the better video of Beta over VHS and the smaller more compact cassette. I figured the general public would be smart and take better PQ, but alas I was proved wrong and bought a format that was dead in two years. Now it looks like history is repeating itself. I bought not one but two HD-DVD players but looks like the general public is gonna go with the inferior product (at a higher cost also.) I would really like to see what the disc sales would be like if the PS3 did not come with the BluRay player. Something tells me this war would be over by now.

ThumpinSub

March 10th, 2007, 20:58

<div>If I had to choose a particular format, as I stated, I think it'll be Blu-ray. Having said that, it's my belief that there really won't be a winner and both formats will fall by the wayside just like DVD-A and SACD did. People, in general, can ALMOST tolerate the speed at which technology changes computers. Now that home A/V is in the same express lane as the computer, I don't think the general public is ready for so many, so drastic and so frequent upgrades to just "<em>watching TV</em>". Sure, us stereo geeks thrive on the stuff but we're in the minority. The vast majority don't even have a handle on what HDTV is. You mention shutting off the analog signal to some people and they look at you like you're from another planet. Admittedly, I might be a tad slanted since live in a very small, rural area - you know the type - it says "Welcome to our town" on both sides of the same sign. Perhaps you already have the ability to subscribe to Verizon's FiOS whereas it'll be 2010 before I have that choice. </div><div> </div><div>The point being, DVD was an accepted optional luxury and welcomed with open arms. We now have DTV looming in the not-too-distant future that is, in essence, a requirement. Having other optional luxuries along the way like DVD-A, SACD, Blu-ray, HD-DVD, Dolby Digital (Plus, TrueHD) DTS Master Audio HD Super HiFi Ultra Elite Edition XX, it's all just too much and the majority of people are overwhelmed.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 10th, 2007, 23:31

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>MatthewB wrote:<br>Thumpin, I'm not when videotapes came out, I saved up for a year (I was 12) to buy a Beta machine, I took into account the better video of Beta over VHS and the smaller more compact cassette. I figured the general public would be smart and take better PQ, but alas I was proved wrong and bought a format that was dead in two years. Now it looks like history is repeating itself. I bought not one but two HD-DVD players but looks like the general public is gonna go with the inferior product (at a higher cost also.) I would really like to see what the disc sales would be like if the PS3 did not come with the BluRay player. Something tells me this war would be over by now.<br><hr></div></blockquote>BluRay is an "inferior" product? :D</div>

EJR

March 10th, 2007, 23:40

<blockquote><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>MatthewB wrote:<br>Thumpin, I'm not when videotapes came out, I saved up for a year (I was 12) to buy a Beta machine, I took into account the better video of Beta over VHS and the smaller more compact cassette. I figured the general public would be smart and take better PQ, but alas I was proved wrong and bought a format that was dead in two years. Now it looks like history is repeating itself. I bought not one but two HD-DVD players but looks like the general public is gonna go with the inferior product (at a higher cost also.) I would really like to see what the disc sales would be like if the PS3 did not come with the BluRay player. Something tells me this war would be over by now.<br><hr></div></blockquote>BluRay is an "inferior" product? :D</div><br><hr></blockquote><br><br><br>Yes I was confused by this as well. I was initially rooting for HD-DVD b/c the players were cheaper and I have a profound hatred for Sony. However, I never thought BD was inferior in any way - notwithstanding the documented problems in the Gen 1 players. However, now that the player prices are leveling out I am more accepting of BD as a technology. I still hate Sony though.<br><br>-Eric<p>Message Edited by EJRothman on <span class="date_text">03-10-2007</span><span class="time_text">11:41 PM</span></p>

Jomari

March 11th, 2007, 11:45

<div>i never actually considered blu ray as the 'inferior product' based on the tale of the tape. not saying that it is, nor sayin that hd-dvd is inferior, but if you look at the specs of the disc, it shows some sort of detail as to why it COULD be considered a 'higher quality' product.</div><div> </div><div>i dont really like sony as much as i used to. they too know that they are one of the bigger names in the industry, and making some good bank on us too. i dont like microsoft either, thus a number of people developed alternative software et al.</div><div> </div><div>in the long run, i consider us, the consumer as the losers in this format war. conning people to buy this or that product, and see how it runs from then on.</div>

MDRiggs

March 11th, 2007, 13:45

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
MatthewB wrote:<BR>Thumpin, I'm not when videotapes came out, I saved up for a year (I was 12) to buy a Beta machine, I took into account the better video of Beta over VHS and the smaller more compact cassette. I figured the general public would be smart and take better PQ, but alas I was proved wrong and bought a format that was dead in two years.
<HR>
</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>I was involved in testing many Beta and VHS VCRs back in the day and consider the supposed technical superiority of Beta an urban legend. The original Beta I recording system probably was a little better than VHS, but it was also a tremendous marketing miscalculation. In the U.S. market, where movies broadcast on TV almost invariably occupied 2-hour time slots, 2-hour recording time was critical to format success. Sony realized this shortly after VHS was introduced, brought out the Beta II format (and eventually Beta III to compete with VHS LP and EP recording), and consigned Beta I to the dustbin of history. Very few decks with Beta I recording capability were ever sold. Meanwhile, VHS SP and Beta II were very comparable in performance. I saw plenty of performance variation from brand to brand and model to model within a brand but virtually none that could be tied to format: The best VHS and Beta decks offered essentially identical performance. Beta did have a smaller cassette (designed with future camcorders in mind) and a somewhat better tape-loading mechanism, however.</DIV></DIV>

Jomari

March 11th, 2007, 16:11

<div>confirm this for me if you please,</div><div> </div><div>if the ps3 blu-ray player detects that your display unit cannot use 1080p/i, it downconverts the Blu-ray dvd into 480p?</div><div> </div><div>if so, this is definitely a big big loss.</div><div> </div><div>too bad, was so tempted to get the ps3...</div><div> </div><div>but then i remembered the 3 games to choose from in walmart.</div><div> </div><div>maybe i will wait out the new updated players for Q2 2007 instead...</div>

ThumpinSub

March 11th, 2007, 16:44

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div> </div><div> </div><div>in the long run, i consider us, the consumer as the losers in this format war.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote>Well said, Brother!<br><div></div></div>

MDRiggs

March 12th, 2007, 10:54

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
jomari620 wrote:<BR>
<DIV>confirm this for me if you please,</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>if the ps3 blu-ray player detects that your display unit cannot use 1080p/i, it downconverts the Blu-ray dvd into 480p?</DIV>
<HR>
</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>I'm pretty sure you can also select 720p. But any set that would accept 720p would also accept at least 1080i (though it might not display at that resolution).</DIV></DIV>

Jomari

March 12th, 2007, 16:58

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>MDRiggs wrote:<br><div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>confirm this for me if you please,</div><div> </div><div>if the ps3 blu-ray player detects that your display unit cannot use 1080p/i, it downconverts the Blu-ray dvd into 480p?</div><hr></div></blockquote><div>I'm pretty sure you can also select 720p. But any set that would accept 720p would also accept at least 1080i (though it might not display at that resolution).</div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Err... not according to some websites Md, i have been looking for quite sometime on numerous websites, and most of em say the same thing. if your display unit cannot take 1080p/i it WILL DOWNCONVERT the image (may it be sdvd or blu-ray) into 480P.</div><div> </div><div>It also doesnt upconvert sdvds...</div><div> </div><div>Too sad mate. i really wanted one.</div></div>

MDRiggs

March 12th, 2007, 18:05

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
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<DIV>
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jomari620 wrote:<BR>
<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
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<DIV>
<HR>
MDRiggs wrote:<BR>
<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
jomari620 wrote:<BR>
<DIV>confirm this for me if you please,</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>if the ps3 blu-ray player detects that your display unit cannot use 1080p/i, it downconverts the Blu-ray dvd into 480p?</DIV>
<HR>
</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>I'm pretty sure you can also select 720p. But any set that would accept 720p would also accept at least 1080i (though it might not display at that resolution).</DIV></DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>Err... not according to some websites Md, i have been looking for quite sometime on numerous websites, and most of em say the same thing. if your display unit cannot take 1080p/i it WILL DOWNCONVERT the image (may it be sdvd or blu-ray) into 480P.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>It also doesnt upconvert sdvds...</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Too sad mate. i really wanted one.</DIV></DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>But the thing is, there are no HDTVs that will not accept 1080i. (That is, the only TVs that will not accept 1080i are SDTVs that would require 480p or, more likely, 480i input anyway.) And if your TV has a good scaler, it doesn't matter whether the player can upconvert standard DVDs. Granted you would expect a 720p output option (and I still think there is one), but I don't know that it's necessarily that big a deal, either. I'll try to double-check the 720p capability, though.<BR>
<DIV></DIV></DIV>

Jomari

March 12th, 2007, 22:05

<div><div><blockquote><div><div><blockquote><div><hr></div></blockquote>But the thing is, there are no HDTVs that will not accept 1080i. (That is, the only TVs that will not accept 1080i are SDTVs that would require 480p or, more likely, 480i input anyway.) And if your TV has a good scaler, it doesn't matter whether the player can upconvert standard DVDs. Granted you would expect a 720p output option (and I still think there is one), but I don't know that it's necessarily that big a deal, either. I'll try to double-check the 720p capability, though.<br><div></div></div><br><hr></div><div>What im talking about is that it wont show the true HD signal that the blu-ray disc would give. if your set aint 1080 then it wont shoot out a 1080 signal instead just the regular 480p signal instead.</div><div> </div><div>about the upscaling, heck thats the least on my list if i am getting a HD capable dvd player like blu ray.</div></blockquote></div></div>

MDRiggs

March 13th, 2007, 11:22

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
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<DIV>
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jomari620 wrote:<BR>
<DIV>
<DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<DIV>
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<DIV>
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</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>But the thing is, there are no HDTVs that will not accept 1080i. (That is, the only TVs that will not accept 1080i are SDTVs that would require 480p or, more likely, 480i input anyway.) And if your TV has a good scaler, it doesn't matter whether the player can upconvert standard DVDs. Granted you would expect a 720p output option (and I still think there is one), but I don't know that it's necessarily that big a deal, either. I'll try to double-check the 720p capability, though.<BR>
<DIV></DIV></DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV>
<DIV>What im talking about is that it wont show the true HD signal that the blu-ray disc would give. if your set aint 1080 then it wont shoot out a 1080 signal instead just the regular 480p signal instead.<BR>
<HR>
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<DIV>But that's not the case. Any HDTV will take a 1080i input and convert it to its native resolution (unless it's a CRT, in which case it will display 1080i). So if you have, say, a 1,366 x 768 plasma and connect a PS3 to it, the PS3 can deliver 1080i to the set, which will deinterlace the signal and scale it to 1,366 x 768.</DIV></DIV>

MatthewB

March 13th, 2007, 15:33

<div>I meant inferior as slightly less in PQ than HD-DVD, so far from all the experts who have reviewed both BluRay and HD-DVD they all seem to agree that the HD-DVD is slightly better at PQ. hence why the term inferior (I meant it not in a bad way, it's just not as comparable as Bluray. As far as my experiemce has been.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 13th, 2007, 17:16

<div></div><div>Matt - Here is a summary of ALL the professional reviews on several webzines:</div><div> </div><div><strong><font color="#8b0000">HD DVD PQ SQ TOTAL </font></strong><font color="blue"><b>Blu-ray PQ SQ TOTAL </b></font><br><font color="darkred">HighDef 3.94 3.68 3.81 </font><font color="blue">HighDef 3.93 3.88 3.91 </font><br><font color="darkred">HTSpot 4.02 3.89 3.95 </font><font color="blue">HTSpot 3.92 4.27 4.09 </font><br><font color="darkred">DVDTalk 3.67 3.51 3.59 </font><font color="blue">DVDTalk 3.57 3.69 3.63 </font><br><font color="darkred">HTForum 4.11 3.63 3.87 </font><font color="blue">HTForum 4.20 4.09 4.14 </font><br><font color="darkred">UpDisc 4.02 3.86 3.94 </font><font color="blue">UpDisc 4.02 4.19 4.11 </font><br><font color="darkred"><b>Totals 3.90 3.71 3.80 </b></font><font color="blue"><b>Totals 3.85 3.98 3.91</b></font></div><div> </div><div>As you can see, HD-DVD has a 0.05 advange over BluRay in the image quality department so far. Meanwhile, BluRay has a 0.27 advantage in the audio dept. In total, BluRay is has ratings 0.11 higher than HD-DVD when all things are considered.</div><div> </div><div>I hardly call that a significant advantage for HD-DVD in the image category.</div><p>Message Edited by IrritateGuy on <span class="date_text">03-13-2007</span><span class="time_text">04:19 PM</span></p>

MDRiggs

March 13th, 2007, 18:10

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
MatthewB wrote:<BR>
<DIV>I meant inferior as slightly less in PQ than HD-DVD, so far from all the experts who have reviewed both BluRay and HD-DVD they all seem to agree that the HD-DVD is slightly better at PQ. hence why the term inferior (I meant it not in a bad way, it's just not as comparable as Bluray.  As far as my experiemce has been.</DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>That's just random stuff, though. The two formats are totally equivalent in video and audio performance.</DIV></DIV>

