Good-bye DVD's

[Kimp the Shrimp]

Playsation 3 will be Blu-ray technolagy in the spring

 

[sugarbritchez]

I just think that it is normal that we always make things better/faster/easier for the future. And just think in 10 more years there will be something else, it is a never ending process. Personally I am happy with what we have today verses what we had in the 80's. Computers for one thing have evolved from one as big as a wall to small compact things we can hold in our hands. I wouldn't think that this is a bad thing.........just a new thing.

 

[Was Once Ernie]

The two formats are not compatible with existing DVDs only in the sense that they are different formats. It's pretty much guaranteed that all HD-DVD and BluRay players will be able to play regular DVDs (in the same way that your DVD player today can play CDs).

Just to make this completely clear (as mud): The two new formats are incompatible with each other, meaning HD-DVD discs will not play on BluRay players and vice-versa. However, everything I've read (and anathema posted) says that BOTH HD-DVD players and BluRay players will be backward compatible, meaning they WILL be able to play all of your existing DVD's.

Hi-def itself is definitely worthwhile if you have a larger screen (>40 inches, usually). Below that point you may or may not notice the difference.

I completely agree with this. I got a high def set almost a year ago and not a day goes by that I'm not impressed by the picture every time I turn it on. And you don't have to spend $4,000 to get a decent one, either. Granted, they are still expensive, but not $4,000 expensive. (That price range is mostly for plasma TV's and there are other worthwhile formats which aren't as much money.)

However, standard-def shows will never look any better than they do now

That is only true if you are talking about video productions. Anything that was shot on film will look better on HD (provided, of course, that it's remastered and broadcast in HD.)

 

[Drtooth]

The two formats are not compatible with existing DVDs only in the sense that they are different formats. It's pretty much guaranteed that all HD-DVD and BluRay players will be able to play regular DVDs (in the same way that your DVD player today can play CDs) for the very simple reason that any player that does not support them simply will not sell. If you choose to buy into either of the new technologies you won't have to hang onto your DVD player if you don't want to.

DVD isn't going anywhere any time soon. As this thread demonstrates, the average viewer simply isn't interested in hi-def

The big selling point of the new formats is likely to be hi-def. As such, there's unlikely to be much interest from the studios in releasing non-hi-def material on the formats. In order to cover their costs, never mind make a profit, a single season of (say) The Muppet Show released on a single HD-DVD or BluRay disc would have to be priced at a similar level to the 4-disc DVD releases we have now. Regardless of the fact that you're getting the exact same content on each format, the average customer will perceive that they're getting better value for their money from the set with the most discs...hence the single-disc releases would not sell. Expect new format releases to be largely movies and hi-def TV shows.

Hi-def itself is definitely worthwhile if you have a larger screen (>40 inches, usually). Below that point you may or may not notice the difference. However, standard-def shows will never look any better than they do now

You relaxed me in a way that only a deep tissue massage and a crap load of chocolate could only perform (wait... I'm a guy. I meant like football and three stooges!). That is why I hate Hi-Def. I have to watch my DVD's on a small, 12" TV (Even then, I do prefer widescreen for some reason). The channel change up button just broke a week ago! Now I can only go down. Don't even have cable.

Tell you the truth, I do prefer DVD's to videos now for multiple reasons, including the fact that even if a DVD of a show has 3 episodes on it and costs 10 bucks, a Video of the same show had 1 episode for 10 as well. My DVD's are mostly TV shows, anyway... long cancelled ones at that.

This news sort of reminded me of the Movie Men in Black. When they look at alien technologies, K replies, "In 5 years, these will replace CD's! Means I'll have to go back and get the White Album all over again."

As for Downloading, I figure it would take at least 4-5 years to perfect that technology. If Blueray and Hi-Def were to replace DVD's, they'd be phased out in a while longer than it would take for the downloading to become a standard, then having a bunch of Blue-rays and H-D's become useless in a matter of a year. That's what I ment by the comment.

 

[Vic Romano]

Playsation 3 will be Blu-ray technolagy in the spring

And that is something I intend on owning!

