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Toshiba to exit HD DVD, end format war-NHK | |
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| Time: 14:11 EST/19:11 GMT | News Source: Reuters | Posted By: Byron Hinson | ||
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Corp is planning to stop production of equipment compatible with the HD DVD format for high-definition video, allowing the competing Blu-Ray camp a free run, public broadcaster NHK reported on Saturday. Toshiba is expected to suffer losses amounting to tens of billions of yen (hundreds of millions of dollars) to scrap production of HD DVD players and recorders and other steps to exit the business, Japan's NHK said on its website. No one at Toshiba could be reached for comment. | ||
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| #1 By 655 (68.89.42.239) at 2/16/2008 2:54:36 PM |
| I think I'll still stick with my DVD player that upsamples to 1080p. It's almost as good as Blu-Ray, and the DVD's cost a lot less... |
| #2 By 20505 (216.102.144.11) at 2/16/2008 4:29:05 PM |
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Epitaph:
HD DVD, we hardly knew ye |
| #3 By 1896 (68.153.171.248) at 2/16/2008 5:53:03 PM |
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Same here; I really do not care for a format full of DRM and still tryiing to force something so stupid as the "Regions" scheme. Blu Ray will end as the "Laser disc" etc. This post was edited by Fritzly on Saturday, February 16, 2008 at 17:54. |
| #4 By 82766 (122.107.28.192) at 2/16/2008 7:20:30 PM |
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Fritzly... tryiing to force something so stupid as the "Regions" scheme
um, current DVDs do this as well - so whats the problem? Whether one agrees with regions or not, the simple answer is "there is no change", so people will not be confused. |
| #5 By 23278 (96.233.37.121) at 2/16/2008 7:57:16 PM |
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Fritzly,
Laser Disc was better than VHS but at that cost and, IMO, storing the large laser disc dvd's was not easier than VHS. Blu Ray to me seems to be much better than dvd and it is just as easy to store. I don't have any numbers to compare this statement to, but I imagine more people are embracing Blu Ray because of the PS3 and if they weren't before they might consider it now. For the record, I pulled for HD DVD, but when I got the PS3 and I got a handful of Blu Ray movies I realized how little I cared about the differences in HD DVD and Blu Ray. When given the chance to get a good deal on a Blu Ray movie and a standard DVD movie I will choose Blu Ray. |
| #6 By 7760 (12.155.143.50) at 2/16/2008 9:01:35 PM |
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So, WalMart snubbed them on Friday and Toshiba pulled out of the market the very next day? That sure sounds like a colossal over-reaction to me. I know that WalMart is huge, but, you never know, another company may've been willing to make a similar switch in HD-DVD's favor.
I was confident that HD-DVD would prevail, but I never thought in a million years that Toshiba would just quit. I'm not looking forward to Blu-Ray domination. I hate Sony with a passion |
| #7 By 3653 (65.80.181.153) at 2/16/2008 9:58:37 PM |
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as walmart goes, so goes the entire market.
you know, i have ~600 dvds and not a single one of them is region-encoded. on a related note, every single one of them has the movie title written in sharpie. |
| #8 By 82766 (122.107.28.192) at 2/16/2008 11:59:08 PM |
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Osprey - whats Sony got to do with whether you like BR or not? sure they did the original design but for quite some time since, they're just another one of the members in the Blu-Ray Association.
Sony has no more (or less) influence with what happens to Blu-Ray that the other member companies, which are: Apple Inc., Dell Inc., Hewlett-Packard Company, Hitachi, Ltd., LG Electronics, Mitsubishi Electric, Panasonic (Matsushita Electric), Pioneer Corporation, Royal Philips Electronics, Samsung Electronics, Sharp Corporation, Sun Microsystems, TDK Corporation, Thomson SA, Twentieth Century Fox, Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group / Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment and Warner Home Video Inc. Do you equally "hate with passion" all those companies as well? Mooresa - you're a naughty boy! ;-) |
| #9 By 7760 (12.155.143.50) at 2/17/2008 3:44:06 AM |
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MyBlueRex, you misunderstood. I hate Sony, not BluRay (though there are a few things that I don't like about it). They're the greatest proponent of the format and I don't like seeing them succeed because it gives them more power, influence and confidence, and with that comes more proprietary formats (like Memory Stick) and rootkits. If you like Sony, great, but I don't.
BTW, I found an article that gives greater insight into why Toshiba has made this decision. Instead of citing just WalMart, it points out that Netflix also decided last week that they'd not carry HD-DVD anymore, after Blockbuster made the same decision, and Target did, too. It's looking more like it was an avalanche of recent snubs that led up to this. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,330938,00.html |
| #10 By 1896 (68.153.171.248) at 2/17/2008 5:25:20 AM |
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#4: I am very well aware that the DVDs have the same "Region" scheme as I am sure you are aware that HD DVD did not; so I considered the absence of this restriction an evolution and a progress that, as usual, Hollywood and Co. did not like.