MatthewB

March 13th, 2007, 18:29

<div>IT's STILL .05 higher though now isn't it. ;)</div>

yromj

March 14th, 2007, 11:06

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>confirm this for me if you please,</div><div> </div><div>if the ps3 blu-ray player detects that your display unit cannot use 1080p/i, it downconverts the Blu-ray dvd into 480p?</div><div> </div><div>if so, this is definitely a big big loss.</div><div> </div><div>too bad, was so tempted to get the ps3...</div><div> </div><div>but then i remembered the 3 games to choose from in walmart.</div><div> </div><div>maybe i will wait out the new updated players for Q2 2007 instead...</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>My projector does not accept 1080p, but it does accept 1080i and 720p. I have my PS3 currently set to 720p output, just to see how I like it. I did have it set to 1080i so that it did no scaling whatsoever to BDs.</div><div> </div><div>I'm pretty sure I confirmed the input signal to my projector was 1080i and 720p when playing a BD. I'll confirm this and take a picture of it for you as well.</div><div> </div><div>I will say this, the one movie that I have on BD and DVD is <em>House of Flying Daggers</em>. I would take you about 0.3 seconds to determine which one is playing. The BD looks much better than the DVD, especially at a larger screen size.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div>

IrritateGuy

March 15th, 2007, 11:47

<div>I mentioned earlier that the BD business leaders had formed a group to promote BluRay in Europe. Now the HD-DVD has formed a group to promote HD-DVD in Europe.</div><div><a href="http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38247" target="_blank">http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38247</a></div><div> </div><div>This is going to be fun to watch.</div>

Jomari

March 15th, 2007, 11:50

<div>i just want that new blu-ray player to come out from sony... and if it does? tempting. tempting. tempting.</div>

ThumpinSub

March 15th, 2007, 15:59

<div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>i just want that new blu-ray player to come out from sony... and if it does? tempting. tempting. tempting.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><br><div>Ask and ye shall receive!</div><div><a href="http://blog.hometheatermag.com/geoffreymorrison/" target="_blank">http://blog.hometheatermag.com/geoffreymorrison/</a></div></div></div>

Jomari

March 15th, 2007, 17:00

<div>links not working... =(</div>

IrritateGuy

March 15th, 2007, 17:11

<div>It is my understanding that the gen-1 low cost Sony player which was recently announced won't ship in the US until this summer.</div><div> </div><div>I am still waiting for a Gen-3 player. Those are at least a year away.</div>

Jomari

March 15th, 2007, 17:19

<div>summer officially starts March 21st. hehehe. 6 days away.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 15th, 2007, 17:24

<div>I've seen and heard "in the know" reports of May as well as June. But until you see it in person, those are only rumors.</div>

IrritateGuy

March 15th, 2007, 21:08

<div></div><div>LG has announced the dual format PC drive. It will read & write BluRay, but only read HD-DVD.</div><div><a href="http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=6458" target="_blank">http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=6458</a></div><div> </div><div>At $1,200 each, this is not a product for everyone.</div><p>Message Edited by IrritateGuy on <span class="date_text">03-15-2007</span><span class="time_text">08:08 PM</span></p>

ThumpinSub

March 15th, 2007, 22:56

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div></div><div><div><a href="http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=6458" target="_blank"></a></div></div><div>At $1,200 each, this is not a product for everyone.</div><p><br></p><hr></div></blockquote><br><div>Patience, my good man. In a year or so, it'll be $49 and everybody will be offering them.</div></div>

MUDSHARK

March 16th, 2007, 17:37

<div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>summer officially starts March 21st. hehehe. 6 days away.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><br><div></div></div>Huh??? Summer starts in June except for our friend, Portgarza.:cool:</div><div> </div><div>The PS3 (using HDMI, anyway) allows setup of the maximum resolution our DLP supports. We have never had a Blu-ray disc or game default to SD. The PS3 will suit us just fine for a couple generations until dual format players by quality manufacturers reach $500 or so (LG is not what I have in mind). I wonder when LOTR will come out and in what format?</div>

Jomari

March 16th, 2007, 20:36

<div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>MUDSHARK wrote:<br><div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>jomari620 wrote:<br><div>summer officially starts March 21st. hehehe. 6 days away.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Huh??? Summer starts in June except for our friend, Portgarza.:cool:</div></div></div><div> </div><div>The PS3 (using HDMI, anyway) allows setup of the maximum resolution our DLP supports. We have never had a Blu-ray disc or game default to SD. The PS3 will suit us just fine for a couple generations until dual format players by quality manufacturers reach $500 or so (LG is not what I have in mind). I wonder when LOTR will come out and in what format?</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Sorry, its spring that starts on March 21st..</div><div> </div><div>hmm. the ps3 part is a little confusing on my end. nonetheless, i wont bother at this point, aint gonna get one anytime soon.</div><div> </div><div>The LOTR will come out with the WINNER of the format wars. which would be around 2010 hehehe. Seriously, this one would definitely spin things around. if it does come out on HD-DVD, i bet this would increase chances of people buying their hardware JUST to get LOTR.</div></div></div>

IrritateGuy

March 16th, 2007, 22:39

<div></div><div>It was announced at CES that LOTR would be released on both BluRay AND HD-DVD, but it will be the theatrical release, not the Extended Edition of the Trilogy. We'll have to way for the EE version.</div><p>Message Edited by IrritateGuy on <span class="date_text">03-16-2007</span><span class="time_text">09:40 PM</span></p>

MatthewB

March 17th, 2007, 11:03

Hopefully the will have the lossless audio which should sound fantastic. The standard DVD already looks HD, I'm interested to see how much of an improvement the HD version looks like.

tmankiller72

March 17th, 2007, 21:06

<div>I recently asked this question directly to New Line(customer inquiries) and they said it should be released later this year on HD-DVD , but thats not to say it won't be released on both formats eventually. If you (supporters of either format) are confident in yours eventually winning ,than why don't you have a player if you do not already have one? the HD-A2 is only about $400 online and we know the PS3 is $599 . I paid $400 for a Panasonic DVD player in 1996 :mad: (but that was the only format so it wasn't so bad) </div>

IrritateGuy

March 17th, 2007, 21:34

<div>I won't buy a first generation product, that's why. I want all the kinks, issues, technical hurdles, and standards to be worked out before I jump onto a new technology. I waited two years after they were released to get a DVD player, and I am very glad I did. I watched my early adopter friends go into gear envy when they saw the later generation stuff, and I am glad I wasn't them.</div><div> </div><div>But, that said, my son is a gamer and he is thinking he wants to get a PS3 in the next two to three months at which point I will utilize it as a BluRay player until he moves out, or a more commoditized stand alone player is released.</div>

IrritateGuy

April 13th, 2007, 09:53

<div>I pulled this data out of an article about the announcement of a dual format player from Samsung.</div><div> </div><div><em>Market monitor Nielsen VideoScan's numbers for the week ending 18 March - the most recent stats made public - put BD ahead in sales of pre-recorded content in the US, with year-to-date sales of 549,730 units to HD DVD's 249,451 discs. Since sales of each format started, some 708,600 HD DVDs and 844,000 BDs have been sold.</em></div><div> </div>

Jomari

April 15th, 2007, 15:49

<div></div><div>heres a visual image btw of which studio is on board with blu-ray... care of klipsch corner.com ...</div><div> </div><div>http://www.klipschcorner.com/images/StudioOrgChart.jpg</div><br><br>Message Edited by jomari on <span class="date_text">04-15-2007</span> <span class="time_text">03:51 PM</span>

Jomari

April 15th, 2007, 16:36

<div>I just noticed how it looked like a democrats and republican tree... ;)</div><div> </div><div>something did occur to me yesterday,</div><div> </div><div>if HD DVD suddenly dropped their player prices, as well as their cost on the dvds they sell, would this</div><div>1. prove to hurt the goliath that is blu-ray?</div><div>2. albeit blu-ray being the more 'stronger' format (i couldnt fine a 'proper' term sorry), considering the cost may in effect make people choose HD instead.</div><div> </div>

Jomari

April 15th, 2007, 21:01

<div>Saw this in another website, thought it would be nice to learn more about. indicated below is the number of sales of dvds purchased by numbers...</div><div> </div><div>http://www.highdefdigest.com/images/post/2/2256/original.gif</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/564">http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/564</a></div>

rockemsockem

April 16th, 2007, 09:17

<div>The Toshiba A2 will be $299 at a store near me this Wednesday.</div><div> </div><div>At this rate they will be $100 by Christmas, and Blu-ray will still win once Disney opens their vaults.</div>

kdsmithjr

April 18th, 2007, 17:36

<div>I'm old enough to remember the VHS/Beta videotape wars. Betamax might have been technically superior, but the "winner" in these things goes to those who do their marketing homework and give US consumers what they want (even if it isn't good for them). I just came over to HDTV and I love my Samsung Plasma. I really want to take the plunge into HD Optical Media but...i ain't stoopid.</div><div> </div><div>So far reviews on the LG "you can have it both ways" machine say leave it on the shelf--particularly at $1,200. I'm thinkin that with the 'houses' that have endorsed Blue-ray, i.e., Sony and Disney (which includes ABC of course), that Blue Ray will be hard to beat--in terms of who will eventually "win." My money says spend $125-200 on a upconverting player, sit back and wait about a year. Everything will be cheaper and better...and there will be no "mistakes."</div>

Jomari

April 18th, 2007, 21:31

<div>welcome to the forum kdsmithjr, as a number of us are already sittin on the fence, we therer are a number of upconverting dvd players in the market we are quite pleased with, mine being the oppo hd970.</div>

IrritateGuy

April 20th, 2007, 09:32

<div>Sony converting their Terre Haute manufacturing facility to produce BluRay discs.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=143">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=143</a></div>

IrritateGuy

April 23rd, 2007, 15:23

<div>Now CNET is weighing in on the format war and reporting the disparity in sales of discs:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://news.com.com/Blu-ray+besting+its+high-def+DVD+rival/2100-1025_3-6178403.html?tag=nefd.top">http://news.com.com/Blu-ray+besting+its+high-def+DVD+rival/2100-1025_3-6178403.html?tag=nefd.top</a></div><div> </div><div>http://www.tsurugi.co.uk/misc/hdmarketshare_4-15.jpg</div><div> </div><div> </div>

IrritateGuy

April 24th, 2007, 14:51

<div>BluRay has sold over 1 million titles:</div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.dailytech.com/Bluray+Disc+Sales+Surpass+One+Million/article7028.htm">http://www.dailytech.com/Bluray+Disc+Sales+Surpass+One+Million/article7028.htm</a></div><div> </div><div> </div>

IrritateGuy

May 10th, 2007, 10:58

<div>Now it appears the "porn effect" won't be an issue in the format war....</div><div> </div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=39510">http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=39510</a></div><div> </div><div> </div><div>Does that mean the war will last longer (hopefully not too long, I have an ego too).</div>

MatthewB

May 12th, 2007, 14:08

<div>I thought about waiting but just couldn't especialyy after I heard how great losless audio was, but since I got both of my HD_DVD players for very cheap. Total about 500.00 outta pocket for both of mine, and the fact I am using one of them (The XA1) as a very nice "upconverting" DVD player. The money was well spent. I get the best of both worlds, a very nice upconverting via HDMI and a great HD-DVD with lossless for a bedroom system.</div><div> </div><div>I only have about 10 HD-DVDs right now but according to the sign in my videorental store there are expecting HD and BluRay very soon. But once you guys hear lossless it will trounce what you may think of picture clarity. Heck even the standard DTS-ES at 1.5Mbps sounds incredible for disks without lossless.</div><div> </div><div>I will be buying Bluray once the players drop in price, just so that I can have the best of both worlds. For those considering the LG dual format for 1,200 why not get an A2 for 300.00 and PS3 for 600.00 you wil still save 300.00 get about 10 free titles (five for each) and still come out ahead.</div>

IrritateGuy

May 14th, 2007, 15:45

<div>The CEO of Disney had some very biased things to say about the format war and Disney's stance on BluRay. Many of his arguments make sense, but some are hyperbole:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=7264">http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=7264</a></div><div> </div><div> </div>

Huey

May 14th, 2007, 16:39

<div>He never did come out and say that they wouldn't back HD-DVD if it started to pull ahead, although I don't think any head of any studio would burn a bridge like that.</div><div> </div><div>Funniest part was in the comments section, when one of the people stated about someone who worked at BB, that if they wanted Blu-ray to win, they should support Hd-dvd, because BB employees were some of the most misiformed people around.(no offense to TimfromMass and others)</div><div>Rob</div>

IrritateGuy

May 18th, 2007, 11:10

<div>One guy at MS says they will support whichever format wins, while another assures us they are 100% committed to HD-DVD and will not support BluRay, ever.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=7346">http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=7346</a></div>

IrritateGuy

June 3rd, 2007, 13:39

<div>The Digital Bits webzine has posted a very honest and, in my opinion, fair commentary on the BluRay / HD-DVD format war. Of course, I agree with it 100% (though I feel they bend over being nice to some of the HD-DVD fanboys to make their point), so of course I would like it.</div><div> </div><div>They bring up stuff I have known about for months but have been prevented from discussing due to my responsibilities to my employer, so I like that aspect of the essay.</div><div> </div><div>If you are really interested in an seemingly unbiased argument for why BluRay is most likely to win the format war, then I recommend taking the time to read the article:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/soapbox/soap060107.html">http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/soapbox/soap060107.html</a></div>

sonnyvegas

June 5th, 2007, 12:15

<div>Hey IG</div><div>I am at work and am unable to read the digital bits article would it be too much to ask</div><div>to cut and paste it</div><div>I would really appreciate it</div>

