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Forums - General - HD-DVD or BluRay?

jasonnc80 on 01 November 2007
altimus said:

The advantages of BD include:

-Greater studio, retail and other industry support
-Better security features. HD-DVD was cracked for ripping a while ago, and just this week, BD was cracked. BD doesn't just have AACS like HDDVD does, but also BD+, and watermarks, so its a few steps up with respect to security.
-Cheaper on a movie per movie basis. Yes, BD movies are a bit cheaper than their HD-DVD counterparts
-More storage means better picture and sound quality.

-BD has better resistance to scratching than HD-DVD

 

  

1) The studio support arguement can change (as we have seen it has already shifted once)
2) Since when is excessive DRM a benefit for the customer?  I always love this arguement. Seems like blind loyalty to the movie studios.
3) Only cheaper b/c of the inclusion of combos. If you factor those out the prices of discs are THE SAME.  If you go by specs on paper (which a lot of BD fans like to do) HD DVD should be cheaper with the cost and ease of manufacturing being cheaper.
4) I'll give you the scratch resistance but it's only because of the data layer on BD being so close to the surface.  It wasn't done out of the kindness of sony's hearts but because it was necessary.  I don't consider this a deal breaker though because DVD has the same scratch resistance as HD DVD and we all see how that turned out.

A good article about the specs vs reality was posted on highdefdigest.  A suggested read: http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Joshua_Zyber/Commentary:_Specs_vs._Reality/1096

Currently I am HD DVD only.  The reason?  Cheap prices and region free.  I'm not anti-Blu and will pick up a player in the future.  I just hope the recent price drops of Toshiba players will put a kick in the ass of Sony and we'll get some affordable standalones (that wont be outdated in a few months) for reasonable prices.



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scorptile on 01 November 2007

im goin with dvd winning the war. not everyone is gonna buy a high def player cause people are still changing their movie collections over to dvd from vhs. That my friends are the facts



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DMeisterJ on 01 November 2007

I think that Beta-max will win the war! :)



Delusional on 01 November 2007

I noticed that many arguing in favor of blu-ray are a lot of new users with less than 50 posts. hm.. :) Maybe they are not here for video gaming discussion but to promote blu-ray instead since the HD DVD under $100 announcement.



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makingmusic476 on 01 November 2007
welshbloke said:
I have followed the Blu Ray and HD-DVD formats closely and tbh my opinion has not altered.

HD DVD is better for the consumer, The discs should be cheaper, the combo option should make adoption easier, the players should be cheaper, the discs are currently region free and they have less movie house anti piracy mullarky which only causes issues with legitimate purchasers.

Now I used "should" a lot in the HD DVD is better because not all these things happen. I would like to see more combo discs at the same price to help with adoption also discs prices to better match those of DVD equivalents.

Blu Ray is more expensive and panders to the movie house anti piracy mullarky and that inevitable leads to the people actually making the purchases being the ones who are left with discs that do not play. Also again probably pandering to the movie houses the Blu Ray players are region locked, which of course only benefits the movie houses.

Yes Blu Ray has advantages but whether these are of sufficient interest to the consumer is debateable. Had Blu Ray not had the anit piracy and region locking then it would be a closer call just leaving the cost.

I can now buy HD DVD players for £200 in the UK and recently I have seen $169 and even less prices bandied around for the US Black Friday sales of HD DVD players so price is really becoming an issue and we could be at a tipping point.

The general public are less tolerant of accepting discs which they cannot play because of anti piracy measures so I see a seismic shift but the only thing that holds this in the balance are the movies houses, if they all went dual format tomorrow then HD DVD would win and that is the real crux of the matter in my mind and why this war most definately does not benefit the consumer.

Keyword: should.  The discs SHOULD be cheaper, but they are not.> how is that better for the consumer?  Movies released on both Blu-Ray and HD DVD cost the exact same, except when the HD DVD version is a combo disc. Then it costs $5 more than the Blu-Ray version.  

That's GREAT for the consumer. 



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nathantay on 02 November 2007
davygee said:
nathantay said:
So what your saying is BR a year and a half later is on par or marginally better than HD. It's amazing that BR has a storage & bit rate advantage yet HD gives you identical or almost identical PQ with a lower bit rate and more features with less storage. The DD+ track on Transformers "which HiDef Digest gave a 5"wasn't an issue for me as it has the best AQ I've ever heard on HD. I did get the best video/audio quality of Transformers because I got it on HD and not Dvd like you.
 

It's a shame that the video scores given for Transformers wasn't 100% compared to the Silver Surfer (see below):

Site

Transformers
HD DVD Video Score

Silver Surfer
BD Video Score

DVDTOWN

8.0

10.0

DVDfile

9.0

10.0

HiDef Digest

9.0

9.0

AV Forum

9.0

10.0

Average

8.75

9.75

Maybe they used more of the space on the HDDVD disc for audio thus reduced the space for the video?


Too bad 99% of the people will see both films and see a great picture in both but then see that HD is $200 Vs. BR $400 and buy the HD player. Maybe they used more of the space for extra features like web-enabled features so the customer has more incentive to upgrade to HD.



         

welshbloke on 02 November 2007

In reference to makingmusic476 and the "should" be cheaper point and the consumer: 

It should be, the fact the Movies houses choose to make more on the discs or that they choose to pass on the costs of the combo is not good for the consumer the fact they could is. Blu Ray is more expensive so the option of could does not apply to the same degree, plus from what I understand authoring of Blu Ray titles tends to carry a slightly higher development cost due to the more complex language used.



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welshbloke on 02 November 2007

In reference to davygee point about content versus price: 

In the end it will come down to price. For you it may be studios but for the general public it is price that determines whether I replace my cheap DVD player with an expensive one that can also do this HD thingy.  A number of my friends are now replacing the humble glass TV with the wonders of HD Ready TV's, they have no scoob what 720 1080i or 1080p nor do they care all they see is the HD Ready logo. The same could be said for the 24fps issue and judder. They may care after they bought it but most will then live with it.

To further highlight the confusion my friend bought himself the mandatory all singing and dancing 50" plasma. He then bought himself a DVD Player with an upscaler. Next stop a super duper film to watch, what does he choose but 300 (not a good example of HD in my opinion) HD DVD edition (The UK do not do the Combo version). He now knows a lot more about HD after spending £20 on a disc he can never play, I have a copy of 300 which I can play for only £10 so I am benefiting from his ignorance HUUUZAAAAH!

The only thing that will prevent price from winning is if one side lost major studio support (Obviously that is just cryptic for saying this is now in the hands of Warner Brothers).



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Winner of the 2010 VGC Holiday sales prediction thread with an Average 1.6% accuracy rating. I am indeed awesome.

Kinect as seen by PS3 owners ...if you can pick at it   ...post it ... Did I mention the 360 was black and Shinny? Keeping Sigs obscure since 2007, Passed by the Sig police 5July10.
Avinash_Tyagi on 02 November 2007

Buy HD-DVD today, wait two years and buy a PS3 when it hits $299



 

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