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1. Comment - At Last, Blu-ray Gets Picture-in-Picture

   (Nov 1, 2007 - 11:25 AM)

   If PiP is SO important why did more (double?) BD discs sell for 300 than for Red??
   
   Toshiba are panicking and trying one last effort to save itself. The ship is sinking fast and they are loosing money by the bucket load.

2. Comment - New Chinese Involvement Could Trigger HD DVD Price Plunge

   (Sep 10, 2007 - 11:23 AM)

   I'm not sure if you'll ever be able to do a 100% 1 to 1 comparison. Let's face it both formats look good, the question is Joe public willing to upgrade for this? Especially when you read about the War, disc issues, compatibility issues etc.. DVD was a big jump from VHS not just in quality, but ease of use etc.. HD Discs is not such a big change, but needs a better screen as well to enjoy this format (and Digital connection if possible which the early HD sets in the US did not have).
   
   So the TOTAL cost to move to HD is larger for a smaller improvement.

3. Comment - New Chinese Involvement Could Trigger HD DVD Price Plunge

   (Sep 10, 2007 - 9:56 AM)

   These threads are a great way to escape from time to time ?. Maybe you should take a step back and review all of this.
   
   Some items to consider:
   
   HD-DVD does not need the extra space that Blu-Ray offers, but then comes out with a similar capacity version? So size does matter (and don’t let any lady tell you any different), but also what you do with it counts more?
   
   One question I have how does adding a third layer increase the data transfer speed?
   
   Plus does adding the 3rd layer increase the manufacturing costs?
   
   Also the writable HD discs are only single layer (for now at least) from my understanding. The price for these are artificially high to make it cost in-effective to use them to copy movies.
   
   It’s great news for China to supposedly produce HD-DVD players for Wal-Mart, but then bad news for Blu-Ray to have manufacturing done in China?
   
   This war has pro’s and cons, both formats have pros and cons. Who’s gonna win? Nobody knows just yet, there are too many factors to take into account.
   
   My biggest concerns are:
   
   1/ Con: Content - Studio's might rush to get more movies on the shelf in format X which might mean quality suffering (this is my BIGGEST Con concern i.e. why pay HD prices which would be as good if not better on SD at a lower price).
   
   I guess the same might be said for Hardware.
   
   2/ Con: You have to make a decision on one the other or why not both formats (that is if you are interested/can afford and even have a HD-TV etc...) or have to wait for one to win (which might be a loooooooong wait).
   
   3/ Pro: This is forcing the prices down far quicker than any previous format (not good for the developers as it will take longer to re-coup their investment, but good for the punters maybe).
   
   With regards to the price, someone spending several thousand dollars on a high end Display will probably think twice about matching this with a Cheap player. I personally won’t be going out to buy the cheapest player but looking for a high end system to compliment the investment I have made.
   
   It’s true HD is a great format but at what cost of ‘TOTAL’ ownership. That’s the big stumbling block, not which player hardware format is cheaper or discs are cheaper. I don’t plan to upgrade my old CRT till it dies. But I do have a HD projector in my dedicate ‘High-End’ cinema room for top notch movies (obviously this is ‘my’ preference of movie types). I’m happy to watch run of the mill stuff on my standard TV but certain types of movies (generally Action, Sci-Fi and Horror) I like to watch where I get the FULL Cinema experience. For now up scaling SD’s looks great, but I hope to move to HD before the year is out, hence my interest in HD related articles.

4. Comment - HD DVD: We're Not at War with Blu-ray

   (Aug 27, 2007 - 6:00 AM)

   Having 2 competing formats is killing/slowing early adopters. We can argue the pro's and con's till we are blue in the face, it's not gonna change anything. Will one format dominate, or will they end up living along side each other, only time will tell. I for one am unsure weather to wait or jump into one or the other formats?
   
   New versions of either format may just comlicate teh issue further, especially if tehy are not backward compatible and/or the hardware (or at leastthe firmware) can be upgraded easily, i.e. over the internet and/or via a downlaod burn to CD). I've read about newer higher capacites form both camps.
   
   In addition to this format war is the additional cost associated with moving to HD. Not everyone has or can afford the new HD TV's no matter how cheap the players and movies are. What I've not seen are figures on how many HD TV's are out there? What's the figures like 1 in 10 households have HD or maybe lower. Surely this will play a big part in this war too.
   
   I also know lots of people able to get HD from other sources and therefore not interested in HD formats on DVD.
   
   On top of this a lot of Americans have already been bitten by buying early HD ready TV's without a Digital input and 1/ might not be able to see the movie in HD without one. 2/ Even if they can see this in HD over Analogue, it's never going to look as good.
   
   Yes HD does look far better than SD, but who cares? When SD-DVD images are so good (even more so in Europe where PAL is a slightly higer resolution than NTSC and wide-screen was adopted a long time ago as a standard for DVD's.
   
   Content also play an issue here. For me personally I'd only be looking to use this format for films that would really benefit from this, i.e. Action and Sci-Fi, Documentries (i.e. Planet Earth). I don't have any wish to have some TV soap or chick flick etc.. on HD. I have a dedicated Cinema room to watch movies with the FULL cinema experience, and everything else we watch on an old SD CRT (of course trhis will be upgraded to HD but only when it packs up).
   
   It would also be great if the capacity of these HD systems could be used to reduce the number of discs for a series, but using SD. i.e. a whole series on one disc etc..
   
   Anyhow that's my tuppence worth. I don't see this ending in the near future which is a shame for the consumer.

5. Comment - Paramount Switch to HD DVD Evens the Stakes

   (Aug 23, 2007 - 8:23 AM)

   Just gone onto Amazon.co.uk and Blades of Glory is available on Blu-Ray (Pre-Order). On Amazon.com you can sign-up to be notified when it becomes available. So time to pre-order and request availabilty :-).