The difference this time for HD-DVD/Blu-ray that was not there in Beta/VHS is video games consoles: customers will already have their video players in them, instead of just choosing one type or another based on marketing!

MS will only release a HD-DVD add-on, while Sony will have Blu-ray bundled in their PS3. Also the PS3 will obviously sell better than MS. On top of that, Sony now holds many awesome exclusive hits, like the upcoming Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children (if you haven't imported it). Finally, the image quality will be better and the movies will have more extras because of the bigger storage. 'Nuff said.

I think the people who voted HD-DVD are MS fan boys. If you look at the specs, Blu-Ray is the superior Disc and had the potential to "upgrade"(if you will) to go up 200GB a disc. Because of this, it will eventually win out over HD-DVD. Although, I am very excited over both formats.

Let me ask you this, how many people do you think will be playing Blu-Ray movies anytime soon? As for storage, since when did storage capacity determine the winner of a format war? The movie industry will determine the winner of this battle. Not a bunch of computer enthusiasts with burners.

As for either one, its a safer bet to go with a proven format, than to actively pursue establishing a format that doesn't exist. Sony had better hope that Blu-Ray does prove dominant, or at least remains available. They may be making a huge mistake trying to establish technology that 80% of consumers have no interest in. This has to do more than with just the disc format. The entire system is choc-ful of technology that we all think is awesome, but 80% of the market will have no use for. Such as the Cell processor. How many of you think the Cell processor will be available aside from the computer market? And even in that market, the hardware doesn't exist to utilize that processor.

Even with its techno goodies (where MS is no slouch either), they'll have a hard time justifying the extra expense to the consumer of buying the console and whatever media becomes available for it.



What 200gb disc do you think a consumer will ever be able to touch. Do you realize how expensive a disc of that capacity would be? Not to mention a drive that can acutually read a disc of that capacity. What good is this evetuallization of Blu-Ray dominance if it takes 5-6 years to become available?

They will both fail... in time. We can expect holografic media in 2006, 100 GB storage at 100 MB/sec rewritible. And the price well below the curent dvd-r. They will rapidly be upscaled to 1 TB and up. So they are far superior to hd-dvd and blue-ray, both in storage volume and speed.

You cant stop hackers and piraters its a proven fact. Just because they dont have blue-ray roms yet dosen't mean they wont in the future.....

Who cares who wins the war. Are any of you going to be paid????

i'm voting blu-ray

it's backed by apple, and they are slowly taking the media scene away from M$ (especially when it comes to providing content)

I vote that they will both die. Why because enthusiasts are sick of the endless vhs/beta battles and joe six pack doesn't know any better and is happy with SD DVD. J6P doens't really understand that that High Def monitor needs a high def signal....

Witness the SACD/DVD-A battle...who's winning? Who cares? 5 guys in New Jersey sitting in thier basements posting on Audiophilia about the Sony SCD-1 being just as good as vinyl. if the maufacturers can't stop bickering like little assholes the same thing will happen to HD DVD.

HD-DVD: Cheap, easier to produce, the dvd name is now in peoples minds and MS are backing it.
C`mon its MS, they have enough money to make the blu-ray format fail and most computers in the world have the MS os on.

BLU-RAY: In the ps3, more storage. Who cares about storage? Sony have always had the "better" technology but always fail. The protection on the disks is just going to be a huge pain and thats all sony care about.
Weve all seen what theyve done with there music cds with there virus like software installing on your pc.

The thing is the consumer is the one whos going to pick the format. I think there going to pick the hd-dvd. Its much cheaper and the name dvd.
Plus you have porn companies using hd-dvd which won the war for vhs.

i think blue ray wil stand a chance, look at umd movies sony got lucky there and they may again w the ps3 playing blueray. but hd dvd will probably win its still a dvd , sony has been cloning features from it , and its only a 10% increase in price due to the fact that i can still use most of the current dvd making machines , blue ray needs all new manufacture process

This thread reeks of fanboys. Blueray has already won. Mosre studios are supporting blueray and several are refusing to support hd-dvd. More hardware manufacturers are supporting Blureray as well. Asside from the greater storage space in Blueray, they also allow HD and SD content to be on one side of the disk where as you will have to get up and flip your HD-DVD disk.