You said "What is the problem", well the problem is that an existing issue, the "Region" limitation, has not been eliminated; this is, at least for me, the problem. 5: as you correctly stated, there are no doubts that the quality of the laser disc was much better than the VHS, as Betamax was better than VHS and V2000 developed by Philips and Grundig was way ahead of both VHS and Betamax. Cost was indeed an issue although I had no problem with storage; I kept the few ones I bought placed vertically with all my 33 music discs. :-) This post was edited by Fritzly on Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 05:27. |
| #11 By 3746 (72.12.161.38) at 2/17/2008 8:20:16 AM |
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HD-DVD died when warners made the jump to blu ray exclusive giving them 75 percent of titles. Retailers picking sides is just the fallout. Personally, I was pulling for HD-DVD. No region encoding, a completed spec on release, so sony f-ing stuff up. The best doesn't always win though but it is good the format war is over.
#1 Upconverted DVD's almost as good as blu ray or other HD content? Are you watching them on a 24" TV? Up converted is not almost as good - it is not anywhere close to the same quality as 1080p. The larger the screen the more noticeable it is going to be. |
| #12 By 13759 (67.190.66.88) at 2/17/2008 9:11:17 AM |
| Sony is evil! |
| #13 By 39852 (69.70.86.250) at 2/17/2008 9:25:31 AM |
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I don't know anyone who cares about a finalized spec on some interactive features. It's a movie, 99% of people just want to watch the main feature and some deleted scenes and outtakes. If it's a big special effects masterpiece, then a featurette. Nobody will care if the discs don't have a fully functional version of monopoly built-in complete with 3D graphics and TrueHD sound effects. Isn't that what game consoles are for anyway? At the very worst, if a movie studio is really peeing its pants to have you play their new virtual tarot game that somehow ties into their movie, they can put it on their web site in Flash.
Quick, what's your top 10 interactive DVD bonuses, and how badly were you dying to see them updated for the HD format? |
| #14 By 3746 (72.12.161.38) at 2/17/2008 10:41:17 AM |
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#13
There are plenty of people who watch all the interactive bonuses on their discs. You buy a disc you pay for all the content including the movie. That is not the point though. The blu ray camp rushed their product to market without an complete spec leaving those with early players unable to access all features of the finalized discs. The only reason to do this was to compete with HD-DVD and was not to benefit the consumer. And it is not just interactive games or online content. The early stand alone players don not have dual video and audio encoders which mean features like PiP are not available. HD-DVD did it right and came to market with a complete spec that didn't leave early adopters unable to access features on future discs. This post was edited by kaikara on Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 10:42. |
| #15 By 39852 (69.70.86.250) at 2/17/2008 12:09:04 PM |
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Yeah I agree in principal it's not idea to rush a spec and have different profiles for the players, but really it's pretty much backward compatible so it's not that bad. However the reality is nobody will care because they can watch the content they do care about. It may not be a benefit to the consumer that they can't play a dice game with some pirates but I think most of them will not even notice. Personally I wish studios would stop spending money on such throw-aways.
Btw the PiP thing is interesting but honestly the problem isn't as bad as it sounds, I used a 1.0 profile blu-ray player to watch a movie that used it, and I didn't notice the feature wasn't there until I tried it in a player with an updated firmware. The only difference was when you were in a scene selection menu, you weren't watching the movie at the same time. It was able to fail graciously because the movie and menus were 100% usable, really the only difference was an absence of PiP. I wouldn't have known it was gone, and when I tried it on the newer player, I noticed the feature was there but I didn't really care. These features really don't add anything to the movie watching experience. While watching the movie, I don't really want my view obstructed by a ton of widgets, and I want my menus to be clean and not confusing. I believe the KISS rule would apply to movies, and personally I think DVD menus were fine. What's annoying now is seeing every movie get creative with their menus and it takes forever to get to the actual feature because they want to wow you with a billion different effects in the menu. The menus even have introductions now, and there are transitions everywhere even on DVD. Wtf? Anyway. I really don't know anyone who actually lies awake in bed at night wishing for this stuff. It certainly doesn't make or break my purchases and it definitely wasn't going to lead my decision for which HD format to use. This post was edited by Mister on Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 12:12. |
| #16 By 3 (86.1.38.147) at 2/17/2008 1:30:12 PM |
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I find it funny with so many against Blu-Ray because of the region coding - yeah its not good - but you do know HD-DVD still has the possibility of enabling region coding in the future if it had taken off, something I think probably would have happened if they had actually sold many titles.
