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DVD Format War Already Over?
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Jun 26, 2006 06:32 PM
from the there-were-these-things-called-laserdiscs dept.
from the there-were-these-things-called-laserdiscs dept.
An anonymous reader writes "'Nobody likes false starts' - claims the assertive and risky article "10 Reasons Why High Definition DVD Formats Have Already Failed" published by Audioholics which outlines their take on why the new Blu-ray Disc and HD-DVD formats will attain nothing more than niche status in a marketplace that is brimming with hyperbole. Even though the two formats have technically just hit the streets, the 'Ten reasons' article takes a walk down memory lane and outline why the new DVD tech has a lot to overcome."
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They might have a point (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They might have a point (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:They might have a point - Try holographic (Score:5, Interesting)
Instead, try this:
www.inphase-tech.com
Guaranteed 50 year media life, first generation will be 300 GIG per disc, going to 1.6TB per disk. Drives going out to OEM's right now.
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Re:They might have a point (Score:5, Insightful)
I backup all my DVDs onto external hard drives and throw the shiny discs into the closest. The flimsy plastic is really only good for a couple of uses before scratching, fingerprints or other marks degraded them.
HD DVDs would be useful as a transient storage container for transporting data between locations, because its eay to transport and after copying the data to its real location it can be thrown away. But not as a backup. Same as DVDs today.
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Re:They might have a point (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:They might have a point (Score:5, Insightful)
Under what conditions? Sealed in an air-tight, moisture-proof box? Handled with gloves like any fragile document from the 13th Century? The cheap media most people buy is about as reliable a hard drive.
Crap. No other word for it.
I've been backing up on hard drives for over four years now - in fact, I now have 8 hard drives purely for dedicated backups (well, I have a 1.5TB media library). Every now and then I need to restore a file that has been accidentally deleted or corrupted and I have yet to go to one of my drives and find it unusable.
Granted its only been four years, and yes, hard drives are not archive grade storage mediums. If I wanted archive quality I'd go back to backing up on tape drives - that is the only proven archive media in the industry today. I've gone back to DVDs and CDs that I haven't used on twelve months and find they are unreadable - let alone four years. I'm sure there are people on /. that have had working hard drives for 7, 8, hell 10 years+.
Even audio CDs don't last more than a couple of years, particularly if you do something ridiculous, such as actually use them. Who here as a pile of audio CDs they bought in the 90s that are degraded beyond use?
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I have to say... (Score:5, Insightful)
I also wouldn't count too heavily on tapes as being "proven archive media". Have you ever heard of people having to "bake the tapes"? That is because a lot of tapes that are only a couple of decades old have started to seriously degrade. Also, you can't just throw tapes into a non-climate controlled environment any more than you can a CD. About the only area that a tape has greater reliablity than a CD is when they are tossed in a pile on a desk without being put in a case. And that is only because the tapes have a built in case.
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Re:They might have a point (Score:5, Insightful)
Not me, unless you count "two" as a pile. And those two failed because I let them bang around in my truck and get scratched to hell, not because they were played or otherwise magically rotted.
Given much less care than LPs or cassette tapes, virtually all of them play as well now as they did when I bought them. ExactAudioCopy does occasionally report an error or two when I'm ripping them. I'd estimate that 90% of my discs are error free, and the rest are mostly 99% or better (EAC figures.) And while I don't deliberately manhandle them, I'm far from a paranoid audiophile with alcohol swabs and white gloves.
And as far as burn-'em-yourself discs, I've not had any data discs degrade on me (that I'm aware of.) Those, I definitely treat better than audio discs, with limited handling and their lives spent inside clean CaseLogic CD folders.
As for hard drives, I certainly haven't had the good luck you seem to be having. If I have an older drive that is powered down for a couple of years, the chances of it spinning up seem to be far from 100%. And that's not just cheap Maxtors I'm talking about (although Maxtor is no proof against failure), I've had it happen with a number of server-class SCSI drives, too. While it's certainly not a 50% fail rate, I'd guess that long-term stored hard drives seem to have only about a 90-95% chance of spinning up again.
