HD ... BR ... or wait

[philh]

My cheap SD DVD player drives me crazy at times, locking up, requiring a power cycle to reset. Looking to update my receiver in the next few months. TV will wait a couple of years, so still on a tube Should I pick up a HD as the price falls and they stop making them or just bite the bullet and get a BR?

 

[gus6464]

Why anyone would think to buy an HD DVD player at this point in time is beyond me

I have both an A3 and a PS3 so I am somewhat neutral but I say get a BD player.

 

[Nomo]

My vote comes from the cheap seats.
Get yourself another cheapo SD player and wait things out. If not until the prices fall, at least until the BD camp gets their crap together and solidifies their audio format support.

 

[stratman]

I'm with Nomo, why spend the extra money when you're going to upgrade your tv later? And at that time, hopefully, there won't be any more format war and blu-ray players will be inexpensive. That is if Blu-ray "wins."

 

[The Dukester]

I respectfully disagree with the above. With Toshiba's A3 players available for $100 with two movies in the box and five by rebate, why not buy one of those? They upscale SD great, also. There are also several HD-DVD only releases that may not be available on BD for quite some time, if at all. Would I go out and buy 50 new discs at full price? Probably not, but it's not like any you have will disinigrate when/if HD looses.
That's my two cents worth.

PS I DO agree that BD needs to get their crap together, though!!!!

 

[Nomo]

I respectfully disagree with the above. With Toshiba's A3 players available for $100 with two movies in the box and five by rebate, why not buy one of those? They upscale SD great, also. There are also several HD-DVD only releases that may not be available on BD for quite some time, if at all. Would I go out and buy 50 new discs at full price? Probably not, but it's not like any you have will disinigrate when/if HD looses.
That's my two cents worth.

PS I DO agree that BD needs to get their crap together, though!!!!

That's a tough call.
The problem I have with my A2 is it's un-god-ly sluggishness. While I don't completely regret paying the $100 for it, as it is a good upscaler, if I had it to do all over again, with the recent knowledge that HD-DVD has lost, I'd probably have held out.

 

[MUDSHARK]

Once I loaded the 40 updates on Friday the A2 loaded considerably faster. Also got through a movie without glitches (The new Marantz may be partly responible).

 

[Nomo]

I hadn't noticed that there was another update.
I'll have to try it.
Great, it only took me a couple of weeks and a dozen or so blank CDs last time.
Wish me luck.

 

[MUDSHARK]

I also was unable to find server everytime I tried for weeks. My son Clint came over Friday and was updating when I arrived home. I will ask him his secret and maybe we both can learn something.

 

[Sr SQ]

I respectfully disagree with the above. With Toshiba's A3 players available for $100 with two movies in the box and five by rebate, why not buy one of those? They upscale SD great, also. There are also several HD-DVD only releases that may not be available on BD for quite some time, if at all. Would I go out and buy 50 new discs at full price? Probably not, but it's not like any you have will disinigrate when/if HD looses.
That's my two cents worth.

PS I DO agree that BD needs to get their crap together, though!!!!

I have to agree
I was in he same boat as the OP a couple of weeks ago.
Locally the rental stores we rent from have a little larger selection of HD vs BD and when one of the local shops put the HD-A30 on for $219 I decided that was the way to go for a year or so until this format thing hashes out.
I guess if you want to buy the discs then it would be a different story but if Toshiba didn't give me 7 movies I wouldn't own one.

 

[Davidt1]

The A30 can be had for $140 now. I think its up-converting abilitiy is better most regular upconverting dvd players including those Oppo ones. I am seriously thinking about buying one. Already have the Oppo 970. Now need a second player. Does anyone know if the A30 can handles TrueHD audio?

 

[Gimpy Ric]

Why anyone would think to buy an HD DVD player at this point in time is beyond me

I have both an A3 and a PS3 so I am somewhat neutral but I say get a BD player.

Several companies are offering newer faster BD players. My Sony BDP-S300 is 2nd. Generation, and warms up slow. I've just upgraded the firmware, and shes rock solid, well built, and just groovy.

Here is an example of current HD And BD players

A few BD players. I'd get the open box BDP-S300 for $275.00, and just upgrade the firmware.

 

[Davidt1]

Why anyone would think to buy an HD DVD player at this point in time is beyond me

I have both an A3 and a PS3 so I am somewhat neutral but I say get a BD player.

How about people who need a super nice up-converting dvd player but don't want to pay four times more for a BD? Some HD deals come with 7 free movies. The A3, for example, can be had for $100 and comes with 5 or 7 free movies.

 

[sokrman14]

It may as well become a fact that bluray has/will win this war. At most HDDVD will be lucky if they can last til the end of the year. I don't know why, even at how cheap they are, people would go out and buy and HDDVD player. The more I see people recommend still buying them, the more I feel bad for them because the people that listen to them will be so pissed off when HDDVD is gone. I would never recommend and HDDVD player to someone, only bluray, or SD if you arent ready for the price jump. As far as the audio formats go, they are finalized, they are just as finalized as DVD and HDDVD are. There are Dolby TrueHD, DTS MA, and PCM.

 

[sokrman14]

How about people who need a super nice up-converting dvd player but don't want to pay four times more for a BD? Some HD deals come with 7 free movies. The A3, for example, can be had for $100 and comes with 5 or 7 free movies.