I say both will fail. Why? Holographic discs will rape their asses all the way.

Actually I've seen figure of 10-15 grand for a recorder.

And $200 per disc as the current price for holographic storage.

Both will fail, DVDs have not been around for all that long and so many old timers are still using VHS.. People are getting raped up the ass with prices and new technology and I think they won't buy into either. Besides do we relaly need them? you can rip most DVDs onto Cds (excluding menus, extra) and let's face it most of us never use the extras.. Also in regards to games, most PC games are on CD format still, using 3 or more discs but they are not even using DVDs...
also, with compress technology as it is, there is no need for 47Gig

blu-ray will dominate because sony owns enough titles to push it along. Look at how many movies sony put out on umd. The fact is through bmg and sony's hollywood contacts its looking like the next home entertainment format will be blu-ray... whether or not being a dominant computer storage medium will be enough to keep hd-dvd afloat remains to see but that seems like it's likely future. and about the whole MS thing remember MS has no huge vested interest in hd-dvd besides the fact that it is more friendly with their media center os, and they want to screw over sony... but it seems clear through MSs comments that they will jump off the hd-dvd ship if blu-ray becomes the clear front runner.

i picked bluray. much better future for it.

DVD's came out because they could fit long movies on 1 disc including extras. companies sure made use of that. 2disc dvds are commonplace now.

with HDDVD its gonna be DVD all over again. one HD movie will fit on the disc with a few extras. once they fill that up theyre gonna start throwing us 2 disc hddvds like they did with DVD. atleast with bluray theres gonna be the ability to have the highdef movie with tons of extras all in HD.

bluray costs alot yes, but so did DVD when it first came out. $1000 for a dvd player when they came out. HDDVD is already cheap format, u wont see a whole lot of price decreases with it. atleast with bluray theres the potential for price drops.

imo, both will succeed but id say bluray is a much better overall format.
standards now a days arent common. years ago 1 type one, and that was it. now we have so many different formats that all havent died. hell, minidisc is still alive.
just look at mp3 (vbr, cbr, many different bitrates, many different encoders.)
same goes for divx and xvid.
dvd's even still are +/-. CD's atleast went -r after a while, dvds dont look like they will anymore.

so yeah, imo both formats will live (unfortunately, because now were gonna see exclusives on either format like consoles) but i think bluray should win.

I Don't think there is a market for either right now, everybody has spent the last 10 years building a dvd collection. Dvd's look awesome on my 46" Plasm. I buy every gadget when it comes out, but until there is a clear cut winner I won't even sniff a new format. A good DVD player with component out is all you need, you can barley notice the difference. I think HD-DVD will win because it's compatible with PC's, but we are at least 3 years away from affordable Players.

HDdvd will win because its acually document as the offical new standard and sony is just releasing theres cause they can.I dont trust sony in any disc they ever make.Who knows wtf they can put on each disc to keep me from copying or spying on me,because this has happend already on standard cds ,just think what could happend on there own format.And finally i hear the disc life of the blueray is only like 10 years as to hddvd keeping the same specs of the dvd which is 100 years.Yeah no dout about that ,if thats true sony will fail real bad.10 vs 100 years will easly chose the next format.

SD DVD's look better with a up-converting DVD player and most of the new HD DVD players up-convert SD DVD's through their HDMI output.

HD DVD's on a HD DVD player with a HD display look amazing. The HD DVD CES demos were terrific.

HD DVD will be out before Blu-rey, the hardware cost 50% less and the discs are less expensive. HD DVD has the market edge over Blu-rey. Why wait, for well under $1k you could have a state of the art HD DVD player and a great library of HD DVD.

We just began to offer Toshiba's HD-A1 and HD-XA1 and advance sales are very strong.

-Robert

alot of people are getting this wrong. this argument/war will be decided by the movie industry. if they can get HD-DVD out before blu-ray, then people will buy them.

i belive that HD-DVD will win, it has a lot going for it in terms of reasons why it might win

Blu-Ray will win.
With sony mass producing the drives for the new ps3 the price of making a blu ray play will drop dramatically as it did with dvd.
MS cater for computer enthusiasts and the genral business market where as sony create for everyone from televisions to dvds, films and music.