No medium is perfect. And there's another point I've not mentioned yet, and that's the availability of readers / interface electronics. If I had backed up all my valuables on an old Winchester drive, what are the chances I'd be able to read it today? First, I'd have to find a working machine with an ISA bus, video card, possibly a monitor, a keyboard, and some kind of boot drive. I'd need to scrounge a copy of DOS, although pirating an ancient one off the Internet seems pretty doable (but creating a bootable disk is less simple.) Then, I'd have to find a WD503 ISA card for it, and cables. I'd probably have to come up with a network card, too, so I could get the data off the machine.
Of course, these same arguments will hold true for CDs and DVDs at some point in the not-too-distant future, as well as any current hard drive communications bus. Maybe it won't be BluRay or HD-DVD that spells doom for the CD/DVD/hard-drive backup plan, but it will be something.
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They left one out (Score:5, Funny)
Re:They left one out (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:They left one out (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah, but that's probably the Civic you're hearing, not the vinyl.
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Re:They left one out (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:They left one out (Score:5, Informative)
Or, if you're lazy and don't want your mp3's as vinyls, just use a Winamp plugin [winamp.com]?
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4. Studios are Conservative (Score:5, Funny)
Relative to the Southern Baptist Convention, though...
Another reason for failure (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Another reason for failure (Score:5, Funny)
Heck, the bastards stick around to this day.
Floppy disks are the media format parallel to Paris Hilton.
They simply refuse to get impopular despite how crappy they are.
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Re:Another reason for failure (Score:5, Insightful)
Zip files, 120MB floppy (whatever it was called): Expensive, more reliable, more storage, more features, etc., FAILURE.
DVD: Cheap, convenient, and sufficient for most people.
HD-DVD: Expensive, higher res, more storage, etc. FAILURE?
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Re:Another reason for failure (Score:5, Interesting)
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Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Insightful)
Is this all that much better to Joe Sixpack than what he had before?
Cassettes were better than LP's. Not in fidelity. But in portability, durability, and most importantly - the cost of a 'decent' player - Cassettes were hands down better.
CD's were better than Cassettes. They sound GREAT. You can skip tracks just like you could on an LP. They are supposed to last forever! (unlike those cassettes that by now you know simply don't)..
SACD... Does anyone have an SACD player? No! (Except niche enthusiasts). Because, to Joe Sixpack, it's simply not worth the money for an immeasurable (to his ears) difference in quality.
Same goes for video. DVD was a great upgrade from VHS. It combined the cheap player aspects of VHS with the hi-def of Laserdisc. Suddenly, everyone could have a GREAT copy of their favorite movie (as long as it wasn't starwars - a whole other topic entirely), for the output cost of about $50 for a cheap player. What part of Hi-def DVD is going to be any different than SACD or DVDAudio? Anyone?
Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe there will be a demand for HD DVD and Blu Ray when HD sets are a lot more common, but not until then.
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Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Insightful)
The actual uptake rates for HDTV are anemic. THats likely to continue for the rest of the decade. People are replacing dead TVs with HDs, but not running out to buy HDs (and not always replacing with HD, since there's still a huge price difference). Until the price difference drops dramaticly, and we give it most of a decade for the old sets to break, we won't see a significant market penetration.
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Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Interesting)
LCD prices are barely dropping (and not everyone wants an LCD- horrible picture quality compared to a tube IMO). Sales of HDTV are basicly flat. And the OTA drop dead date has been pushed back twice already- its going to be pushed back again.
Basicly, the vast majority of people don't give a shit about HDTV. The product has failed in the marketplace so badly even Congress had to admit to it and push back adoption dates twice. On top of that the format changed so even early adopters are scared of reinvesting. HD is a no go, write it off.
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Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Insightful)
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the whole problem with today's entertainment industry!
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Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Insightful)
Almost. Those high def DVD's really do look nicer on ***BIG*** HDTVs. On smaller ("regular size") tvs dvds and hddvds look pretty much the same at normal viewing distances.
