PCs seen playing key role in HD-DVD vs Blu-ray war

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News article from Reuters today covering Computex, the world's second biggest computer show, which is held in Taiwan:

By Doug Young
Tue Jun 6, 7:10 AM ET, Reuters


TAIPEI (Reuters) - PCs are emerging as a battleground in the budding war between two technologies vying to be the standard for high capacity DVDs -- and take the lucrative mantle of next benchmark in optical storage.

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The stakes are huge for one group led by Sony Corp. (6758.T), developer of the standard known as Blu-ray, and another led by Toshiba Corp. (6502.T), developer of the rival HD-DVD standard, with each party standing to reap a fortune in royalties if its candidate becomes the next industry standard.

Many liken the war to the 1980s battle over video cassette recording standards, which ultimately saw the VHS standard emerge the victor over Sony's Betamax.

Most attention to date has focused on a new generation of video players that can take advantage of up to 30 gigabytes of storage capacity -- six times the amount in current DVDs -- to show movies in high definition.

But PC makers will also be vital in deciding which standard ultimately wins, said Howard Locker, director of new technology at China's Lenovo Group Ltd. (0992.HK), the world's third biggest computer maker.

"The three major suppliers of the players of these new next generation discs will be the PC industry, consumer electronics and gaming machines," Locker said. "If you look at the volumes, PCs are now more than 50 percent of that total space, so we'll have a big say on who wins."

So far, however, most PC makers are refusing to take sides.

Lenovo itself is taking a wait-and-see approach, keeping its feet in both camps but committing to neither just yet.

Among other industry giants, Dell Inc. (Nasdaq:DELL - news), the world's biggest PC maker, has said it is committed to Blu-ray, while Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE:HPQ - news), the number two player, has said it will support both standards.

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Taiwan's Acer Inc. (2353.TW) was showing four notebook models with HD-DVD drives this week in Taiwan at Computex, the world's second biggest computer show. But a spokeswoman said the company also plans to support Blu-ray when drives become available.

PC and optical disc makers at Computex said Sony could once again be behind the game, with its technology about a half year behind HD-DVD in terms of market readiness.

Like Acer, laptop specialist Asustek Computer Inc. (2357.TW) said it was planning to incorporate both standards into its models, but was only showing an HD-DVD-equipped laptop at the show.

"Right now we have no supply (of Blu-ray drives)," said Vicki Hsiao of the company's sales and marketing department. "We're expecting some this month."

She and others said PCs equipped with HD-DVD or Blu-ray will cost several hundred dollars more than comparably equipped models with DVD drives -- a factor that should keep sales relatively low this year as consumers wait for applications and video titles that can take advantage of the higher capacity.

CMC Magnetics Corp. (2323.TW), the world's largest maker of compact discs, was showing both Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats at Computex, but Chairman Bob Wong said Blu-ray was about six months behind HD-DVD.

But sales of both types of discs -- which now cost around $20 each but are expected to come down quickly as volume ramps up -- are expected to zoom next year as the disc drives find their way into more PCs and standalone video players.

"We've just started taking orders for these discs," Wong said.

Hmmm. I already have an XA1 . . . . . guess I need to buy an HD DVD drive for the PC when come out.:p
 
I don't see much of anything on this front quite yet.

First, for any software company to sell software, they are going to have to do 1 of the following

Make BluRay and DVD Discs. More expensive to make BR Discs, when most BR players on a PC will read DVD discs anyway. So they simply can't make a BR discs cause the installed userbase will be small for years to come.

Download on Demand. Many games and software is available on demand, you can buy and download, never having to leave the house.

As a backup storage medium. Way to Expensive, when you can pratically get a TB for half the cost of a BluRay Recorder. Not including BR media, which, is only 50 GB at best.

So no, the PC will not affect much quite yet. In a few years maybe, but not yet.
 
I could disagree with DrWho more. The technology that supplies the burner and disks at a reasonable price the soonest will win the overall war. Ripping software will develop and the netflix and blockbuster rentals for that format will go through the roof as well as media center PC's and equipment for that format. Yes, IMO piracy will play a large part in determining the winner for many varied reasons. Bitch and Moan all you want about it, but even grandpa is at home ripping DVD rentals.
 