I vote for neither.

... and actually, the hype for one format over the other is completly retarded at this point.
"MS soft is backing HD-DVD... No.. they are NOT going to support HD-DVD... They ARE
going to suppory HD-DVD.... They ARE going to Support Blu-Ray... They are NOT going to support
Blu-Ray...... blah blah"

Who the heck cares right now? If the first stages of the format will only be for movies, it will
take that a few years to even become commonplace. Besides those who wipe their arses
with money, who would even buy one of these 'new technology' devices to watch a movie?
You'll just end up spending a ton of money for what... something that will be useless in
two years afterwards becasue of the next XBOX system coming out.

Lets talk about this in another year or two when we actually
see something happening. People, DVD burners are finally a norm and we are not even to
the point where DL-DVD is common yet. (Mostly becasue of media prices) That is so sad.

in the end i think neither will win, with holographic discs coming out next year, and the discs getting cheaper, I see no need for the next formats. As said before, I believe that the HD-DVD is basically too small for new standards, while the blu-ray doesnt allow you to copy the disc. I would take the size difference if I could copy with HD-DVD, however, I dont think either format will survive, in the end I think they are both betamax, and the next up-and-coming device will be the holographic disc.

If you look at the curent market for new disc formats like a 3x3 grid, you can imagine Sony and MS playing a game of format naughts and crosses.

The same thing happened with VHS/BETA, but the VHS camp got enough of the market to make it a standard, so they won.

I don't see this happening with the new formats. There are a large group of movie people supporting blu, and a not so large group supporting hd. Unless one side takes control of all the important squares, they will not win, and we will end up in a stalemate.

Noboby wants a system where in order to watch WB movies you need one device, and a bluray drive to wtch the rest. They will probably fail. But bluray has the best chance, if sony learnt from the vhs/beta thing.


then of course, these holographic discs everyone is talking about will wipe the floor wth both

Blueray will be just like Sony MD. Sony likes to keep pattions and make money on them. Look at Sony MiniDisc when it first launched you saw a few companys make players for the 6 months they had rights to. after that 6 months nothing happen. I think Blueray will do the same. Also look at cost of the disc Blueray cost more to produce. HDDVD will win this war the name is good the cost if low and its expandable for more space if needed. The movie companys have to make a profit thats number 1. If the cost of material is to high they won't use it. Look at today how cheap dvd's are sold and how much its costing them to make them. Right now I bet you won't find people to pay more than 22.00 for new released movie. now if HDDVD or Blueray comes out and it will be in 1080P or somthing then people might pay alittle extra as much as 30.00 (tops) now as it stands HDDVD can do it where they can make a profit. But BlueRay is coming too close to the profit area. Now also this means the players will also need to come out at a cost savings too. With Toshiba and NEC making them I think the cost will be low enought that HDDVD will come out ahead.

I don't see a driving need or large benefits for a new format like when DVD arrived.
* Better display quality on all existing consumer equipment
* Lower media costs and cost of production
* Lower shipping costs
* Longer play time
* No video degradation.
* No rewinding of media.
* Familar disc format.

With BluRay or HDDVD the benefits aren't as compelling:
* Better display quality on some existing consumer equipment. (Many consumers could not tell the quality difference between VHS and DVD, the law of diminishing returns implies that fewer consumers will notice the next step in quality difference.)
* Familar disc format. (But confusing because DVD is for movies and CD is for music in consumer minds)

I see BluRay as compelling as LaserDisc, which was partially successful.

I would be nice to see a format that is abstracted from the storage media, like flash currently is. This way media advancements could be made over the life of the format while still using the standardized storage interface to access the data.

I think both will fail because Broadband Internet Connections are getting faster and video on demand will and hopefully games on demand will rule.

Thus you could buy movies and games online and have them sent straight to your consoles harddrive for playback.

only problem with that is , there is still something like 70% of the US alone that does NOT have Broadband access...

