I actually miss the format war. avs forum was so much fun to read with all
the inflamatory posts by blue and red fanboys.

now things are somnolent, boring.

i wonder if br sales currently are exceeding the sales of hd and br players when the format war was at its peak

i miss the good old days. maybe another manufacturer can come out with a new hdm format to get things going again

Yes, cause "I" lost!!! :-(
The Blu's should have the blues too, cause prices sure ain't what they used too be!!! :-0

All so SQ & PQ was top notch or die because of choices/pressure; hope imports create the same type of competition for quality!

Personally, "I" still think WB picked wrong. I know they were going by #'s. Just I still believe (who cares?) price (now that Sony isn't slashing too win, we see the TRUE price of Blu) & film fans were red.

Of coarse, REEL (pi) movie manics are PURPLE!!!

No.

I think the number of posts to this part of the forum have gone from hundreds a day to tens a day.

I do miss the entertainment.:D

No.


^^^

No, during the format war to many people were more interested in attacking the other format than anything else and would not even admit that both HD formats had advantages. Even now that the format war is over a few people still act like the format war is going on but thankfully that has been decreasing. Though it was nice to have Blu-ray/HD DVD insiders posting here during the format war I find it far more pleasant to post about Blu-ray now than it was during the format war.

Yep the insiders are missed.

My hopes are that bluray does not let us down .:confused:
Star trek OS comes to mind .:rolleyes:
I still believe red was the way to mass adoption . And bluray
was a playstation win . :eek:
Blu had more to lose also ...so they played hard ball ...:mad:

I have blu movies and looking at the Panasonic bd50 .:confused:
Can get it for $400.00 with employer discount
:p
Have fun:)
Bob

I miss all the deals. I think if the format war was still on, we'd have better and cheaper hardware and software from both sides. Competition is good.

Hd-dvd titles are finally dropping .
Looked at Tosh a1's on ebay . cheap as anything .
The xa2 still commands some cash to buy though ...

Yes , blu . lets get moving !!
And get prices down , not holding breath

Bob

Yup. I do, things where so exciting those day but it did bring out the ugly in some folks.

They be more format war and this HD/Blu will be remember once again and those ugly people will stick their heads out one more time!

DJoel

Yup. I do, things where so exciting those day but it did bring out the ugly in some folks.


No kidding about the latter point. Some people got downright evil trying to back their sub-$1,000 purchases of HDM, as if their behavior had any bearing on the outcome.

yawn

I do miss the entertainment.:D

Yeah, I must admit I do too. I think I'm one of the few who found whole thing incredibly amusing.

No-but I do miss the BOGO's & insiders.

Not at all.

I wish we could have [had] an Insiders thread limited to just technical information / discussion

Its good most of the ignorant riff raffs are gone.

Nope. I entered the fray late and only have about 7 discs left.

Maybe my new tv will take 1080p from the PC and then I can get shot of the A35....

Seggers

I wish we could have [had] an Insiders thread limited to just technical information / discussion

NO don't miss it at all, plus you could have changed all that if you all wanted to, speaking of avs management in general. I remember they ran you off for awhile too.

BTW: I have both optical disc formats (that retired insider ran me off to BLU!, and killed a magazine subscription in the end). I am happy with more HD, I plan on keeping all of them (software and players) and even the D-VHS stuff and tapes. The "movies" are KEY to me, not screen caps (screen caps are good for ONLY wallpaper!). All this IMHO, key is "opinion". Thanks. ;)

Nope. The riff raffs left once they lost their battle or won. There's still a few cases of "Format war itis" but they hardly post.

Yep, I absolutely do miss it. There's no incentive now for anyone in the game to excel. 2008 will go down as the year of the garbage (software). I'm so tired of looking at Peter O'Toole's vibrant blue eyes in that Sony promo. And so I say "RELEASE THE FREAKIN' FILM ALREADY". But No, we get more garbage.

I went neutral early on. I love both formats. I have 4 HD DVD players, 2 BD players and an LG combo player ... plus my LG combo drive in my PC. But I STILL have more than twice as many HD DVDs as I do BD. What does that tell ya.

It will get good at some point. Question is, will I still be alive?

Its good most of the ignorant riff raffs are gone.

Nope, I'm still around though I rarely pay attention to this forum anymore, and this too is an answer to the original question.

ted

Yep the insiders are missed.Agreed. It was great to be able to ask questions directly to the people that knew the answers. While there's still a little bit of that left on the occasional odd post, it's not even close to the same level.

