[PCWorld]

Post your comments for Blu-ray Disc--The New VHS? here

[knathraak]

Was there an editorial hidden in here somewhere? Maybe I missed it. All I could find was a bunch of links plugging other PCWorld.com articles and a bunch of completely unrelated "dig this" links.

[TheSouljourner]

To Shanedr: Blu-Ray players DO play DVDs! Both camps have full backwards compatibility.
What makes Blu-Ray better is that it has inherently 66% more space on each disk, which means you don't have to compress the audio and video as much, so you get better quality. It also means you can have more special features on the same disk. Blu-Ray also has a higher max bitrate than HD-DVD, which means that it can output higher quality audio and video.
As for "pimple faced PS3 owners", I'm 31 and a Senior Software Engineer. The 15 year olds with the PS3 their parents gave them are not the ones pushing for blu-ray, ok? It's the older audiophile and videophile home theater folks who actually know what they're talking about.

[joker1231978]

Blue Ray does not have 66% more disk space than HD. HD now holds 50 or 51g....it's in the 50 gig range for sure. Not to mention that the special features that BR has talked about since the beginning isn't even implemented yet. They are planning to implement them, but it makes all current stand-alone players obsolete. As of right now, there is not a stand-alone BR player that will be able to use the special features. The PS3, as stated by Sony, is the only player that is upgradable. For more, search for information about Profile 1.1 and Profile 2.0. I thought I would add that HD has had these special features since it launched. Oh yea....about the DVD compatibility. It has been noted from BR and HD camps that HD has better upscaling of normal DVD's.


HD is just prolonging the inevitable. I'm for HD, but BR is more than likely going to win. It's not the players that is going to make the difference. Five of the seven major studios will be exclusively BR. Odds are that if a new movie is released in high definition that it will be on BR instead of HD.

[ChrisL]

Let's not forget that another reason Blu-ray is ahead is because Blockbuster rents these movies and not HD-DVD. There are people like me that do not buy movies but rent. I very rarely see a movie more than once so rented movies is 95% of what I watch on my Blu-Ray player. Yes, I know Netflix rents HD-DVD but Blockbuster is a much larger company with 2 ways to rent (in-store & online).

[finchna]

According to the information i can find on the web the 51G HD is a spec, not yet a reality. For now, in production, BR top is 50G, HD top is 30G.

[Yert]

Most people on the street seem to think that Blu-Ray is higher definition or something.

This is why the consumer has failed me. I like Blu-Ray's hardware, but the software sucks and is quiet ununified, and furthermore, is less consumer friendly.

[TheSouljourner]

"it's in the 50 gig range for sure" Wow, there's a compelling argument. HD-DVD is 15 gigs per layer, Blu-Ray is 25 gigs per layer. That's why I said Blu-Ray is 66% bigger. Per layer, it's 66% bigger, and pretty much any multi-layering one can do, the other can do, too.

"In September 2007 the DVD Forum
approved a preliminary specification for the triple-layer 51GB HD DVD
(ROM only) disc. It is still unknown if the upcoming triple layer HD
DVD is compatible with current players."

"In September 2006 TDK announced a prototype Blu-ray Disc with a capacity of 200GB^[5]^. TDK was also the first to develop a Blu-Ray prototype with a capacity of 100GB in May 2005^[6]^. In October 2007
Hitachi developed a Blu-Ray prototype with a capacity of 100GB. Hitachi
has stated that current Blu-ray drives would only require a few
firmware updates in order to play the disc^[7]^."

Those quotes are from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia....wiki/Comparisonofhighdefinitionopticaldiscformats#Capacity.2Fcodecs

Also, profile 1.1 and 2.0 does not make older Blu-Ray players obsolete. They can still play the disc, they just won't get picture in picture or internet connectivity. You can still watch any Blu-Ray movie made with a 1st gen Blu-Ray player.

As for HD-DVD having better DVD upscaling... that's a straw-man argument. The upscaling has nothing to do with the HD disc hardware. That's completely separate hardware, and will differ in every model. It's entirely possible that an HD-DVD player and a Blu-Ray player could use the exact same upscaling technology.

[skizzybee]

It's stupid to have someone who owns neither even writing an piece for PC World about the fate of either. In fact, I stopped reading after his disclaimer about being too cheap to buy one or too lame to climb behind the tv and hook it up. What a joke.

...I went back and read through it...

The article is very imformational with excellently researched links. Steve is a good writer for sure, but he still should buy a new player if he's going to be deciding who the winner is in the High Def Wars.