"access" as in physical cable or "access" as in they dont wanna pay for it ?

who cares only few can fill up a dual layer dvd and use that much seems like a waste of time and ahead of there selves I mean come you can still buy cdroms for your pc whats that tell you seems as if some people want the consumer to put out money for shit they donot need just the liuke that little psp peice of shit with a umd or should I say mini mini dvd

True. And it looks like they've already determined that Blu-Ray is the winner.



Where do you pull your crazy statistics from? I bet there were people like you 5 years ago who said that "Nobody need to store 4.7 gb of data! 80% of consumers won't use these new fangled 'DVD-Rs'". Everyday, more and more people are wanted to store more and more data. There is a huge market already for inexpensive, high capacity data storage (and yes, Blu-Ray will become inexpensive, just like DVD is now). Most people's home PC holds more than 10 gb of data. How do you back that up? RAR the whole thing into seperate 4.7 gb files then burn to DVD? Sounds good, but what happens when you need to backup 20gb, or 30? It becomes a real hassle. Then there is business and government who are looking for ways to backup hundreds of gb.



Do you realise how cheap these disc will become 12 months after introduction? The same thing happened with CDR, DVD-R, etc. They all start out expensive, and then prices drop very quickly. Cost will not be a problem.

Sony were smart to include Blu-Ray with the PS3. That's a guaranteed 50 million sales (ps2 was over 80mil worldwide). So regardless of what all the M$ fanboys think, there will be millions of people wanting blu ray movies and discs thanks to the PS3 alone.

Disc's get damaged too easy i've had data last longer on my pc hard drive than i have on disc's so instead of burning stuff to disc now i just buy another hard drive.

If they were smart they would make it so that if you buy a movie or game online and have it downloaded to your hard drive, you own the right to have that, so a record would be kept that you bought that game. If anything should happen to that peice of content like a hard drive gone dead. Then you could re download it at no cost

Where as if you scratch a disc that's it you have to buy another one.

i vote for hddvd since it will be generally cheaper and somewhat more versatile for use. i wouldn't be surprised if bluray comes on top, though.



1366x768 wasn't started by sony, right? that res. is more pc friendly by the way(4:3 1024x768 output of games, etc).

i think you hit the nail on the head Bizquick

They need to dump legacy support altogether and look to the future. Blu-Ray wins there, sorta. Digital video connecitons, digital audio connections, not a bit of analog. Maybe if they forced shit upon people we still wouldn't have most of hte world watching analog TV and using VHS.

I'm voting HDDVD atm, simply because of the better DRM on it (as opposed to Bluray).
Space doesn't matter terribly unless movies are stupidly encoded with MPEG-2 (FAR better compression producing FAR better quality is in the specs). For movies the space of a HDDVD is pretty much enough.

F**k this I'm going back to vhs. Lol just kidding...seriously i hope sony and MS both burn in hell, for they're monopolistic ways. The thing is sony is trying to start a reason for the market to start making better TVs. The PS3 is supposably gonna run at 120fps!!!. What the fuck, current television sets don't even run at that. So in return sony is trying to fast foward the entertainment market by bringing out all this gay-ray shit which will run smooth and better oooooooooohhhhhhh. They are saying the PS3 is ahead of it's so therefore it will be around for years to come. Anyways, sony is smart= PS3 will run at "supposably" 120fps, PS3 will run on gay-ray, tv's will have to comply for compatiblity, forcing market change, and which television will come out with that compatibily first? Of course sony...you see were i'm getting at with this long ass boring paragraph....fucking sony!! And MS counterattacks with HD-DVD. Which in term is more common with the general public, so some people might want to buy HD-DVD instead cuz they feel less overpowered by something that "sound" similar...what the fuck is gay-ray...common folk don't know...so we'll see what will happen. Or maybe...just maybe I'm full of shit, high on PCP and don't know what the fuck I'm talking about...hmmm

To be honest screw both of em and wait for the blue ray/hddvd combo drives to arise and then it wont matter just like + or - dvd dosent matter now

I vote for the one without HDCP... oh wait, that's neither.

I'm surprised that no one has explicitely mentioned that probably half of the HDTVs in homes won't be able to play either format in HD because they lack a DVI/HDMI port for the HDCP encryption.