Scott

I actually miss the format war. avs forum was so much fun to read with all
the inflamatory posts by blue and red fanboys.
Yes, I found that as entertaining as the old DVD-versus-Divx debate.


now things are somnolent, boring.

i wonder if br sales currently are exceeding the sales of hd and br players when the format war was at its peakJudging by the titles released to the format, I can't believe that Blu-ray is doing well, software-wise. At present, I find little of interest on Blu-ray (no surprise, since experts warned Blu wasn't ready for mass adoption), and have only bought one disc (Batman: The Movie) since the format war ended. My PS3 is relegated to SDVD and gaming until the sad state of Blu-ray software availability changes.

I never realized that the format war could become such a passionate issue. Their were so many people making up stuff just to prove they were right. I also agree with Mark that it would have been nice if the insiders thread just stayed on technical issues, but the politics of some insiders and some questioners just corrupted the thread. Perhaps someday now that the war is over we could have a technical thread without the BS.

I just plain miss new HD DVD releases.

It does seem that the post-war big ramp up of Blu-ray releases has not yet started, unless I have simply got much more picky about what I consider worth buying.

No, I don't miss the format war. Now the denizens of AVS Forum can tackle the big issues, such as LCD vs. plasma. ;)

No, I don't miss the format war. Now the denizens of AVS Forum can tackle the big issues, such as LCD vs. plasma. ;)

I always saw it as Projector vs Flatscreen. ;)

There was a format war?

It was a war only for those who chose to make it one. My collection of HD DVDs and Blu-ray's have always existed peacefully side by side.

It was a war only for those who chose to make it one. My collection of HD DVDs and Blu-ray's have always existed peacefully side by side.

I dont know about that, I had to sepperate Tears of the sun from Pitch black the other day. But now when they are further away from each other, Its been peacefull here.

I wish we could have [had] an Insiders thread limited to just technical information / discussion

Not possible. Not with insiders who were actually viral marketers.

I miss the daily arguing. Low bitrate vc-1 is better, Sony is the devil, more space is bad, BD50s are impossible, triple-layered HD-DVDs are just around the corner, combo discs are the key, internet features are the future, DD+ is fine, Disney is going to switch before Christmas... sigh

It does seem that the post-war big ramp up of Blu-ray releases has not yet started, unless I have simply got much more picky about what I consider worth buying.
Agreed.
I don't miss the ugliness brought out by the format war, but I do miss the competition that gave us better prices, selection and quality. I was purple fairly early, but I think I've bought less discs this year (so far), than I did in one month during the peak of the format war.
That's kind of sad.
J

I miss the daily arguing. Low bitrate vc-1 is better, Sony is the devil, more space is bad, BD50s are impossible, triple-layered HD-DVDs are just around the corner, combo discs are the key, internet features are the future, DD+ is fine, Disney is going to switch before Christmas... sigh

Transformers will look better on blu!

Well, if it has a higher bitrate it should even if it's microscopic improvements. :D

What happened to all those diehard HD-DVD guys anyway?

Well, if it has a higher bitrate it should even if it's microscopic improvements. :D



Even if its micoscopic and with lossless sound Blu will have the edge ;) Should have the edge. Michael Bay says so :D

What happened to all those diehard HD-DVD guys anyway?

You mean people like rdjam, creator of the campaignhd.com FUD site? He suddenly lost all interest in HDM.

mikemorel is all over downloads (such as the Roku box).

plazman, MichaelHDDVD and nataraj are long gone.

nfinity has found himself a niche posting delusional comments on engadgethd posts

Others have migrated elsewhere, mainly to highdefforum.com which is like a bar for Confederates still reenacting the war.

And others have probably changed user names to be reborn as Blu-ray users, or to continue to throw darts at Blu-ray (there are a couple of them over at HDD).

Agreed.
I don't miss the ugliness brought out by the format war, but I do miss the competition that gave us better prices, selection and quality. I was purple fairly early, but I think I've bought less discs this year (so far), than I did in one month during the peak of the format war.
That's kind of sad.
J
Just looking at the new release list of 8/19 for sd dvd...

the fletch collection
Restraint
perry mason season 3

yikes!

I've never heard of 99% of the dvds released this week (maybe they went straight to dvd). It would be reasonable that BD releases would not be any better.
The reason dvd sales may be stagnant this year is because of what was produced on film 9 months ago.
My purchases have trailed off because there is nothing to purchase, sd dvd or BD!
Fall releases look more promising as some (not all...where is braveheart, titanic, gladiator, aliens, etc) of the better catalog films worthy of a DD will be released on BD.