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Nice thing about PC based...

A niuce thing about a PC based player/recorder is that they are VERY easy to change out! Even the Notebook drives are a snap these days...makes early adoption less of a thorn since youdo not have tto dump an entire setup if something comes out of the Blue <no Pun intended>:D

Jeff
 
vurbano said:
I could disagree with DrWho more. The technology that supplies the burner and disks at a reasonable price the soonest will win the overall war. Ripping software will develop and the netflix and blockbuster rentals for that format will go through the roof as well as media center PC's and equipment for that format. Yes, IMO piracy will play a large part in determining the winner for many varied reasons. Bitch and Moan all you want about it, but even grandpa is at home ripping DVD rentals.

Right now BluRay has a $1000 ripper and blank media at $20 per disc.

That's not going to take the market by storm. It's going to take years for BluRay to come down in price to make it worth owning.

Grandpa is not ripping, they are most likely buying movies at $9.99 on DVD. Why bother with ripping and burning? And if people are ripping it's going to be to the Hard Drive, not to DVD so much anymore. (see Itunes and the move from CDs to software based music)

This format war is at least 5 years away from a conclusion.

In the meantime, ON Demand porgramming, including High Def movies is available now, this market is going to explode as we move movies to the binary format and away from actual discs.

http://www.moviebeam.com/ is yet another offering.

bluray and hddvd is already dated before it has even begun
 
If you remember

DrWho said:
Right now BluRay has a $1000 ripper and blank media at $20 per disc.

That's not going to take the market by storm. It's going to take years for BluRay to come down in price to make it worth owning.

Grandpa is not ripping, they are most likely buying movies at $9.99 on DVD. Why bother with ripping and burning? And if people are ripping it's going to be to the Hard Drive, not to DVD so much anymore. (see Itunes and the move from CDs to software based music)

This format war is at least 5 years away from a conclusion.

In the meantime, ON Demand porgramming, including High Def movies is available now, this market is going to explode as we move movies to the binary format and away from actual discs.

http://www.moviebeam.com/ is yet another offering.

bluray and hddvd is already dated before it has even begun

If you remember, the orig 1x DVD scsi PC writer was about $750 and blanks were about 12-$15+...No Buffer Under protection either...coaster city!

Notice that once the media got past 4x...it quickly accelerated to
16x...I recall about 1 yr.

Market forces will dictate price...OR THEY SHALL ALL PERISH! (IMHO) Also this war will accelerate quickly and be over quickly....probably resulting in dual format stuff! We are not patient enough to wait 5 years IMHO again!

Who knows...maybe a purple ray machine will debut...(just kidding)

Funny the public is a herd of sheep politically, but not so any more with their entertainment! Notice how fast Plasma TV's have been dropping in price...took a few years but the drops are geometric!!!

Jeff
 
DrWho said:
Right now BluRay has a $1000 ripper and blank media at $20 per disc.

That's not going to take the market by storm. It's going to take years for BluRay to come down in price to make it worth owning.

Grandpa is not ripping, they are most likely buying movies at $9.99 on DVD. Why bother with ripping and burning? And if people are ripping it's going to be to the Hard Drive, not to DVD so much anymore. (see Itunes and the move from CDs to software based music)

This format war is at least 5 years away from a conclusion.

In the meantime, ON Demand porgramming, including High Def movies is available now, this market is going to explode as we move movies to the binary format and away from actual discs.

http://www.moviebeam.com/ is yet another offering.

bluray and hddvd is already dated before it has even begun

1. I agree Blu ray is too expensive to win right now. That just means its a great opportunity for VMD and HD DVD :rolleyes:

2. Frugal Grandpa has been ripping and burning DVD's for months now, at least he has here. Why spend 9.99 to buy ONE movie when you can rent by the month for 9.99 and burn 10 for 20 bucks. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817132019

10 movies for 30 dollars is 3 dollars a movie. A hell of a lot better deal than $9.99 for one. :rolleyes:

3. Ive never purchased PPV and never will. Only if I can keep it permanently on a disk or hard drive.
 
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Whatever happened to SACD and DVD-Audio?

Using a learning remote is a great improvement

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