Sony doesn't have(has very few) rights to blu-ray drives anways. Toshiba owns most of them. Sony has the most of the patents for the discs 

I think the xbox 360 has an onboard upscaler and i think this is why Sony brag about being the only true HD console
this is a good questions and I'm not to sure, this was actually the first question i asked on this website a few years back and here was some of the answers for your seconds question

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=63328

Does this mean microsoft can use it in their next gen console? or would they have to buy into it? I knew that Sony didnt own blu ray, infact i think their are a few other companies on board with it such as Panasonic

Although they can go with a new format (just like rumos say Cafe will use 25Gb DVD), they will probably go with BluRay as their objective has always been to provide a "media device", that's why they have Netflix, facebook, etc.

To continue that route they need to include the physical format used for movies, and once you have it for movies, why not use it with games?

I was commenting on the being in a PC aspect. Panasonic and Toshiba make disc drives for computers. It would be very easy to release a bluray drive for the PC. 

They'd have to pay royalties to the Blu-ray disc association, but I see of no reason why they can't use it 

• Apple Inc.
• Dell Inc.
• Hewlett-Packard
• Hitachi, Ltd.
• Intel Corporation
• LG Electronics
• Mitsubishi Electric
• Panasonic Corporation
• Pioneer Corporation
• Royal Philips Electronics
• Samsung Electronics
• Sharp Corporation
• Sony Corporation
• Sun Microsystems
• TDK Corporation
• Technicolor SA
• 20th Century Fox
• Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group
• Warner Bros. Entertainment

Doesn't matter what you and I think, it'll be Microsoft's call, and they have more of an idea on this than you and I.

The most efficient  way to do cutscenes today, which also assists with the immersion factor, is to do it with the in game engine.  La Noire has done this.  Rockstar could of decided, "Let's do the game with the engine, but film live actors and show Full-motion video for the cutscenes".  Would that of been a better way to do it the old way, where the cut scenes were pre-canned and read off the disk?

im not saying your wrong, not in the slightest, but im still confused.

if it is just a matter of Storage, why is the max resolution of Blu-ray 1080p.

doesnt it also have to do with speed, or bit rate or what ever (im not a very technical person so i dont know much about thi stuff)

also wikipedia says this. it mentions its max resolution and the speed of it. 

Frame size and frame rate

To record moving pictures, DVD-Video uses either MPEG-2 compression at up to 9.8 Mbit/s (9,800 kbit/s) or MPEG-1 compression at up to 1.856 Mbit/s (1,856 kbit/s).

The following formats are allowed for MPEG-2 video:

• At 25 frame/s, interlaced (commonly used in regions with 50 Hz image scanning frequency - PAL):

• At 29.97, interlaced (commonly used in regions with 60 Hz image scanning frequency - NTSC):

The following formats are allowed for MPEG-1 video:

• 352 × 288 pixels at 25 frame/s, progressive (Same as the VCD Standard)
• 352 × 240 pixels at 29.97 frame/s, progressive (Same as the VCD Standard)

All resolutions support video with 4:3 frame aspect ratio. Only full D1 resolutions support widescreen (16:9) video, via anamorphic DVD.

MPEG-1 formats do not support interlaced video. MPEG-2 formats support both interlaced and progressive-scan content, with the latter being encoded within interlaced stream using pulldown.

An MPEG-2 encoder can add flags in video stream to indicate scanning type, field order and field repeating. A DVD player uses these flags to convert progressive content into interlaced video suitable for interlaced TV sets. These flags also help reproducing progressive content on progressive-scan television sets.^[7]

[edit]Audio data

The audio data on a DVD movie can be PCM, DTS, MPEG-1 Audio Layer II (MP2), or Dolby Digital (AC-3) format. In countries using the PAL system standard DVD-Video releases must contain at least one audio track using the PCM, MP2, or AC-3 format, and all standard PAL players must support all three of these formats. A similar standard exists in countries using the NTSC system, though with no requirement mandating the use of or support for the MP2 format. DTS audio is optional for all players, as DTS was not part of the initial draft standard and was added later; thus, many early players are unable to play DTS audio tracks. The vast majority of commercial DVD-Video releases today employ AC-3 audio.^{[citation needed]} The official allowed formats for the audio tracks on a DVD Video are:

• PCM: 48 kHz or 96 kHz sampling rate, 16 bit or 24 bit Linear PCM, 2 to 6 channels, up to 6,144 kbit/s. N.B. 16-bit 48 kHz 8 channel PCM is allowed by the DVD-Video specification but is not well-supported by authoring applications or players.
• AC-3: 48 kHz sampling rate, 1 to 5.1 (6) channels, up to 448 kbit/s
• DTS: 48 kHz or 96 kHz sampling rate, 2 to 6.1 channels, Half Rate (768 kbit/s) or Full Rate (1,536 kbit/s)
• MP2: 48 kHz sampling rate, 1 to 7.1 channels, up to 912 kbit/s

DVDs can contain more than one channel of audio to go together with the video content, supporting a maximum of 8 simultaneous audio tracks per video. This is most commonly used for different audio formats—DTS 5.1, AC-3 2.0 etc.—as well as for commentary and audio tracks in different languages.

[edit]Data rate

DVD-Video discs have a raw bitrate of 11.08 Mbit/s, with a 1.0 Mbit/s overhead, leaving a payload bitrate of 10.08 Mbit/s. Of this, up to 3.36 Mbit/s can be used for subtitles and a maximum of 9.80 Mbit/s can be split amongst audio and video. In the case of multiple angles the data is stored interleaved, and so there's a bitrate penalty leading to a max bitrate of 8 Mbit/s per angle to compensate for additional seek time. This limit is not cumulative, so each additional angle can still have up to 8 Mbit/s of bitrate available.

Professionally encoded videos average a bitrate of 4-5 Mbit/s with a maximum of 7–8 Mbit/s in high-action scenes. This is typically done to allow greater compatibility amongst players, and to help prevent buffer underruns in the case of dirty or scratched discs.

Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment has created a line of DVDs (dubbed "Superbit") aiming to maximize picture quality by eliminating multiple languages, angles, and audio tracks. This allows average bitrates closer to 6 Mbit/s.

[edit]

 

There are so many members of BDA that i don't think Microsoft would care that one of them was Sony.

They are not all Japanese companies and they are not all linked with just technology. If it was just one owner then yeah i could see a case why MS would not want to join but it isn't like that. Pioneer and Microsoft have various partnership deals with one another. They even share patents. Seeing as Pioneer are co creators and close to MS as a company i can't see MS having any problems with using Blu Ray in the next 360.

But i think there will be many way's to play games in the next generation. Direct to drive digital distribution is taking off fast. Streaming technology is getting better as the internet get's faster and more stable. The next batch of consoles will have huge harddrives in my opinion. If you have a minimum of say 1tb in your console it could destroy the need for a disc. Like with Steam you can just download it. And new releases pre-download it before release which get's activated at a certain time. In the UK places that sell physical discs are in deep shit. HMV and Game are basically the last ones standing and they are not in such a great position financially. I would be shocked if companies like MS are not aware of these trends and will plan for it.

As hard drives get bigger and the internet becomes faster it will replace physical cd's over time. The success of steam prooves that.

thats not what i was asking.

also no, in in game, in engine cut scense doesnt make it better. i personally really like the cutscenes in GOW3, UC2, 1, and KZ3 (though not all of them are "pre-canned"). i dont understand the stigma some people have against these type of cutscenes. they act as if they some how arent as good/make the game worse is they use cgi.