Just imagine how great this world could be without the format war.

We could enjoy $1000 players and $39.99 discs.

Woudn't that be great?

It is too late now, and damage is done..

there are alot of threads on this subject already. do we need another?

there are alot of threads on this subject already. do we need another?

Not really, my apologies.

I have observed this forum for a few days and had a burning desire to express my militaristic feelings, aka common sense.

Mods, please close.

So at what point does the format war become bad? Never?

When all studios go to the fence (like Fox) and Bill Hunt closes his business...:)

Diogen.

So at what point does the format war become bad? Never?

Never.

Amazing new concept. It is called "Competition".

And you know, competition is good. For both the companies and the consumers. The best and the strongest has more sales and therefore more money. Despite the fact that they had to lower their initial price.

The second best grabs part of the market too. Die-hards will be there for them.

short term - good
long term - bad

consumers will be disgusted by the fact that they will have to buy two players to play two different movies from different studios. i'm already confused on who supports what and what movies will be available to me. imagine the folks that are not so concerned about hd but want hd. you think it's going to be easy to stick the right disc in the right player? don't say dual format players either. it's just all bad. then comes hd download material, less headaches and easier to operate. we can kiss our players good bye eventually. how long will this carry on. it's all speculation now.

don't say dual format players either.

dual format players :)

I bet you have at least one in your home already.

Doug

Never.

Amazing new concept. It is called "Competition".

And you know, competition is good. For both the companies and the consumers. The best and the strongest has more sales and therefore more money. Despite the fact that they had to lower their initial price.

The second best grabs part of the market too. Die-hards will be there for them.

Yeah I've heard of competition, thanks. It's obviously helped drive down player prices, but at some point prices will get low enough and if studios are still not united behind one format, people will not buy players. I won't, and I'm far more into HD than the average dude. This concept seems understood by analysts and journalists of virtually every website I read outside this forum.

dual format players :)

I bet you have at least one in your home already.

Doug

with the everchanging specs of both hddvd and bd, no way. you know how many bugs and firmware updates you'd have to go through just to get the player working right? no thanks!

with the everchanging specs of both hddvd and bd, no way. you know how many bugs and firmware updates you'd have to go through just to get the player working right? no thanks!

That's probably why only one company actually has a player on the market and only one other has announced one. In going forward, however, if either format holds at least 30 percent of the market, dual-format players are inevitable for everyone.

Doug

yeah, its true but too soon to tell. we all have to bend over at some point.

Never.

Amazing new concept. It is called "Competition".

And you know, competition is good. For both the companies and the consumers. The best and the strongest has more sales and therefore more money. Despite the fact that they had to lower their initial price.

The second best grabs part of the market too. Die-hards will be there for them.

Couldn't have said it better myself. Actually, I have been saying that. :rolleyes:

I think the only people making money in the war are the studios that charge $39.99 for combos and dual layer BD and maybe Pioneer on there players. I would be surprised if Samsung and Panasonic are making money on their players. To be perfectly coy, I could care less if any of the CEs make a dime off this war. They should have launched with one format to start with and I hope they all lose big! I am however greatful for the war in that I have had a low cost of entry of both formats!

Never.

Amazing new concept. It is called "Competition".

And you know, competition is good. For both the companies and the consumers. The best and the strongest has more sales and therefore more money. Despite the fact that they had to lower their initial price.

The second best grabs part of the market too. Die-hards will be there for them.

Explain DVD. Divx was hardly competition, and I can't imagine things being any rosier or happening any faster than they did there. Were you complaining that you wished there was a competing format for DVD?

Just imagine how great this world could be without the format war.

We could enjoy $1000 players and $39.99 discs.

Woudn't that be great?

It is too late now, and damage is done..
There has always been competition and it is DVD. The problem is that HDM cannot compete with DVD players that cost 1/10 as much and catalog titles on DVD that are 1/2 the price of HDM.

There has always been competition and it is DVD. The problem is that HDM cannot compete with DVD players that cost 1/10 as much and catalog titles on DVD that are 1/2 the price of HDM.

The same argument could be made for HDTV vs. SDTV. I admit that I still have an analog SD Sony WEGA in the family room, and (worse yet) I still enjoy watching it.

I am convinced that I would not notice any difference on that display between DVD, HD-DVD, and Blu-Ray - provided I connected all of them via a 480i input. Like the vast majority of TV viewers in the USA who still own SD displays, I don't give a hoot about a "format war", even though I am an AVS member and an early adopter of HD.

So much angst. So much chatter. So many impassioned arguments. People dividing into champions of one format or another. What if they gave a format war and nobody came?

