Wnorris your logic is all sorts of whacked.

Your attach rate figures are for a slice in time; if you follow the trending, BD made up 7% of HD DVDs entire historical sell-through in a single week. Whatever the ratio of PS3 owners buying BD films, and however many films they buy, it is clearly greater in volumes than the present equivelent on HD DVD. If it weren't, the gap wouldn't be closing at all - simply maintaining. If the present rate were to keep up, BD would catch HD DVD the next week, surpass it the week after that, and never look back.

Let's just assume your five times the players and three times the releases... but it's not resulting in a simple "catch-up," it's resulting in an outright catapulting.

sony's tactic is surely working. get the gamers to pay more and get the PS3. Deprieve them of gaming software so that they will have no choice but to test what Blu-ray is all about ;) . Whuuuhuuuu... next week there will be more Blu-ray titles as compared to HD DVD out there making the figure even more significant. Further more attach rate is the king. Give HD DVD the same console figure and the exclusive studios. Blu-ray would have already six feet under last year. Attach rate attach rate attach rate ;) cant emphasis that enough ... ;)

the big differences are

1) then the sales of HD disks were about 1/10 wht they are today
2) they were not videoscan numbers comparing the two (I don't remmeber anyone questioning the 3:1 HD DVD over BD back in August) but the interpretation of ranking on Amazon

why is it soo difficult to comprehend? there are more BD hardware and software out there. Blu-ray title sales SHOULD BE MUCH MORE BETTER THAN hd dvd. What happened (regarding HD DVD better movie sales) was extra ordinary so people talked about it. What is happening now - Blu-ray movie sales = better = is mere normality so . .what is the fuss?

one question. What release the sales figure only now? I mean when Blu-ray is 'winning'. Is that a yearly thing? or is it Niesen's policy to leak the info in January? I am VERY confused. Why no figure were published and made public last year when HD DVD titles were selling much more better than Blu-ray?

The DVD empire states just updated their Jan to date and year to date numbers as 56% to 44%.

Wnorris your logic is all sorts of whacked.

Your attach rate figures are for a slice in time; if you follow the trending, BD made up 7% of HD DVDs entire historical sell-through in a single week. Whatever the ratio of PS3 owners buying BD films, and however many films they buy, it is clearly greater in volumes than the present equivelent on HD DVD. If it weren't, the gap wouldn't be closing at all - simply maintaining. If the present rate were to keep up, BD would catch HD DVD the next week, surpass it the week after that, and never look back.

Let's just assume your five times the players and three times the releases... but it's not resulting in a simple "catch-up," it's resulting in an outright catapulting.


Its entirely possible the 7% change is a reporting artifact, the dataset is too small. A variation in reporting over the MLK long holiday weekend could result in a 4-5 day versus 9-10 day reporting period.

Its too small of a sample size for meaningful assumptions. Now if the trend continues until April 1st and is not effected by the HD A2 launch, that's another story.

January also historically has slow sales after the holiday rush. December skews up in sales m January down, Feb-Nov are much more even. This comparison is taking place during the slowest sales period of the year. The launch of the PS3 is a one time event and may not be brepresentative of future trending.

Originally Posted by paulbh
It will be interesting keeping tabs on these data points throughout 2007 to see if this trend continues and how volatile it is on a weekly basis (i.e. how significant of an impact is a new release). Two weeks is an awfully short sample to draw any grand conclusions from. I imagine many PS3 buyers are at least trying a Blu-Ray movie or two (or a few) to see what all the fuss is about. Whether they are as sold on buying HD material on an ongoing basis as most of us are remains to be seen. A data set drawn from January sales no less after a one time event of the PS3 launch as the cheapest Blu-ray player.

How many Blu-ray guys here and neutral guys were waiting all year until the PS3 was available to buy? If those amount of Blu-ray zealots equaled the HD DVD early adopter zealots future PS3 buyers may not be as intense.

Not to rain on the jubilant Blu-Ray lovefest here celebrating that the format war is over, but y'all need a serious reality check. Blu-Ray's had a phenomenal *month* compared to HD-DVD... during a period when virtually no new HD-DVD releases came out and during a period when no worthwhile games are available for the PS3.

Extrapolating that single month out ad infinitum is a fool's gambit... as much idiocy as those who celebrated prematurely at the initial HD-DVD sales numbers and proclaimed BR dead.

I realize that it's the usual suspects leading the cheerleading, so attempting to interject logic here is about as useful as tits on a bull, but you do realize that the sales numbers for both formats combined are so small that it would not take much to invert the trend (or steepen it), right? Any time you are working with small samples/populations, it doesn't take much to skew the results one way or the other.

We very well could see the trends cross one another back and forth several times over the course of 2007 and into 2008 before anything definitive occurs.

Best to just chill, buy both formats, and enjoy it all... :)

Well I'm all for logic also, and I share your pain.

The DVD empire states just updated their Jan to date and year to date numbers as 56% to 44%.
That means 56% Blu-ray in January, and 44% Blu-ray in the past year, correct?

Where is this data on their site?

According to Fox's prediction, we should be at less than 2:1 for Blu-ray:HD DVD. It appears they underestimated the adoption rate of PS3 owners.

if you look more closely (and at the BD and arrows) you will notice at

~100k you have 2:1 (HD DVD~ 50K)
~200K you have 3:1 (HD DVD~ 67k)
~250K you have 3.5:1 (HD DVD~ 71k) The HD DVD numbers are absurd if you have any attach rate at all for HD A2 sales.

Toshiba estimated 1.8 million HD DVD units to be sold this year with a minimum volume of 100,000 units a month shipped from Febuary on

Silly to think those would sell those few movies.

Didn't someone say (during Amazon debates) that somehow BD guys buy their movies in B&M and HD DVD guys buy them online ?

I beleive that now ;)

p.s: for people who don't get it - Nielson only tracks b&m sales and then tries to extrapolate to online & wallyworld. If the way the extrapolate is using the dvd model doesn't fit what happens in the HiDef DVD world (as given above) .... then it would account for the difference Nielson is reporting.

56% Blu-ray in January, and 44% Blu-ray in the past year, correct?

Where is this data on their site?

http://www.dvdempire.com/index.asp?userid=99365291527966&tab_id=61&site_id=68&site_media_id=0

No this year to date 56% Blu-ray , 44% HD DVD.

(at this moment 2007 to date and Jan 2007 to date, 56.10% Blu-ray vs 43.90% HD DVD )

Ouch, I'm glad I didn't invest in HDDVD. The annihilation is well under way. :)

lol, the HD-DVD battle cry used to be buy HD-DVD only burn in hell sony/blu-ray, now the tune is buy both and enjoy all.

Nielsen's TV ratings data has long been questioned by the TV and cable outlets...in fact, some have jumped ship and gone to other suppliers for data. That's why they have been instituting a complete overhaul of their methodologies.

So any data one gets should be taken with a grain of salt. One of the real issues with Nielson's numbers is that they are very innacurate for small markets and small demographic segments and they keep a lot a lot of their data gathering secretive.

They are much more accurate using large data sets in large markets but they have been (IMHO rightly) of being very aggressive and innacurate in using relatively small sample sizes to project larger numbers. Their tracking stats are notorious for having a lot of short term volatility for small markets or for small time periods. They give useful historical data over time and can detect momentum spikes, but the magnitude of the change is often over or underestimated.

They tend to, as an example grossly underestimate the market share of a smaller television station in a market because they are using small samples of diary users .

No one in any industry, except network broadcast TV, makes decisons based on on or two weeks or even months of data product wise.

All of those factors could be in play here as the overall numbers of HD discs still is small compared to DVD sales.

lol, the HD-DVD battle cry used to be buy HD-DVD only burn in hell sony/blu-ray, now the tune is buy both and enjoy all.


:)

Kinda like last month 90% said "STOP WITH THE DAMN COMBOS, UNIVERSAL!"
This week, "Gosh! Combos are just SWELL! I can play my new Combo of THE JERK in the CAR!!!!"

;)

Kosty, give it up already. You're embarrassing yourself trying to refute hard data.

:)

Kinda like last month 90% said "STOP WITH THE DAMN COMBOS, UNIVERSAL!"
This week, "Gosh! Combos are just SWELL! I can play my new Combo of THE JERK in the CAR!!!!"

;)

yup, that was classic, a shame the HD-DVD brigade worked so hard to get it closed.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/show...90&page=1&pp=30

Oh, just check out this thread. The spin attempts are jaw-dropping!

now that is an entertaining thread ;)

How many Blu-ray guys here and neutral guys were waiting all year until the PS3 was available to buy?Why none, of course. Don't you remember? Consoles are terrible movie players, gamers don't own HDTVs, the PS3 will have no effect on the HD wars, etc etc etc.

Why none, of course. Don't you remember? Consoles are terrible movie players, gamers don't own HDTVs, the PS3 will have no effect on the HD wars, etc etc etc.

Don't forget, BD50 is impossible and HD-DVD already won!

This thread is gold. Did someone imp Plazman's account? :)

Wow. The thread on this evening's news here re: the nielsen sales figures that was in the BD forum just got consolidated into a week old, 18 or so page ramblefest. So now anyone clicking on the "BD outselling by more than 2-1.." thread there won't even see this info. until page 19 or so!
Way to bury the story!

The HD DVD numbers are absurd if you have any attach rate at all for HD A2 sales.

Toshiba estimated 1.8 million HD DVD units to be sold this year with a minimum volume of 100,000 units a month shipped from Febuary on

Silly to think those would sell those few movies.

100,000 per month ?? At that rate all they will be selling is a lot of warehouse space to store them.. ;)

b2b

Kosty, give it up already. You're embarrassing yourself trying to refute hard data.

Yes, a whole 2 weeks worth. I'm convinced, HD DVD is dead. :rolleyes:

I'll say one thing, for as smart as some people seem to be on this forum at times (and others not so much), a lot of the posts in this thread are irrational.

I hate to say it for the millionth time, but this format war isn't going to be decided by the posters in this forum nor is it going to be decided on a $500-$600 gaming console/blue player. The PS3 price is going to have to drop drastically for it to soley win the format war.

The HD market is so miniscule right now; making these numbers mean so little. Show me this trend for the next 12 months and then we're talkin'.

I'll echo other people, first to $200 players or less wins. If the blue boys can accomplish that before HD DVD, they'll win. Of course, this is just my humble opinion.

I'll say one thing, for as smart as some people seem to be on this forum at times (and others not so much), a lot of the posts in this thread are irrational.


There is a definite lack of level-headedness, surprisingly from some of whom one would never expect such behavior.

Now if the trend continues until April 1st and is not effected by the HD A2 launch, that's another story.You already told us once that the Blu-ray sales went up for a couple of weeks or so after the PS3 launch but that the HD-A2 launch brought them back. That was December. But the trend on Amazon showed the Blu-ray sales continuing to improve even after the HD-A2 launch (whenever you want to count that) and now these numbers from Videoscan support that the first 2 weeks of January really went Blu-ray's way even while the Amazon rankings showed HD DVD ahead:

http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/graphs/salesrank-1-1-recent30.jpg

And since then the Amazon rankings have shown a trend more in Blu-ray's favor than the first 2 weeks of January.

I expect that the Videoscan numbers for the week ending January 21st won't look as bad for HD DVD. Given your position before about HD DVD pulling ahead by even more than they were, what is your position now about when you expect HD DVD to take the lead (and hold it for at least a day or two) on thedvdwars.com site once again?

--Darin

Yes, a whole 2 weeks worth. I'm convinced, HD DVD is dead. :rolleyes: Okay. How many weeks you need for BD to trump HD-DVD sales? Just asking.

I hate to say it for the millionth time, but this format war isn't going to be decided by the posters in this forum nor is it going to be decided on a $500-$600 gaming console/blue player. The PS3 price is going to have to drop drastically for it to soley win the format war. No doubt, people who posts on AVSF is not J6P. However, in both the Playstation and the BD player forum, more threads are created by new PS3 owners asking for help in setting up BD playback.

I doubt that even SCE is going to push the PS3 as the primary product to end the war. Manufacturing productivity, as good and as fast as they can make the PS3, still has limits. Other BD players will have to take up the slack. Also some people are just allergic to using the PS3 as their BD playback unit.

The HD market is so miniscule right now; making these numbers mean so little. Show me this trend for the next 12 months and then we're talkin'. Fox at CES showed a sales projection through the end of the first quarter of 2007. You should take a look at that graph (it did get the dates wrong).

Right now BD trumps HD-DVD by about 2.6 to 1 (certainly more than 2). If Universal executives wait until it gets to 10:1, they are not doing their job right. 5:1 for me is a good ratio to throw in the towel.

I'll echo other people, first to $200 players or less wins. If the blue boys can accomplish that before HD DVD, they'll win. Of course, this is just my humble opinion. Let me ask you this. If you're saying that J6P will get into HD-DVD in droves when US$200 players come into the market, what do you say to those who want to get into the market now?

1) Do you tell them to wait until US$200 players come into the market?
2) Do you tell them that HD-DVD has Universal as an exclusive studio and BD has Sony PE, Disney and Fox as its exclusives?


fuad

Right now BD trumps HD-DVD by about 2.6 to 1 (certainly more than 2). If Universal executives wait until it gets to 10:1, they are not doing their job right. 5:1 for me is a good ratio to throw in the towel.

fuad
heh. So it's purely a matter of the ratio for you? You don't think maybe volume is a little more important? Can you show me where the volume of units sold data is listed? And do you have an opinion on what the level of volume would be for an exclusive studio to go neutral, an opinion based on some meaningful data?

Right now BD trumps HD-DVD by about 2.6 to 1 (certainly more than 2). If Universal executives wait until it gets to 10:1, they are not doing their job right. 5:1 for me is a good ratio to throw in the towel.

Even with that, Universal still had 4 of the top 10 selling titles year-to-date as of January 25:

Since the format’s inception in April 2006, USHE has released 60 titles on HD DVD, and currently boasts four of the top 10 best-selling HD DVDs year-to-date, including Casino, Serenity, Fearless and Miami Vice.

http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20070125006192&newsLang=en


So Universal is doing pretty good right where they are.

Even with that, Universal still had 4 of the top 10 selling titles year-to-date as of January 25:
...
So Universal is doing pretty good right where they are.They had 4 of the 10 best selling HD DVDs. How does that tell you anything about how HD DVD is doing compared to Blu-ray or how they might do on Blu-ray?

--Darin

They had 4 of the 10 best selling HD DVDs. How does that tell you anything about how HD DVD is doing compared to Blu-ray or how they might do on Blu-ray?

--Darin
According to Warner's data the presented at CES, Universal accounts for 25% of HD-DVD/BD software market.

So ya, they're doing ok.

According to Warner's data the presented at CES, Universal accounts for 25% of HD-DVD/BD software market.

So ya, they're doing ok.I think they are doing okay, although having given up more of their titles to do it than just about any studio, but what really matters for studio decisions are the future sales, of which runrate is an important factor to look at. If it wasn't we could look at total VHS sales for the last couple of decades and get all excited. :) If the trends from the Amazon rankings and those Videoscan numbers continue they won't be doing alright as far as future sales. When it was 3:1 in favor of HD DVD in August or so the Blu-ray camp did something to change that. Now it looks like the HD DVD camp needs to somehow change the currect trend, unless Blu-ray somehow does it on its own (which I doubt with even better titles coming out).

--Darin

Ok, I read all 10 pages of this thread and I still don't get why the BD supporters are claiming they have won the war.

The numbers as I understand them show BD has sold less discs since inception than HD. "Yay we sold less discs so we won?" Catching up is not winning. How is this a clear victory in the overall scheme of things? If anything it's a tie right now.

They have had 1 great month during a time when HD released next to nothing.

Looking at the big picture the install base for both formats is small. A lot of new PS3 owners are checking out Blu-ray movies right now at a time when there are few good games for the PS3. It should have been obvious to anyone that BD would outsell HD in the month of January.

Having said that I don't see how anything is over. Just as last year when HD was vastly outselling BD all the BD supporters were preaching patience until the PS3 arrived, I say we will see how things play out when the new wave of HD players rolls out in the 2nd quarter of 2007. Cheap players could once again tip the balance the other way.

There are also some BIG titles coming for HD. Matrix. Harry Potter. Jaws. Jurrasic Park. Hitchcock. Even though some of those are also going to be BD for someone coming into the hi-def arena those cheap players and great movies will make many consider HD as the way to go for them.

HD still has some big cards to play. Chalk up a battle to BD but the "war" is hardly over.

According to Warner's data the presented at CES, Universal accounts for 25% of HD-DVD/BD software market.

So ya, they're doing ok.
By the looks of this data though, that 25% is probably rapidly dwindling.

Congrats to Grubert - Your post made The Digital Bits (though, he didn't give you credit for finding the data).


Yeah, I noticed. highdefdigest too (http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Industry_Trends/Disc_Sales/Finally:_VideoScan_Releases_High-Def_Disc_Sales_Numbers_/456). Granted, the information was in the open. But still...

Come to think of it, in the past couple days at least three important news stories I posted on AVS (the Warner France slate (with IME titles appearing only on HD DVD), the specs for the Spanish HD DVD release of Underworld Evolution and now this) appeared hours later on DVD information sites such as dvdtimes or thedigitalbits.

Anybody hiring? :D

PS: I'm augmenting the initial post to make it more clear.

I think they are doing okay, although having given up more of their titles to do it than just about any studio, but what really matters for studio decisions are the future sales, of which runrate is an important factor to look at. If it wasn't we could look at total VHS sales for the last couple of decades and get all excited. :) If the trends from the Amazon rankings and those Videoscan numbers continue they won't be doing alright as far as future sales. When it was 3:1 in favor of HD DVD in August or so the Blu-ray camp did something to change that. Now it looks like the HD DVD camp needs to somehow change the currect trend, unless Blu-ray somehow does it on its own (which I doubt with even better titles coming out).

--Darin

Could the stats also indicate a trend whereby HD DVD owner stop buying titles and adopt a wait and see attitude, or there is a switch-over effect too?

Could the stats also indicate a trend whereby HD DVD owner stop buying titles and adopt a wait and see attitude, or there is a switch-over effect too?
I think it's simply a fact of there being a rather large influx of potential buyers in a short amount of time for BD. Lets face it, until the end of December or so, there were a few thousand potential BD buyers in existence. Whereas the number of HD-DVD software buyers has seen the steady growth you would expect with a movie format, BD has enjoyed an initial spike you would expect with the release of a gaming console. A quick influx of potential BD software buyers will of course bring with it a surge of BD software sales, but to take from that some indication of a change in the buying habits of HD-DVD supporters, well, that is just not supported by the data.