Now that I have gone neutral by buying a PS3. I wish it was still around for the sales. Rarely do I see anything worth looking at from Amazon or other retailers. Most of the time it is 30-50%. Instead of 40 bucks I pay 23. Still more than I want to pay. I have bought one Blu-Ray since going neutral. Netflix is my answer for now.

You mean people like rdjam, creator of the campaignhd.com FUD site? He suddenly lost all interest in HDM.

mikemorel is all over downloads (such as the Roku box).

plazman, MichaelHDDVD and nataraj are long gone.

nfinity has found himself a niche posting delusional comments on engadgethd posts

Others have migrated elsewhere, mainly to highdefforum.com which is like a bar for Confederates still reenacting the war.

And others have probably changed user names to be reborn as Blu-ray users, or to continue to throw darts at Blu-ray (there are a couple of them over at HDD).

Thank you for the followups. I was wondering what happened to those guys.

Just looking at the new release list of 8/19 for sd dvd...
There are 545 discs coming out 8/19. Even when you subtract the few BDs, that is alot of discs, and, for the most part, it doesn't include imports.

I've never heard of 99% of the dvds released this week
So, if you never heard of them, they must by definition be bad? Not everyone limits themselves to blockbusters. While I have slowed down this month, I'm still buying SD DVDs.

Fall releases look more promising
Only slightly.
Of the announced titles for upcoming BDs, there's only a handful (<10) that I'm likely to buy this year. I can say with reasonable certainty, that I'll probably buy anywhere from 4 to 10 times as many SD DVDs the rest of this year.
NOTE: With a few exceptions, I don't plan on duplicating my SD DVDs and HD DVDs.
J

NOTE: With a few exceptions, I don't plan on duplicating my SD DVDs and HD DVDs.
J

If you're not buying anything that has been released on DVD before, you're pretty much limited to day-and-date. And, didn't you ever rebuy on HD DVD a title you already had on DVD? I know I did with a few of them.

There are 545 discs coming out 8/19. Even when you subtract the few BDs, that is alot of discs, and, for the most part, it doesn't include imports.


So, if you never heard of them, they must by definition be bad? Not everyone limits themselves to blockbusters. While I have slowed down this month, I'm still buying SD DVDs.


Only slightly.
Of the announced titles for upcoming BDs, there's only a handful (<10) that I'm likely to buy this year. I can say with reasonable certainty, that I'll probably buy anywhere from 4 to 10 times as many SD DVDs the rest of this year.
NOTE: With a few exceptions, I don't plan on duplicating my SD DVDs and HD DVDs.
J
Quantity will never equate to quality (or multiple viewings, which is why I buy).

So while "Television Under the Swastika" (1 of 545)might have been an excellent production and might even be a good rental, I expect its sales numbers to be very small. This would not justify the expense or effort to release on BD.

As far as fall releases...I guess we just disagree. The Godfather and Kill Bill set as well as Ironman and Batman on BD are eagerly awaited in my home theatre.

I miss the sales that we got but don't miss the utterly ridiculous schoolgirl like e-fights we had here.

We do still have the occasional silly comment (ie that hd dvd sucks or that people who bought it got screwed when discs still work, bhigher bitrate will make the PQ 4566 times better, etc) but hopefully those die out soon.

One thing the format war did was show me just how childish grown humans can act. Scary....

If you're not buying anything that has been released on DVD before, you're pretty much limited to day-and-date. And, didn't you ever rebuy on HD DVD a title you already had on DVD? I know I did with a few of them.
I didn't say I wasn't buying anything that was already on DVD, just not the ones in my collection, with some exceptions. I don't own every DVD, do you?
Yes, I did rebuy some discs on HD DVD, but when the newness of HD wore off, I regretted some of those purchases-that's why I'm not duplicating many now. I admit that I'd be more inclined to duplicate if the prices were considerably lower, but at twice the price of DVDs, I have to be motivated. This is where the format war came in handy-competition drove down prices.
J

I miss both sides keeping each other honest on pricing as well as (to a lesser) extent quality.

I don't miss the format war, but there are a few things I do miss.

Having started with HD DVD I miss the logical menus that were used. Blu ray menus seem very disorganized and amateurish by comparison.

I also miss the ability to hit the menu button during previews and get right to the movie. The best I've been able to do with Blu ray is to fast forward through the advertising.

I've found pq to be about the same, as is aq.

One format does offer access to all available HDM titles. I just wish the movies were better overall. Some offer great stories and acting, with average pq. Others offer a great picture. but the movie itself is so bad it is hard to sit through.