I admit, in my Home Theater I have been playing HD-DVD for some months now, but only because the ubiquitous Xbox 360 drive was available for $200. But the problem is, up until the announcement this week, there was about 40% of the HD media exclusive to one format or the other. Now the percentages will shift a few points, but the war will continue.

You must still choose both formats, or watch some movies in SD instead of HD. As soon as I can get a Blu-Ray player for a reasonable price, I'll have one. If one format becomes predominant months or years from now, I won't care then anymore than I care now. I will own enough movies in the losing format to retain that player.

I don't double dip, I never have. Occasionally I feel the urge to watch one of my old movies on -gasp- VHS. I'd rather buy new films than replace old ones.

It really is OK if you don't give a hoot about a format war. You don't have to be a proponent of either media. They both produce wonderfull audio and video in your Home Theater.

The people in this Forum, who unlike most folks are knowledgeable enough to know about the nuances of each type of media, can just decide not to have a war.

The parallel with display technology is the approaching end of analog broadcasting in February 2009, only 18 months away. Before then, everybody must choose a format for HDTV:

1) Cable distribution via QAM signals.
2) OTA broadcast via 8VSB signals.
3) DSS from one of two surviving providers.

Think of the fun we could have dividing into three camps and arguing endlessly in the Forum about the merits of each HD programming provider. But wait a minute.....we have sub-Forums for that and we've been enjoying that war for years.

OR - we could not give a hoot. I'm already set up for two of the above three HD programming sources, and could add the third if I was willing to pay more money.

But I care about content not format. I own a display that has no less than SIX inputs capable of 1080p. Multiple formats for broadcast HD and HDM mean that I will have more toys, and the wife will look at that even deeper rat's nest of wires in the Home Theater and maybe decide she still needs me around a while longer.

Explain DVD. Divx was hardly competition, and I can't imagine things being any rosier or happening any faster than they did there. Were you complaining that you wished there was a competing format for DVD?

@Padriac:

My first DVD player was $799. It was a bargain, because the same player was sold at Frys (one of the cheapest stores) for $999, and Frys guys did not believe me when I told them I bought the same player for $799.

It took a long time for the DVDs to hit $9.99 price tag. The price for the DVD was around $20 for a long time.

The price for the blank DVD media was around $3-$5 for quite a while.

To answer your question: if there was a competing format of the same or better quality, prices for both DVD players and DVD titles would go down much, much faster.

Unfortunately there was no competing format, SVCD could not cut it.


I can imagine things being rosier and happening faster than they did there.

@Padriac:

My first DVD player was $799. It was a bargain, because the same player was sold at Frys (one of the cheapest stores) for $999, and Frys guys did not believe me when I told them I bought the same player for $799.

It took a long time for the DVDs to hit $9.99 price tag. The price for the DVD was around $20 for a long time.

The price for the blank DVD media was around $3-$5 for quite a while.

To answer your question: if there was a competing format of the same or better quality, prices for both DVD players and DVD titles would go down much, much faster.

Unfortunately there was no competing format, SVCD could not cut it.

I can imagine things being rosier and happening faster than they did there.
My first dvd player, a Pioneer, purchased December of 1998. So, roughly the same time-line as you're going to see coming this December for HD DVD & Blu-ray. I want to say it was $350. Component outputs, optical audio output, dts support, the works. The player was still performs to this day exactly as well as it did the day I bought it. Back then there was a much larger support of player manufacturers, even had multi-disc dvd changers to choose from. Where's the massive player support for HD DVD or Blu-ray? One manufacturer for HD DVD, a few for Blu-ray.

And when I bought that player back in 1998, there was absolutely no doubt in my mind that dvd was going to overtake the market in a big way, and I would have a plethora of movie titles available to me over the years. Can you honestly say the same thing right now about either HD DVD or Blu-ray?

There's two sides to the argument. And they both are valid.

I see your point. However, DVD is a standard definition media that replaced videotape, and was visibly and audibly superior on good quality displays, those with component video or S-video inputs.

HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are visibly and audibly superior to DVD on high definition displays only - such displays are still a small minority compared to the SD displays in the country.

DVD took 5 years to ramp up. The HD media have only been shipping about a year. The HD disks will really start moving IMHO once digital TV broadcasting replaces analog, and 1080p displays become more common.

militaristic feelings, aka common sense.
Militaristic common sense? :confused:

Without the format war, I'd be happily buying movies from all the studios and putting them in a single player that plays them all...right now.

The big question in my mind is how many titles would we have without a format war? Would we at least have had more catalog titles coming out without the sidelines attitude some of the majors are taking? I'd have taken $1k players and $40 movies if it meant knowing *this* (insert HD/BD here) was the way of the future without question, and I could watch some of my favorite catalog titles like LOTR and Gladiator and X-Men without waiting until years later, especially since you an alway buy some and rent the rest.