It will be interesting keeping tabs on these data points throughout 2007 to see if this trend continues and how volatile it is on a weekly basis (i.e. how significant of an impact is a new release).

Of course, that is what I intend to do. :)

Of course, that is what I intend to do. :)

Do you know when the next data point in this particular series will be available?

You already told us once that the Blu-ray sales went up for a couple of weeks or so after the PS3 launch but that the HD-A2 launch brought them back. That was December. But the trend on Amazon showed the Blu-ray sales continuing to improve even after the HD-A2 launch (whenever you want to count that) and now these numbers from Videoscan support that the first 2 weeks of January really went Blu-ray's way even while the Amazon rankings showed HD DVD ahead:

http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/graphs/salesrank-1-1-recent30.jpg

And since then the Amazon rankings have shown a trend more in Blu-ray's favor than the first 2 weeks of January.

I expect that the Videoscan numbers for the week ending January 21st won't look as bad for HD DVD. Given your position before about HD DVD pulling ahead by even more than they were, what is your position now about when you expect HD DVD to take the lead (and hold it for at least a day or two) on thedvdwars.com site once again?

--Darin I was wrong about that being the PS3 launch spike. The sales figures for movies look to me now that they lag the hardware sales by a couple weeks. Remember we were wondering about the LACK of impact on the Amazons sales figures for the first two or three weeks of the PS3 launch.

We also also have a bit more data and was of looking at it from the tracking sites now.

The most valid indicators to me are the older head to head title comparisons that have been released in both formats, such as MI III, Superman Returns or Tim Burtons Corpse Bride. Check out the 14 day custom trend lines from hdgamedb.com. Lot less joy there for Blu-ray. Same as the number of titles in the top 1000 and top 10000 rankings.

I think that the Blu-ray lead is much less now than HD DVDs lead was throughout the entire last year and has been to short to project into the end of the quarter, let alone the year, or into the end of the format war.

Last years comparisons showed that standalone sales and attach rate favor HD DVD over Blu-ray, probably as a result to HD DVD lower price advantage.

The last couple weeks sales data are a lagging indicator of the PS3's pre holiday sales spike and are probably to early to see the effect of the later HD A2 move into inventory and sales. They also show the clear advantage of the amount of the lack of HD DVD new titles being sold to the existing HD DVD player base.

A lot more PS3 have to be sold to get this slight lead for the Blu-ray movie sales and HD DVD has to sell less to stay competitive. If HD DVD sells as many units as Toshiba is moving into retail inventory the sales pattern will shift again.

Yeah, I noticed. highdefdigest too (http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Industry_Trends/Disc_Sales/Finally:_VideoScan_Releases_High-Def_Disc_Sales_Numbers_/456). Granted, the information was in the open. But still...

Come to think of it, in the past couple days at least three important news stories I posted on AVS (the Warner France slate (with IME titles appearing only on HD DVD), the specs for the Spanish HD DVD release of Underworld Evolution and now this) appeared hours later on DVD information sites such as dvdtimes or thedigitalbits.

Anybody hiring? :D

PS: I'm augmenting the initial post to make it more clear. Your one of the most appreciated posters here in the way that your posts create discussion.

Well done sir. Keep it up. :)

I think it's simply a fact of there being a rather large influx of potential buyers in a short amount of time for BD. Lets face it, until the end of December or so, there were a few thousand potential BD buyers in existence. Whereas the number of HD-DVD software buyers has seen the steady growth you would expect with a movie format, BD has enjoyed an initial spike you would expect with the release of a gaming console. A quick influx of potential BD software buyers will of course bring with it a surge of BD software sales, but to take from that some indication of a change in the buying habits of HD-DVD supporters, well, that is just not supported by the data. Best 200 words in this thread.

December standalone player sales in Germany

HD DVD (Toshiba HD-E1) sold 600 units (yes, six hundred players)
BD (Samsung BD-P1000 and Panasonic DMP-BD10EG-S) sold 140 units (one hundred and forty units)

Germany is awash in hidef. Well using the same logic used by many here,....

I hereby declare the HD format war in Germany to be over as player sales there are well over 4:1 in HD DVD's favor, using hard data. :rolleyes:

Not so fast though. Although the percentage who own a game may indeed by higher than the percentage that own a movie, I'd say that among those that own BD films, they've bought many more movies for the system thus far than they have games. Myself - 2 games, 13 movies.

I think the PS3 has sold more films than games by far up until now, among those that bought it for movies alone and gamers both.

This is the case in my home....I've bought way more Blu-ray movies than games. In fact, I only bought one game and spend time playing demos and the 360.

I posted this elsewhere, but figured it was relevant here:

For the 30 days before these numbers ended (Jan 14th) HD DVD had 11 releases, while Blu-ray had 10 releases. It is true that for 2007 it was 2 releases for Blu-ray to 0 releases for HD DVD, but I get the feeling some people around here think that there was this huge influx of Blu-ray titles that accounted for these numbers and then it will slack off. The skew toward Blu-ray having significantly more releases than HD DVD per week didn't start until January 23rd, which is after the period these numbers refer to.

--Darin


That's why I'm confused by those who are stating that the explanation for the increased sales is due to the fact HD DVD didn't have any titles released lately. In fact, I clearly remember a HD DVD fan creating a thread that basically questioned Blu-ray studio support since HD DVD was keeping up with all the Blu-ray titles recently.

this is amazing. njoy it while you can boys ... :D

Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!
And Kevin Federline is a great Rapper!

HD DVD has my support until I can't support it any more.
Numbers are nothing but...numbers!

The numbers as I understand them show BD has sold less discs since inception than HD. "Yay we sold less discs so we won?" Catching up is not winning. How is this a clear victory in the overall scheme of things? If anything it's a tie right now.The answer is obvious. HD-DVD came out a few months before BD. So no, it's not a "tie" or even close. Look at highdefdigest and see how many more BD movies are going to be released compared to HD-DVD.

I don't know how people manage to resist the obvious implication of these numbers.

As I said immediately after looking at the HMR data that this was hardware related. Nothing to do with titles, but PS3 owners buying movies.

The challenge for Sony is to sustain this. Unlike the PSP, the PS3 is a very good movie player.

However, we don't have actual hardware and movie sales, to see if the overall volume is strong.

BTW. IF anyone still believes that Digitalbits is unbiased should realize that while they picked this item to post from Grubert, they ignored the Warner news about France.

Overall, I also find it some what suspicious that HMR would post both this and and article about why BD will win in the same issue. So, given that this info is free and HMR is probably paying Neilson, the question I have is who is paying HMR? This is a very relevant question. IMHO.

Overall, I also find it some what suspicious that HMR would post both this and and article about why BD will win in the same issue. So, given that this info is free and HMR is probably paying Neilson, the question I have is who is paying HMR? This is a very relevant question. IMHO.

Not true. They started giving sales figures on the Jan 21-27 issue, whereas the "Researcher Sees Blu-ray Victory" interview is from the Jan 28-Feb 3 issue.

There's a saying, "pride comes before a fall".


That's from Proverbs 16:18: "Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall."

Looks like a lot of people around here have recently gone neutral, bought a PS3, and bought some BD movies. This in the face of a lack of new releases for HD DVD. I would guess this is a big factor in these numbers.

Going neutral can only prolong the format war.

It will be interesting to see if the trend continues.

Two things jumped out at me from that interview which I would consider red flags.

1. He says BD Players would be in the 400 range, when even Sony says it isn't like for 2-3 years. He then discounts the HD DVD side of cheap players by saying Chinese players won't arrive to make a difference. If you look at market prices today, HD DVD is already much closer to $300 than BD is to $400.

2. He discounts co-existence. When we know, co-existence is based on overall volume not relative. Just like PS3 is expected to coexist with xbox and Wii.

Overall, the interview and the Nielson data as presented smacked of partisanship to me. They should have reported overall growth, since the data was there!

heh. So it's purely a matter of the ratio for you? You don't think maybe volume is a little more important? Can you show me where the volume of units sold data is listed? And do you have an opinion on what the level of volume would be for an exclusive studio to go neutral, an opinion based on some meaningful data?

Pretty much, volume is key.

BD may have sold 260,000 movies compared to HD-DVD's 100,000. But that number isn't as solid or hard to fill in as 260,000,000 BD Vs 100,000,000 HD DVD.

Once it gets to that point, I think the numbers game will be the point of do or die.

Until then I think everyone is being overly optimistic or pessimistic as to what this all means.


/sits back and relaxes

All this arguing about which format will win...just pass the popcorn while I watch another Blu-Ray movie on my PS3 using a Panasonic 700AE projector with a 110" screen...

Oh, Netflix is great for ordering Blu-Ray movies!

I don't think they will or need to. DVD only sold something like 1 million DVD players in their 2nd year. I believe that the HD DVD groups estimate of $600 million in software is way high, but if they did hit it I think they would be in very good shape for at least a tie.
I hear things about the HD DVD add-on selling well and the PS3 selling poorly, but the Amazon numbers for the dedicated remote for the PS3 and the add-on don't look good for HD DVD to me. They have both pretty much been in stock over the last 2-3 weeks, with the PS3 remote generally ranked in the top 20 under video games (even outselling the $399 XBOX360 a lot of the time) while the add-on has been around the 70s. I just checked and the PS3 remote is #17, while the add-on is #101.

--Darin

Everyone tosses out the PS3 remote like it proves people are using the PS3 to watch BD. All the remote sales prove is that people are using the PS3 to watch movies, probably most of them DVD's that they already own. The fact that the remote is #17 doesn't mean BD is outperforming. I wish folks would quit referring to this as proof more PS3's are being used as BD players, compared to Toshiba standalones, or the addons.

Where did you get that 3X number. Did you just make it up?

--Darin

I took a stab at an approximate number. But since you want to question everything, I went back and counted HD-DVD release and BD releases since the launch of the PS3 and the week ending the 14th, and it looks like it is 2X, not 3X. The analogy remains unchanged. In a given period, BD needed to launch 5X (or more) hardware and 2X as much software to try to catch up to the SI numbers, which they still weren't able to do.

Why none, of course. Don't you remember? Consoles are terrible movie players, gamers don't own HDTVs, the PS3 will have no effect on the HD wars, etc etc etc.
:)

All the remote sales prove is that people are using the PS3 to watch movies, probably most of them DVD's that they already own.

Ludicrous.

First, most American households with a PS3 also have a standalone DVD player.

Second, if you only want to play DVDs, why buy a $24.99 remote when you can buy a player for $20.96?

People are playing BDs on their PS3s. Ze debate is ovah.

Everyone tosses out the PS3 remote like it proves people are using the PS3 to watch BD. All the remote sales prove is that people are using the PS3 to watch movies, probably most of them DVD's that they already own. The fact that the remote is #17 doesn't mean BD is outperforming. I wish folks would quit referring to this as proof more PS3's are being used as BD players, compared to Toshiba standalones, or the addons.

First we got members claiming for months/years that nobody will use a game machine to watch HD discs. Then we got (and still do) have members pointing out that nobody will seriously use the PS/3 in the HT because it doesn't do DVD upscaling.

But, you figure they are all wrong, and in reality the massive interest (implied by lots of remote purchases) is in using the PS/3 just as a DVD player for regular TVs?

Gary

Going neutral can only prolong the format war.

You're right, for HD DVD.

Since it is overwhelmingly HD DVD to BD defection, do you expect HD DVD owners to dump their consoles and software when they defect?

Most won't be doing that for a long time.

However, if they see the writing on the wall before the rest of the world, they can sell their stuff on ebay while it's still valuable and replace their titles with BD. If they miss the opportunity, they will still be able to play their HD DVD library for quite awhile.

Oh, Netflix is great for ordering Blu-Ray movies!

Are you being serious?

There are numerous threads to the contrary, unless you're talking about catalog titles.

Ok, I read all 10 pages of this thread and I still don't get why the BD supporters are claiming they have won the war.

The numbers as I understand them show BD has sold less discs since inception than HD. "Yay we sold less discs so we won?" Catching up is not winning. How is this a clear victory in the overall scheme of things? If anything it's a tie right now.

They have had 1 great month during a time when HD released next to nothing.

Looking at the big picture the install base for both formats is small. A lot of new PS3 owners are checking out Blu-ray movies right now at a time when there are few good games for the PS3. It should have been obvious to anyone that BD would outsell HD in the month of January.

Having said that I don't see how anything is over. Just as last year when HD was vastly outselling BD all the BD supporters were preaching patience until the PS3 arrived, I say we will see how things play out when the new wave of HD players rolls out in the 2nd quarter of 2007. Cheap players could once again tip the balance the other way.

There are also some BIG titles coming for HD. Matrix. Harry Potter. Jaws. Jurrasic Park. Hitchcock. Even though some of those are also going to be BD for someone coming into the hi-def arena those cheap players and great movies will make many consider HD as the way to go for them.

HD still has some big cards to play. Chalk up a battle to BD but the "war" is hardly over.

Good points. Anyone following this "war" should expect a give and take between these two formats. Locally I have seen a huge switch by the big box stores in their attitude towards HD DVD and others are reporting the same thing where they live - anecdotal only - the fact that some of the people selling these things are actually positive about them could make a subsatantial difference.

Cheers,

Grant

Everyone tosses out the PS3 remote like it proves people are using the PS3 to watch BD. All the remote sales prove is that people are using the PS3 to watch movies, probably most of them DVD's that they already own. The fact that the remote is #17 doesn't mean BD is outperforming. I wish folks would quit referring to this as proof more PS3's are being used as BD players, compared to Toshiba standalones, or the addons.

I'm sure there is some truth to this, but how many of these PS3 owners are likely to already have a DVD player? Pretty much all of them? Why throw down an extra 25 bucks. Oh, and don't forget that the PS3 is not an upconverting player, right?

Like I said... some...will want just one machine hooked up to their display. But really, how many of these would buy that remote just to play DVDs?

Ludicrous.

First, most American households with a PS3 also have a standalone DVD player.

Second, if you only want to play DVDs, why buy a $24.99 remote when you can buy a player for $20.96?

People are playing BDs on their PS3s. Ze debate is ovah.

You beat me to it.

Are you being serious?

There are numerous threads to the contrary, unless you're talking about catalog titles.

Yes. I don't live on this forum.

I have yet to see the entire BD selection for Netflix. At the end of the day, I don't have any substantial investment in either BD or HD-DVD movies, unlike my DVD collection.

So, I will continue to use Netflix until the war is over. Meanwhile, I am watching a BD movie a week at the moment and I see that continuing for the next 2-3 months.

Yes. I don't live on this forum.

I have yet to see the entire BD selection for Netflix. At the end of the day, I don't have any substantial investment in either BD or HD-DVD movies, unlike my DVD collection.

So, I will continue to use Netflix until the war is over. Meanwhile, I am watching a BD movie a week at the moment and I see that continuing for the next 2-3 months.

Nice!

I'm with you. I'm all about renting, it's just that the reports of title availability haven't been good at all. Glad to see someone's getthing their discs.

There is no denying that the huge surge in BD sales can be attributed to the PS3, as people who bought it are undoubtedly using it to sample the BD functionality.

A lot of people might have bought at least a couple of BDs, leading to this surge. The same thing happened with PSP during its initial stages, and everyone knows how the PSP movie market fared in the long term. The interesting thing to see is how many of the PS3 owners will become regular BD movie buyers rather than 'curious Goerge's sampling a novelty. How many of the PS3 owners bought the BD discs and decided that the improvement in PQ and AQ was worth the price premium over regular DVDs? There won't be an answer to this question for another couple of months, when we see how the BD sales to PS3 owners fare when there will be more games - especially Motorstorm, coming out.

Only time will tell, and the war is not over by any chance. Not yet. HD-DVD had its period of sales dominance. It is Blu-Ray's turn now. How long will it last before tables turn is anyone's guess.

Wnorris your logic is all sorts of whacked.

Your attach rate figures are for a slice in time; if you follow the trending, BD made up 7% of HD DVDs entire historical sell-through in a single week. Whatever the ratio of PS3 owners buying BD films, and however many films they buy, it is clearly greater in volumes than the present equivelent on HD DVD. If it weren't, the gap wouldn't be closing at all - simply maintaining. If the present rate were to keep up, BD would catch HD DVD the next week, surpass it the week after that, and never look back.

Let's just assume your five times the players and three times the releases... but it's not resulting in a simple "catch-up," it's resulting in an outright catapulting.

Actually, I am applying logic where you are applying none. Let's take things at face value for a second. In the 2nd week of November, the HD-DVD promotions group releases a press announcement that 1.5 million HD-DVD discs had shipped. Now, we don't know how many sold, but lets just estimate 1 million sold. Again, lets estimate that for the holiday season, another .5 million discs ship bringing the total to 2 million, and lets say the total number sold becomes somewhere in the range of 1.25-1.5 million. To confirm this range, the promotions group als said there was an attach rate of 8.4 for HD-DVD in 2006 (annualizing gives you the larger number around 26 which was touted at CES) and an estimated 175,000 player sales. Also keep in mind that the addon and A2 account for around 100,000 of these sales, and together, they average about the same amount of time on market as the PS3. So all this means 1.47 million discs sold in 2006, which confirms my estimate.

So in 2006, HD-DVD sold 1.47 million discs, and using the closest index to Dec. 31, 2006 (85.05), it would mean BD sold around 1.25 million discs.

Now, there were also numbers released around that time that indicated only 25,000 standalone BD players on the market. So up until the launch of the PS3, there were at most 25,000 standalones. Now there are various sales analysis of the PS3 on the web, but they put PS3 sales through the end of 2006 between 500,000 and 700,000 units in North America (where the Nielson numbers are valid). So this gives us between 525,000 and 725,000 players and 1.25 million discs, or an attach rate between 1.7 and 2.4 for BD players (compared to HD-DVD's 8.4).

Now, the fact that BD index went up to about 92 would mean BD outsold HD-DVD by about 100,000 discs between the 7th and 14th. This isn't a huge amount by any means, especially considering that Crank, BD's #1 selling disc was released in that period. Crank alone may be enough to account for the difference. There were no new releases for HD-DVD.

