Exclusivity
It may be true that around 70 percent of home video titles will be on Blu-ray Disc once Warner stops supporting HD DVD, but your high-def disc library simply won’t be complete if it’s exclusively BD. Right now, for example, mega-hits such as “Shrek the Third,” “Transformers,” “Knocked Up” and all three titles in the Bourne series are available only on HD DVD. Barring a sudden change of heart by Universal and Paramount/Dreamworks, the same will be true of upcoming releases such as “American Gangster,” “Bee Movie,” and “Beowolf.” Granted, there also are plenty of must-have BD exclusives – the Spider-Man and Pirates of the Caribbean trilogies come immediately to mind. But we’re not arguing against adopting Blu-ray; we’re citing reasons it makes sense to embrace HD DVD.
Dual Personality
Chances are pretty good – like, say, a billion-to-one – that anyone who buys an HD DVD or BD player already has a collection of standard DVDs and realizes that players from both camps will upscale those DVDs to near high-def quality. But anyone with a DVD library also is likely to have more than one DVD player, and you might as well feed it a hockey puck as try to play a BD disc on it. But HD DVD standards provide for Combo Format discs that feature high-def on one side and a standard-definition DVD on the other. That means they’ll not only work on the new HD DVD player in the home theater, but also on the DVD player in the bedroom, the laptop, and even in the car.
How much longer you’ll be able to buy new high-def releases to feed your HD DVD player, of course, is uncertain. But with movie downloads gaining momentum, the longevity of Blu-ray also is up in the air. And HD DVD prices are so affordable it won’t hurt as much if the hardware is relegated to playing DVDs and catalogue titles a few years from now.
I just wanted to say I just watched the Bourne Ultimatum in 1080P/24 frame per second in DOLBY TRUE HD on my Toshiba HDDVD A35 player that I got from Amazon.com. Phenomenal unmatched surround sound with jaw dropping detail and clarity. Then watched Transformers in DOLBY DIGITAL + and was just as spellbound. Is there a Bluray player that can give me DOLBY TRUE HD and DOLBY DIGITAL + right now for 230 BUCKS with 7 free movies to boot?? And I am not just talking about a player that mentions the audio codecs on the box, I am talking about one that can give me that sound today.
Aaron, where you at Aaron?
Poll numbers referenced in above article were from Jan. 30. You are correct...the poll remains open and results have since changed.
Poll numbers are off above (Blu-ray leading) - but that is just one poll - all sales figures worldwide have been in favor of Blu-ray and are growing more so now.
I doubt there will be any new adopters of HD-DVD unless someone goes to Best-Buy and buys one of the last ones left before a salesperson tells them to get Blu-ray instead.
GHU
What did I lie about? Oh, I know. It must have been the part about bluray looking about the same as hddvd on 1080P. You right, I lied. Todays head to head match up of hddvd Eastern Promises on 1080i vs We Own The Night on bluray. Eastern Promises (Universal) was much sharper and more detailed than We Own The Night (Sony Pictures) and it was only 1080i thru my HDD1. Even on my regular dvd player in the study the flip side dvd version is great. I can’t seem to get a picture from the bluray flip side on my dvd in the study. Nevermind, I forgot, it doesn’t have a dvd version on the flip side. Yeah, bluray is the obvious choice for consumers (wink,wink).
GHU
Incase you missed it, I was lying about the last part.
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I was just at the local Sams club. The employee said the sold 20 Toshiba HDDVD A3 players in two days, and can’t keep them in. The Sony bluray players are going for 377 a pop and they have sold 2 this week, in spite of the enormous Sony endcap with the 52” lcd 1080p hooked up to the 377 dollar blewray player surrounded by a dozen blurays.