I consider myself one of the average joes. The only reason I am watching movies in high definition is due to the HD-DVD $99 player sale at Walmart. I didn't even need a 1080p player, I got the 1080i hd-a2. Until Blu-ray gets players that hit the $99 mark, I won't be watching any of its material. I really don't see how anything larger than a small portion of the mass market will either. Therefore the Warner news doesn't seem to be that big of a deal.

+1

I don't care which side wins, but until we have sub-$99 players, there will not be mass adoption. I liked HD DVD because I thought they could get there first.

My fear now is that player prices will remain high and HDM will remain a tiny niche. Downloads will have time to become viable.

Has anyone noticed the price of all the latest Blu-ray players announced? :eek: The average person isn't going to fork over that much cash.

I'd probably go as high as $299 for a non-Sony fully featured BD player around 2010 unless there is an alternative I prefer by that time.

all the people wanting 99 dollar cd and dvd players did not impede the grouth of that
industry when it was getting started and its still going.

all the people wanting 99 dollar cd and dvd players did not impede the grouth of that
industry when it was getting started and its still going.

but we didn't have the financial catastrophe that we have now

(ie weak US Dollar, Housing/credit market turmoil etc).

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)

I spent a $1000 for a 1st gen Sony. My spending on HDM so far $0.

all the people wanting 99 dollar cd and dvd players did not impede the grouth of that
industry when it was getting started and its still going.



My first CD player was a cheap $99 player I bought in 1988. My first DVD player was a cheap $99 player I bought in 1998. Had the price not been so low, I would not have been able to afford to buy in. I think the same holds true today but even moreso because the benefits of the HD formats offer little to the average consumer whereas the benefits of DVD and CD could be seen and heard on just about any device able to play them. DVD's looked and sounded much better than VHS even on a 13" mono TV. CD's sounded "better" (I am a still a vinyl junkie and haven't bought CD's in almost 20 years but lets not go there) even on a cheap boombox. The same does not hold true for HDM. Without sub $100 players available, the market will remain niche regardless of which studios are signed on.

I seriously thought HD-DVD had the best business plan to replace DVD and bring HDM to the masses. We'll see.

When sub $200 BD players come out I will find it hard to resist. Until then, I will continue to watch Transformers and Shrek 3 with my kids.

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)

I paid 500bux for a jvc player back in 00, so I had no problem dropping 399 for a ps3 which is a bargain and superior in every way. Also considering inflation it was even cheaper.

Sub $200 players are coming, likely in 2008. Funai has announced a "sub $300 player" at CES and Philips has announced a $349 player. Both players are profile 1.1 and both prices are MSRP.

Expect street prices to hit the $200 mark within 6-8 months, no question.

I don't think a $99 price is imperative for HDM adoption with Blu-ray. Sub $200prices and final profile/final profile capable players ARE.

But even given that, all the studio switches and uncertainly about whether studios will stay behind Blu-ray as well if numbers don't pan out with it as the dominant format is hurtful to HDM overall.

Blu-ray needs to do the following things if HDM is to survive.


Shift the focus from the PS3 to standalone players as the lead face of Blu-ray.
Trend players toward final profile/final profile capability immediately to eliminate uncertainty about whether it's a finished product.
Trend player prices down to at least the $200-250 for final profile/final profile capable players this year to encourage a mass market transition from DVD to Blu-ray.
Work out an amicable resolution with Toshiba and HD DVD forum members to unite and put a somewhat unified face on steering the public to Blu-ray as the future of home video.


They don't have to nail that last one, but the other three are needed. While the battle vs. HD DVD appears over, the battle for viability against DVD is far from it, and Hollywood studio support has shown itself as fickle.

If Blu-ray doesn't show itself to on track to replace DVD soon, the studios could very well decide to look at downloads.

Most are already exploring the technology and making investments in it as we speak.

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)

I don't think it matters how expensive the DVD was back in the day. This is a different format and a different year.

The DVD was something new. Since HDM is only better PQ and AQ we need to have lower prices and better player.

We also have digital downloads to compete with so the quicker we can get super low prices the quicker we have a chance to stay alive.

But since it looks like the BDA will win I don't expect low prices at all and they might lose this war because of the greed.

I think we'll see a lot more package deals with TVs coming up soon.

I think we'll see a lot more package deals with TVs coming up soon.


Toshiba did that recently with their Regza HDTV's and it was a success,if Toshiba did that from the start then more households would have HDTV's and HD DVD players...win/win for Toshiba.
I will buy a BD player when they are <$200USD.

I agree that the price is a major consideration. I bought in to HD DVD because I purchased an xbox 360 add-on for $130 with the CompUSA going out of business sales. That is the only reason I am in HDM. Since then I have bought 5 or 6 HD DVD disks, all of which I have purchased on sale, and would not have purchased at full price. All other HD-DVD disks I watched were Netflixed.

If the manufacturers want HDM to remain niche, then the high prices that Blu-Ray is pushing is the way to go. If they want mainstream penetration, then they MUST have lower than $200 players, and they MUST have those players be full final spec, and not the mess that Blu-Ray is in today.

I personally would have happily bought a Blu-Ray player instead of an HD-DVD player.... if they had the lower price. There is no way in hell I would buy one for the price they are going at now. Until I can buy a Blu-Ray player for less than $200 (and less than $150 for wife-acceptance) I will be happy living with my HD-DVD's and my upconverting DVD player, bought for $29 on a black friday sale :)

Said this on another thread, but regardless of player price......until HDTVs are in over 50% (more like 65-75%) of US homes, neither format would hope to see "mass adoption" and supplant DVD.

By the time HDTV has such a presence in the avg. living room, those quick, easy HD downloads MS have been talking up may very well be a reality.

Before a $700 BD player was too much yet a $400 HDDVD player was great.. then sub $300, then 200, 150 is the perfect price etc..
And when HD-DVD couldnt make dent even at $100 some were saying $50 was the magical number.

People want confidence in a format more than they do bargain bin prices. Thats what will get mass market adoption.

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)


Toshiba $1150.00 /1997.

Art

It only took DVD about 6 years to get to that price point and look what a failure it was.

I don't think it matters how expensive the DVD was back in the day. This is a different format and a different year.

The DVD was something new. Since HDM is only better PQ and AQ we need to have lower prices and better player.

We also have digital downloads to compete with so the quicker we can get super low prices the quicker we have a chance to stay alive.

But since it looks like the BDA will win I don't expect low prices at all and they might lose this war because of the greed.

+1

Blu-ray has to compete with upscaling players adn HD downloads. As of right now the general public has chosen upscalers to go with their HDTVs, and they are quite happy with them.

Why would someone drop $400 and replace their whole DVD library just to watch Blu-ray on their 37 inch 720p TV?

And when HD-DVD couldnt make dent even at $100 some were saying $50 was the magical number.


I am sorry, didn't they sell 60,000 players in a day (WM, CC, BB) and then run out of stock at that price? Clearly $99 is a magic price point.

At the end of 1998 I found a DVD player for $179. My wife almost killed me for paying that much. We also joined a little on-line service that had just started called Netflix.:D

It only took DVD about 6 years to get to that price point and look what a failure it was.QFT for all the HD DVD supporters that are crying that it's getting closer in 2 years for Blu-ray.
I am sorry, didn't they sell 60,000 players in a day (WM, CC, BB) and then run out of stock at that price?And still got beat in player sales for the holidays. You can refuse to acknowledge it, but that's the reality.

I am sorry, didn't they sell 60,000 players in a day (WM, CC, BB) and then run out of stock at that price? Clearly $99 is a magic price point.A $200 DVD player 5 years ago would have sold 10x as much. Heck a $200 BD player right now would sell at least twice as much. Like I said people want confidence, not bargain bin prices.

Until Blu-ray gets players that hit the $99 mark, I won't be watching any of its material. I really don't see how anything larger than a small portion of the mass market will either. Therefore the Warner news doesn't seem to be that big of a deal.

It's certainly true that DVD replacement (i.e. tens of millions of BD players in consumers homes) won't begin util prices come down, but what you don't seem to understand is a lot of other things have to happen before that is possible.

The cost of movies is far higher than the player (even with $1,000 players) and consumers are mentally conditioned to not want competing video foramts (ala DVD/Divx, or the legendary VHS/Beta). What consumers want is a single format, and they want one that feels "worth" the upgrade. The format war has depressed adoption by second and third tier early adopters, as has the profit-eating artificial price lowering. That may seem weird to you, but most earlier adopters (especially the ones who aren't hardcore tech geeks) like the status that comes with purchasing an "elite" product, and this usually build consumer demand before prices come down ("wow honey, did you see how good that blu-ray player looked on Tom's HDTV?"). THEN when prices come down sales take off.

What MSFToshiba did was try to artificially lower the pricing before there was sfficient consumer demand. That did allow people who were early-adopters at heart (but not pocket-book) to buy in, but it was never going to achieve wide-apread market penetration. Worse, it threatens the normal channels by which desirability is established, and could have caused consumers to see HDM as a cheap, waste-bin product before it ever achieved critical mass.

Luckily, the format war is now over, so we can get back to our regularly scheduled market penetration. As CE retailers drop HD DVD and push Blu-ray, more and more later early adopters will start to buy in (my brother in law and his coworker are two classic examples who jumped over the weekend) and the idea of HDM will start to excite people as they stop worrying about picking the "wrong" format and start being impressed by the image and sound quality, and the new intereactive features (which I suspect will player better to families and younger people than it has to HT enthusiasts so far).

So in short, the Warner decision is the most important thing that could possibly happen, and it absolutely had to happen before prices dropped too much, or we could have lost everything.

I am sorry, didn't they sell 60,000 players in a day (WM, CC, BB) and then run out of stock at that price? Clearly $99 is a magic price point.

No it isn't; 60k is a drop in the bucket for mass adoption. Remember Toshiba predicting like 4 million (later revised to 2 million) players sold in 2007? They didn't even hit a million.

All that happened was a ton of inventory of an EOLed model was moved below cost, and Toshiba tried to spin it as positive, rather than potentially creating 60k pissed off customers, which is in fact what is happening now.

I'd probably go as high as $299 for a non-Sony fully featured BD player around 2010 unless there is an alternative I prefer by that time.

Here ya go: Sub $300 Blu-Ray player in Q2. Funai branded as Sylvania.

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=815

Well, from what we've seen from CES so far, BD player prices seem to be going up.

It's certainly true that DVD replacement (i.e. tens of millions of BD players in consumers homes) won't begin util prices come down, but what you don't seem to understand is a lot of other things have to happen before that is possible.

The cost of movies is far higher than the player (even with $1,000 players) and consumers are mentally conditioned to not want competing video foramts (ala DVD/Divx, or the legendary VHS/Beta). What consumers want is a single format, and they want one that feels "worth" the upgrade. The format war has depressed adoption by second and third tier early adopters, as has the profit-eating artificial price lowering. That may seem weird to you, but most earlier adopters (especially the ones who aren't hardcore tech geeks) like the status that comes with purchasing an "elite" product, and this usually build consumer demand before prices come down ("wow honey, did you see how good that blu-ray player looked on Tom's HDTV?"). THEN when prices come down sales take off.

What MSFToshiba did was try to artificially lower the pricing before there was sfficient consumer demand. That did allow people who were early-adopters at heart (but not pocket-book) to buy in, but it was never going to achieve wide-apread market penetration. Worse, it threatens the normal channels by which desirability is established, and could have caused consumers to see HDM as a cheap, waste-bin product before it ever achieved critical mass.

Luckily, the format war is now over, so we can get back to our regularly scheduled market penetration. As CE retailers drop HD DVD and push Blu-ray, more and more later early adopters will start to buy in (my brother in law and his coworker are two classic examples who jumped over the weekend) and the idea of HDM will start to excite people as they stop worrying about picking the "wrong" format and start being impressed by the image and sound quality, and the new intereactive features (which I suspect will player better to families and younger people than it has to HT enthusiasts so far).

So in short, the Warner decision is the most important thing that could possibly happen, and it absolutely had to happen before prices dropped too much, or we could have lost everything.

Wow - KUDOS to you for putting together an intelligent logical and factual post which is based on laws of economics. I'd shake your hand if I could cause you are RIGHT ON and as more set tops are manufactured and more discs are made costs come down, prices come down, product lines mature...etc.

Warner going Blu-Ray actually does matter, because it killed HD-DVD, even without cheaper Blu-Ray players.

The Wal-Mart $99 HD-DVD player sale was one day only. It is a price point that has not been repeated since.

Out of the million HD-DVD stand-alone players sold, less than 90k were at the $99 price point. The rest have paid $199 and up. Quit pretending HD-DVD has hit $99 in anything but a one day doorbuster sale.

how long did it take for dvd players to be sub $100?

Luckily, the format war is now over, so we can get back to our regularly scheduled market penetration.

Really???

When did Universal and Paramount announce their switch? Did I miss it?

Is this the 3rd or 4th time the war has been declared over in the past 2 years?

:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

As long as studios remain with HD-DVD and continue to release desirable films only on HD-DVD, while Blu-ray CEs continue to sell overpriced, non-standardized hardware, the war continues.

I consider myself one of the average joes. The only reason I am watching movies in high definition is due to the HD-DVD $99 player sale at Walmart. I didn't even need a 1080p player, I got the 1080i hd-a2. Until Blu-ray gets players that hit the $99 mark, I won't be watching any of its material. I really don't see how anything larger than a small portion of the mass market will either. Therefore the Warner news doesn't seem to be that big of a deal.
+1

I'll just continue watching my current HD-DVD library, rent DVD's, or download HDM from the Marketplace.

Actually, I might pull the trigger if there was a top notch BD player for $150ish, the same I paid for the 360 AO.

My first DVD player: Creative PC DVD-Rom - >$100 ...I did not invest in an actual DVD player till they were about $100 either.

The way I got into HD DVD was exactly the same way. $179 Xbox 360 addon (With free copy of Heroes, so price of addon was about $100). I invested in the HD-A2 at the $99 price.

So for me, as I've said in another thread, I'm going to be one of those that will keep purchasing HD DVDs and SD DVDs as I wait for a BR player that's profile-proof, at a price range of $99-$199.

I just don't see it happening any time soon.

come on people think about it they are in it to make money you want a 99 dollar
player that means they will have to use the cheapest parts with the cheapest labor
cause if they can not make a reasonable profit why build it and toshiba said they
where taking a hard hit on their players trying to win the masses how long due you
think the shareholders would be willing to go along with that before the plug gets pulled.

how many good upconverting dvd players are < $100 ? lol

come on people think about it they are in it to make money you want a 99 dollar
player that means they will have to use the cheapest parts with the cheapest labor
cause if they can not make a reasonable profit why build it and toshiba said they
where taking a hard hit on their players trying to win the masses how long due you
think the shareholders would be willing to go along with that before the plug gets pulled.

Punctuation is your friend. :)

That said, I'm not in this war to help out any particular company. I'm in it as a consumer trying to save a buck and at the same time be able to enjoy my hobby of collecting movies.

how many good upconverting dvd players are < $100 ? lol

A $99 HD-A2 ;)

Is this the 3rd or 4th time the war has been declared over in the past 2 years?

FWIT, this is the first time I've declared it.

As long as studios remain with HD-DVD and continue to release desirable films only on HD-DVD, while Blu-ray CEs continue to sell overpriced, non-standardized hardware, the war continues.

Nope. BD hardware was already outselling HD DVD hardware the last month or so, even before this announcement (and depite costing more). Retailers want an end to this ever worse than the studios do, and within weeks several chains are almost certain to drop HD DVD support. By the end of Q3 you won't find HD DVD software in an major retailer (so there's no confusion for next holiday shopping). I douth either studio will still be HD DVD exclusive that long, but even if they are the WB announcement is starting off a chain of events that can only result in HD DVD disappearing.

Identical discussion has occured in several threads, including:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=969708

When sub $200 BD players come out I will find it hard to resist. Until then, I will continue to watch Transformers and Shrek 3 with my kids.

Same here, I probably won't get Blu Ray player until price is redueced ~ $150 with feature matcing HD-DVD (PiP & network). I got A2 player when it hit $120.

+1

I'll just continue watching my current HD-DVD library, rent DVD's, or download HDM from the Marketplace.

Actually, I might pull the trigger if there was a top notch BD player for $150ish, the same I paid for the 360 AO.

The 360 AO is a top notch player? It does not eve do lossless. I love it when people want better BD players for the same price as the HD DVD player they bought. I bet you will want BOGOs on your BD software as well, even though HD DVD had very few.

I would pay a higher price- if the features where there. What i have heard here on AVS is the current hd/br players have many bugs and strange setup features{ those in the know- pipe-in here}
-all tech has bugs-; but i don't think HD/br players are really ready for prime time. Thats why i'll be waiting a year, for 4th-5th gen players. Also DVDs at $15+ would limit alot of new custommers and no SACD/DVD-A.

It's certainly true that DVD replacement (i.e. tens of millions of BD players in consumers homes) won't begin util prices come down, but what you don't seem to understand is a lot of other things have to happen before that is possible.

The cost of movies is far higher than the player (even with $1,000 players) and consumers are mentally conditioned to not want competing video foramts (ala DVD/Divx, or the legendary VHS/Beta). What consumers want is a single format, and they want one that feels "worth" the upgrade. The format war has depressed adoption by second and third tier early adopters, as has the profit-eating artificial price lowering. That may seem weird to you, but most earlier adopters (especially the ones who aren't hardcore tech geeks) like the status that comes with purchasing an "elite" product, and this usually build consumer demand before prices come down ("wow honey, did you see how good that blu-ray player looked on Tom's HDTV?"). THEN when prices come down sales take off.

What MSFToshiba did was try to artificially lower the pricing before there was sfficient consumer demand. That did allow people who were early-adopters at heart (but not pocket-book) to buy in, but it was never going to achieve wide-apread market penetration. Worse, it threatens the normal channels by which desirability is established, and could have caused consumers to see HDM as a cheap, waste-bin product before it ever achieved critical mass.

Luckily, the format war is now over, so we can get back to our regularly scheduled market penetration. As CE retailers drop HD DVD and push Blu-ray, more and more later early adopters will start to buy in (my brother in law and his coworker are two classic examples who jumped over the weekend) and the idea of HDM will start to excite people as they stop worrying about picking the "wrong" format and start being impressed by the image and sound quality, and the new intereactive features (which I suspect will player better to families and younger people than it has to HT enthusiasts so far).

So in short, the Warner decision is the most important thing that could possibly happen, and it absolutely had to happen before prices dropped too much, or we could have lost everything.

DVD hit $200 price points around late 99'-00'. I remember this well because I bought my first Philips DVD player and the Matrix on DVD at around the same time. About a year later I bought my wife (college sweetheart at the time) a DVD player for $150 and then about a year after that I bought her a 5 disc DVD player for about the same.

DVD hit mass market adoption at around $200 and it didn't take 7 years for it to do that, more like 3-4 as it debuted in retail generally around late 96'-97'.

Not to mention DVD didn't have itself to compete with as it was leaps and bounds over an improvement over VHS thanks to the ability to views angles, commentaries, special features and the like. It offered a revolution in home video, not just better PQ and SQ.

If you think the mass market is going to willingly pay $300-$400 to upgrade from DVD, you're not thinking realistically.

Most will appreciate the quality, some will buy, a majority will say "I'll wait until it comes down in price".

That's going by historical trends anyway. And it doesn't help that many of the same CEs making Blu-ray players are selling upconverters advertising 1080p.