So what all this says is that in a relatively short amount of time HD-DVD hit an attach rate ~5X greater than BD, because BD flooded the market with ~4X more players than HD-DVD. I think this is a good indicator that basically as many people are using the PS3 for regular movie viewing, as there are HD-DVD owners. I would guess ~150,000 PS3's are being used to watch movies (during the period that we have data for), which means between 21%-30% of PS3's.Inevitably, some in there were just taking BD for a test drive (since it is the beginning of life), and may decide BD isn't worth an extra $5-$10 per disc. The actual percentage in the long run, will probably be slightly lower (15-20% maybe).

So what this tells us is that if Sony sells 10 million PS3's by the end of 2008, at most, maybe 2 million will be used as regular BD players. So HD-DVD needs to sell at most 1.825 million addons and standalones to keep pace with BD in NA. This is less than .5% of the NA population, so I think it is easily achievable, especially with prices seeming to fall weekly on HD-DVD players.

Like I said, I think BD has made a big push and now HD-DVD and BD are roughly equal. If Sony misses their sales forcast for the PS3, I think BD could be in big trouble. If HD-DVD doesn't get some more releases rolling, they could be in big trouble. It all goes back to the same thing I've always said, Sony's strength is content right now, and Toshiba's is hardware. If a HD-DVD could convince an exclusive studio were to go neutral, it would be severely damaging to BD. If BD found a way to produce cheap players, it would be severly damaging to HD-DVD.

It all points to parity, and without some new developments, I think the year will end on parity. This data doesn't show that BD is winning. It shows that the formats are stalemated, and if the likely trends continue, they will remain stalmated throughout 2007, with thin leads that see-saw back and forth.

This post is making me go buy another BD movie online now.

- Great news for Blu-Ray supporters!

Nice!

I'm with you. I'm all about renting, it's just that the reports of title availability haven't been good at all. Glad to see someone's getthing their discs.


Yea, I have noticed that some titles have long wait times, like "Click", so I am watching more kids movies that my kids like :-)

Last weekend, we watched "Wild". It was ok and my kids really enjoyed it.

On the other hand, if I start to encounter delay times...my tune might change about netflix :)

I attribute the delay times to a big surge in BD rental requests....

First we got members claiming for months/years that nobody will use a game machine to watch HD discs. Then we got (and still do) have members pointing out that nobody will seriously use the PS/3 in the HT because it doesn't do DVD upscaling.

But, you figure they are all wrong, and in reality the massive interest (implied by lots of remote purchases) is in using the PS/3 just as a DVD player for regular TVs?

Gary

No, I'm saying that some people will play BD's with it a need a remote. Other folks will have it in a bedroom, they will have traded in the PS2 that used to be there and played their DVD's, and now they will use the PS3 to play the same DVD's. For some folks, the PS3 may be their first DVD player and next gen game system, and they just want to get the most out of it.

And yes, they would pay $25 for a remote vs. $20 for a really cheap DVD player, because a $20 player is exatcly that, cheap and unreliable (not to mention that an older TV may not have enough inputs, need a switch box, possibly need a surge strip or extra outlet, etc.).

So the fact that the remote sells highly, doesn't mean that it counts the same as a BD player sale, or that the remote will even be used in regards to BD playback. It's a BD fanboy myth that helps them sleep better at night.

Everyone tosses out the PS3 remote like it proves people are using the PS3 to watch BD. All the remote sales prove is that people are using the PS3 to watch movies, probably most of them DVD's that they already own. The fact that the remote is #17 doesn't mean BD is outperforming. I wish folks would quit referring to this as proof more PS3's are being used as BD players, compared to Toshiba standalones, or the addons. I disagree somewhat. I think someone who has a remote and is using the PS3 as a movie player is much more likely to use the thing for Blu-ray movies. Sure it can still be used for DVD's , but its easier to use a $30 DVD for that.

I would like to get PS3 remote numbers as I think they would show intent.

Also , buying even a $29.99 device is a consumer behavior consideration , as peole who buy anything, are much more likely to use it, than if they were given it for free.

I think PS3 remote sales are a significan t indicator and they show movie watching intent.

I didn't buy the PS3 BD remote. I use the PS3 controller for now. How much do you need to fiddle with the controller once you hit play?

I am waiting for logitech to release a bluetooth capable remote control.

My old DVD player was the iodata Linkplayer2, which now sits unplugged. I like it a lot, but it was way too noisy (DVD drive). The PS3 is very silent

So the fact that the remote sells highly, doesn't mean that it counts the same as a BD player sale, or that the remote will even be used in regards to BD playback.

That's not what you were saying. To wit:


All the remote sales prove is that people are using the PS3 to watch movies, probably most of them DVD's that they already own.

There is no denying that the huge surge in BD sales can be attributed to the PS3, as people who bought it are undoubtedly using it to sample the BD functionality.

A lot of people might have bought at least a couple of BDs, leading to this surge. The same thing happened with PSP during its initial stages, and everyone knows how the PSP movie market fared in the long term. The interesting thing to see is how many of the PS3 owners will become regular BD movie buyers rather than 'curious Goerge's sampling a novelty. How many of the PS3 owners bought the BD discs and decided that the improvement in PQ and AQ was worth the price premium over regular DVDs? There won't be an answer to this question for another couple of months, when we see how the BD sales to PS3 owners fare when there will be more games - especially Motorstorm, coming out.

Only time will tell, and the war is not over by any chance. Not yet. HD-DVD had its period of sales dominance. It is Blu-Ray's turn now. How long will it last before tables turn is anyone's guess.

You could be right about this, for the most part.

One thing that has me worried is the lack of rental availability, on both sides. But I figured that many of the PS3 owners could just rent for Netflix and BB with no added cost. The overall sales (not retail, of course) would increase with the winning format increasing the most which could be tracked by the studios and influence their decisions. But the obviouls lack of support from these 2 is dissappointing, to say the least.

I have also said many times that new PS3 purchases will also occur when these games you speak of begin to roll out. Your first sentence applies to these people too. I believe sheer volume of new PS3 owners will offset any loss in attach rate.

Ludicrous.

First, most American households with a PS3 also have a standalone DVD player.

Second, if you only want to play DVDs, why buy a $24.99 remote when you can buy a player for $20.96?

People are playing BDs on their PS3s. Ze debate is ovah. I agree some are. Those people that buy remotes certainly are IMHO.

Another question is whether these initial PS3 buyers include a lot of Blu-ray pent up demand from first adopters , and are representative of future PS3 sales. In addition, we don't know how the HD A2 sales will counter these increased Blu-ray sales.

It's truly not that simple...



In the short term, they don't expect a profit at all, and where there most immediate concern is, is the format war. Pushing Blu-ray into the PS3 was a central part of this push, and it has ramifications across the entirety of Sony's BD strategy. Not only is there a player now on the market in volumes no other device can touch, but this same device (and its associated volumes) have driven Sony on the diode side to iron out their diode fabrication process in a manner that would have taken *much* much longer if not aided by the internal push generated by the PS3. The PS3 in turn suffered for its role in fast-forwarding the diode expertise, but it was a strategic risk taken.

Sony is unable to put out a subsidized standalone because unlike HD DVD, one of BD's present strengths is the coalition of CE manufacturers behind it. They are no doubt tolerent of the PS3 (to whatever extent that they are), because they understand that there is still a market among the high-end purchasers who will never consider a console as an option. They are able to compete and market as normal in this environment, as Sony competes with them in the expected fashion. Were Sony to subsidize a standalone, I think it would put the entire CE coalition at serious risk, as truly then there would be some resentment brewing.



As I said, this isn't the typical console model this go-around. PS3 will serve a dual purpose in the short term - indeed, BD is probably viewed as the more important of the two at the moment - and as time goes on, and 'real' games are released, it will settle into a more typical console model. As soon as BD player standalones reach price parity with PS3, it's role in the BD vanguard will have been served.



I recommend all of my posts in the thread I am about to link to, but especially this one and the two posts that follow it:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9642743&&#post9642743



Well that's because I'm also a technology guy. ;)

My ever-present focus and passion...


This excellent post probably hit on the head what Sony's strategy is. Now the question is, will it work?

I didn't buy the PS3 BD remote. I use the PS3 controller for now. How much do you need to fiddle with the controller once you hit play?

I am waiting for logitech to release a bluetooth capable remote control.


1. Good point. What about those who don't even go for the remote, yet watch BDs.

2. Any self respecting universal remote company had better get on the stick for bluetooth. There are going to be a lot of BD owners out there salivating for the first good bluetooth universal. I suspect it won't be too long.

You mention that outselling HD DVD by 100,000 discs in a given week is ultimately not that meaningful, but when that number is nearly triple what HD DVD did, and on top of that a volume number that previous to this year was probably not seen in a single given seven day stretch for the majority of 2006 (representing nearly 7.5% of an entire year of HD DVD in a single week), I'd say it's significant.

Right.

Also, if new HD DVD consoles are selling like they should, new titles would not be needed. New owners would be stocking up on the plethora that have already been released, wouldn't they?

Certainly we're still very early in this whole 'war'. Anecdotally, I went to Fryes yesterday to pick up a few hd-dvd and blu-ray movies and a couple of other guys were there looking over the movies. I got the impression they might have both been dual format owners and could have picked from either side, as I was.

They both looked at the 4 shelves of HD and BD movies and remarked to each other "wow, that selection sucks on both sides doesn't it?". "Yeah, not much there". Of course compared to other stores Fryes has a great selection but in their view it was being compared to DVD and of course in that respect, not much was there.

Still very early for formats that hope to be the successor to DVD.

Having bought my HD DVD hardware back in April 2006, I am pretty much caught up with previously released titles. I buy most of what comes out each week on an ongoing basis (not to mention BD titles as well as I bought the Panasonic player back in Oct 2006).

So if November and December were the months that so many PS3's were sold, doesn't it stand to reason that just after the holiday season (when many of them were opened) would be a chance for new hardware owners to buy a few titles and for some of the enthusiasts to catch up on what has been previously released? The question is what trend will form from mid January on? Is this trajectory a trend or will it level off? This snapshot of 2 weeks is just data, whereas 6-12 months of these data points may become useful information.

Gross numbers of units sold would also be better than these percentages.

There is no denying that the huge surge in BD sales can be attributed to the PS3, as people who bought it are undoubtedly using it to sample the BD functionality.

A lot of people might have bought at least a couple of BDs, leading to this surge. The same thing happened with PSP during its initial stages, and everyone knows how the PSP movie market fared in the long term. The interesting thing to see is how many of the PS3 owners will become regular BD movie buyers rather than 'curious Goerge's sampling a novelty. How many of the PS3 owners bought the BD discs and decided that the improvement in PQ and AQ was worth the price premium over regular DVDs? There won't be an answer to this question for another couple of months, when we see how the BD sales to PS3 owners fare when there will be more games - especially Motorstorm, coming out.

Only time will tell, and the war is not over by any chance. Not yet. HD-DVD had its period of sales dominance. It is Blu-Ray's turn now. How long will it last before tables turn is anyone's guess.

You are correct, however you are assuming that the PS3 base stays static or has very low growth.

The reality is that we are probably going to see minimum PS3 sales of 200K units a month for the rest of the calendar year, with a spike at the end of the year.

So, in effect you are going to have "replenished" the ranks of new people wanting to sample BD titles every month which are going to drastically outnumber all of the people buying HD player standalones and the Xbox add on.

In fact, Sony was actually brilliant in developing a movie lineup that really plays strongly to gamers as they are the ones doing the "sampling" at this point in time.

If at the end of 2007 BR has 80% of total sales over HD-DVD then it is over. If on the other hand if attach rate for PS3 actually is very very low and HD-DVD is able to get a very cheap player to the market, along with some good exclusive titles then the ratio might not be so clear at the end of the year.

I would say that if at the end of 2007 the ratio is not overwhelmingly in favor of one format or the other then it is far morel ikely that we see a combo format like Total-HD becoming more mainstream and whichever format is weaker for CE support starts to fade into the sunset, perhaps with combo units out there for the loser's supporters.

You guys need to debate the facts and stop taking jabs at each other's credibility based on two weeks of sales data.

It's like every BD shill out there all of a sudden feels vindicated by the PS3 sales spike that we are seeing and is trying to rub everyone's nose in it.

My opinion of these numbers is that they are good for HD-DVD and even better for BD. They are impressive for BD regardless of how you view the numbers for HD-DVD although I don't believe this will actually "help" anything with the format war - wether to prolong it or end it. <Sigh>

pretty much agree here.

Probably 200-250,000 PS3's per month , but that will be more than balanced with 75-100, 000 HD A2s, HD A20 and HD XAs and 50,000 - 75,000 Xbox 360 add ons per month until the Xmas season when cheaper Chinese players arrive and everybody drops prices. So I see 250,000 PS3's added each month, 10,000 or less Blu-ray stand alones compared to 125,000 HD DVD players with far greater attach rates.

That makes the worse HD DVD can do is tie Blu-ray, even if the PS3 sales and attach rates maintain.

It's just too soon to say. HD-DVD is starved for content, big time (as evidenced by The Departed shooting to the top of the Amazon charts for either HD-DVD or BR shortly after the preorder was opened up). They won't be able to move that many players per month at any price if the content library remains starved much past April.

It's just too soon to say. HD-DVD is starved for content, big time (as evidenced by The Departed shooting to the top of the Amazon charts for either HD-DVD or BR shortly after the preorder was opened up). They won't be able to move that many players per month at any price if the content library remains starved much past April. Well the library of content is a clean slate for all new owners. I don't think the dearth of new HD DVD content will last long, I think a lot of that was waiting for the LA AACS decision on the software exploit.

Not to toot my own horn, but I have a degree in Economics from a Top 40 Business School, and what you were talking about is not Economics.

Heh, you might want to get a refund! :D

"Given the quarter's tidings, investors might want to ponder the economics associated with the PS3, as well as the idea that despite its well-known and popular brand and state-of-the-art features, maybe it's not bulletproof, especially with a price many argue is too steep for many less avid fans' wallets. There are still a lot of questions -- and Sony's still got some work to do as it turns things around."

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/ticker/article.aspx?Feed=FOOL&Date=20070201&ID=6424011&Symbol=SNE

I think all insiders or format related employees that post controversially should ID themselves somehow.


several members have expressed similar concerns:

right now the Insider's sig is only required to post in the Insider's Q&A Forum, but perhaps it should be expanded to apply more generally: we are looking at this

In the meantime:



You guys need to debate the facts and stop taking jabs at each other's credibility

Having bought my HD DVD hardware back in April 2006, I am pretty much caught up with previously released titles. I buy most of what comes out each week on an ongoing basis (not to mention BD titles as well as I bought the Panasonic player back in Oct 2006).


And you will remain mostly caught up because there is little for you to catch up on for the near future. While Blu-ray, on the other hand...

I don't wish to drive this point too far home. It's a bummer and a pretty big mistake by the HD DVD camp. Of course BD has made their fair share, but it's HD DVD's turn.

Ok, I read all 10 pages of this thread and I still don't get why the BD supporters are claiming they have won the war.

The numbers as I understand them show BD has sold less discs since inception than HD. "Yay we sold less discs so we won?" Catching up is not winning. How is this a clear victory in the overall scheme of things? If anything it's a tie right now.

They have had 1 great month during a time when HD released next to nothing.

Looking at the big picture the install base for both formats is small. A lot of new PS3 owners are checking out Blu-ray movies right now at a time when there are few good games for the PS3. It should have been obvious to anyone that BD would outsell HD in the month of January.

Having said that I don't see how anything is over. Just as last year when HD was vastly outselling BD all the BD supporters were preaching patience until the PS3 arrived, I say we will see how things play out when the new wave of HD players rolls out in the 2nd quarter of 2007. Cheap players could once again tip the balance the other way.

There are also some BIG titles coming for HD. Matrix. Harry Potter. Jaws. Jurrasic Park. Hitchcock. Even though some of those are also going to be BD for someone coming into the hi-def arena those cheap players and great movies will make many consider HD as the way to go for them.

HD still has some big cards to play. Chalk up a battle to BD but the "war" is hardly over.

Best post of this whole thread. Did BDA give up when sales for HD DVD was 3-1. No. Was the war over. No. Is the war over now because BDA had betters sales for 2 weeks. No.

Numbers today simply don't mean that much. Neither format has a huge installed base of dedicated players.

We haven't hit the next phase where we get web/network connectivity, Managed Copy and more complex interactivity.

The goal is still the same for HD DVD. Get players out and get them into homes. Amazon still has brisk sales of the A2 (rank 12 for DVD players) and the Euro XE1 and E1 players look to be ready for larger delivery.

The only way to beat superior content is price with adequate content.

hmurchison, Are you waiting for the "next phase" before you buy a HD-DVD player or does your company(Toshiba) let you borrow one for now? Should others wait for that phase as well? I couldn't imagine having a bunch of titles on not even being able to watch them at home.

It's like every BD shill out there all of a sudden feels vindicated by the PS3 sales spike that we are seeing and is trying to rub everyone's nose in it.

I have pondered this quite heavily.

There was a time, not too long ago when I was considering HD DVD based on initial cost. My mindset changed and I suddenly felt the sting of being on the other side. It was a bit scary to me to invest in a format (after I just bought a boat and RV) that had only one studio to support it. I know how that feels from a few months ago. Remember the BD launch?

However, the posts on this thread are aimed mainly at those who wish to argue. You don't see people like Plazman and you, for example getting replies when you are expressing defeat. That would be nose rubbing.

The HD DVD die-hards are fighting vigorously on this thread to extinguish a happy moment for BD fans after it has been such an uphill battle. Should BD fans not be allowed to respond?

When responding to civil posts, I believe my responses, as well as many others, have also been civil.

I keep hearing about interactivity, but I am wondering what market research was done to determine that "Interactivity" will actually save the sell-to-home shiny disk market for movies?

I look back at the early 90's and at what happened to the premise of popups and flash animation or java beans that was supposed to make the internet so compelling to everyone. Yet now, more than a decade later, we see that entire industries sprung up to kill internet popups and other malware.

People pay money to kill popups in their webbrowsers for a good reason. People kill that stapler icon in MS Office for a good reason.

If the studios really believe that people who watch movies at home are eagerly anticipating the release of the next great interactive pong experience for the blockbusters, I think they haven't done enough research.

several members have expressed similar concerns:

right now the Insider's sig is only required to post in the Insider's Q&A Forum, but perhaps it should be expanded to apply more generally: we are looking at this

In the meantime:

Put me down for a yea on this as well.

Did BDA give up when sales for HD DVD was 3-1.

