But I Already HAVE a DVD Player!

[admin]

I've stayed out of the high def format debate mostly because of apathy. I honestly don't care. I don't own a player, have no real desire to run out and buy one, and I know a lot of people that feel the same way. It was a conversation I had over the weekend with a PS3 owner that started me thinking. Of course he was complaining about the lack of games but what was more interesting was the complete LACK of mention of Blu-ray. Why? The box is in his living room, hooked up to his stereo (I assumed), and connected to his TV. But he never mentioned the Blu-ray capacity.

Discuss "But I Already HAVE a DVD Player!" here. Read the article.

 

[autoboy]

Yep,

I've been arguing this for a long time. The only way any HD disc will get adopted is if they offer the disc for the same price as the DVD and make it backward compatible so all discs have both formats on them. Only HD-DVD can do this and they won't because they don't want to invest in this kind of plan. It essentially makes the HD version free. Instead of making profits on the disc they could hopefully make profits on the players as people upgrade.

Most people didn't see any difference in quality b/w vhs and dvd, they switched so you didn't have to rewind. What makes anyone think Jane Doe will want anything except a game changer like the vhs to dvd switch? DVDs already look pretty damn good on HD displays.

The next game changer is On Demand movies (and I am not talking exclusivly comcast here). However, we are not likely to get any great quality improvement with instant downloads. I personally would rather watch a soft DVD than a blocky mess of low bitrate 1080i HD mpeg2.

 

[Joe Schmoe]

Those of us who have been collecting DVDs for years, and have now ammassed collections worth thousands of $, are in no hurry to replace them with something new.
Also, DVD still has the power to impress, especially with certain material (the aerial views of Las Vegas that open most CSI episodes, for example.)

 

[Dezoris]

First and foremost, this entire thing namely with the Paramount announcement is very very disappointing.

It's true I am biased towards BluRay because I own a PS3.
Also I prefer it over HDDVD because it was a Microsoft project.
The last thing they need is more design influence over more market share.

Aside from that with the sales numbers of BluRay increasing I started actually buying BluRay in hopes this was the turning point.
After this I am not buying anymore.

Even more depressing is that Sony for once went out on a limb and made a very good console/DVD/Hi-Def player years ahead of it's time and this article highlights many of the reasons people are not buying it.

The niche market of techies is obviously smaller that the companies thought.

The other thing this article does is brings to light another good point.
Enough of the optical storage.

Where is our down loadable hi-def movies?
Where are our players that integrate into home theatre for networking, music, stream radio and download and store 1000s of movies.
The PS3 and Xflop attempt this but not at an acceptable level.

Give me a player With 4 hard drives in it, and let us download our movies like i-tunes but with real video and sound quality, make it trendy and cheap.

 

[Shugs1037]

I'm LMAO at the pic of Mark H crying like a school girl

I logged onto the site and saw the pic of Luke .....I started laughing like a little school girl in my cubicle. Great shot selection!!! Moohahahahahaha!!

In serious response to the article........these companies can all bite me! They aren't getting another penny from me until they end the war, get HDMI to cooperate and make products that will maximize the formats potential before deep sixing it. I saw a Runco 610 setup playing a regular def disc (I provided the disc which was The Aviator) on a 2:35:1 screen using an anamorphic lens.....most awesome picture I have ever seen!!! No 1080P,Just pure 480P upconverted to 720P. It's all in the processing folks. I realize the Runco stuff is expensive but come on!! Why can't other companies make regular DVDs look this friggin good!? I will be perfectly happy to buy my "low rez" PJ and screen and not worry about 1080P since these companies are already making money hand over fist on regular DVDs. At least when I plug in the component cables and Toshlink digital I know it will actually work on any combination of products I buy. This whole format war, HDMI garbage and marketing hyped 1080P business can go fly a kite......and I consider myself to be an Audioholic!