IrritateGuy

June 5th, 2007, 12:19

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>sonnyvegas wrote:<br><div>Hey IG</div><div>I am at work and am unable to read the digital bits article would it be too much to ask</div><div>to cut and paste it</div><div>I would really appreciate it</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>It is WAY too long as it is truly a complete analysis of all the aspects entire market.</div><div> </div><div>Not only that, it is a copyrighted article.<br></div><div></div>

IrritateGuy

June 8th, 2007, 23:55

<div>Blu_ray.com is reporting that there are several new players about to be released:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=244">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=244</a></div><div> </div><div>News reports from all over the world have hinted at new Blu-ray players and drives coming from some well respected manufacturers in the coming months. Computer giant Asus has revealed their BC-1205PT Blu-ray computer drive. Priced at an entry level $270, this drive will read Blu-ray, DVD, and CD discs. Also hinted, was that we will soon see a Blu-ray player from JVC and possibly new players from LG and Philips.<br><br>Asus' drive will read Blu-ray discs at up to 5X speed, but will feature no write capability in order to keep costs down for HTPC enthusiasts. No specs have been announced for the other players at this time.<br></div>

IrritateGuy

June 12th, 2007, 16:29

<div>Toshiba has cut their HD-DVD player forecast in nearly in half for this calendar year.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=199903402">http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=199903402</a></div><div> </div><div>That can't be good.</div>

IrritateGuy

June 22nd, 2007, 11:50

<div>In even more exciting BluRay news, the BD exclusive content protection system, which is much harder to crack than AACS, has been finalized.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=7777">http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=7777</a></div><div> </div><div>Basically, this enable a unique decryption key for each title which is harder to crack than previous encryption keys. So, pirates can probably still crack the system, but it will take longer and they'll have to do it on each title press run separately (they can produce 10,000 titles with one key, 10,000 with another, and so on). Also, the BD-Virtual machine can be used to analyze the hardware to ensure it is not modified, and that it meets all the requirements of the BD-A.</div><div> </div><div>This is actually very big news for the studios - many of which chose to back BluRay specifically because of this protection scheme.</div><div> </div><div>Insiders have said for a long time that the studios have held off on release plans for several of their most valuable titles because they were waiting for this. Assuming that is true, we should see some exciting release announcements soon.</div><div> </div><div> </div>

Tee

June 22nd, 2007, 13:29

<div></div><div>IG,</div><div> </div><div>I just asked one of the mods to change the name of this thread to......</div><div> </div><div><strong>Blu-ray News & Updates</strong> </div><div> </div><div>That way we can have a home base for Blu-ray, after all this thread pretty much is that.;)</div><br><br>Message Edited by Tee on <span class="date_text">06-22-2007</span> <span class="time_text">01:30 PM</span>

jstwong

June 22nd, 2007, 13:50

<DIV>Title change done.  :)</DIV>

Tee

June 22nd, 2007, 14:02

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>jstwong wrote:<br><div>Title change done. :)</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>WOW!</div><div> </div><div>Now that is what i'm talking about, fast, quick customer service!</div><div> </div><div>Thx!<br></div><div></div>

Tee

June 22nd, 2007, 14:13

<div></div><p><strong>Potter, Oceans and Burt Reynolds on Their Way</strong></p><p><span>Posted:</span> 21 Jun 2007 12:07 PM GMT-06:00</p><p> </p><font face="Trebuchet MS" size="2"><p>http://blu-ray.typepad.com/./photos/uncategorized/2007/06/21/potter_bluray_movie.jpg alt=Photo</p></font><p><font face="Trebuchet MS" size="2">Studios prepare their Blu-ray movie line-up for fall 2007. Here's what we gathered about it lately: </font></p><p><font face="Trebuchet MS" size="2"></font> </p><p></p><p><span>Buena Vista will release "Remember the Titans", featuring Denzel Washington, on September 4th. No specifications have been announced yet but you should expect the regular 1080p video transfer with PCM audio. The studio also announced "Meet the Robinsons" for October 23rd. Specifications announced include a 1.78:1 1080p video transfer and a PCM 5.1 surround soundtrack. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>"Return to the House on Haunted Hill" has been announced by Warner. No information on specifications, price and exact release date have been announced so far.</span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>Are you a Burt Reynold fan? If you are, you should be happy to know that on September 18th, the classic movie "Deliverance" will be released by Warner. The retail price has been set to $28.99. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>Harry Potter and Oceans Movies should also be release on Blu-ray discs soon. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>Disney will bring "Sleeping Beauty on Blu-ray discs but only in 2008.</span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>Beethoven music will make its debut on Blu-ray disc on August 21th. Sony will release "Immortal Beloved" starring Gary Oldman as Ludwig van Beethoven. Specs include a 1080p video transfert with a 2.4:1 format and 5.1 PCM surround audio soundtrack. The retail price will be $28.95. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>Flashdance has been announced by Paramount for September 13th.</span></p><p><span></span> </p><div><span></span><strong>â€œGhostâ€ and â€œAn Officer and a Gentlemanâ€ Postponed</strong></div><div><strong></strong> </div><p>http://blu-ray.typepad.com/./photos/uncategorized/2007/06/21/ghost_bluray_movie.jpg alt=Photo</p><p> </p><p>Bad news for Demie Moore and Richard Gere fans. "Ghost" and "An Officer and a Gentleman" have been postponed by Paramount. Originally scheduled for July 24th, the movies have been delayed but no new dates have been announced yet.</p><p> </p><p><strong>Samsung and Panasonic Release Blu-ray Player Firmware Upgrade</strong></p><p><strong></strong> </p><p><strong>http://blu-ray.typepad.com/./photos/uncategorized/2007/06/21/bluray_player_dmpbd10_2.jpg alt=Photo</strong></p><p> </p><p>Two of the short list of Blu-ray players on the market received a firmware update this week.</p><p><strong></strong> </p><p></p><p><span>Samsung upgraded their BD-P1000 by releasing the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.samsung.com/support/productsupport/download/Model_Select.aspx?type=DVD+Player&typecode=3&subty pe=BD+Player&cmssubtypecode=310&model=BD-P1000&filetype=FM&language=">firmware update v1.2</a>. No release notes are available but we can suspect that this firmware addresses some bug and performance issues. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>Panasonic DMP-BD10a has also been upgraded this week with the released of <a target="_blank" href="http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/bd/download/bd10/bd10.html">firmware v2.2</a>. The update should improve the playability and stability of the Blu-ray player. DTS-HD playback has been enhanced as well. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>It's always great to see companies backing their products like this. People are less afraid of buying a product if they now it will be upgraded in the future. To bad they don't offer a reimbursement program for future price cuts thoughâ€¦ </span></p>

IrritateGuy

June 23rd, 2007, 09:51

<div>My local grocery store, the one which was forced to put HD-DVD players on a faluable end cap display, is now blowing out those players. The manager (the husband of a co-worker & friend) told me that they were sent 20 players and they sold two to customer, 5 to employees at a discount, and all the rest just sat there for 9 months. They are now "blowing them out" for $350. They are the HD-A1 model from October of last year.</div><div> </div><div>II would have never thought I'd see several HD-DVD players on a "specials" table along with old printer cartridges, photo frames, and cheap digital cameras.</div>

Huey

June 23rd, 2007, 10:23

<div>Tee, Thanks for the info. One update though, Panasonic pulled the 2.2 firmware, and is only making the 2.1 available for now. There have been some reports of frozen players with 2.2, although it worked for me. When I installed 2.1, it took all of 4 minutes to do the upgrade, 2.2 took probably about 20 minutes, which made me very nervous that I had turned my player in dead black box. All is well though, and this a fantastic player.</div><div> </div><div>On a side note, Jomari, did you get your player yet. I was able to go back and get the 12% yesterday, didn't try the $100 though. Figured I had one shot, and $72 bucks is better than nothing.</div><div>Rob</div>

Tee

June 23rd, 2007, 11:24

<div></div><div></div><div>I found this article interesting, had to post it.</div><div> </div><div><strong>One Year Anniversary Day 4: Best Player<br></strong>Posted June 21, 2007 by Josh</div><div><br><img width="100" src="http://www.blu-ray.com/images/news/ps3.gif" height="75" alt="PlayStation 3" border="0"> </div><div> </div><div><strong>Playstaion 3</strong><br><br>Almost unanimously voted for by both forum and staff members, Sony's PlayStation 3 (PS3) became <i>the</i> Blu-ray player to own soon after its release last November. Since then, the popular game machine has received numerous updates, all accessible through the machine's built-in Internet ports, to provide increased stability and features. Most recently, Sony added DVD upconversion to the list of features, and overnight the PS3 became one of the top DVD players on the market as well.<br><br>Like most players, there were some initial issues, but the flexible nature of the PS3 hardware meant quick fixes for Blu-ray enthusiasts. BD-Java updates were also distributed quickly, usually before the title utilizing those new features ever hit store shelves. The inclusion of Dolby TrueHD and upgrade to 24p video output means that the console is equally applicable to both the casual movie watcher and dedicated home theater enthusiast.<br><br>The strength of the player comes from its awesome processing power. This means that upcoming advances like DTS Master Audio and BD-Java Picture-in-Picture (PIP) are not totally out of the question (though no promises to their addition have been made). Still, the future looks very bright for the PS3 as a Blu-ray player. With an expected price drop for the holiday season, this will not only be the best Blu-ray player available, but also remain one of the cheapest.<br><br><strong>Runner-Up</strong>: Panasonic DMP-BD10<br><br>Coming in a distant second was the Panasonic DMP-BD10. Lovingly referred to as â€œThe Rockâ€ by its owners, this player has been just that â€“ rock solid. Recent updates include support for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD, making this a very capable player. Panasonic recently released an updated version, the DMP-BD10a, which is identical to the BD10, a testament to the success of the original design. Originally priced above $1000, the new lower $599 price is much more accessible to those looking for a great stand-alone player.<br></div><br><br>Message Edited by Tee on <span class="date_text">06-23-2007</span> <span class="time_text">11:25 AM</span>

IrritateGuy

June 24th, 2007, 17:42

<div></div><div></div><div>It appears the reviewers and critics are generally giving BluRay higher marks on Video AND Audio performance. BluRay always had higher ratings for audio performance (probably due to the regular use of LPCM), but now they are winnind the video quality battle.</div><div> </div><div>This is a summary of 5 reviewer sites.</div><div> </div><div><p><font face="Courier New" size="2">HD DVD<span> </span>PQ<span> </span>SQ<span> </span>TOTAL<span> </span>Blu-ray<span> </span>PQ<span> </span>SQ<span> </span>TOTAL </font></p><p><font face="Courier New" size="2">HighDef<span> </span>3.96<span> </span>3.64<span> </span>3.80<span> </span>HighDef<span> </span>3.99<span> </span>3.83<span> </span>3.91 </font></p><p><font face="Courier New" size="2">HTSpot<span> </span>3.99<span> </span>3.86<span> </span>3.93<span> </span>HTSpot<span> </span>4.02<span> </span>4.25<span> </span>4.14 </font></p><p><font face="Courier New" size="2">DVDTalk<span> </span>3.66<span> </span>3.51<span> </span>3.58<span> </span>DVDTalk <span> </span>3.64<span> </span>3.68<span> </span>3.66 </font></p><p><font face="Courier New" size="2">HTForum<span> </span>4.04<span> </span>3.80<span> </span>3.92<span> </span>HTForum<span> </span>4.28<span> </span>4.10<span> </span>4.19 </font></p><p><font face="Courier New" size="2"><u>UpDisc<span> </span>4.03<span> </span>3.83<span> </span>3.93<span> </span>UpDisc<span> </span>4.05<span> </span>4.14<span> </span>4.10</u> </font></p><strong><span>Totals</span><span><span> </span></span><span>3.90</span><span> <span> </span></span><span>3.69</span><span><span> </span></span><span>3.79</span><span><span> </span></span><span>Totals</span><span><span> </span></span><span>3.93</span><span><span> </span></span><span>3.95</span><span><span> </span></span><span>3.94</span></strong></div><br><br>Message Edited by IrritateGuy on <span class="date_text">06-24-2007</span> <span class="time_text">04:42 PM</span>

jstwong

June 25th, 2007, 00:59

The ability of the PS3 to receive updates via the internet [and my belief it will be supported that way for a long time] was a major factor of me buying it as a Blu-ray player.  I realize the Blu-ray format is still maturing, so I am hoping that the "headroom" of the PS3's processor will allow it to grow with the format.  I really think this is one of the stongest points of having a PS3 as a Blu-ray player right now.<br><br>IG, that is definitely an intersting story about your friend's store "blowing out" the original Toshiba HD-DVD players.  Hehehe...  That would seem like an odd sight to see a clearance table with older stuff / mostly junk and then boxes of HD-DVD players!  :)<br><div></div>

