[hyteckit]

Originally Posted by analogue SPRINKLES 

I don't see anyone saying that.

The only sense of urgency is if you can return as much HD-DVD stuff as you have even if you just buy BR in 6 months.

Any why you still obsessed with thinking all BR players are $500 when they are $300?

I have until end of January to return my HDDVD player. Am I going to? No. It's less than $200 for a Hidef player. Netflix has over 400 HDDVD titles for rent. So the PS3 is $400 now.

Financially, it makes more sense for me to keep my $170 HDDVD player. Use it for a year or two to watch Hidef movies and HDDVD exclusives. Then when Bluray players drop below $200, I might just grab one.

$370 - Total out of pocket keeping my HDDVD and buying a $200 Bluray in a year or two. Less risk, cause if Bluray doesn't make it, it's $170 lost just for the HDDVD player.

$400 - Return $170 HDDVD player and buy a PS3 for $400. Run risk of losing $400 if both format dies.

[Oversoul]

Live from Toshiba's CES press conference - Engadget

Toshiba really sounds like they were unprepared for this. After canceling their press conference and then rescheduling it, they still only spent 5 minutes total on discussing the HD DVD format (with two of those minutes regurgitating their earlier press release). No real response, just positive spin. No Q&A afterwards.

What really surprises me is that their pie chart shows Toshiba's brand share of HDM hardware is only 49.3%, even excluding PS3 numbers (as they always do).

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Originally Posted by hyteckit 

I have until end of January to return my HDDVD player. Am I going to? No. It's less than $200 for a Hidef player. Netflix has over 400 HDDVD titles for rent. So the PS3 is $400 now.

Financially, it makes more sense for me to keep my $170 HDDVD player. Use it for a year or two to watch Hidef movies and HDDVD exclusives. Then when Bluray players drop below $200, I might just grab one.

$370 - Total out of pocket keeping my HDDVD and buying a $200 Bluray in a year or two. Less risk, cause if Bluray doesn't make it, it's $170 lost just for the HDDVD player.

$400 - Return $170 HDDVD player and buy a PS3 for $400. Run risk of losing $400 if both format dies.

Nobody is holding a gun to your head. Keep it if you want as it doesn't make any difference to us.

[PaperNotes]

Originally Posted by Eug 

P.S. The new DVD Player.app in Leopard has very, very good upscaling. I'm impressed. Unfortunately, I'm not keen on using a computer for general DVD playback either.

I was going to comment on how good it is. I stuck Highlander in as a test because my copy is a very early DVD that has a not very perfect digital transfer. Well in the new Leopard DVD player the disc has been given new life. The image is sharp and has very good contrast and color. For comparison's sake stick the same DVD in Vista and play it with Windows Media Center. It's drab.

[jokell82]

Originally Posted by Oversoul 

Live from Toshiba's CES press conference - Engadget

Toshiba really sounds like they were unprepared for this. After canceling their press conference and then rescheduling it, they still only spent 5 minutes total on discussing the HD DVD format (with two of those minutes regurgitating their earlier press release). No real response, just positive spin. No Q&A afterwards.

What really surprises me is that their pie chart shows Toshiba's brand share of HDM hardware is only 49.3%, even excluding PS3 numbers (as they always do).

Toshiba never canceled their press conference???

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Originally Posted by Lateralus 

How many times are you going to post about people returning HD-DVD items?

I think I am up to 3 now. What is the MacNN official limit?
If there is a news report next week about it can I post it or am I overlimit?

In the 99 pages of this thread I don't think anyone posted the same question more than once. It is 99 pages of original comments here baby!

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Originally Posted by jokell82 

Toshiba never canceled their press conference???

HD DVD group cancels CES press conference in wake of Warner announcement: daaamn - Engadget HD

[Oversoul]

Originally Posted by jokell82 

Toshiba never canceled their press conference???

That's not how the press is spinning it. Toshiba canceled their originally scheduled press conference and rescheduled. I think its a fair enough assessment.

HD DVD Promo Group Cancels CES Press Conference

HD DVD group cancels CES press conference in wake of Warner announcement: daaamn

[PaperNotes]

Originally Posted by mrtew 

Dude I really don't think that's what the movie companies care about. You don't need to be a genius to figure out that the goal of any corporation is to reduce the number of people on the payroll as much as possible. I'd be nice if they cared about people and the economy etc but in theory and in truth they only care about money, in fact legally a corporation's primary duty is to maximize profits.

Dude, they care a lot because when unemployment figures rise the stock market gets hurt by that news every time. Higher unemployment and instability on the stock market equals low consumer confidence and lower consumer spending. Everyone gets hurt when retail and manufacturing gets hurt. Those are two of the cornerstones of a strong economy. Brick and mortar sales will always take precedence over digital sales, that's one of the reasons (bandwidth and piracy concerns too) that it took so long for music and film companies to come around to digital distribution.

[pooka]

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

When you get into the details of all the arguments against Blu-ray you will notice that it was from little minded people who had bought a Nintendo or an X-Box 360....

A console made them feel insecure about themselves. Rather sad.

Generalize much? You mean the little minded people that bought gaming consoles to.. you know.. play games? Games people WANT to play? Post that schedule of upcoming "gotta haves" for the ps3 again. The saddest thing about this "war" is that you've got people like me having to admit that MS made a better product/platform than Sony. But hey, keep reminding yourself and everyone else trying to ignore you that the PS3 is the greatest bluray devise on the market. Whatever makes you feel better about your $500 movie player.

[TETENAL]

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

Dude, they care a lot because when unemployment figures rise the stock market gets hurt by that news every time.