They convert just as well as a regular DVD upconverting player, and you don't have to worry about having movies that will be useless in a year.

 

[BMXTRIX]

The main arguement for HD DVD purchase should be rentals and upconversion - nothing more. HD DVD at this point is, basically, dead in the water as a format and while it may not be written in stone, it definitely is penciled up on the wall that Paramount and Universal will be releasing on Blu-ray before this year is out.

It means that a HD DVD purchase now can deliver to you only Universal and Paramount new movies throughout this year (perhaps longer), and already released WB movies (up through May). After May, only about 20% of the movies released will be available on HD DVD, and while 7 free movies is great, they better actually be movies you want to see.

I've got an A2 and my wife most definitely complains about how incredibly slow it is about everything related to everything. Slow load, slow response, slow, slow, slow. This was compared to our regular DVD player and our PS3 w/Nyko Blue Wave IR remote control (via universal remote).

If you have the money for Blu-ray then the PS3 is a great way to go. Not one person that I have heard who owns one has ever really complained about it. If the money is to much and you gotta buy now, then a cheap DVD player may do it for you.

But, once you have the knowledge to know what is out there, the choice is up to you. I couldn't possibly recommend buying into HD DVD if your intent is to actually get movies for it and if you WANT to have a next generation HD format. The honor belongs exclusively to Blu-ray at this point for the long term.

 

[Alamar]

I've got to agree with BMXTRIX for once .... IF you get an HD-DVD player then I'd only bother with it from a rental [NetFlix or BlockBuster] standpoint. You can watch a decent number of HD flicks for cheap and you can wait for the cost of BluRay players to come down.

On the other hand if you like video games the PS3 at 400$ or so would be tempting [compared to buying 100$+ HD player now and a 200$+ BluRay player later] because you get into the likely winning format now, can enjoy more rentals than HD-DVD likely has, and can wait for the price of movies to eventually fall.

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On the other hand if your TV & audio system isn't good then you may not get a lot of benefit from going HD-DVD or BluRay until those are upgraded.

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EDIT: If only I could easily get around region codes with BluRay

 

[Martiad3]

... and you don't have to worry about having movies that will be useless in a year.

Please explain to me how my movies will be useless in a year? Will they suddenly stop playing in my HD-DVD player? Will Toshiba say "Sorry guys, we're stopping production and also sending out a signal to permanently turn off all HD-DVD players."? Or will they just come by and take it all away from me?

I'm sorry if I'm taking this a little too far, but it's perfectly valid to recommend getting something like an HD-A3. It doesn't cost any more than a decent SD upconversion DVD player (which the A3 does a great job at), plus it'll play HD media. You get some really good free movies that'll look great and sound great.

I guess I just don't see the harm. If the guy needs a new DVD player, I think it'd be a lot better to spend $100 on an A3, enjoy some HD rentals and good quality upconversion, and wait for BR to get its profile situation straightened out and for prices to come down.

Just my opinion though.

 

[Alamar]

Please explain to me how my movies will be useless in a year? Will they suddenly stop playing in my HD-DVD player? Will Toshiba say "Sorry guys, we're stopping production and also sending out a signal to permanently turn off all HD-DVD players."? Or will they just come by and take it all away from me?

I'm sorry if I'm taking this a little too far, but it's perfectly valid to recommend getting something like an HD-A3. It doesn't cost any more than a decent SD upconversion DVD player (which the A3 does a great job at), plus it'll play HD media. You get some really good free movies that'll look great and sound great.

I guess I just don't see the harm. If the guy needs a new DVD player, I think it'd be a lot better to spend $100 on an A3, enjoy some HD rentals and good quality upconversion, and wait for BR to get its profile situation straightened out and for prices to come down.

Just my opinion though.

It just kind of seems like a waste to spend 100$ on a player now and then spend another 200$ after prices come down for a while. IF I was a gamer and the PS3 was interesting for some gaming value then spending 400$ on that would be a pretty good move from a value proposition.

Of course if you're not a gamer then going HD-DVD then waiting a while for BD may not be a bad idea if the player prices do come down in a reasonable time frame.

 

[acacia987]

Please explain to me how my movies will be useless in a year? Will they suddenly stop playing in my HD-DVD player? Will Toshiba say "Sorry guys, we're stopping production and also sending out a signal to permanently turn off all HD-DVD players."? Or will they just come by and take it all away from me?

I'm sorry if I'm taking this a little too far, but it's perfectly valid to recommend getting something like an HD-A3. It doesn't cost any more than a decent SD upconversion DVD player (which the A3 does a great job at), plus it'll play HD media. You get some really good free movies that'll look great and sound great.

I guess I just don't see the harm. If the guy needs a new DVD player, I think it'd be a lot better to spend $100 on an A3, enjoy some HD rentals and good quality upconversion, and wait for BR to get its profile situation straightened out and for prices to come down.

Just my opinion though.

i couldn't agree more!, i own an A-2, got 7 free movies, and i use netflix to rent my media. Another thing is whats wrong with people that they cant wait 20 seconds for a movie to load???? stop making a mountain out of a mole hill. for people that need a new up-converting DVD player that just bought a new TV,and don't feel like dropping a lot on blue-ray i would definitely recommend buying a Hd0dvd player,