Makes mental note - must plug in brain before posting in future

 

So what to do ...

 

indeed

 

Personally, I'm sticking with dvd for now. Looks almost as good as HD when upscaled, and is a lot cheaper at the moment. I may take the plunge later in the year when the decision is a little clearer

 

An interesting article on BBC News.

You could look at this 2 ways,

1) Blu-Ray is a PITA and what else will happen?

2) Buy a PS3 as you get a Blu-Ray player and excellent games console for a reasonable price, plus you don't have to worry about the upgrades mentioned in the article.

Geezer

 

This was covered sometime ago - Effectviely what it means is that older player will still play main features (i.e. the film) but may not be able to play some extras.

 

But Mr Upham said
ummm did laser discs take off?

i suspect this high def war is far from over to be honest, i will make my coice in a year or so

 

Been to HMV and woolworths, even tescos, can't seem to find any HD-DVD's under 18-19quid. Which is pretty poor really, escpecially seeing as I'm mostly looking for older movies. I'm hoping the "war" will be over soon.

 

HMV in store are a rip-off for BR's, the same film on thier online store is usually about £9 cheaper...

 

Ive had a large, decent HD telly for a couple of years, so I looked at high definition DVD very closely and it really isnt that much better than what I have already. When you compare it to a decently upscaled 576 line picture, then its disappointing.

Simon

 

HD DVD really is in its death throes now - Toshiba look like they are pulling out.

The Associated Press: Toshiba Says It May End HD DVD

 

Not surprising considering Sony have paid off all the studios and vendors

 

'Cept Paramount of course- HD-DVD paid them off.

 

Good news. Now they can get on with making the things as cheap as DVD players are now.

 

It will take a little while, but it will get there - Expect a similar patter to DVD players. You can but a BluRay player for £250 now, this time last year it would have cost you £800.

 

Guess the BetamaXbox 360 owners aren't too happy this morning?

http://www.toshiba.co.jp/about/press/2008_02/pr1903.htm

 

Standard DVD drive in a 360. Just means a few semi-redundant add on drives.

 

It also probably means some dirt cheap deals out there - HD DVD media still exists, what is already there won't just vanish into thin air - So you might be able to pick up all sort of deals in the near future.

 

Not really worth it though is it? Would be a short term benefit but will be redundant in a year or so.

 

Depends on the deal - If you can get a HDDVD player and 5 films for £50, then what have you got to lose? The films don't crumble into dust.

 

True. I guess it's me been one not to watch many films over again. I don't have a DVD collection so this side of if it pretty mute to me. It's more for the PC side and burnable media.

 

It's over.

Roll on cheap blu-ray!

Geezer

 

Without competition they do not need to lower their prices just yet

As with dvd the prices will start to drop in a few years once the format is mainstream

 

The prices for hardware have already droppped considerably, but I agree, the software prices will take a little while - but it will come down to DVD like prices.

 

TBH all disc formats are on their last legs, HD movies will be downloaded or on memory cards/chips in a few years time. 32gb cards already available albeit v expensive at the moment but no doubt will be cheap as chips soon enough................... circle of life eh? not too disimilar to the atari formats of 30 years ago.....

 

Absolutely no chance

The price difference between flash memory and optical disk is absolutely huge.

I mean like at least a factor of 10

And we are miles away from an infrastructure where we can download high quality HD films on a mainstream basis.


And even then, in place sin the world where such infrastructure does exists (japan Korea etc) they still would rahter have the discs in thier hands.

 

really? you can get 1gb SD for less than £1.00, 5 yrs ago you'd have paid 50times as much......

BT are trialling optical fibre feeds to every new home and business in the ebbsfleet valley new residential developement from August 2008 with 100mb/s connection speeds. or the ability to watch streaming multiple HD broadcasts or download a HD movie in 30mins or so.

not as far away as you think.......

 

I think you're both right.

There will always be a market for both, downloading is going to gain speed and memory is becoming dirt cheap, but there's still plenty of people who like the tangible feel of having something they have bought, with nice packaging and all the extras that you get.

Geezer

 

As for BT's downloadable stuff, they are piggy backing MS's 360 service and will no doubt incorporate rediculous monthly fees.

 

A 4.7gig dvd is 10p, a 25gig blu-ray disc is £6, media will for the next few years be a lot cheaper than the hardware storeage.

The UK internet is not ready for movie streaming/downloading, certainly not this year, most ISP's already enforce monthly limits / traffic shaping to cut bandwidth useage.

As for BT's streaming movies, isnt that via their new TV on demand thing? which is like Sky & Virgin and not actually giving you the bandwidth to download from the internet as you feel.

Also the current downloadable HD content (from legal sources) is compressed to improve these issues and so altho being good quality will not be as good as the blu-ray/hd-dvd disc versions.