Don't get me wrong.....bigger, faster, brighter, clearer, sharper, louder...are all great things. But come back to me when they all work well together and the sales guy at the local Hi-Fi store actually knows which version of HDMI we are on...

The mighty dollar talks and that is what will influence the industry more than any hype or promises can.....

 

[autoboy]

But come back to me when they all work well together and the sales guy at the local Hi-Fi store actually knows which version of HDMI we are on

The sales guy should never have to know what HDMI version we are on and the average joe should never have to worry about double scaling an image because their xbox360 is set to 1080i on a 720p screen. These things should autodetect the optimum resolution just like computers do now. It is freaking retarded.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I've stayed out of the high def format debate mostly because of apathy. I honestly don't care. I don't own a player, have no real desire to run out and buy one, and I know a lot of people that feel the same way. It was a conversation I had over the weekend with a PS3 owner that started me thinking. Of course he was complaining about the lack of games but what was more interesting was the complete LACK of mention of Blu-ray. Why? The box is in his living room, hooked up to his stereo (I assumed), and connected to his TV. But he never mentioned the Blu-ray capacity.

Discuss "But I Already HAVE a DVD Player!" here. Read the article.

I own both a blu-ray & hd dvd player. But I don't buy every HD movies that come out. I think most movies and TV shows don't even DESERVE the HD treatment, especially with the new awesome 1080p upscaling DVD players out there.

 

[j_garcia]

If the video quality is noticeably improved and the supplemental material isn't lost, I don't have a problem replacing discs with the new versions.

I don't see a lack of games. There are quite a few good ones on the market right now.

 

[autoboy]

Who here watches the suplemental material on a regular basis? I know I have only watched it on a select few discs.

 

[j_garcia]

And that is probably why they don't feel the need to include it all the time. I don't watch it on every disc, but I do at the very least like to watch gag reels/outtakes and deleted scenes. Rarely do I watch most or all of the additional content.

 

[avaserfi]

And that is probably why they don't feel the need to include it all the time. I don't watch it on every disc, but I do at the very least like to watch gag reels/outtakes and deleted scenes. Rarely do I watch most or all of the additional content.

I feel exactly the same. In general after watching a movie I enjoy quiet a bit I love to watch the outtakes/bloopers etc...otherwise I could care less.

 

[Thunder18]

I admit, I rarely watch special features, but if the movie was a good comedy, occassionally, they include some good gag reels and such. 300 is the first Blu-Ray that I've watched any special features on and I have to admit I enjoyed it. It was also nice that I didn't have to switch to an extra "supplemental" disc in order to watch the special features. Now even with that being said, I don't like the idea of video on demand, or even downloadable movies for that matter, unless I can successfully burn them to some kind of physical format other than a hard drive. Cable outages are uncommon nowadays, but they do happen. Time Warner let me stew for 7 days before sending someone out to replace my cable box. As for downloading or streaming movies...I don't want to have to connect my computer to my home theater system all the time. My laptop is not equipped to output digital audio to my receiver so I couldn't get surround sound. Not to mention hard drives fail! They are also not as cheap as dvd's to replace. Come to think of it, i've never actually had a dvd fail. You take care not to scratch them and they work. All hard drives quote a "MTBF" or mean time before failure. They have a finite life and I'd hate to lose a library worth of movies to a hard drive failure.

 

[jimfitz]

I just bought a new Sony Blu-ray DVD and Samsung 1080p LCD. I don't buy DVD's, but I recently joined the Blockbuster mail rental service and am really enjoying my new system. It is well worth the price of admission.

 

[davidtwotrees]

Tom, you hit my sentiments exactly! I am 80/20 music/movies. My Denon 3910 plays SD DVDs just fine. Would I like better quality movies? You betcha. Let me know when it is all figured out. Until then, meh, I could care less. And you can bet your bippy the man in the street cares even less.

