http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071027-the-sub-200-hd-dvd-player-arrives-multiple-retailers-slashing-prices.html
That's still far from decided...
PS3 Strategy/Confidence Retrospective
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http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071027-the-sub-200-hd-dvd-player-arrives-multiple-retailers-slashing-prices.html
That's still far from decided...
That is a huge assumption at this point. It was one I openly agreed with over a year ago, but as it stands right now Blu-ray isn't in a position to outright beat HD DVD let alone be crowned the heir to DVD.
HD display adoption has grown but is still a minority of the market and DVD player sales are still massive. HD DVD has also made a major play over the last couple months--first with the Paramount and Dreamworks defections, and now hitting the value market at $198 at Walmart.
On a totally different tangent (nothing to do with Nesh) is I have owned a PlayStation, never owned an Xbox, have not purchased an Xbox 360, have lamented Halo's gameplay mechanics as "old school" which I don't prefer at all, have never received anything free from Sony/MS/Nintendo/ATI/Nvidia/Intel/AMD, and am a full-time student working in a factory of all places. My opinions aren't always right, but my Blu-ray comments aren't because I work for MS (that would pay much, much better!). Whether every point is of equal value, the bottom-line is that the PS3 has failed to generate the marketshare expected by most analysts (and PS1/PS2 market expectations) and much of this has to do with delays and cost inflation related to Blu-ray.
There is no arguement against the fact Blu-ray adoption has been relatively slow and that a PS3 launched at $200 cheaper ($299/$399) in 2006 without Blu-ray would be doing significantly better in console marketshare than it has to this point, especially in the light of RROD by the competition, than the PS3 is doing right now. Blu-ray hasn't been a major catalyst for PS3 sales and makes the machine significantly more expensive to manufacture which inturn inflates the retail price. And my general point has been I see no reason, especially in the face of MS's RROD, that Sony could not have created a Cell based console that could be well on pace to repeat the PS2's success. Blu-ray isn't completely to blame, but it is a factor.
DuckThor Evil
Legend
That's exactly how it is. PS3 plays a huge role in the success of Blu-ray. If PS3 didn't have a Blu-ray player, HD DVD would destroy it in a very short time. HD DVD is cheaper and the name HD DVD is clear and self explanatory and points a clear upgrade path to casual people, whose money is eventually needed to make these new formats into more than just something that exists only in the homes of theater nuts.
Even if PS3 owners buy little amount of movies and thus only makes small plashes, those small plashes are still making a difference in this early stage, and that's the only reason Blu-ray is outselling HD DVD at the moment. Now with the cheaper PS3 those small plashes will probably increase, giving more boost to Blu-ray, but the format war is far from over, it could take ages, still in my opinion the PS3 not only plays a major part in it, it is Blu-ray's only hope.
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scooby_dooby
Legend
Of course it counts for something. But it's not nearly as compelling as the real, tangible benefits that DVD brought.
To accuse JL of being slanted just struck me as a little funny, in general he seems to present a more balanced viewpoint that I've seen you represent. The "Halo 3" comment was definately uncalled for, as far as I know he hasn't even played the game, doesn't like the gameply, and thinks the GFX are dissapointing...
Fair enough, but that's the way your posts come off.
Sure, but this doesn't have much to do with the larger discussion at hand.
scooby_dooby
Legend
Since when is 50% not a fraction?
But again, it also makes for easier upgrading.
Could we drop that please, it was a mistake, was primarily meant to make my discouragement of someone else from using the 'you work for Microsoft' slant more effective, and as far as I am concerned, it was never written (hopefully JL accepts that also).
I understand, but then that's probably for the same reason as yours often don't. We should try to stick to the arguments instead.
The discussion at hand was whether or not the PS3 could have a significant impact in that area. For this we only need a postive example. If the PS2 had a significant impact on at the very least the speed of DVD acceptance in Japan (where Video-CD and LaserDisc ruled if I remember correctly), then that's that positive example.
EDIT: my memory hasn't fosaken me completely. From an article dating back to 2000:
If you look for it online, you will find several publications indicating that DVD uptake in Japan was much slower than in the US (fastest) and the EU (next fastest).
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Yes the PS2 was for some (saying many would require stats to prove it) the 2nd DVD player and that DVD player just might as well have been the only DVD player for the kid that owned it.
And that kid could rent and buy movies and watch them on his own TV with his own DVD player in his own room... Girls Gone Wild 1 for example.
I think the marketplace is very different today. You already have Broadcom with a dedicated chip that can decode two H.264 or VC-1 streams at the same time at HD bitstream speeds. This has equal use in set-top boxes for HD broadcasting as in HD players (be it HD-DVD or BluRay).
As the Ars link shows, we already have $200 players. In a year or two we'll hit $100 for both HD-DVD and BluRay players. I think it'll be hard to see the effect of PS3 on BluRay adoption looking back 3-4 years from now. What will be evident though, is the slow start PS3 got on this generation, in part thanks to costs and delays associated with blue diode storage drives.
Cheers
And then you have people like me, who have 150 DVD movies. I've had a PS2 and a XBox with the DVD kit, yet I'm on my 4th DVD player since 2001.