HD DVD disappearing isn't the end of the confusion or the beginning of mass market adoption. It's one battle in a hard fight to succeed DVD.

I'm in the $99-$150 boat for a Blu-Ray player. I did pay quite a bit more for my A35 just because I jumped the gun and had some extra $ before the holidays.

My first DVD player was my PS2. Got it about a year after it was out. The next one was a $99 Sony upconvert, bought roughly 1 1/2 years ago.

If downloads are made fast and affordable I would go that way as I'm tired of the clutter disks create and scratches that make them unplayable over time.

The 360 AO is a top notch player? It does not eve do lossless. I love it when people want better BD players for the same price as the HD DVD player they bought. I bet you will want BOGOs on your BD software as well, even though HD DVD had very few.

As many people as Blu-ray supporters have often argued don't care for special features and extras, even fewer care about lossless audio.

But since Blu-ray is pretty much the dominant HD disc now, can we officially stop bickering about which format does what?

A $99 HD-A2 ;)
Really, where can I buy one, currently?

I disagree, once the Warner announcement was out, more than a few people I konw went out and purchased a PS3. In their eyes the war was over and they felt "safe" buying into the Blu-Ray world.

The PS3 has dropped by almost 50% in a year. Going by that rate by next year it should be well under the sweet spot for CE of $299MSRP.

I got A2 player when it hit $120.
A lot of people got an A2 when it went for fire-sale doorbuster prices, only to be greeted with a dead-format come New Year.

Not exactly the bargain they thought it was.

Nope. BD hardware was already outselling HD DVD hardware the last month or so, even before this announcement (and depite costing more).

That's if you include PS3s which sold well over the holidays. Standalones are a different story.

Retailers want an end to this ever worse than the studios do, and within weeks several chains are almost certain to drop HD DVD support. By the end of Q3 you won't find HD DVD software in an major retailer (so there's no confusion for next holiday shopping).

If you say so. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

I douth either studio will still be HD DVD exclusive that long, but even if they are the WB announcement is starting off a chain of events that can only result in HD DVD disappearing.

Yes it may very well lead to the other studios switching eventually, but until then, there's still a format war. Plus, there's not a whole lot of money to be made in either format right now because DVDs are several orders of magnitude higher in unit sales. Not much incentive for the remaining studios to switch.

DVD hit mass market adoption at around $200 and it didn't take 7 years for it to do that, more like 3-4 as it debuted in retail generally around late 96'-97'.

Absolutely (I snipped your brief historical synopsis, but it was spot on). Blu-ray is in its second year. Expect $200 players sooner than with DVD.

Not to mention DVD didn't have itself to compete with as it was leaps and bounds over an improvement over VHS thanks to the ability to views angles, commentaries, special features and the like. It offered a revolution in home video, not just better PQ and SQ.

Which is why people like Warner are rightfully interested in advanced interactivity. While HT enthusiasts don't usually care (me included) it really helps sell HDM as "a revolution in home video, not just better PQ and SQ."

If you think the mass market is going to willingly pay $300-$400 to upgrade from DVD, you're not thinking realistically.

I never said I did. I expect a much larger number of "late" early adopters who didn't like the uncertainty of the format war to get involved this year (low millions) while Blu-ray players are still status symbols ($300-400). That establishes desirability (HT magazines really help here, as they are often "window-shopping" for lat-adopter HT enthusiasts), so that when $100-200 players become common (maybe Q4 2008, otherwise Q1-2 2009) sales will really take off.

At that point software sales will still be a much smaller volume than DVD, but the larger profit margins will make it a more attractive product for stores and manufacturers, so it will start eclipsing DVD in terms of floor space and advertising emphasis. Also, this whole time the media buying public will learn that BD is the de facto successor to DVD, so as player and media prices drop market penetration will increase roughly analagous to how DVD replaced VHS (which took several years as well), although with the last year lost due to the format war I expect BD will be about a year behind.

HD DVD disappearing isn't the end of the confusion or the beginning of mass market adoption. It's one battle in a hard fight to succeed DVD.

Well, yes and no. You are right that it'll still be a long slog against DVD, but with essentially all of the CE manufacturers on board (minus Toshiba for now) and the retailers wanting a new product that starts the profit margin to sales volume ratio over again, there will be lots of people (and money) working to educate consumers and drive desirability. I assure you next holiday that every HDTV in major stores will be hooked up to a BD player. The biggest hurdle was getting past the format war, and now we are finally doing that.

Now that there will soon be one format, there is no hurry with any of this. Player prices will drop, media prices will drop, selection will improve, and features will be more numerous. This will happen by Holiday 2008, long before anyone is routinely downloading movies. Coupled with increased HDTV sales, this improved selection and more attractive pricing will make Blu-Ray a big holiday hit a year from now. But there's no rush to have this happen tomorrow or next week or next month. Patience.

That's if you include PS3s which sold well over the holidays. Standalones are a different story.

No, they aren't. I'm sure it'll be announced at CES, but several people have leaked that BD standalones outsold HD DVD standalones the last month of the year (it happened in august too). Why do you think Toshiba so carefully said that "HD DVD standaloens and computers outsold BD counterparts in 2007"??? Because they were not leading during December. BTW, BD capable hardware (including the PS3) has always outsold HD DVD capable hardware...why would that be news?

If you say so. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

Don't take my word for it, wait and see. The first announcements should be coming shortly. By the end of January I expect at least one mass retailer (walmart, target, etc) and one electronics store (Best Buy, Circuit City, etc) to have announced BD exclusivity "to help end customer confusion".


Plus, there's not a whole lot of money to be made in either format right now because DVDs are several orders of magnitude higher in unit sales. Not much incentive for the remaining studios to switch.

There hasn't been much money becaues of the format war. Remember that the studios are making more from each HDM disk sold than from a DVD sale. So you don't have to sell as many before the profits start to become important. I'd expect the first BD to sell a million copies before the end of 2008 (although probably not till pretty close to the end), at which point you'll be talking about money you don't want to walk away from.

Also, remember that not switching risks losing the entire HDM market, which means that you are selling out future earnings. That's why WB went exclusive (to avoid damaging the packeaged media market), and I doubt Universal wants to gamble with it either. I honestly don't know about Paramount, but we'll see soon enough.

The average person isn't going to fork over that much cash.
I remember buying one of the first sony dvd players (non es) for like $300 in 1998-1999. Watching die another day was pretty cool. Now my main unit is a cheapo dvd-rom for the computer compusa brand for like $25 about 2 years old. Now watching die another day in sd is boring. Time for HD, if there was a profile 2 pc drive. The format war is a conspiracy.

The PS3 has dropped by almost 50% in a year. Going by that rate by next year it should be well under the sweet spot for CE of $299MSRP.

???

You do realize that removal of hardware (PS2 engine for backwards compatibility) was necessary to make that happen and that SCEA is still losing money on each one sold don't you?

I'm not sure how much more the price can be cut before you end up making it just a Blu-ray player or SCEA loses it's ability to ever make money off the console.

We'll see though.

No, they aren't. I'm sure it'll be announced at CES, but several people have leaked that BD standalones outsold HD DVD standalones the last month of the year (it happened in august too). Why do you think Toshiba so carefully said that "HD DVD standaloens and computers outsold BD counterparts in 2007"??? Because they were not leading during December. BTW, BD capable hardware (including the PS3) has always outsold HD DVD capable hardware...why would that be news?


Don't take my word for it, wait and see. The first announcements should be coming shortly. By the end of January I expect at least one mass retailer (walmart, target, etc) and one electronics store (Best Buy, Circuit City, etc) to have announced BD exclusivity "to help end customer confusion".




There hasn't been much money becaues of the format war. Remember that the studios are making more from each HDM disk sold than from a DVD sale. So you don't have to sell as many before the profits start to become important. I'd expect the first BD to sell a million copies before the end of 2008 (although probably not till pretty close to the end), at which point you'll be talking about money you don't want to walk away from.

Also, remember that not switching risks losing the entire HDM market, which means that you are selling out future earnings. That's why WB went exclusive (to avoid damaging the packeaged media market), and I doubt Universal wants to gamble with it either. I honestly don't know about Paramount, but we'll see soon enough.

Which means you're going by hearsay and have no proof that BD standalones outsold HD DVD standalones during the holiday season. Please stop echoing this rumor until concrete proof is provided.

No, they aren't. I'm sure it'll be announced at CES, but several people have leaked that BD standalones outsold HD DVD standalones the last month of the year (it happened in august too). Why do you think Toshiba so carefully said that "HD DVD standaloens and computers outsold BD counterparts in 2007"??? Because they were not leading during December. BTW, BD capable hardware (including the PS3) has always outsold HD DVD capable hardware...why would that be news?



Don't take my word for it, wait and see. The first announcements should be coming shortly. By the end of January I expect at least one mass retailer (walmart, target, etc) and one electronics store (Best Buy, Circuit City, etc) to have announced BD exclusivity "to help end customer confusion".




There hasn't been much money becaues of the format war. Remember that the studios are making more from each HDM disk sold than from a DVD sale. So you don't have to sell as many before the profits start to become important. I'd expect the first BD to sell a million copies before the end of 2008 (although probably not till pretty close to the end), at which point you'll be talking about money you don't want to walk away from.

Also, remember that not switching risks losing the entire HDM market, which means that you are selling out future earnings. That's why WB went exclusive (to avoid damaging the packeaged media market), and I doubt Universal wants to gamble with it either. I honestly don't know about Paramount, but we'll see soon enough.

You make a lot of statements based on conjecture, but it's a forum so I'd expect no less.

Your making out the HDM market like its the life and death of studios. It's not. DVD sales will continue to outsell HDM because there's not enough consumers out there who feel they need HDM. There's not even enough HDTV penetration to start with. Then you have to convince them it's better than their upconverting DVD player. Then you layout the players at $300 plus and discs costing 2x. Your potential market keeps shrinking while DVDs keep selling. Until the remaining studios see a potential for BD to overtake DVD in sales, why should they switch. The money's just not there yet, and may never be.

Warner going Blu-Ray actually does matter, because it killed HD-DVD, even without cheaper Blu-Ray players.Really?

When did Universal and Paramount announce their switch?

Not everyone wants cheap players.

Frankly I would have been an early adopter of one format. Now I will simply wait for the highest quality player, regardless of price.

???

You do realize that removal of hardware (PS2 engine for backwards compatibility) was necessary to make that happen and that SCEA is still losing money on each one sold don't you?

I'm not sure how much more the price can be cut before you end up making it just a Blu-ray player or SCEA loses it's ability to ever make money off the console.

We'll see though.

They're also quietly dropping SACD support. Hey remember that high resolution format that was so much better than the "old" CD technology.

Absolutely (I snipped your brief historical synopsis, but it was spot on). Blu-ray is in its second year. Expect $200 players sooner than with DVD.



Which is why people like Warner are rightfully interested in advanced interactivity. While HT enthusiasts don't usually care (me included) it really helps sell HDM as "a revolution in home video, not just better PQ and SQ."



I never said I did. I expect a much larger number of "late" early adopters who didn't like the uncertainty of the format war to get involved this year (low millions) while Blu-ray players are still status symbols ($300-400). That establishes desirability (HT magazines really help here, as they are often "window-shopping" for lat-adopter HT enthusiasts), so that when $100-200 players become common (maybe Q4 2008, otherwise Q1-2 2009) sales will really take off.

At that point software sales will still be a much smaller volume than DVD, but the larger profit margins will make it a more attractive product for stores and manufacturers, so it will start eclipsing DVD in terms of floor space and advertising emphasis. Also, this whole time the media buying public will learn that BD is the de facto successor to DVD, so as player and media prices drop market penetration will increase roughly analagous to how DVD replaced VHS (which took several years as well), although with the last year lost due to the format war I expect BD will be about a year behind.



Well, yes and no. You are right that it'll still be a long slog against DVD, but with essentially all of the CE manufacturers on board (minus Toshiba for now) and the retailers wanting a new product that starts the profit margin to sales volume ratio over again, there will be lots of people (and money) working to educate consumers and drive desirability. I assure you next holiday that every HDTV in major stores will be hooked up to a BD player. The biggest hurdle was getting past the format war, and now we are finally doing that.

Warner seemed to believe that the window for HD disc viability is alot narrower than this suggests. CE manufacturers' ability to make huge profits should take a back to seat acheiving mass adoption, and given the Hollywood studios fickle support of HDM over the past year with delayed/cancelled releases and switching support in the name of fast tracking mass adoption, I question the studios willingness to wait for CEMs to get their fill on those margins before pressing on elsewhere.

The key point here is that the format war hasn't been HDMs only vice. The market has changed due to the success of DVD and downloadable media and consumers just aren't responding as actively to the old CE models and telling consumers your product is the future won't coax them out of their wallets anymore if the price isn't right.

They want the best, they want it affordable and they want it now.

Vizio hasn't lead HDTV sales on a fluke.

It took 4-5 years before DVD players were sub-$200.

2 years after Blu-Ray has hit the mass market, we have $270 players.

Get a grip about the prices. All technology gets cheaper over time.

Not everyone wants cheap players.

Frankly I would have been an early adopter of one format. Now I will simply wait for the highest quality player, regardless of price.

No not everyone, just the majority of consumers.

It took 4-5 years before DVD players were sub-$200.

2 years after Blu-Ray has hit the mass market, we have $270 players.

Get a grip about the prices. All technology gets cheaper over time.

It was 3-4 years on DVD and let's be honest, the $270 BD players are incapable of taking advantage of the new software coming out. By comparison, there hasn't been a single DVD I own that I haven't been able to play the special features on with my earliest players. That's not the technology getting cheaper, that's clearing out obsolete models.

Luckily, the format war is now over, so we can get back to our regularly scheduled market penetration. As CE retailers drop HD DVD and push Blu-ray, more and more later early adopters will start to buy in (my brother in law and his coworker are two classic examples who jumped over the weekend) and the idea of HDM will start to excite people as they stop worrying about picking the "wrong" format and start being impressed by the image and sound quality, and the new intereactive features (which I suspect will player better to families and younger people than it has to HT enthusiasts so far).

So in short, the Warner decision is the most important thing that could possibly happen, and it absolutely had to happen before prices dropped too much, or we could have lost everything.

Your argument is:
* Low prices foster the idea of cheap product
* Low prices actually prevent early adoption
* Higher prices contribute to a snob factor that is vital to early adopters.
* Low prices could have killed HDM.

You had a few points in there, but I think your argument is confused. If you want to argue that trying to manipulate market forces by artificially reducing prices can cause a backlash with 3rd-party manufacturers, I'll buy that. I won't buy that snob appeal is why early-adopters buy HDM, or that high prices will make people flock to the stores.

I've seen this argument before on this forum, and it was shot down then. Low prices are always good -- provided there is a sustainable business model behind it. The number of price-snobs is hugely outnumbered by people that want a good deal. Did Toshiba isolate themselves with unsustainable player prices? Perhaps -- but that is the only argument that one can make IMO.

I am sorry, didn't they sell 60,000 players in a day (WM, CC, BB) and then run out of stock at that price? Clearly $99 is a magic price point.

He's not too bright, huh? +1

Pat

It was 3-4 years on DVD and let's be honest, the $270 BD players are incapable of taking advantage of the new software coming out. By comparison, there hasn't been a single DVD I own that I haven't been able to play the special features on with my earliest players. That's not the technology getting cheaper, that's clearing out obsolete models.


Yep, we need decent $200 Blu players. Not older models with no plan to be able to be updated via firmware from the manufacturer.

FWIW, all the Toshiba players can take advantage of the HD DVD technology.

I plan to do nothing but watch what HD DVD's I can until I can get a decent Blu Ray player for $200. I think a lot of HD DVD folks as well as J6P's are in the same boat.

Pat

Nope. BD hardware was already outselling HD DVD hardware the last month or so, even before this announcement (and depite costing more).

That's if you include PS3s which sold well over the holidays. Standalones are a different story.

Actually, ottscay is right.

You don't have to take our word for it. Take Toshiba's!

September 14, 2007
http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/09/14/sony-toshiba-tussle-over-standalone-player-sales/

Rather than focusing on the recent past, Tosh reiterated that year-to-date, Blu-ray players only held 42-percent of the market share

...this suggests that HD DVD had a year to date market share of 58%, give or take.

This was BEFORE the 90,000 units sold during the $99 sale, incidentally.

Now, fast forward to Toshiba's press event at CES on Saturday:

http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.engadget.com/media/2008/01/p1070010_small.jpg

What have we here? Toshiba slips in standalone market share from 58% to 48% between September 14 and December 22. That's with a 90,000 unit boost from the HD-A2 fire sale. And still Blu-ray outsold HD DVD.

Note - these are standalone sales figures. From Toshiba. Not including the PS3.

standalone[/b] market share from 58% to 48% between September 14 and December 22. That's with a 90,000 unit boost from the HD-A2 fire sale. And still Blu-ray outsold HD DVD.

Note - these are standalone sales figures. From Toshiba. Not including the PS3.

Nasty, if true. But, it goes to prove that price matters. Why did Sony sell those units? Its because even obsolete 1.0 players will sell if you bring the price down enough. There were bundles with Sony TVs as well (though Tos did the same thing -- but they don't sell nearly the number of TVs).

Price and marketing. One company can't match the marketing might of 5 major CE names. They can't position the players in as many stores, and can't pay for as much advertising. They also don't have the advertising that the PS3 brings to BluRay.

As for $99 players -- they were mainly bought as a second player, or as presents by existing early adopters. And, they were in limited supply, preventing the average Joe from getting one on a whim while walking through a store. They really weren't the way to make a big splash in the general population. Now, $99 players all the time, with major marketing, would be another issue.

What have we here? Toshiba slips in standalone market share from 58% to 48% between September 14 and December 22. That's with a 90,000 unit boost from the HD-A2 fire sale. And still Blu-ray outsold HD DVD.

Note - these are standalone sales figures. From Toshiba. Not including the PS3.

LG and Samsung both make combos. And the Other category might include Venturer. And Denon did make a short lived HD DVD player.

Nasty, if true. But, it goes to prove that price matters. Why did Sony sell those units? Its because even obsolete 1.0 players will sell if you bring the price down enough. There were bundles with Sony TVs as well (though Tos did the same thing -- but they don't sell nearly the number of TVs)
I'd hardly call the S300/S301 obsolete - not yet, at any rate, considering there's less than a handful of BD 1.1 Bonus View discs on the market even today.

Price and marketing. One company can't match the marketing might of 5 major CE names. They can't position the players in as many stores, and can't pay for as much advertising. They also don't have the advertising that the PS3 brings to BluRay.

As for $99 players -- they were mainly bought as a second player, or as presents by existing early adopters. And, they were in limited supply, preventing the average Joe from getting one on a whim while walking through a store. They really weren't the way to make a big splash in the general population. Now, $99 players all the time, with major marketing, would be another issue.
Only the hardest of hardcore HD DVD fanatics could believe that $99 is a sustainable price point for a high def player at this time. Even a halfway decent upconverting SD DVD unit costs more than that, and the Toshibas are quite a bit better than just half decent, leaving aside the HD DVD capabilities.

Maybe in a couple of years we'll see manufacturing costs bring the retail price down to that level, but it will take time, regardless of which format is under discussion.

LG and Samsung both make combos. And the Other category might include Venturer. And Denon did make a short lived HD DVD player.
And Sharp makes a Blu-ray player. As does Phillips. Which would also go into the Other category.

The LG Super Multi Blu isn't precisely an HD DVD player either. It's only dual format in name, since while it does play the movie, it doesn't run the HDi content.

