Toshiba to Give Up on HD DVD

[EastCoasthandle]

You mean like this?
More to thank Sony for.

It's amazing how people downplay the class action law suit on the very problem that prevent most knowledgeable people from buying br. If HD holds out until the class action matures this could actually turn the tides...big time. IMO, this is why so many people want this war to end sooner then later, the class action law suit was inevitable.

 

[Snipe343]

You mean like this?
More to thank Sony for.

I loled when I read that, i would be very pissed,( it also wont matter, they will either pay the people back, or release a firmware update) but anyway good to see the Blue Ray won, we dont need MS controling something else XD

 

[spacejunky]

No because they license the product out to other manufactures. If they didn't let other people use the technology then yes. I would expect Toshiba to begin production of Blu-Ray players. Toshiba has had then same grip hold on VHS and DVD for say um, the past 20 years? It's time to give let go.

Siverel: That's actually not true, and is a misconception. Companies are reporting record Blu-Ray sells and more and more revenue is being reported from companies everyday. Sony isn't going to rip people off, and that's what people are scared of. It just won't happen that way.

Words of wisdom?
Where do you get off speculating that Sony will be a nice company and not try to squeeze as much as they can from the consumer? You have no basis to what you say. Why do you even reply?

Look at Sony's track record. How much do you think they would charge for their game consoles if there were no x-box of Wii?

 

[Snipe343]

Look at Sony's track record. How much do you think they would charge for their game consoles if there were no x-box or Wii?

If the were no xbox or Wii the world would probely just blow up

 

[thoughtdisorder]

We all get screwed.

+1. That's what pisses me off so much about the whole situation. We the consumer are essentially being told what to buy. We don't have to buy, but the way they drive the market really gets under my skin.....

 

[warhammer]

I have some DVD's about 300 original movies. I look at some of the Blue-ray movie titles which I own in DVD that cost me $7/$12 range and Blue ray $40.00+ AU with the same content I don’t think so.
Let’s look at it this one blue-ray disc cost $40.00au or 4 DVD @ $10.00each.
Also DVD and HD DVD (HD RIP) are cheaper to manufacture and faster.
Blue-ray is slower and more expensive to produce so will prices go up now that there’s no competition for them now..
Companies that manufacture good's, base their profit and cost on quantity per hour so how long does it take to produce 1xBlue-ray disk ????.
I will continue to buy DVD movies for now, Blue-ray movies let see if those prices start to come down.
And as far as SONY goes whatever they have had a monopoly on prices have always gone UP and UP never DOWN.

 

[CarolinaKSU]

+1. That's what pisses me off so much about the whole situation. We the consumer are essentially being told what to buy. We don't have to buy, but the way they drive the market really gets under my skin.....

My thoughts exactly. We the consumer will end up losing. Not HD-DVD. The big-wigs that signed the exclusive deal with Universal and Paramount will still come out ahead even if HD-DVD dies. They made their money with that deal and while Im sure they would want to win the overall war, they will still ride off into the sunset with a boatload of cash.

 

[Mussels]

and sata BD rom drives just hit $300 here in au as well.

BD movies cost around $30 here too, once the players drop in price all shall be well.

 

[thoughtdisorder]

My thoughts exactly. We the consumer will end up losing. Not HD-DVD. The big-wigs that signed the exclusive deal with Universal and Paramount will still come out ahead even if HD-DVD dies. They made their money with that deal and while Im sure they would want to win the overall war, they will still ride off into the sunset with a boatload of cash.

You are right on the money my friend!

 

[DaJMasta]

Yeah it's over..... too bad HD-DVD is the looser though, those cheap players and all the sales on HD-DVDs would have been great if they kept up.... Blu-Ray has the 5 free videos with a player thing going, but I haven't seen as many sales.





I guess at least with one format chosen there isn't ambiguity, and Blu-Ray does hold more per disk in it's standard format.

 

[EastCoasthandle]

and sata BD rom drives just hit $300 here in au as well.

BD movies cost around $30 here too, once the players drop in price all shall be well.

Actually no it won't with all the confusion of BD 1.0, BD1.1 and BD2.0 and the pending class action it will be far from well. That's why I hope HD still sticks around until that's all sorted.

