RSSHD DVD Claims 'Undeniable Momentum'
By Ed Oswald | Published September 6, 2007, 11:54 AM
Despite lagging behind Blu-ray in both sales of discs and overall players, HD DVD still put on a happy face for CEDIA 2007 and pointed to its advantage in price and computer manufacturer support in the next-gen format war.
Four of the five top PC notebook manufacturers support the format, the North American HD DVD Promotional Group said Wednesday. In addition, its third-generation players would lower the bar for entry even further, which it believes will give it momentum into the holidays.
In fact, the new high-end HD-A35 from Toshiba at $499 is as expensive as the cheapest Blu-ray player from Sony, the BDP-S300. There has been talk that the price of HD DVD may fall even further closer to the holiday, with the possibility for a $199 player quite real, according to sources.
To build momentum, HD DVD has signed a marketing agreement with NBC that will bring 30 second ads on the format to air in key markets during Sunday Night Football, with additional HD DVD promotional videos to air during shows like Football Night in America.
About 125 titles are planned for the fourth quarter between the three studios supporting the format, the group said. In addition, it plans to offer users of second-generation players a firmware upgrade that would give the earlier players 1080/24p capabilities.
Even with all the positive spin, HD DVD still has serious issues in its way to becoming the dominant format. A majority of studios still exclusively support Sony's Blu-ray, and there has not been any indication that those companies are even considering supporting HD DVD.
Additionally, Blu-ray is now consistently selling more discs than HD DVD by a 2-to-1 margin, further complicating matters.
Are they trying to be funny? Computer Manufacturer Support? mwhaaa..ha...ha... Dell = BluRay, HP = BluRay, Sony = New Vaio HDTV/Computer w/BluRay, Apple = BluRay, Sony Playstation = BluRay, ...need I say more? Sounds like a lot of Wishing! They are DEAD! Caput! Zero! Zilch! Down the Tubes by middle of next year!
HD-DVD Claims 'Undeniable Momemtum'? ... yes, but in what direction? hehe ;)
PS3 is the Best Movie Player for the Money, ABSOLUTELY!
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|Man I love this watch all the cattle go out and buy these HD Movie players while i sit back and wait for a winner LOL
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|Exactly
Call me chicken, but I'm NOT spending my hard earned $$ on this crap until they find a definite winner/make the mid-range players around $150. Only then will I buy it.
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|so true, id rather buy something thats not going to go obsolete in matter of months.
Another thing is that it will be a "while" before this battle is over. What ive noticed is that HD, full or not, isnt actually such a big deal to people in general. You tell them what HD means and they pretty much say "ok". Unlike DVDs, which was pretty much a switch from VHS (analog) to digital format. In a way, HD isnt "nessary" to a lot of people as was the VHS to DVD change.
...but thats just me. :)
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|Me too. Don't forget in addition to Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, we have On Demand type services and digital downloads all vying for that next generation spot.
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|I have both a Toshiba HD-DVD player (latest generation) and a Sony PS3 w/Blu-Ray, so have had a chance to look at both critically. IMHO HD-DVD wins out in that the picture is just plain BETTER! Also my Toshiba HD-DVD is the best player I've had for converting non-HD disks to 1080i format. I think the fact that Sony included a Blu-ray drive in the PS3 is skewing the statistics, as people do buy a lot more game consoles (XBox or PS3) than they do a stand-alone DVD player, so Sony is definetly using the game console sales to exagerate the popularity of Blu-ray. Blu-ray is good...but HD-DVD is better in every way at this point in time! Hope one company (Sony) stacking the "statistics" and with their tremendous marketing clout doesn't kill off superior HD DVD format...sigh...
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|Well I also have both formats, a PS3 and a HD-A2
The PS3 is far superior, it boots quicker, it looks better on like-for-like movies, it sounds better on like-for-like movies, and the upscaling of DVD's is immense, far better than my previous Denon upscaling DVD player. It also hook up nicely to my HDMI 1.3 receiver.
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|The real platform battle (and decisive test) will take place on December 18. Blade Runner will be released on both formats and, as we all know, there can be only one.
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|I think 300 showed how it will work.
2x - 3x more sales on Blu-Ray.
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|Source? Sounds like you're guessing.
