Blu-Ray has won the Hi-Def war!

Post by **Daniel** » January 8th, 2008, 1:22 am

Lets hope its true!

Post by **EricJ** » January 8th, 2008, 6:31 am

Unfortunately--accdg. to current statements afterwards--it's true that they could opt out, but it was only speculation on FT's part that they would...Yet.

PR still has to be stubborn until the last minute, and Paramount's sticking to their story.
Still, Paramount/Dreamworks was originally second on Toshiba/MS's shopping list, and only took the bribe on T/MS's defective sales pitch that they "almost had Warner" and that that new studio majority for HD would be along any day now, not to worry...
Paramount said, no Warner, no deal, and now we've got the No-Warner part--They've got every right to return the deal to sender, it's just a question of how muleheadedly they want to go down with their present ship.

Post by **Randall** » January 8th, 2008, 8:04 am

Paramount's own official word so far is that they will continue to support HD DVD... although they have not commented on potentially putting out Blu-ray discs again in addition to HD DVD.

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/ ... ED%5D/1345

Post by **Ben** » January 8th, 2008, 8:12 am

Paramount has only been bought out for a year or two anyway, from what I understand, so they'll switch back to being at least neutral after that period if not before, if that rumored contract clause proves to be honest.

After all, Paramount is being heavily lent on to hold back their big franchises (Godfather, Indiana Jones) by those filmmakers who really want their titles out in Blu or at least both, and it's telling that Paramount haven't really done a lot with their Star Trek properties yet.

Spielberg is the deciding factor with both Paramount and Universal. He says Blu, and they will have to at least issue his films (the Paramount Indys, the Universal Jurassics, ET, Schindler's and more) on both formats. Once those companies start issuing on Blu-ray for good, the floodgates are open.

Anyone buying an HD-DVD player now is buying into Betamax, ironically!

Post by **James** » January 8th, 2008, 12:36 pm

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/

The Digital Bits has more on this as they are actually talking to people involved at CES. Sounds like there may a tidal wave of switchers coming soon.

Post by **Ben** » January 8th, 2008, 12:49 pm

This is excellent (and rather exciting)!

Post by **Randall** » January 8th, 2008, 8:25 pm

I check Amazon daily now to see if they're blowing out HD DVDs yet!

Post by **Ben** » January 9th, 2008, 6:54 am

I'm split on whether to think that's a "fool's game" or not.

On the one hand, the format will soon become obsolete...I can't see Toshiba developing third/fourth gen players. What's out there is out there.

On the other hand, you have a good player which <I>should</I> last you a good few years.

But I don't really see the point in buying discs like that. At some point you'll still need to double-blu-dip on some of them, unless by that time we're plugging holographic cubes directly into our eyeballs for the ultimate "Brainstorm" experience!

BTW, what with the rumblings that the BDA might be offering some casback/swap incentives to replace HD-DVD discs for BR discs, I can't see the HD prices falling very soon. Otheriwse they'll have people clambering for "cheap" HD discs to crossgrade to BR ones!

Just a thought...

GeorgeC · Post by **GeorgeC** » January 12th, 2008, 1:34 am

I wouldn't get into HD-DVD myself to save a few bucks.

The format is going to be obsolete soon enough and fairly soon Toshiba will be the only company making any kind of player or drive compatible with the HD-DVD discs.

The smart choice to get into if you don't have a high-def player now is definitely Blu-Ray. All the HD-DVD exclusives are going to be reoffered on Blu-Ray anyway.

Right now, it's a waiting game to see when Universal and Paramount will announce their switchover to Blu-Ray and abandonment of HD-DVD. They'd be foolish not to do this as soon as possible. Everybody else is on board!

As it is, the HD-DVD supporters are left with eggs on their faces and it will look worse and impact them more financially the longer they hold off on the Blu-Ray switchover.

It's happening sooner than people think. The retailers are already saying behind the scenes that they're not going to support two hi-def formats beyond the end of this year. It's just been too costly for them to support two incompatible standards and has dragged out the hi-def transition far longer than necessary.

In the meantime, the competition has sped up the reduction in player prices to levels that are more sensible for most people, but it sure hasn't done a darn for the hi-def disc prices or HDTV prices yet!

Post by **Ben** » January 12th, 2008, 9:17 am

Of course, Rand already has HD-DVD George. I think his point was to see if he could now pick up any cheapie discs that get discounted rather than returned.

Naturally, I don't think anyone is going to get into HD-DVD now, but if you have it, what's not to like about some falling prices? You'll find my comments on that above too.

Post by **Foxtale** » January 12th, 2008, 1:28 pm

I'm not really up on all the high def/blu ray stuff (let's fact it I don't have enough money to buy anything more than a vhs or dvd player) but since I have a feeling that with the constant pushing blu ray may catch on enough to replace dvd's in some places (instead of waiting until the next, next gen of players which will be a much bigger and better step) I have a random question. Are blu ray players backwards compatible with dvds?

Post by **Ben** » January 12th, 2008, 2:13 pm

Yep, and a good player will even "upscale" your standard DVDs to make them look more than half decent on an HDTV.

Of course, this isn't quite as good as buying Blu-ray hi-def titles but will save a fortune on many titles that aren't worth shelling out $20 to own again!

I'm sure some of the others will chime in with more...

Post by **Foxtale** » January 12th, 2008, 2:42 pm

Thanks Ben. That's good to know because I have so many dvd's and I know I am going to keep buying them for a long time (probally until they are only sold at the level that vhs's were a few years ago).

I asked about Blu ray but is this the same for hd dvd ? (in case for some reason they win out)?

Post by **Daniel** » January 12th, 2008, 2:56 pm

That 'for some reason', would have to huge for it win over Blu at this stage of the game!

Yep, like Blu, HD-DVD is backwards compatible with DVD's.

Post by **Ben** » January 12th, 2008, 4:01 pm

Blu is the way to go...but also remember this...

I'm still buying <I>LaserDiscs</I> for things that have yet to show on DVD, so there's a good chance that we'll all still be buying good old DVDs for a good while yet, as I said on the front page yesterday. In ten years time, there will still be things yet to come out in hi-def!