Warner Bros. On Board With BLU-RAY - Page 11  

Well, then I guess they are drinking champagne and congratulating eachother with their latest string of luck among the Toshiba executives.

So, if/when Universal and Microsoft (if MMC/iHD in 'some form' is included) also choose to back Blu-ray, they'll order the lobster too? :rolleyes:

XBox360 will almost surely be a succes like it's predecessor.

The PS/3 will almost surely be a succes like it's predecessors.

Some like the games that are available with the XBox the best and some like the PS games the best and they will choose their next console accordingly (but not all ofcourse), whether it's available in spring2006 or fall2006.

And how will the succes of the XBox360 (sans HD-DVD) help Toshiba/HD-DVD? Or are you more interested in the potential damage done to sales of PS/3 and Sony, than you are interested in the future prospect of HD/HD-DVD?

Well, it sounds like Time Warner may actually hurt Blu-Ray rather than help it, but I still don't know if it's going to matter.

Consumers want Blu-Ray. Why else would major studios be jumping from supporting HD-DVD to supporting both? However, consumers don't want major studio movies in HD on 9 Gb discs. I'm not going to watch Batman Begins in HD with only 9 Gbs. I don't care how good their VC-9 compression is. How many 9Gb discs is it going to take for one season of The Sopranos? :rolleyes:

I really sounds like Warner is half way there, but they're not willing to support Blu-Ray in all of its glory. Not only does it muddy up Blu-Ray, it muddies up the consumer market for Warner Bros. content.

Let's hope WB wanted BD9 for music!?

maybe WB is doing a "superbit" thingy of it's own. :lol

sell to early adopters in BD-9 format (at dirt cheap replication prices with royalties.)

rerelease discs in BRD format (same codecs but 3x bandwidth) a few years later when target audience is much higher for alot more sales and hype.

WOOO HOOO

Please correct me if I am wrong, but I thought your previous position about HD-DVD having support for red laser 9 was that it was a positive thing because it could be used for extras, or something like that. This was when Warner was on the HD-DVD side completely. Now that they have added BluRay support with similar specs for a red laser 9 it seems that your position about Warner and 9GB disks has changed completely from that Warner might use it for extras to that they might use it exclusively for whole movies. Am I wrong?

--Darin

Oh not at all. I think HD DVD-9 is a wonderful solution as there are a lot of movies/extras that I don't want to pay a penny more for and such, would be perfectly fine on HD DVD-9. And it is good that BD has added it. It is not public information but a year ago we pushed very hard for BD-9 also. And if the two groups had not deviated at logica/software/copy protection layers, that would have been a “unified†format that played in both players! Alas, BD companies did not want to hear about because there would be no new patent train at the physical layer. So it didn’t go anywhere.

My beef is that BD lovers here used to chastise HD DVD just because they dared to allow HD DVD-9. And that by doing so, they were giving studios the option to "lower quality". Now they come and celebrate this? What is left of BD these days anyway if the physical format is no longer BD or has high capacity, at least with respect to Warner content? And what is to stop the rest of the studios from going to this cheaper option, especially if they can lower their risk, cost, and avoid having Sony make discs for them? Remember, no replicator may be ready to make BD-25 discs early next year and any price caps probably comes with strings attached from s-company (i.e. use their plant).

The other point is that getting Warner on board with BD-9 does nothing to resolve the doubt around cost and manufacturability of BD. If anything, it shows that they see serious problems with even BD-25. Otherwise, why push for BD-9?

Now let’s look at HD DVD situation. They already have HD DVD-9. But they also have HD-DVD 15 and 30. All at very low cost and below BD-25. They don’t have the huge step in risk and cost between BD-9 and BD-25 which may send most studios toward BD-9.

In other words, BD may have opened Pandora’s box here. Warner may have the last laugh on this if the bulk of BD content becomes BD-9. Think about it!

Amir

Reminds me of a quote from Yes(Prime?) Minister. UK would join EU because it is easier to derail EU from inside ... :D

Truth is consumers are perfectly happy with DVD. They are not clamoring for anything more ... either BR or BD-9. What you say is true of videophiles, though.

LOL :D

How about the episode when the Prime Minister was pursuaded to buy the Trident nuclearmissiles - not as part of defense against the Sovjetunion, oh no, but against the French! :p

Best political satire ever (apart from real life some would say ;) ).

Same with VHS - it took a couple of years before DVD wasn't considered an 'exclusive' product and in the meantime, most people were happy with VHS, though everybody knew of that formats shortcomings...

Blu-ray/HD-DVD will take a couple of years to become mainstream as well I guess...