[Oversoul]

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

Dude, they care a lot because when unemployment figures rise the stock market gets hurt by that news every time. Higher unemployment and instability on the stock market equals low consumer confidence and lower consumer spending.

I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree with you there. If a movie studio or a B&M cuts 50, 500, or even a thousand people from their payroll, it'll barely register as a blip in the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, NYT, etc. Besides, a company acting in its own self interest will not think, will our firing of a department signal other companies to do the same? The answer to that is that other companies may or may not follow suit. Their bottom line is going to guide their decision, and for each company respectively. Even if every studio and B&M cut their payroll by the same amount, I doubt it'll even compare to the recent auto industry layoffs for example. And just because CompUSA is closing their doors does not spell the end of other B&Ms.

Brick and mortar sales will always take precedence over digital sales, that's one of the reasons (bandwidth and piracy concerns too) that it took so long for music and film companies to come around to digital distribution.

There will always be a market for entertainment, regardless of the format. Right now, my opinion stands that physical media is a better option over downloads but this may change in a few years when licensing, DRM issues, bandwidth and technologies have been worked out. If that happens, the resources (i.e. jobs) behind that market will merely shift. There may be some jobs cut in the process or there may be more jobs created. Those who lose their jobs will just move on to something else. Especially likely if a new industry emerges to replace the old paradigm. And really, in terms of physical media, they're all pressed overseas anyway; in terms of B&M stores, you're talking about mere retail and service industry jobs -- they'll find something else.

[goMac]

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

DRM is going nowhere so get used to it. All the companies shedding DRM for music sales are just doing so for public relations but it will be back because there's nothing wrong with it. It's the organised piracy clans who creating the whoopla against DRM because it makes their job harder.

Did you even read what I said or did you just start typing?

I am perfectly aware DRM for movies will probably go no where.

I also don't think you understand why DRM for music is going away. When the labels demanded DRM from Apple, they failed to foresee the problem of vendor lock in. As a result of their own demands, they allowed Apple to lock in a huge percentage of the market to iPods, and gave Apple a lot of power. Now the music companies are trying to retake that power in the music market. They can't simply switch DRM formats because 75% of the market uses iPods and would be incompatible with a different DRM format. The only way for them to free up Apple's control on the market is to go DRM free. That allows them to compete against iTunes while being able to convert the iPod using market. It doesn't really have anything to do with public relations.

I think the movie companies, having seen what's happened to the music companies, will come up with a standard DRM platform that isn't managed by one movie studio or one distributor. This would prevent one distributor, such as Apple, from taking all the power in the market.

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

With rentals coming to iTunes DRM is the only way to do it right otherwise you have to install auto-destruct software to destroy files after the rental period has passed. That type of system could work but wouldn't prevent unrestricted copying and would be worrying to have on any computer if it had bugs.

Errrrr no. You'd invalidate the license, but not the movie file itself. Without a valid license you can't play the movie file. All you'd have to do to play the movie again is buy a new license.

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

iPod, Apple TV and iPhone content is also coming to Blu-ray rental discs.

No, it's not. The Bluray committee struck the idea down. Believe me, I was following that pretty closely.

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

From the moment you copy it to iTunes you will have 24 hours to watch it or you can click the buy button next to the title to purchase the movie or extend the rental period. This is only possible with Blu-ray because the disk's space allows a full HD movie, HD extras, high quality audio AND finally the HD video file you can copy from the disk to purchase.

That's a pretty elaborate story you have there.

Originally Posted by PaperNotes 

And that folks is the method that is being chosen for now to deliver HD movies to computers because the online only method consumes massive bandwidth and increases the cost of running ISPs who would pass the cost to subscribers. Until bandwidth improves we will see HD delivered on discs instead of just online.

Again, nothing about what you just said is true, but mmmkay. I can already get HD movies online through XBox Live. So yeah... subscriber bandwidth would seem to be there.

Originally Posted by mrtew 

You don't even hear what you're saying. You can take your digital media player to someone's place regardless of what player they have??? Well I can take my Blu-ray player to someone's place regardless of what player they have too!

Ok, let's compare the two choices. One let's me store tons of different movies on a device I'd normally carry in my pocket and could just pull out any time. The other requires me to carry around a large player and optical disks.

Seriously? You might have as well suggested I just carry around my XBox with my XBox Live content, or maybe just roll around my entire A/V cabinet.

And hey, with content all being hosted on a machine that is world accessible, technically I don't even have to carry anything on me.

[goMac]

Originally Posted by analogue SPRINKLES 

Any why you still obsessed with thinking all BR players are $500 when they are $300?

There is no $300 Bluray player anymore. Miss my post on that?

[analogue SPRINKLES]

Originally Posted by goMac 

There is no $300 Bluray player anymore. Miss my post on that?

Fine but there aren't $500 like he keeps saying. You can easily find them for $399 for stand alones.

Even with that Universal said they still had huge growth and sold over HD-DVD despite the price premium.

You should have learnt by now that the price of the player is now what people are concerned about hence why BR has been winning for 12 months.

[Oversoul]

Originally Posted by goMac 

There is no $300 Bluray player anymore. Miss my post on that?

$316.31 for a Sony BDP-S300 at Amazon with free shipping. And I saw the BDP-S301 going for less than $300 at my local Costco last week.

And Philips just announced their Profile 1.1 BDP7200 player for $350 list in April (which means it'll likely hit $300 or less after retailer discounting and just general competitive pricing when it debuts or before summer).

Finally, a Blu-ray player that costs less than a PS3: The $350 Philips BDP7200 - CES 2008 - Consumer Electronics Show - CNET.com - CNET Blogs