Toshiba's deal with Microsoft doomed HD-DVD from the beginning!

JoeSp

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Oct 11, 2003
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Toshiba got into bed with Bill Gates and like every other company that has done this over the last 15 years -- they got tossed like a bad salad!! M$ has stated from the very beginning that they were not interested in a disc-based medium for HD movies and believe that downloading was the future for HD media. But Toshiba got into bed with them anyway.

Let's see how this benefited M$:
1) They have delayed acceptance of HD media on disc and after 18 months HD discs media is still a niche market.

2) They were able to improve VC-1 codecs and supporting software will using HD-DVD as a test bed.

3) They were able to flesh out their iHD (known to HD-DVD fans as HDi) on the HD-DVD medium and get paid while they worked out the bugs.

4) They were able to convince Universal to go along for the ride and it did not cost them one penny for Paramount/Dreamworks as Toshbia paid that bill.

Let's see what Toshiba got out of this:

1) They have not made one penny on their players-- so how long do you continue to sell at a loss when you know you have lost?

2) They paid out $150mil to Paramount/Dreamworks for two titles (Transformers and Shrek3) that did absolutely nothing to help their cause.

3) Stole the Black Friday thunder with the $98 HD-DVD player sale and after losing money on that -- it did not affect their cause.

4) Thought they had Warner sowed up (if you really believe all these rumors) but in reality lost the biggest supporter outside of Universal to HD-DVD - period!

5) Have a format that -- right now -- seems dead in the water. If news shows all over the country see it this way, if business writers see it this way, if they cancel their CES time -- oh wait this has all happened.

Maybe someone can show me where Toshiba jumping into bed with M$ did them any good? Hey, I will take any company jumping into bed with M$ making out like a bandit other then Bungie -- and I don't expect that miracle to last too long. But I will take whatever anyone can offer.
 
Microsoft at this point they don't care about Toshiba anymore....I can see Blu-ray add on player for Xbox 360 coming out soon.
 
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I wonder what % of BD will be VC-1 in a year. Since companies will not have to worry as much about bit rates on BD, they could do AVC.

VC-1 still has the pricing advantage though. MS priced it below both MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 royalty rates.
 
I think that with higher bitrates and more disc space VC-1 could and does have a future on BD discs.
 
I wonder if Bill Gate's press conference slides have been updated already?

Microsoft Xbox 360 said they had a big announcement this year @ CES, let me guess Microsoft to release an add on Blu-ray player by the end of the year?
 
I wonder if Bill Gate's press conference slides have been updated already?

Bill doesn't like to lose. Expect the anouncement of Downloadable HD movie content to go along with a now HD-DVDless new XBOS360 Media Box. Bill can spins stuff just about better than anyone.
 
Bill doesn't like to lose. Expect the anouncement of Downloadable HD movie content to go along with a now HD-DVDless new XBOS360 Media Box. Bill can spins stuff just about better than anyone.

Yeah only 2 people spin it better than Uncle Bill... Steve Jobs and You :D
 
Microsoft didn't doom HD DVD. The first quarter lull in software and lack of advertising campaign doomed them. That's about it. Microsoft was willing to work with BDA and VC-1, but MPEG2 was what was chosen. Why? Who owns most of the royalties? AVC and VC-1 support were added later on because of Warner and Disney. Same woth BD-J sliding in. Not what was originally planned. HDi was what was originally voted on and approved.
 
Microsoft didn't doom HD DVD. The first quarter lull in software and lack of advertising campaign doomed them.

I don't think the impact of the ad campaigns for BD vs. HD DVD should be underestimated. Most people I know, who aren't tech savy and aren't into Hi-def video, had heard of Blu-ray but not HD DVD... most through the ads (and not just me ;) )
 
Microsoft didn't doom HD DVD. The first quarter lull in software and lack of advertising campaign doomed them. That's about it. Microsoft was willing to work with BDA and VC-1, but MPEG2 was what was chosen. Why? Who owns most of the royalties? AVC and VC-1 support were added later on because of Warner and Disney. Same woth BD-J sliding in. Not what was originally planned. HDi was what was originally voted on and approved.

You sure that's right on the codecs? My understanding is that all three got approved but Sony was going to use MPEG2 initially because it already had a good track record for creating movie content. The issue with AVC and VC-1 was that they were new and untested.
 
Microsoft wanted VC-1 in both formats and got it. MS cut the royalty rate of VC-1 below MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 to make it attractive. MS also was willing to work with BD, but HD-DVD seemed more receptive.

As to why the HD-DVD player on xbox360, my personal feeling is that MS did not want to put BD on it because it would be an admission that the PS3 was correct to have a BD drive. But, they felt pressured to offer something for the check box comparison, so HD-DVD was the winner. I do not think MS would ever had come out with HD-DVD on xbox if Sony did not have BD on PS3. MS will probably do BD on xbox now to stay competative.
 
The main reason M$ went with HD-DVD was iHD. The tech board voted to use iHD but the governing board chose Java. M$ immeadiately said no and pulled Toshiba and Universal into their evil web!
 
You sure that's right on the codecs? My understanding is that all three got approved but Sony was going to use MPEG2 initially because it already had a good track record for creating movie content. The issue with AVC and VC-1 was that they were new and untested.

Original specs called for MPEG2 video and Uncompressed PCM. Hence extra storage and bandwidth required to accomodate them. AVC and VC-1 were approved later, still before the first units shipped I believe. As Mike stated, MS cut the royalty rate to get it adopted. Also why TrueHD and DTSHD MA are not required in the format either, only optional.

S~
 
I think this was discussed on AVS over a year ago.
VC-1 was added to BD to buy Disney's exclusivity (after VC-1 beat the sh!t out of MPEG-2 in 2 officially run tests).
AVC was added at the same time to soften the blow (it didn't have FRExt yet).

HDi was developed by Disney and Microsoft. Techgroup in BD recommended it. Microsoft was told it will be accepted if they join BDA.
Microsoft refused. BD overruled the techgroup conclusion, replaced HDi with BD-J and added BD+. Microsoft went with HD DVD.

Lossless audio codecs are not mandatory most probably because licensing fees were not set for them
when HD/BD standards were written. Later they were priced at $0 if you have licensed the non-lossless codecs.

BTW, Gary Sullivan, who led the development of H.264 and got an award for it, works for Microsoft (also designed DXVA for Windows).
Gary Sullivan (engineer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Diogen.
 
I think this was discussed on AVS over a year ago.
VC-1 was added to BD to buy Disney's exclusivity (after VC-1 beat the sh!t out of MPEG-2 in 2 officially run tests).
AVC was added at the same time to soften the blow (it didn't have FReXT yet).

HDi was developed by disney and Microsoft. Techgroup in BD recommended it. Microsoft was told it will be accepted if they join BDA.
Microsoft refused. BD overruled the techgroup conclusion and added BD+. Microsoft went HD DVD.

Lossless audio codecs are not mandatory most probably because licensing fees were not set for them
when HD/BD standards were written. Later they were priced at $0 if you have licensed the non-lossless codecs.

BTW, Gary Sullivan, who led the development of H.264 and got an award for it, works for Microsoft.
Gary Sullivan (engineer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Diogen.

Yeah not matter what MS wins in the end. Even the precious BDA uses VC-1. So might as well figure Sony is in bed with the devil as well.
 

Michael Bay:"Blu-ray is just better"(Producer of Transformers)

Warner: No Payoff for Move to Blu-ray

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