[360] $1.99 360 HD-DVD Player

Originally Posted by Guru

HD AND Blu-Ray are pretty much still failing to make any substantial market impact.

With the way current trends are going, neither format is really going to penetrate the DVD market enough to become the front-runner, before direct download HD content will become the norm.

But, the 360 HD player is still a great deal if you feel like it's something worth investing in.

Not really. Blu-Ray is boasting a higher adoption rate than DVD had. To expect these formats to be adopted by the world overnight is naive. Right now there simply is not a new DVD release that isn't also put out side by side on Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. Blu-ray players are also expected to once again drop in price to around $300US this Christmas.

Considering all of that along with the expressed desire of the movie companies supporting Blu-Ray to have the format replace DVD to escape the current asinine DVD licensing costs which Toshiba controls with an iron grip, I don't really see DVD surviving for much longer. At worst case there will be a forced consumer shift attempt by simply not releasing new films on DVD.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Guru

Blu-Ray is also owned by Sony, who also own a movie studio themselves. There's a little bit of an unequal advantage that they have.

Their adoption rate seems high now, but it's going to table off once the numbers meet the number of people who own HD televisions.

And Blu-Ray DVDs are largely more expensive for companies to produce than regular DVDs, simply because of the delicate materials used in Blu-Ray discs. Don't expect consumer America to support having to pay an extra 10 dollars a movie just because movie companies don't want to pay licensing fees. That's the most bogus thing I've ever heard (although it wouldn't be completely surprising if Sony has all their eggs in that basket -- they don't really tend to be consumer-focused through many of their business decisions in the past two years or so).

No Blu-Ray is not owned by Sony. They are only one of seven major contributers to the format. Besides Sony, Disney, Fox and Warner Brothers are also the major contributers and supporters of the format. Blu-Ray as a format was first conceived and developed with the primary goal of escaping the licensing fee system of DVD. Why do you think Toshiba is the major company against the format? Because they will lose a tremendous amount if Blu-Ray wins out and the current DVD licensing system is removed. FYI, the HD-DVD licensing system is even worse than DVD, hence you most likely will never see these major movie studios support the format even if it ever gains the lead at some point.

Of course they are pushing the format for the quality reasons, but the real reason for the Blu-Ray push is to develop a better licensing environment for the movie industry.

There's nowhere I can't reach.