Hell no. Did Braveheart give up? Did Payback give up? :D

But the BDA responded to counter that, with the PS3 with bundled BD movie, and an influx of appropriate titles.

The HD DVD needs to do something.

And we may be seeing now some of the HD DVD PRG response. There are reports of increased HD DVD presence in big retailers such as Best Buy. That may mean they are putting the $150M to use.

I have pondered this quite heavily.

There was a time, not too long ago when I was considering HD DVD based on initial cost. My mindset changed and I suddenly felt the sting of being on the other side. It was a bit scary to me to invest in a format (after I just bought a boat and RV) that had only one studio to support it. I know how that feels from a few months ago. Remember the BD launch?

However, the posts on this thread are aimed mainly at those who wish to argue. You don't see people like Plazman and you, for example getting replies when you are expressing defeat. That would be nose rubbing.

The HD DVD die-hards are fighting vigorously on this thread to extinguish a happy moment for BD fans after it has been such an uphill battle. Should BD fans not be allowed to respond?

When responding to civil posts, I believe my responses, as well as many others, have also been civil.

Who said we are defeated? Two weeks is far too soon to tell and I have a feeling Toshiba and Universal (and maybe WB) won't go quietly into the night.

It's simply frustrating right now that a video game console could potentially decide this format war, with interesting results and consequences for those of us who really enjoy our movie collections and some of the things HD-DVD brings to the table that BD can't do.

Best post of this whole thread. Did BDA give up when sales for HD DVD was 3-1. No. Was the war over. No. Is the war over now because BDA had betters sales for 2 weeks. No.

BD had just come out then.

Personally I'm happy the consoles are making HD movies popular. Isn't HD-DVD add-on the highest selling HD-DVD player and PS3 the highest selling Blu-ray player? If so, to me it seems they are helping speed up the adoption process. This is exactly what I want as that means higher chance of success ( I wish this had happened with higher res music formats as well).

Heh, you might want to get a refund! :D

"Given the quarter's tidings, investors might want to ponder the economics associated with the PS3, as well as the idea that despite its well-known and popular brand and state-of-the-art features, maybe it's not bulletproof, especially with a price many argue is too steep for many less avid fans' wallets. There are still a lot of questions -- and Sony's still got some work to do as it turns things around."

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/ticker/article.aspx?Feed=FOOL&Date=20070201&ID=6424011&Symbol=SNE

How exactly does quoting an article which has no relation to what you were talking about prove your point?

You were talking about a predicted loss per console, relative popularity, and balance sheets. If you can point to a theory of economics which helped you explain how you determined what you wrote, I will take back what I said.

Being that I know you can't, I stick to what I said.

BD had just come out then.

Didn't stop HD-DVD fanatics from claiming it was dead.

Hell no. Did Braveheart give up? Did Payback give up? :D



Simpsons?

That makes sense.

I wonder how Nielsen gets data. We know they don't get it off internet vendors or walmart. So in our case that leaves just BB / CC ?

You are wrong. They get it from Wal*Mart and from major web merchants (including Amazon). Check their website.

/carmi

Best post of this whole thread. Did BDA give up when sales for HD DVD was 3-1. No. Was the war over. No. Is the war over now because BDA had betters sales for 2 weeks. No.

Quite true. But, the BDA and BD supporters are had a vision of what would occur at the point HD DVD had the 3:1 lead: The PS/3 would be released in large numbers, followed by a lot of great content, and the result would be a lot of BD movie watchers.

As someone pointed out: The Brits at Dunkirk. It's a far more appropriate analogy for BD.

HD DVD release - The Germans invade Poland (first to market)
BD release - The Allies attempt to save France and fail (big HD DVD advantage)
PS/3 release - D-day
Chinese players - The V2 rocket or jets (significant, but will it have any affect on the outcome?)

The war is not over. But, it may be beginning to be over.

Gary

Who said we are defeated? Two weeks is far too soon to tell and I have a feeling Toshiba and Universal (and maybe WB) won't go quietly into the night.

It's simply frustrating right now that a video game console could potentially decide this format war, with interesting results and consequences for those of us who really enjoy our movie collections and some of the things HD-DVD brings to the table that BD can't do.

It was not my intention to say you are defeated, but that you were "expressing defeat" ala your back and forth with hmurchison early on in this thread.

If I offended you, I apologize.

Didn't stop HD-DVD fanatics from claiming it was dead.

Yes, that does seem to ring a bell, doesn't it.

I keep hearing about interactivity, but I am wondering what market research was done to determine that "Interactivity" will actually save the sell-to-home shiny disk market for movies?

I look back at the early 90's and at what happened to the premise of popups and flash animation or java beans that was supposed to make the internet so compelling to everyone. Yet now, more than a decade later, we see that entire industries sprung up to kill internet popups and other malware.

People pay money to kill popups in their webbrowsers for a good reason. People kill that stapler icon in MS Office for a good reason.

If the studios really believe that people who watch movies at home are eagerly anticipating the release of the next great interactive pong experience for the blockbusters, I think they haven't done enough research.

Excellent post. To me, the claim of interactivity stinks of a diversionary tactic.

Its entirely possible the 7% change is a reporting artifact, the dataset is too small.I think the 7% makes sense based on the numbers. They seem to indicate that Blu-ray outsold HD DVD by about 3:1 the week of the 14th. If HD DVD had just an average week previous 37 weeks or so since launch then that is like Blu-ray having 3 weeks worth of average sales for HD DVD in one week. Two extra weeks equivalence could add about 3.5% each given that HD DVD should have had a lot more players in the market than they did for the average week last year (when they had less than 70k total for the first 6 months). Even with no releases in those weeks I don't think the 7% catchup looks out of line at all.
The most valid indicators to me are the older head to head title comparisons that have been released in both formats, such as MI III, Superman Returns or Tim Burtons Corpse Bride. Check out the 14 day custom trend lines from hdgamedb.com.We've discussed before how Superman Returns would go out of stock on Blu-ray and couldn't even be ordered, while the same thing wasn't happening on the HD DVD side, so I'm not sure why you chose that one. Just look at what has happened to the ranking for the Blu-ray SR since it could be ordered again. The Corpse Bride graph shows the Blu-ray ranking higher than the HD DVD most of the time on there over the last 2 weeks. MI:3 does also. I think the Videoscan numbers also are one indicator that the Amazon rankings tend to skew more toward HD DVD than the in store sales. Just look at the two weeks that Videoscan reported on and see how the Amazon rankings had HD DVD showing as in the lead for the top 10 rankings both weeks. Is your point that Blu-ray doesn't seem to be leading by as much for those three?
Lot less joy there for Blu-ray. Same as the number of titles in the top 1000 and top 10000 rankings.Are these the graphs that you are saying have a lot less joy for Blu-ray?

Top 1000:
http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/graphs/top1000-1-1-All.jpg

Top 10000:
http://www.eproductwars.com/dvd/graphs/top10000-1-1-All.jpg

I think that the Blu-ray lead is much less now than HD DVDs lead was throughout the entire last year and has been to short to project into the end of the quarter, let alone the year, or into the end of the format war.So, does that mean I can't entice you to predict when HD DVD will go back in the lead in the Amazon rankings and hold it for at least a day? :)

--Darin

And you will remain mostly caught up because there is little for you to catch up on for the near future. While Blu-ray, on the other hand...

I don't wish to drive this point too far home. It's a bummer and a pretty big mistake by the HD DVD camp. Of course BD has made their fair share, but it's HD DVD's turn.

I don't understand the mistake. The HD DVD group announced a couple of weeks ago that they planned to release 300 titles in 2007. If only 2/3 of that number show up, and I have no reason to believe that will be the case, an HD DVD player owner would still have an average of 4 titles/week to buy in 2007 (6 if all 300 arrive). That is probably way above average for most folks, that are not posting in these forums, to buy or rent in a week.

The point I was trying to make is that we have no reason to believe that this 2 weeks of data is indicative of an ongoing trend. It might be, but it may also just include a lot of catching up on the BD side. Once again, time will tell.

If I bought a player today, I would probably buy at least a couple of dozen titles during the month thereafter (given how many there are available). I realize I am a heavy purchaser, but I think the enthusiast crowd is driving a lot of the volume at the moment for both formats. If these formats don't go mass market, they will both survive.

Excellent post. To me, the claim of interactivity stinks of a diversionary tactic.

I believe rdjam's poll is making things very clear what BD supporters think in this regard. So, unless the silent majority of the mass market are interactivity zealots, there is no issue.

I suspect if you posted a poll for HD DVD supporters that asked for people to choose ONE of IME or lossless audio on an HD DVD, IME would get trounced.

Someone should post that poll.

Gary

So, does that mean I can't entice you to predict when HD DVD will go back in the lead in the Amazon rankings and hold it for at least a day? :)

--Darin
:)

I took a stab at an approximate number. But since you want to question everything, I went back and counted HD-DVD release and BD releases since the launch of the PS3 and the week ending the 14th, and it looks like it is 2X, not 3X.Where did you get your numbers and what were the actual numbers you got? I used Grubert's lists and got 47 for Blu-ray and 42 for HD DVD from 11/14/06 to 1/14/07.

--Darin

I believe rdjam's poll is making things very clear what BD supporters think in this regard. So, unless the silent majority of the mass market are interactivity zealots, there is no issue.

I suspect if you posted a poll for HD DVD supporters that asked for people to choose ONE of IME or lossless audio on an HD DVD, IME would get trounced.

Someone should post that poll.

Gary

That would be my guess well.

Wow, somebody's testy. I quoted the movie "Animal House" verbatim, as it was on topic, and it's been deleted?

I wonder how long before the entire BR/HD-DVD forum is put on hiatus...

I don't understand the mistake. The HD DVD group announced a couple of weeks ago that they planned to release 300 titles in 2007. If only 2/3 of that number show up, and I have no reason to believe that will be the case, an HD DVD player owner would still have an average of 4 titles/week to buy in 2007 (6 if all 300 arrive). That is probably way above average for most folks, that are not posting in these forums, to buy or rent in a week.

The point I was trying to make is that we have no reason to believe that this 2 weeks of data is indicative of an ongoing trend. It might be, but it may also just include a lot of catching up on the BD side. Once again, time will tell.

If I bought a player today, I would probably buy at least a couple of dozen titles during the month thereafter (given how many there are available). I realize I am a heavy purchaser, but I think the enthusiast crowd is driving a lot of the volume at the moment for both formats. If these formats don't go mass market, they will both survive.

1. No offense, but I won't touch your "planned" releases. That horse is badly beaten.

2. My point is BD has caught up and possibly surpassed HD DVD in total disc sales extremely quickly! Not even Fox predicted it would happen this fast.

But you're right. Time will tell.

Josh, let me give you a little advice.
"It's better to let someone think you are an Idiot than to open your mouth and prove it."

Even better:

"When you know you are wrong, its easier to dismiss the question then to admit your ignorance."

If I'm wrong, prove it. Don't pretend to know something when you so obviously don't.

Yes, that does seem to ring a bell, doesn't it.

If you've followed this thread long enough, you'll recall that it was a little over a year ago when BD supporters first claimed that HD DVD was dead. There were polls put up asking if people thought HD DVD would survive 2006, etc. BD clearly had homicide in their hearts, but they somehow couldn't couldn't complete the act.

So when BD declared themselves the winners before, they only got it thrown back in their face when HD DVD rose from the grave and even went on to lead the mindshare. HD DVD did this by having a better product at it's launch then BD had at it's launch. For whatever reason, the PQ was simply better on HD DVD than BD, and that gave HD DVD a new lease on life. That gave them the lead in mindshare, as well as the lead in sells.

Yet here we are again, nearly a year after BD's originally planned victory lap. Once again, people are planning their BD victory parties and declaring the format war over. One would think that past experiences would make people a little more conservative with their predictions, but apparently not.

I have to agree with Darin when he wrote:
When it was 3:1 in favor of HD DVD in August or so the Blu-ray camp did something to change that. Now it looks like the HD DVD camp needs to somehow change the current trend, unless Blu-ray somehow does it on its own (which I doubt with even better titles coming out).

--Darin

BD has the lead now, and it's up to HD DVD to do something about that. But I think it's a little early to suggest that HD DVD should throw in the towel. There are still plays to be made yet.

If I'm wrong, prove it. Don't pretend to know something when you so obviously don't.

OK, joshd, we get it. Yours is much bigger than his.

Josh, let me give you a little advice.
"It's better to let someone think you are an Idiot than to open your mouth and prove it."

Careful now. Forum rules.

And I believe it is closer to...

"Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt"

Abraham Lincoln.

Also, "fool," to me is a bit less insulting than your word.

The HD DVD needs to do something.

And we may be seeing now some of the HD DVD PRG response. There are reports of increased HD DVD presence in big retailers such as Best Buy. That may mean they are putting the $150M to use. The "something" that HD-DVD needs to do may not be enough. Announcements of titles must ramp up pretty quickly. Universal need to take up the slack that Disney and Fox created on the BD side. Not having solid announcements for February onwards creates a huge uneasiness for HD-DVD supporters.

The presence that US$150M is going to buy in retail space is not going to buy Sony, Disney or Fox for their contents in the retail rack. Players may be cheap but content rules. Unlike when the first BD player launched, a HD-DVD promotion now is also dampened by the shadow created by the PS3.


fuad

That would be my guess well.
Thirded.

Hey! It's back open!

Did Mark have a change of heart?

If you've followed this thread long enough, you'll recall that it was a little over a year ago when BD supporters first claimed that HD DVD was dead. There were polls put up asking if people thought HD DVD would survive 2006, etc. BD clearly had homicide in their hearts, but they somehow couldn't couldn't complete the act.

So when BD declared themselves the winners before, they only got it thrown back in their face when HD DVD rose from the grave and even went on to lead the mindshare. HD DVD did this by having a better product at it's launch then BD had at it's launch. For whatever reason, the PQ was simply better on HD DVD than BD, and that gave HD DVD a new lease on life. That gave them the lead in mindshare, as well as the lead in sells.

Yet here we are again, nearly a year after BD's originally planned victory lap. Once again, people are planning their BD victory parties and declaring the format war over. One would think that past experiences would make people a little more conservative with their predictions, but apparently not.


I responded to skogan in PM when the thread closed. I just want to put our responses on record...

Me,

"I have followed THIS thread, but I must admit I did not follow as closely way back then. I was not aware of that. If that is the case, then your points here are very valid.

I'm guessing you are aware that the problem with picture quality was a big mistake on BDs part and has been resolved. Many HD-BD converts have reported that some BDs look and sound better than their HD DVD equivalents."

Take care,

Sketch


skogan,

"Hi,

I only quoted your post as a reference, I didn't mean to make my post point at you. I see I used the word "you" when I should have said "one" to show that I was making a general statement. So I apologize if it looked like I was directing that at you.

Yeah, the problems in BD PQ were likely due to poor masters and perhaps Sony didn't know that the bar was being set so high in the beginning. But it looks like that is all taken care of now, and pq is roughly even between the two formats."


Me,

"Thanks to the war/competition."

and

"...thanks for clearing that up

Have a good day"

Sketch

Maybe you prefer Mark0's style of just giving advice on being an idiot rather than provide any facts :o Josh is right on target.

No, it's just that they're both basically on target and are arguing semantics.

From Wikipedia:


Financial economics has traditionally been considered a part of economics, as its body of results emerges naturally from microeconomics. However, today Finance effectively established itself as a separate, though closely related, discipline.

Just to add.
We have a PS3.
We have bought and rented BD discs.
We still just use the PS3 game remote.
I'm sure many others buying and watching BD discs still haven't bought the dedicated remote yet...

"arguing semantics"

what would this place be without that ;) I kid

Just to add.
We have a PS3.
We have bought and rented BD discs.
We still just use the PS3 game remote.
I'm sure many others buying and watching BD discs still haven't bought the dedicated remote yet...

I haven't.. I don't need it but the woman would like it as the PS3 controller is very sensitive, especially when moving it etc it is easy to bump the shoulder buttons.

Unfortunately the stores (Best Buy, Circuit City and Fry's) all seem to be sold out around me (silicon valley) just as the PS3's are still sold out.

Does anyone else think this might be the end of Home Media Magazine reporting those numbers? I can see many people upset that this information is being relayed for free.

Thanks for reopening the thread, Mark.

People, please don't get personal. I'd like this thread to stay open so that it includes valuable information as it is disclosed.

Thanks!

Thanks for reopening the thread, Mark.

People, please don't get personal. I'd like this thread to stay open so that it includes valuable information as it is disclosed.

Thanks!

Agreed.

Hmm, I expected more sales for HD DVD discs since the inception.

Didn't stop HD-DVD fanatics from claiming it was dead

The reason that HD DVD fanatics claimed it was dead was because Blu-ray did a (well-documented) abhorrent launch that was so difficult to imagine could happen, that the only logical conclusion was that it was a trainwreck. And it wasn't just "HD DVD fanatics". A (well-documented) boatload of Blu-ray supporters returned their Samsungs feeling that Blu-ray was going nowhere. So it wasn't just a flippant "Blu-ray is dead" vibe going on, it was a reasonable, if somewhat emotional, reaction to the events at the time. No such reasonable statement can be made at this time. HD DVD has many times over proved it's worth as a next-generation optical format, and claiming it's death is flame-provoking, unreasonable commentary, to say the very least.

Well, I for one dread the day that either format announces its death. All the immature "I told you so" people will be out in droves on this and many other forums. I've already gotten a taste of whats to come by this thread alone.

The death of a format will be so obnoxious. That the lot of people making premature speculations in this thread will seem cool and calculated.

Well, I for one dread the day that either format announces its death. All the immature "I told you so" people will be out in droves on this and many other forums. I've already gotten a taste of whats to come by this thread alone.

The death of a format will be so obnoxious. That the lot of people making premature speculations in this thread will seem cool and calculated.

Well, we can only hope for the best.

However, it is my opinion that when the writing is truly on the walls, those on the losing team who accept it will be spared. Those who want to fight to the last breath, may be in for it.

I have pointed out before in this thread where die-hard HD DVD fans that posted a sense of loss over this topic were not responded to by thier "opponents;" only their teammates in attempts to rally them back.

I have seen several times where ultra die-hard HD DVD fanatics with histories of blasting BD at every turn, were quietly taken in upon their announcement of going neutral.

Regardless of who wins, I hope that I am right about my belief in the abilites of even our toughest fighters to be civil if/when the time comes.