Admittedly 'big TVs' are in right now, but its going to be a *long* time before everyone has one. (If ever; some people are perfectly happy with a 20", 25" or 30" set.) Plus, for someone to be won over by an HD media format, he's going to be looking at his other playback devices -- his laptop/portable dvd player, the one mounted into the back of the seats in his SUV, the one in his bedroom, the one at the summer cabin...
Even if he has a big screen in his living room, the fact that the disc won't play anywhere else will be an issue. Tapes lingered on for years beside cds partly because they were recordable while cds took ages to get there, and partly because all our 'walkmans', 'car stereos', 'ghetto blasters' and other devices still used them. We could buy the CD, and make a tape to use in our other players until the rest of our world caught up.
Can we easily do that *that* with our HD purchases? Nevermind perserving the "HD" Can we even easily hook up a CD burner or SVHS VCR to our HD player to make copies? Can we rip them to our PSPs, and iPod videos?
The whole HD format just isn't looking to be very user friendly. That's going to hurt it. I think there's a very decent chance it will be repeat of the "LaserDisc".
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Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Informative)
That isn't strictly true, although it does depend no what you consider "surround sound". While currently unused, Red Book does permit four channel [wikipedia.org] audio formats. As well, Dolby Pro Logic can be encoded into the standard two channel Red Book format without violating the specification.
So if you're referring to discrete 5.1 surround, you are correct -- however, there are different types of surround sound, at least two of which can be encoded on to Red Book CDs.
Actually, both standards can handle H.264 [wikipedia.org] video, which is a signficantly better encoding standard than MPEG-2. Depending on what profile is used for the encoding, it is possible to specify much higher colour fidelity.
This isn't to say I disagree with your overall argument, however. I'm not so sure that the quality differences are going to be sufficiently significant to the average viewer (which would include myself) to matter. As I've stated in other articules on this subject, I'm personally more interested in these formats (BlueRay in particular) for data storage than for video.
Yaz.
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Re:Well, duh. I could have told you that (Score:5, Interesting)
How will I know (just by looking at the package) that a HD-DVD title is done in H.264? And even if it has that information on the back, thats meaningless to the average consumer.
I would be happier if one of the specifications dictated H.264 (or at least did not permit MPEG2 to be used on HD-DVD/BDs). At least that would remove one variable, you know that they're at least using the best codec permitted.
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#3 is the killer (Score:5, Informative)
- Much higher quality video and audio
- Random access
- Don't have to rewind them
- Switchable audio tracks
- Subtitles that are optional
- Extras
- Nifty menus
Advantages of switching from DVD to HD/BR:Re:#3 is the killer (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah you left out one:
- more robust forms of DRM
In my mind, this is the real motivation behind the HD-DVD / BD camps -- they aren't trying to sell consumers on HD quality, they're trying to convince Hollywood to adopt the format based on how well you can lock it down. Then, just kill of DVD's. Why entice consumers when you can *force* them, right?
Of course this scheme will fail -- you can't convince Hollywood to embrace a new technology (for any reason) because they are scared of change and hate risks. You have to drag them kicking and screaming into new technology.
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Troll article (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Troll article (Score:5, Funny)
But what about the troll children? Won't anyone think of the troll CHILDREN?!
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In part because they're useless (Score:5, Interesting)
I'll be amused if we start seeing DivX encoded pirated DVDs start to appear in the states that offer HD on a standard DVD. The studios response should prove interesting
And divx? Fine, thanks :-/ (Score:5, Interesting)
No, no, no! (Score:5, Insightful)
I fundamentally disagree with this statement. Most people now have at least heard of HDTV; there have been plenty of adverts for high-def digital cable and satellite services here in the UK, especially in the run-up to the World Cup (which can be viewed in HD with the required equipment).
I'm also pretty sure that people buying larger TVs today are buying HDTVs. The big thing about it is the 'Wow' factor of these sets. With a good HD source, the massive screens are pretty amazing. Now, people bought enough DVDs of old VHS tapes for a huge back catalog of old (and oftentimes, shite) films to be released on DVD. What is to say it won't happen again?
Personally, I believe it is far to early to tell what will happen. But, no matter what Audioholics says, High definition IS the future and it WILL take over eventually.