Tee

June 25th, 2007, 07:07

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>jstwong wrote:<br>The ability of the PS3 to receive updates via the internet [and my belief it will be supported that way for a long time] was a major factor of me buying it as a Blu-ray player. I realize the Blu-ray format is still maturing, so I am hoping that the "headroom" of the PS3's processor will allow it to grow with the format. I really think this is one of the stongest points of having a PS3 as a Blu-ray player right now.<br><br><div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Exactly!</div><div> </div><div>Same reason here why i choose the PS3 as a Blu-ray player, and with all the other muti-media functions that the PS3 can do tuned out to be a bonus. The cell processor is something special, just think what the future holds for such a power house. To me it is truly a major upgrade to my HT. <br></div><div></div>

Huey

June 25th, 2007, 09:00

<div>The one thing I will complain about Bluray, is the inconsistency of Lossless audio on the disks. I watched Flags of our Fathers last night, and the only audio options were English and French DD 5.1. I believe that every hd-dvd that I've watched had at least Dolby TrueHD, but I could be wrong about that. If they would at least offer 5.1 pcm, I would be happy with that.</div><div>Rob</div>

IrritateGuy

June 25th, 2007, 09:03

<div>The vast majority of BluRay discs have LPCM, except Warner Brothers titles where they skimp on the format and put regular old DD or DTS instead. The dedicated BluRay forums are filled with people complaining about WB's "screwing" them on both Audio and Video (WB also uses the same video stream as their HD-DVD releases, and thus are not as good as BD could be since HD-DVD has to be more compressed to fit into the smaller disc size).</div>

IrritateGuy

June 25th, 2007, 09:17

<div></div><div>Huey - Here's a link to the BluRay.com forum post where a guy has provided the video data rate, size, and audio format & data rate for dozens of BluRay titles.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=3338">http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=3338</a></div><div> </div><div>You'll find all of the Warner Brothers titles have slower data rates, smaller video file size, lower resolution audio, and so on. They also all use VC-1 instead of AVC for the video encoding. This matches what they are doing on HD-DVD and fits within the format constraints of HD-DVD. To repeat those constraints...</div><div> </div><div>Capacity: HD-DVD ~ 15GB/30GB BD ~ 25GB/50GB</div><div>Data Rate:: HD-DVD ~ 37Mbps BD ~ 54Mbps (peak throughput)</div><div> </div><div>I understand why WB is forced to do what they are doing - it is extremely expensive and time consuming to author one HD disc title, much less two. If they chose to make to completely different versions of the same title from the ground up, it would cost them a small fortune and occupy what little resources they have, thus reducing the release scheduel considerably. They already have to spend extra time re-authoring for BD since it uses a different file hierarchy and user interface layer. So, companies like WB who support both formats equally are spending more for every title they release versus those companies who have chosen to be exclusive to one format or the other.</div><div> </div><div>The pain for people who own BluRay players is they know they are getting what is often considered an inferior product.</div><div> </div><br><br>Message Edited by IrritateGuy on <span class="date_text">06-25-2007</span> <span class="time_text">08:20 AM</span>

Huey

June 25th, 2007, 13:20

<div>Thanks for link IG! I found Bluray.com this weekend, alot of decent information there, although I didn't delve into the bit information thread. </div><div>Rob</div>

saldog78

June 25th, 2007, 14:39

Has Pixar made any announcements about releasing titles on BluRay? I'd love to see The Incredibles in 1080p...<br><div></div>

Huey

June 25th, 2007, 14:41

<div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>saldog78 wrote:<br>Has Pixar made any announcements about releasing titles on BluRay? I'd love to see The Incredibles in 1080p...<br><div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><br><div></div></div>Cars has been announced, but delayed for some reason and Meet the Robinsons is supposed to be out in October I believe. </div><div>Rob</div>

yromj

June 25th, 2007, 15:02

<div>Anybody notice the audio specs for <em>The Descent </em>and <em>Crash</em>? They're both in 7.1. WOO-HOO!</div><div> </div><div>John- Who's happy to see anything in 7.1</div>

IrritateGuy

June 25th, 2007, 15:18

<div>Titles have been delayed in order to incorporate the BD+ ROM-Mark which gives the studio a fantastically stronger any-piracy capability.</div>

Huey

June 25th, 2007, 16:00

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>yromj wrote:<br><div>Anybody notice the audio specs for <em>The Descent </em>and <em>Crash</em>? They're both in 7.1. WOO-HOO!</div><div> </div><div>John- Who's happy to see anything in 7.1</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Really? I own a movie that is 7.1? Crash came with the Panny, but I haven't gotten around to seeing it. I would have hoped the Pirates 2 movie would have been 7.1, but it's a start. </div><div>Rob<br></div><div></div>

Huey

June 26th, 2007, 16:27

<div>FYI, there is a thread over at AVS that talks about Sony giving away 5 free movies with players and ps3's purchased after 07/01/07. At this point, it is just a rumor, as no one has posted a link to the deal that works, but they do have a list of the movies you can choose from. I'm not sure if I'll try to take advantage of this deal, I would be in the 30 day window to return and repurchase. Those sitting on the fence, might want to wait a few days longer. <a target="_blank" href="http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=866782">LINK</a></div><div>Rob</div>

jstwong

June 28th, 2007, 20:54

I guess the rumor is true.  Someone has posted the rebate / mail in form in the DVD Section of this forum.<br><div></div>

IrritateGuy

June 29th, 2007, 00:17

<div>New titles from Fox coming?</div><div> </div><div>Most assume that releases so far have been slowed in order to wait for the BD+ mark to better protect the content.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=283">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=283</a></div>

IrritateGuy

June 29th, 2007, 10:01

<div>A Denon BluRay player on the way???</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=286">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=286</a></div><div> </div><div> </div><div>That would be VERY interesting.</div>

Tee

June 29th, 2007, 10:10

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div>A Denon BluRay player on the way???</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=286">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=286</a></div><div> </div><div> </div><div>That would be VERY interesting.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>interesting indeed!</div><div> </div><div>Should Denon go Blu-ray (i think they will) they will make a lot of noise in the HT community.<br></div><div></div>

IrritateGuy

June 29th, 2007, 10:13

<div>Here's the current list of hardware companies who have licensed BD+ (content protection scheme):</div><div> </div><div>ArcSoft, Inc.<br>Broadcom Corporation<br>Cyberlink<br>D&M Holdings, Inc.<br>ESS Technology, Inc.<br>Hitachi, Ltd.<br>Intervideo<br>LG Electronics, Inc.<br>MediaTek Inc.<br>MEI<br>NEC Electronics Corporation<br>Nero AG<br>Philips<br>Pioneer<br>Samsung<br>Sharp Corporation<br>Sigma Designs<br>Sonic Solutions<br>Sony<br>STMicroelectronics</div><div> </div>

Tee

June 29th, 2007, 10:20

<div>Strange......where is Panasonic and Mitsubishi on the list?</div>

IrritateGuy

June 29th, 2007, 10:37

<div>They only started licensing this stuff a few weeks ago. I am sure they will do it soon, or else they won't be able to play most of the hollywood titles which will definitely use the BD+ tech to protect the content.</div><div> </div><div>I am more interested in the companies appearing on the list of licensees who we haven't seen officially backing BD in the past.</div>

Tee

June 29th, 2007, 11:16

<div>Understood.</div><div> </div><div>Yeah, i'm waiting to see myself what they do and they are waiting to see what happens.</div><div> </div><div>So we all just waiting.</div>

Tee

June 29th, 2007, 14:19

<div></div><div>Great 4th Of July sale on Blu-ray movies at Frys Electronics!</div><div> </div><div>For $13.99 you can choose these three movies</div><div> </div><div><img width="100" src="http://image.ak.outpost.com/art/product/box_shots/5037795.box.GIF" height="119" alt="Warner Home Video-DVD" border="0"> <img width="100" src="http://image.ak.outpost.com/art/product/box_shots/4927761.box.GIF" height="119" alt="Warner Home Video-BD" border="0"> <img width="100" src="http://image.ak.outpost.com/art/product/box_shots/5037845.box.GIF" height="119" alt="Warner Home Video-DVD" border="0"></div><div> </div><div>AND....</div><div> </div><div>For 2 for $25 you can get...</div><div> </div><div>-Curse Of The Golden Flower</div><div>-Black Hawk Down</div><div>-House Of Flying Daggers</div><div>-Hellboy</div><div>-Layer Cake</div><div>-Kung Fu Hustle</div><div>-Resident Evil: Apocalspe</div><div>Tears Of The Sun</div><div>-Identity</div><div>-Stealth</div><div>-Into The Blue</div><div>-XXX</div><div>-Big Fish</div><div>-Memento</div><div>-Donnie Brasco</div><div>-Closer</div><div>-Revenge</div><div>-Hitch</div><div>-Seven Years In Tibet</div><div>-Creul Intentions</div><div> </div><div>The sale starts today and ends on July 3rd. Just thought i would pass it on.;)</div>

yromj

June 29th, 2007, 18:11

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>Tee wrote:<br><div>Strange......where is Panasonic and Mitsubishi on the list?</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Who is "MEI" on the list? I thought it was probably Matsu****a (sp?) the parent company of Panasonic.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div>

Huey

June 30th, 2007, 08:01

<div>For those interested, the website is now up for the 5 free movies with a purchase of a Bluray player.</div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.BluraySavings.com">BluraySaving.com</a></div>

Barney

June 30th, 2007, 17:38

<DIV>Have a question......was at Game Stop today with my son & got into a conversation....the salesman stated they aren't selling too many PS3's.but alot of XBOX's...........I mentioned I was leaning on Blu-ray...........he said right now Blu-ray only has about 200 movies....anyone know what the total is for movies avalible (I understand that the planned number was to be alot higher now..........just wondering) ?.....still going to wait this out awhile. He also told me his brother is a Manager of several Pawn Shops & manufactures have to report to them any price changes...........& said the Sony Blu-ray player will be $400 or less before Christmas...........</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Barney</DIV>

IrritateGuy

June 30th, 2007, 22:16

<div>Barney - According to the eProduct wars monitoring site, there are over 350 BluRay titles at Amazon and just over 300 HD-DVD titles.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/">http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/</a></div><div> </div><div> </div>

IrritateGuy

July 1st, 2007, 11:54

<div>Asustek is releasing a BD-ROM drive for PCs which supports CD-R, DVD+/-R, and BD playback.</div><div> </div><div>The target price is around $300 US.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.digitimes.com/systems/a20070628PD220.html">http://www.digitimes.com/systems/a20070628PD220.html</a></div><div> </div><div>This is pretty neat!!!</div>

Barney

July 1st, 2007, 18:11

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
IrritateGuy wrote:<BR>
<DIV>Barney - According to the eProduct wars monitoring site, there are over 350 BluRay titles at Amazon and just over 300 HD-DVD titles.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><A href="http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/" target=_blank>http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/</A></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV>
<DIV>Thanks COF.....just from what I'm seeing, only Warner & Universal is doing HD-DVD's..............I'll wait this one out.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Barney</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>
<DIV></DIV></DIV>

IrritateGuy

July 3rd, 2007, 11:54

<div>The first 3rd Generation BluRay player is going to be shown at the IFA trade show.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=293">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=293</a></div><div> </div><div>I have been preaching about waiting for Gen 3, so I guess this is the first of that generation.</div><div> </div>

Jomari

July 3rd, 2007, 12:20

<DIV>hmm. why is 'the patriot' numba 2 tho? dont see the logic... :(</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>also was hoping on HD DVD's end that the matrix would AT LEAST hit 3rd place...</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>wierd how this market is going.</DIV>

IrritateGuy

July 3rd, 2007, 13:15

<div>Latest title sales numbers:</div><div> </div><div>http://www.soundenvironments.org/images/ig/BD_HDDVD_Sales_June24_2007.jpg</div>

IrritateGuy

July 3rd, 2007, 15:36

<div>Barney - I stand corrected on the BluRay and HD-DVD title count.</div><div> </div><div>According to the much more reliable industry magazine, "Home Media Magazine," the actual title count is:</div><div> </div><div>BluRay = 259 available + 42 announced</div><div>HD-DVD = 224 available + 62 announced</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom070107/index.php">http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom070107/index.php</a></div><div> </div><div>However, there are high expectations that both Fox and Disney are going to make massive release announcements now that BD+ has been released. According to many reliable sources, they are doing final testing to be assured the BD+ technology does indeed add significant pirate protection before they start making announcements about new release schedules.</div><div> </div><div> </div>

IrritateGuy

July 3rd, 2007, 15:48

http://www.soundenvironments.org/images/ig/BD_Sales_Weekly_June24_2007.jpg<div> </div><div>Only one HD-DVD only HD title on the weekly sales charts for the week of June 24th.</div>

hifichip76

July 3rd, 2007, 15:48

<div>I finally broke down and joined the BluRay side. I bought the Sony player a couple of weeks ago. So, I hope BD wins.</div>

Tee

July 3rd, 2007, 15:58

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>hifichip76 wrote:<br><div>I finally broke down and joined the BluRay side. I bought the Sony player a couple of weeks ago. So, I hope BD wins.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote>What do yout hink of the Sony players performance?<br><div></div></div>

hifichip76

July 3rd, 2007, 16:08

<div>I'm very pleased so far. It functions very well. It froze once when I was watching Superman 2. It was stuck for a while. But I went back over the same spot and it was perfect. Every other disc I've watched (10 or 12 so far) has been fine. I'll post a review when I have some more experience.</div>