I don't miss the war, I just miss buying new HD-DVDs - but I now enjoy having a lot more money to buy other toys. I still have not bought into BD and based off the current catalog, yuck! - no plan to anywhere in future. With the money I've saved, I have expanded my Mythtv setup, upgraded all my D* machine to HD-DVRs plus added HD-On-Demand cable, I've got more than enough HD to keep me happy (plus my 150+ HD-DVDs). :D

No, I don't miss the format war, because now I've been able to buy a lot of HD DVDs for a third of their original prices and that keeps me HD Happy until the Blu Rays I want are released.

I don't miss the war, I just miss buying new HD-DVDs - but I now enjoy having a lot more money to buy other toys. I still have not bought into BD and based off the current catalog, yuck! - no plan to anywhere in future. With the money I've saved, I have expanded my Mythtv setup, upgraded all my D* machine to HD-DVDs plus added HD-On-Demand cable, I've got more than enough HD to keep me happy (plus my 150+ HD-DVDs). :D

Whatever.... I see a lot of HD DVD fanboys trying to rewrite history like their format was so superior on every level. The fact is that HD DVD was behind the eight-ball ever since Toshiba decided to proceed with it.

Blu-ray might not have a great catalog yet, but don't act like HD DVD had a superior catalog. Last I checked when HD DVD folded, they had about the same number of titles as were available on Blu-ray.

Blu-ray had Disney/Pixar and what did HD DVD have? "a crappy" Shrek sequel. A lot of the Universal titles were pushed out to try to keep pace with BD.

Let's see, I have viewed two of the most recent Oscar winning films on BD: No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood. Along with chick flicks for my wife. Pixar and Disney titles with the kids.

Your comment that BD has no decent catalog is a pretty vague and weak arguement against BD.

Guess what I will be watching on BD before the end of the year. THE DARK KNIGHT, INDY IV, IRON MAN, Coppola's GODFATHER restoration along with other high potential titles.

Next time check your facts before making such a dumb statement.

You know you were addicted to the format war if….

1. You had to subscribe to multiple forums just to make sure you got your fix of the format fight.

2. You knew more about the latest news from each side even if your company was in the business and had expensive news service to boot.

3. You got more infractions during the war than the entire decade you were on AVS before.

4. You had 10X more posts during the war than before or after.

5. You had to worry about violating forum rules for the first time in your AVS history.

6. During forum moratorium, you kept hitting the refresh key to see when the intermission was going to be over. And worried if you had anything to do with it.

7. You used the same alias as AVS in other forums so that everyone knows your war credentials.

8. When your wife wondered why you were frowning while typing a post, you would say it was a bad email from work you were responding to. Or worse, disagree that you were frowning at all.

9. You couldn’t go to sleep at 1:00am in the morning, until you saw how the other side was going to return the favor after you typed that 100 line response. And couldn’t go to sleep for a couple of hours in bed after you saw it.

10. Separating the other person’s post into ten parts and responding to each a few times in a row seemed “normal.”

Bonus one: you think participating in the format war automatically qualifies you as a comedian!

I miss both sides keeping each other honest on pricing as well as (to a lesser) extent quality.


I tend to agree with this point, but BD does have to compete with DVD.

DVD sales are down, but BD sales may pick up if studios are willing to lower their prices enough to entice consumers to start replacing their SD catalog.

I’m glad it’s over. (But I do miss it a little.)

I spent WAY too much time poring over these forums. I loved all the fighting, all the drama; it was like a grand, geeky soap opera. I missed a lot of sleep. I’ve been following the latest High-Def DVD news thread since it debuted on the $5,000 and up projector forum. But in retrospect, boy, most of it seems pretty pointless and a lot of it ridiculous. Like all the months of hand wringing and prognosticating worrying about possible bitrate permutations of the lossless vs. lossy audio codecs, or the colours of the respective boxes, or how many times we had to hear about how the video codecs were not tied to either format and just because there was a bad MPEG encode it had nothing to do with the format, and just wait Chinese players are on the way.

I picked my horse early, I thought Blu was going to win and I picked up a PS3 on launch day, and I started buying discs right away. But I never put my mouth where my money was. I never had any interest in posting here, it was too often vicious and silly, but I loved reading everyone else duke it out!