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|He/She is correct.
http://www.highdefdigest...ls_HD_DVD_by_2_to_1/848
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|AT this point the sales are still a joke compared to DVD sales. The general public has yet to jump into the HD format. These fromats are still in their infancy time will tell.
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|I disagree. Nothing right now really matters as far as sales goes. What matters is whenever the $200 and below player come in to play. This is where you will start seeing what the majority want. Right now all of these numbers are good for nothing but a pointless pissing match. We are talking about numbers from 1% of the movie buyers out there. DVD probably sells more in 1 week than Blu-Ray and HD-DVD have sold TOTAL combined!
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|Uh, that's Highlander you're thinking of. :D
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|I keep hoping that some new technology will leapfrog both of them and leave them with their thumb where the sun doesnt shine.
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|The answer to this is hybrid players. Play both. End of story. And if one standard gets crushed (if history really does repeat itself it will probably be Sony), oh well your hybrid doesn't go to waste.
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|Blu-ray is not beating hd-dvd in standalone player count, only in profit count as there players cost way more. do your research.
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|It's also worth pointng out that Blu-Ray is doing just fine, and not having to resort to paying of studios to defect, and losing vast sums on money on every player sold, in a desperate attempt to gain marketshare.
I don't know hoe much longer Toshiba can carry on floating the dying HD DVD format.
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|LMAO! Yes because $ony didn't lose any money by putting Blo-Ray into the POS3. Wake up! $ony is grasping at straws just to keep the company afloat! Their TVs were helping them for a while, and now those sales have gone down the s***ter. They have lost billions on the POS3 and it is not even past the first year yet. Their battery department is a total and complete disaster. Not to mention that the POS3 is not moving the movie or game sales like they had likely hoped for in order to recoup their investment. If anyone can't hold on much longer it is $ony.
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|You missed the fact that basically the only Blu-Ray players being purchased are PS3s? And Sony is losing a fortune on each and every one of those sold? (still!)
If you want to be a successful fanboy you might want to check your facts.
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|"You missed the fact that basically the only Blu-Ray players being purchased are PS3s?"
Well seeing as it now transpires that Blu-Ray standalones are outselling HD DVD standalones, that must mean that Toshiba sales are REALLY bad...
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|"Well seeing as it now transpires that Blu-Ray standalones are outselling HD DVD standalones"
- BS.
You have Sony 'citing' one report (which we don't know who paid for).
One report.
That's in the face of so much other data.
.....but of course the Sony shills could care less about anything not 'on message', eh?
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|I thought it was the NPD Group, which Betanews always uses as a reliable source.
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|http://www.videobusiness...ndex.a...leid=CA6467868
You did check the references right? Those two AV sellers are local Chicago companies. They are not even on the map when it comes to sales of anything compared to BB, CC, Wal-Mart.
Just because it is in print does not make it fact.
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|Some of you take this entire subject entirely too serious. Despite BR's capacity, they have no other advantage. Whether HDDVD paid anyone anything or not, you act as if you know for a fact that Sony hasn't. Sony, the wonderful makers of rootkit and God knows what else they have up their sleeve. You act like Sony is so honest and would never "stoop" to such acts...I think they'd do worse. If what you allege happened, it's just common, simple business as usual. HD DVD deserves to win.
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|Desperate spin from Toshiba. Much like the "let's exclude 5 million Blu-Ray players from out stats to make our 200,000 HD DVD players look like they are selling well" nonsense.
Even the Toshiba spin turns out to be a lie, with Blu-Ray standalones actually outselling HD DVD standalones.
http://www.videobusiness...amp;articleid=CA6475686
You really can't make this crap up.
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|Because as it has been shown since the attach rate is low even though there are millions of ps3 out, on average people who buy ps3 buy it for games not to play movies.
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|"Desperate spin from Toshiba."
- Yeah right.
A major movie studio like Viacom/Paramount dumping a format to go exclusive with the supposedly 'dead' HD DVD is just 'spin'.
HD DVD now offering the most available content is just 'spin'.
HD DVD now offering the largest amount of exclusive content is just 'spin'.
HD DVD now having the largest potential catalogue behind it is now just 'spin'.
It's all just spin.
....unlike the claims that everything is going to get better for Blu-ray at some undetermined point in the future, right?