Even if you add the entire Other category AND LG's slice to HD DVD's total, it doesn't come anywhere close to 58%, let alone support the notion that HD DVD standalones somehow outsold Blu-ray players this holiday season. It is obvious that Blu-ray standalones handily won the holidays, unlike you'd care to assert that Toshiba is lying about their NPD data.

I'd hardly call the S300/S301 obsolete - not yet, at any rate, considering there's less than a handful of BD 1.1 Bonus View discs on the market even today.


Only the hardest of hardcore HD DVD fanatics could believe that $99 is a sustainable price point for a high def player at this time. Even a halfway decent upconverting SD DVD unit costs more than that, and the Toshibas are quite a bit better than just half decent, leaving aside the HD DVD capabilities.

Maybe in a couple of years we'll see manufacturing costs bring the retail price down to that level, but it will take time, regardless of which format is under discussion.

I'd realistically put $299 at the upper end of what consumers might pay. $199 is probably the no-brainer point. But from what I'm seeing at CES, the new Blu-ray players that are hardware compliant start in at $350. Still too high. The are charging premiums for features (internal decoders, secondary decoders, ethernet) that came standard with HD-DVD players.

And Sharp makes a Blu-ray player. As does Phillips. Which would also go into the Other category.

The LG Super Multi Blu isn't precisely an HD DVD player either. It's only dual format in name, since while it does play the movie, it doesn't run the HDi content.

Even if you add the entire Other category AND LG's slice to HD DVD's total, it doesn't come anywhere close to 58%, let alone support the notion that HD DVD standalones somehow outsold Blu-ray players this holiday season. It is obvious that Blu-ray standalones handily won the holidays, unlike you'd care to assert that Toshiba is lying about their NPD data.
All I'm saying is that everyone seems to think that everything not red is a percentage for BD.

Yep, we need decent $200 Blu players. Not older models with no plan to be able to be updated via firmware from the manufacturer.

FWIW, all the Toshiba players can take advantage of the HD DVD technology.

I plan to do nothing but watch what HD DVD's I can until I can get a decent Blu Ray player for $200. I think a lot of HD DVD folks as well as J6P's are in the same boat.

Pat
J6P probably doesn't know about profiles and probably could care less about buying ring tones and other advertised products using the Ethernet connections. Profile 1.1 will be enough for the majority IMO.

Once prices drop, they will most likely adopt Blu-ray as their HDM player, which will happen here in the next 6 months or less.

All that J6P knows now is the HD DVD lost hugh studio support and Blu-ray is the new HDM format when they go to their local CE stores.

Also, not everyone has high speed Internet access to take advantage of being sold products and trinkets they don't need. They also can do this on the PC RIGHT NOW if they really wanted these EXTRAS.

I wonder what J6P has done when he needs a DVD-ROM to watch extras on the DVD on his PC ? Probably hasn't even looked at them because the majority doesn't care about bells and whistles but want to enjoy Hi Definition PQ/AQ on their new HDTV.

People who are waiting for $99 BD players probably are not going to be buying a lot of $20-30 movies. I am far from wealthy -- I just happen to spend an unusually large portion of my income on my hobbies. If you are really interested in HDM at this early juncture, you will pony up. $350 for a BD player really isn't that much when you consider how much you will be spending on software. You have to keep in mind, that the only reason you saw such cheap HD DVD players is because Toshiba was willing to take a loss in order to win the war (I paid $500 for an A2 last year on boxing day -- boy am I glad I returned it). It is very unrealistic to expect such precipitous price drops in a product's NORMAL life cycle so early in the game. The whole point of this from a CE company's point of view is to find a new revenue stream. $99 BD players -- why even bother? Instead of cheap players, I would like to see cheaper media. I think $15-20 for catalog titles is reasonable. If studios expect us to rebuy our dvd collections, they need to lower the price. I don't mind paying $30 for new releases since the deluxe DVD version will cost nearly as much. If you really can't afford BD, just be patient and wait -- prices will come down just like all electronics do. Unfortunately, I get the distinct impression that some of the people posting in this thread are just HD DVD supporters still "fighting the good fight". To those people -- honestly, I just can't see an informed "fence sitter" looking to get into HDM choosing your format. It's time to cut bait.

If you are really interested in HDM at this early juncture, you will pony up. $350 for a BD player really isn't that much when you consider how much you will be spending on software

That has to be the worst logic I've ever heard. You should spend too much on hardware because your going to spend too much on software anyway? Please tell me you don't work for a marketing department.

The whole point of this from a CE company's point of view is to find a new revenue stream.

Now you're making sense.

J6P probably doesn't know about profiles and probably could care less about buying ring tones and other advertised products using the Ethernet connections. Profile 1.1 will be enough for the majority IMO.

Once prices drop, they will most likely adopt Blu-ray as their HDM player, which will happen here in the next 6 months or less.

All that J6P knows now is the HD DVD lost hugh studio support and Blu-ray is the new HDM format when they go to their local CE stores.

Also, not everyone has high speed Internet access to take advantage of being sold products and trinkets they don't need. They also can do this on the PC RIGHT NOW if they really wanted these EXTRAS.

I wonder what J6P has done when he needs a DVD-ROM to watch extras on the DVD on his PC ? Probably hasn't even looked at them because the majority doesn't care about bells and whistles but want to enjoy Hi Definition PQ/AQ on their new HDTV.

Extra features are exactly what HDM needs. You have to have a way to distinguish yourself from the competition. For J6P, picture quality may not be enough, and he's already listening to mp3s, so forget about audio quality. Extras get his attention. Even if he never uses them, it still distinguishes the HDM product.

Once all studios are on one format and a good 1.1 profile player is available for under $200 then I'll be back into HDM (hope Oppo will come thru).

I may spend up to $500 on a 2.0/1080p player but only when I upgrade rest of HT to 1080p (currently only have 720p PJ).......not interested in paying a premium for 1080p in other areas of house as I can't tell difference on a 42" set at 10' which is minimum distance I sit from TV (I have better than 20/20 vision).

However, although I might buy a BD player I will not buy 'family' orientated BD media until there is a solution for my non-HD players (or the BD players's are cheap enough to swap them out)......I'll rent from Netflix.

All I'm saying is that everyone seems to think that everything not red is a percentage for BD.
You do realize that you're pontificating over what amounts to about 5% of the chart right? As I said, even if you assume all the Other are Venturer/Onkyo/whatever and Sharp sold nothing and Phillips sold nothing, it still doesn't hit Toshiba's previous claim of 58% HD DVD market share.

Since we know HD DVD picked up about 90,000 units in three days of November, that would indicate that the differential over the holidays was at least high enough for Blu-ray in total units to erase that difference and make some headway into the year to date ratios.

Those that have been following the Nielsen numbers over the past year should note that even small changes to YTD numbers are very hard to achieve towards the end of the year, so a shift of more than a percentage point or two indicates a proportionately larger shift in sales ratio.

Consider:

Let's say there were 400,000 HD DVD standalones in September, and that, on top of the 90,000 blowout units, HD DVD sold another 100,000 units over the holiday period. Toshiba claims there were "nearly 1 million" HD DVD capable units in the wild, so the remaining 400,000 we can probably guesstimate are Xbox 360 add-ons, for a rough guesstimate total of 990,000 units.

Let's further propose that the entire "other" slice belongs to the Venturer and Onkyo - I'll give HD DVD the benefit of the doubt here in the interest of magnanimity, because even with this generous assumption the results don't shift much. I'll eyeball that "Other" slice at around 3% of the total.

So we have 51.3% HD DVD Year to Date dedicated standalones, represented by a guesstimated 590,000 units.

For this to be true, the remaining slices of the pie (Blu-ray + dual format) has to be 48.7%. Solving for x, where x is the number of Blu-ray/DF units...

51.3/48.7 = 590000/x
x = 48.7 * 590000 / 51.3 = about 560,000 units on Dec 22.

If we go back to our 400,000 figure assumed in September and do the same math, we get:

42/58 = x/400000
x = 42 * 400000/58 = about 290,000 units on Sep 14.

That means there were perhaps 270,000 Blu-ray/DF units sold compared versus 190,000 dedicated HD DVD units sold, if this guesstimate is anywhere near to being close (which I believe it is, since all of my assumptions trigger from various and sundry bits of data that Toshiba has released this year).

How anyone can spin this into an assumption that HD DVD units sold better than Blu-ray units is completely beyond me.

That has to be the worst logic I've ever heard. You should spend too much on hardware because your going to spend too much on software anyway? Please tell me you don't work for a marketing department.

If you can't afford the hardware it's unlikely you can afford the software (case in point: the thousands of $99 A2 players did not result in a corresponding rise in sales of relatively expensive HD DVD media). Also, I don't feel that BD hardware is overpriced. But since WB can give us a 5 disc Blade Runner collection for $35, I do feel that software could come down a bit (especially Fox).

- Prices will drop. DVD used to be as expensive, if not more.
- HD DVD was cheaper but not all that cheaper when you stop bringing up random 1-day sales. Price was also it's primary weapon, not to mention subsidies.

End result: HD DVD would have been cheaper faster, but Blu-ray will eventually reach that same point. When you look at it from a time perspective it's not that HD DVD had more features OR was more cheaper than Blu-ray, but simply that it was roughly a year a head in terms of launching and features. Being ahead is only a benefit until you both reach the same goal, and BD will be there within the year.

I understand that for the HD DVD guys this is frustrating because it's like you got thrown back in time to features and prices you had a year ago, but we all knew this format war was going to result in some bull**** for some of us. This is that bull****.

I think the picture will be a lot rosier by summer: just wait until then (that's when you officially lose WB anyway). Hopefully by this time next year it will all be settled: reasonably priced BD-Live players, all the studios on one format, economies of scale kicking in... then we can go back to focusing on the movies and maximizing AV quality rather than the format bickering that has taken over AVS over the last few years.

last i looked oppo does not have anything for 99.00 and thats sd-hd.

last i looked oppo does not have anything for 99.00 and thats sd-hd.

If that remark is in reference my post (assuming it is as I'm only one mentioning Oppo in this thread) I never said under $99.

Oppo has a reputation for good value / high quality products - I'm sure that they can come up with a quality standalone BD player - and now it seems they no longer need to decide which format to gamble on I'm hoping it will be soon.

Cheaper players alone will not speed up the adoption of HDM. What needs to happen is the software price must come down to DVD levels. After all the player is usually a 1 time investment and people don't mind spending on it whilst the movies they buy all the time. It really is in the best interest of the studios to drop the prices soon otherwise many people will either not buy the players unless they are less then $200 or rent them.I fear that with no competition from HD side that blu prices won't drop as fast (Fox at 39.95 is a joke) and blu could go the way of SACD, Min Disc. DVD-A.

HDM only made 300 million last year!!! So damn yes cheaper players to flood the market will help.

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)

$599 Sony DVP-S3000 in 1997. Didn't even have component video. :eek:

Oh, and WB going BD exclusive is a big deal (hence all the hoopla). ;)

I read yesterday that Target is going Blu only , around May.
Cant seem to find the page though.

Your argument is:
* Low prices foster the idea of cheap product
* Low prices actually prevent early adoption
* Higher prices contribute to a snob factor that is vital to early adopters.
* Low prices could have killed HDM.

Not my exact arguement; Artificially low prices when consumer interest is tepid (e.g. in the middle of a format war) fosters the idea of a cheap product. Early adoption was going to be impeded regardless of hardware price, because the cost of software is the highest expense over the course of a format.

Higher prices DO contribute to a snob factor, but what's important is simply that consumer interest is grown while pricing is aloud to fall based on anufacturing costs, not artificial deflation (Eating the profits). That causes a backlash not just by 3rd party manufacturers, but also by retailers (who make less per unit sold).

I won't buy that snob appeal is why early-adopters buy HDM, or that high prices will make people flock to the stores.

I won't buy that either; my point is that consumer demand (real consumer demand, as in millions of people know the products name and really want the product, they just can'a fford $400 right now...) needs to be built prior to lowering prices, otherwise market penetration doesn't grow the way you want AND there's progressively less and less money in it for all the companies involved, leading to stagnation and adandonement prior to mass adoption.

Low prices are always good -- provided there is a sustainable business model behind it.

Absolutely.

The number of price-snobs is hugely outnumbered by people that want a good deal.

True, but both groups are vastly outnbumbered by the number of people who won't buy into a format war and so tune the whole thing out until there's a winner. Now that there is consumer interest will perk up, but it will take some time and there is no reason to artificially depress prices; sales will pick up anyways (witness the superior BD standalone sales in December) due to interest, and at THAT point lowering prices truly drives significant market penetration.

That means there were perhaps 270,000 Blu-ray/DF units sold compared versus 190,000 dedicated HD DVD units sold, if this guesstimate is anywhere near to being close (which I believe it is, since all of my assumptions trigger from various and sundry bits of data that Toshiba has released this year).

That looks about right to me. It's painfully obvious from Toshiba's own statements (especially their rapid shift to talking about YTD hardware sales while trying to emphasize week over week growth of software sales), but talking points never really die, they just fade away...

True, but both groups are vastly outnbumbered by the number of people who won't buy into a format war and so tune the whole thing out until there's a winner. Now that there is consumer interest will perk up, but it will take some time and there is no reason to artificially depress prices; sales will pick up anyways (witness the superior BD standalone sales in December) due to interest, and at THAT point lowering prices truly drives significant market penetration.

Totally agree ottscay. When there is a format war the target demographic you're dealing with is early adopters. Early adopters of A/V equipment, tend (not always true) to be people willing to pay the extra money to be first. These are the same people who spent $1000 on their first DVD player or their first digital camera. When the demographic changes to people who buy things at Wal-mart price becomes more of a factor.

Price can indicate quality as well, and the more complicated or ambiguous the buying decision the more likely price will be used as an indicator in quality. If anyone saw two HD DVD players next to each other one for $99 and one for $299 there would be a natural assumption that the 299 is better in some way. Psychologist have known these tricks for a long time and trust me so do marketing firms.

I was shocked at the huge drive for HD DVD to be the cheapest player. I think that hurt the format more than helped it.

all the people wanting 99 dollar cd and dvd players did not impede the grouth of that
industry when it was getting started and its still going.

There are several differences involved from an economics perspective when comparing the evolution of the dvd/hddvd formats.

Sure, discs were more expensive than tapes at introduction, but the key was that the public investigated and bought into the dvd format as a better means for home-use entertainment displays. However, not many non-AVS Forum diehards that I know view the hdm format in the same manner as sddvd's, which has been pointed out in these forums ad nauseum. Many of us do not see the mass adoption to hddvd's by the masses that you apparently do because the legendary Joe Sixpak & family do not conceptualize hdm as an improvement over dvd like they did with dvd/tape.

- Prices will drop. DVD used to be as expensive, if not more.
- HD DVD was cheaper but not all that cheaper when you stop bringing up random 1-day sales. Price was also it's primary weapon, not to mention subsidies.

End result: HD DVD would have been cheaper faster, but Blu-ray will eventually reach that same point. When you look at it from a time perspective it's not that HD DVD had more features OR was more cheaper than Blu-ray, but simply that it was roughly a year a head in terms of launching and features. Being ahead is only a benefit until you both reach the same goal, and BD will be there within the year.

I understand that for the HD DVD guys this is frustrating because it's like you got thrown back in time to features and prices you had a year ago, but we all knew this format war was going to result in some bull**** for some of us. This is that bull****.

I think the picture will be a lot rosier by summer: just wait until then (that's when you officially lose WB anyway). Hopefully by this time next year it will all be settled: reasonably priced BD-Live players, all the studios on one format, economies of scale kicking in... then we can go back to focusing on the movies and maximizing AV quality rather than the format bickering that has taken over AVS over the last few years.

Really? If you expect BDR to reach that same point then how come Sony's two latest standalone's are more expensive than their second-generation model? I'm no more a Toshiba fan than a BDR fan, but the fact that Sony's prices are increasing rather than decreasing seems to belie your logic.

No it isn't; 60k is a drop in the bucket for mass adoption. Remember Toshiba predicting like 4 million (later revised to 2 million) players sold in 2007? They didn't even hit a million.

All that happened was a ton of inventory of an EOLed model was moved below cost, and Toshiba tried to spin it as positive, rather than potentially creating 60k pissed off customers, which is in fact what is happening now.

How convenient it is for you to ignore the changing sales targets of the PS3 and all the people that are going to be pissed off when their $300 BD players won't do BD features. As I said, you're the biggest fan boy of them all.

all the people wanting 99 dollar cd and dvd players did not impede the grouth of that
industry when it was getting started and its still going.

True, but that time the transition was from cassette tape and VHS tape. This time it's from SD DVD and most see no reason to make that change! BDA pricing and feature tiering is almost certain to kill any potential for general acceptance (IMO). I speculate BD is unlikely to be that much more widely accepted than LD was -- basically enthusiasts only. My guess is the studios have blown it -- the new HD Optical Media frontier is about to become the latest niche!

From the BDA Press Conference:

Q. The problem is the price of the machine, who can afford the price of the machines, what are you going to do to reduce the price?
A. Andy reminds us that pricing is up to individuals, not up to the BDA. He says we don't do coupons, in fact we try to sneak up on everyone else.

Doesn't sound good IMO

Really? If you expect BDR to reach that same point then how come Sony's two latest standalone's are more expensive than their second-generation model? I'm no more a Toshiba fan than a BDR fan, but the fact that Sony's prices are increasing rather than decreasing seems to belie your logic.

One thing to consider is that there are many more companies making Blu-ray players than just Sony. Unlike Toshiba, Sony doesn't have to bear the burden of bringing down BD player prices alone. For example, Funai announced at CES that they will be producing a sub-$300 (that's MSRP, not street price) 1.1 compliant player this year. Based on their past history, this player will probably be OEM'ed out to other companies known for rock-bottom prices. Given this fact, it's not surprising that companies like Sony, Pioneer and Denon would leave the entry-level pricepoint to these entry-level companies and concentrate on the more profitable mid/high-end. HD-DVD tried to do the same thing with Venturer on the low end and Onkyo on the high end (both of which they OEM'ed). Why would Sony want to compete with the Funai-based brands if they don't have to? They did much the same thing when low-end SD DVD player brands came out as well. When was the last time that Sony (or Panasonic, Pioneer, Denon) offered the lowest priced SD DVD players on the market?

Really? If you expect BDR to reach that same point then how come Sony's two latest standalone's are more expensive than their second-generation model? I'm no more a Toshiba fan than a BDR fan, but the fact that Sony's prices are increasing rather than decreasing seems to belie your logic.

Huh? Sony only has 3 Blu-ray players (not counting weird ES/HTB variants). Sony launched their first player with the BDP-S1 and then later launched the BDP-S300 and the BDP-S500($700), both of which are extremely cheaper than the BDP-S1 was when it came out. Hell, the BDP-S300 dropped $100 in price *before* it came out, and then another $100 after, and then temporarily another $100 during the holidays.

So unless you can point me to some mythical Sony next gen players that I somehow did not noticed got announced *with a price* I'm just going to assume you have no idea what you are talking about.

I got a free BD player. I bought a PS3 to play next gen games and it came with a BD player free! Amazing deal! Lucky me.

