What's amazing is that in the early days of DVD, with only 480i displays on the market, most of them small, most people did NOT see a dramtic improvement in quality like so many claim. It wasn't really until TVs started going way up in quality and size with more RPTVs on the market that the quality started to really shine.
It was the convenience of DVD which was a huge breakthrough for many, yet it was still years before it became mainstream with DVD as the product.
But, my DVD player doesn't play my old VHS tapes - my Blu-ray player handles the DVDs and Blu-ray discs... Still struggle with the portability, yet distributed audio & video in my home has those bases covered.