And I'm fence-sitting until I'm certain that the money invested in a HD movie library isn't wasted.
Cheers
archangelmorph
Veteran
If you have a HD movie player already then why would it be?
Surely if you just decide to purchase the HD versions of any new DVD releases in the future then you can't go wrong right?
Same with me but $200 with five movies may prove to be to tempting.
scooby_dooby
Legend
This is not a positive example that is relative to the PS3 though. There was no competing format on the level of HD-DVD, so the two situations share very little in common.
I don't think we need to debate whether the inclusion of BR in a PS3 will help the format, of course it will, we can see it right now. I think most agree that if it weren't for the PS3, BluRay would be dead in the water right now.
It's certainly helping, but the strategy has already failed in that it's been unable to push HD-DVD out of the market. And with the launch of the new $200 HD-DVD player, and mounting studio support, it seems that the format war is not going anywhere anytime soon, and at best BR will become the dominant platform in maybe 2-3 years.
I think the entire initial reason for inclusing BR in the PS3 was to deflate HD-DVD before it even left the ground, securing BR as the dominant platform. It was a big risk with a bigger reward. And it very nearly succeeded. We saw movie studios switch over citing expected PS3 sales, we assumed there would be 10million players in the market in year 1, we assumed PS3 owners would buy a significant number of BR titles, and HD-DVD didn't have a prayer (such was conventional wisdom around here, I shared it)
However that opportunity has been lost, and I think that really calls into question the benefit of including BR in the PS3. Sure, it may eventually secure BR as the HD format, but not until after a long ugly (read: low sales) format war, and it will never become the selling point it was originally intended to be as consumers in general remain on the fence until the format war is decided.
That $200 screams fire sale for an older, non-profitable model. The cost of HD DVD player and Blu-ray player hardwares are not much different, with the same decoder chip and a blue laser diode. Toshiba's HD DVD players are most likely sold below the real cost just like PS3. PS3 has software sales at least, but I doubt Toshiba can continue it seeing no other hardware manufacturers are joining in. Now, if the cost of those hardwares really goes down that's nice, PS3 will get cheaper alongside of them.
To which I simply counter that it's far too early to say how vital for BluRay the PS3 inclusion has been until the war has been decided, and that I'm still 100% convinced (for all the reasons I've stated a-plenty) that BluRay is the best platform for a games console in this generation.
From now on I think we'll get very cyclical, so I better make work of my idea of putting all the pros and cons in a list, and then simply start collecting the data as reality unfolds, as that will be the only way to see what is really happening.
Even so, my comment still apply though: They may make arrogant statements, but it does not necessarily mean that their very complex business plan is founded on arrogance. As for them shutting up, it would be silly for them to continue the same PR strategy given that they have real products to sell now, their major plans have been delayed, and Nintendo is leading the pack.
Now say if they get back on track again, they might still thrash talk depending on the exec's personality and their PR. But then again, this has nothing to do with whether their plans are arrogant or not. There are many other critical success factors. I am not sure if labelling a plan as arrogant is meaningful actually.
EDIT: Finally made it back from R&C.
How's your betamax player holding out?
The media should outlive the CE device by a fairly large margin, trying to replace the player for a dead format isn't always so easy.
I wasn't arguing against BluRay. I was arguing that it was a mistake to put it in PS3. It added costs and delayed the launch of PS3 in a critical phase of this generation.
I don't care who comes out on top, HD-DVD or BluRay, both are comparable technically. I'm waiting until one of them wins, - or is confident that both of them will continue to exist. I'm not going to be stuck with 30-40 movies in a dead format. I'm pretty sure I'm not alone.
Cheers
A lot of misconceptions in this post. 1st, quite a few hardware manufacturers have jumped in (Onkyo, Ventura, Integra, LG, Samsung) and while Blu-ray and HD DVD share using a blue laser diode, the lens assembly is much more expensive for Blu-ray than for HD DVD because of focusing requirements and precision needed to read data stored so close to the surface of the disc. Also Ventura is releasing an HD DVD player at MSRP for $249 (retail will be $150-$200) and since they aren't Toshiba I doubt they'd launch at a loss to themselves. And Walmart has stated they have replenishment available for the HD-A2 that they are selling for $199 (as well as Amazon and Circuit City selling at that price).
The market is up for grabs in the HD movie distribution disc venue. Sony made a very bold play for it by including it in the PS3, but the misconception that Toshiba is alone in the HD DVD market and subsidizing players is getting old (and inaccurate).
You have some links to reviews of these players?
If you have a PS3 though, you can happily buy BRD movies knowing they'll still play on it even if you later get an HD DVD player and HD DVD movies. It's not like a stand-alone player where it'll take up shelf space for no other purpose. The only situation where that's a bad move is if in 10 years time your PS3 dies and there's no alternative to play your old BRDs. But that's not much different from all those VHS tapes you used to have. What's the life expectancy of any film format?
I wouldn't have any qualms buying BRDs if I had a PS3, even without an HD set, because they don't cost much more and when I do upgrade the TV, I'll enjoy the benefit.
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