 

[OverUnderAround]

I'm personally happy with my DVD player. So I'm in no rush to upgrade. But you know the industry will eventually transfer non HD programming (such as I Love Lucy, Three Stooges, etc.) onto Blu-ray and HD-DVD just for the sake of making money in the new formats.

I think it was Sony who annouced that their computers will come with Blu-ray drives as well.

One of those two formats will fail and and the remaining one will become the new standard. It seems blu-ray is being pushed more by studios to be the main format over HD-DVD, however that could change.

Oh, thanks gang for pointing out that the new formats will be backwards compatible. The article I read on some audio-video website said it wouldn't be.

 

[anythingmuppet]

Oy, I heard about this a month ago. I am anxious to see about this. I am not really wanting to buy them but I certainly want to know about them. I woudnt, however, throw out yer old DVDs because they say the superceeder to HD-DVD will be coming soon called HVD ( Holographic Versatile Disc) so then I suppose that if you throw out your old regular DVDs, you can throw out the HD's too when HVD comes out in 2 years or so..

 

[anathema]

Oy, I heard about this a month ago. I am anxious to see about this. I am not really wanting to buy them but I certainly want to know about them. I woudnt, however, throw out yer old DVDs because they say the superceeder to HD-DVD will be coming soon called HVD ( Holographic Versatile Disc) so then I suppose that if you throw out your old regular DVDs, you can throw out the HD's too when HVD comes out in 2 years or so..

That's been around for a few years. Actually, what tends to happen is that every few months some lab announces a "DVD-beating technology" with vast amounts of storage on a single disc, and every time the same thing happens: you never hear of it again.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

They are always upgrading everything in our lives today. I don't see them completely doing away with the DVD's anytime soon. Plus........if you have a DVD player you can still watch your DVD's anyway.

Unless you buy it at Wal-mart, then it's only good for a year.

I suppose it's time to start downloading our DVDs to the internet or to our computers so we can watch them all, huh?

So, who wants to come by and download my DVDs to my computer for me??

 

[anathema]

Just to make this completely clear (as mud): The two new formats are incompatible with each other, meaning HD-DVD discs will not play on BluRay players and vice-versa. However, everything I've read (and anathema posted) says that BOTH HD-DVD players and BluRay players will be backward compatible, meaning they WILL be able to play all of your existing DVD's.

Assuming that one format doesn't kill off the other, we'll see multi-format players because that's what the market will demand. AFAIK some manufacturers already have fingers in both pies.

I completely agree with this. I got a high def set almost a year ago and not a day goes by that I'm not impressed by the picture every time I turn it on. And you don't have to spend $4,000 to get a decent one, either. Granted, they are still expensive, but not $4,000 expensive. (That price range is mostly for plasma TV's and there are other worthwhile formats which aren't as much money.)

The basic problem is that none of the various technologies is actually as good as a traditional CRT. LCDs still suffer from poor contrast and smearing; DLPs have the "rainbow effect"; plasmas tend to suffer from contouring; and all the technologies are awful at dealing with noisy signals. Things are slowly improving, though. I've been keeping an eye on screens for the last five years or so, and plasma technology has just about reached the point where I'd consider the pictures to be acceptable.

That is only true if you are talking about video productions. Anything that was shot on film will look better on HD (provided, of course, that it's remastered and broadcast in HD.)

Which is why I said "shows" :-P And film isn't a given - anything from 35mm up should look great in HD, but 16mm can be pretty variable.

There's also more than one kind of HD. Officially there are two main standards: 1280x720p and 1920x1080i. In practice, the vast majority of screens you can buy don't run at either of these resolutions, so the resulting picture will have been digitally scaled to fit the display, degrading the image a bit. In Europe, a set can legally be called "HD-ready" if it has at least 720 lines and is capable of accepting a 1080-line signal. Very few sets actually run at 1280x720 and I don't believe there are any yet which do 1920x1080 (although I may be wrong about that last). The plasma I'm currently considering getting has a resolution of 1024x768 for no apparent reason.