Merry Xboxmas (War Is Over)
Posted on | January 4, 2008 at 11:22 pm | 5 Comments
Comes the news today that Warner Bros, which has been distributing their HiDef movies in both Blu-ray and HD DVD formats, is dropping HD DVD and focusing on Blu-ray exclusively. This was apparently a surprise to some, but not to others. This decision has spawned all sorts of pronouncements of doom for the HD DVD format, like this one. I guess I’m glad that I didn’t go out and buy an HD DVD player when they were momentarily very cheap before Christmas. And I’m still committed to buying a PlayStation 3 partly because of the Blu-ray player, although the accident has put the kibosh on any spending plans for now. But it looks like I was going to make the right decision. Another factor in my decision is that I recently discovered the PS3 (the 80GB version, at least) will play SACD discs, and I have a lot of those. Too bad it won’t do DVD-Audio too, but at least most DVD-Audio discs also have their surround mixes in Dolby Digital 5.1, playable on regular DVD players, and surround is really more important to me than the Advanced Resolution aspect. So I could do away with my SACD/DVD-Audio player, which I may not have room for after the PS3 comes along. But I digress.
I still think the whole HiDef DVD thing is pretty pointless, even if I ultimately buy into the technology. HiDef DVDs will not have as long a product life as even DVDs. Something else will come along soon which is better – probably digital downloads. Netflix is already starting up a new movie delivery system that uses a set-top box and the Internet. Once discs are obsolete for rentals, how long until they are obsolete for purchase? I suppose some diehard collectors will still want their hard media, but will that be a big enough market to profit from? And couldn’t those collectors just make their physical media from the downloads? Or be happy with their collections stored on their home computer?
Technology changes too fast these days. I miss my 8-track tapes and rotary phone.
Jogged Today: No.
Today’s Weight: 163.2 lbs
Lunch Yesterday: Homemade ham sandwich.
Pet Peeve of the Day: Season finales in January. C’mon producers, settle that strike!
Latre.
Comments
5 Responses to “Merry Xboxmas (War Is Over)”
January 5th, 2008 @ 12:04 am
The AppleTV was supposed to be the set-top box that would sneak a Bittorrent-like network into America’s homes, and eliminate Netflix as well as hard media. But apparently they forgot to make it do HDTV or something.
Our TV just went out (second one we’ve lost in 6 months) and no warranty replacement for 2 weeks, so we’re in the market for something cheap to tide us over… stone tablets, anyone?
January 5th, 2008 @ 8:50 am
Big giant flash hard drives are clearly the technology to wait for. I’m going to sit out the Format Wars like I did the Clone Wars.
January 5th, 2008 @ 10:07 am
“couldn’t those collectors just make their physical media from the downloads? Or be happy with their collections stored on their home computer?”
No way. If physical media stop being published, so be it. But home-recorded media stand little chance of substituting prerecorded media when it comes to pride of ownership.
What might help is if the publishers include proper artwork and a disc label ready-made for printing and applying at home but so far I haven’t seen that happening (though in terms of effort and cost it should be a no-brainer).
Oh and yes, PS3 does play SACDs. Check out PS3SACD.com
Now if only Warner would admit DVD-Audio was as poor a choice as HD-DVD and put its weight behind SACD then we can finally consider that other format war closed too.
January 5th, 2008 @ 10:39 am
Great site, Steve! It’s going to be very helpful to me! I was hoping someone out there would have some detailed information on the PS3 SACD capabilities.
Now if only Warner would admit DVD-Audio was as poor a choice as HD-DVD and put its weight behind SACD then we can finally consider that other format war closed too.
I bet that’s pretty hard for Warner to do, seeing as how even Sony, the inventor of the format, isn’t even putting out any SACD discs these days (AFAIK).
January 6th, 2008 @ 5:11 am
That’s right. They’ve got this site http://becausesoundmatters.com/ but all we seem to get here is vinyl reissues, no DVD-Audio.