 

[stratman]

Most additional material is marketing hype anyway, notice when they re-release a movie with alternate ending, director's cut, etc. most of the time its just milking the product. The master of this is George Lucas and his "empire," when he re-releases the hi def versions of Star Wars people will go out and buy it again along with all the other versions previously released.

 

[Pwner_2130]

Yep,

I've been arguing this for a long time. The only way any HD disc will get adopted is if they offer the disc for the same price as the DVD and make it backward compatible so all discs have both formats on them. Only HD-DVD can do this and they won't because they don't want to invest in this kind of plan. It essentially makes the HD version free. Instead of making profits on the disc they could hopefully make profits on the players as people upgrade.

Most people didn't see any difference in quality b/w vhs and dvd, they switched so you didn't have to rewind. What makes anyone think Jane Doe will want anything except a game changer like the vhs to dvd switch? DVDs already look pretty damn good on HD displays.

The next game changer is On Demand movies (and I am not talking exclusivly comcast here). However, we are not likely to get any great quality improvement with instant downloads. I personally would rather watch a soft DVD than a blocky mess of low bitrate 1080i HD mpeg2.

Pretty sure that more than a few of us noticed the quality difference between the two formats. Especially when viewing DVDs on a HD set.

 

[keni88]

Those of us who have been collecting DVDs for years, and have now ammassed collections worth thousands of $, are in no hurry to replace them with something new.
Also, DVD still has the power to impress, especially with certain material (the aerial views of Las Vegas that open most CSI episodes, for example.)

 

[Joe Schmoe]

Those of us who have been collecting DVDs for years, and have now ammassed collections worth thousands of $, are in no hurry to replace them with something new.
Also, DVD still has the power to impress, especially with certain material (the aerial views of Las Vegas that open most CSI episodes, for example.)

This is an exact, word-for word duplication of my earlier post (#3). So where are the quotation marks?? Also, did you have a comment or something to add??

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Most additional material is marketing hype anyway, notice when they re-release a movie with alternate ending, director's cut, etc. most of the time its just milking the product. The master of this is George Lucas and his "empire," when he re-releases the hi def versions of Star Wars people will go out and buy it again along with all the other versions previously released.

I for one will NOT be buying anymore of his Star Wars. I think Episodes 1, 2, & 3 are total crap. Episodes 4, 5, & 6 are just too OLD to look or sound good in Hi-Def. The SD versions are more than good enough here.

I don't get all the Hi-Def "remastering" of any pre-90s movies. Dolby Digital and DTS weren't even around yet.

 

[migs_inc]

A few more thoughts on VHS vs. DVD vs Blu Ray

I appreciate the author's point of view, and generally agree. However, DVD vs. VHS has, I think, a few more components to it. DVDs often have better picture quality than VHS, generally due to the technology (tape wear and dirty heads tend to degrade picture and, sometimes, audio quality). DVDs are more compact, making it easier to store. Their size is the same as CDs, so they "fit" better into cabinets and the like. All these factors played into the consumers choice of DVD vs. VHS.

This "choice," however, was ultimately driven by manufacturers, with DVDs offering them far more options for advertising and branding, content (due to additional capacity vs VHS) and control (DVDs that force viewing of certain portions). Consumers did not fight the evolution to DVD, so it happened.

As a simplistic non-engineer, I always thought Blu Ray vs. HD DVD was a simple choice in favor of Blu Ray, and I base that on capacity. That is overly simplistic, as cost of disk production and other factors certainly influence the choice. Ultimately, though, the "winner," if indeed either of these two win, will be driven more by manufacturer influence than consumers, if the past is any indication. My preference - get all of my content onto one small, portable, easily backed-up "thing," whether it be a disk, cube, or magic crystal. Oh, and I'd like a time machine, too.

As for me, I'm with the author's friend. I am sticking with my DVD player, whose video and audio quality is quite good over my HDTV. Then again, I may have been the last person on my block to go from VHS to DVD, so I am not exactly a bellweather for technology shifts.