One thing to consider is that there are many more companies making Blu-ray players than just Sony. Unlike Toshiba, Sony doesn't have to bear the burden of bringing down BD player prices alone. For example, Funai announced at CES that they will be producing a sub-$300 (that's MSRP, not street price) 1.1 compliant player this year. Based on their past history, this player will probably be OEM'ed out to other companies known for rock-bottom prices. Given this fact, it's not surprising that companies like Sony, Pioneer and Denon would leave the entry-level pricepoint to these entry-level companies and concentrate on the more profitable mid/high-end. HD-DVD tried to do the same thing with Venturer on the low end and Onkyo on the high end (both of which they OEM'ed). Why would Sony want to compete with the Funai-based brands if they don't have to? They did much the same thing when low-end SD DVD player brands came out as well. When was the last time that Sony (or Panasonic, Pioneer, Denon) offered the lowest priced SD DVD players on the market?

Almost all the stand-alone branded Blu-Ray players are either Sony or Samsung brand. Panasonic has a small piece of the pie, and LG has a sliver, too. Pioneer makes the most stand-alone Blu-Ray players, which are then branded for other companies. Obviously because of the percentages, Pioneer has to be making stand-alone Blu-Ray players for Sony and/or Samsung, so Sony isn't necessarily making any stand-alone Blu-Ray players, which is quite strange when they have made 3 million PS3's, which are Blu-Ray players in their own right (just with the gaming system bundled in).

I do not consider myself an early adopter. It makes me nuts to buy an expensive piece of gear and have it become outdated or obsolete practically before I get my credit card statement. And big price drops shortly after a purchase drive me crazy too. So for whatever reason, $200 seemed like the magic price point at which a HDM player made sense for me. That was the price point that got me to buy my first DVD player which was also an SACD player. I didn’t do so well with that audio format, but the DVD player is still in my home theater. Up until the last few months, I was not even considering getting a HDM player. But when Toshiba dropped prices below $200, I got excited about the idea and started planning to buy one. The decision by Warner is disappointing to me because now I must wait through the traditional new product cycle until BD players reach my $200 price point. HDM was in my sights but now seems out of reach for the foreseeable future. I hope it is not too long a wait.

Almost all the stand-alone branded Blu-Ray players are either Sony or Samsung brand. Panasonic has a small piece of the pie, and LG has a sliver, too. Pioneer makes the most stand-alone Blu-Ray players, which are then branded for other companies. Obviously because of the percentages, Pioneer has to be making stand-alone Blu-Ray players for Sony and/or Samsung, so Sony isn't necessarily making any stand-alone Blu-Ray players, which is quite strange when they have made 3 million PS3's, which are Blu-Ray players in their own right (just with the gaming system bundled in).

True, but I believe that Funai will be manufacturing their own players, as does Sharp (at least their outward designs seem radically different from any of the other BD manufacturers I've seen). That would make Funai, Sharp, Panasonic, Pioneer, Samsung and LG manufacturing BD players separately. And even though Panasonic isn't much of a player in the U.S. market yet, their share of the Japanese BD market (where BD/HDD recorders now account for 20 percent of ALL disc recorders being sold) is pretty big.

I think $199 is more the price point to hit. But it'll have to be feature-complete (aka Profile 2.0)... none of this "it'll do everything except picture in picture and advanced features" or "everything except web-enabled content" bs. And it'll have to load up discs in under 30 seconds... none of this 2+ minutes to load Java-heavy Disney titles that the current crop of standalone Blu-Ray players does.

When there's a ~$200 or less Profile 2.0 Blu-Ray player that doesn't take a year to load discs, I'm buying it.

My first DVD bought arround 97 was about $1000 (Pioneer 888).
I just bought a Sharp 52" LCD TV last summer. Originally,
I set the price bar for Blue-ray player at $200. After I saw
a Blue-ray vs. regular DVD demo at a Sony store, I lower the
bar to $100. I just do not feel the difference is big enough
to justify the cost. Frankly, the improvement from VHS to DVD
is much significant than the improvement from DVD to
Blue-ray/HD-dVD. Watching upconversion DVD on my 52" LCD is
just fine.

but we didn't have the financial catastrophe that we have now

(ie weak US Dollar, Housing/credit market turmoil etc).
That is an awe struck rebuttal!

Cheaper players do matter.

I said before that Toshiba shot themselves in the foot, when they did the A2 firesale.

Any J6P looking for an HD DVD player in December probably passed on it with the recent $99 HD DVD player sale in mind. Obviously the demand was there as it resulted in immediate stock depletion of the players at that price point.

However, Toshiba's inability to keep prices reasonably low after that probably killed HD DVD in December.
Going from $99 to $299 for a similar player (model difference which probably doesn't matter to J6P) is too much of a difference.

I for one did not buy into HD DVD for this reason until the end of December when Amazon had a decent sale on HD-A3 for $163+10 movies. However, I ended up returning all of it due to Warners announcement. There was no way I was going to make a huge investment on 30% studio support. And yes I say huge investment because you have to consider the purchase as a whole and not just one item at a low price (i.e. price of player+software).

Also just because people want cheap players does not mean they will not buy software. When DVD first came out, I was reluctant to buy an expensive DVD player. It wasn't until I got my first JVC DVD player for $150 that I got into the DVD market. Soon after that I was endlessly buying movies for it, and built a collection of 100 DVD's on a college student's salary (i.e. small income).
For myself this Christmas season, lost sales were $200 in HD DVD movies (given as a gift) that was cancelled and a Harry Potter set around $100 (buying myself).

So yes low prices does matter. However those low prices must be sustained and not a one time deal. If people say price does not affect sales/adoptation then you really have not worked sales. I worked retail at CC during the time that DVD became mainstream with Apex driving it. DVD players moved slowly until that point, after which other CE's were forced to drop the price and became mainstream.

HDM should work like the Gillete model. Sell at a low discounted price (Player-Razor) and rape on the refills (HD-DVDs/BDs - Blades).
DVD took off upon adoption of this model, even more so when their prices hit < $100. It is going to be hard for HDM to overcome DVD if they keep their premiums. Today's consumer is different from the past. There is no more price-quality mindset. J6P will just buy the cheapest version available, why do you think so many off-brand CE's are doing so well? Because price sells in today's retail world.

Check out the CES news section. A new Daewoo and Funai player announced. ($199 to $300).

Sony have never been considered cheap so what do you expect. Cheap players in the short term will be left to the likes of Daewoo and Funai. Maybe Toshiba can produce a relatively cheap BD player too.

Cheaper players do matter.

I said before that Toshiba shot themselves in the foot, when they did the A2 firesale.

Any J6P looking for an HD DVD player in December probably passed on it with the recent $99 HD DVD player sale in mind. Obviously the demand was there as it resulted in immediate stock depletion of the players at that price point.

However, Toshiba's inability to keep prices reasonably low after that probably killed HD DVD in December.
Going from $99 to $299 for a similar player (model difference which probably doesn't matter to J6P) is too much of a difference.

I for one did not buy into HD DVD for this reason until the end of December when Amazon had a decent sale on HD-A3 for $163+10 movies. However, I ended up returning all of it due to Warners announcement. There was no way I was going to make a huge investment on 30% studio support. And yes I say huge investment because you have to consider the purchase as a whole and not just one item at a low price (i.e. price of player+software).

Also just because people want cheap players does not mean they will not buy software. When DVD first came out, I was reluctant to buy an expensive DVD player. It wasn't until I got my first JVC DVD player for $150 that I got into the DVD market. Soon after that I was endlessly buying movies for it, and built a collection of 100 DVD's on a college student's salary (i.e. small income).
For myself this Christmas season, lost sales were $200 in HD DVD movies (given as a gift) that was cancelled and a Harry Potter set around $100 (buying myself).

So yes low prices does matter. However those low prices must be sustained and not a one time deal. If people say price does not affect sales/adoptation then you really have not worked sales. I worked retail at CC during the time that DVD became mainstream with Apex driving it. DVD players moved slowly until that point, after which other CE's were forced to drop the price and became mainstream.

HDM should work like the Gillete model. Sell at a low discounted price (Player-Razor) and rape on the refills (HD-DVDs/BDs - Blades).
DVD took off upon adoption of this model, even more so when their prices hit < $100. It is going to be hard for HDM to overcome DVD if they keep their premiums. Today's consumer is different from the past. There is no more price-quality mindset. J6P will just buy the cheapest version available, why do you think so many off-brand CE's are doing so well? Because price sells in today's retail world.
I don't think the razor blade theory works for optical disc hardware.

See, with CE products like game consoles, the companies involved control the entire chain, from hardware to licensing to software, so they get the money from the "razors" and the "blades", and can choose to make their money from either one, or both, in any proportion they like. Considering how much larger their licensing fees are for game software, they have a LOT of latitude in this. This is a true "loss leader" formula that works, and has been proven to work for decades.

With things like high definition players, not everyone holds patents on HDM software, and thus there needs to be an incentive for manufacturers who aren't in the licensing pool to produce players. Even for those that are primary patent holders, I am sure the license-cost-per-disc is a miniscule fraction of what Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo are getting per disc on their game software.

This really has been the fatal flaw in Toshiba's marketing strategy for HD DVD, in my opinion. Toshiba's slash and burn pricing strategy on hardware was possible only because they control a majority share in the licensing pool for HD DVD. They could price the players at any price point they wanted, on the expectation that they would eventually get it back in licensing if the format took off. The problem with this approach is that it pushed all other manufacturers away - not only did it make Toshiba look desperate, but it also made any CE think twice about entering a market where there was literally zero profit to be made - particularly when there was another option available to them in the same industry that was selling at least reasonably well, with a much healthier profit margin.

Even a disinterested observer would raise eyebrows at the sort of losses Toshiba was incurring on their early units (nearly as much as the early PS3 per unit on the HD-A1, and that's without the golden parachute of hefty licensing fees to soften the blow). Later revisions to the hardware would do good things to the build cost, of course, but certainly not to the extent of Toshiba actually making any sort of a net profit per unit, even if you don't include the mega-spending they've done on advertising, research and development, and other associated costs.

Taken in context, while I agree that price is a major factor in a purchasing decision, the whole concept behind a supply-demand curve is that there must be a reason for someone to supply a product at a given price point to meet the demand. You can certainly sell HDM players for $1 to virtually everyone, but you'd lose your shirt in the process - so you don't do it. That's really what Toshiba was trying to do. Take losses early to proliferate hardware install base, and hope you can optimize build costs faster than you're dropping hardware pricing.

Unfortunately for Toshiba, it didn't work. Price wasn't the only factor. Marketing and perception played a huge role, as big box retailers pushed the higher-profit product in their own self-interest.

Thus we saw that Blu-ray standalones handily beat HD DVD standalone sales this holiday season despite the disparity in pricing.

I don't think the razor blade theory works for optical disc hardware.

See, with CE products like game consoles, the companies involved control the entire chain, from hardware to licensing to software, so they get the money from the "razors" and the "blades", and can choose to make their money from either one, or both, in any proportion they like. Considering how much larger their licensing fees are for game software, they have a LOT of latitude in this. This is a true "loss leader" formula that works, and has been proven to work for decades.

With things like high definition players, not everyone holds patents on HDM software, and thus there needs to be an incentive for manufacturers who aren't in the licensing pool to produce players. Even for those that are primary patent holders, I am sure the license-cost-per-disc is a miniscule fraction of what Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo are getting per disc on their game software.

This really has been the fatal flaw in Toshiba's marketing strategy for HD DVD, in my opinion. Toshiba's slash and burn pricing strategy on hardware was possible only because they control a majority share in the licensing pool for HD DVD. They could price the players at any price point they wanted, on the expectation that they would eventually get it back in licensing if the format took off. The problem with this approach is that it pushed all other manufacturers away - not only did it make Toshiba look desperate, but it also made any CE think twice about entering a market where there was literally zero profit to be made - particularly when there was another option available to them in the same industry that was selling at least reasonably well, with a much healthier profit margin.

Even a disinterested observer would raise eyebrows at the sort of losses Toshiba was incurring on their early units (nearly as much as the early PS3 per unit on the HD-A1, and that's without the golden parachute of hefty licensing fees to soften the blow). Later revisions to the hardware would do good things to the build cost, of course, but certainly not to the extent of Toshiba actually making any sort of a net profit per unit, even if you don't include the mega-spending they've done on advertising, research and development, and other associated costs.

Taken in context, while I agree that price is a major factor in a purchasing decision, the whole concept behind a supply-demand curve is that there must be a reason for someone to supply a product at a given price point to meet the demand. You can certainly sell HDM players for $1 to virtually everyone, but you'd lose your shirt in the process - so you don't do it. That's really what Toshiba was trying to do. Take losses early to proliferate hardware install base, and hope you can optimize build costs faster than you're dropping hardware pricing.

Unfortunately for Toshiba, it didn't work. Price wasn't the only factor. Marketing and perception played a huge role, as big box retailers pushed the higher-profit product in their own self-interest.

Thus we saw that Blu-ray standalones handily beat HD DVD standalone sales this holiday season despite the disparity in pricing.

Except the razor and blade model is exactly why Blu-Ray won. Sony was selling the PS3, which was far more advanced than any of the standalones on the market from Sony or anyone else, for *LESS* money than the standalones cost and losing money on every single PS3 sold. True, they artificially held back the entire Blu-Ray platform by having it be Profile 1.0 only... and currently Profile 1.1 only... despite the fact that it was ready to do 2.0 from the beginning for political reasons (to keep from pissing off the other BR player manufacturers too much) which effectively stifled innovation in terms of extra features on the content side compared to HD DVD. But, besides that, they were dropping the PS3 on the market at a loss the entire time.

If Sony hadn't done the razor/blade approach, the PS3 would have been over $1,000 when released and not sold at all. After release, it would have been at least double the price of the standalone Blu-Ray players that it handily outperformed, BR wouldn't have caught on and we wouldn't have seen the momentum behind it towards the end of 2007. Put simply, without the razor/blade formula on its side, Blu-Ray would have lost to HD DVD.

It is of my opinion that we could see Toshiba "throw in the towel" probably as early as circa April 2008. With Time Warner going Blu-ray exclusive as of June 2008, there will be intense pressure on Toshiba, Paramount and NBC Universal to end the format war for the good of the industry.

In fact, I see Toshiba in that announcement say that they will begin the phase-out of the HD-DVD format, and Toshiba themselves will make a lower-cost combo player that is HD-DVD and Blu-Ray Profile 1.1 compliant as a transitional product until Toshiba starts making their own Blu-ray players starting around the end of calendar year 2008.

With everyone supporting Blu-ray, expect player costs to steeply drop by the end of 2008. A Profile 1.1 player costing under US$200 and a Profile 2.0 player costing under US$250 from the major manufacturers could become reality by November 2008. :)

Icemage,

I think you have a well reasoned argument. I do disagree with much of what you have said though. Despite much talk about the $99 players they were never available to the general public at that price. That is to say Best Buy didn't have it in their Sunday circular with piles of them right in front of the checkout aisles. They were essentially sold to people in the know. People that A) hung out in forums like this and were picking them up as a second player or as a gift B) were going to resell them. If you are going to give away players you have to give them to the right people and they simply didn't get there.

Through all of this I think Toshiba was brilliant in how they spent their resources. However, it was always clear that they were putting far fewer resources into this than Sony. Sony has been completely committed to this platform and has advertised significantly more, paid for preferential placement at major retailers. This preferential placement essentially cut HD DVD off from its prospective customers. If you asked about HD DVD at Best Buy a sales associate essentially told you to buy Blu. You can only sell so many players online. At some point the soccer mom's have to go take a look at what they are getting. HD DVD got crushed at B&M sales.

While HD cut price on players, Blu cut price on disks. My biggest surprise in all of this is that HD risked alienating other HD manufacturers (there were none!) while Blu risked alienating the most important people in the format battle, the studios. The studios knew it cost atleast twice as much to produce Blu and yet their sales were all based on disks selling at 65% off retail, a hefty discount over HD. Talk about lowering the perceived value of a product. I am especially curious how this is going to be remedied in the future. While I love picking up new releases for $10 there is no future in HDM at $10 a disk. I am surprised there wasn't more of a rebellion from the studios about the complete abdication to pricing demands of customers. I only hope it continues.

Except the razor and blade model is exactly why Blu-Ray won. Sony was selling the PS3, which was far more advanced than any of the standalones on the market from Sony or anyone else, for *LESS* money than the standalones cost and losing money on every single PS3 sold. True, they artificially held back the entire Blu-Ray platform by having it be Profile 1.0 only... and currently Profile 1.1 only... despite the fact that it was ready to do 2.0 from the beginning for political reasons (to keep from pissing off the other BR player manufacturers too much) which effectively stifled innovation in terms of extra features on the content side compared to HD DVD. But, besides that, they were dropping the PS3 on the market at a loss the entire time.

If Sony hadn't done the razor/blade approach, the PS3 would have been over $1,000 when released and not sold at all. After release, it would have been at least double the price of the standalone Blu-Ray players that it handily outperformed, BR wouldn't have caught on and we wouldn't have seen the momentum behind it towards the end of 2007. Put simply, without the razor/blade formula on its side, Blu-Ray would have lost to HD DVD.
True, but unlike Toshiba's HD DVD standalones, the PS3 IS a game console and therefore can pick up those licensing fees I spoke about earlier. It was a gutsy gamble on Sony's part to put their muchly successful PlayStation franchise on the line to launch Blu-ray, and thus far it has worked brilliantly on the Blu-ray side (whether the fallout will push them farther behind in the console wars is another matter entirely, but this isn't the forum to discuss that).

Sony can reasonably expect that the majority of PS3 owners are still gamers, and can therefore expect a hefty chunk of that original subsidy back in the form of licensing for future game titles sold to those users. Not so with Toshiba, who at most was looking to earn a few pennies per disc - the typical user would have had to have purchased hundreds of titles for Toshiba to break even on the early units, and I suspect the A2 units incurred heavy losses at some point as well after they dropped below $400 MSRP.

Do you see the difference here? The PS3 IS and remains heavily subsidized, but it is the nature of the beast for most game consoles, because the razor blade theory works there - they control the entire supply chain and can therefore dictate where and how their profits get returned.

Toshiba, on the other hand, needed other CEs to manufacture units in bulk to see licensing returns on hardware, and they needed disc sales in even higher bulk to see licensing returns on software; neither of these two things have come to pass. And now they're stuck, because they've dropped their market tolerance price point below the level of sustainability, and they have no momentum with either the CEs or studios.

You can bet the incoming Nielsen VideoScan returns every week from here on in will turn increasingly in favor of Blu-ray as titles go out of stock from Warner, more retailers re-allocate shelf space, and perception shifts - all of which, unless Toshiba can pull a magic rabbit out of a hat very soon (say, in the next week), will turn into a vicious feedback loop where each of these issues will feed into the others, accelerating the process.

That is an awe struck rebuttal!
Bummer that it's also accurate - gas & food come before "toys".

I think $199 is more the price point to hit. But it'll have to be feature-complete (aka Profile 2.0)... none of this "it'll do everything except picture in picture and advanced features" or "everything except web-enabled content" bs. And it'll have to load up discs in under 30 seconds... none of this 2+ minutes to load Java-heavy Disney titles that the current crop of standalone Blu-Ray players does.

When there's a ~$200 or less Profile 2.0 Blu-Ray player that doesn't take a year to load discs, I'm buying it.
Sounds like a winner. The consumer will not tolerate poor performance & if history is to be believed there will be no serious market penetration over $200.

I consider myself one of the average joes. The only reason I am watching movies in high definition is due to the HD-DVD $99 player sale at Walmart. I didn't even need a 1080p player, I got the 1080i hd-a2. Until Blu-ray gets players that hit the $99 mark, I won't be watching any of its material. I really don't see how anything larger than a small portion of the mass market will either. Therefore the Warner news doesn't seem to be that big of a deal.