Re:No, no, no! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:No, no, no! (Score:5, Interesting)
Regardless of what that does for HDTV, though, it doesn't really mean much to BR or HDDVD. The better picture is nice, but it's still hard to justify a whole new player and library when there aren't any convenience benefits, like portability or ease of use. If DVD had exactly the same picture and sound as VHS, it still would have replaced it. THe primary reason for its adoption was the convenience of the format. Until there's a new format that's easier to use than laser-read discs, DVD is here to stay and I think the HD formats are dead in the water.
Let's not even get into the fact that the new formats actually make things less convenient with their DRM "features". Or the fact that someone's going to tell me that my $3200 plasma TV won't work with the formats because it doesn't have an HDMI input.
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10 really good reasons plus a new one (Score:5, Insightful)
But they forgot another one - most Americans don't have, and don't want to buy, an HDTV set that would even need either Blu-Ray or HD-DVD, nor do most consumers see any reason to pay twice as much for the same product they can use today.
Is this true in a few years? Perhaps not. But it's true today.
Which leads us to the conclusion that both Sony and our other player decided to fight this battle early, after what happened to them when Beta and VHS fought - the stakes are so high they're trying to front-end the decision, but both sides ended up trying to steal a march on their competition, resulting in two formats way too early for consumers to be interested in either.
Re:10 really good reasons plus a new one (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that the various companies pushing "HD" movie formats are *radically* overestimating how many HDTV sets are actually out there. Most people I know don't own an HDTV. Most people in the U.S. don't own an HDTV. Most people in the U.S. don't *have* the disposable income to buy an expensive set. And as the article said, if you don't have HD channels, then the picture is worse.
HDTVs won't be everywhere until *most* of the content on regualar broadcast TV/cable is in HD, and the sets are under $400 or so, and HD DVD players drop to under $100. And that's a long ways away.
Plus, many people just bought new TVs in the last few years, since the price of 32" CRTs dropped through the floor. They're not about to upgrade.
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Yep, it's the Laserdisk all over again (Score:5, Interesting)
not sure how lawn darts relate exactly but it sounded good:)
HDTV and Lack of Content (Score:5, Interesting)
I too have an HDTV but no HDTV service. (In my case, I knew regular TV would look "worse" and picked plasma over LCD/DLP because IMO plasmas look better when playing non-HD content.) DVDs do look significantly better - but the high price of HDTV service (extra $20+ a month, plus money to Dish Network for a new receiver, plus loss of ability to archive shows like I can with my old pre-encryption DVR) together with the lack of content (football, Lost, and Law and Order are about it right now for me) makes it far, far too much to pay.
I'm not certain off hand if my TV has the correct plugs (HDMI, whatever) to work with the highest resolution HD-DVD/Blue-Ray players. Be assured, if it doesn't, there is no reason that I would ever consider buying either type of player for many, many years to come. (P$3 is already off the list, so no sneaking one in that way either, Sony.) Even if my TV was supported, I'm not sure yet if entire-seasons-of-TV-shows-on-one-disk is better than ability-to-backup-and-play-from-server, if I were to want to do that. I doubt it.
Mass confusion. (Score:5, Insightful)
Thats whats going to kill these formats.
You have HD dvd players (upscaling) that dont play HD-dvd's, Tv's are HD ready, HD compatable, what HD, 720p, 1080i/p? Component, DVi, HDMI, HDCP, region codes or not... Can I play my CD in my HD-DVD, my blu ray in my car..?
Your avererage consumer, ne average sales guy doesnt know the answers, it its new expensive and confusing it wont sell.
Two formats, too much DRM and RCs kills anything (Score:5, Informative)
They're already screwing up. (Score:5, Interesting)
Undettered though, I looked at another display they had which was showing HD movies on a smaller screen which was not rear projection. The picture quality was better, but I still couldn't tell, even looking at CG like Chicken Little, if I was seeing a better picture than I would get on a DVD. Or rather, I couldn't tell how much better the picture was. I couldn't tell if it was just a small improvement or a big one.