Barney

July 3rd, 2007, 20:57

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
hifichip76 wrote:<BR>
<DIV>I'm very pleased so far. It functions very well. It froze once when I was watching Superman 2. It was stuck for a while. But I went back over the same spot and it was perfect. Every other disc I've watched (10 or 12 so far) has been fine. I'll post a review when I have some more experience.</DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV>
<DIV>Thanks...........;)</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>
<DIV></DIV></DIV>

IrritateGuy

July 4th, 2007, 21:33

<div>Panasonic has announced 4x BD-R blank discs in both single layer (25GB) and dual layer (50GB) varieties.</div><div> </div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20070704PR202.html">http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20070704PR202.html</a></div>

Huey

July 5th, 2007, 09:25

<div>Anyone hear anything on THX certified Bluray or HD-DVD movies. I know for gear the general consensus that it just adds another cost to the gear, but I've never seen a bad picture or sound with a THX movie. There seems to be quite a bit of diversity in the movies being released as there is with DVD's.</div><div>Rob</div>

IrritateGuy

July 5th, 2007, 09:28

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>Huey wrote:<br><div>Anyone hear anything on THX certified Bluray or HD-DVD movies. I know for gear the general consensus that it just adds another cost to the gear, but I've never seen a bad picture or sound with a THX movie. There seems to be quite a bit of diversity in the movies being released as there is with DVD's.</div><div>Rob</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><br><div>THX movies aren't "certified" by THX, they are produced by THX mixer/engineers for release on Disc. I don't think THX has finished installing the gear to master titles for HD-DVD and BD, yet.</div><div> </div><div>Today nearly all HD titles are mastered by engineers at the studio.</div></div>

MDRiggs

July 5th, 2007, 11:44

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
IrritateGuy wrote:<BR>
<DIV></DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV>THX movies aren't "certified" by THX, they are produced by THX mixer/engineers for release on Disc. I don't think THX has finished installing the gear to master titles for HD-DVD and BD, yet.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Today nearly all HD titles are mastered by engineers at the studio.<BR>
<HR>
</DIV></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>I don't think there are dedicated THX mixer/engineers. As I understand the process, it involves inclusion of certain test signals through the mastering process that THX can use at the end to determine that the film has been transferred faithfully. At least, that's the way it was explained when the program was initiated, and that would make more sense given the way THX is structured and staffed.</DIV></DIV>

Tee

July 5th, 2007, 14:03

<div></div><div><strong>Can BD+ Stop the Blu-ray Piracy?</strong></div><div><strong></strong> </div><div><p>http://blu-ray.typepad.com/./photos/uncategorized/2007/07/04/bluray_bd_plus.gif alt=Photo</p><p><font face="Trebuchet MS" size="2"></font> </p><p><font face="Trebuchet MS" size="2">BD+ Technologies, a joint venture of Panasonic, Sony and Twentieth Century Fox, announced the completion of its licensing program. </font></p><p><font face="Trebuchet MS" size="2"></font> </p><p></p><p><span>BD+ is a Virtual Machine-based content protection technology created exclusively for the Blu-ray Disc format. The technology features have already been implemented into all Blu-ray Disc players in the marketplace, however updated technical specifications are now available. The main Blu-ray copy-protection system is provided by AACS but an additional layer is added with BD+. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><a target="_blank"></a><div><p><span>Mike Dunn, President Worldwide, Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment said, "Fox has vigorously fought against piracy for years and the adoption of BD+ as part of the Blu-ray Disc specification, and an enhancement over and above AACS, was a key factor in our decision to publish on the format". He added "This added layer of content protection gives Blu-ray yet another distinct competitive advantage." </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>President of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, David Bishop thinks that BD+ serves as an additional safeguard to protect next generation HD content from piracy. </span></p><p><span></span> </p><p><span>BD+ does not give any value to the end-user, but could eventually attract more studios to Blu-ray. Having a more secure ways to distribute the content is what every studio is looking for. But can BD+ really survive to hackers? </span></p><p><span>BD+ also has an <a target="_blank" href="http://www.bdplusllc.com/">official website</a>.</span></p></div></div>

Tee

July 5th, 2007, 22:53

<div></div><div><strong><font size="4" color="#ff0000">Blu-ray Price Drops Announced - PS3 to Follow?<br></font></strong>Sony Corp. announced this week that it has finally unlocked some key manufacturing techniques and processes that will allow it to manufacture Blu-ray Disc players less expensively. The significant drop in pricing is expected to be ab out $100 (retail) almost across the board. This got everyone talking about whether a price drop of $100 would be on its way for the Playstation3 as well. It would appear that this is to be the case, since lower costs of manufacturing on an expensive component would necessarily yield an opportunity to drop the price of this gaming system and make it more palatable for new users.<br><br>"If the cost of Blu-ray is coming down, you can drop the price of anything with Blu-ray in it," said Arvind Bhatia, an analyst with Sterne Agee & Leach Inc.<br><br>Sony already announced its first price reduction - focusing first on its Blu-ray Disc players. According to an article at Marketwatch, on Monday a Sony representative said it will begin selling a new version of its Blu-ray video disc player later this week for $500, which is a $100 price drop from it's expected retail pricing.<br><br>If the price drop hits Sony's PS3 then the system may indeed start to show some serious gains against Microsoft's Xbox 360... at least once the software begins to become more prevalent - a serious drawback at present for the Japanese gaming system. So far over 1.3 million PS3s have been sold compared to 5.4 million Xbox 360 consoles. Nintendo's Wii has already sold over twice as many consoles as the PS3. A $100 price break and the inclusion of a BD drive may push some users over the edge who may have been holding back.</div><div><br> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.audioholics.com/news/industry-news/blu-ray-price-drops-ps3.html">http://www.audioholics.com/news/industry-news/blu-ray-price-drops-ps3.html</a></div><br><br>Message Edited by Tee on <span class="date_text">07-05-2007</span> <span class="time_text">10:55 PM</span>

Tee

July 5th, 2007, 23:04

<div></div><div><p align="left"><strong>Sharp Blu-Ray player out Q4</strong><br><br>Features: 1080p24 output, HDMI 1.3, True HD. Component out, optical/coaxial digital audio and multichannel analog outs.</p><p align="left"> </p><p align="left">http://www.areadvd.de/images/2007/Sharp_BD-HP20S.jpg border=0 width=500 height=119</p><p align="left"> </p><p align="left"><a href="http://www.areadvd.de/news/2007/200707/04072007001_Sharp_BD-HP20S.shtml" target="_blank">http://www.areadvd.de/news/2007/200707/04072007001_Sharp_BD-HP20S.shtml</a><br></p></div>

IrritateGuy

July 6th, 2007, 08:52

<div>People have been anticipating a price drop on the PS3 for months, but most predicted it would happen in late October for the Christmas rush.</div><div> </div><div>Sony is finally entering the "commodity" phase of nearly all of the bits and peices which make up the gaming console, including the BluRay components (which were opened wide to all licensees early this week for the first time).</div><div> </div><div>So, insider sites are now spreading word of evidence that the price will by $100 to $499 in the next week or two - which is a quarter earlier than anyone expected.</div><div> </div><div>This is a good thing for Sony and the BluRay format. It is also a VERY good thing for all the game developers who have taken the risk of developing PS3 specific games.</div><div> </div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=16721">http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=16721</a></div><div> </div><div> </div>

drrosen2l

July 6th, 2007, 11:27

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>Jomari wrote:<br><div>hmm. why is 'the patriot' numba 2 tho? dont see the logic... :(</div><div> </div><div>also was hoping on HD DVD's end that the matrix would AT LEAST hit 3rd place...</div><div> </div><div>wierd how this market is going.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>The Patriot was just released (7/3/07) and its Blu-Ray release coincided with the Fourth of July Holiday.</div><div> </div><div>-Paul<br></div><div></div>

Tee

July 17th, 2007, 08:59

<div></div><div><strong>New Line: First BD Title is Hairspray</strong><br>Posted July 16, 2007 by Josh<br><br>http://www.blu-ray.com/images/news/movies.gif alt=Blu-ray Movies border=0 width=100 height=75</div><div> </div><div>New Line has reportedly told indie retailers that their soon to be released remake of the classic film 'Hairspray' will be their first high definition release. Obviously, its too early to talk about specs, but it is good to see that the studio who distributes many fan favorite movies (including 'Lord of the Rings') will get into the HD arena soon.<br></div><div> </div><div>Bring on LOTR baby!;)</div><div> </div><div>Once again it's about the content, if you want LOTR in HD you have to go Blu-ray!</div>

Tee

July 17th, 2007, 09:08

<div></div><div>Getting the word out for Blu-ray.</div><div> </div><div><strong>Disney's Magical Blu-ray Tour</strong><br>Posted July 17, 2007 by Josh<br><br>http://www.blu-ray.com/images/news/disney.gif alt=Walt Disney Pictures border=0 width=100 height=75</div><div> </div><div>Walt Disney Home Entertainment and Panasonic have teamed up to bring "Disney's Magical Blu-ray Tour" to 18 malls across the country. The event will be set up for three-day runs and feature high definition displays where mall patrons can watch the upcoming Blu-ray releases of 'Cars' and 'Meet the Robinsons', as well as play games from both 'Pirates of the Caribbean' releases. Disney hopes this tour will bring the advantages of Blu-ray to the eyes of the general public.<br><br>Tour dates are as follows:<br><br>-Westfield Topanga, Canoga Park, Calif.<br>Aug. 17-19<br><br>-South Coast Plaza, Costa Mesa, Calif.<br>Aug. 24-26<br><br>-Westfield North County, Escondido, Calif.<br>Aug. 31-Sept. 2<br><br>-Westfield San Francisco, San Francisco<br>Sept. 7-9<br><br>-Washington Square, Portland, Ore.<br>Sept. 14-16<br><br>-Westfield South Center, Seattle<br>Sept. 21- 23<br><br>-Mall of America, Bloomington, Minn.<br>Sept. 28-30<br><br>-Orland Square, Orland Park, Ill.<br>Oct. 5-7<br><br>-Westfield West County, St. Louis<br>Oct. 12-14<br><br>-Tysons Corner Center, McLean, Va.<br>Oct. 19-21<br><br>-Roosevelt Field, Garden City, N.Y.<br>Oct. 26-28<br><br>-Burlington Mall, Burlington, Mass.<br>Nov. 9-11<br><br>-King of Prussia, King of Prussia, Pa.<br>Nov. 16-18<br><br>-Circle Centre, Indianapolis<br>Nov. 23-25<br><br>-Lenox Square, Atlanta<br>Nov. 30-Dec. 2<br><br>-The Galleria, Houston<br>Dec. 7-9<br><br>-Barton Creek Square, Austin<br>Dec. 14-16<br><br>-Chandler Fashion Center, Chandler, Ariz.<br>Dec. 21-23<br><br>Source: <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/2007-07-16-disney-blu-ray_N.htm" target="parent">USA Today</a> | <a href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=322" target="_blank">Permalink</a><br></div>

saldog78

July 18th, 2007, 17:36

Funny chart, courtesy of TheOnion:<br><br><a target="_blank" href="http://www.theonion.com/content/statshot/why_are_we_switching_to_blu">Why Are We Switching to Blu-Ray?</a><br><br><br><div></div>

tmankiller72

July 18th, 2007, 23:25

<div>That's what I'm waiting for, LOTR in BD!! I've emailed New Line several times and have not gotten a direct answer ...but this looks good.</div>

tmankiller72

July 18th, 2007, 23:29

<div>you are correct , now developers can utilize that BD gaming platform and come up with some outstanding hi def games , this is a major advantage that the PS3 has against the XboX 360 in terms of total content availability thats possible with being a BD format .</div>

IrritateGuy

July 20th, 2007, 08:31

<div>The Laser used in Blu-Ray drives is getting closer to being a commodity part.</div><div> </div><div>LG has announced that the price of the laser in their PC BD recorders has dropped in price and increased in availability enough to lower the retail price of their drives by 100 euros.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=41108">http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=41108</a></div><div> </div><div>This will affect everyone making BD players and recorders.</div>

Kbob

July 25th, 2007, 09:20

Blu-Ray just took another step in winning the war. Blockbuster is renting Blu-ray discs in select stores. I ran to mine and they have one copy each of about 50 movies. I joined Blockbuster Online for their Blu-Ray rentals. I currently have 10 BR on my list that I'm waiting for someone to return so I can see them. My store in Saginaw MI has six of the titles sitting on their shelf.<br><br>I asked a clerk and he said that they don't have any HD DVDs. If blockbuster is their shelf space for BR, it has to be the winning format.<br><div></div>