So what this tells us is that if Sony sells 10 million PS3's by the end of 2008, at most, maybe 2 million will be used as regular BD players. So HD-DVD needs to sell at most 1.825 million addons and standalones to keep pace with BD in NA. This is less than .5% of the NA population, so I think it is easily achievable, especially with prices seeming to fall weekly on HD-DVD players.Two million as "regular" BD players, but how many as occasional players?

You also have up to 8 million potential customers waiting in the wings with only the right title and the cost of a movie needed to sell the format to that user, something HD-DVD can't hope to compete with.

Well, I for one dread the day that either format announces its death. All the immature "I told you so" people will be out in droves on this and many other forums. I've already gotten a taste of whats to come by this thread alone.

The death of a format will be so obnoxious. That the lot of people making premature speculations in this thread will seem cool and calculated.

There probably won't be a big announced death or obituary. One format (or both) will just gradually fade away.

But it could happen that both formats gain enough support that each will live independently of how well the other does. For example, like UMD, BD could exist as a movie format for PS3 users - even if HD DVD has a lot more sells. Conversly, HD DVD could also exist as a movie format for the xbox 360, and get enough sells that way that it could find support independent of what happens on the PS3.

mod

if you want the thread to remain open

excercise a bit of self restraint

Well, we can only hope for the best.

However, it is my opinion that when the writing is truly on the walls, those on the losing team who accept it will be spared. Those who want to fight to the last breath, may be in for it.

I have pointed out before in this thread where die-hard HD DVD fans that posted a sense of loss over this topic were not responded to by thier "opponents;" only their teammates in attempts to rally them back.

I have seen several times where ultra die-hard HD DVD fanatics with histories of blasting BD at every turn, were quietly taken in upon their announcement of going neutral.

Regardless of who wins, I hope that I am right about my belief in the abilites of even our toughest fighters to be civil if/when the time comes.

yup, pretty much what I've observed as well.

Well, we can only hope for the best.

However, it is my opinion that when the writing is truly on the walls, those on the losing team who accept it will be spared. Those who want to fight to the last breath, may be in for it.

I have pointed out before in this thread where die-hard HD DVD fans that posted a sense of loss over this topic were not responded to by thier "opponents;" only their teammates in attempts to rally them back.

I have seen several times where ultra die-hard HD DVD fanatics with histories of blasting BD at every turn, were quietly taken in upon their announcement of going neutral.

Regardless of who wins, I hope that I am right about my belief in the abilites of even our toughest fighters to be civil if/when the time comes.

The point is, all you're doing is countering speculation with more speculation. Ones in this thread are no better and know no more than the very people they are arguing with.

The point is, there is nothing to argue in this thread except opinions and neither side is likely changing the others mind.

Anything could happen. Thats goes both ways. So no point in putting a trophy up on the pedestal yet.

The point is, all you're doing is countering speculation with more speculation. Ones in this thread are no better and know no more than the very people they are arguing with.

The point is, there is nothing to argue in this thread except opinions and neither side is likely changing the others mind.

Anything could happen. Thats goes both ways. So no point in putting a trophy up on the pedestal yet.

You're right, of course.

I know, its a burden i've come to accept :o ;)

Well, I for one dread the day that either format announces its death. All the immature "I told you so" people will be out in droves on this and many other forums. I've already gotten a taste of whats to come by this thread alone.

The death of a format will be so obnoxious. That the lot of people making premature speculations in this thread will seem cool and calculated.

Funny, I look forward to that day - only because I think the opposite will happen. All the recent hardcore "fanboys" that jumped into this forum will disappear when they don't have anyone/anything to argue about and insider postings will probably decline when they don't have a product to push or spread FUD against the competition. Hopefully, some insiders will stick around just to discuss issues and provide help. But the discussions should return to something more civilized like the other areas on AVS (except the gaming forums of course!)

Well, we can only hope for the best.

However, it is my opinion that when the writing is truly on the walls, those on the losing team who accept it will be spared. Those who want to fight to the last breath, may be in for it.

I have pointed out before in this thread where die-hard HD DVD fans that posted a sense of loss over this topic were not responded to by their "opponents;" only their teammates in attempts to rally them back.

I have seen several times where ultra die-hard HD DVD fanatics with histories of blasting BD at every turn, were quietly taken in upon their announcement of going neutral.

Regardless of who wins, I hope that I am right about my belief in the abilities of even our toughest fighters to be civil if/when the time comes.

Is this a joke post? You act like this is some sort of mafia thing. I doubt very much anyone cares if the Blu Ray nutts welcome them with open arms. Seriously, you are all just jumping to conclusions and screaming victory from the rooftops just as you have always done when there was even the slightest hint that things were going your way.

Ask yourself this question before you declare it all over...

The HD DVD group got into this battle expecting to fight a PS3 that would have already sold about 4 million units. Do you really think they have any plans to ditch now that they are facing numbers an order of magnitude LESS than they had anticipated battling in the first place?

The HD DVD group got into this battle expecting to fight a PS3 that would have already sold about 4 million units. Do you really think they have any plans to ditch now that they are facing numbers an order of magnitude LESS than they had anticipated battling in the first place?

Nope.

And I don't believe you will find anywhere in any of my posts that I have declared victory in the name of BD.

How's the weather down in Carlsbad? That just might be my favorite town. Santa Cruz had nothin' on Carlsbad. I used to live in San Marcos, a pit, of course compared to Carlsbad just 15 miles away. If I could get my wife to move that far from family, I'd be there.

Take it easy

Didn't stop HD-DVD fanatics from claiming it was dead.


Do you ever post anything that is not an attack on someone else, Brian? And do you admit to being a fanatic yourself? Because 99.9% of your posts are extremely shrill.

Refresh my memory, how long did DIVX last in its war against DVD? Seriously folks, I think this format war will be over sooner rather than later.

Just shy of 1 year for active user registrations after sale, if I remember correctly, but the sales were never anything comparable to DVD.

BTW, these sales numbers still don't mean much because we're getting sales ratios and not total volume. My guess is that it's being done to disguise who few discs are actually selling so as not to discourage consumers from buying either one.

Ask yourself this question before you declare it all over...

The HD DVD group got into this battle expecting to fight a PS3 that would have already sold about 4 million units. Do you really think they have any plans to ditch now that they are facing numbers an order of magnitude LESS than they had anticipated battling in the first place?

However, nobody knew if gamers would buy movies. It could have gone either way.

And still might, if a lot of good games are released and games devote their budget to game-buying.

This will be interesting.

-edit: I've added the sales info to the omnibus release calendar/distilled news thread. It's on post 4 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9136396&&#post9136396).

The HD DVD group got into this battle expecting to fight a PS3 that would have already sold about 4 million units. Do you really think they have any plans to ditch now that they are facing numbers an order of magnitude LESS than they had anticipated battling in the first place?

There are only 400,000 PS3 sold? Wow... Where did Sony predict 4 million sold by Jan?

The only reference I can find on 4 million PS3 is an August one by Sony before production started and the Europe launch was pushed back.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060822-7558.html

However, nobody knew if gamers would buy movies. It could have gone either way.

And still might, if a lot of good games are released and games devote their budget to game-buying.

This will be interesting.

I knew ;) Plus I will continue to buy games and movies like I've always done in the past. Honestly I've never met a gamer that doesn't like movies.

I knew ;) Plus I will continue to buy games and movies like I've always done in the past. Honestly I've never met a gamer that doesn't like movies.

True. But where I come from, gamers overwhelmingly download movies from p2p. Good luck getting those to buy some hidef disc thing. ;)

I knew ;) Honestly I've never met a gamer that doesn't like movies.

Good point.

I think Sony may have been aware of this too.

True. But where I come from, gamers overwhelmingly download movies from p2p. Good luck getting those to buy some hidef disc thing. ;)

Especially when some are on the p2p networks already.

Especially when some are on the p2p networks already.

Wow, really? What's that download time like?

There probably won't be a big announced death or obituary. One format (or both) will just gradually fade away.Unless it is mostly going to be a tie we should have at least one big event (or combination of events) that should make most here agree that the side on the bad news end of that is not going to win. As I see it right now the HD DVD side is trying to get Disney and/or Fox to go neutral without Universal going neutral and the Blu-ray side is trying to get Universal to go neutral without Disney or Fox changing. I think the war is far from over, but if either side ends up with a 3:1 advantage for sales for December of this year and no studio has gone neutral, I believe it will be very difficult for the side behind to retain all their exclusive studios.

--Darin

However, nobody knew if gamers would buy movies. It could have gone either way.

And still might, if a lot of good games are released and games devote their budget to game-buying.

This will be interesting.

-edit: I've added the sales info to the omnibus release calendar/distilled news thread. It's on post 4 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9136396&&#post9136396).


Clearly, some gamers are buying movies, and one can see that there are enough disc being sold to put BD firmly in the lead, (no matter how one defines it). Yet at the same time, BD isn't outselling HD DVD by 10:1 or 20:1. It's a more mild 2:1, which is about the lead HD DVD had held before.

Previously some people predicted that gamers wouldn't buy movies, while others predicted that the PS3 would come in and blow HD DVD away.To me it doesn't look like either of those things happened. It looks like it fell somewhere inbetween. The deluge of PS3 demand has came, and a bunch of sales in a short period of time have occured, and that was enough to give BD the lead, but it didn't deliver a knock out punch.

I had thought we would know for sure who would be the format winner after the release of the PS3. Either BD would outsell HD DVD by a lot, or gamers wouldn't buy games. It turns out, we still don't have a winner. BD has taken back the lead, but it's not an insurmoutable lead. It's about the same lead that HD DVD had only a few months ago. And adoption levels are still low enough that we can expect some volatility. HD DVD needs to do something different and big if they want to get the lead back.

Wow, really? What's that download time like?

Very large, 20-30GB, I have not seen any BD titles yet, only HD DVD ones though.

The HD DVD group got into this battle expecting to fight a PS3 that would have already sold about 4 million units. Do you really think they have any plans to ditch now that they are facing numbers an order of magnitude LESS than they had anticipated battling in the first place?

Are you claiming that there are only 400,000 Playstation 3 consoles out there? That would one order of magnitude smaller than 4 million.

/carmi

Clearly, some gamers are buying movies, and one can see that there are enough disc being sold to put BD firmly in the lead, (no matter how one defines it). Yet at the same time, BD isn't outselling HD DVD by 10:1 or 20:1. It's a more mild 2:1, which is about the lead HD DVD had held before.


Jan 1-7 was 2.1:1, and Jan 1-14 was 2.6:1.

So Jan 8-14 must have been considerably over 2.6:1 to make that average, maybe 3:1

Very large, 20-30GB, I have not seen any BD titles yet, only HD DVD ones though.

I guess you could use your Terabyte external for those.

Let's see, around 500 bucks for the HDD.

about 35 films say.

About 15 bucks a pop. Not a huge advantage unless you just want to watch them and dump them, which, of course, would be almost like renting them for free.

Unless it is mostly going to be a tie we should have at least one big event (or combination of events) that should make most here agree that the side on the bad news end of that is not going to win. As I see it right now the HD DVD side is trying to get Disney and/or Fox to go neutral without Universal going neutral and the Blu-ray side is trying to get Universal to go neutral without Disney or Fox changing. I think the war is far from over, but if either side ends up with a 3:1 advantage for sales for December of this year and no studio has gone neutral, I believe it will be very difficult for the side behind to retain all their exclusive studios.

--Darin
But the question wasn't "when will we know a winner", it was "what will happen when a format announces it's death". Losing the format war isn't necessarily the same things as having the format die.

It will be easier to declare a winner then it will to find out when one is dead, because it may make economic sense to keep producing in the 2nd place format. The install base of 360 add ons or PS3's may be large enough that people will still try to hit that market, even if it isn't supported as widely as the other format. So the losing format could, and probably will, live a long time after it's clearly the loser.

So I agree with you that we should find a time or event when we can declare a "winner", but I don't think that will be the same thing as being able to pinpoint the time of death for the loser.

Good point.

I think Sony may have been aware of this too.

no doubt about it

But the question wasn't "when will we know a winner", it was "what will happen when a format announces it's death". Losing the format war isn't necessarily the same things as having the format die.

It will be easier to declare a winner then it will to find out when one is dead, because it may make economic sense to keep producing in the 2nd place format. The install base of 360 add ons or PS3's may be large enough that people will still try to hit that market, even if it isn't supported as widely as the other format. So the losing format could, and probably will, live a long time after it's clearly the loser.

So I agree with you that we should find a time or event when we can declare a "winner", but I don't think that will be the same thing as being able to pinpoint the time of death for the loser.

Yeah, but I just wonder how long the rental houses and retailers will want to keep the losing format on their shelves.

Of course with VHS, that was much different. They were already the dominant format and just slowly phased out.

Online ordering might be the ticket. Warehouses are alot different than shelf space.

Who would publish sales of standalone players?

Why aren't we seeing actual volume numbers?

Why would a publication that reports sales, not do so?

Are we looking at a thinly disguised PR?

Many questions.....

Jan 1-7 was 2.1:1, and Jan 1-14 was 2.6:1.

So Jan 8-14 must have been considerably over 2.6:1 to make that average, maybe 3:1

Fair enough, either way, 2:1 or 3:1 is about the same lead as HD DVD had previously. I only point that out to show that, while it is a substantial lead, it's not an insurmountable lead.

I think if HD DVD doesn't have some trick up it's sleeve, it could soon become insurrmountable. But as of right now, the PS3 didn't knock HD DVD out, to use boxing terms. BD is ahead, but nothing more than that, and HD DVD could still do something about that.

However, nobody knew if gamers would buy movies. It could have gone either way.

And still might, if a lot of good games are released and games devote their budget to game-buying.

This will be interesting.

Let's not be guilty of the same narrow mentality that is going to get some executives fired.

When I was in college, I would have considered myself a gamer. I spend hundreds of dollars a year on games. Me and my roommates would drag our 27" TV outside and play Dr. Mario until we were either too drunk to see the screen or the sun came up.

During this same time period, my movie collection went from 5 to over 150. Clearly, I was spending more money on movies than games. Even my roommate, who is now a game programmer, amassed an even larger collection of movies.

Its all entertainment. Being a gamer has no connection to the amount of movies you might buy.

Who would publish sales of standalone players?

Why aren't we seeing actual volume numbers?

Why would a publication that reports sales, not do so?

Are we looking at a thinly disguised PR?

Many questions.....You didn't have many questions when they were publishing HD DVD's superior ratios a couple months ago, nor were you questioning the validity of Nielsen/Videoscan, who have been doing this for years with no bias. After the first couple hours (and I guess shock wearing off), you've been trying to spread the meme that now, all of the sudden, these numbers and Nielsen/Videoscan are suspect. Why so paranoid now, and not before?

However, nobody knew if gamers would buy movies. It could have gone either way.


But many AV early adopters bought PS3 this time and treated it as a traditional CE device. Therefore bluray has a $500 CE player with 90% content support while HD DVD has a $500 player ($400 street) with only 40% content support if you take the entire game demographic(including the addon) out of the picture. Common sense would indicate bluray will take a decent lead.

I think the key here is how big is that early adopters market? 20k-25k copies per movie doesn't smell much profit. If it is indeed a niche, HD DVD would still have the chance to bounce back by first breaking the $250 price point. They need to get two additional studios by this summer and flood the market with <$300 player starting from this fall.

PS3 at $500 will carry bluray a decent distance, but it is very interesting to see whether it will be enough to battle the $250 player.

Yeah, but I just wonder how long the rental houses and retailers will want to keep the losing format on their shelves.

Of course with VHS, that was much different. They were already the dominant format and just slowly phased out.

Online ordering might be the ticket. Warehouses are alot different than shelf space.

I think the UMD analogy may come into effect - but it may be for the 360 rather than the PS3. HD DVD may eventually become a cheap optical distribution system mainly for people that have a 360. If MS gets a few hundered K out there, there will be a market for it. If they ever integrate it into the 360, then there will be a little larger market for it. Then, even though the support wouldn't be equal to BD, it would still exist.

But the question wasn't "when will we know a winner", it was "what will happen when a format announces it's death". Losing the format war isn't necessarily the same things as having the format die.I should have been more clear that I agreed with what you said, but was just expanding on it. Even after most of us agree that the death of a certain side is inevitable, they will likely continue for a while. That is assuming of course that it isn't just a tie and we do get to the point where the majority (or maybe vast majority would be more accurate) around here can agree that after some event one side is pretty much done for.

BTW: Looking at the titles released on 1/16/07, it wouldn't shock me if Videoscan actually shows HD DVD in the lead for the week ending 1/21/07.

--Darin

Who would publish sales of standalone players?

Why aren't we seeing actual volume numbers?

Why would a publication that reports sales, not do so?

Are we looking at a thinly disguised PR?

Many questions.....

I think it's because they sell their more hard data.

From wikipedia "Nielsen Videoscan"

"Clients may purchase data either through on-going subscriptions, or on an ad hoc basis. Additionally, Nielsen VideoScan frequently provides sales rankings of video titles (although not specific sales numbers) to entertainment and mainstream news media."

-edit: I've added the sales info to the omnibus release calendar/distilled news thread. It's on post 4 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9136396&&#post9136396).

Grubert, you might want to take a look at this Lionsgate's press release (http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/02-01-2007/0004518543&EDATE=).

The release says that Lionsgate has sold 2.5 million units (DVD and Blu-ray combined) of Saw 3 in its first week of release. But the interesting part is this quote: "Also, according to Rentrak Home Essentials, SAW III Blu-Ray disc is the largest and most successful Blu-Ray debut to date."

It should be interesting to see how this translates into the overall Blu-ray ratio when you get the next charts. (Saw 3 was released on January 23, so this will only appear on the stats for the week ending on Jan 28 though).

The release says that Lionsgate has sold 2.5 million units (DVD and Blu-ray combined) of Saw 3 in its first week of release. But the interesting part is this quote: "Also, according to Rentrak Home Essentials, SAW III Blu-Ray disc is the largest and most successful Blu-Ray debut to date."Interesting. In the Amazon rankings I believe that Crank generally did better than Saw III.

--Darin

But the question wasn't "when will we know a winner", it was "what will happen when a format announces it's death". Losing the format war isn't necessarily the same things as having the format die.

It will be easier to declare a winner then it will to find out when one is dead, because it may make economic sense to keep producing in the 2nd place format. The install base of 360 add ons or PS3's may be large enough that people will still try to hit that market, even if it isn't supported as widely as the other format. So the losing format could, and probably will, live a long time after it's clearly the loser.