You're right. Although, I am willing to pay the same as I did for the 360 AO; around $150.

The claims in this thread that hardware pricing is the only thing that matters are seriously flawed.

- It completely leaves out the issue for brick and mortar retailers (Best Buy for example) who must decide how to allocate shelf space. When 70% of the content is coming out in blue cases and 30% is coming out in red cases, what do you think the allocation in the aisles of each store are going to look like? We're already at 60:40 at many retailers in favor of Blu-ray even before the Warner switch. It would not surprise me in the least to see the ratio turn even more lopsided as titles go out of print and become unavailable for stocking (let alone sales). Online retailers aren't as heavily affected since they don't have to worry about profit-per-square-measurement, but brick and mortars still sell the sizable majority of optical discs, and most people aren't savvy enough or secure enough to shop for movies online.

- When those Warner HD DVD titles go out of print, what happens when Netflix and Blockbuster Online have to drop them from circulation because they can no longer replace their damaged copies? Blockbuster is already Blu-ray exclusive in their stores, and this latest decision is just going to cement their position even further.

- Blu-ray hardware will come down in price like every other CE product has come down in price. To compare it to HD DVD pricing is to be willfully ignorant of the marketing strategy that Toshiba has used from day 1 in their efforts to pull off a come-from-behind victory. It isn't like the pricing hasn't come down quickly - a year ago, the prices were circa $1000. Now they're in the $300 range and should continue to fall as lower-margin manufacturers come into the picture.

I agree with the topic of this thread. I am a realist and when a Warner movie I want comes out on Blu Ray, I will be inclined to buy a BD player. But... I have two HD DVD players that I paid sub-$200 for. I have no reason to pay more money for a BD player (in fact, I refuse to).

Well - I for one am waiting for quite a while. I bought HD and was extremely happy with both it and the price. Not going to pay more for a player with inferior sound and unfisinished specs... Price is the major obstacle - for now. As some have said, I suppose it's all relative - heck my brother paid almost $800 (I was too little:) for his first VCR.

I won't go Blue Ray until the players are $200 or less and come with a bunch of free movies.

My other consideration is that Blue Ray Media needs to be in $15-$20 range.

This is what I have right now with HD DVD and I have a large enough collection that I'm not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I'm not as concerned about new releases and I'll give it some time to see what develops.

I actually think that we may see a day where we download HD movies and then burn them to an HD DVD, so I don't think the format or my player will become obsolete.

My take from what has happened is Blue Ray is going to raise their prices and then die on the vine.

For all the PS3 owners that are out there, I doubt highly that they want to pay $30 for a movie.

The BOGO's have artificially inflated sales numbers for both HD DVD and Blue Ray and the only thing that has been proven is people are willing to buy the movies at about 1/2 the normal retail price.

If the Blue Ray folks bring the cost of movies and their players down, they'll probably get me, but not when I have to pay $30-40 for Close Encounters on Blue Ray and over $300 for a good Blue Ray player.

At those prices, I'll sit on the sidelines.

Cheaper players alone will not speed up the adoption of HDM. What needs to happen is the software price must come down to DVD levels. After all the player is usually a 1 time investment and people don't mind spending on it whilst the movies they buy all the time. It really is in the best interest of the studios to drop the prices soon otherwise many people will either not buy the players unless they are less then $200 or rent them.I fear that with no competition from HD side that blu prices won't drop as fast (Fox at 39.95 is a joke) and blu could go the way of SACD, Min Disc. DVD-A.

You are absolutely right on the money!

Let's be honest about a couple of facts here:


Mass market consumers don't care about a company's profit margins/revenues/losses. It's employees and investors do.

Mass market consumers weren't abstaining from buying into HD DVD/Blu ray because they were confused about which was better. They were abstaining because they were being forced to decide which movies they wanted more than others.

Mass market consumers buy a product when it's a value to them, not a value to the industry or to CEMs. Value to a mass market consumer is a good quality to price ratio, and usually that price on big box electronics is about $200-250.


iPOD, Wii, Zune, GPS Navigation units. These sold like hotcakes this past holiday season where you could find them because they were current and popular tech, demonstrated great quality for at an agreeable price. We saw the same thing happen with HD DVD players when people could get them for $200 or less.

If you get a complete HD player on the market for $200-$250 or less with solid Hollywood support behind it, mass market adoption will happen.

Continue to let studios take the half step approach with their release schedule, CEMs take the half step approach on completing spec and hold pricing to $400-500 players and what will happen is this:

Jim and his buddy Greg walk past a Blu-ray end cap at Best Buy.

Jim: There's the Blu-ray player those commercials have been talking about!
Greg: Yeah, I read an article about it in the paper. Looks nice!
Jim: Nice? it looks beautiful! I hear it looks 6x better than DVD! Gonna buy one?
Greg: Tags says its $500 for one that does everything. It's nice but I think I'm gonna wait until I can get it for $200.
Jim: I does sound like a lot of money, but look they say you get 5 free movies with it.
Greg: You're still paying $500 upfront and then waiting for the mail in. No thanks.
Jim: Yeah, maybe Black Friday.
(walk away)

That's what we're up against here. If mass market consumers are buying Vizios rather than wait for traditional CEMs to drop Flat Panel HDTV prices, they're certainly not going to drop $400-500 on an HD player.

Recent market trends make that clear.

My other consideration is that Blue Ray Media needs to be in $15-$20 range.
Exactly - $39.98 for the Simpsons.........are you out of your freaking mind?

This really has been the fatal flaw in Toshiba's marketing strategy for HD DVD, in my opinion. Toshiba's slash and burn pricing strategy on hardware was possible only because they control a majority share in the licensing pool for HD DVD. They could price the players at any price point they wanted, on the expectation that they would eventually get it back in licensing if the format took off. The problem with this approach is that it pushed all other manufacturers away - not only did it make Toshiba look desperate, but it also made any CE think twice about entering a market where there was literally zero profit to be made - particularly when there was another option available to them in the same industry that was selling at least reasonably well, with a much healthier profit margin.

Thus we saw that Blu-ray standalones handily beat HD DVD standalone sales this holiday season despite the disparity in pricing.
Define "handily"?

And has not Sony used the same strategy? They have pretty well locked every other CE out of the entry market with the PS3. I mean, really, why buy a gimped player when you can get a PS3 that plays movies and games (not disagreeing with the argument, just wondering why the other CE's are taking Sony to task)

Prices must drop for Blu Ray to really take off. It's unaceptable for a player not to be in the sub $100 range. I would think if you're a manufacturer such as Funai you'd head down that level as soon as possible. Even if the players are gimped players if they do pcm and standard dd it should meet the needs for Blu Ray content for a lot of people. By the time Blu Ray sorts out its interactivity issues those types of players will be of a more reasonable cost if people wish to upgrade. The profiles still are the soft spot for Blu Ray though and it presents a selling negative when you have a mass of purchasers who will see full interactive features something they are excluded from because of the varying profiles.

Define "handily"?
Are you being facetious or have you honestly not read my contributions to this thread?

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=12725628&postcount=82

I reiterate: Blu-ray standalones outsold HD DVD standalones in Q4 2007 HANDILY.


And has not Sony used the same strategy? They have pretty well locked every other CE out of the entry market with the PS3. I mean, really, why buy a gimped player when you can get a PS3 that plays movies and games (not disagreeing with the argument, just wondering why the other CE's are taking Sony to task)
As long as they're moving product, what do they care? Not everyone wants a game console as a playback device, and there are a number of units on the market now that are at or below the price of the PS3, with more coming on the horizon.

If we're looking from a performance-value, then absolutely the PS3 is the most jam-packed high definition device on the market. But it can never shake the perception that it is a gaming device - and that's where the standalones come into play.

i really would like to know how many people think that a 100.00 player will have the
quality built in, that it will outlive its 1 year warranty.

I want to know how people think they should be under $100 when the build componenets are twice that.

Yeesh. (and I'm a red).

i guess people ignored the fact that toshiba took a loss on evey low priced player
they made hoping for a win and if they had won the death of the 100.00 player
would have been overnight. bottom line companies have to show a profit in order
to stay in business.

The irony is Sony went rogue with BD and started the "war" so they could get the major share of HDM player royalties, but Toshiba will reap more royalties from the hundreds of millions of HD-DVD based Chinese format players (used in China only) than Sony will ever get from BD players!

The irony is Sony went rogue with BD and started the "war" so they could get the major share of HDM player royalties, but Toshiba will reap more royalties from the hundreds of millions of HD-DVD based Chinese format players (used in China only) than Sony will ever get from BD players!

I still think it's very up in the air if the HD-DVD based Chinese players will ever catch on in China. I don't think we've seen any evidence for that so far.

In fact, the PS3's popularity in Asia may boost Blu-Ray in China as well, just as it has in the US.

Are you being facetious or have you honestly not read my contributions to this thread?

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=12725628&postcount=82

I reiterate: Blu-ray standalones outsold HD DVD standalones in Q4 2007 HANDILY.

By you're own words, you said that math was a guesstimate. Make the claim once you have actual figures to support it please.


As long as they're moving product, what do they care? Not everyone wants a game console as a playback device, and there are a number of units on the market now that are at or below the price of the PS3, with more coming on the horizon.

If we're looking from a performance-value, then absolutely the PS3 is the most jam-packed high definition device on the market. But it can never shake the perception that it is a gaming device - and that's where the standalones come into play.

Units on the market below the price of a PS3 are profile 1.0 and being moved out. I don't think purchasers will be happy to see new 1.1 titles unavailable to give a full experience on their 1.0 players. That's not good for word of mouth.

1.1 players are in the range of $400-500 and 2.0 is still in the future. What you have as result of the profile mess is people sitting on the fence because they don't want to spend good money on players that won't give a complete experience, and CEMs refusing to move final profile players below the cost of the $399 PS3.

I agree with you that the PS3 can't drive Blu-ray to mass market adoption levels, standalones have to do that. The PS3 is making it tough for them to get where they need to go though by outflanking them with features/upgradability.

I want to know how people think they should be under $100 when the build componenets are twice that.

Yeesh. (and I'm a red).


Because people don't care how much the components cost. All they are interested in is "is it a good value?". Neither HD DVD or Blu-Ray offer a HUGE benefit to the average consumer. The benefits are noticable and for someone like me, highly sought after but for the average HDTV owner, they are not going to see a $500 benefit over their upconverting DVD player. I am a movie nut and bought in to HD-DVD as soon as it was under $200. Knowing what I know about the currently available <$300 BR players, I will have to pass until I can get a 1.1 or 2.0 profile player for <$200 before I pull the trigger again. I don't expect those kinds of prices for at least another year bringing the format dangerously close to missing out on it's window of opportunity.

people waiting on a 100.00 blu-ray player are only denying their self of that format.

Are you being facetious or have you honestly not read my contributions to this thread?

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=12725628&postcount=82

I reiterate: Blu-ray standalones outsold HD DVD standalones in Q4 2007 HANDILY.


As long as they're moving product, what do they care? Not everyone wants a game console as a playback device, and there are a number of units on the market now that are at or below the price of the PS3, with more coming on the horizon.

If we're looking from a performance-value, then absolutely the PS3 is the most jam-packed high definition device on the market. But it can never shake the perception that it is a gaming device - and that's where the standalones come into play.
"Guess" math ^= handily.

Given the total sales of SA's I'm not certain they happy with "moving units" when that's a paltry number............but who knows............anecdotal evidence after a trip to all the local retailers last night with my wife hunting a DS Lite I saw acres of PSPs & PS3's...............not a single 360 or DS lite = who know's who's selling what :D

By you're own words, you said that math was a guesstimate. Make the claim once you have actual figures to support it please.
You'll have to wait about another half week or so before NPD hardware figures for December are released (and I assume the 2007 YTD figures will be released next week as well), but as I said - everything in my calculation was drawn from Toshiba press releases. If you'd like to take issues with my analysis, feel free, but if my calculations are wrong, Toshiba lied at some point.

We know what most of the quantities "should have been".

- Toshiba says they have "nearly 1 million" dedicated players.

- We know what the approximate values were for HD DVD standalones vs. Xbox 360 add-ons earlier this year.

- We know about how many units were sold during the $99 blowout.

There really ISN'T much wiggle room in the figures - all I'm doing is drawing conclusions based on numbers that Toshiba has provided. Considering that they have very little reason to understate HD DVD numbers or overinflate Blu-ray numbers, the worst that can happen is that my guesstimate is overly generous to HD DVD, and any lopsidedness was actually worse than my projection.

Exactly - $39.98 for the Simpsons.........are you out of your freaking mind?





retail price has nothing to do with how much it costs in reality. If you haven't noticed pretty much all new hd movies cost 27.95 on both sides.

Because people don't care how much the components cost. All they are interested in is "is it a good value?". Neither HD DVD or Blu-Ray offer a HUGE benefit to the average consumer. The benefits are noticable and for someone like me, highly sought after but for the average HDTV owner, they are not going to see a $500 benefit over their upconverting DVD player. I am a movie nut and bought in to HD-DVD as soon as it was under $200. Knowing what I know about the currently available <$300 BR players, I will have to pass until I can get a 1.1 or 2.0 profile player for <$200 before I pull the trigger again. I don't expect those kinds of prices for at least another year bringing the format dangerously close to missing out on it's window of opportunity.

Exactly.

If it takes a year or more for the Blue Ray standalones to come out that are in the $200 range and have the correct profile, they are losing a big segment of the market that was already knee deep in HD media.

This is all price driven for me. I got in on HD DVD because of the Best Buy 360 HD add on deal in Sept where I got more movies for free than the price of the player.

That's what got me in the door.

Knowing I was getting a $80 Heroes box set, Kong in the box, 2 free HD DVD's in store of my choice (which also turned out to be box sets) and 5 through the mail got me to jump.

And I'm a guy who loves movies, works in the business (and is currently on strike) and has a 55 inch Plasma hanging on the wall.

Up until the deal was too good to pass up, I wasn't ready to buy into HDM. I have a SD DVD library that is stocked. The only movies from that I replaced w/HD DVD were Kubrick and Scorcese movies that I already had in SD. Otherwise my rule was I would not rebuy what I had, unless it was a classic.

This is what Blue Ray is up against. I don't consider myself the average consumer. I'm exactly who they want to get into their format and quite frankly, the prices are not attractive to me at this point for Blue Ray.

I'm not a fanboy. I'm not talking quality. I'm talking prices.

If they can't get me off the fence, I tend to believe that they are going to have a tough time getting the regular consumer off the fence.

They are essentially depending on people with gaming consoles to buy their overpriced media.

I know a lot of people with PS3's and most of them are in it for the gaming over the Blue Ray.

Getting them to drop $40 for a movie is going to be next to impossible unless it's a Lord of The Rings Movie or Indiana Jones.

If you think I'm gonna pay $40 bucks or even $27.98 for a Blue Ray version of The Simpsons, you're nuts.

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)

Good point. I spent $499 on a Panasonic DVD player with 5.1 channel discrete audio out back in May 1999. I also spent $130ish on a PS1 around that time. I spent $599 on a PS3 in January 2007 and that was easily the best $599 I've ever spent!

Exactly.

If it takes a year or more for the Blue Ray standalones to come out that are in the $200 range and have the correct profile, they are losing a big segment of the market that was already knee deep in HD media.

This is all price driven for me. I got in on HD DVD because of the Best Buy 360 HD add on deal in Sept where I got more movies for free than the price of the player.

That's what got me in the door.

Knowing I was getting a $80 Heroes box set, Kong in the box, 2 free HD DVD's in store of my choice (which also turned out to be box sets) and 5 through the mail got me to jump.

And I'm a guy who loves movies, works in the business (and is currently on strike) and has a 55 inch Plasma hanging on the wall.

Up until the deal was too good to pass up, I wasn't ready to buy into HDM. I have a SD DVD library that is stocked. The only movies from that I replaced w/HD DVD were Kubrick and Scorcese movies that I already had in SD. Otherwise my rule was I would not rebuy what I had, unless it was a classic.

This is what Blue Ray is up against. I don't consider myself the average consumer. I'm exactly who they want to get into their format and quite frankly, the prices are not attractive to me at this point for Blue Ray.

I'm not a fanboy. I'm not talking quality. I'm talking prices.

If they can't get me off the fence, I tend to believe that they are going to have a tough time getting the regular consumer off the fence.

They are essentially depending on people with gaming consoles to buy their overpriced media.

I know a lot of people with PS3's and most of them are in it for the gaming over the Blue Ray.

Getting them to drop $40 for a movie is going to be next to impossible unless it's a Lord of The Rings Movie or Indiana Jones.

If you think I'm gonna pay $40 bucks or even $27.98 for a Blue Ray version of The Simpsons, you're nuts.


There is this assumption that people were sitting this out because of the format war. No. People were sitting this out because their DVD player was just fine. There is really only a significant benefit to a slim minority of people (those of us with systems that can show off the benefits with great, big, expensive TVs). People are revolting against the 1080 sets. Vizio and Olevia are the two biggest HDTV sellers and they sell low priced models, mostly of the 720p variety. Even EDTV (480!!) sell better than most high end TVs.

Hardrion (quote above) is EXACTLY the type of person that should be an early adopter in tech. But he is not. So many people are going to sit this one out that it would be a shock if Blu was able to seriously compete with DVD. Few people have HDTVs (13%) and many that do purchase them due to their slim design rather than the improved contrast and resolution. An overwhelming majority don't have ANY HD source attached to their new shiny TV. You start doing the math and you realize that this is going to be niche for a long time. Hopefully over time people will start utilizing the benefits of their new TVs and the medium will take off. But not for a while.

By the way, I LOVE my HD. I got a taste and there is no way I go back. As soon as I can find a decent price/promotion on a PS3 or Panny 30 I will start watching my ballooning BD collection.

Fox IS crazy. I LOVE the movie Hoosiers. But even at 66% off MSRP I couldn't bring myself to buy it (Blu BOGO 30% off then 50% off). Minor upgrade from the DVD. I imagine they have a lot of titles like that. Simpsons is one thing, 20+ year old catalogs without steller transfers is another.

"Guess" math ^= handily.

Given the total sales of SA's I'm not certain they happy with "moving units" when that's a paltry number............but who knows............anecdotal evidence after a trip to all the local retailers last night with my wife hunting a DS Lite I saw acres of PSPs & PS3's...............not a single 360 or DS lite = who know's who's selling what :D
Unlike your example, however, I'm not using anecdotal evidence. I'm using logical extensions of published data from the source that is least likely to favor my stated position.

You can doubt me if you like, but I'll note that my track record on this forum has been pretty good at predicting the numbers based on published data. If you ever read the old Nielsen sales tracking thread, I was the one who came up with the established method for tracking the sales volume each week.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=10367450&postcount=5389

I don't post figures like this unless I'm fairly certain they're at least within shouting distance of correct, and so far no one who has taken a potshot at them has provided any sort of logical reasoning as to why my conclusions would be wrong.

Times like this make me really wonder what has happened to the "Science" in these parts of AV Science Forum. When people can't look at numbers and determine for themselves what the they mean, and instead post snide remarks calling reasoned analysis into question, how does that reflect on this forum and its membership?

Exactly.

If it takes a year or more for the Blue Ray standalones to come out that are in the $200 range and have the correct profile, they are losing a big segment of the market that was already knee deep in HD media.

