This isn't true for multi-disc games however.  When you have a multi-disc game, you will need to have some redundant data between discs because the core game files need to be read and re-read now and again.  If there is no redundant data, you would have to do a lot of swapping back to disc 1 and then back to whatever later disc again.

 Why do you consider attach rates to be more important than overall disc sales?  Also, Toshiba estimates 1 million HD-DVD sales this year.  The PS3 alone is going to sell more than 1 million units before the end of this year.  HD-DVD cannot win.  They can only try to pull even.  As for HVD, no studios are signed on for HVD, and it sounds too different from what people are currently used to.  Frankly, HVD sounds like the makings of the next laserdisc: several generations too early.  How do you even put a $500 disc player next to a $15,000 one?

Lol what do you think attach rates are?  They are the amount of discs sold per system.  Let's do some math: if the HD-DVD has 60% of standalone players, and sells 4 to 1 the amount of discs as the stand alone Blu-Ray, obviously the amount of disc sales is higher.  That doesn't count the PS3, but even if everyone who bought the PS3 bought at least 1 movie (and I know they haven't), it wouldn't reach that number. 

I'm not saying HD-DVD will win.  I just think it will hold the playing field even for so long that neither will win.

Dude, blu-ray dominates every month now in movie sales.    If blu-ray has sold more every single month this year, then obviously blu-ray is selling better.

If you are a studio, you care about overall sales, not attach rates. You could have only 1 guy owning a player who bought up 100 discs versus 1,000 guys owning players who bought up 10,000 discs. The attach rate for the former player is 100. The attach rate for the latter player is 10. But what is really more important? I'm sure attach rate is a stat with some utility, but not in the context you are trying to present it.

Well put.

I don't see how the overall sales could POSSIBLY be better, can someone cite this? Because if not it seems a fair assumption to assume that with attach rates like that (even not counting the PS3) that HD-DVD must be at the least even with Blu-Ray in software sales. Please try and find a source no more than 1 month old. Again, I'm not criticizing either format for what they are, I just don't think either stand a chance of winning fast enough to stop something like HVD from blowing them away as soon as it gets in cheap range.

By the time HVD gets anywhere near a realistic price range, blue opticals will be $50 (or less). Isn't that the exact same battle you are fighting *against* right now?

Geez.  Every news article tells you that blu-ray is beating hd-dvd.  I'm not sure about this month exactly but seeing as how Pirates beat out Matrix and every multi-platform other than Planet Earth was higher on amazon's list all month, I'm pretty sure the trend will continue.

If every article says it, seems it would have been quite simple for you to cite it, agreed? I'm hardly an unreasonable man. I just like to see sources for statements.

JSF, I'm not "fighting" against anything. I am just interested in the situation and am presenting my point of view. I hardly hate either format, nor do I care whether they succede or fail, I'm just stating what I believe from my perspective. I don't think DVD was given enough time, and I don't think people are accepting Blu-Ray and HD-DVD very readily. I think around the time that an HVD player could be sold for 200 bucks or less (the magic number) will be around the end of this gaming generation. It's such a huge technology leap, but prices fall very quickly, and as long as they don't try to introduce it too early (read: when it's still really expensive) like these 2 formats did, I can easily see it becomming dominant. Either that or downloadable movies (in HD) as compression technology advances.