 

[Ravenas]

Spacejunky you're not worth talking to...You can't accept the fact that you may be wrong, even when it hits you in the face. No offense but you've never had anything useful to say in a conversation, it's just you trying to ignite some sort of flame war. Oh well, I guess that's the nature of a few.

 

[Ravenas]

+1. That's what pisses me off so much about the whole situation. We the consumer are essentially being told what to buy. We don't have to buy, but the way they drive the market really gets under my skin.....

Nobody is telling you what to buy though. If you want a cheap solution, get a DVD upconverter. If you want a different solution, try iTunes. But the fact is, no one is telling you what to buy.

Even if it were that way, it would mean Toshiba has been telling you what to buy for the past 20 years.

 

[-2kill-]

Some people on here are acting as if blu-ray is the new oxygen, it's the simple fact of YOU DON'T HAVE TO BUY BLU-RAY. It's like everything, all new technologies are more expensive at first it's like complaining that you can't have a new car at the cost of it depreciated by a year. Sony can't just jack up the price because, simply, people just won't buy blue-ray movies, It's much better economics to find the happy medium between price and point of sales. Sure they make more money per copy if they sell the movies for more but lowering the cost and getting a much larger % of clientele is much more effective.

 

[Easy Rhino]

Understandable and regrettable, yes...But don't they (Sony) run the risk of having a "monopoly" if they are the only ones with "blu-ray" and that happens to be the only high-def option?

no offense, but that is like saying Apple has a monopoly on OSX

 

[Easy Rhino]

You know what's funny. I invited a few friends over for some movies on BR and overall were not impressed enough to buy into HDM. Sure they liked the idea that the movie's picture quality seemed clearer then DVD. But after 3 movies they became accustom to how they looked and begin asking "what else is there". When I wasn't able to offer any other incentives they took it as a learning experience. Not a "I most buy one" experience. Why?
-they weren't willing to pay that much just to watch a movie
-they would simply come to my house to watch it (ironic...I know)
-there wasn't much difference when all they were interested in is the movie itself more then how it looked.

The last one is a big eye opener for me since I consider them the average joe. They aren't interested in HDM because of the eye candy but wanted to see a particular movie they liked. So, what does that mean? If they aren't interested in a particular movie, regardless if it's on DVD or HDM it's not going to sway them into buying BR if it's not of interest to them. Also, if all they want to do is just watch the movie...HDM offers very little incentive to go out and buy a $400 (thereabout) dvd player just to watch it.

Therefore ultimately, in the minds of how consumers think, they may in fact lose the war. Remember, HDM is still around 1% of the entire movie market on disc. Their hope is to eliminate competition for better brand recognition. However, they fail to realize that consumers are aware of them but just not interested. As with anything, time will tell how all of this turns out.

my friends came over and were blown away by "the patriot" on a 42 inch HDTV at 1080p pushing LPCM 7.1

yea, i may pay 30-40 bucks for a blu-ray movie but i get 100 times the picture quality out of it.

 

[Easy Rhino]

My thoughts exactly. We the consumer will end up losing. Not HD-DVD. The big-wigs that signed the exclusive deal with Universal and Paramount will still come out ahead even if HD-DVD dies. They made their money with that deal and while Im sure they would want to win the overall war, they will still ride off into the sunset with a boatload of cash.

congratulations, you just figured out how the real world works.

 

[Easy Rhino]

Some people on here are acting as if blu-ray is the new oxygen, it's the simple fact of YOU DON'T HAVE TO BUY BLU-RAY. It's like everything, all new technologies are more expensive at first it's like complaining that you can't have a new car at the cost of it depreciated by a year. Sony can't just jack up the price because, simply, people just won't buy blue-ray movies, It's much better economics to find the happy medium between price and point of sales. Sure they make more money per copy if they sell the movies for more but lowering the cost and getting a much larger % of clientele is much more effective.

you make far to much sense and therefore have no place on this thread

 

[EastCoasthandle]

my friends came over and were blown away by "the patriot" on a 42 inch HDTV at 1080p pushing LPCM 7.1

yea, i may pay 30-40 bucks for a blu-ray movie but i get 100 times the picture quality out of it.

I am not the only person who had such an experience with BR.

Embarrassment...
I had a small dinner party last night and decided to show off my projector and sound system after a few of the guests asked about it. I arbitrarily pulled out "Ghost Rider" on BD and played it via my PS3. Everyone was absolutely "wowed"- so far, so good.