"Much like the "let's exclude 5 million Blu-Ray players from out stats to make our 200,000 HD DVD players look like they are selling well" nonsense."
- Well obviously the concept that stand-alone players ought to be compared to stand-alone players is clearly a little advanced for you.
But twiddle around in circles all you like over this it's hardly the issue.
Count you PS3s, go ahead.
Is it 4, 5 or 6 million of them failing to pull much of a 'lead' on HD DVD?
Is it 4, 5 or 6 million PS3s that are now seeing that 'lead' shrink close to parity now verses a few hundred thousand HD DVD players?
From Sony's own presentation at CEDIA, read it and weep.....
http://images.dailytech....image/5901_large_bd.jpg
"You really can't make this crap up."
- Clearly from the amount of BS you Sony/PS3/Blu-ray shills make up on the hoof you lot can.
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|"A major movie studio like Viacom/Paramount dumping a format to go exclusive with the supposedly 'dead' HD DVD is just 'spin'."
After Microsoft/Toshiba gave them a $150,000,000 bung!!!
"HD DVD now offering the most available content is just 'spin'."
http://img122.imageshack...p?image=image037qs3.jpg
" Well obviously the concept that stand-alone players ought to be compared to stand-alone players is clearly a little advanced for you."
No because they will easilly ignore the 80,000 Xbox 360 addons, so they can ignore 5 million PS3's. They have brainwashed you into thinking attach rates are important, because it's the only thing HD DVD have left to cling to. In hardware sales they are being slaughtered, in media sales they are being slaughtered.
As for the graph, all it shows, is HD DVD has been bumping along the bottom for the last 12 months, and Blu-Ray havinhg highs and lows (depending upon title launch dates), but even the lows are still way above a HD DVD high...
As it transpires, Blu-Ray standalones are now even outsellign HD DVD standalones, so Blu-Ray is winning the battle regardless of wether you include 5 million PS3 Blu-Ray players or not.
http://www.videobusiness...amp;articleid=CA6475686
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|Showing a store stock is kind of stupid since I have yet to see a store that had a good stock of either format. Your picture shows one section in a store and both formats have how many titles. Go to BB and uou will see that several titles are absent for both formats. The only way to truly see all titles is online. But you attempt is weak at best.
Wait until the people that bought players find out that shortly they will not be able to play the additional features on the format they bought into. The movie will still play sp they say but the extras won't. I don't see any pisse* off people there.
I have both formats but am very concerned about the tactics going on here with blo-ray. Will my blo-ray player play future movies, it better.
So cool aid drink some more of the toxic drink Sony is givin ya...
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|"After Microsoft/Toshiba gave them a $150,000,000 bung!!!"
- 1st of all prove it.
Secondly then come back and show any of us how $150 million
(according to the original BS split and not even all going to Paramount)
is supposed to be a big deal to a major movie giant like Viacom/Paramount.
Don't be ridiculous.
HD DVD does offer the most available content.
You might not like that but suck it up, it's the truth.
Ditto that HD DVD offers the most exclusive content and has the largest potential catalogue (and thanks to the high costs of Blu-ray HD DVD also has the larger number of independent film makers and small studios too......cos Sony makes them use AACS even for small pressed runs and charges them £2500 initial licensing and £1500 per film, as a film-making acquaintance told me recently)
"No because they will easilly ignore the 80,000 Xbox 360 addons, so they can ignore 5 million PS3's."
- Pfffhhhhh, pathetic attempt at a little dig there (go, show your source for claimin 80,000, I dare you).
Frankly I could give a flying one whether it's 9 or 90 XBox 360 HD DVD add-ons (IIRC it's something over 200,000).
It really doesn't matter.
You're beloved 4, 5, or 6 million PS3s have established a (shrinking) lead of 60:40 at best now.
Deal with it.
" They have brainwashed you into thinking attach rates are important, because it's the only thing HD DVD have left to cling to."
- LMAO
If this is the latest 'thinking' coming down the line for you lot then truly you have lost the plot.
" In hardware sales they are being slaughtered, in media sales they are being slaughtered."
- No.
In media sales (not counting Blu-ray game discs) the lead is dropping.
In hardware sales the PS3 has given them a boost ....but don't worry HD DVD has 4 of the top 5 Laptop/Notepad makers actually producing content with HD DVD drives; within the year the output of them will dwarf those rather disappointing (for you lot) PS3 sales numbers.