This is all price driven for me. I got in on HD DVD because of the Best Buy 360 HD add on deal in Sept where I got more movies for free than the price of the player.

That's what got me in the door.

Knowing I was getting a $80 Heroes box set, Kong in the box, 2 free HD DVD's in store of my choice (which also turned out to be box sets) and 5 through the mail got me to jump.

And I'm a guy who loves movies, works in the business (and is currently on strike) and has a 55 inch Plasma hanging on the wall.

Up until the deal was too good to pass up, I wasn't ready to buy into HDM. I have a SD DVD library that is stocked. The only movies from that I replaced w/HD DVD were Kubrick and Scorcese movies that I already had in SD. Otherwise my rule was I would not rebuy what I had, unless it was a classic.

This is what Blue Ray is up against. I don't consider myself the average consumer. I'm exactly who they want to get into their format and quite frankly, the prices are not attractive to me at this point for Blue Ray.

I'm not a fanboy. I'm not talking quality. I'm talking prices.

If they can't get me off the fence, I tend to believe that they are going to have a tough time getting the regular consumer off the fence.

They are essentially depending on people with gaming consoles to buy their overpriced media.

I know a lot of people with PS3's and most of them are in it for the gaming over the Blue Ray.

Getting them to drop $40 for a movie is going to be next to impossible unless it's a Lord of The Rings Movie or Indiana Jones.

If you think I'm gonna pay $40 bucks or even $27.98 for a Blue Ray version of The Simpsons, you're nuts.

Same here. The *ONLY* reason I got involved in this whole deal is because I got a feature-complete HD DVD player for $159 shipped with 10 free movies on a platform that had some of my favorite movies that I'd really want HD over SD (like The Matrix) with some kick ass extras (picture in picture, etc). If that deal hadn't come along, I'd still be watching only SD movies.

Like a lot of people, I'm not going to be buying Blu-Ray until they have a feature-complete (Profile 2.0) player in that same price range that's powerful enough to load the complex Java discs (Disney stuff) at a reasonable speed (the over 2 minute load times on current Blu-Ray players isn't even remotely close to reasonable... my computer boots up faster than that). And it's not that it's because of HD DVD I'm in this position. If HD DVD hadn't existed, I'd be thinking the same thing. (I was even using the same logic in going format neutral).

I have a decent SD library and was only buying HD content for the movies that I really enjoyed and wanted to watch again and again.

It's funny, but this whole HDM thing has me hesitating from even buying SD content now. Since HD is supposed to be the rule in the next year, buying SD seems like a throw-away. And, yeah, you can get discs for under 5 bucks on sale here and there... but it takes up more room in my one bedroom apartment. And it feels a bit like a waste. (Yes, I know the logic that I get to enjoy it now, etc, but that doesn't change the way it feels.)

In an ideal world, HD would be here *TODAY* (who cares what format or what they call it). With feature-complete, well-made players under $200. Discs that were maybe a $5 premium over SD. And all discs as combo discs so that you could still play them on your laptop, portable DVD player, bedroom DVD player, car DVD player, etc. Unfortunately, we live in the real world...

I have pointed out many times the silliness of assuming that HDM is dead if players/discs don't immediately hit some arbitrary price ASAP. There's one format and there's now time for volumes to pick up and prices to fall. People will buy more HDTVs and DVD players will need to be replaced. And the fence sitters will come down off the fence.

For the people who are currently saying that they won't buy Blu-Ray until some arbitrary price, if you have a DVD collection, that probably makes little sense. For me, the cost of media (DVDs and Blu-Rays) far far far outstrips the cost of the hardware, even after buying several generations of DVD players and an early Blu-Ray player. I'm certainly not going to keep buying DVDs now that there is a single HD format.

Spending $30 from your paycheck is a lot easier to do than spending $399.

Hardware purchases will always be the single most difficult thing to get consumers to do. ESPECIALLY if they don't perceive value for the money.

Once you've hooked the consumer by "helping" them purchase a player (usually by low prices) you're set...

It's like taking candy from a baby to get even a lower income person to buy a movie here and there. Just like what has been happening with DVDs for years.

Hardware price will make or break any format. What the blinded are not realizing is that the reason people supported HD-DVD was NOT because they were cheap... it was because they knew the only hope for ANY HD format was a player the masses would buy.

Without that.. enjoy your 200 titles per year. No studio in their right mind will release massive amounts of content with a small niche market of owners.

i guess people ignored the fact that toshiba took a loss on evey low priced player
they made hoping for a win and if they had won the death of the 100.00 player
would have been overnight. bottom line companies have to show a profit in order
to stay in business.

Toshiba was able to offer entry level, mid level and high end players, all with the same basic feature set, so if HD DVD had won, those levels and prices would stay the same. The mid-level and high end players would cover any loss on the entry level player sales.

It's a shame that with as many CEMs as there are behind Blu-ray we haven't seen a basic feature set or more competitive pricing between manufacturers. You would think it would be the reverse, Toshiba only able to offer a set price, while having several CEMs help lower Blu-ray player costs to adoption levels thanks to competition.

That hasn't been the case, and at this time doesn't appear ready to change.

The entry level players were arguably the only area where Toshiba stood to have a serious loss and they did garner attention. $98 pricing was never an official MSRP and everyone knows it.

It's a shame that with as many CEMs as there are behind Blu-ray we haven't seen a basic feature set or more competitive pricing between manufacturers. You would think it would be the reverse, Toshiba only able to offer a set price, while having several CEMs help lower Blu-ray player costs to adoption levels thanks to competition.

That hasn't been the case, and at this time doesn't appear ready to change.




+1

This is the difference between success and failure. Unfortunately they are on the road to failure without addressing this SERIOUS problem.

You'll have to wait about another half week or so before NPD hardware figures for December are released (and I assume the 2007 YTD figures will be released next week as well), but as I said - everything in my calculation was drawn from Toshiba press releases. If you'd like to take issues with my analysis, feel free, but if my calculations are wrong, Toshiba lied at some point.

We know what most of the quantities "should have been".

- Toshiba says they have "nearly 1 million" dedicated players.

- We know what the approximate values were for HD DVD standalones vs. Xbox 360 add-ons earlier this year.

- We know about how many units were sold during the $99 blowout.

There really ISN'T much wiggle room in the figures - all I'm doing is drawing conclusions based on numbers that Toshiba has provided. Considering that they have very little reason to understate HD DVD numbers or overinflate Blu-ray numbers, the worst that can happen is that my guesstimate is overly generous to HD DVD, and any lopsidedness was actually worse than my projection.

Strange that you haven't tried to do the same analysis with Blu-ray figures. Or have you?

My bottom line is that you're essentially stating that BD standalones outsold HD DVD standalones during the holidays as a fact without the concrete data.

Until the final numbers are released, the correct answer when asked whether BD SAs outsold HD DVD SAs, should be: I don't know.

What it looks like is that people have run away with the claim in Warner's press release that BD settops outsold HD DVD settops without even considering why Warner used the term settop instead of standalone player.

Unlike your example, however, I'm not using anecdotal evidence. I'm using logical extensions of published data from the source that is least likely to favor my stated position.

You can doubt me if you like, but I'll note that my track record on this forum has been pretty good at predicting the numbers based on published data. If you ever read the old Nielsen sales tracking thread, I was the one who came up with the established method for tracking the sales volume each week.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=10367450&postcount=5389

I don't post figures like this unless I'm fairly certain they're at least within shouting distance of correct, and so far no one who has taken a potshot at them has provided any sort of logical reasoning as to why my conclusions would be wrong.

Times like this make me really wonder what has happened to the "Science" in these parts of AV Science Forum. When people can't look at numbers and determine for themselves what the they mean, and instead post snide remarks calling reasoned analysis into question, how does that reflect on this forum and its membership?

So it reflects poorly on the forum and its membership that people aren't comfortable accepting you're guesstimation as fact? I don't think so.

People are just more comfortable seeing actual numbers reports than accepting calculations based on pure guesses.

You could be right but the numbers aren't in.

Exactly.

If it takes a year or more for the Blue Ray standalones to come out that are in the $200 range and have the correct profile, they are losing a big segment of the market that was already knee deep in HD media.

This is all price driven for me. I got in on HD DVD because of the Best Buy 360 HD add on deal in Sept where I got more movies for free than the price of the player.

That's what got me in the door.

Knowing I was getting a $80 Heroes box set, Kong in the box, 2 free HD DVD's in store of my choice (which also turned out to be box sets) and 5 through the mail got me to jump.

And I'm a guy who loves movies, works in the business (and is currently on strike) and has a 55 inch Plasma hanging on the wall.

Up until the deal was too good to pass up, I wasn't ready to buy into HDM. I have a SD DVD library that is stocked. The only movies from that I replaced w/HD DVD were Kubrick and Scorcese movies that I already had in SD. Otherwise my rule was I would not rebuy what I had, unless it was a classic.

This is what Blue Ray is up against. I don't consider myself the average consumer. I'm exactly who they want to get into their format and quite frankly, the prices are not attractive to me at this point for Blue Ray.

I'm not a fanboy. I'm not talking quality. I'm talking prices.

If they can't get me off the fence, I tend to believe that they are going to have a tough time getting the regular consumer off the fence.

They are essentially depending on people with gaming consoles to buy their overpriced media.

I know a lot of people with PS3's and most of them are in it for the gaming over the Blue Ray.

Getting them to drop $40 for a movie is going to be next to impossible unless it's a Lord of The Rings Movie or Indiana Jones.

If you think I'm gonna pay $40 bucks or even $27.98 for a Blue Ray version of The Simpsons, you're nuts.

Yes cost is the issue for adoption. And to those who claim it isn't doesn't reflect the reality of the adoption of sd dvd. The prices had to plummet for mass adoption. A year after dvd, about the same time as now for hi def, there were 1.5 million players out there. Not even counting the PS3 there are more standalone players of both varieties then sd players at relatively the same juncture. A huge if not the reason for those numbers is because of the aggressive pricing of Toshiba. With Toshiba basically out of the picture now, unless they start making cheap Blu Ray players (to compete with Sony and other manufacturers who refused to side with them, hehehe) the adoption will in fact not keep pace with the growth of dvd in subsequent years. This is a crucial statistical figure for the growth of Blu Ray and HDM. The analysts will look next year at the rate of adoption and if they see it's not keeping pace with the pace dvd was adopted that could spell the end for Blu Ray as a viable and competitive format.

What makes this even more challenging is that this pace must be maintained in the context of an already specialized and growing market - hdtvs which is still only at about 35% of the market. It was not like dvd/vhs market where you didn't need a "special" tv to play vhs or dvd. You used the same television. So the market was already actualized fully in terms of display devices and was only necessary for the prices of dvds to drop for the market to take off.

Blu Ray cannot afford to drag its feet on pricing because if it does that market expectation will be severely scrutinized the same time next year and if there isn't similar adoption and growth as dvd this will have a huge impact on perception and further adoption.

Yes cost is the issue for adoption.

Finally someone who "gets it"

Great post.

Strange that you haven't tried to do the same analysis with Blu-ray figures. Or have you?

My bottom line is that you're essentially stating that BD standalones outsold HD DVD standalones during the holidays as a fact without the concrete data.

Until the final numbers are released, the correct answer when asked whether BD SAs outsold HD DVD SAs, should be: I don't know.

What it looks like is that people have run away with the claim in Warner's press release that BD settops outsold HD DVD settops without even considering why Warner used the term settop instead of standalone player.
I'd do the numbers for Blu-ray, but then people would be calling my calculations into question based on "tainted data". I am using the LEAST favorable available data to support my position - all of my data points come from Toshiba. That I can do so and still arrive at what is a solid conclusion is what interests me most about the numbers - even under HD DVD's best case scenario, Blu-ray standalones outsold HD DVD standalones in Q4 2007.

Or are you suggesting that if I somehow use Blu-ray/BDA published data that my numbers will magically invert in the other direction and show that HD DVD standalones did better than Blu-ray?

This isn't a "runaway claim" - it is something I picked up off of Warner's press release, found interesting, and decided to do a little digging to support with the information available.

Should the NPD figures or other press releases next week prove to not bear out what I'm saying, I will be happy to issue an apology, but I am very confident in my math skills. Would you be willing to offer me an apology for doubting if the numbers get released and prove that Warner was right, and that I am also (at least close to) right?

people waiting on a 100.00 blu-ray player are only denying their self of that format.

What do you the this topic is about?
people=J6P

And like one other poster said, hardware purchase requires more decision making on the consumers part, not in regards to quality but price.

It is easier to buy something say $100 than $200. Easier to buy something say $200 than $300, so on and so forth.
It doesn't matter what the ongoing price of the media is because, it is easily justified as an once in awhile thing.

I can go out and buy a new movie $10-35 whatever the current sale price on HD DVD/BD every paycheck and not really think about it.
But I cannot just pick up and goto the store and decide to buy next day a $400+ BD player. That takes effort, financial planning, budgetting or saving for alot of people.

If you are rich and can afford everything, no need to brag, but the majority of J6P is not so keep that in mind.

J6P does not = poor people or not financially stable. FYI. ;)

I consider myself one of the average joes. The only reason I am watching movies in high definition is due to the HD-DVD $99 player sale at Walmart. I didn't even need a 1080p player, I got the 1080i hd-a2. Until Blu-ray gets players that hit the $99 mark, I won't be watching any of its material. I really don't see how anything larger than a small portion of the mass market will either. Therefore the Warner news doesn't seem to be that big of a deal.

Bare in mind that, the more BD players sell, the cheaper each unit will get. Such is the nature of mass production. The quantity of units that will be manufactured largely depends on how many units they think they will sell.

The Warner news will undoubtedly increase worldwide sales of BD units. As a result, BD production will increase to match the increase in demand. Producing more units reduces the cost-per-unit.

Also, the higher the probability of BD winning the format war, the more money can be invested in R&D, with the intent of reducing production costs.

All in all, Warner going BD-exclusive will play a factor in BD's success, and BD's success will play a factor in cheaper BD players. Make no doubt about it. Warner Bros opened the floodgates.

+1

I don't care which side wins, but until we have sub-$99 players, there will not be mass adoption. I liked HD DVD because I thought they could get there first.

My fear now is that player prices will remain high and HDM will remain a tiny niche. Downloads will have time to become viable.

Has anyone noticed the price of all the latest Blu-ray players announced? :eek: The average person isn't going to fork over that much cash.
I agree with everything you said except that downloads will have a chance now to become viable. This red herring is thrown out there all the time, especially by the BD camp, to justify rushing ahead whether we (especially Blu-ray) are ready or not.

But think about it for a second; audio CD's were established for almost two decades before music downloads became possible, yet that hasn't stopped music downloads from overwhelming the CD market. The reason is that downloads and the devices that play them are more convenient, plain and simple. The same thing will eventually happen to the HD media market, no matter how popular it becomes in the meantime. It is inevitable.

I wish this weren't the case, as I prefer quality over convenience and hate what MP-3's have done to music fidelity, but there is no reason the movie market won't follow exactly the same path as the music market once sufficient bandwidth becomes available.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=974378

People go out and spent 2500 to 3000 for a tv but don't want to spent 400 to 500 for a blu-ray player.They want to wait until they hit 99.98 price point.You don't expect that 2500 to 3000 tv to hit 1000 to 1500 in the next couple months why would you expect blu-ray players to hit rock bottom prices in a few months.

As long as they have been making dlp,lcd and plasma sets there should be no reason for them to cost what they do.Before you call me a bly-ray fan boy I have had a A2 since they first come out.That I paid 500 for.

I am perplexed that people who think that someone who spends $1000-3000 on an HDTV during Holiday 2006 or 2007 will somehow find a $250-400 player prohibitively expensive during Holiday 2008, particularly now that there's a single format. Let's see where prices and selection stand in six months. Only then can one make remotely plausible predictions about the future of HDM, and even those will be unreliable. We have absolutely no idea what Blu-Ray player sales have been (and will be) after the Warner announcement (and the likely Paramount and Universal announcements).

People seem to want instant gratification about the outcome of HDM, but that's just not possible.

That's probably because that someone probably did not spend $1000 - $3000 on HDTV. I myself spent $400 on a good 24 inch 1080P monitor (used LG S-PVA Panel) and paid $200 for HD-A20 that was on sale.

I chose this route because I found current display technology to be inferior or inconvenient (Plasma, LCD, rear-projection, computer projector, etc.) to CRT (I own 27 and 36 inch XBR series). The new Pioneer Plasma TV is an exception, it's quite good and comparable to CRT but I didn't see $6000 dollars worth of improvement over CRT.

My goal was to get a taste of HD, and see if I would get what I pay for before I jumped in full-force.

Over all, I just don't feel that HD was a quantum leap of an improvement compared to the past experience of going from VHS to DVD.

Back then, as the source material improved, so did the CRT display technology and it was a wonderful combination. But this time, the display technology took a step backward. (Yes, it's a bigger screen, but it's a bigger, crappy screen)

I chose HD-DVD over Blu-ray because not only was it better, but it was also cheaper. And I've enjoyed HD on my LCD display for sometime now.

But I find that I still prefer my CRT display - HD may have more detail, but the screen is quite pale and lifeless, lacking color, vibrance, and depth.

The conclusion I've drawn from my HD experiment is that I will wait until display quality improves further. When Pioneer drops to $1000 range, I may jump in fully.

I'm already accustomed to paying around $10 for a DVD. Most of my HD-DVD's were purchased near this price point and I have no intention of paying $20-$30 for a movie, HD or otherwise.

If HD-DVD is on its way out well, then I look forward to adding more HD-DVD movies at discounted prices - which I will be able to enjoy later on with a better display. Same codecs are used after all.

why bother...........

People go out and spent 2500 to 3000 for a tv but don't want to spent 400 to 500 for a blu-ray player.They want to wait until they hit 99.98 price point.You don't expect that 2500 to 3000 tv to hit 1000 to 1500 in the next couple months why would you expect blu-ray players to hit rock bottom prices in a few months.

As long as they have been making dlp,lcd and plasma sets there should be no reason for them to cost what they do.Before you call me a bly-ray fan boy I have had a A2 since they first come out.That I paid 500 for.

Actually, according to the fact that Vizio has been the top seller of HDTVs, most people don't go out and spend 2500 and 3000, they spend closer to 1000 where they can help it.

Naturally, they're not going to turn around to drop $400-500 for a decent Blu-ray player in mass number.

The assertions that everyone will jump on the train no matter the cost because Blu-ray's not the de facto HD disc standard, is gravely naive. They didn't do that for DVD, and won't now.

I am perplexed that people who think that someone who spends $1000-3000 on an HDTV during Holiday 2006 or 2007 will somehow find a $250-400 player prohibitively expensive during Holiday 2008, particularly now that there's a single format. Let's see where prices and selection stand in six months. Only then can one make remotely plausible predictions about the future of HDM, and even those will be unreliable. We have absolutely no idea what Blu-Ray player sales have been (and will be) after the Warner announcement (and the likely Paramount and Universal announcements).

People seem to want instant gratification about the outcome of HDM, but that's just not possible.

Of course not when serious competition no longer exists. Given BD supporting CEMs reluctance to seek a mass adoption price point, we have no data to suggest they'll suddenly start undercutting each other's price to seriously compete.

It's all $400-500 right now with the only competition being the brand name.

All these folks waiting for sub $200 players, do you just stay home all the time?.

Tickets, tailgating, beer, food for a typical Football game with the wife and a couple kids in tow will cost way more than what you people are crying about. Get real. And also remember that the majority of die hard fans are blue collar.