Then a couple of guests asked about the difference between DVD and HDM (I have both). I spent a few of minutes talking about the sharpness, contrast, resolution, etc. and ended up voluteering to show the difference to them. Well, here's where it got tricky. I have the SD of Ghost Rider as well and put it in my Toshiba A3 for comparison. By this time only the guys were left with me and we opened a bottle of wine and started looking at both versions. Lo and behold, the difference was minimal at best to all in the room. Needless to say, questions followed like "How much for that PS3?" and "How much are the disks again?" My only saving grace was really the sound levels between the two. With GR outputting Linear PCM and the A3 doing DD on the SD side (Upconverted to 720P), everyone at least ooh'ed and ah'ed over the perceived sound difference.

My PJ is a 720P Panasonic AE900 on a 100" grey high contrast screen (1.85:1) and I use a Marantz SR-8001 to the projector all via HDMI. The projector is ISF calibrated.

Surely most of you have done the same test with friends! I am sure that something must be wrong as the A3 is good but is not rated that good, nor have I read that Ghost Rider is a demo quality SD disc.

Suggestions?

On a side note: the A3 is the quietest player I have ever connected. I have to crank the sound to about 10 units higher than the same disc on the PS3. Is that die to the PS3 converting everything to Linear PCM?

Source

 

[effmaster]

If the were no xbox or Wii the world would probely just blow up

very true Snipe.

Where would this world be if you and I couldnt crash our warthogs into one another lol.
I told yall that I thought a big announcement would be coming soon whether it be good or bad for HD DVD. And here it is folks. Im saddened yes by this turn of events. I still stand by my reasons for why I chose HD DVD over Blu Ray: Cheaper players, Dual playability (i.e. Not every single room is going to have n HD player nor will a car so its nice not to have to buy 2 copies of one movie as they are essentially with Blu Ray.), Toshiba and Microsoft supported it along with Intel and many other high profile companies, better features, more completed standards versus Blu Ray, etc. the list goes on and on.

 

[lemonadesoda]

I'm sorry to hear Toshiba is throwing in the towel. Personally, i think they should make the strategic decision that they have lost the high-value high-price war. They should OPEN SOURCE the technology, format and firmware and give it to all the DVD manufacturers around the world, so we can have upscaling HD-DVD compatible DVD players for just a few dollars more.

Regular DVDs can then become dual layer (not double sided) with a regular DVD on layer 1 and HDDVD on layer 2. Simple enough for 80% of the population that dont get technology-hard-ons.

ON THE FLIP SIDE.

I'm a SONY shareholder, and I'm delighted we've won the format war and now control, and can extract fat royalties and margins from, the hi-def movie industry. Whoopie. It's also a DOUBLE WHAMMY WIN... because most people will by a PS3 for their BR-player... and that means more PS3 sales... and that it also becomes the console of choice. RIP Toshiba, RIP Xbox.

 

[Mussels]

I'm sorry to hear Toshiba is throwing in the towel. Personally, i think they should make the strategic decision that they have lost the high-value high-price war. They should OPEN SOURCE the technology, format and firmware and give it to all the DVD manufacturers around the world, so we can have upscaling HD-DVD compatible DVD players for just a few dollars more.

Regular DVDs can then become dual layer (not double sided) with a regular DVD on layer 1 and HDDVD on layer 2. Simple enough for 80% of the population that dont get technology-hard-ons.

ON THE FLIP SIDE.

I'm a SONY shareholder, and I'm delighted we've won the format war and now control, and can extract fat royalties and margins from, the hi-def movie industry. Whoopie. It's also a DOUBLE WHAMMY WIN... because most people will by a PS3 for their BR-player... and that means more PS3 sales... and that it also becomes the console of choice. RIP Toshiba, RIP Xbox.

on here, its more likely we get them for PC

sata BD-RW ftw! (just get cheaper already damnit!)

 

[moto666]

Finely!

 

[Triprift]

If your not happy with blue ray then just stick with dvd bearing in mind it has lower res and is now old technology.

 

[WarEagleAU]

Actually, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on Blu-Ray is exactly a justification for the premium over DVD (if then its only like $5 bucks at Wally World). That right there made me glad I own a PS3 and HD LCD TV.