Will bluray ever be replaced?

[Halon451]

I have a 50mbs download package (allegedly) and some days I actually see that rate. They definitely have to expand bandwidth to accommodate higher quality content and I see no reason why those greater bandwidths couldn't be implemented more cost effectively for consumers.

I agree on cable.. it's just something I've always had and still watch it for my local news and weather but I'm finding it harder and harder to justify the price. I've already gotten rid of my landline phone a few years ago; seems these old standbys are finding themselves irrelevant and obsolete in today's world. I don't have an issue with that as long as whatever is replacing it can deliver as good and preferably better quality.

I do believe blu-ray is likely the last of the physical media formats we'll see. It'll def be around still for a long time but like someone said above there's no justification in developing and marketing any brand new formats beyond it these days... it just wouldn't be a competitive decision. It's like them trying to improve upon the cassette tape long after CD's became a thing.

I predict streaming will be the future and eventually we will see greater bandwidths to accommodate the traffic. Discs will be obsolete. Relics of a foregone era.

 

[yepimonfire]

I have a 50mbs download package (allegedly) and some days I actually see that rate. They definitely have to expand bandwidth to accommodate higher quality content and I see no reason why those greater bandwidths couldn't be implemented more cost effectively for consumers.

I agree on cable.. it's just something I've always had and still watch it for my local news and weather but I'm finding it harder and harder to justify the price. I've already gotten rid of my landline phone a few years ago; seems these old standbys are finding themselves irrelevant and obsolete in today's world. I don't have an issue with that as long as whatever is replacing it can deliver as good and preferably better quality.

I do believe blu-ray is likely the last of the physical media formats we'll see. It'll def be around still for a long time but like someone said above there's no justification in developing and marketing any brand new formats beyond it these days... it just wouldn't be a competitive decision. It's like them trying to improve upon the cassette tape long after CD's became a thing.

I predict streaming will be the future and eventually we will see greater bandwidths to accommodate the traffic. Discs will be obsolete. Relics of a foregone era.

You don't even need cable to watch local news. An antenna will provide better quality anyways because you won't have to deal with the secondary compression from the cable company.

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[Halon451]

You don't even need cable to watch local news. An antenna will provide better quality anyways because you won't have to deal with the secondary compression from the cable company.

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I had my TV running on antenna for awhile after dropping Frontier (they are just awful). Quality was quite good when it actually worked but reception was very spotty and some channels just ended up a frozen mess of pixelation. Plus aside from news, the gf and I follow some good TV shows that aren't always immediately available on Netflix, Amazon, etc. Roku seems pretty good but haven't gotten that yet.

 

[sterling shoote]

I don't think there will be another format war again. Blu-ray was the last.

Understand, if 'Blu-ray gets better' - it is actually another format.

4K UHD Blu-ray discs can't play back in standard BD players. Just like BDs can't play back in DVD players, and DVDs can't play back in CD players. 4K UHD Blu-ray is actually a new disc standard. We may see 8K Blu-ray come along some day, and that will also be an upgrade. It may be based upon the current BD standard with 4 or 8 or 10 layer discs. Or it could be something a fair bit different. But, there is not enough market left for another format war like HD-DVD vs. Blu-ray.

The ridiculous jump for people to 4K on their 40" displays they view from 12' away is a joke as it is. Then they watch their 1080i 13Mbs cable television and rave about what an improvement it is. *sigh*

Streaming is the future, but it's a future of convenience rather than quality. It's the MP3 of the CD. Like it or hate it, those that care about video quality are generally going to be screwed in this entire process. Making TVs that are higher and higher quality in terms of video, while delivering video that actually is of lower and lower quality.

A 4K stream at 25Mbs is slower than what Blu-ray has delivered from day one with their 1080p video. So, the benchmark for video quality will remain Blu-ray. It has already moved to a new format with UHD Blu-ray. It may move forward again in future years with 8K Blu-ray. But, it is the last time there will be a major format war.