"As for the graph, all it shows, is HD DVD has been bumping along the bottom for the last 12 months, and Blu-Ray havinhg highs and lows (depending upon title launch dates), but even the lows are still way above a HD DVD high..."
- It shows how unstable the Blu-ray sales are.
It's also very illuminating the time period they chose to use.....cos we know from the Amazon charts that HD DVD disc sales are rising.
Ignore the truth if you like but that graph shows just how come Blu-ray has 'won' nothing.....and that after the Viacom/Paramount move they are most unlikely to actually 'win' this at all.
"As it transpires, Blu-Ray standalones are now even outsellign HD DVD standalones"
- BS.
You have 1 report cited (and paid for?) by Sony.
That is all, one report. Pathetic.
"so Blu-Ray is winning the battle regardless of wether you include 5 million PS3 Blu-Ray players or not."
- Again this is obviously a little too demanding for you.
No-one has ever 'not included' PS3 sales.
They just won't set them against stand-alone numbers cos they are not a stand-alone player.
Count them all you like......4, 5 or 6 million PS3s and a small handful of Blu-ray stand-alones have established a shrinking 'lead' of approx 60:40 in retail movie disc sales compared to the sales generated by a mere (just over, IIRC) 400,000 HD DVD players.
Laughable.
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|"Showing a store stock is kind of stupid since I have yet to see a store that had a good stock of either format."
- Yeah but it illustrates the condescending attitude to the board, they think 'a picture says a 1000 words' - to a reasonably tech savvy community.
But it's all they have got.......excepting that 1 report cited (and paid for?) by Sony.
It's pretty laughable & tragic really.
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|I don't have either format...
but I think I would go with BD...since they give us the op to burn some BD data discs right?
HDdvd does not give us the option yet right? Someone enlighten me as I have avoided this thing altogether :D
I would only get the players to purchase discovery channel high def content...edu power!
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|"I think I would go with BD...since they give us the op to burn some BD data discs right?"
- Not really.
It's true that you can get blank BD -R & BD -RE media but it can't be played on Blu-ray stand-alones like the Sony S300 (see the pdf manula page 6), thanks to their copyrighting issues.
"HDdvd does not give us the option yet right?"
- Actually they now do.
Laptop/notepads have had this for some time and new drives are on the way for PC.
These will play in an HD DVD stand-alone.
"I would only get the players to purchase discovery channel high def content...edu power!"
- Sounds like what you really need is an HD satellite box or cable box (or if you're American a free-to-air HD TV).
Failing that you might like to scour the net for HD TV content that has been reencoded to fit DVD5 or DVD9s and that will run off of your PC (if the specs are decent - anything dual core ought to be capable of handling it).
The other (very cheap) way of testing the water is the XBox 360 HD DVD add-on, if you have a dual core AMD 4000 or better or any of the C2D Intels you ought to be able to run it with PowerDVD 7.3.
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|Where can I get a list of those 125 titles? I just bought an HDDVD.
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|I think if you look on the avsforums or have a look for CEDIA 2007 & the HD DVD press conference you'd find it; but it'll be all over the web in a day or so.
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|I see Acer just joined the HD DVD group (4th largest PC manufacturers in the world); this gives HD DVD four (of the top five) notebook manufacturers sorted: Toshiba, Acer, HP and Asus.
There's only Dell left to go on that one.
Also there's new high end HD DVD player been announced from (an entirely new CE brand to HD DVD) Integra.
.....and I see Warner, Universal, Paramount, Dreamworks and Dreamworks Animation have more than 125 new titles to be released by the end of '07.
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|Sorry, Acer have gone Blu-Ray.
Still it's awesome news that the 4th largest PC manufacturers in the world has joined Blu-Ray!!! (except now it's Blu-Ray, Acer will suddenly be insigificant in the HD DUD supporters eyes)
http://www.engadget.com/...unce-blu-ray-allegiance/
Amidst the slew of new Blu-ray players showcased at IFA comes word that two new forces are pledging their allegiance to the BD camp. Reportedly, both Acer and China Huala Group have joined on as hardware partners, and the latter is supposedly looking to establish a "Blu-ray Disc authoring center in China." The announcements were purportedly made by the Blu-ray Disc Association while in Berlin, and while we're not exactly sure how long Acer will make us wait for more Blu-ray-equipped lappies, the more intriguing question -- you know, the one regarding concerns over piracy from a newfound authoring center in China -- has yet to be tackled by the BDA.