Tee

July 25th, 2007, 09:41

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>Kbob wrote:<br>Blu-Ray just took another step in winning the war. Blockbuster is renting Blu-ray discs in select stores. I ran to mine and they have one copy each of about 50 movies. I joined Blockbuster Online for their Blu-Ray rentals. I currently have 10 BR on my list that I'm waiting for someone to return so I can see them. My store in Saginaw MI has six of the titles sitting on their shelf.<br><br>I asked a clerk and he said that they don't have any HD DVDs. If blockbuster is their shelf space for BR, it has to be the winning format.<br><div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><p>Click on the linky below for the Blocbuster press release.</p><p><a target="_blank" href="http://forums.soundandvisionmag.com/audiovideo/board/message?board.id=43&thread.id=20698">http://forums.soundandvisionmag.com/audiovideo/board/message?board.id=43&thread.id=20698</a><br></p><div></div>

rockemsockem

July 25th, 2007, 11:31

<div><div><blockquote><div>If I'm at work that week, I will make it over to Circle Centre to see the demo on Nov. 23-25.</div></blockquote></div></div><div> </div><div> </div>

IrritateGuy

July 25th, 2007, 19:40

<div></div><div>Target going BluRay exclusive on players...</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=349">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=349</a></div><div> </div><div>Target to Sell Blu-ray Players Exclusively<br>Posted July 25, 2007 by Josh<br><br><img border="0" width="100" height="75" alt="Sony BDP-S1" src="http://www.blu-ray.com/images/news/bdp-s1.gif"></div><div>Target will begin selling the Sony BDP-S300 in its stores starting this October, marking the first time the second-largest retailer will offer a stand-alone high definition movie player. The player will be featured along with movies from Sony Pictures and Disney on aisle endcaps. Sony will be paying for the endcaps, but Target's decision to not stock HD DVD players in store is solely their own. Target will continue to sell discs for both formats.<br></div>

IrritateGuy

July 25th, 2007, 19:44

<div>Many of Stanley Kubrick's are going to be released on BD on October 23rd!</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=348">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=348</a></div><div> </div><div>Note they are using a full BD-50 disc and TrueHD soundtrack.</div>

IrritateGuy

July 27th, 2007, 09:41

<div>This is an interesting chart (from the news.com web site):</div><div> </div><div>http://i.n.com.com/i/ne/p/2007/blueraydvdchart_540x560.jpg</div>

IrritateGuy

July 27th, 2007, 17:29

<div>Paramount, who supports both HD-DVD and BluRay, has stopped mastering one version of their movies in HD. Instead, they are making two versions of many of their new releases, one for HD-DVD and another for BluRay which takes advantage of the extra capacity and capabilities of the BluRay format.</div><div> </div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=360">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=360</a></div><div> </div><div>On August 28th, Paramount will ship its first high definition title to include a lossless or uncompressed soundtrack - 'Blades of Glory'. This title will feature a PCM 5.1 soundtrack for the Blu-ray release, but will feature no equivalent on the HD DVD, presumably because of the smaller disc capacity. Two weeks later, Paramount will ship 'Face/Off' with extras features available in high definition, but only on the Blu-ray version, again due to space constraints.<br><br>This is a drastic change from the Paramount we once knew. For the past year, Blu-ray owners have cringed as they saw release after release issued with low bit rate MPEG-2 video encodes and Dolby Digital soundtracks, while the HD DVD versions received VC-1 encodes and higher bit rate Dolby Digital Plus audio. It was disappointing to say the least.<br><br>The shift began with 'Flags of Our Fathers', which was released with a high bit rate AVC encode for the Blu-ray release. The audio was still lacking, but it was clear they were finally recognizing the Blu-ray consumer as a valuable asset. Now, with the addition of PCM audio, Paramount completes the high definition package and Blu-ray owners can now enjoy their favorite Paramount movies the way they were meant to be seen.<br></div><div> </div>

MDRiggs

July 30th, 2007, 14:08

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
IrritateGuy wrote:<BR>
<DIV>On August 28th, Paramount will ship its first high definition title to include a lossless or uncompressed soundtrack - 'Blades of Glory'. This title will feature a PCM 5.1 soundtrack for the Blu-ray release, but will feature no equivalent on the HD DVD, presumably because of the smaller disc capacity.
<HR>
</DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>Hard to believe they couldn't fit a Dolby TrueHD soundtrack if they wanted to.</DIV></DIV>

Tee

August 4th, 2007, 11:13

<div></div><div></div><div><strong>Spider-Man Swings onto Blu-ray<br></strong>Posted August 3, 2007 by Josh<br><br><img border="0" width="100" height="75" alt="Sony Pictures" src="http://www.blu-ray.com/images/news/sony.jpg"></div><div> </div><div>Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has announced that they are releasing 'Spider-Man 3' and the 'Spider-Man High Definition Trilogy' for Blu-ray on October 30th. Very little is known about the specs of the releases, but we do know that 'Spider-Man 3' will be a two disc set packed with special features. Insider sources have also revealed that 'Spider-Man 2' will make use of seamless branching to present the two versions of the film.<br><br>The Spider-Man movies were first revealed during promo intros on Sony Blu-ray discs. He was seen in Blu-ray flyers, and as Sony's top movie franchise (they even used the Spider-Man font on the PS3) it has become a highly anticipated release. Rumors continued to swirl as to when the famous masked hero would make his HD debut, when Best Buy featured a special Spider-Man teaser disc featuring trailers for all three films remastered in stunning high definition.<br><br>The wait is finally over. Spider-Man has arrived on Blu-ray, and it is sure to be one of the top selling movies this holiday season.</div><div> </div><div><strong></strong> </div><div><strong></strong> </div><div><strong>Spider-Man 3 Specs</strong><br>Posted August 3, 2007 by Josh<br><br><img border="0" width="100" alt="Sony Pictures" height="75" src="http://www.blu-ray.com/images/news/sony.jpg"></div><div> </div><div>Scott Hettrick (HiHD) has revealed the specs for the upcoming two-disc Blu-ray release of 'Spider-Man 3', as well as some additional info about the upcoming 'Spider-Man High Definition Trilogy'. 'Spider-Man 3' will feature all the extras from the 2-disc DVD release, and both 'Spider-Man' and 'Spider-Man 2' will be single disc releases, with the SM2 featuring both versions of the film via seamless branching. Both the 'Spider-Man 3' and the Spider-Man box set will be available October 30th.<br><br>Spider-Manâ„¢ 3 Two-Disc Special Edition DVD, Two-Disc Blu-rayâ„¢ High-Def<br><br>Disc One Special Features:<br>â€¢ Digitally Mastered Audio and Video<br>â€¢ Audio: English Dolby True HD 5.1, English PCM 5.1 (Uncompressed), French, Spanish, Portuguese, Thai 5.1 (Dolby Digital)<br>â€¢ Subtitles: English, English SDH, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Korean, Thai, Chinese Mandarin, Chinese Cantonese<br>â€¢ Bloopers<br>â€¢ Photo Galleries<br>â€¢ Snow Patrol Music Video<br>â€¢ Audio Commentary with Director Sam Raimi and Cast Members Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Thomas Haden Church, Topher Grace, and Bryce Dallas Howard<br>â€¢ Audio Commentary with Producers Laura Ziskin, Avi Arad and Grant Curtis, Editor Bob Murawski and Special Effects Supervisor Scott Stokdyk<br>â€¢ Closed Captioned<br>â€¢ Bonus Previews<br><br>Disc Two Special Features:<br><br>â€¢ Digitally Mastered Audio and Video<br>â€¢ Audio: English, Spanish 5.1 (Dolby Digital). English, Spanish (Dolby Surround)<br>â€¢ Subtitles: English, Spanish<br>â€¢ Featurette: Grains of Sand - Building Sandman<br>â€¢ Featurette: Re-Imagining the Goblin<br>â€¢ Featurette: Covered in Black â€“ Creating Venom<br>â€¢ Featurette: Hanging Onâ€¦Gwen Stacy and the Collapsing Floor<br>â€¢ Featurette: Fighting, Flying & Driving â€“ The Stunts<br>â€¢ Featurette: Tangled Web: The Love Triangles of Spider-Man 3<br>â€¢ Featurette: Wall Of Water<br>â€¢ Featurette: On Location Cleveland â€“ The Chase on Euclid Avenue<br>â€¢ Featurette: On Location New York â€“From Rooftops to Backstreets<br>â€¢ Featurette: The Science of Sound<br>â€¢ Featurette: Inside The Editing Room<br>â€¢ Theatrical TV Spots From Around the World<br>â€¢ Closed Captioned<br><br>Spider-Manâ„¢ 3 Blu-rayâ„¢ High-Def 2-Disc<br>BD Catalog # 15932<br>UPC Code: 0-43396-15932-7<br>Order Date: 9/27/07<br>SLP: $49.95<br><br>Spider-Manâ„¢ Blu-rayâ„¢ High-Def 3-Pack<br>BD Catalog # 22633<br>UPC Code: 0-43396-22633-3<br>Order Date: 9/27/07<br>SLP: $98.95<br></div><div> </div><div>http://www.blu-ray.com/images/movies/covers/546_front.jpg</div><div> </div><div> </div><div>Trilogy Pack</div><div><img width="300" src="http://www.hollywoodinhidef.com/admin/uploads/Spider3Big3Large.jpg"></div><div> </div><br><br>Message Edited by Tee on <span class="date_text">08-08-2007</span> <span class="time_text">08:02 AM</span>

Barney

August 4th, 2007, 20:13

<DIV>Is this the 1st Blu-ray disc with Dolby True HD audio (according to the specs---"Audio: English Dolby True HD 5.1, English PCM 5.1 (Uncompressed)"</DIV>
<DIV>If so, we need more............upgrades are in the future..............</DIV>

IrritateGuy

August 4th, 2007, 22:24

<div>How is TrueHD better than uncompressed PCM?</div><div> </div><div>I am confused.:(</div>

tmankiller72

August 6th, 2007, 23:22

IrritateGuy

August 11th, 2007, 15:53

<div>Looks like Sony stand alone players are starting to outsell all of the HD-DVD players:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.videobusiness.com/index.asp?layout=article&articleid=CA6467868">http://www.videobusiness.com/index.asp?layout=article&articleid=CA6467868</a></div><div> </div><div>_______________________</div><div> </div><blockquote><div><p><em>According to NPD Group, HD DVD set-tops dominated the market in the second quarter, with a 61% market share, compared to 36% for Blu-ray.</em></p><p><em>However, retailers are taking notice of a summer shift in the high-def market.</em></p><p><em>â€œWith all of the introductions of Blu-ray product, we have seen more sales in BD than in HD DVD, because there are so many options now out for consumers,â€ said John Abt, VP at Illinois bricks-and-mortar and national online dealer Abt Electronics.</em></p><p><em>Blu-ray sales might even be performing better, if not for currently limited supplies of some of the formatâ€™s relatively inexpensive offerings.</em></p><p><em>Ultimate, for instance, is still waiting on its first shipment of Panasonicâ€™s latest $599 second-generation model, which started streeting to retailers in June-July. San Antonioâ€™s Bjornâ€™s cannot meet customer demand of Sonyâ€™s $499 BDP-S300.</em></p><p><em>When Bjornâ€™s had adequate supply of Sonyâ€™s player in June, â€œwe were seeing a 50/50 split in unit sales,â€ president Bjorn Dybdahl said. â€œThat was primarily all three Toshiba players versus Sonyâ€™s $499 players. If the Blu-ray group wants to put a death knell on HD DVD, then they need to get it everywhere very quickly.â€</em></p><p><em>Sony and Panasonic executives say that are working to remedy the supply situation but insist they are happy with second-generation sales results.</em></p></div></blockquote>

yromj

August 11th, 2007, 21:38

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr></div><div><em></em> </div><div><em>...Sony and Panasonic executives say that are working to remedy the supply situation <strong>but</strong> insist they are happy with second-generation sales results.</em><br></div><div><hr></div></blockquote><div>Why a "but" there I wonder? If I was literally selling a product faster than I could make them, darn straight I'd be happy about sales results.</div><div> </div><div>JOhn<br></div><div></div>

IrritateGuy

August 11th, 2007, 21:53

<div>They are emphasizing they didn't expect it to do so well. There are internet hacks who will use their lack of supply as proof that they don't have faith in the product.</div>

Barney

August 18th, 2007, 18:36

<DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>
<HR>
IrritateGuy wrote:<BR>
<DIV>How is TrueHD better than uncompressed PCM?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I am confused.:(</DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV>
<DIV>its not that, but from what I have seen on the latest Blu-ray players, none support the new DD & DTS HD audio formats.........but do the  Blu-ray disc's offer this option..........& why not.......it has the "space" on the disc's....?</DIV>
<DIV>maybe SH is right..............audio engineers play second fiddle to video.........DVD movies only have about 10% of the "audio"...........so the new HD disc's will be doing the same ?..........I'd like a little more.....I think our speakers/subs can handle the info...........would love to hear your tweeters COF with all that "new" info.............bet they would do outstanding..............</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>
<DIV></DIV></DIV>

IrritateGuy

August 18th, 2007, 18:55

<div>Barney - All of the current BD players support DTS and DTS HD, but only a couple support DTS Master Audio, but that is not their fault. DTS just recently provided all the hardware specs for DTS MA so no one could design into their systems until recently. Most of the players on the market will be capable of supporting DTS MA via a firmware upgrade.</div><div> </div><div>But the point I was making was this... if most BD titles provide a full resolution Linear-PCM soundtrack, why would it be any better to offer a Dolby TrueHD or DTS HD soundtrack which technically aren't any better sounding? In fact, they are, at least emotionally, lower quality as they require less bandwidth per channel than LPCM.</div>