I now have some 220 Blu-ray discs, and for me there are plenty of titles to look forward to. Among others I just ordered;

Persepolis
Son of Rambow
Om Shanti Om
The Bank Job
Dark City
The Seventh Seal
Black Narcissus
Shoot ‘Em Up
Destiny’s Child –Live in Atlanta
30 Days Of Night

IMHO that seems like a pretty reasonable variety of titles. I’m looking forward to Austin Powers, James Bond, Ronin, Iron Man, Batman, Wall-E, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Indiana Jones, Sleeping Beauty, The Thing. For the people complaining of a dearth of good titles, what are you hoping for?

Maybe it has got more expensive for you people in the States? But here in Europe prices have been dropping since the format war ended.

I picked my horse early, I thought Blu was going to win and I picked up a PS3 on launch day, and I started buying discs right away. But I never put my mouth where my money was. I never had any interest in posting here, it was too often vicious and silly, but I loved reading everyone else duke it out!



Same common sense reason I used to justify buying the PS3. The HD DVD group never had a real answer for it. Now it is the sore losers claiming that BD is tied to closely with PS3 like UMD was with the PSP. Sorry but BD has already far surpassed UMD sales and some standalone players are now selling for less than the PS3.

BD used PS3 as a trojan horse. It's the main reason that companies reconsidered their HD-DVD only stance long before the products were available. The only reason Paramount swung back (albeit for a very short time) was because of a payout. If the PS3 did not have BD, then I don't think Warner or Paramount ever would have considered being neutral.

I guess for some people, format war is still going on strong...:)

Agreed.
I don't miss the ugliness brought out by the format war, but I do miss the competition that gave us better prices, selection and quality. I was purple fairly early, but I think I've bought less discs this year (so far), than I did in one month during the peak of the format war.
That's kind of sad.
J


Could you provide some examples please? I hear this over and over and I just don't get it. NOT intending to pick on you since I have bought a little less this year also, but in my case it's directly due to higher fuel (and everything that fuel cost touch - everything) leaving me with less disposable income. I know that I am seeing many more titles released now than I saw a year ago. I'm especially interested in specific HD-DVD titles that you feel were unique to HD-DVD.

Comcast Video onDemand is certainly format neutral!

It is agreed that there's one less thing to debate about with the homogeneous format. I'm of the Sony PS3 contengent, and therefore a "Blu-Ray die hard", but call it what it is; the HD-DVD, (players and movies), with comparible, (if not superior) quality by some arguements to the Blu-ray disc, but with cheaper prices and backwards compatibility with existing standard DVD players, would have been a very logical choice.

When the Toshiba A1 was riding around $100 I was really going to get myself one and "Go Red". Then they pulled the plug.

Still, my non expert or scientific opinion is that even blu-ray will go the way of the dinosaur soon, with subscribers opting for the OnDemand services offered by satalite and cable TV providers. If an extensive enough offering is provided I can see how users would choose this option over the discs, (relatively expensive, to be handled with care, can add clutter to home, limited life time,etc.).

But one could easily counter this vantage point.

Gee

I am already having to delete posts here

I hope we can carry on a good discussion without dredging up old format war bickering?

Thanks

Comcast Video onDemand is certainly format neutral!


And Comcast OnDemand even their so-called HD offerings are far from HD quality.

Fine if you want to use it, but it won't be confused with BD by a long shot.

http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x66/LeeAStewart/dutycallspu2.png

:D

IMHO that seems like a pretty reasonable variety of titles. I’m looking forward to Austin Powers, James Bond, Ronin, Iron Man, Batman, Wall-E, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Indiana Jones, Sleeping Beauty, The Thing. For the people complaining of a dearth of good titles, what are you hoping for?


I am guessing they secretly want Sony to pull the plug so they too can say HA HA.

I will be saying HA HA again when Toshiba's XDE is another epic failure.

Do I miss the format war here on AVS? NO, NO, and again NO. So many viral marketers and FUD--I almost fell for it too, but then realized I just wanted HD movies...once the price was acceptable to me, I bought both. Honestly the format war could still be going on and I wouldn't care--might get more free movies or whatever, but it was toxic to allow it here on AVS--all fanboys/marketers or "insiders"(LOL) should have been banned--unless it was all technical Q&A's.

now that it's over, will I re-buy the same movies in Blu that I have in red cases? only if I have to. I didn't fall for the FUD and hype over sound "quality" either--life is great when you live above the influence LOL

Format war discussions are a thing of the past at AVS. We've asked members to move on ...no matter how "boring" it makes it here. ;)

I also understand that the intent of this thread was not meant to incite bickering or an arguement....AVS had taken a position once HDdvd called it quits that it was time to put all format war discussions behind us. I hope everyone understands. Thanks