HVD doesn't seem to be a likely format to move into the market. It is a heck of a technology in terms of storage, but isn't supported by a Sony or a Panasonic. As well, since computers are ditching optical drives completely, the use in a computer is pretty much meaningless. It would find it's market from gaming consoles and movie players, which are showing no rush towards the UHD format, let alone something beyond that.

Remember the real buzz around Blu-ray? There was quite a bit. Certainly the format war sparked some interesting discussions, and it was all over the pages of the magazines.

How about UHD Blu-ray? Not so much.

Eventually, I expect, all the Blu-ray players will become UHD players. It's just going to become the 'standard player' that people buy. If there is a follow up for 8K, it will likely follow the same path. Slow, trudging, no dazzle or excitement. It will most likely fit right into the round hole that Blu-ray has created as a format and will be the last physical media format that any of us will remember.

Well, I do not know the future; but, I do know that Blu-ray is superior to streaming and downloading. Netflix still streams a lot of stuff in stereo; and, many of the movies are not in genres of which I have any interest. At any rate, when I said Blu-ray will get better, I'm alluding to the medium being ideal for multi-channel music delivery. Since folks now have players along with the pre/pros or AVR's to support multi-channel music from Blu-ray I would suspect record producers would want to explore the possibilities, especially when Apple Music appears to be making CD's moot.

 

[Halon451]

Well, I do not know the future; but, I do know that Blu-ray is superior to streaming and downloading. Netflix still streams a lot of stuff in stereo; and, many of the movies are not in genres of which I have any interest. At any rate, when I said Blu-ray will get better, I'm alluding to the medium being ideal for multi-channel music delivery. Since folks now have players along with the pre/pros or AVR's to support multi-channel music from Blu-ray I would suspect record producers would want to explore the possibilities, especially when Apple Music appears to be making CD's moot.

I remember having similar discussions with people on CD's back when digital downloading first started emerging. At the time the quality of downloaded music was vastly inferior to CD and I made the bold claim that CD's would never go away as they'll remain the superior format. But then the game changed when sites began offering lossless music online and it's now fairly common. Thing is, in the digital realm it doesn't matter the delivery medium. Quality is based on bit depth, compression, etc. and as long as that depth and sampling rate is preserved, physical media is irrelevant. It then just becomes a matter of whether people just like to have a physical copy to hold in their hands of if they're okay just having that material on a hard drive somewhere. Then one could argue that portability is still important too and it's often easier to just take a disc with you then have to transfer files or set up a home network, etc, and that's valid but these days with the plethora of networking options and cloud based storage even that argument is losing ground.

I used to be an avid collector of CD's and still have one entire wall of a spare room in my house consumed with a large CD rack. It's ridiculous. I was one of those people who vowed to never let go of my physical formats. And now, here in 2017, I don't think I've bought an actual physical CD in more than 8 years but I've still bought a LOT of music.

Times change, and eventually we all change with it.

 

[sterling shoote]

I remember having similar discussions with people on CD's back when digital downloading first started emerging. At the time the quality of downloaded music was vastly inferior to CD and I made the bold claim that CD's would never go away as they'll remain the superior format. But then the game changed when sites began offering lossless music online and it's now fairly common. Thing is, in the digital realm it doesn't matter the delivery medium. Quality is based on bit depth, compression, etc. and as long as that depth and sampling rate is preserved, physical media is irrelevant. It then just becomes a matter of whether people just like to have a physical copy to hold in their hands of if they're okay just having that material on a hard drive somewhere. Then one could argue that portability is still important too and it's often easier to just take a disc with you then have to transfer files or set up a home network, etc, and that's valid but these days with the plethora of networking options and cloud based storage even that argument is losing ground.

I used to be an avid collector of CD's and still have one entire wall of a spare room in my house consumed with a large CD rack. It's ridiculous. I was one of those people who vowed to never let go of my physical formats. And now, here in 2017, I don't think I've bought an actual physical CD in more than 8 years but I've still bought a LOT of music.