This is also a huge problem since no graphics card on the market supports it for the PC and no monitor other than the 30" Dell that just came out has HDCP support. I don't know if graphics cards will have updated drivers to support HDCP, but you'll definately need a new monitor, and they will have to redesign laptops as well.

Also, I really don't care about HD-DVD having a lesser DRM, since streaming, etc, will probably only work in Windows Media Center.

The person that made the point that ps3 having blue ray may really be a boost to the overall market saturation of the technology has a point. I bought my ps2 simply for the dvd function seeing as I was getting two great technologies in one, video game console and dvd player.

There won't be many (if any) Blu-Ray/HD-DVD hybrid readers/writers because of the heavy licensing limitations set by Sony vs Toshiba, etc. So no, one format will have to win, but I think if HD-DVD ends up being the "Winner", Sony won't back down for years to come (much like the Sony MemoryStick, whilst everyone else is using SD, MMC, and other Flash memory). Eventually, Blu-Ray will fail though.

Last I'd heard, the HD-DVD players will be less expensive than Blu-Ray, at least initially. HD-DVD computer drives will be cheaper than Blu-Ray computer drives. Archiving your computer files will be easier with HD-DVD than with Blu-Ray due to less restrictive DRM issues. People considering a next generation player may find some HD-DVD disks in their collection already, and no Blu-Ray, due to some releases including both on opposite sides of the same disk. And over 80% of the movie companies behind the popular theatre releases of the past few years will be producing HD-DVD compatible disks.

The most favorable scenario for the Blu-Ray format would be Sony taking a MASSIVE loss on each PS3 sold, with full knowledge that many of those consoles will never be used with games, as a very cheap player. If that doesn't happen, I don't think that the format will do very well.

The cheaper and easier to crack will win.

I say HD-DVD will be the one.

---------------------

"gay-ray" lol!

Then they have already decided the winner, for heres the first one I know of thats in HDDVD

This is in no way safe for work. You have been warned.

Yo Mr. Disco Gee, answer me this.

Do you have even 3 DVD-9's on your shelf right now? I'll take a guess that you don't. Want to know why you don't? Because they cost about $40 for a 3-5 pack. And those have been out for quite a while. So when you get his 54gb or 200gb disc in your hands you let me know.

As for 80 percent of the market yes. Do most people out there that play games, not us, just average gamers really have a clue what all this great hardware can do? Will any of those gamers actually utilise any of this great technology in this $500 machine? Yeah some will, but you average Joe sure was hell won't on his 19 inch standard definition TV in his dorm room.

Want to know what the biggest game to date is? Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it's Everquest & Everquest 2. Those weigh in at about 12gb? Go ahead and pay for your 54gb disc, with the 35-40gb of dummy files.

"Groups representing the Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD--both of which are blue laser formats aiming to become the technology to replace DVD--made their announcements at the Consumer Electronics Show here. Both formats offer storage capacities of about 10 times what the DVD format can hold. A DVD disc can store about 4.7GB of data on a single side, while Blu-ray Disc can hold up to 50GB and HD DVD can hold 30GB.
The Blu-ray Disc Association introduced game publishers Electronics Arts and Vivendi Universal Games, along with tech companies Sun Microsystems and Texas Instruments, as the newest members of their group. The companies will support the development, promotion and marketing of the Blu-ray Disc format.
Executive from the game publishers noted that the high storage capacity of Blu-ray Disc was important for them as they look to high-definition game development.
"Gaming is a multibillion-dollar business that is largely being ignored by HD DVD," said Richard Doherty, director of professional AV for Panasonic Hollywood Laboratory.
Blu-ray Disc supporters plan to include interactive features and game capabilities to discs that hold high-definition movies.
Blu-ray recorders and discs are expected in early 2006. Other companies in the Blu-ray Disc Association include Sony, Hewlett-Packard and Dell, among others.
Toshiba, NEC and Sanyo are among the leading electronics makers backing the HD DVD format.
Toshiba said at CES earlier this week that HD DVD recorders and notebook drives would be available in the fourth quarter.
HD DVD entertainment partners stood up to support the HD DVD format Thursday and announced movie and TV series titles that would be available on HD DVD discs by the end of the year. Paramount Home Entertainment, Warner Home Video, Universal Studios Home Entertainment, HBO and New Line Cinema said that about 100 titles, including the "Harry Potter" movies, the "Batman," "Superman," "E.R.," "The West Wing" and "The Sopranos" franchises, would be available on HD DVD discs.
"The real-world benefits (of HD DVD) are apparent and obvious," said Jim Cardwell, president of Warner Home Video. Cardwell added that rapid time-to-market and dependability were significant factors in choosing to go with HD DVD.
HD DVD is based on technology similar to that of DVD, which can reduce the time and cost of manufacturing discs and recorders, according to HD DVD supporters.
Studio supporters of Blu-ray Disc include Walt Disney Pictures and Television and the entertainment properties of Sony. "