So I agree with you that we should find a time or event when we can declare a "winner", but I don't think that will be the same thing as being able to pinpoint the time of death for the loser.360 add-on is what, 100K at best? Hits among 100K users would be 10K at best. That's not a viable market if you ask me. Worse than SACD.

Grubert, you might want to take a look at this Lionsgate's press release (http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/02-01-2007/0004518543&EDATE=).

The release says that Lionsgate has sold 2.5 million units (DVD and Blu-ray combined) of Saw 3 in its first week of release. But the interesting part is this quote: "Also, according to Rentrak Home Essentials, SAW III Blu-Ray disc is the largest and most successful Blu-Ray debut to date."

It should be interesting to see how this translates into the overall Blu-ray ratio when you get the next charts. (Saw 3 was released on January 23, so this will only appear on the stats for the week ending on Jan 28 though).

Wow, SAW III! Whooda' thunkit'.

I wonder what Casino Royale is going to do.

I should have been more clear that I agreed with what you said, but was just expanding on it. Even after most of us agree that the death of a certain side is inevitable, they will likely continue for a while. That is assuming of course that it isn't just a tie and we do get to the point where the majority (or maybe vast majority would be more accurate) around here can agree that after some event one side is pretty much done for.

BTW: Looking at the titles released on 1/16/07, it wouldn't shock me if Videoscan actually shows HD DVD in the lead for the week ending 1/21/07.

--Darin



I would add that UMD, IPOD, Internet downloads, Xbox live anywhere, etc., will all have some level of support. DVD will have some level of support, probably greater than either HD format for the next several years.

It may turn out that there isn't one dominate form of distribution, a la' DVD. Instead, there are many, each of them with various different levels of support. And BD may end up with more support than HD DVD, but that won't make HD DVD dead anymore than IPOD will be dead if it can't match HD DVD.

HD DVD is part of the MS paradigm, and that may give it a future regardless of how well BD does. It may not be the dominate optical disc format, but it may the answer for many people who follow the model of using the 360 as an extender from a vista hub. There may be enough of those people to make it viable and it may make sense to produce content for it whether or not it is the dominate format.

360 add-on is what, 100K at best? Hits among 100K users would be 10K at best. That's not a viable market if you ask me. Worse than SACD.

If they never sell anymore, you may be right. But if they never sell any more PS3's, BD probably isn't vialbe either. So we have to expect some reasonable growth in both products.

BTW, I wonder how many DVHS units were on the market. Not that it's directly relevent.

BTW, I wonder how many DVHS units were on the market. Not that it's directly relevent.

Not enough and the price was too high. ;)

I see. Because BD is ahead, it doesn't make sense to ask for volume data? That is strange logic indeed.

I am not challenging what HMR is reporting from Videoscan, I am sure they have a valid reason not to show the units shipped for either format or even the top titles sold. However, it does apear that this publication is using data from Videoscan and interview with a selected reviewer to drive a very specific point of view....at least that is how it appears to me.

FWIW, I've said many times that without actual sales, even Amazon's ranking don't tell the whole story.....

If HMR continues to report on sales ratios from Videoscan on a weekly basis, I'll be satisfied. It will show they are simply reporting and not pushing an agenda. That's all. Not illogical at all.

I give credit to dvdempire and Amazon for at least reporting consistently. HMR should do that as well.

Remember, HMR had to pay for Videoscan data, it's not free. Videoscan by no means a comprehensive account of sales. Just to be clear.

Is it possible for BD movie sales to be 3:1 ahead? sure! Is this great data for BD? absolutely! Does it show the success of PS3 on the format? yes, yes, yes!

If Sony can sustain their PS3 and BD subsidy, they will win? I believe yes.

Is it possible to sustain this? I don't know. Is it ever discussed? Nope. Is it significant? possibly. Why? The economics cannot be ignored.

IMHO to win outright Sony will need to ship 50 million units before HD DVD reaches 5 million. Cost to Sony? Appox. $5-$15B! The range is based on achieving economies of scale. So far Sony has used $1B or so......so we are still early in the game. JMHO.

HD DVD is part of the MS paradigmReally? If I recall correctly some Microsoft guy said all optical disc would die soon in favor of online distribution. That's why the Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on is an add-on, it's separate to reserve the way to kill it anytime. I bet Microsoft would happily release Blu-ray add-on if necessary.

Wow, SAW III! Whooda' thunkit'.

I wonder what Casino Royale is going to do.

Haven't watched either but I'm going to blind buy Casino Royale.. I liked Saw but it was kind of a 1 timer so I'll probably just rent SAW III.

IMHO to win outright Sony will need to ship 50 million units before HD DVD reaches 5 million.If either side gets to the point that 2 million people have a non-combo player that they buy movies for at a reasonable rate in the next couple of years, then I think it is going to be tough for exclusive studios (other than Sony) for the other side to stay exclusive. I bet both Universal and Disney would have trouble ignoring 2 million people from the other side.

--Darin

Really? If I recall correctly some Microsoft guy said all optical disc would die soon in favor of online distribution. That's why the Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on is an add-on, it's separate to reserve the way to kill it anytime. I bet Microsoft would happily release Blu-ray add-on if necessary.

Why do you think they would release a BD add on, if you also believe they want to kill optical disc format? I'm not sure I follow your reasoning, sorry.

MS likes HD DVD as an intermediary, (until people move to online distribution) because it has iHD, and lacks BD+. That has been there stated position. They choose to go HD DVD when BD group blocked iHD from there format, if I remember correctly. There was also an issue with managed copy, which appears to have been cleared up.

But many AV early adopters bought PS3 this time and treated it as a traditional CE device. Therefore bluray has a $500 CE player with 90% content support while HD DVD has a $500 player ($400 street) with only 40% content support if you take the entire game demographic(including the addon) out of the picture. Common sense would indicate bluray will take a decent lead.

I think the key here is how big is that early adopters market? 20k-25k copies per movie doesn't smell much profit. If it is indeed a niche, HD DVD would still have the chance to bounce back by first breaking the $250 price point. They need to get two additional studios by this summer and flood the market with <$300 player starting from this fall.

PS3 at $500 will carry bluray a decent distance, but it is very interesting to see whether it will be enough to battle the $250 player.

Yes, I agree with this assessment. I doubt the studios on either side are panicking right now because we're still in the very early stages. DVD wasn't this far along less than a year after release. Numbers on both sides are likely small enough that patience is still the watchword.

I tend to believe that cheap hardware will win the day sooner than more content because this is the reason I ended up buying into HD as opposed to BD in the first place. The important point here is MORE content, as opposed to ALL the content. It would be different if there were NO good movies on the HD side but there are plenty even as of today. If the average attach rate is somewhere in the neighbourhood of the 25-30 movies per year that was floated around a little while ago then by the time summer rolls around you will have at least that many blockbusters (not just borderline stuff but huge hits) on both sides. At that point I see cheaper hardware being the advantage.

The PS3 is only slightly more expensive than the Toshibas right now but I don't see them lowering the price this year. Meanwhile if the chinese CEs can come in with sub-$300 players it will mean a big surge for HD. BD could still come out of nowhere and release a cheap player as well but there has been no hint of anything like that yet.

I bet both Universal and Disney would have trouble ignoring 2 million people from the other side.

--Darin

Yes, if PS3 could help bluray to reach that 2 million point half a year before HD DVD camp. The war is over. How many >$500 dvd players has been sold since in the first two years? What is the numbers for $200-250 players? I am curious. :)

Microsoft supports HD DVD because extending this war as long as possible will promote digital distribution (which they want and VC-1 was designed for). They have absolutely no play in this war besides a name.

DVD wasn't this far along less than a year after release. I believe that DVD sold about 300,000 players in their first partial year. I think that was US or NA, but not positive. HD DVD says that had more than 175k in NA. Despite HD DVD not being able to match what DVD in that timeframe, it seems that some here feel that HD DVD won't have any problem beating the 1.1 million or so for DVD for their next year.
Yes, if PS3 could help bluray to reach that 2 million point half a year before HD DVD camp.Just in case it wasn't clear, I was talking about 2 million people using a player for HD. That could take 10 million PS3s (if the effective number is 20%).

--Darin

Really? If I recall correctly some Microsoft guy said all optical disc would die soon in favor of online distribution. That's why the Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on is an add-on, it's separate to reserve the way to kill it anytime. I bet Microsoft would happily release Blu-ray add-on if necessary.

It wasn't just any old MS guy, it was THE MS guy, Bill Gates himself.

Yes, if PS3 could help bluray to reach that 2 million point half a year before HD DVD camp. The war is over. How many >$500 dvd players has been sold since in the first two years? What is the numbers for $200-250 players? I am curious. :)

Did you mean to say "2 million PS3 owners who would consistently buy Blu-Ray movies"??

I tend to believe that cheap hardware will win the day sooner than more content.

I don't know. HD DVD camp certainly doesn't have any cards left for the first half of 2007 AFAIK. They are betting on early adopter market would not make a big difference and PS3 is not a mainstream weapon moviewise. If their market research is right, the tide might change when HD DVD camp bring the sub $250 player half a year before BDA. BTW, hd dvd camp is also betting on the capacity of bluray replication couldn't meet the demand once it become mainstream.

Yes, if PS3 could help bluray to reach that 2 million point half a year before HD DVD camp. The war is over. How many >$500 dvd players has been sold since in the first two years? What is the numbers for $200-250 players? I am curious. :)

The problem there is it's very difficult to gauge how many PS3s are actually being used to watch movies. Including both game systems and standalones I think BD capable players currently outnumber HD by about 5:1 (correct me if I'm wrong) but this ratio isn't reflected in the sales figures posted in this thread which is a pretty good indication less than half the PS3s are being used for movies.

Plus you need to take into account how many of the people who ARE using it for that are of the "I may as well check out what all the fuss is about" types. I would venture to guess that a lot of people without HD displays bought 3 or 4 movies, couldn't see a difference over their regular DVD players and won't bother spending 3 times as much on BD as the same SD disc in the near future.

Factor in again what will happen when some actual good game content comes out for the PS3 and the future becomes even harder to predict.

I may have missed it but were the Talladega Nights and King Kong bundled discs included in the sales figures?

Did you mean to say "2 million PS3 owners who would consistently buy Blu-Ray movies"??

Yes. :)

I don't know. HD DVD camp certainly doesn't have any cards left for the first half of 2007 AFAIK. They are betting on early adopter market would not make a big difference and PS3 is not a mainstream weapon moviewise. If their market research is right, the tide might change when HD DVD camp bring the sub $250 player half a year before BDA. BTW, hd dvd camp is also betting on the capacity of bluray couldn't meet the demand once it become mainstream.

Yep, 1st quarter release list looks mighty slim for HD but they have to start releasing some of these promised 300 movies soon. Looking at the promotions group list shows some big movies on the horizon. Coupled with the fact that sales for both camps is probably pretty low overall I can see why HD can afford to bide it's time.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, forum time moves much faster than real world time. 6 months in the real world probably won't mean much in the grand scheme of things but it's an ETERNITY of whining, bickering and hand wringing on these (and other) forums. :p

Microsoft supports HD DVD because extending this war as long as possible will promote digital distribution (which they want and VC-1 was designed for). They have absolutely no play in this war besides a name.


They believe HDi and lack of BD+ are better for their big picture/transition of future media delivery. VC-1 is in both format.

I see. Because BD is ahead, it doesn't make sense to ask for volume data? That is strange logic indeed.

I am not challenging what HMR is reporting from Videoscan, I am sure they have a valid reason not to show the units shipped for either format or even the top titles sold. However, it does apear that this publication is using data from Videoscan and interview with a selected reviewer to drive a very specific point of view....at least that is how it appears to me.

FWIW, I've said many times that without actual sales, even Amazon's ranking don't tell the whole story.....

If HMR continues to report on sales ratios from Videoscan on a weekly basis, I'll be satisfied. It will show they are simply reporting and not pushing an agenda. That's all. Not illogical at all.

I give credit to dvdempire and Amazon for at least reporting consistently. HMR should do that as well.

Remember, HMR had to pay for Videoscan data, it's not free. Videoscan by no means a comprehensive account of sales. Just to be clear.


I must say I'm a little puzzled by your posts. If I'm missing something, please let me know.

Did you miss my post #418? Videoscan DOES offer some free data.

Meanwhile if the chinese CEs can come in with sub-$300 players it will mean a big surge for HD.When will these mysterious Chinese arrive exactly and how can Toshiba recoup their investment while destroyed by Chinese players in the consumer market?

I believe that DVD sold about 300,000 players in their first partial year. I think that was US or NA, but not positive. HD DVD says that had more than 175k in NA. Despite HD DVD not being able to match what DVD in that timeframe, it seems that some here feel that HD DVD won't have any problem beating the 1.1 million or so for DVD for their next year.

I should have clarified I mean quality software and not hardware sales. Both in terms of quality titles and PQ/AQ both HD and BD are far ahead of initial DVDs IMHO.

Having said that, I thought if you included 360 add-on sales HD was in the vicinity of 250-270k units?

When will these mysterious Chinese arrive exactly and how can Toshiba recoup their investment while destroyed by Chinese players in the consumer market?

They are hardly mysterious, there is a list of manufacturers in the CES press releases as well as expected shipping dates of 2Q 2007.

Toshiba is making a profit on current players and I'm sure they will still outclass the chinese CEs in features thereby retaining a consumer base. Whereas those with a limited budgets will have an option. No such option will exist for BD.

By your logic any CE making DVD players that sell for over $50 can't make a profit since you can buy a $30 DVD player in Walmart.

The keyword here is "options". Meridian doesn't seem worried about making an HD player when it will most certainly cost many times what a Toshiba current sells for.

The problem there is it's very difficult to gauge how many PS3s are actually being used to watch movies. Including both game systems and standalones I think BD capable players currently outnumber HD by about 5:1 (correct me if I'm wrong) but this ratio isn't reflected in the sales figures posted in this thread which is a pretty good indication less than half the PS3s are being used for movies.


The packages under the tree were just opened a month ago. Does the average HD DVD owner buy all of his/her titles at once?

I would say no. They budget themselves; maybe one disc a week, maybe less, some more.

Yep, 1st quarter release list looks mighty slim for HD but they have to start releasing some of these promised 300 movies soon. Looking at the promotions group list shows some big movies on the horizon. Coupled with the fact that sales for both camps is probably pretty low overall I can see why HD can afford to bide it's time.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, forum time moves much faster than real world time. 6 months in the real world probably won't mean much in the grand scheme of things but it's an ETERNITY of whining, bickering and hand wringing on these (and other) forums. :p

Gotta' give ya' that one. :)

They are hardly mysterious, there is a list of manufacturers in the CES press releases as well as expected shipping dates of 2Q 2007.

Toshiba is making a profit on current players and I'm sure they will still outclass the chinese CEs in features thereby retaining a consumer base. Whereas those with a limited budgets will have an option. No such option will exist for BD.

By your logic any CE making DVD players that sell for over $50 can't make a profit since you can buy a $30 DVD player in Walmart.

The keyword here is "options". Meridian doesn't seem worried about making an HD player when it will most certainly cost many times what a Toshiba current sells for.

I thought that Meridian announcement was false. No?

They are hardly mysterious, there is a list of manufacturers in the CES press releases as well as expected shipping dates of 2Q 2007.

Toshiba is making a profit on current players and I'm sure they will still outclass the chinese CEs in features thereby retaining a consumer base. Whereas those with a limited budgets will have an option. No such option will exist for BD.

By your logic any CE making DVD players that sell for over $50 can't make a profit since you can buy a $30 DVD player in Walmart.

The keyword here is "options". Meridian doesn't seem worried about making an HD player when it will most certainly cost many times what a Toshiba current sells for.I mean how "sub-$300 player" can be possible by them. If Chinese guys can do it in this year it's indeed mysterious to me. Any details?

I must say I'm a little puzzled by your posts. If I'm missing something, please let me know.

Did you miss my post #418? Videoscan DOES offer some free data.

I was responding to a post by Mr. JBlacklow who was questioning why I would be interested in sales volume since I didn't bring it up when HD DVD was ahead. So that is why you may have been puzzled...

In any case, do you know for a fact that what HMR was reporting was free data? If yes, how come they didn't publish anything while HD DVD was ahead? Perhaps they did, but I can't seem to find in on HMR! I agree on the top ranking of titles, these are provided by Videoscan and have been reported by multiple sites on a regular basis. I have no problems with that.

However, IF HMR provides sales updates from Videoscan on a regular basis, I will buy the fact that they are an unbiased site and are merely reporting what they are finding. Otherwise, they are simply massaging information (not data) to propogate BD.

That is just my humble opinion. I also found it strange that they would use this data and in their following issue follow up with a research analyst to talk about why BD will win. Not only that, but the researcher in question:

1. Dismissed the impact of Chinese Players in the cost of hardware.

2. Did not even mention MSFT, but only Universal and Toshiba as backers of HD DVD

3. Talked about $400 BD players, when none have been announced and even Sony said they did not see this happening for 2-3 years...

These are musings of a pre-determined supporter of one format v. another. Nothing wrong if it came from a FOx rep. But not when it comes from a supposed neutral media avenue...

My 2 cents...

I thought that Meridian announcement was false. No?

No. I believe there was a rep from Meridian who came to the Insiders Thread to specifically say that what Amir has posted about working with Meridian on a player was true. FWIW.

Looks like the FUD being spread by some of the BD folks on this forum spread to you as well (unfortunately). :eek:

Originally Posted by MeridianHQ
Just to clear this up:

1) Amir's statements at CES regarding Meridian were correct.
2) Meridian's position has been made clear in the release on our media server. (apologies, this BB seems not to want us to put a url since we are 'new'!)
3) Our interest should not be a surprise since Meridian has been deeply involved in the development and standardisation of HD (and BD) specifications, of tool sets and of peripheral technologies, through our work on the lossless coding.
4) We apologise that a member of our CES crew did not have the whole story and made comments that caused confusion.

However, and to stem any ongoing discussion, please note that Meridian has a general policy not to pre-announce specific models, price ranges, availability or feature sets for any of the several product categories we have in regular development.

No. I believe there was a rep from Meridian who came to the Insiders Thread to specifically say that what Amir has posted about working with Meridian on a player was true. FWIW.

Looks like the FUD being spread by some of the BD folks on this forum spread to you as well (unfortunately). :eek:

Working on a Meridian player or another brand player? I've read other articles where it indicated Meridian was helping but they didn't say they were working on there own.