Times change, and eventually we all change with it.

Most of my music purchases are made at the iTunes Store; but, I still buy multi-channel SACD's, since multi-channel music downloads are virtually non-existent. Now, although much of my music has been purchased from iTunes for stereo and mono works, CD's still make sense to me. After all they don't crash, they can be transferred to iTunes for convenience, they are mine to trade, sell or give, and, they generally sound as good as it gets.

 

[3db]

I consider 4K disks to be part of the BluRay fold. Its my understanding that its the same physical media. That being said I hope it never gets replaced because internet access is not guaranteed to be 100% available nor does it support full 1080p with lossless soundtrack. If the Internet goes down, I take comfort in knowing that I can pull the disk off my shelf and play on my Blu Ray player.

 

[Halon451]

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I consider 4K disks to be part of the BluRay fold. Its my understanding that its the same physical media. That being said I hope it never gets replaced because internet access is not guaranteed to be 100% available nor does it support full 1080p with lossless soundtrack. If the Internet goes down, I take comfort in knowing that I can pull the disk off my shelf and play on my Blu Ray player.

Very true, good point. I think that's the big difference right now between the above discussion of music and the way in which we acquire that and movies; music tends to end up stored locally either on hard drives or physical media (bracketing out Pandora, Spotify, etc.) whereas movies, if not already on DVD or Blu-ray more often than not do require an internet connection. But even that's changing now with download capabilities, DVR, etc.

 

[panteragstk]

There are still more people than we may realize that purchase discs. It isn't as many as it used to be, but people still buy dvds. Insane I know, but they still do.

Stream may be the future, but if we have to have 20 subscriptions to as many services people will not want to put up with that.

Vudu might be the only service that offers UHDBD quality audio and video, but the price is the same as buying the physical disc.

The issue I've always had with streaming is if you "purchase" a show and for some reason the show you "purchased" drops off due to an agreement dispute or expired contract, how do you get your "purchase"?

Or if the service you "purchased" your movie from goes out of business, how do you still own anything?

Not only that, but (as stated above) there are still tons of people that have limited or no internet in this country. I'm lucky enough to have a 1gbps connection and can stream all day without any quality issues, but the FCC rules might change to where Netflix and the like will have to pay a premium in order for their traffic to not be throttled.

Streaming may be the future, but it has a VERY long way to go to gain mass market acceptance as an alternative to traditional media. That includes discs and TV subscriptions.

 

[BMXTRIX]

I consider 4K disks to be part of the BluRay fold. Its my understanding that its the same physical media.

I would expect that their 50GB discs may be, but the 66GB and 100GB discs are different. They are using a tighter data pattern to increase data storage and the 100GB disc is a triple layer. Potentially, an old player could get a modification to read HEVC and would work with 50GB discs, but there is an actual physical change required to read the 66GB and 100GB discs.

It is still a standard sized round disc, and it is still read by the same type of laser, but there is a different manufacturing process which must be used for those larger disc sizes. Similar, but different.

The big thing for me to consider something the 'same' is if the disc plays back in older players, and since you can't play a UHD disc back in a standard BD player, then it really is a new format. It seems like a natural successor, but so was 'HD DVD' back in the day. It was similar to DVD, but it was not the DVD format. UHD Blu-ray is similar to Blu-ray, but it is not the original BD format.

That's all nitpicking of course, and I don't really care as long as there are some discs out there I can pick up that look amazing. Most of my collection is on hard drives and stored locally with about 500 BDs and 500 DVDs with several thousand TV episodes. I keep my Netflix on my LAN.

 

[BMXTRIX]

...I'm alluding to the medium being ideal for multi-channel music delivery. Since folks now have players along with the pre/pros or AVR's to support multi-channel music from Blu-ray I would suspect record producers would want to explore the possibilities...

So, there already are a ton of audio discs on Blu-ray out there. So, yes, people are playing with this.