As for this format war, Blu-Ray will ultimately fail. Want to know why? These PS3 gamers won't be able to keep their $500 consoles from overheating.

HD-DVD.

HD-DVD players are expected to be about half the price of BLU Ray players (at launch).

Unless BLU Ray players get less expensive, im confident that HD-DVD will win.

But then again, the porn industry may choose to support BLU Ray. They decided the VHS and Betamax war. Why not this one? Its definitly grown since then.

I think both will fail, im holding out with DVD-9's and normal DVD's atm (im a movie editor and computer programmer) and waiting holographic discs (i dont watch movies so idk what wins really) come on Holographic discs have like 2.2-2.4 times the capicity of my current set of HDD's (which atm is 3 500GB HDD's = total of 1.5TB) and that means i can make total system back up and wipe my HDD clean and start again safe in the knowledge that i can get at ALL the data of my previous system

I think both options suck - especially with the first HVD due in June 06. Up to a theoretical 3900GB - yes 3.9TB!!!. And don't give me any "theoretical" bullcrap.
A: The Blu-Ray is a theoretical 100GB
B: A 200GB HVD is the one due in June

But I'd choose HD-DVD over Blu-Ray mainly because of the case the Blu-Ray comes in like Mini-Disc.

VCD!! all the way

I dont know too much about the technical aspects of each but I suppose they could both win - each could end up making drives that would support either one. They are both using the same wavelength for the laser . . .

kind of like the DVD+r DVD-r thing. Neither really one or loss. The products just got to the point where it did not matter.

I think HD DVD is going to win this war. Why?

1. the name. People are familiar with a DVD movie. I think the name means alot
2. Manufacuring plants and backwards compatibility. The fact that HD DVD is able to use old manufacturing plants, and that HD DVD's can have the old SD movie encoded on it for use on regular dvd palyers IMO is a huge advantage.
3. Storage on HD DVD and Blu Ray isnt that much different. Ok BlueRay they are saying can max out at 4 layers with 100 gig. Great, HD can do like 60 gig. both plenty of space.
4. Ps3 will not have the saturation that the ps2 did. Sorry to say, I think the ps3 might actually lose to the xbox. Ps3 is going to be really expensive (probubly just as much as the xbox 360 WITH the external HD drive), and when ps2 came out, they really no no serious competition except for dreamcast, which sega truely failed at marketing. Xbox on the other hand is a true competitor.
5. Price. HD will be much cheaper. I CES i heard blu ray devices could be as much as $1800.
6. Blu Ray only digital? Oh so lets crap on everyone who doesnt own the newest HD TV? I own a Mitsubishi. I bought it in 2003, its a 2002 model. Only has firewire and Component, no DVI and HDMI (dont get me started on my SD dvd upconverting issues. Thank god i found a momitsu player that upconverts thorugh component).
7. People are starting to get really sick of the movie industry whinning, and could rally against a format that is as copy unfriendly as the Blu Ray.
8. Sony is just a shitty company with whats good for the movie studio in mind, not the consumer. I hate the movie studios. Dont they make enough money? Is piracy that big of a problem. OH NO, you cant pay tom cruise a bajillion dollars to act in a movie. Cry me a river. I laugh at the movie studios piracy whinning.

blu-ray could become a good backup disk, or possibly only used for television production like the betamax.