Can anyone tell me if the sales numbers also count the BD and HD-DVD discs bundled with the PS3 and Xbox360 add-on to be individual sales or are they disregarded?

There is a major factor that is not getting enough discussion: the perceived need to end the format war.

The studios and especially the retailers are very upset about this format war. It has complicated their lives and greatly reduced their sales.

This December, retailers saw a 101% increase in HDTV's being sold. Reports this January are that the usual "Super Bowl" crowds of buyers of big TV's are much larger than usual.

We are further facing the fact that two years from now, NTSC broadcasts will be going away. Everyone thinks that a huge number of new HDTV's will be sold in this time frame. This is a great opportunity to sell hd players.

So, we have the odd situation that a lot of new hd sets, but few new hd players selling with them.
== Retailers are hopping mad about this. They want the format war to be over.
== The studios, disappointed in their overall hd sales, realize that the format war must end.

I think that retailers and the studios are ready to take the matter into their own hands and virtually declare a winner.

This news about Blu-ray sales does not come in a vacuum. We saw at CES that the Blu-ray studios all held firm and in fact virtually declared victory. None of the Blu-ray studios went neutral, although many were predicting that they would. It was not that they were so happy with existing sales Blu-ray, or even the "just OK" PS3 launch. It is that they feel a need to hitch their wagon to some star or another and get on with it.

When I visit retailers, I am seeing a real Blu-ray bias in presentation and pricing. Circuit City doesn't seem to even have HD DVD disks or players. Best Buy features Blu-ray and side-steps HD DVD. Given the larger number of Blu-ray players and more "favorable" margins, who can blame them?

I can well imagine that retailers will now be telling their customers that the "format war is all but over, Blu-ray is winning the sales war, has more titles, etc.". This is a pitch that is much more likely to make a sale than a complete explanation of all of the details of the format war as we know them.

HD DVD failed last year to attract new CE or studio support. For a few months, HD DVD had momentum, and they didn't go anywhere with it. It may now be too late.

The one important development for HD DVD announced at CES was Microsoft's efforts to get Chinese manufacturers into the mix with cheap players. This is their best strategy at this point: sell cheap players, show that software sales increase, get studios to change their minds. However, it runs a risk with many of the nation's retailers, who will consider the introduction of cheap players to be an affront to their normal sales strategies.

Retailers can spin this by calling Blu-ray the quality product supported by the major manufacturers, with HD DVD being the "bargain basement also-ran" that isn't as good. With titles like Spiderman, Pirates, Cars, etc., to back them up, they can make this case.

All the more reason for them to push Blu-ray now and hope to put an end to this mess.

[I should add that, while I believe Blu-ray to be the better format, there isn't really much difference and I don't much care who wins the format war personally. But it is time to make something happen. As a consumer, I know that I am never going to see the variety of titles that I want until this format war is resolved. ]

Having said that, I thought if you included 360 add-on sales HD was in the vicinity of 250-270k units?They might be by now, but the statement from the HD DVD group around CES listed the different players, including the add-on with the XBOX360 and laptops and said that they estimated that these got them to over 175k in North America (or words to that effect).

--Darin

When will these mysterious Chinese arrive exactly and how can Toshiba recoup their investment while destroyed by Chinese players in the consumer market?


If the Chinese players use the MS-Broadcom reference design, then it is not exactly mysterious. As for recoup investment, they need to establish the format first. If they lose, they get nothing.

I was responding to a post by Mr. JBlacklow who was questioning why I would be interested in sales volume since I didn't bring it up when HD DVD was ahead. So that is why you may have been puzzled...

In any case, do you know for a fact that what HMR was reporting was free data? If yes, how come they didn't publish anything while HD DVD was ahead? Perhaps they did, but I can't seem to find in on HMR! I agree on the top ranking of titles, these are provided by Videoscan and have been reported by multiple sites on a regular basis. I have no problems with that.

However, IF HMR provides sales updates from Videoscan on a regular basis, I will buy the fact that they are an unbiased site and are merely reporting what they are finding. Otherwise, they are simply massaging information (not data) to propogate BD.

That is just my humble opinion. I also found it strange that they would use this data and in their following issue follow up with a research analyst to talk about why BD will win. Not only that, but the researcher in question:

1. Dismissed the impact of Chinese Players in the cost of hardware.

2. Did not even mention MSFT, but only Universal and Toshiba as backers of HD DVD

3. Talked about $400 BD players, when none have been announced and even Sony said they did not see this happening for 2-3 years...

These are musings of a pre-determined supporter of one format v. another. Nothing wrong if it came from a FOx rep. But not when it comes from a supposed neutral media avenue...

My 2 cents...

Gotcha'.

You didn't use quotes and I believe your respective posts were pretty far apart so it was confusing.

1. Don't know if the data was free. It certainly sounds like the kind of data that they do give away for free.

I have no idea of the bias of HMR, nor, quite honestly do I care. The data they reported does appear to be Nielsen's and it speaks for itself.

Of course sales figures would be great and may tell a different story.

Apparently you and JBlacklow have a difference of opinion that I have no stake in so I will excuse myself from the conversation.

Working on a Meridian player or another brand player? I've read other articles where it indicated Meridian was helping but they didn't say they were working on there own.

The Meridian rep came on here specifically to quash those other articles, what more do you want? It was a one time post, something they do not intend to do any more of and only did it on request of Amir who had to do it because too many people refuse to believe him.

Cheers...
Duy-Khang Hoang

I posted before plazman edited his post. It was a simple question hdkhang.

Thanks plazman.

I thought that Meridian announcement was false. No?

No . It was true. A new insider MerdianHQ from Oxford, England verified it.

Originally Posted by MeridianHQ
Just to clear this up:

1) Amir's statements at CES regarding Meridian were correct.
2) Meridian's position has been made clear in the release on our media server. (apologies, this BB seems not to want us to put a url since we are 'new'!)
3) Our interest should not be a surprise since Meridian has been deeply involved in the development and standardisation of HD (and BD) specifications, of tool sets and of peripheral technologies, through our work on the lossless coding.
4) We apologise that a member of our CES crew did not have the whole story and made comments that caused confusion.

However, and to stem any ongoing discussion, please note that Meridian has a general policy not to pre-announce specific models, price ranges, availability or feature sets for any of the several product categories we have in regular development. There was then a link requested to the Meridian internal press site.

Can anyone tell me if the sales numbers also count the BD and HD-DVD discs bundled with the PS3 and Xbox360 add-on to be individual sales or are they disregarded?At least PS3 in store now have no bundle discs, so the 7% increase for BD sales in 1 week in Jan is clean.

They might be by now
--Darin

Let's assume 20% PS3 are effective volume for bluray player and add-on could negate half of that.

Just treat 10% PS3 as CE player and take the gamers and add-on out of the equation tend to make guesswork easy. :) Of course, no matter how you play with the numbers, bluray will for sure win the >$500 market by a decent margin. The question is how fast HD DVD players could brake the $250 price point before Universal blinks and is that enough to compete with the above $500 market.

Gotcha'.

You didn't use quotes and I believe your respective posts were pretty far apart so it was confusing.

1. Don't know if the data was free. It certainly sounds like the kind of data that they do give away for free.

I have no idea of the bias of HMR, nor, quite honestly do I care. The data they reported does appear to be Nielsen's and it speaks for itself.

Of course sales figures would be great and may tell a different story.

Apparently you and JBlacklow have a difference of opinion that I have no stake in so I will excuse myself from the conversation.


If I use my PDA it doesn't attach the post I am replying to. So there is a loss in context.....

Working on a Meridian player or another brand player? I've read other articles where it indicated Meridian was helping but they didn't say they were working on there own. His PM to me when I was trying to get his link to work was it be a Meridian branded player.

FWIW that was consistent with what Amirm had to say on the subject.

No . It was true. A new insider MerdianHQ from Oxford, England verified it.

There was then a link requested to the Meridian internal press site.
Roger

EDIT: And FWIW, I certainly meant no FUD spreading. Just misinformed as Plaz said.

The Meridian rep came on here specifically to quash those other articles, what more do you want? It was a one time post, something they do not intend to do any more of and only did it on request of Amir who had to do it because too many people refuse to believe him.

Cheers...
Duy-Khang Hoang The MeridianHQ insider said that he would post from time to time and was now following the discussion on AVS and would take possibly take questions on the insider thread, but would reserve the right to not answer them.

I wonder if they are now getting cold feet with the HMR report and analyst report ;)

BTW Grubert

I bet you just knew that this thread would grow real quickly when you posted it didn't you :)

Anycase, some 2c coins thrown into the discussion.

When Grubert mentioned many gamers download movies off P2P, he did not specifically imply that they downloaded HD ripped movies, most gamers (and indeed non gamers) are still happy having a DivX/XviD etc. collection of movies at sub SD resolutions. They still have their DVD players of course, and their token DVD movie collections.

When I hit the stores to grab some entertainment goodies, I'm not thinking budget so much, but looking for stuff to check out. If there is a game i want to buy I'll grab it if I feel like I'd actually play it. If there are movies that are on sale I'd grab it if it looks remotely interesting, even if I wont be watching it in the foreseeable future. If I want both the games and the movies I'll grab both... but thats because I am not the typical consumer who has to allocate a budget to entertainment, I'm single, no kids, no mortgage etc. so don't really have to think about it all too much. Many 25 - 35 gamers are like me, but not enough of them to think that the PS3 movie buying habit will continue trending this way. For the trend to continue, there must be no more HD-DVD, price parity with DVD, lower hardware prices etc. etc.

I'd like for HD domination, any which way it happens. Buying DVD's nowadays feels like more of a waste of money than any one of the Hidef supporters who buy into their format. I'd much rather put money into the losing HiDef format than into more DVDs, unfortunately the situation in Aus isn't such that I'm willing to jump in just yet... not so much player prices (only choices are BD funnily enough), more so on the software, but mostly because I'd want to upgrade the projector first... once that's done... I'll be a late early adopter :)

Cheers...
Duy-Khang Hoang

There is a major factor that is not getting enough discussion: the perceived need to end the format war.

The studios and especially the retailers are very upset about this format war. It has complicated their lives and greatly reduced their sales.

This December, retailers saw a 101% increase in HDTV's being sold. Reports this January are that the usual "Super Bowl" crowds of buyers of big TV's are much larger than usual.

We are further facing the fact that two years from now, NTSC broadcasts will be going away. Everyone thinks that a huge number of new HDTV's will be sold in this time frame. This is a great opportunity to sell hd players.

So, we have the odd situation that a lot of new hd sets, but few new hd players selling with them.
== Retailers are hopping mad about this. They want the format war to be over.
== The studios, disappointed in their overall hd sales, realize that the format war must end.

I think that retailers and the studios are ready to take the matter into their own hands and virtually declare a winner.

This news about Blu-ray sales does not come in a vacuum. We saw at CES that the Blu-ray studios all held firm and in fact virtually declared victory. None of the Blu-ray studios went neutral, although many were predicting that they would. It was not that they were so happy with existing sales Blu-ray, or even the "just OK" PS3 launch. It is that they feel a need to hitch their wagon to some star or another and get on with it.

When I visit retailers, I am seeing a real Blu-ray bias in presentation and pricing. Circuit City doesn't seem to even have HD DVD disks or players. Best Buy features Blu-ray and side-steps HD DVD. Given the larger number of Blu-ray players and more "favorable" margins, who can blame them?

I can well imagine that retailers will now be telling their customers that the "format war is all but over, Blu-ray is winning the sales war, has more titles, etc.". This is a pitch that is much more likely to make a sale than a complete explanation of all of the details of the format war as we know them.

HD DVD failed last year to attract new CE or studio support. For a few months, HD DVD had momentum, and they didn't go anywhere with it. It may now be too late.

The one important development for HD DVD announced at CES was Microsoft's efforts to get Chinese manufacturers into the mix with cheap players. This is their best strategy at this point: sell cheap players, show that software sales increase, get studios to change their minds. However, it runs a risk with many of the nation's retailers, who will consider the introduction of cheap players to be an affront to their normal sales strategies.

Retailers can spin this by calling Blu-ray the quality product supported by the major manufacturers, with HD DVD being the "bargain basement also-ran" that isn't as good. With titles like Spiderman, Pirates, Cars, etc., to back them up, they can make this case.

All the more reason for them to push Blu-ray now and hope to put an end to this mess.

[I should add that, while I believe Blu-ray to be the better format, there isn't really much difference and I don't much care who wins the format war personally. But it is time to make something happen. As a consumer, I know that I am never going to see the variety of titles that I want until this format war is resolved. ]

Nicely stated.

I must say this is how I feel as well.

Thanks for doing all the work, rl. :)

The packages under the tree were just opened a month ago. Does the average HD DVD owner buy all of his/her titles at once?

I would say no. They budget themselves; maybe one disc a week, maybe less, some more. One significant issue to follow is the difference between initial attach rates and sustained ones. The big deal with the HD DVD attach rates is that people were continuing to buy movies after their initial purchase period. Most DVD purchasers buy a couple new movies with their player. But then the excitment drops off and their buying fever moderates. With HD DVD it look sto be fairly consistent over time. The open question is whether the PS3 attach rate over time for the PS3 movie watchers will be as consistent or if it would be more like DVD than HD DVD.

If the PS3 launch spike shows only a early purchase period attach rate but a much lower sustained attach rate then the relative HD DVD sales ratios could rebound.

The Meridian rep came on here specifically to quash those other articles, what more do you want? It was a one time post, something they do not intend to do any more of and only did it on request of Amir who had to do it because too many people refuse to believe him.

Cheers...
Duy-Khang Hoang

I followed the Meridian issue carefully.

The most important point is that, whatever Meridian does or does not do in building a high-end player, is very unlikely to affect the format war: they will not deliver anything soon, and whatever they deliver will be too expensive to be of interest to all but a few customers.

If the studios and retailers have their way, the format war will be over long before Meridian delivers.

When I visit retailers, I am seeing a real Blu-ray bias in presentation and pricing. Circuit City doesn't seem to even have HD DVD disks or players. Best Buy features Blu-ray and side-steps HD DVD. Given the larger number of Blu-ray players and more "favorable" margins, who can blame them?

I can well imagine that retailers will now be telling their customers that the "format war is all but over, Blu-ray is winning the sales war, has more titles, etc.". This is a pitch that is much more likely to make a sale than a complete explanation of all of the details of the format war as we know them This is not true anymore as the HD A2 has started to reach Circuit City and other retailers and Toshiba has started to pay for retail placement and advertising.

One significant issue to follow is the difference between initial attach rates and sustained ones. The big deal with the HD DVD attach rates is that people were continuing to buy movies after their initial purchase period. Most DVD purchasers buy a couple new movies with their player. But then the excitment drops off and their buying fever moderates. With HD DVD it look sto be fairly consistent over time. The open question is whether the PS3 attach rate over time for the PS3 movie watchers will be as consistent or if it would be more like DVD than HD DVD.

If the PS3 launch spike shows only a early purchase period attach rate but a much lower sustained attach rate then the relative HD DVD sales ratios could rebound.

At the risk of sounding like Al Gore in the 2nd Bush debate...

I agree. :)

You're right, of course. The next few months will be interesting, indeed.

I followed the Meridian issue carefully.

The most important point is that, whatever Meridian does or does not do in building a high-end player, is very unlikely to affect the format war: they will not deliver anything soon, and whatever they deliver will be too expensive to be of interest to all but a few customers.

If the studios and retailers have their way, the format war will be over long before Meridian delivers. Kinda sounds like most standalone Blu-ray players. ;)

Kinda sounds like most standalone Blu-ray players. ;)
ZING!!!

See, there ya' go. Keeping it light. Nice work.

Originally Posted by rlsmith


I can well imagine that retailers will now be telling their customers that the "format war is all but over, Blu-ray is winning the sales war, has more titles, etc.". This is a pitch that is much more likely to make a sale than a complete explanation of all of the details of the format war as we know them.

mr smith .... why are you so afraid that HD DVD would be sticking around? there must be a reason ... da da !!!

When I visit retailers, I am seeing a real Blu-ray bias in presentation and pricing. Circuit City doesn't seem to even have HD DVD disks or players. Best Buy features Blu-ray and side-steps HD DVD. Given the larger number of Blu-ray players and more "favorable" margins, who can blame them?

I can well imagine that retailers will now be telling their customers that the "format war is all but over, Blu-ray is winning the sales war, has more titles, etc.". This is a pitch that is much more likely to make a sale than a complete explanation of all of the details of the format war as we know them.

HD DVD failed last year to attract new CE or studio support. For a few months, HD DVD had momentum, and they didn't go anywhere with it. It may now be too late.

absolutely amazing! Hopefully AVS readers are not some illinformed idiots that you r post suggest that they are ;)

Circuit City refuses to carry Toshiba products due to some long-ago grudge that I don't understand, so no you're not going to see much in the way of HD DVD there.

There is a major factor that is not getting enough discussion: the perceived need to end the format war.

The studios and especially the retailers are very upset about this format war. It has complicated their lives and greatly reduced their sales.

This December, retailers saw a 101% increase in HDTV's being sold. Reports this January are that the usual "Super Bowl" crowds of buyers of big TV's are much larger than usual.

We are further facing the fact that two years from now, NTSC broadcasts will be going away. Everyone thinks that a huge number of new HDTV's will be sold in this time frame. This is a great opportunity to sell hd players.

So, we have the odd situation that a lot of new hd sets, but few new hd players selling with them.
== Retailers are hopping mad about this. They want the format war to be over.
== The studios, disappointed in their overall hd sales, realize that the format war must end.



All of this I agree with... but then;


I think that retailers and the studios are ready to take the matter into their own hands and virtually declare a winner.

This news about Blu-ray sales does not come in a vacuum. We saw at CES that the Blu-ray studios all held firm and in fact virtually declared victory. None of the Blu-ray studios went neutral, although many were predicting that they would. It was not that they were so happy with existing sales Blu-ray, or even the "just OK" PS3 launch. It is that they feel a need to hitch their wagon to some star or another and get on with it.


I think if this were true we wouldn't see things like the introduction of Total-HD by warner. What possible reason do they have to spend millions developing Total-HD discs if they really feel they could decide things by drying up their support to HD-DVD? This just doesn't make a lot of sense. If anything it seems to me that they are trying to entice exclusive studios to go format neutral via licensing their Total-HD format discs.