The discussion for me is not about whether Blu-ray goes away. I don't think it will. But, it will die. Eventually. Right now, there's no way to get better audio and video in your home. But, you caring, or me caring, doesn't matter if we are the only people buying it. The days of physical media being the top dog are over. Sales of physical discs are dying, and studios are seeing less and less from that revenue stream.

Will it go away? No, I don't expect it will. But, there may come a day when the disc is just ported over from the streaming version. That it barely gets much thought (except for certain discs) because the revenue from it will just not justify additional production costs.

Hopefully no time soon, as I love me some great movies on BD.

 

[yepimonfire]

Well, I do not know the future; but, I do know that Blu-ray is superior to streaming and downloading. Netflix still streams a lot of stuff in stereo; and, many of the movies are not in genres of which I have any interest. At any rate, when I said Blu-ray will get better, I'm alluding to the medium being ideal for multi-channel music delivery. Since folks now have players along with the pre/pros or AVR's to support multi-channel music from Blu-ray I would suspect record producers would want to explore the possibilities, especially when Apple Music appears to be making CD's moot.

I've actually had much better results with netflix then amazon. Almost everything is 5.1 and the audio bitrate is high enough I don't notice compression artifacts. Amazon is a different story. Their audio quality leaves much to be desired. I don't necessarily need lossless, just a bitrate high enough to be psychoacoustically transparent and stuff like 7.1 and Atmos. There is no reason streaming serviced can't offer both of those things.

I remember having similar discussions with people on CD's back when digital downloading first started emerging. At the time the quality of downloaded music was vastly inferior to CD and I made the bold claim that CD's would never go away as they'll remain the superior format. But then the game changed when sites began offering lossless music online and it's now fairly common. Thing is, in the digital realm it doesn't matter the delivery medium. Quality is based on bit depth, compression, etc. and as long as that depth and sampling rate is preserved, physical media is irrelevant. It then just becomes a matter of whether people just like to have a physical copy to hold in their hands of if they're okay just having that material on a hard drive somewhere. Then one could argue that portability is still important too and it's often easier to just take a disc with you then have to transfer files or set up a home network, etc, and that's valid but these days with the plethora of networking options and cloud based storage even that argument is losing ground.

I used to be an avid collector of CD's and still have one entire wall of a spare room in my house consumed with a large CD rack. It's ridiculous. I was one of those people who vowed to never let go of my physical formats. And now, here in 2017, I don't think I've bought an actual physical CD in more than 8 years but I've still bought a LOT of music.

Times change, and eventually we all change with it.

I'd say streaming music has replaced downloads even. I don't really care about lossless, I fail abx testing at 256kbps on every common lossy compression format regardless of the genre. Spotify offers a massive music library at 320kbps ogg for $9 a month, downloads are irrelevant to me now. I do wish streaming services offered 5.1 on PC, so far netflix is the only one who does, with Windows 10 apps designing and app to do it while protecting the copyright is not hard.

For the most part, multichannel music has been a failure. I would certainly purchase it if it existed, but back when DVDA became a thing and sacd very few releases have utilized it. I suppose we will have to deal with matrixing via dolby surround or prologic II. Works very well on classical.

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[sterling shoote]

I don't see it as a this vs that argument, I acquire music and video by the means I see most beneficial. For example, I just purchased a Steely Dan CD from Amazon for about four bucks. I could have streamed, or downloaded it instead from Apple Music to listen to via my paid subscription to the service provider; but, it seemed buying the CD was better for a multitude of reasons. For one, if I cancel my subscription, I still have the music. I also can produce copies of the CD from my computer to play in my old truck's CD player. The only way I can make a copy of a stream that I know of is with a CD, DAT, or hard drive recorder, which requires wired connection/USB converter from computer to recorder. At any rate, since I can buy DVDs and Blu-rays for not much more cost than I can download 'em, with better playback assured at any convenience I have to watch a movie, I'll usually just buy the movie on DVD or Blu-ray from my Best Buys just down the street from where I live.