Blue Ray Discs are just too expensive. Period. Pricing a three disc set of BOURNE movies is a mere $80! Business people have a tendency to shoot themselves in the foot. There is no way I want a Blue Ray player for $199
if it costs me a $27 for one movie. Not just for an improvement in the
picture. Unless the Blue Ray HDMI cable runs through your Dolby Digital
receiver and back to the TV you cannot receive True HD Audio. Few people are going to go to the trouble.
While what you say makes sense, it only does so if you don't own a HDTV and don't care about getting great video quality and truly only shop at brick and mortar stores without patience.
I can definitely attest to the concept of doing some smart shopping instead of just buying whatever. I've paid, on average, less than $15 a movie for the titles I own, which is, as I said, about 100 titles. If I were to buy DVDs ten years ago, it would have cost me at least that much to get the same titles on DVD. 20 years ago, it would have cost me five times as much to get the movies on VHS.
Plus, above all else, you don't have to BUY a single movie!
Blockbuster Online, Netflix, Redbox... You have choices galore to rent as many movies as you want for well under $20 a month.
Considering that most people with a HDTV pay for HD cable/satellite service, often for $10+ a month extra, the cost for renting as many movies as you want for around $20 is almost negligible.
Cost, of course, should be a consideration for everyone, and is a fair consideration. But, buying a new HDTV has a cost which should be a consideration before you buy it. Do you get a very good HDTV at a proper size for your viewing distance and pair it with a good HD source or do you get the 32" Vizio from Wal-Mart and sit 10 feet from it and think that it is HDTV you are viewing with your composite video connection?
Blu-ray Disc, with a HDMI cable, to you typical 50" display will ALWAYS deliver better video quality than DVD is capable of. Whether you buy, or just rent, the quality will always be better, and the potential for better audio by using a receiver with HDMI inputs and a surround setup, is avaialble, and ONE CABLE easy. Your statement implies that the alternatives are easier!
Some typical ways to do A/V through a surround system - best to worst:
1 - HDMI (carries audio & video) (1 wire)
2 - Component video (3 wires), optical (or coaxial) digital audio (1 wire)
3 - Component video (3 wires), analog audio (2 wires)
4 - S-video (1 wire), analog audio (2 wires)
5 - composite video (1 wire), analog audio (2 wires)
Kind of a weird thing to point to a one wire solution as being to complicated for you, and pointing to the highest prices possible as your standard for comparison.
I would wonder why anyone would actually buy a decent HDTV then NOT spend $200 to get a quality player which can handle their entire DVD collection as well as allow them to rent/buy BDs to play back true HD on their HDTV.