When I visit retailers, I am seeing a real Blu-ray bias in presentation and pricing. Circuit City doesn't seem to even have HD DVD disks or players. Best Buy features Blu-ray and side-steps HD DVD. Given the larger number of Blu-ray players and more "favorable" margins, who can blame them?


Again, this doesn't make sense. Profit margin on the PS3 is zero. HD-DVD players actually make retailers a lot more money than the BR players that are actually selling today (PS3). Additionally what you are providing is anecdotal evidence, many members have also indicated that they are hearing HD-DVD ads and seeing fresh HD-DVD displays in stores. Why do that if the format is dead?


I can well imagine that retailers will now be telling their customers that the "format war is all but over, Blu-ray is winning the sales war, has more titles, etc.". This is a pitch that is much more likely to make a sale than a complete explanation of all of the details of the format war as we know them.


This could be true, but again, does nothing for the CE consumer who wants HD media but doesn't want a game console. I would fully expect that we will see the HDA2 at retail for $399 or less after the HDA20 is released. That's going to give consumers looking for HD content some pause.

[
HD DVD failed last year to attract new CE or studio support. For a few months, HD DVD had momentum, and they didn't go anywhere with it. It may now be too late.


Again, this is false. Onkyo announced HD-DVD support as did Meridian. The fact that they are not yet shipping product is not much more disconcerting than all of the BR players that were announced last year and still have not materialized on store shelves.


The one important development for HD DVD announced at CES was Microsoft's efforts to get Chinese manufacturers into the mix with cheap players. This is their best strategy at this point: sell cheap players, show that software sales increase, get studios to change their minds. However, it runs a risk with many of the nation's retailers, who will consider the introduction of cheap players to be an affront to their normal sales strategies.


I'm not so sure. Retailers are looking for anything that gives them a shot in the arm. If the Chinese can bring 20% margin $299 HD-DVD players to market you don't think that the retailer will take the easy sale? They also have a high end line to go to with the XA2 and future Onkyo product. For BR if the person isn't interested in PS3 then they are at $800 or more.


Retailers can spin this by calling Blu-ray the quality product supported by the major manufacturers, with HD DVD being the "bargain basement also-ran" that isn't as good. With titles like Spiderman, Pirates, Cars, etc., to back them up, they can make this case.


The biggest challenge for HD-DVD right now is content, without a doubt. Those releases are seriously going to hurt HD-DVD's chances with nothing to counter with.


All the more reason for them to push Blu-ray now and hope to put an end to this mess.

They want it over for sure but I'm not sure if they really think BR, a.k.a, PS3 is going to make them more money at this point.


[I should add that, while I believe Blu-ray to be the better format, there isn't really much difference and I don't much care who wins the format war personally. But it is time to make something happen. As a consumer, I know that I am never going to see the variety of titles that I want until this format war is resolved. ]


Despite being called an HD-DVD hack I agree with this, I would like to see it ended also, just not by a video game console. :)

Circuit City refuses to carry Toshiba products due to some long-ago grudge that I don't understand, so no you're not going to see much in the way of HD DVD there.

Circuit City sells HD-DVD movies AND the HDA2 player, where the heck have you been?

mr smith .... why are you so afraid that HD DVD would be sticking around? there must be a reason ... da da !!!

I don't care whether HD DVD or Blu-ray "sticks around". Either one is OK.

What I do think is that there is not room in the marketplace for two so similar formats, and that customers are avoiding both as a result.

I have 12 friends with high-end home theatres and huge collections who are waiting eagerly for the format war to end so they can buy in. Meanwhile, some of them are deferring buying new equipment of any sort and even additional DVD titles. The format war is stagnating everything.

Under the conditions of two low-volume formats, I know that most of the titles I want will never make it to either one. I have a list of 300 titles that I want on hd disk. About 10 percent, at best, may make it under the conditions of the format war. The rest are either too obscure ("South Pacific" for example) or too popular ("Star Wars") to motivate their owners to press them at present. "Crank" and "Clerks II" just don't do it for me.

"The Searchers" made it, but I haven't seen Warners repeating that sort of experiment lately with similar classic titles. They seem to have shut down that effort last fall.

A title that actually interested me in HD DVD was "Spartacus" from Universal. Unhappily, Universal did such a poor job of it that I lost my interest. I haven't seen them doing any similar classics lately. [BTW: The "Back to the Future" trilogy is playing on the HD networks right now. Why hasn't Universal put it on HD DVD? Not enough "penetration" is no doubt the reason.]

I really empathize with the retailers. Hey, they just want to sell boxes and collect their commissions. Me, I just want to buy disks.

I will have great respect for whomever decides which format wins and makes it stick so that we can move forward with the agenda: movies!

If the studios and retailers have their way, the format war will be over long before Meridian delivers.

That's like saying "if Pepsi and Coke had their way, there would be no cola war."
Do you think that MS is going to stop selling the add-ons? That Toshiba will stop making HD DVD players? WB, Universal, Weinstiens, etc. are going to suddenly stop supporting HD DVD?

You've twice now made predictions like this. First you said that you believe retailers and the studios are ready to take the matter into their own hands and virtually declare a winner. Now this. I ask, please be more specific - just what are you predicting will happen and when do you think it will happen? And as importantly, what do base this on?

Circuit City refuses to carry Toshiba products due to some long-ago grudge that I don't understand, so no you're not going to see much in the way of HD DVD there. Not true anymore. There in my local Circuit CIty right now. They also now have them on their online store.

Issue was resolved before the HD A2s shipped. Toshiba is buying endcap space in selected markets now.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/Search.do?c=1&context=&keyword=HD+A2&searchSection=All&go.x=18&go.y=5

Circuit City sells HD-DVD movies AND the HDA2 player, where the heck have you been?

Where have I been? Actually in the stores seeing what really goes on.

Not in any of the three Circuit City stores that I have been in recently. They all have Blu-ray players and BD disks but no HD DVD to be seen.

That is partially my point: I am sure that stores have official policies, and equally sure that they are violated at the local level.

Here is an interesting story: I heard a commercial on the radio yesterday saying that Toshiba was running a Super Bowl special: buy a Toshiba HDTV, get an HD DVD player for $200. The commercial mentioned Fry's as a place to go.

So I went to Fry's to check it out. They had a close-out Toshiba A1 in the sales rack, and I found an A2 on a shelf (no price or display). I then asked an employee about this special: they had never heard of it.

There were however 3 Blu-ray players actually set up and running: Sony, Philips, and Samsung.

Since the special runs through Sunday, they had better get cracking. :)

Again, this doesn't make sense. Profit margin on the PS3 is zero. HD-DVD players actually make retailers a lot more money than the BR players that are actually selling today (PS3). Additionally what you are providing is anecdotal evidence, many members have also indicated that they are hearing HD-DVD ads and seeing fresh HD-DVD displays in stores. Why do that if the format is dead? Real good point. Retailers make zip on the PS3. If that's the only Blu-ray player selling, they have an incentive to push HD DVD players that they make a profit on.

One reason you had such an anti HD DVD bias last year was that there no HD DVD players in inventory to sell. Retailers were trying to sell what they had to sell with the Samsung.

Where have I been? Actually in the stores seeing what really goes on.

Not in any of the three Circuit City stores that I have been in recently. They all have Blu-ray players and BD disks but no HD DVD to be seen.

That is partially my point: I am sure that stores have official policies, and equally sure that they are violated at the local level.


Now you are flat out being silly so I'm going to have to call you on it.. Local stores violating CCs policy? The A2 is right on their website;

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Toshiba-HD-DVD-Player-HDA2/sem/rpsm/oid/169466/catOid/-16221/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

Just because you haven't personally seen them in your .01% demographic area doesn't mean they aren't selling them.

Where have I been? Actually in the stores seeing what really goes on.

Not in any of the three Circuit City stores that I have been in recently. They all have Blu-ray players and BD disks but no HD DVD to be seen.

That is partially my point: I am sure that stores have official policies, and equally sure that they are violated at the local level.

Here is an interesting story: I heard a commercial on the radio yesterday saying that Toshiba was running a Super Bowl special: buy a Toshiba HDTV, get an HD DVD player for $200. The commercial mentioned Fry's as a place to go.

So I went to Fry's to check it out. They had a close-out Toshiba A1 in the sales rack, and I found an A2 on a shelf (no price or display). I then asked an employee about this special: they had never heard of it.

There were however 3 Blu-ray players actually set up and running: Sony, Philips, and Samsung.

Since the special runs through Sunday, they had better get cracking. :) One of the issues is that the HD A2 is literally still being distributed nationwide form their initial shipments. Its 2-3 weeks by boat from manufacture travel customs and truck to distribution in every nook and cranny in the USA. Plus if sales are good , there may be local shortages until follow on inventory arrives.

If of course your retailer only had one left on the shelf and none in the back, the logical assumption is they sold the rest of their initial shipment. :)

That's like saying "if Pepsi and Coke had their way, there would be no cola war."
Do you think that MS is going to stop selling the add-ons? That Toshiba will stop making HD DVD players? WB, Universal, Weinstiens, etc. are going to suddenly stop supporting HD DVD?

You've twice now made predictions like this. First you said that you believe retailers and the studios are ready to take the matter into their own hands and virtually declare a winner. Now this. I ask, please be more specific - just what are you predicting will happen and when do you think it will happen? And as importantly, what do base this on?

I think if you look back at the predictions I made (most recently after CES in an article that I wrote), you will find that the recent Videoscan news is very compatible with some of the things I suggested would happen.

Since you ask for specific predictions, let me put on my turbin and see what I can come up with.

I predict that by summer (specifically by VSDA) the format war will be looking a lot different.
-- Sales will be way up for Blu-ray, continuing their current trend.
-- Weinstein will start Blu-ray support. [Harvey Weinstein can smell a dollar in the next state, he will not miss this opportunity.] This has only psychological impact of course since Weinstein has few titles.
-- There will be pressure on Universal to use THD (effectively going neutral).

I further predict that by CES 2008 the matter will be resolved.
-- All studios will be supporting Blu-ray, and only legacy support for HD DVD will be happening. Studios that supported HD DVD will continue for the present but the handwriting will be on the wall.
-- Toshiba will announce combo players or outright Blu-ray players.
-- HDTV sales will be much higher than currently expected.
-- Blu-ray sales will be much higher than expected with a clear path to adoption of Blu-ray as the successor to DVD.
-- Meridian will announce a high-end Blu-ray player (with no mention of their ostensible HD DVD player).

I wish I could add universal peace and an end to global warming but this is the best I can do.

I base this on the following:
-- CE, retailer, and studio support for Blu-ray, coupled with a strong desire to end the format war
-- Current and projected title announcements
-- Current player announcements
-- Most of all, current sales trends.

[I don't really know that this will happen. But you asked for specifics, so I am willing to go with this and eat crow accordingly. I am sure your predictions are as likely to come true as mine are BTW.]

WRT this issue about retailers: it has been claimed in many posts from HD DVD supporters (do a search) that many retailers are showing a preference to marketing Blu-ray. There are probably multiple reasons for this. One article on this is posted at the projectorcentral.com web site for example.

I am suggesting that retailers may be trying to force a conclusion to what they see as a disastrous format war by picking the format that they feel they can market more effectively and profitably.

I am sorry that my comments were taken as controversial, I thought many people believed that this was happening.

I am sorry I am going to have to bail on this thread. Very interesting discussion, thanks. But I need to get back to work to be able to afford these toys. :)

But the question wasn't "when will we know a winner", it was "what will happen when a format announces it's death". Losing the format war isn't necessarily the same things as having the format die.

It will be easier to declare a winner then it will to find out when one is dead, because it may make economic sense to keep producing in the 2nd place format. The install base of 360 add ons or PS3's may be large enough that people will still try to hit that market, even if it isn't supported as widely as the other format. So the losing format could, and probably will, live a long time after it's clearly the loser.

So I agree with you that we should find a time or event when we can declare a "winner", but I don't think that will be the same thing as being able to pinpoint the time of death for the loser.

UMD discs sale pretty poorly, but Sony keeps cranking those out. Even if HD-DVD ends up with the small slice of pie, discs will still be made as long as people buy them. I think people need to come to terms with the possibility of a tie, and all studios being neutral in 3 years. I think it is very possible.

Since you ask for specific predictions, let me put on my turbin and see what I can come up with.

I predict that by summer (specifically by VSDA) the format war will be looking a lot different.
-- Sales will be way up for Blu-ray, continuing their current trend.
-- Weinstein will start Blu-ray support. [Harvey Weinstein can smell a dollar in the next state, he will not miss this opportunity.] This has only psychological impact of course since Weinstein has few titles.
-- There will be pressure on Universal to use THD (effectively going neutral).

Those predictions are as controversial as your original claim; which was that retailers and the studios are ready to take the matter into their own hands and virtually declare a winner.


[I don't really know that this will happen. But you asked for specifics, so I am willing to go with this and eat crow accordingly. I am sure your predictions are as likely to come true as mine are BTW.]

But in my predictions, I try to say "it may" happen, or some other qualifier to connote to the reader that I realize I could well be wrong. While in this post, you appropriately show that you are just guessing, your earlier posts were pretty declarative.

Regardless of the above, you did make your points well, even if I disagree with the certainty with which you made your predictions.

Have a nice evening.

I thought that Meridian announcement was false. No?

No the owner of Meridian confirmed it was true, twice. It was just some marketing guy for Meridian didn't know what was going on at his own company an dmade an error by denying it.

Can anyone tell me if the sales numbers also count the BD and HD-DVD discs bundled with the PS3 and Xbox360 add-on to be individual sales or are they disregarded?

No, the freebie discs are not included. Videoscan works by tracking point-of-sale data (barcode scans). Bundled discs do not get counted.

You are wrong. They get it from Wal*Mart and from major web merchants (including Amazon). Check their website.

From everything that came up when I searched, they don't cover amazon or walmart (or even target or toys-r-us). The following is what NPD says - this I posted sometime back in the General discussion thread.

NPD receives data representing about two-thirds of U.S. retail sales and makes projections for the remainder of the market based on a sampling of consumers.

If you have links to prove your point let us have it. I can post numerous links where people are saying NPD doesn't cover the big retailers or e-tailers.

Circuit City refuses to carry Toshiba products due to some long-ago grudge that I don't understand, so no you're not going to see much in the way of HD DVD there.

I checked a nearby CC this weekend and they did have Toshiba HD-DVD. Stupidly enough though, I could find no HD-DVD discs.

A month ago, I asked if they had any HD-DVD's. The sales guy said they only carried Blu-ray and would never carry HD-DVD, because BD was superior in every way. Oops!

I am suggesting that retailers may be trying to force a conclusion to what they see as a disastrous format war by picking the format that they feel they can market more effectively and profitably.

Disastrous for whom ?

But for the format war all you guys would have had are 5E type of "beyond HD" PQ to "enjoy" ;)

I think if you look back at the predictions I made (most recently after CES in an article that I wrote), you will find that the recent Videoscan news is very compatible with some of the things I suggested would happen.

Since you ask for specific predictions, let me put on my turbin and see what I can come up with.

I predict that by summer (specifically by VSDA) the format war will be looking a lot different.
-- Sales will be way up for Blu-ray, continuing their current trend.
-- Weinstein will start Blu-ray support. [Harvey Weinstein can smell a dollar in the next state, he will not miss this opportunity.] This has only psychological impact of course since Weinstein has few titles.
-- There will be pressure on Universal to use THD (effectively going neutral).

I further predict that by CES 2008 the matter will be resolved.
-- All studios will be supporting Blu-ray, and only legacy support for HD DVD will be happening. Studios that supported HD DVD will continue for the present but the handwriting will be on the wall.
-- Toshiba will announce combo players or outright Blu-ray players.
-- HDTV sales will be much higher than currently expected.
-- Blu-ray sales will be much higher than expected with a clear path to adoption of Blu-ray as the successor to DVD.
-- Meridian will announce a high-end Blu-ray player (with no mention of their ostensible HD DVD player).

I wish I could add universal peace and an end to global warming but this is the best I can do.

I base this on the following:
-- CE, retailer, and studio support for Blu-ray, coupled with a strong desire to end the format war
-- Current and projected title announcements
-- Current player announcements
-- Most of all, current sales trends.

[I don't really know that this will happen. But you asked for specifics, so I am willing to go with this and eat crow accordingly. I am sure your predictions are as likely to come true as mine are BTW.]

A few of my own Carnac predictions...

1) Warner not finding any other willing victims for their Total HD discs wiil produce 4 titles that are greeted by howls of complaints by both sides "being forced to pay for that other disc :mad: "

2) Paramount after going through the pains of BD and HD-DVD combo disc production for the most of 2007 announce in October they are dropping HD-DVD for "the low cost solution of Blu-Ray".

3) Toshiba announces at CES 2008 three new Blu-Ray/HD-DVD combo players to "fill the gap" for HD-DVD supporters. The new players will also support the new 51GB TL discs that replace the older 30GB DL format that is being abandoned. Warner at the same time anounces "Total HD+" which is a 51GB/50GB HD combo flipper disc aimed to reduce retailer and consumer confusion about the new HD formats. ;)

b2b

Now you are flat out being silly so I'm going to have to call you on it.. Local stores violating CCs policy? The A2 is right on their website;

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Toshiba-HD-DVD-Player-HDA2/sem/rpsm/oid/169466/catOid/-16221/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

Just because you haven't personally seen them in your .01% demographic area doesn't mean they aren't selling them.

I think he must not have been in CC recently as claimed. Check the 94301 zip code on CC and you will see ALL THREE stores in his area have them instock and instore.

It's amazing how much we can predict based on 2 weeks of sales data. I'm sure at some point UMD was looking like the portable media for the future with super fantastic short term trends....

Kinda like when we expected the war in Iraq to end after a few weeks of fighting.

It's not that we just have two weeks of sales data increase. It's the fact that it went from 3:1 HD-DVD's favor to 2:1 Blu-rays favor in a very short period of time. It's an interesting fact if nothing else. However, it is a little early to be shouting winner from the mountain tops. I still see Christmas 2007 as the defining moment for both formats.

UMD discs sale pretty poorly, but Sony keeps cranking those out.Haven't you heard about what's called "install base"? There are 10 million PSPs around after all. That's a very, very different situation from that of HD DVD.

No the owner of Meridian confirmed it was true, twice. It was just some marketing guy for Meridian didn't know what was going on at his own company an dmade an error by denying it.
Aahaa