Rodraid

August 20th, 2007, 10:35

<div>Which current BluRay players support DTS-MA? </div><div> </div><div>Which players will be capable of decoding DTS-MA with a firmware upgrade?</div><div> </div><div>Rodney</div>

IrritateGuy

August 24th, 2007, 11:06

<div>Here's the latest from Nielson / VideoScan on HD title sales:</div><div> </div><div><img alt="" border="0" src="http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/2540/nielsen8pu0.jpg"></div><div> </div><div> </div>

IrritateGuy

August 24th, 2007, 11:08

<div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>Rodraid wrote:<br><div>Which current BluRay players support DTS-MA? </div><div> </div><div>Which players will be capable of decoding DTS-MA with a firmware upgrade?</div><div> </div><div>Rodney</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><br><div></div></div>According to my friends at DTS, nearly all firmware upgradeable BD players have the horsepower and hardware capabilities to support DTS-MA.</div><div> </div><div>DTS is working on the algorithems to make this a possibility.</div>

IrritateGuy

August 24th, 2007, 12:35

<div>Here's a neat chart someone put together based on Nielson / VideoScan figures for real retail sales of titles (discs).</div><div> </div><div>http://196.38.250.50/Blu_vs_HDDVD/Blu_vs_HDDVD.jpg</div>

Rodraid

August 24th, 2007, 14:08

<div>I am curious what do think these numbers mean?</div><div> </div><div>Rodney</div>

IrritateGuy

August 24th, 2007, 14:27

<div>They are market share number from Nielson / VideoScan for the percentage of HD titles <em>sold</em> in either format.</div><div> </div><div>So, if you add the HD-DVD percentage to the BluRay percentage, you get a total of 100%, or all of the HD titles sold.</div><div> </div><div>Nielson / VideoScan is the recognized market research leader in video sales, and those numbers are critical to marketing executives as they define future strategy and evaluate success for failure in product releases.</div><div> </div><div>This is for sales to consumers, not rentals or give aways.</div><div> </div><div>I hope that makes sense.</div>

Rodraid

August 24th, 2007, 14:54

<div>Critical to executives?</div><div> </div><div>These numbers show BluRay with a 2:1 advantage I would have thought HD DVD would have been abandoned by the studios. </div><div> </div><div>Why do you suppose this is not the case?</div><div> </div><div>Rodney</div>

IrritateGuy

August 24th, 2007, 14:57

<div>You are reading WAY too much into this.</div>

Rodraid

August 24th, 2007, 15:28

<div>I just thought you might have more information on this. I have seen you post these numbers before.</div><div> </div><div>Rodney</div>

Tee

August 28th, 2007, 08:32

<div></div><div><strong>Buy 2 Blu-ray Movies Get 1 Free!</strong></div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://forums.soundandvisionmag.com/audiovideo/board/message?board.id=44&message.id=63850#M63850">http://forums.soundandvisionmag.com/audiovideo/board/message?board.id=44&message.id=63850#M63850</a></div>

Tee

August 28th, 2007, 10:54

<div>A pic is worth a 1000 words, and what i feel ol good time Bill is doing. Having a nice big laugh while he undermines the HD formats progress.</div><div> </div><div><img alt="shift_toy_soldiers.jpg" height="400" src="http://blog.scifi.com/tech/pics/shift_toy_soldiers.jpg" width="590"></div>

IrritateGuy

August 30th, 2007, 15:38

<div>Acer, now the worlds third largest PC company (since they acquired Gateway), has joined the BluRay Disc Association (BDA).</div><div> </div><div>Nearly every single major PC maker is a member of the BDA and most are on the BDA Board of Directors, including Dell, HP, Apple, Sun, and others.</div>

IrritateGuy

August 30th, 2007, 15:46

<div>I am aware of at least a dozen new BluRay players being released to the market in time for the Christmas shopping season. Manufacturers like Philips, Samsung, Sony, Daewoo, Loewe, Sharp, and a few others are all announcing and showing the new players as I am typing this.</div>

yromj

August 30th, 2007, 15:48

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div>Acer, now the worlds third largest PC company (since they acquired Gateway), has joined the BluRay Disc Association (BDA).</div><div> </div><div>Nearly every single major PC maker is a member of the BDA and most are on the BDA Board of Directors, including Dell, HP, Apple, Sun, and others.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>That's cool. My only question is: Does that have any impact on the CE world? Don't get me wrong, the more support, the better; but, I would think all the PC manufacturers could join the BD camp and it wouldn't have near the impact of one major studio's leaving the camp. It won't matter if BD is the greatest since sliced bread if there are no movies to put on the discs.</div><div> </div><div>I want to see Warner go BD exclusive. THAT would be fun.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div>

IrritateGuy

August 30th, 2007, 15:57

<div>It can only be good news to consumers when more hardware companies get financially committed to BluRay technology. While Acer's commitment won't change the world for HD Movie viewers, it will cause a trickle down effect of more factories producing drive components, more competition, and an increase in the economies of scale needed to drive prices down.</div>

yromj

August 30th, 2007, 19:03

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div>It can only be good news to consumers when more hardware companies get financially committed to BluRay technology. While Acer's commitment won't change the world for HD Movie viewers, it will cause a trickle down effect of more factories producing drive components, more competition, and an increase in the economies of scale needed to drive prices down.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>The economy of scale impact for the hardware is good. I just get so PO'd when I think about Paramount screwing the high-def world like they did that I tend to neglect the several small steps the BD camp makes daily.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div>

IrritateGuy

August 31st, 2007, 10:46

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>yromj wrote:<br><div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div>It can only be good news to consumers when more hardware companies get financially committed to BluRay technology. While Acer's commitment won't change the world for HD Movie viewers, it will cause a trickle down effect of more factories producing drive components, more competition, and an increase in the economies of scale needed to drive prices down.</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>The economy of scale impact for the hardware is good. I just get so PO'd when I think about Paramount screwing the high-def world like they did that I tend to neglect the several small steps the BD camp makes daily.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><br><div>Just keep reminding yourself that Paramount only accounts for about 12% of the film titles available to us from the major studios. Sure there are some which we really want to see, but given time (after HD-DVD has thoroughly lost the format war), all those titles will be re-issued in better performing BD versions.</div><div> </div><div>That's something most of us are completely forgetting - nearly all the titles being released right now are not as good as they could be. The technology is very new, and the studio's engineers are still learning. Just like nearly all the early DVD releases were re-released as higher quality discs, the same is likely to happen with all the hi-def titles.</div></div>

Rodraid

August 31st, 2007, 15:05

<div><div>Just keep reminding yourself that Paramount only accounts for about 12% of the film titles available to us from the major studios. Sure there are some which we really want to see, but given time (after HD-DVD has thoroughly lost the format war), all those titles will be re-issued in better performing BD versions.</div><div> </div><div>That's something most of us are completely forgetting - nearly all the titles being released right now are not as good as they could be. The technology is very new, and the studio's engineers are still learning. Just like nearly all the early DVD releases were re-released as higher quality discs, the same is likely to happen with all the hi-def titles.</div><br> <hr></div><p>After HD-DVD has thoroughly lost the format war?</p><p>How many HD DVDs have you watched? </p><p>What I find comical is every fan-boy of either format always try to claim something like "Paramount only accounts for 12% of film titles but when it was also putting out BluRay all you could say is BluRay has the most studio support". </p><p>IrritateGuy you are probably one of the most well respected and most knowledgable people I have ever read on any forum but you don't miss one opportunity to take a jab at a format you don't even own? What is your problem with HD DVD?</p><p>Rodney</p>

IrritateGuy

August 31st, 2007, 16:08

<div><br><blockquote><div><hr>Rodraid wrote:<br><div><div> What is your problem with HD DVD?</div></div><p>Rodney</p><br><hr></div></blockquote><br><div>First off, how does ownership make any difference? I know a lots of people who don't own guns who think we should stop selling them. This logic is a fallacy.</div><div> </div><div>I've been intimately involved on BOTH formats since about a year prior to their introduction to the market. I have used and tested nearly every player of either format ever made. I have been allowed access to all these technologies because of my employer and my role in the company. I've been playing with both formats since the earliest prototypes were released. I am VERY familiar with them and how they perform.</div><div> </div><div> </div><div>My problem with HD-DVD is that there is NO REASON WHATSOEVER for a format war and the only reason we have one is due to Toshiba forcing one on us virtually on their own. The BDA was formed specifically to get EVERY company interested in a next generation HD disc together and produce an outstanding new technology, and almost all the CE companies joined the BDA and were involved in defining the technology. Toshiba worked almost completely alone on HD-DVD. The BDA approached Toshiba on three very public occasions to see if they would be interested in joining the BDA while the BDA would add some of their intellectual property to the BluRay spec to allow them some licensing revenue. Clearly, Toshiba refused those offers outright.</div><div> </div><div>So, why doesn't everyone have an issue with Toshiba and HD-DVD?</div><div> </div><div> </div><div>Next is Microsoft, who clearly would prefer no one win the HD disc war so their HD IPTV technology, in which market they are a big leader, will become the de facto standard for distributing HD content to consumers. They have been marketing their product as a solution to the HD disc format war since the earliest days of the technology announcements and they have a vested interest in seeing both fail.</div><div> </div><div>Why doesn't everyone have an issue with Microsoft and their support of HD-DVD?</div><div> </div><div> </div><div>Then there's industry support. BluRay has almost every consumer electronics and computer company financially invested in it as members of the BDA board of directors. These companies account for over 80% of the overall CE market. Meanwhile, HD-DVD has a much smaller supporting group, consisting primarily of Toshiba, NEC, and Microsoft. There are several companies hedging their bets and refusing to choose sides by either waiting out the format war or joining both camps. The BDA is a huge organization and has more members than the original DVD Forum did at its inception.</div><div> </div><div>Are we going to outright dismiss such huge industry support just because the price of the player isn't under $200 yet?</div><div> </div><div> </div><div>Finally, technologically, BluRay is a superior format in every aspect. It has 66% higher capacity, 50% higher standard throughput, a more robust and extensible programming interface, extended and more advanged content protection, and is built from the ground up as a data format as well as a movie distribution format. There is only one area where BluRay currently falls short of HD-DVD, and that's in how much one manufacturer is willing to charge for the players, and in two years no one will be commenting on that difference as either format will likely have sub $100 players by then.</div><div> </div><div> </div><div>So, for the life of me, I cannot fathom why anyone would want to see this format war go on any longer. I cannot understand the logic behind supporting HD-DVD at all. There was no logical reason for anyone to support it, except Toshiba who could potentially lose out on billions of dollars in licensing fees over the life of the technology (like they got for DVD, which was a compromise for Sony and Philips who agreed to use Toshiba's intellectual property to avoid a format war).</div><div> </div><div> </div><div>But, these are only my opinions.</div></div>

IrritateGuy

August 31st, 2007, 17:32

<div></div><div>BluRay dominates current disc sales:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=459">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=459</a></div><div> </div>Blu-ray Dominates HD Sales<br><div><em>New data from Home Media Research shows that Blu-ray is continuing to lead in high definition media sales. As of August 5th, the top 10 best selling high definition movies are all available on Blu-ray, and half of those exclusive to the format. Warner Brother's '300' leads the pack, followed by 'The Departed', 'Casino Royale', 'Planet Earth', and 'Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest'.<br><br>Noticeably absent from the list is Universal who did not have a title which sold enough copies to break into the top 20. Paramount made it to 17th with their release of 'Babel', but if there wasn't a Blu-ray version of the title, it would have fallen short making the list.</em><br><br>Source: <a target="parent" href="http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/questex/hom090207/index.php">Home Media Magazine</a> |</div><div> </div>

Towen7

August 31st, 2007, 17:33

<div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr></div><div>IrritateGuy wrote:</div><div> </div><div>So, for the life of me, I cannot fathom why anyone would want to see this format war go on any longer. I cannot understand the logic behind supporting HD-DVD at all. There was no logical reason for anyone to support it, except Toshiba who could potentially lose out on billions of dollars in licensing fees over the life of the technology (like they got for DVD, which was a compromise for Sony and Philips who agreed to use Toshiba's intellectual property to avoid a format war).</div><div><div> </div></div><div><hr></div></blockquote><div>Are you taking about "support" from a CE manufacturer's perspective or a consumer's?</div><div> </div><div>I can understand why a consumer who has several thousands of dollars in a home theater would buy (and therefore support) HD-DVD products. The consumer's understanding or appreciation of the technical superiority of the BluRay platform is irrelevant if he wants any of the content that is HD DVD exclusive now. Sure he could wait for the format war to end and for contnet producers to re-release content but that eventaulity can (and likely will take years). Especially with MS's meddeling and Toshiba's stubborness.</div><br><div></div></div></div>

yromj

September 1st, 2007, 00:03

<div></div><div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div></div><div><br><p>Just keep reminding yourself that Paramount only accounts for about 12% of the film titles available to us from the major studios. Sure there are some which we really want to see, but given time (after HD-DVD has thoroughly lost the format war), all those titles will be re-issued in better performing BD versions...</p><p></p><hr></div></div></blockquote><br><div>Yea, I know, but I sure was looking forward to the BD version of <em>Transformers </em>in a couple of months. Of course, I can still watch it on HD-DVD, but I'll most likely end up buying it twice. The one bright side here is the fact that I can listen to uncompressed audio this way.</div><div> </div><div>John</div></div></div>