And how about a quality night out with a good meal and drinks afterwards with friends? Couple hundred right?

The point? Give folks are product they want and they'll find a way to budget it. Add confusion they'll stay away.

Single format is needed.

Fox just announced Predator for BD . . . $39.99

It's not the cost of the players . . it's the cost of the movies.

Fox just announced Predator for BD . . . $39.99

It's not the cost of the players . . it's the cost of the movies.

It will be cheaper that that. Thats the RRP. Since when have you ever paid RRP:rolleyes:

Two things, by the time the player hit 99 only Chinese (brands) will be able make money in the hardware.

Second, Sony sold 120 MILLION Playstation2 without the price ever hitting 99. It's still at $129 8 years after its launch.. This attitute is silly to say the lease.

It will be cheaper that that. Thats the RRP. Since when have you ever paid RRP:rolleyes:

You are forgetting who sells the most HDM titles . . BB. They will sell it for $34.99.

The whole world does not shop at Amazon.

All these folks waiting for sub $200 players, do you just stay home all the time?.

Tickets, tailgating, beer, food for a typical Football game with the wife and a couple kids in tow will cost way more than what you people are crying about. Get real. And also remember that the majority of die hard fans are blue collar.

And how about a quality night out with a good meal and drinks afterwards with friends? Couple hundred right?

The point? Give folks are product they want and they'll find a way to budget it. Add confusion they'll stay away.

Single format is needed.


That was the argument Sony made for the PS3's original price point. "You'll work more hours to afford it! Over a year later, at least 3 PS3 revisions later sales are abysmal compared to that of the other gaming consoles.

Single format won't do it alone. Historical sales trends show the mass market tends to jump in at a $200 price point.

No one's going to work ridiculous overtime, miss meals, or seriously measure buying a $400-500 movie player against getting gas and paying the bills.

Two things, by the time the player hit only Chinese (brrands) will be able make money in the hardware.

Second, Sony sold 120 MILLION Playstation2 without the price ever hitting 99. It's still at $129 8 years after its launch.. This attitute is silly to say the lease.

Actually, I think you'll find that the highest number of PS2 sales came once it hit around $200.

Fox just announced Predator for BD . . . $39.99

It's not the cost of the players . . it's the cost of the movies.

So don't buy it. Lots of people will. And many know to wait for sales and BOGOs (both Amazon and BB do these from time to time). If they pay full SRP, then they aren't too smart.

So don't buy it. Lots of people will. And many know to wait for sales and BOGOs (both Amazon and BB do these from time to time). If they pay full SRP, then they aren't too smart.

Are you sure the BOGO's will continue now? Many have doubts that they will.

One member joking said it . . . The BOGO Format is history:D

I think BOGO will be extremely scarce and be reserved for movies-that-can't-sell category only. :(

BOGOs will continue. Since HD DVD is, for the most part, out of the picture and pretty much lying in state, the bigger picture is now Blu Ray getting the SD crowd to make the switch. I'm sure lots of promotions and BOGOs will be offered to do just that.

And speaking of MSRP prices, here's a bit o' news I discovered. Let's see. $29.95 for this jewel of a classic, or $39.99 for Predator. Hard decision.

In a late-breaking announcement, City Lights says it will bring the star-studded religious satire 'The Ten' to HD DVD this month.

Despite an ensemble cast filled with big names including Winona Ryder, Jessica Alba, Paul Rudd, and Liev Schriber, 'The Ten' barely rated a theatrical release this past August, eventually earning less than $1 million at the domestic box office.

'The Ten' marks the first high-def release from indie City Lights Home Entertainment, which will debut the title on HD DVD January 15, day-and-date with the standard DVD.

Tech specs for the high-def version include 1080p video (1.85:1 widescreen), with Dolby Digital-Plus 5.1 Surround audio. There are no announced supplemental features.

Retail for the HD DVD is $29.95.

Sony PS2 never reached $99, because it was a monopoly. No one but Sony alone made PS2.

Blu-ray, no matter how Sony puts a spin on its format, is a monopoly. It's a Sony movie, fabricated at Sony disc factories, played on Sony players. (Movies you must re-buy God forbid, should you scratch the disc! And no no no, you CAN NOT back-up your movies, Sony doesn't allow it. And you must pay... *quite a bit more* for these privileges. )

Umm.. heh. No thanks.

J6P does not = poor people or not financially stable. FYI. ;)


that is correct, my father is one of them. However, spending $300 on a BD player is something that's unfathomable for him. (although he owns multiple houses, two of which are mansions).

Sony PS2 never reached $99, because it was a monopoly. No one but Sony alone made PS2.

Blu-ray, no matter how Sony puts a spin on its format, is a monopoly. It's a Sony movie, fabricated at Sony disc factories, played on Sony players. (Movies you must re-buy God forbid, should you scratch the disc! And no no no, you CAN NOT back-up your movies, Sony doesn't allow it. And you must pay... *quite a bit more* for these privileges. )

Umm.. heh. No thanks.

Ummm, you do know that there are companies other than Sony that are involved in Blu Ray, don't you? Samsung, Panasonic, Pioneer, Sharp, etc. As for a monopoly, Toshiba pretty much had that in the bag with HD DVD, didn't they? Who else, other than Microsoft, had any interest in that format?

that is correct, my father is one of them. However, spending $300 on a BD player is something that's unfathomable for him. (although he owns multiple houses, two of which are mansions).

I'm impressed. :rolleyes:

Well..now the only monopoly is Sony...

They [Sony] spent there way to victory with strategic investments, a good marketing plan and a great product... They were riding that Beta monkey on their back that folks always reminded them of. That failure that always hung over their head.. They planned and executed and despite being an average of over 2X the cost of HD DVD players (and not even fully spec'd) AND implementing an entirely new game format int he processess, they knocked Toshiba out cold. Kudos to them. They earned it!

So now that's established, lets roll out more films!!!!

All these folks waiting for sub $200 players, do you just stay home all the time?.

Tickets, tailgating, beer, food for a typical Football game with the wife and a couple kids in tow will cost way more than what you people are crying about. Get real. And also remember that the majority of die hard fans are blue collar.

And how about a quality night out with a good meal and drinks afterwards with friends? Couple hundred right?

The point? Give folks are product they want and they'll find a way to budget it. Add confusion they'll stay away.

Single format is needed.
I think you are missing the boat on this one. Upconverting standard DVD's look almost as good as an HD DVD. Sorry, but there just isn't that much difference that is worth $400.00 to most people.

I'm impressed. :rolleyes:

What I'm trying to say (since you clearly missed the point by a mile) is that even people with money can be considered J6P in the context of HT buff. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

badboi,

If there is true competition within Blu-ray, then the price of Blu-ray players and its movies should drop. Time will tell.

I won't be holding my breath tho. (Here's a hint: Sony is losing $$$ for every PS3 Blu-ray players sold and they've sold millions. I wonder how they will make that back?)

I think you are missing the boat on this one. Upconverting standard DVD's look almost as good as an HD DVD. Sorry, but there just isn't that much difference that is worth $400.00 to most people.

exactly! :o

Flat screen plasmas and LCDs are flying off the shelves and have been for the last 2-3 years. Yet the prices continue to drop at an alarming rate. Is BluRay any different?
I continue to read uninformed and negative posts about whats going to happen with BluRay software and hardware and it clear to me that some of you are either negative by nature, or just don't have a clue about how business and specifically the consumer electronics business operates.
I also think there are some conspiracy theorists in our midst.

Lastly, Sony does not have a monopoly on anything. They will get licensing fees but the other manufacturers and studios are free to sell their products for whatever price they like.

Upconverting standard DVD's look almost as good as an HD DVD.

Good lord! :eek: You mean this whole time I could have enjoyed my movies on an $89 upconverting dvd player and had skipped the whole HD sham? Why didn't someone tell me earlier? :mad:

Like a lot of people, I'm not going to be buying Blu-Ray until they have a feature-complete (Profile 2.0) player in that same price range that's powerful enough to load the complex Java discs (Disney stuff) at a reasonable speed (the over 2 minute load times on current Blu-Ray players isn't even remotely close to reasonable... my computer boots up faster than that). And it's not that it's because of HD DVD I'm in this position. If HD DVD hadn't existed, I'd be thinking the same thing. (I was even using the same logic in going format neutral).


+1

...and regarding price... I've been into home theater for years. To me, the whole HDM represents an upgrade path, not a revolution. I originally got an HD DVD player because of the price and its ability to be a solid up-converting player. That was expected to allow me to transition to what I hoped to be a mostly HD viewing experience (format war be damned!).

It just so happens I was planning on upgrading my projector to HD, which I did after I got the player. My next step would have been to upgrade my receiver to one that can handle HDMI for the hi-rez audio. Since my current AVR was at the $1500 price-point when I got it, I was shooting for the same level of quality. That ugrade was scheduled for summer-ish.

The point is getting into HD or BluRay is not as simple as plug-n-play into your current system.

Now the player will most likely go back (holiday return policy), and I will wait for a solid, 2.0 BluRay player that can up-convert without artifcating AND give me some level of transitioning on the sound (i.e. solid down-rezing of the sound). That will allow me to take my time and upgrade my reciever. The player does not need to be $99, but I do not expect to pay $500 given all the other factors with making the investment into this for of HDM.

By the way, I spent $250 on a pansonic RP-56 back in the day. It will go back into service in the HT. With that investment I was not concerned on it being a throw-away AND the quality improvement was instantly perceivable.

You are forgetting who sells the most HDM titles . . BB. They will sell it for $34.99.

The whole world does not shop at Amazon.

Online shopping is a must for any HDM collector. Why spend more at the retail stores when you can buy from the likes of amazon, play.com, sendit.com to name but a few.

Actually, up-converting players do a pretty good job.

b4z,

There is plenty of information available from the following forum:

**Industry Insiders Master Q&A thread IV: ONLY Questions to Insiders**

Draw your own conclusions.

people waiting on a 100.00 blu-ray player are only denying their self of that format.

I know, I know! I'm so mean to myself. On the other hand, I'm thankful to myself for giving myself more money to buy gas with!

Online shopping is a must for any HDM collector. Why spend more at the retail stores when you can buy from the likes of amazon, play.com, sendit.com to name but a few.

True . . . but the facts say that more HDM's are sold by B&M's versus Etailers. Can't argue with the facts.;)

So don't buy it. Lots of people will. And many know to wait for sales and BOGOs (both Amazon and BB do these from time to time). If they pay full SRP, then they aren't too smart.

BR: "BOGOs? BOGOs? We don't need no stinkin' BOGOs!!"

[QUOTE=gerrylum;12753406]I still think it's very up in the air if the HD-DVD based Chinese players will ever catch on in China. I don't think we've seen any evidence for that so far.
QUOTE]

Are you serious! First of all AFAIK the Chinese HD players are not even on the market yet (which explains why you have not seen evidence of their popularity) and second the Chinese government is not going to allow any other format to be compete with their proprietary (based on HD-DVD) HDM format, so forget about BD getting any foothold in China. The Chinese economy is the fastest growing in the world and the Chinese equivalent of J6P will easily be able to afford a player and a nice digital TV (probably even subsidized by the government). Anyone who thinks the Chinese HDM format will not be big in that country is just being ridiculously naive. It would not surprise me to see India follow the Chinese model and then you would have a total HD-DVD population base of 2 BILLION people! There is no way the more expensive BD players/movies can compete with HD-DVD in those two markets. So we may see the rest of the world enjoying affordable and reliable HD-DVD while the US, Europe and Japan suffer with overpriced BD!

I think you are missing the boat on this one. Upconverting standard DVD's look almost as good as an HD DVD. Sorry, but there just isn't that much difference that is worth $400.00 to most people.


Uhhhh.....No I'm not. I base this on having a Denon 5910, A-2 and a PS3.

No comparison. Period.

Uhhhh.....No I'm not. I base this on having a Denon 5910, A-2 and a PS3.

No comparison. Period.
You are talking only about yourself, not others.

Actually, up-converting players do a pretty good job.

I've seen the output from an upconverting DVD player and while it works, you can still see a slight "softness" in details on movies that show a lot of sharp background details like Disney/Pixar's Cars and Ratatouille and the Extended Editions of the Lord of the Rings movies.

I've seen the Blu-ray release of Cars and the sharpness and clarity of the background details is breathtaking. :) This is especially true if your widescreen display is 50" or larger.

Good lord! :eek: You mean this whole time I could have enjoyed my movies on an $89 upconverting dvd player and had skipped the whole HD sham? Why didn't someone tell me earlier? :mad:

I "almost" did! Guess I did a "pretty good job" of that, huh? http://charles-song.com/phpBB2/images/smiles/silly.gif

Many people have made the good point that increased sales will bring the cost down. My first (and only) stand-alone DVD player, the Sony DV7000 cost me almost $1000... 10 years ago-ish. Now, my computer's no-name internal DVD +/-R player gives me a better picture--for $30. You can got to Fred Meyers and buy one of those Coby progressive scan DVD players for $40.

Blu-Ray (or HD-DVD) will be no different. Why should it? Sony is just following their classic price-structure... premium price at and near release, then dropping both build quality and price as the years progress to appeal to the mass market once the early-adopters/hardcore enthusiasts have been satisfied. In 8-10 years, Coby will have a tiny Blu-ray and/or HD-DVD player selling for $40 at Fred Meyer, and the new media will have phased out the old by then.... and the mass market will neither notice or particularly care, but will simply buy it because that's what's there.

im waiting for 249 or less profile 2.0, unless profile 2.x is announced, then ill continue to wait.

Altho If a really good sale comes on a solid 1.1 player I might jump in early, im talking 99 or less though.

Flat screen plasmas and LCDs are flying off the shelves and have been for the last 2-3 years. Yet the prices continue to drop at an alarming rate. Is BluRay any different?
I continue to read uninformed and negative posts about whats going to happen with BluRay software and hardware and it clear to me that some of you are either negative by nature, or just don't have a clue about how business and specifically the consumer electronics business operates.
I also think there are some conspiracy theorists in our midst.

Lastly, Sony does not have a monopoly on anything. They will get licensing fees but the other manufacturers and studios are free to sell their products for whatever price they like.

You just contradicted yourself there :D

I've seen the output from an upconverting DVD player and while it works, you can still see a slight "softness" in details on movies that show a lot of sharp background details like Disney/Pixar's Cars and Ratatouille and the Extended Editions of the Lord of the Rings movies.

I've seen the Blu-ray release of Cars and the sharpness and clarity of the background details is breathtaking. :) This is especially true if your widescreen display is 50" or larger.
Which has more to do with the transfer more so then just a format :D

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)

I paid $700 on my first Toshiba DVD player. Pretty much featureless and was replaced in a couple of years with a much better and cheaper player that would play all my DVDs

Uhhhh.....No I'm not. I base this on having a Denon 5910, A-2 and a PS3.

No comparison. Period.

I completely agree. It should bother anyone to know there is a superior version of a movie (in everyway), yet they are watching the inferior version.

I originally supported both, but I will feel relieved when one format becomes defacto. I think that most of the public that was waiting on the wings for the war to end will jump in when all indications show that one format is solid. I think in the next year BD will get stronger and stronger. Cheaper players will come out and we will see a standard.

If people want it they will pay what ever the going price is. The Wii is still selling like hotcakes and most for more than the MSRP of 250 bucks.

Most people who don't own either format (that I have talked to) tend to think BD is superior...rightly so or not. I think I see the writing on the proverbial wall. Especially after this latest round of announcements.

It is not only cheaper players but we need disks at the same or only slightly higher costs than SD disks. If this does not happen soon HD in any format will never really take off. The hour is getting late all one has to do is look at the economic news. The music companies hurt themselves with DRM and the film companies are doing the same. High prices and greed looses customers in the long run.

+1

Blu-ray has to compete with upscaling players adn HD downloads. As of right now the general public has chosen upscalers to go with their HDTVs, and they are quite happy with them.

Why would someone drop $400 and replace their whole DVD library just to watch Blu-ray on their 37 inch 720p TV?

Great point about the upscalers, all HD-DVD players are great upscalers too, only if Toshiba can market them as such....

Here's something that I think often gets overlooked on here with the whole $99 point of view.

Just how much did you spend on your first DVD player back in the day? ;)

$88 for the first DVD player

$170 for XBox 360 add on

BD boxes even close to that zero!

You make a lot of statements based on conjecture, but it's a forum so I'd expect no less.

Your making out the HDM market like its the life and death of studios. It's not. DVD sales will continue to outsell HDM because there's not enough consumers out there who feel they need HDM. There's not even enough HDTV penetration to start with. Then you have to convince them it's better than their upconverting DVD player. Then you layout the players at $300 plus and discs costing 2x. Your potential market keeps shrinking while DVDs keep selling. Until the remaining studios see a potential for BD to overtake DVD in sales, why should they switch. The money's just not there yet, and may never be.

The point about the DVD's keep selling, there will be a lot of disenfranchised HD owners out there, that are not going to run out and get a BR player....they will be perfectly happy with what HD movies they have, and upscale their DVD's, when new titles come out, they will buy the DVD and upscale them too....moving another potential BR customer to DVD, increasing it's sales.....

I never thought there would be so much people content with upscaling DVD's on an A/V enthusiast forum.

Are you serious! First of all AFAIK the Chinese HD players are not even on the market yet

Yes, and it's not at all a certainty that they will EVER be on the market. There are no announced players, only vague plans.

and second the Chinese government is not going to allow any other format to be compete with their proprietary (based on HD-DVD) HDM format, so forget about BD getting any foothold in China.

Oh, so China is going to ban the PS3? Hmmm... somehow I doubt that. As much as people may not want to believe, the PS3 is a very effective trojan horse for Blu-Ray media.

The Chinese economy is the fastest growing in the world and the Chinese equivalent of J6P will easily be able to afford a player and a nice digital TV (probably even subsidized by the government). Anyone who thinks the Chinese HDM format will not be big in that country is just being ridiculously naive.

Here's where we agree. Although I believe the HDM format of choice will be blu-ray, thank in no small part to the likelyhood that the PS3 will be even half as popular in China as the PS2 was. That's going to be an installed userbase of millions of Blu-Ray players in the country. IMO, faced with those numbers, I would be surprised if we see any of these Chinese HD-DVD clones hit the market in any massed number.

I never thought there would be so much people content with upscaling DVD's on an A/V enthusiast forum.

I don't really think there is... but even hobbies have their segmentation ;)

J6P probably doesn't know about profiles and probably could care less about buying ring tones and other advertised products using the Ethernet connections. Profile 1.1 will be enough for the majority IMO.

Once prices drop, they will most likely adopt Blu-ray as their HDM player, which will happen here in the next 6 months or less.

All that J6P knows now is the HD DVD lost hugh studio support and Blu-ray is the new HDM format when they go to their local CE stores.

Also, not everyone has high speed Internet access to take advantage of being sold products and trinkets they don't need. They also can do this on the PC RIGHT NOW if they really wanted these EXTRAS.

I wonder what J6P has done when he needs a DVD-ROM to watch extras on the DVD on his PC ? Probably hasn't even looked at them because the majority doesn't care about bells and whistles but want to enjoy Hi Definition PQ/AQ on their new HDTV.

Yep, perhaps using other technologies besides BR.

I never thought there would be so much people content with upscaling DVD's on an A/V enthusiast forum.
Well, sometimes "good enough" is all some people crave when it comes to Hi Definition.

Those who enjoy true Hi Definition will always buy HDM discs and not settle for "good enough" of upconverting SD DVD's.

people waiting on a 100.00 blu-ray player are only denying their self of that format.