All these idiots had to do was make their demo disc show the movies side by side with the DVD version and it would make the difference clear. But they didn't. Instead the consumer is left to guess about the difference in quality between the two formats. Also, they only had a display for the Blu-Ray and I asked them if HD DVD had come out yet, and they said yes, and they pointed me to a small display in a corner with no video being shown. I'm looking at this, and I'm saying to my self, how the hell do they expect this thing to sell at all if they've got it stuck in a corner and they're not even showing video of it?
Oh and another thing. Instead of being in slick black DVD cases like all the rest of the DVD's, the HD DVD's were in these blue cases I think. Or maybe that was the blu-ray discs and the HD ones were in white cases. I think they were slimline too. Anyway the packaging struck me as really cheap and flimsy looking, and the discs were $10 more than new release DVD's, and these were OLD titles! Haha! Hollywood thinks they can get people to pay $30 for a movie which is selling for $15 on DVD at Wal Mart because it's been out for 12 months? DREAM ON!
Re:They're already screwing up. (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.cornbread.org/FOTRCompare/index.html [cornbread.org]
It's a LOTR DVD/HD-DVD comparison. The page I linked to containes DVD captures compared with downsampled HD-DVD captures. You can click on each one to see an upsampled DVD capture compared with a 'native' HD-DVD capture.
Not quite the same as having FMV side-by-side, but it's the next best thing.
Parent
Reason 11 - no one cares (Score:5, Insightful)
Great. I can see the zipper on the back of Darth Vader's uniform, or the edges of Spock's ears. Big flipping deal. DV-Audio died for the same reason quadrophonic music died: who listens to music in that chair set up just so? Outside of audiophiles, no one.
This is technology without a need or a demand.
One over the top claim (Score:5, Insightful)
This is so full of it.
If they had pushed out CD's to replace them with DVD-A standard then the DVD-A DRM would have been cracked..
As it is now most people dont use it so there has not been a huge impetus to crack it.. yet it has already been effectively circumvented through that windvd crack.
this guy is a starry eyed idiot if he actually believes that drek he spews.
An amusing look back... (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.robertsdvd.com/failure.html [robertsdvd.com]
Re:Congress will ensure at least one format succee (Score:5, Informative)
NO ... what's being mandated is a change to digital TV broadcast. Digital TV != HDTV.
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Re:The Markets Will Determine The Winner Of This W (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:The Markets Will Determine The Winner Of This W (Score:5, Insightful)
In the case of VHS vs Beta, consumers didn't have a reasonable other choice. If they wanted to videotape Star Trek episodes, they had to pick one or the other. So the decision wasn't whether to buy, it was what to buy. And VHS killed Beta because of the extended recording times.
However, there's already a choice that's a clear market winner - DVD. Players are cheap, (I can now get a DVD with stereo audio and DVI for $30) media is cheap (movies cost ~ $10-$20) and it's widely supported.
So the choice consumers make is not "Which HD-DVD to buy?" but rather "DVD or one of them expensive, risky HD thingies". If they go DVD, they get all their movies and titles, decent video/sound quality, and don't pay too much. If they go HD-whatever, they get marginally better video, no noticable difference in sound, and a limited, high-priced movie selection.
Which would YOU buy? I don't know about you, but I'm in NO HURRY to adopt HD-DVD - I might end up buying an LCD TV in about a year to replace my aging 19" CRT...
On a side note, I've gotten to where I just don't like DVDs anymore. I have 5 kids and a busy career. When we rent DVDs, we end up paying late fees a good percentage of the time. When we buy them, they often get scratched or lost. I don't have time to be a "DVD cop". But a Dish Network Pay-Per-View is easily recorded on the DVR and played over and over, with no media to lose, no trips to the local video store, and no stupid envelopes to mail back. (a la NetFlix)
When we want a movie, we buy it on PPV. The selection still isn't fantastic yet, but it's just so much less hassle! IPTV is definitely where I'm going to go, as soon as it's available for my DVR!
My vote for the next media format: IPTV on-demand, with a DVR or iTunes. The real question is simply: does Apple have the gonads to actually penetrate the living room, or are they content to just be a cool fad?
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