Towen7

September 1st, 2007, 11:40

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>yromj wrote:<br><div></div><div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div></div><div><br><p>Just keep reminding yourself that Paramount only accounts for about 12% of the film titles available to us from the major studios. Sure there are some which we really want to see, but given time (after HD-DVD has thoroughly lost the format war), all those titles will be re-issued in better performing BD versions...</p><p></p><hr></div></div></blockquote><br><div>Yea, I know, but I sure was looking forward to the BD version of <em>Transformers </em>in a couple of months. Of course, I can still watch it on HD-DVD, but I'll most likely end up buying it twice. The one bright side here is the fact that I can listen to uncompressed audio this way.</div><div> </div><div>John</div></div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote>Why are you willing to buy it twice?<br><div></div></div>

Tee

September 1st, 2007, 12:37

<div>I'm going to buy the SD version of Transformers and let the PS3 upconvert it.</div>

yromj

September 2nd, 2007, 13:30

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>Towen7 wrote:<br><div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>yromj wrote:<br><div></div><div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div></div><div><br><p>Just keep reminding yourself that Paramount only accounts for about 12% of the film titles available to us from the major studios. Sure there are some which we really want to see, but given time (after HD-DVD has thoroughly lost the format war), all those titles will be re-issued in better performing BD versions...</p><p></p><hr></div></div></blockquote><br><div>Yea, I know, but I sure was looking forward to the BD version of <em>Transformers </em>in a couple of months. Of course, I can still watch it on HD-DVD, but I'll most likely end up buying it twice. The one bright side here is the fact that I can listen to uncompressed audio this way.</div><div> </div><div>John</div></div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote>Why are you willing to buy it twice?<br><div></div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Because I'm willing to bet that w/ in a couple of years, I won't have an HD-DVD player in my rack. If I'm going to buy it (which is a given), I figure I'll spend the extra $10 or so and buy it in HD.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div>

ThumpinSub

September 2nd, 2007, 14:11

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>yromj wrote:<br><div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>Towen7 wrote:<div>Why are you willing to buy it twice?<br><div></div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Because I'm willing to bet that w/ in a couple of years, I won't have an HD-DVD player in my rack. If I'm going to buy it (which is a given), I figure I'll spend the extra $10 or so and buy it in HD.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>ATTA BOY, JOHN! ;) A man who knows what he wants and won't allow an inconvenience such as money to stop him from obtaining it! </div><div> </div><div>And all this time, I thought I was the sole member of this club.</div><div> </div><div><br> </div><div></div>

Towen7

September 2nd, 2007, 14:54

<div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>yromj wrote:<br><div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><div><blockquote><div><div><div><br><div>Yea, I know, but I sure was looking forward to the BD version of <em>Transformers </em>in a couple of months. Of course, I can still watch it on HD-DVD, but I'll most likely end up buying it twice. The one bright side here is the fact that I can listen to uncompressed audio this way.</div><div> </div><div>John</div></div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote>Why are you willing to buy it twice?<br><div></div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Because I'm willing to bet that w/ in a couple of years, I won't have an HD-DVD player in my rack. If I'm going to buy it (which is a given), I figure I'll spend the extra $10 or so and buy it in HD.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>Fair enough...but you end-up paying that extra $10 or so twice and that is on top of the purchase of the DVD in the first place. No matter how you rationalize it you are paying full price twice. It just seems odd to me that you would buy one format <em>with the intention</em> of re-buying on another. But I cant crtiticize your enthusiasm when I am considering buying an HD DVD player to get access to the relatively few exclusive titles. Format wars suck!!!</div></div></div>

yromj

September 3rd, 2007, 16:38

<div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr></div><div>Towen7 wrote:</div><div> </div><div><div><div>Fair enough...but you end-up paying that extra $10 or so twice and that is on top of the purchase of the DVD in the first place. No matter how you rationalize it you are paying full price twice...<br></div></div></div><div><hr></div></blockquote><div>My point about it is this: We REALLY enjoyed the movie and would like to watch it several times, including multiple times w/ various groups of friends. Given that, we can either rent it multiple times, rent it for an extended period of time thru Netflix, or buy it. Holding it once we receive it from Netflix is the only cheap way, but it also interferes w/ watching other movies. Renting it multiple times is far less convenient and will probably cost more than the HD-DVD. If I'm going to watch it so many times, I would rather spend a few cents per viewing and have the high def version. As long as HD-DVD is still around, I'm OK. I just don't see myself still using an HD-DVD player in 3-5 years.</div><div> </div><div>The only rational alternative is the "Do Nothing" alternative, as is the case w/ this hobby in general.</div><div> </div><div>John<br></div><div></div></div>

Tee

September 4th, 2007, 09:41

<div></div><div>Pioneer Introduced the BD-LX70A<br>Posted September 3, 2007 by Josh<br><br><img alt="IFA" height="75" border="0" src="http://www.blu-ray.com/images/news/ifa.gif" width="100"></div><div> </div><div>Coming off the success of their BD-LX70, Pioneer has announced that they will soon debut the next generation of Blu-ray players - the LX70A. The player will differ from the current model mostly with its additional audio support. <font color="#ff0000">The LX70A will allow for the passing of bitstream data (via HDMI v1.3) for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio.<br></font><br>Pioneer expect the player to be on store shelves sometime in October. No price has been set at this time.<br></div>

drrosen2l

September 6th, 2007, 09:52

<div>Sony recently reported that BR stand-alone players (i.e. non PS3's) are now outselling HD-DVD stand-alones:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Hardware/Sony/CEDIA/Report:_Sony_Says_Blu-ray_Standalone_Players_Out-Selling_HD_DVD/936">http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Hardware/Sony/CEDIA/Report:_Sony_Says_Blu-ray_Standalone_Players_Out-Selling_HD_DVD/936</a></div><div> </div><div> </div><div>-Paul</div>

Tee

September 9th, 2007, 20:37

<div>Marantz first Blu-ray player showed at Cedia.</div><div> </div><div><img alt="" border="0" src="http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/509/IMG_1968.jpg"></div>

IrritateGuy

September 10th, 2007, 11:57

<div></div><div><br></div><blockquote><div><hr>drrosen2l wrote:<br><div>Sony recently reported that BR stand-alone players (i.e. non PS3's) are now outselling HD-DVD stand-alones:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Hardware/Sony/CEDIA/Report:_Sony_Says_Blu-ray_Standalone_Players_Out-Selling_HD_DVD/936">http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Hardware/Sony/CEDIA/Report:_Sony_Says_Blu-ray_Standalone_Players_Out-Selling_HD_DVD/936</a></div><div> </div><div> </div><div>-Paul</div><br><hr></div></blockquote><div>This is VERY big news!</div><div> </div><div>Considering that the "higher cost" Blu-Ray players are outselling HD-DVD players and the install base for BluRay players is now more than 50% of the stand along HD market means that BluRay is pulling ahead in the format war.</div><div> </div><div>Here's a link to the research announcement:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6475686.html">http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6475686.html</a></div><div> </div><div><b>UPDATE:</b> Sony confirms Blu-ray's lead position <em>By Susanne Ault -- Video Business, 9/5/2007</em><p><em><strong>SEPT. 5 | DENVER</strong>â€”Blu-ray Disc set-top players within the last nine weeks have begun out-selling HD DVD set-top players on a unit basis, according to recent NPD Group research cited by Sony Electronics.<br><br>Sony touted the reversal of HD DVDâ€™s long-running stand-alone dominance during its Wednesday press conference at CEDIA.</em></p><p><em>The most recent data from the NPD Group shows that standalone BD players now exceed 50% of all high-definition players sold.</em></p><p><em>Sony VP Chris Fawcett said the change occurred mostly due to the introduction of Sonyâ€™s $499 player. And according to NPD, today's number one Blu-ray set-top brand in the U.S. is this entry-level Sony model.<br><br>In attempt to fight this revelation, Toshiba spokespeople pointed out Thursday that year-to-date through July Toshiba HD DVD players enjoyed a 55% market share. Collectively, Blu-ray players cornered a 42% share, and dual format players held a 3% share.<br><br>According to a Toshiba statement, "While the competition may claim leadership based on one month of data, Toshiba has had continued sales leadership in every month since the original HD DVD players launched 17 months ago."</em><br></p></div><div></div>

IrritateGuy

September 10th, 2007, 17:14

<div>Rumormongers are presaging a new $399 PS3 with a 40GB hard drive. It may be bundled with Spiderman 3 on BluRay.</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8810">http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8810</a></div><div> </div><div> </div><div>Also, the current 80GB PS3 is predicted to drop by $100 to $499.</div>

IrritateGuy

September 10th, 2007, 20:16

<div>Here's a summary of the BDA (BluRay Disc Association) booth at IFA:</div><div> </div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=496">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=496</a></div><div> </div><div>Of interest to me:</div><div> </div><div> </div><div><em>At the press conference, the BDA further revealed that Blu-ray software so far this year has outsold HD DVD in the US (67%), Europe (70%), as well as Japan (90%+). In addition, representatives from Disney, Sony Pictures, Fox/MGM and Warner detailed their plans for upcoming Blu-ray titles in the fourth quarter and beyond. <strong>Warner, which chose to only appear at the BDA press conference and not the HD DVD one, promised to release more Blu-ray titles in Q4 than in Q1, Q2 and Q3 combined.<br></strong></em></div>

jstwong

September 11th, 2007, 11:50

<DIV>I too have previously read the rumor of a lower capacity, cheaper PS3.  IMO, that makes some sense to me.  I think when they dropped the 60GB version it really helped to increase sales - the lower price point was key.  Not sure if a smaller capacity 40GB version will do as well, but the lower price point will help.</DIV>

IrritateGuy

September 14th, 2007, 19:27

<div></div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=509">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=509</a></div><div> </div><div><strong>Target Increases Shelf Space for Blu-ray</strong></div><div> </div><div>Video Business is reporting that Target has begun increasing shelf space for Blu-ray titles in their retail stores in anticipation of the upcoming holiday shopping season. This will result in two to four times as many Blu-ray titles on Target's shelves as compared to HD DVD. No official statement was made by the retailer, but it is expected that this is a result of Blu-ray's current sales advantage.<p>Andy Parsons, chair of the promotion committee for the BDA commented, "You're going to get a clear message when you see more Blu-ray than HD DVD, and you're going to think something is up. The message to the consumer is that one of these [formats] is dominating. You'll go with the masses and pick titles from the one that is likely to win."</p><p>Beginning in October, Target will be stocking the Sony BDP-S300 as their sole standalone HD movie player. This combined with the increased shelf space will give consumers a clear picture that Blu-ray is the true successor to DVD.<br></p><p> </p></div>

Milpool

September 14th, 2007, 23:27

<div></div><div><br><blockquote><div><hr>IrritateGuy wrote:<br><div></div><div><a target="_blank" href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=509">http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=509</a></div><div> </div><div><strong>Target Increases Shelf Space for Blu-ray</strong></div><div> </div><div>Video Business is reporting that Target has begun increasing shelf space for Blu-ray titles in their retail stores in anticipation of the upcoming holiday shopping season. This will result in two to four times as many Blu-ray titles on Target's shelves as compared to HD DVD. No official statement was made by the retailer, but it is expected that this is a result of Blu-ray's current sales advantage.<p>Andy Parsons, chair of the promotion committee for the BDA commented, "You're going to get a clear message when you see more Blu-ray than HD DVD, and you're going to think something is up. The message to the consumer is that one of these [formats] is dominating. You'll go with the masses and pick titles from the one that is likely to win."</p><p>Beginning in October, Target will be stocking the Sony BDP-S300 as their sole standalone HD movie player. This combined with the increased shelf space will give consumers a clear picture that Blu-ray is the true successor to DVD.<br></p><p> </p></div><br><hr></div></blockquote>That is huge news. I was recently in a Target, and was not impressed with the selection of either BD or HD DVD. My Blockbuster has a much bigger selection.<br><div> But if it were tripled, it would make an impressive statement to any consumer.</div></div>

Jomari

September 15th, 2007, 10:52

<DIV></DIV>
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Milpool wrote:<BR>
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IrritateGuy wrote:<BR>
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<DIV><A href="http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=509" target=_blank>http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=509</A></DIV>
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<DIV><STRONG>Target Increases Shelf Space for Blu-ray</STRONG></DIV>
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<DIV>Video Business is reporting that Target has begun increasing shelf space for Blu-ray titles in their retail stores in anticipation of the upcoming holiday shopping season. This will result in two to four times as many Blu-ray titles on Target's shelves as compared to HD DVD. No official statement was made by the retailer, but it is expected that this is a result of Blu-ray's current sales advantage.</DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>That is huge news.  I was recently in a Target, and was not impressed with the selection of either BD or HD DVD.  My Blockbuster has a much bigger selection.<BR>
<DIV> But if it were tripled, it would make an impressive statement to any consumer.</DIV></DIV><BR>
<HR>
</DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>considering how big of a player Target is in our current lifestyle (well at least in san jose), this definitely would be a big boost towards pushing blu-ray into the 'middle class' section. Im sure that with these developments, a lower cost effective player would definitely be in the works for such, giving in to the higher demand blu-ray is getting.<BR>
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