Either way I'm just glad there is going to be one format and as long as they drop the prices of the PC Blu-Ray recorders then It'll be very good for my storage of video and photography. |
| #17 By 44902 (80.233.142.12) at 2/17/2008 1:55:57 PM |
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unfortunately, studios/corporations decided again. nobody asked consumers. evil won again.
HDDVD was a actual people's choice, not BRDVD. But Microsoft betrayed HDDVD. Prepare for BlueRootkits and other funny stuff from SONY. And for price rising too. Sony will reclaim all their losses. This post was edited by BlackTigerAP on Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 13:58. |
| #18 By 3 (86.1.38.147) at 2/17/2008 2:00:13 PM |
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Peoples choice was actually Blu-Ray - it was outselling HD DVD titles before Paramount etc got paid to switch to HD-DVD only, but even then it was too late as most blu-ray titles sold - I don't see how that equates to HDDVD being the peoples choice.
I have no interest in the politics of either format - all I know is that more films I liked came out in Blu-Ray and I liked the idea of increased space for copying when I get a blu-ray recorder. Also stating price rising - you actually believe that wouldn't have happened if HD DVD had won and remember that it isn't just Sony who decide on pricing. But its good to be nieve just for the sake of it. This post was edited by Byron_Hinson[AW] on Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 14:01. |
| #19 By 44902 (80.233.142.12) at 2/18/2008 12:05:21 AM |
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Peoples choice was actually Blu-Ray - it was outselling HD DVD titles before Paramount etc got paid to switch to HD-DVD only, but even then it was too late as most blu-ray titles sold - I don't see how that equates to HDDVD being the peoples choice.
PEOPLE HAVE NO CHOICE! "The Real Choice" - when ALL "studios" will offer both BR and HDDVD for all titles in same time (at least for some period). "The Real Choice" - when all titles are published by format owners itself, not by bloody "studios". Until then people will never have a "choice". This "battle" is full of lie. SONY declared about "amaizing BRD sales" which created a "chain reaction" (or "avalanche"). PS3 owners were forced to buy BR disks just because they have a PS3 with BR-drive built-in. Look who is a most of "BR buyers" - it's PS3 owners. |
| #20 By 23278 (96.233.37.121) at 2/18/2008 8:33:52 AM |
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#19 that is such a blanket statement. Owners of PS3's are forced to buy Blu Ray, there is standard dvd's. I am the only PS3 owner that that actively buys any Blu Ray movies. The other four people I know with a PS3 don't own a single Blu Ray Dvd.
The fact is the PS3 having a built in next gen dvd player played a huge role in my decision to buy one over the 360, the other major reason was the 360's high failure rates. For the four other people I know, the Blu Ray drive in the PS3 had no part in their decision. |
| #21 By 11131 (68.26.187.162) at 2/18/2008 10:05:54 AM |
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Has Toshiba actually made an announcement or is it still just speculation? If this is true then I guess that I will stick with regular DVD until it dies :)
*** edit **** Toshiba claims no decision made http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/18/toshiba-claims-no-decision-on-hd-dvd-as-desertions-continue/ This post was edited by al_fiend on Monday, February 18, 2008 at 10:35. |
| #22 By 3 (86.1.38.147) at 2/18/2008 10:59:07 AM |
| #19 - please do explain how I was forced to buy Blu-Ray titles for my PS3 when I also have the HD-DVD drive for the 360 again? Love to hear this logic. |
| #23 By 2960 (72.196.195.185) at 2/18/2008 12:44:29 PM |
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Well, it went the WRONG way, but at least it went SOME way.
Luckily out of the 10 or so HDDVD's I have, 8 of them were free and came with the XBOX player. I won't be upgrading to BR any time soon. Don't really need it. TL |
| #24 By 3653 (65.80.181.153) at 2/18/2008 11:04:52 PM |
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Byron - "before Paramount etc got paid to switch to HD-DVD only"
history doesn't start in mid-2007. Dig a bit deeper, if you're going to put yourself forward as KNOWING something about this subject. The other content companies behind bluray got "paid" in the form of royalty savings back at the formation of the consortium. Yes, hddvd did the same thing. My point being... its been dirty play AGAINST CONSUMERS from day 1... and both sides are no better than equally dirty. You lose. I don't lose... only because I'm not going to put even 1 penny toward either camp. |
| #25 By 3 (82.132.136.207) at 2/19/2008 5:49:23 AM |
| I Believe I have said the same for months that one is no better than the other when it came to paying companies but even when it was even ground Blu was coming out top. Buying paramount had people here thinking it was a massive coup and great for hd in the end it was just an expensive disaster as the ps3 and bluray player sales just increased. I'm a lucky one who hasnt had to buy either player and just the films and there was better range on blu for my tastes it was as simple as that I just feel sorry for anyone who bought a hddvd player and hope Sony etc offer some swap package for recent buyers. |
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