[mbriant]

Personally, Blu-Ray's superior picture is worth it to me. But I have to admit, Blu-Ray's market entrance and growth so far has been very similar to SACD's. A long, drawn-out, consumer-turn-off battle for format supremacy, a higher price for both hardware and software vs. the established existing format, and an improvement that so far at least, only seems to appeal to the minority. (at a premium price, at least.)

Perhaps having two similar formats at one time with only slight improvements to the premium priced format will never work. Maybe the only way for either SACD or Blu-Ray to be dominant in their respective areas, is to market them at the same price as Redbook CD and standard DVD. Unfortunately, that wouldn't make sense from the hardware/software manufacturers' perspective.

 

[Kirosia]

On my fairly old 19" vga crt, 1080i/p and 720i/p videos look much, much better than upsampled/scaled DVD. I canonly imagine how much more noticeable the difference is on a high-end HDTV/Monitor.

 

[EyeAmEye]

Quote:

Originally Posted by archosman /img/forum/go_quote.gif Yes... I kind of disagree. I see a huge difference in image quality. I may be a poor judge of character due to the fact I'm in television. We always strive for the best picture and are critical of everything.

I could be seen as the opposite. I still watch SD cable with all the artifacts on my HDTV and couldn't give a rat's dump

DirecTV will not get another $10 a month!

 

[fatcat28037]

Makes you wonder if Toshiba is peeking around the corner and thinking, "maybe an inexpensive HD-DVD would work right about now".

 

[Al4x]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kirosia /img/forum/go_quote.gif On my fairly old 19" vga crt, 1080i/p and 720i/p videos look much, much better than upsampled/scaled DVD. I canonly imagine how much more noticeable the difference is on a high-end HDTV/Monitor.

as i say, its more noticable to me on my laptop than on the 40 inch LCD hdtv down stairs

tho i think my parents are after a 50in one, i dunno why tho

 

[apatN]

I don't Blu Ray is going to die, but I do agree the marketing is kinda whack. It's way too expensive. But so is everything that gets introduced in the electronic game.

Blu-ray's only reason for existence is HD. HD is new as well and it will take some time before everybody owns a nice TV capable of doing 720p.

You can't say it's dead already. More and more producers film in HD and by doing so more space will be needed from a disc. Blu-ray is the only solution atm. The BDA owns the whole of Blu-ray and so they have a monopoly, hence the reason everything is so expensive. Sooner or later they will have to lower their prices, however.

 

[virometal]

Interesting article, ,though the market share has been above 4 points for a while, at least according to the Engadget HD numbers I read every week. I don't think it's dead. However, neither do I think it will replace DVD in the foreseeable future.

I think one problem is that studios other than Sony - whose masters are consistently excellent - are releasing a-lot of shoddy masters. I don't know if that will ever change though, unless the industry moves completely digital. Still the choice flicks look great. The latest Godfather set for example - beautiful! The restoration project for the films, was extensive and expensive.

 

[Kirosia]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Al4x /img/forum/go_quote.gif as i say, its more noticable to me on my laptop than on the 40 inch LCD hdtv down stairs tho i think my parents are after a 50in one, i dunno why tho

Viewing distance is huge factor, mostly people keep their computer screens closer so improvement is much more prominent. Likewise, watching an HDTV (depending on the size/res) from really far away will make the differences appear minimal.

 

[Al4x]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kirosia /img/forum/go_quote.gif Viewing distance is huge factor, mostly people keep their computer screens closer so improvement is much more prominent. Likewise, watching an HDTV (depending on the size/res) from really far away will make the differences appear minimal.

thats the very reason i dont feel the need for a massive tv with less pixels than my small screen,

 

[glitch39]

another consortium is trying to revive what's left of Blu-Ray. I think it's too late. In people's minds, they'd be buying HD-DVD this x'mas.

yep, only enthisiasts know the real difference and advantage to Blu-Ray

 

[necropimp]

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Actual /img/forum/go_quote.gif hm, I still think Blu Rays time is coming. People (based on unscientific polling/spying-on of my friends and family) are slow to upgrade televisions, so most don't have good enough high definition sets to both with blu ray....

you can still watch downscaled bluray on an SDTV and it's still a slight improvement over DVD... this will probably be brought up more when HDTV and player prices drop a little more and player/disc sales increase and the eventual forced obsolescence begins

right now bluray is not dying... it's about where DVD was right before it slowly started replacing VHS.. $200 players $30 new releases

 

[krmathis]

Its a slow starter, but I really don't think its dead...
Took some time for DVD to rule the market, over VHS as well.

 

[archosman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by EyeAmEye /img/forum/go_quote.gif I could be seen as the opposite. I still watch SD cable with all the artifacts on my HDTV and couldn't give a rat's dump DirecTV will not get another $10 a month!

We agree to disagree!

 

[olblueyez]

They just installed FIOS in our apartment building and im thinking by the time Blew-Ray gets going that people will begin to download movies and it will never enjoy the longevity that DVD has. For now I enjoy the HD-DVD titles I bought and even when they were availible I was still buying regular DVDs for most stuff because they look great upsampled. If it were a true replacement for DVD, pricewise then it would stand a chance but the people at Sony are like those guys at AIG, enough is never enough. Compair the older battles (DVD vs VHS) if you want but technology surges ahead exponentionaly and the large periods of time between formats are gone.

 

[Kirosia]

Actually, Sony's relatively in the crapper at the moment. Sony slashes 2008 earnings forecast by a cool billion - BloggingStocks

As for digital distribution, don't expect it to take over physical media anytime soon.