May be true, but they may also feel that what they have is good enough.

[QUOTE=gerrylum;12753406]I still think it's very up in the air if the HD-DVD based Chinese players will ever catch on in China. I don't think we've seen any evidence for that so far.
QUOTE]

Are you serious! First of all AFAIK the Chinese HD players are not even on the market yet (which explains why you have not seen evidence of their popularity) and second the Chinese government is not going to allow any other format to be compete with their proprietary (based on HD-DVD) HDM format, so forget about BD getting any foothold in China. The Chinese economy is the fastest growing in the world and the Chinese equivalent of J6P will easily be able to afford a player and a nice digital TV (probably even subsidized by the government). Anyone who thinks the Chinese HDM format will not be big in that country is just being ridiculously naive. It would not surprise me to see India follow the Chinese model and then you would have a total HD-DVD population base of 2 BILLION people! There is no way the more expensive BD players/movies can compete with HD-DVD in those two markets. So we may see the rest of the world enjoying affordable and reliable HD-DVD while the US, Europe and Japan suffer with overpriced BD!

Yeah, and maybe we can import some cool Chinese martial arts movies, as well as others....Don't forget, no region coding......

I never thought there would be so much people content with upscaling DVD's on an A/V enthusiast forum.

There is a SD DVD forum here where a lot of people talk about upscalers...

Yeah, and maybe we can import some cool Chinese martial arts movies, as well as others....Don't forget, no region coding......
Doesn't CH DVD use the AVS (Audio Visual Standard) compression codec though? Unless your HD DVD player supports this codec (which I don't believe any of the units on the market do - someone correct me if I'm wrong), none of those CH DVD discs will work on an HD DVD player despite the hardware being theoretically compatible.

The point about the DVD's keep selling, there will be a lot of disenfranchised HD owners out there, that are not going to run out and get a BR player....they will be perfectly happy with what HD movies they have, and upscale their DVD's, when new titles come out, they will buy the DVD and upscale them too....moving another potential BR customer to DVD, increasing it's sales.....

I think I read somewhere there were about a million or so disenfranchised people out there that had already said upscaled DVD is not good enough and want HDM. :)

HD-DVD can drop their prices to $50 and it still wont matter because the selection of movies are crap. Consumers will pick up their new $50 HD-DVD player and start buying movies only to realize that all the movies they want are only on Bluray. I have a HD-DVD player from the $99 Walmart special and have only watched four movies on it. Almost every movie I want to watch is on Bluray. I have a PS3 and HD-DVD player in the living room and a stand alone Bluray player in my bedroom.

I bought my standalone Sony Bluray player for $299 which I think is reasonable with 5 free movies. Heck I remember when my dad bought a Hi-fi VCR for $500 15 years ago.....

Yes, and it's not at all a certainty that they will EVER be on the market. There are no announced players, only vague plans.

The plans were only announced a couple months back - it takes time to bring a new product to market. It will happen - 100% guaranteed.

Oh, so China is going to ban the PS3? Hmmm... somehow I doubt that. As much as people may not want to believe, the PS3 is a very effective trojan horse for Blu-Ray media.

The PS3 will be a game-only player in China and since all China-made HDM movies will be HD-DVD there will be no demand for it to play movies, and no demand for BR movies at all.

Here's where we agree. Although I believe the HDM format of choice will be blu-ray, thank in no small part to the likelyhood that the PS3 will be even half as popular in China as the PS2 was. That's going to be an installed userbase of millions of Blu-Ray players in the country. IMO, faced with those numbers, I would be surprised if we see any of these Chinese HD-DVD clones hit the market in any massed number.


See above - the PS3 will not be a significant factor in BR ever becoming a player in China HDM, other than gaming. The Chinese HD-DVD clones will be THE HDM DVD format in China - that is already settled by government fiat. Or maybe you are planning a revolution?

I'm not sure I get this whole notion that there will not be mass adoption until there are sub $99 players. On what history are people making this assumption? It took many many years for DVD players to hit that price point, and by the time they did they were already mass market.

The PS3 will be a game-only player in China and since all China-made HDM movies will be HD-DVD there will be no demand for it to play movies, and no demand for BR movies at all.

I haven't seen anything about the PS3 being a game-only player in China. Do you have a link to back that up?

Since PS3 games are on blu-ray discs too, I don't see any reason why the PS3 couldn't be used to play movies as well.

The plans were only announced a couple months back - it takes time to bring a new product to market. It will happen - 100% guaranteed.

If I were a betting man, I'd hesitate before taking that bet. The bureaucratic red tape that the Chinese government is famous for could hold up that product for years. In the meantime, the PS3 isn't vaporware. It's real, and it's here now.

I'm not sure I get this whole notion that there will not be mass adoption until there are sub $99 players. On what history are people making this assumption? It took many many years for DVD players to hit that price point, and by the time they did they were already mass market.


Based on the history where DVD didn't hit mass adoption until there were $99 players on the market. It wasn't "mass market" until then.

I'm not sure I get this whole notion that there will not be mass adoption until there are sub $99 players. On what history are people making this assumption? It took many many years for DVD players to hit that price point, and by the time they did they were already mass market.

I think you just hit on a key point. The fact DVD totally smashed the $99 price barrier (a while ago) makes it that much harder for HD DVD or BD to become mainstream at significantly higher prices. It's a tough sell to people who don't own large HD displays because standard DVD is "good enough" for many if not most people.

Something that I have seen that some people have failed to mention is that you can upgrade the firmware on the BD players to accomidate any upgrades needed. I just went Blu after Warner made the announcement. Got my Samsung BD-P1400 player with a pricematch at BB for $299 with the 10 free movies. I do agree though that most people will not switch till prices come down to at least $200.00.

I think once Paramount and Universal clear out as much merchandise as they can.. you will see them clear out the rest of their inventory and switch to BD.

Something that I have seen that some people have failed to mention is that you can upgrade the firmware on the BD players to accomidate any upgrades needed.


I have yet to find an HD player that can't be firmware updated.

The price for Blu-Ray and the lack of profile 2.0 players is an obstacle for me. I beleive it will be for others as well. HDM is a luxury and not a need. HD-DVD was the first to make HDM affordable so I jumped in. Looks like I won't be jumping into Blu-Ray for a good while. In the meantime, there are still many HD-DVDs available to me. :D

Someone should bump this thread on Black Friday 2008 to see who was right and who was wrong. It is way too early be be predicting anything. There are few facts and there's even less perspective. Anyone categorically predicting something is almost certain to be wrong, particuarly if that person was predicting an HD-DVD landslide on Black Friday 2007 (remember the $99 Toshibas?), just a few months before HD-DVD (in all probability) died.

Someone should bump this thread on Black Friday 2008 to see who was right and who was wrong. It is way too early be be predicting anything. There are few facts and there's even less perspective. Anyone categorically predicting something is almost certain to be wrong, particuarly if that person was predicting an HD-DVD landslide on Black Friday 2007 (remember the $99 Toshibas?), just a few months before HD-DVD (in all probability) died.
Wait, aren't you the very person to make a prediction in this post?

Wait, aren't you the very person to make a prediction in this post?

I doubt it. And, if so, it probably wasn't categorial (I'm a big fan of waiting for some facts) and I certainly didn't predict an HD-DVD landslide. I'm fairly comfortable with my consistent prediction that Blu-Ray will follow the path of virtually every CE product in that it will get cheaper and better over time. And that holiday 2008 may be a very good time for Blu-Ray.

I heard that Sony bought favor of Warner Bros. with $500 million bribe. It is huge sum of money. I also heard that total number of standalone Blu-ray player sold so far is about 0.7 million units excluding PS-3.

With the $500 million that Sony gave to Warner., Sony can buy 1.7 million Blu-ray players! So, instead of giving the $500 million to Warner, why didn't Sony give 1.7 million Blu-ray players to consumers for free? 1.7 million free players will surely boost sales of Blu-ray disc, and ensure Sony's victory over Toshiba. without need to bribe Warner.

Or at least, Sony can subsidize price of their Blu-ray player by $150 per unit, lower price to be $150 (half of current price) for the cheapest Blu-ray player and give big boost to sales of their player. $500 million can do this magic for 3.3 million player units.

Additional $3.3 million units are about five times number of standalone Blu-ray player units sold so far. Isn't it large enough number to ensure their victory over Toshiba?

I heard that Sony bought favor of Warner Bros. with $500 million. It is huge sum of money. I also heard that total number of standalone Blu-ray player is about 0.7 million units excluding PS-3.

With the $500 million that Sony gave to Warner., Sony can buy 1.7 million Blu-ray players! So, instead of giving the $500 million to Warner, why didn't Sony give 1.7 million Blu-ray to consumers for free? 1.7 million free players will surely boost sales of Blu-ray disc, which will strengthen its position in this format war.

Or at least, Sony can subsidize price of their Blu-ray player by $150 per unit, lower price to be $150 (half of current price) for cheapest Blu-ray player and give big boost to sales of their player. $500 million can do this magic for 3.3 million player units. Additional $3.3 million unit is about 5 times number of standalone Blu-ray player units sold so far. Isn't it large enough number to ensure their victory over Toshiba?

i heard they bought warner for 200 billion dollars, and they gave FOX all rights to the playstation brand to keep them on board.

The Chinese HD-DVD clones will be THE HDM DVD format in China - that is already settled by government fiat. Or maybe you are planning a revolution?

IMHO: In Red-China it is the communist "government" that dictates the HDM format, in our western countries it is a CARTEL dictating what format the consumer has to adopt.

We (the consumer) DID NOT have the choice. The one format that 1.000.000 users bought into is getting phased-out BY A CARTEL.

Their method is to kill the format by starving it software-wise.

Now how can anybody dare saying "format war over - consumer decided".

It's the CARTEL that made the decision and that's making me angry. ;)

HD-DVD can drop their prices to $50 and it still wont matter because the selection of movies are crap. Consumers will pick up their new $50 HD-DVD player and start buying movies only to realize that all the movies they want are only on Bluray.

I believe the number of titles is still currently very close on both formats. This will likely change once Warner starts their exclusivity.. of course.. Paramount and Universal could step up releases.

The reality is.. NOBODY is going to pay $400 for a HDM player that has 400 some odd titles available.

Hmmm 50$ for 400-500 titles vs. $400 for 400-500 titles..

The actual movies available are subject to personal preference. Some might prefer Transformers over Spiderman 3.. which they did.. actually...

HD-DVD can drop their prices to $50 and it still wont matter because the selection of movies are crap. Consumers will pick up their new $50 HD-DVD player and start buying movies only to realize that all the movies they want are only on Bluray.

The selection of titles via HD DVD are far from crap my friend... :rolleyes:

The reality is.. NOBODY is going to pay $400 for a HDM player that has 400 some odd titles available.


WRONG !
Over 700,000+ have paid around $400 or more for a Blu-ray player.
Also, have you noticed that Amazon has 5 Blu-ray players in the Top 25 DVD Player sold. Prior to Dec.2007, you would never see such a thing.
Looks like they appear to be selling and very well to thanks to the recent Warner/New Line exclusivity to Blu-ray.
There are also several Blu-ray titles in the Top 25 selling DVD's but no HD DVD's listed.

The selection of titles via HD DVD are far from crap my friend... :rolleyes:

Well, I guess they do have Blades of Glory for an exclusive.

If it wasn't for the Matrix trilogy, Bourne Trilogy, Transformers and a few other titles, I would have never bought my HD DVD player.
If I didn't enjoy Hi Defintion, I would have settled for upconverting but now that I'm use to great PQ/AQ of Hi Definition, it's hard to watch those movies in SD or upconvert.

HD-DVD can drop their prices to $50 and it still wont matter because the selection of movies are crap. Consumers will pick up their new $50 HD-DVD player and start buying movies only to realize that all the movies they want are only on Bluray. I have a HD-DVD player from the $99 Walmart special and have only watched four movies on it. Almost every movie I want to watch is on Bluray. I have a PS3 and HD-DVD player in the living room and a stand alone Bluray player in my bedroom.

I bought my standalone Sony Bluray player for $299 which I think is reasonable with 5 free movies. Heck I remember when my dad bought a Hi-fi VCR for $500 15 years ago.....

Which movies are not crap on Blu-ray? Dragon wars, the Spiderman movies, I can keep going on with crap hollywood movies!

WRONG !
Over 700,000+ have paid around $400 or more for a Blu-ray player.
Also, have you noticed that Amazon has 5 Blu-ray players in the Top 25 DVD Player sold. Prior to Dec.2007, you would never see such a thing.
Looks like they appear to be selling and very well to thanks to the recent Warner/New Line exclusivity to Blu-ray.
There are also several Blu-ray titles in the Top 25 selling DVD's but no HD DVD's listed.

How many bought a DVD player last year?

Also, Amazon is NO reflection of the current sales. Are you saying any Bluray title ever came close to any of the top 25 DVD releases (not amazon.. actual total volume)

The Chinese HD-DVD clones will be THE HDM DVD format in China - that is already settled by government fiat. Or maybe you are planning a revolution?That was the old days. :rolleyes:

WRONG !
Over 700,000+ have paid around $400 or more for a Blu-ray player.
Also, have you noticed that Amazon has 5 Blu-ray players in the Top 25 DVD Player sold. Prior to Dec.2007, you would never see such a thing.
Looks like they appear to be selling and very well to thanks to the recent Warner/New Line exclusivity to Blu-ray.
There are also several Blu-ray titles in the Top 25 selling DVD's but no HD DVD's listed.

Well since HD-DVD is dead and all lets take a look at amazon's top selling electronic devices today (January 16, 2008 at 5:14 PM CST):


Oh well look at that, the HD-A3 is ranked at number 7.

The HD-A35 is ranked 40.

And the Panny DMP-BD30K is ranked at.....81.

Well since HD-DVD is dead and all lets take a look at amazon's top selling electronic devices today (January 16, 2008 at 5:14 PM CST). Oh well look at that, the HD-A3 is ranked at number 7. The HD-A35 is ranked 40. And the Panny DMP-BD30K is ranked at.....81.
Go take a look at the Top 25 DVD players on Amazon. Yes, the HD DVD players are in the Top 10 but there are 5 Blu-ray players listed in the Top 25.

Also, you would think with all these new HD DVD player sales that HD DVD disc sales would be increasing but there is not ONE HD DVD listed in the Top 25 DVD sellers whereas there is at least 5 Blu-ray titles in that catagory.

From what I can tell, current HD DVD owners are purchasing the majority of the lower priced HD DVD players for a 2nd, 3rd or 4th player in their home.

Go take a look at the Top 25 DVD players on Amazon. Yes, the HD DVD players are in the Top 10 but there are 5 Blu-ray players listed in the Top 25.

Also, you would think with all these new HD DVD player sales that HD DVD disc sales would be increasing but there is not ONE HD DVD listed in the Top 25 DVD sellers whereas there is at least 5 Blu-ray titles in that catagory.

From what I can tell, current HD DVD owners are purchasing the majority of the lower priced HD DVD players for a 2nd, 3rd or 4th player in their home.

WOW... and to think this sale isn't even 48 hrs old :rolleyes:

Can someone show me where I can buy a brand spanking new HD DVD player for $99?

Thread rolled back. Please stay on topic. Sales figures discussions are restricted to the sales figures threads.

Can someone show me where I can buy a brand spanking new HD DVD player for $99?

If this is a serious question, then go to Ebay.

The significance of the Warner decision is that it will remove HD DVD from the marketplace. That's one important step to mass market adoption for HDM.

The second step involves content and price.

Blu-ray needs to expand its library significantly leading up to Q4 2008 and I'm sure that the studios are working on that very thing.

On price the OP is correct that $99 is a critical price point that will bring in a large wave of buyers. However I think it's more likely that by Q4 2008 you will see Blu-ray players at or below the $199 price point. $99 will have to wait for 2009.

I suppose we need to have some consensus on what constitutes 'mass market' but I would say that if we have a Blu-ray title that, by year end, has sold over 1 million copies, then that means HDM has a bright future.

On price the OP is correct that $99 is a critical price point that will bring in a large wave of buyers. However I think it's more likely that by Q4 2008 you will see Blu-ray players at or below the $199 price point.

I hope so.


I suppose we need to have some consensus on what constitutes 'mass market' but I would say that if we have a Blu-ray title that, by year end, has sold over 1 million copies, then that means HDM has a bright future.

..in the first week.

It has been some time since I last posted in this Forum. That’s because I had lost interest in HD on disks because the Great BluRay v. HD DVD Format War guaranteed that neither format could achieve critical mass until the other was no longer a factor. Until that happened I didn’t want to buy either format. With the recent announcement that another big content provider had dropped HD DVD it is starting to appear that BluRay will be the winner. But when?

There is an installed base of HD DVD players and media, new HD DVD player models continue to be MUCH cheaper than comparable BluRay players. This means to me that the War is far from over with no end in sight, even if the probable outcome is clearer now than it has been in the past.

Until and unless a consensus is reached concerning an industry standard HD disk format and the players needed to play that format are truly affordable, let’s say less than $200, HD disks are going nowhere it seems to me. In the meantime, I’ll stick with upconverted 480p.

EDIT: Typos corrected.

However I think it's more likely that by Q4 2008 you will see Blu-ray players at or below the $199 price point. $99 will have to wait for 2009.

I agree, but the $199 players will be 1.0. It'll be 2009 before we see a 1.1 for $199 and probably 2nd half 2009 before we see a 2.0 for that price (hopefully). Best bet is of course to buy a PS3 I suppose, but I still don't believe that's a mass-market machine. Of course the ignorant masses will most likel be happy with a $199 or $99 1.0 machine.

Sams club has the Toshiba HD-DVD players for $129 that includes an HDMI cable.

I agree, but the $199 players will be 1.0. It'll be 2009 before we see a 1.1 for $199 and probably 2nd half 2009 before we see a 2.0 for that price (hopefully). Best bet is of course to buy a PS3 I suppose, but I still don't believe that's a mass-market machine. Of course the ignorant masses will most likel be happy with a $199 or $99 1.0 machine.

The $199 players (assuming they arrive) will have to be at least profile 1.1 (or Bonus View) capable, meaning they will play all the PiP features and anything else that makes use of the secondary video decoder.

I was thinking of models along similar lines to the Funai BD player:

Hot on the heels of Sony'sfirst sub-$200 internal Blu-ray Disc drive comes news from Funai of a sub-$300 standalone Blu-ray player.

The NB500 series will initially sell in the North American market from the second quarter of 2008, and will support BonusView. Though Funai say that their player "will allow consumers to fully enjoy the Blu-ray Disc HD experience" there are no specifications yet to suggest just how feature-packed the player will be.
http://www.hdtvuk.tv/2008/01/ces_2008_funai.html

Funai press release here: http://www.funai.us/bluRayDiscFunai.aspx

I would hope that by Q4 all the old profile 1.0 players will have been cleared from the retail channels (they'll still appear on eBay of course).

The $199 players (assuming they arrive) will have to be at least profile 1.1 (or Bonus View) capable, meaning they will play all the PiP features and anything else that makes use of the secondary video decoder.


I was thinking the $199 players would most likely be the 1.0 players being cleared off/discontinued.

Since $199 is 1/2 price (more or less) of the cheapest 1.1 players on the market now I think it's wishful thinking that either the current ones will be selling for half as much this year (short of a black friday deal) or a new $199 model will be introduced, although maybe the funai player will force prices of 1.1 players down.

I've been surprised before though and that's all speculation on my part.