Amir, what exactly though are you getting at? Don't you think Keith would know whether or not BD-9 is finished? Also Amir unless I am greatly mistaken I believe that several months ago you said that it would be easy to make BD-9. If it is easy to make I would love to hear why you are now so skeptical of it.


Amir, I think most people are celebrating the prevention of a format war and not that BD-9 is now possible. Personally I would have preferred not to have BD-9 but if it can help prevent a format war I can understand why the BDA agreed to it.


Amir, weren't you the same one that was defending against similar accusations about HD-DVD-9 only a few months ago? Blu-ray will be capable of going up to 50 GB so the potential of the format is a lot better than HD-DVD. Also after trying to spread doubt about 50 GB discs you are going to go after 25 GB discs?

Amir, you must be getting really desperate at this point and the fact that you had to use two conditional phrases in the last sentence of this paragraph is somewhat funny. Let me give it a go: HD-DVD may be flammable and is perhaps a carcinogenic substance as well. Of course this is a joke but to be blunt Amir I think it is not that different than the accusations you are now making.


Amir, three conditional phrases? This is actually worse than your sentence with two conditional phrases.

We will have to wait to see this turns out to be like vhs-dvd or cd-sacd.

My guess is it will be like (sd)TV-HDTV ... slow but steady change, which will take 5 or 6 six years to become mainstream.

Yes, I am inclined to agree. CD-SACD was a non-starter because there was also CD-DVD/A. VHS-DVD moved as rapidly as it did because most of the existing/installed television base could tell an immediate difference.

BR-DVD will rely on the HDTV installed base to see a difference, and that installed base is still only a small pervcentage of the total.

This, of course, depends upong two things:

1. A protracted format war between BR and HD-DVD would start to smell a bit like SACD vs. DVD/A
2. The availability of HD over analog outputs - if not, then a significant portion of the installed HDTV base will see no benefit.

Simon

I don't think sacd/dvd-a failed because there were two formats ... but because they offered no apparent quality difference and there was no convinience feature above cd. In the end consumers preferred mp3 - a low-fi fomat with great convinience features. Infact if you apply your vhs-dvd logic to cd/sacd you will see why sacd/dvd-a failed.

I think apart from analog input hd owners will not see a big difference, it will infuriate them that they have been singled out and excluded from the benefits of hidef dvd ... I think this indefensible "descrimination" could delay hidef dvd adoption much more than all the other things ...

Just imagine what can a poor CC/BB salesman say when asked why full rez can't be had on analog inputs .... they will have to either lie or blame the studios.

The issue isn't just analog, there are DVI devices like my Sanyo PLV-70 which don't support HDCP. Of course, that's easily solved with a magic box. :)

I disagree about mp3. I can hear a HUGE difference on my system between a 128kpbs or 192kpbs MP3 and a CD. Also, 5.1/7.1 mastered audio sounds better than matrixed audio IMHO.

If consumers were happy with mp3, DVD's wouldn't need DTS/Dolby. Clearly, people can tell the difference. A listening test with a burned mp3 CD vs a DVD-A will solve the problem real quick.

Thats true. Even my Dell 3200 does not do hdcp.

As a "former" audiophile, obviously I'm not argueing that mp3 sounds same as cd or dvd-a. My analysis is that J6P didn't think CD required any improvement at all. I'm not sure most people even heard about SACD/DVD-A ... let alone try it out and then decide that the difference was not worth it. Most people (I think) understand that mp3 is somewhat lower quality than CD ... but given the convinience they couldn't care less.

So, even though sacd and mp3 were not competetors per se .... in the battle for the new audio format mp3 won over sacd/dvd-a.

Like I've said before, we will have to see whether hidef dvd or divx wins the battle for next video format.

I don't think DVD-A improves upon CD in terms of the quality of each channel. I think the main advantage of the DVD formats is multichannel sound with digitally separated channels. A better soundfield tends to be more impressive, and the LFE channel, if used properly, tends to be more impressive than depending on crossover for everything.

Of course, I'm not an audiophile in the truest sense, and many people prefer Stereo.

Around Y2K when we were discussing SACD/DVD-A, audiophiles uniformly liked SACD and hated DVD-A (audioasylum archives would be a good reference). I've always done 2-ch ... BTW, 196/24 using MLP should sound better than CD (never heard dvd-a myself ...).

Right. This whole "push to high-def" thing is just a figment of our imaginations. ;)

Wouldn't everybody who buys an HDTV be considered a "videophile"? I've never understood the difference between a "videophile" and someone who simply wants a better picture quality (ie HDTV from SDTV).