Asus are also Blu-Ray
http://www.reghardware.c...09/06/asus_goes_blu-ray/
http://www.xbitlabs.com/...lay/20060607235644.html
and HP are producing dual format drives,
http://www.techshout.com...bo-drive-plans-unveiled/
So that just leaves Toshiba pouring money into HD DUD, and releasind desperate press releases trying to convince people that there is momentum, when the stats clearly show Blu-Ray crucifying them.
The fact Toshiba needed to exclude 5 million Blu-Ray capable devices from their stats, to make their 200,000 player sold todate look impressive, speaks for itself.
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|Acer has gone both, do your research :)
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|HP is also on the board of the Blu-ray consortium.
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|Typical of the Blu-ray crowd and their nonsense.
I wonder what it is?
Laughable ignorance or deliberate deceptions?
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|I have this theory that Dell will support BlueRay for the next year or so. Why? Think of all the shoddy Sony crap that's fallen apart within laptops (batteries being the most publicized). I'm sure Sony has offered huge discounts on their goods to keep Dell around.
Just my theory who the hell knows.
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|Stereotyping people by *which format they choose to store their data on*? What's next, saying that everyone who blinks faster with their right eye is 'cheating themselves of the left-eye view through their obvious ignorance'?
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|Damned right-eye elitists. :p
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|Much like your deliberate deception:
"Acer just joined the HD DVD group".
Nonsense...
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|"Much like your deliberate deception:
"Acer just joined the HD DVD group"."
What exactly is "deliberate deception" about that?
It's true.
I didn't (unlike you) try to pretend that Acer had gone exclusively to one side or the other.
Similarly you had a spectacular bout of amnesia about HD DVD now being supported by four (of the top five) notebook manufacturers sorted: Toshiba, Acer, HP and Asus.
There's only Dell left to go on that one.
Interesting paranoia you're displaying there, shill.
Hows this for funny, from Sony's own CEDIA presentation, it was meant to show how well Blu-ray movie disc sales were doing but actually high-lights a huge drop-off in Blu-ray movie disc sales to now almost parity with HD DVD sales.....
http://images.dailytech....image/5901_large_bd.jpg
.....and all with the 'help' of several million Ps3/Blu-ray playing units to a few hundred thousand HD DVD players.
LMAO.
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|He is blind to the truth. He will also never admit to being wrong and this clearly proves that he is. I guess all I am really doing is feeding the trolls like cool aid.
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|They have...
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/33725/118/
September 6th - Los Angeles (CA) – Acer has become the first major global PC manufacturer to become a member of both the North American HD DVD Promotional Group as well as the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA).
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|"He is blind to the truth."
- My bet is also on a large slice of ignorance of the truth.
There are some really difficult concepts to grasp here.
Acer just recently joined the BDA and the Blu-ray fanclub initially believed they were therefore going Blu-ray exclusive.
Then they found out that Acer has just joined the HD DVD Promotion Group.
.....but they seem determined to ignore the fact that Acer were already producing Laptop/Notepad computers with HD DVD drives already in them (they have 3 models on sale right now).
What? How's that?
They already were making HD DVD products without being members of the HD DVD Promotion Group?!
Does not compute, does not compute!
Sony tell us what to think!
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|Speaking as a lefty, I feel the pain. People always making fun of me.
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|The Blu-Ray fan boys need to face the evidence. There are apparently (including PS3's) millions of Blu-Ray players sold against 200,000 -300,00 HD DVD players.
Why hasn't Blu-Ray "won" yet? It should be a walk-over based on those numbers. Truth is that the vast majority of PS3's are for games and not movies.
Personally, I feel sorry for all those PS3 gamers that bought a machine with technology that they didn't want or ask for. Sony bolted on the Blu-Ray drive to launch the format. Without the PS3 the Blu-Ray format would be dead. Sony could have easily made the PS3 like the Xbox so consumers (like me) would have a choice if they wanted to get a add-on Blu-Ray drive.
But we all know why they didn't do that.
Pity.
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