It's kinda like a political commentator who doesn't actually vote. Come to think of it, that's probably the best kind.

[Joserh]

May be all these conjecture are ok for the USA market, but I don't see a big diference in quality between both formats and the rest of the world is a lot more sensible to price. So HD-DVD has an edge and unless Blu-ray gets closer to the $150 barrier, don't think they'll make it.

[sherwiner]

Blue-ray has one BIG problem. Scratch it and no disc repair system can fix it...like can be done with HD, DVDs, game discs, CDs. Your disc is toast! Byebye all that $$$$$$$

[booksy]

The supposed "problem" that you state with scratching disks is a non-starter. You can frisbies blu-ray's across a gravel drive an not come up with a scratch because of the hard coating layer on the disk. So you have to be doing something really funky to scratch a blu-ray.

[superninja42]

Considering that 70% of the movie industry has sided with Blu-Ray, there is a good chance that Blu-ray will win this war. However, I think we are stuck with both HDDVD and Blu-ray for a while.
And for the record - Blu-ray players play normal DvDs!

[coastie65]

I am watching the to see what format the Manufacturers are embracing. I see that Sharp, Samsung and Sony ( Of course) are using the BR format. I'm thinking that Manufacturerwise, BR may have a slight edge. If this format continues to grow in acceptance by the Manufacturers, then it will be a no brainer on which format to choose. I remember the old Beta Max / VHS wars. You could walk into a Video store, and they had both formats on the shelf. At present I don't have a dog in this fight, as I haven't made the move to HD as far as the TV goes. coastie65

[TheSouljourner]

Blu-Ray does not have a scratching problem... it's actually HD-DVDs that do, just like regular DVDs. They both use the same "technology" to be scratch resistant - they just stick the data layer under a thicker layer of plastic. Have you ever had a scratched DVD? yes? Well HD-DVDs will scratch exactly the same way. Blu-Ray disks, on the other hand, have a high-tech, super hard and super scratch resistant layer on them.

Again, from Wikipedia:

"Blu-ray Discs contain their data relatively close to the surface
(less than 0.1 mm) which combined with the smaller spot size presents a
problem when the surface is scratched as data would be destroyed. To
overcome this, TDK, Sony, and Panasonic each have developed a
proprietary scratch resistant surface coating. TDK trademarked theirs as Durabis, which has withstood direct abrasion by steel wool and marring with markers in tests.^[12]^

HD DVD uses traditional material and has the same scratch and
surface characteristics of a regular DVD. The data is at the same depth
(0.6 mm) as DVD as to minimize damage from scratching. As with DVD the
construction of the HD DVD disc allows for a second side of either HD
DVD or DVD."

[mjd420nova]

I'm not going to make a decision on Blu-ray or HD until it shakes out in the market place. I think that Sony's underhanded tricks of going to the manufacturers with money in hand to influence their building of hardware is a vain attempt to side step their BetaMax failure in the video tape market. In the end, the consumer will make the choice of the best format, based on cost, ease of use and proliferation of equipment and content.

[Docusa]

I am also a pimple-faced PS3 owner and I think that this war IS over because HD-DVD lost when they hit the market! First of all, you still cannot burn to HD-DVD. I know that it is coming but it's not here! The minute that Sony said that Blu-Ray was going to write out of the gate, I knew it was over. Businesses jumped on that I bet. Also, Universal and Warner were their biggest providers. Even hearing that they may let HD-DVD support go kinda rattles the cages a little. Sony has enough to actually supply lots of content for Blu-Ray! I think they could make it without the help from the other studios! So Long HD-DVD!

[coastie65]

Hi Docusa, I agree that Sony just may come out on top this time with Blue-Ray. Besides Sony, of course, Sharp, Samsung, and I believe Panasonic have gone to BR. There are a number of Dual Format ( HD & BR) Optical drives on the market as well as a BR writable although they are kinda pricey. I am watching to see how many more Manufacturers go to BR. I know Toshiba is HD and I think JVC as well. JVC was behind the developement of VHS. So far, a lot of the Movie industry is covering themselves by releasing movies in both formats as well as the standard format. I don't think this will last very long because of the expense. As I said in an my previous post, I'm watching to see which way the hardware manufacturers go. If a majority go with the Blue-Ray format, that will be pretty much the end of HD. coastie65

[DeepField]

Doesn't it look like the war between VHS and Betamax? May the better one win this one...

[kittkat349]

Hmm... I just bought a BDP-1400 for $194.

Shipped to Hawaii for a few bucks more.

Yeah it's a refurb but BDP's are coming way down in price fast!!