Anyway, how did we get off topic talking about the differences between mp3, cd, sacd, and dvd-a? May I suggest we get back on topic?

Amir, are you saying that WB is going to produce BD-9 only releases? Full movies? Don't beat around the bush. You seemed to imply it. I just want to see if you can back up your claims. Please don't tell me to wait and see either. You made the implication already. You obviously know something here that we don't. Why should I have to wait to see what happens?

Our imaginations & ideologies here don't match that of mass-market.

Alot of people buy HDTVs for sports and 'cause they want "large TVs" not cause they want videophile discs with movies (ie. BRD/HD-DVD). I know several HDTV owners who have non-progressive scan DVD players and who purchased that only out of pressure from kids, etc. They were fine with cable broadcasting.

Well, I suppose you're right. How could I possibly assume that any one of us here could even remotely be considered a part of the mass market? :rolleyes:

When are we going to start understanding that we ARE a part of the mass market. I absolutely HATE that most people here like to think we're somehow "better" than the average consumer. Just because they don't participate on this forum, doesn't mean that they're stupid "joe six packs".

In fact, I think this forum is an exact REFLECTION of the mass market.

Yeah, there's always going to be people in the mass market who don't give a rip about HDTV. But, I have yet to talk to anyone using DVDs that says, "you know, this whole DVD thing is over-rated. I wish we could have just stuck with VHS. I really don't see the benefits of DVD over VHS." :rolleyes:

^^ you're right we're not "better than average consumers" but I'm not going to bury my head in the sand and pretend what we value matches normal people and the bulk of buying power. Mass market DID see DVD benefits over VHS. They also recognized MP3 benefits over CD, SACD and DVD-Audio. It's unlikely they'll do the same anytime soon with up priced HD platters imho.

We are overjubilant zealots here (not that there is anything wrong with that) :)

BD-9 now exists because of WB, why else would they want it? Just for extras? I don't think so.

This is exactly the kind of ivory tower / elitist attitude that made people in the old days certain that sacd/dvd-a will replace CDs in a couple years ... Those who don't learn from history are bound to repeat it.

Even within AVSForum, few people come and post in these hidef dvd threads. So, to think that we represent the mass market is not correct.

So, I guess, HDTV penetration is 100% :p

Music. Movie extras. Interactive media. That's just to name a few.

I thought maybe they just wanted to keep their options open for cheaper media if the content didn't require more data. If Blu-Ray is going to be this end-all product, perhaps they're thinking along the lines of more than just movies.

All this is speculation. That's why I wanted to hear Amir back up his claims.

Warner sees 'red' for high-def DVD
Technology includes low cost, high quality, limited capacity.
By Daniel Frankel 9/13/2002
http://www.videobusiness.com/index.a...9&catType=NEWS

No, it's probably not 100% here either, but I digress.

In fact, what happens, is that the masses buy their HDTV's and THEN come here. There have been a LOT of new faces around here lately. And I'd say that less than 1% of the total members here have anything to do with the HDTV industry other than on the consumer side.

Nevermind. Appearently, that article is over 3 years old.

Yes ... some people come here after / before they buy HDTV to look for suggestions etc. Most J6P don't do any kind of home work before buying.

So, to say that this forum is exact REFLECTION of the mass market is exactly the opposite of truth. This forum is an outlier in statistical terms.

Members: 181,097

I'd wager alot of "members" check here BEFORE they buy their HDTVs then disappear unless there is a problem or time to upgrade something :D

Again, the masses might buy a HDTV, have a VCR connected via CH3, the TV set to stretch everything wide, DVD player in 4x3 mode connected via yellow RCA (composite video cord), a $99 surround system and 4 remotes on top of the TV all which are required to watch TV then DVD then go back to TV. Until they get rid of all that a HD/BRD player is not making inroads even with video games.

This news is published in another thread :

They got that through a couple of important concessions from Blu-ray. The format will now include a low-cost red-laser option that will allow studios to create a Blu-ray version of the DVD-9, a “BD9.†Cardwell said that since the costs of manufacturing blue-laser-based Blu-ray discs “are unknown to us,†Warner wanted to ensure there was some level of expenses the studio could more accurately project.

The option is essentially the same one Warner proposed to both the Blu-ray and HD DVD camps more than three years ago, but which Blu-ray previously rejected.

The studio plans to use the red-laser option for shorter programs that don’t require all the storage capacity of a blue-laser disc or for budget-priced titles that might not justify the higher costs.

http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6276046.html

I guess I stand corrected.