Blue Ray has more momentum than HD-DVD?

[wco81]

Interesting writeup of what the Blue Ray camp has been up to recently:


http://dvd.ign.com/articles/524/524681p1.html.


If the reporting is accurate and some of the bold claims prove to be true, it's hard to see BR being derailed.

- BR discs will cost only 10% more than DVD initially and eventually cost less? Is that single or dual layer? With or without cartridge? With or without the TDK hard coating?

- Single-layer, 25 GB, gives you 135 minutes of HD video, 3 languages and 2 hours of bonus materials in SD.

- Dual-layer, 50 GB, gives 3 hours of HD video, DTS and 2 hours of HD bonus materials.

- Resoultion would be 1920x1024? What frame rate?

- MPEG2 is almost a given. Also considering MPEG4 AVC FRExt and VC-9. Studios think they can get 2-3 times the compression with MPEG4 over MPEG2.

- TDK protective coating demo - sharpie pen ink beads up, wiped away with cloth.

- Outputs being considered include component, DVI (presumably HDMI too) and 1393 Firewire 5C.

- Sony has 1500 titles ready to go for HD? Is that only Columbia-Tristar titles? What happens if Sony acquires MGM-UA?

The reporting suggests BR is way more on the ball than HD-DVD. Supposedly studios are lining up behind BR "privately if not publicly." If the disc production cost estimates are true, there would be no reason why they wouldn't.

The main outstanding issue is hardware cost. Will they only release recorder units? How fast can they get the costs down towards consumer acceptance? It sounds like they made a lot of progress on disc costs (or we've overestimated BR disc costs). So it's not inconceivable they could get hardware costs down.

For codecs, the interesting question is whether it would be cheaper to just press dual layer discs (if it's true you can get 3 hours of HD video with DTS and 2 hours of HD video of bonus materials with just MPEG2) or pay to license the other codecs. Besides licensing costs, they'd probably have to pay for more powerful decoder chips, affecting hardware costs.

And for Sony, there's a strategic issue with codecs. If they refuse VC-9 put BR on the PS3, MS would almost be forced to use HD-DVD. If Sony is confident about BR, they could "lock out" MS from BR. Of course, MS would likely not support BR in Windows then, in which case BR Consortium members Dell and HP would have to build in BR support independently of MS. However, Sony is not the BR Consortium so other members and the studios would surely have a large say in resolving the codec question.

 

[Legion]

So HD video is ~4 times the bit rate of DVD video?

 

[AlphaWolf]

If the reporting is accurate and some of the bold claims prove to be true, it's hard to see BR being derailed.

Remember beta was equal or clearly superior to vhs in every aspect.

 

[Legion]

If the reporting is accurate and some of the bold claims prove to be true, it's hard to see BR being derailed.

Remember beta was equal or clearly superior to vhs in every aspect.

even length of recording?

 

[Citan]

If the reporting is accurate and some of the bold claims prove to be true, it's hard to see BR being derailed.

Remember beta was equal or clearly superior to vhs in every aspect.

IIRC Betamax's recording length was far less then VHS.

 

[AlphaWolf]

If the reporting is accurate and some of the bold claims prove to be true, it's hard to see BR being derailed.

Remember beta was equal or clearly superior to vhs in every aspect.

IIRC Betamax's recording length was far less then VHS.

ya I suppose. 300 minute beta tapes don't compare to 8 hours.

 

[Vince]

With Hewlett-Packard and Dell leading the way, BD-ROM will offer not only the hardware level protection mentioned earlier, but also some new interactive technologies. For starters, BD-ROM will support a Java layer, so BD-ROM software will be dynamically changeable.

In a demo, they showed the animated, high definition menus of a BD-ROM title and how it was possible to download a new language track for a film, have it automatically installed and the language option added to the movie's language menu.

Now thats more badass then even the Sharpie trick.

 

[Psychogenics]

Its good to see BD moving forward....

 

[wco81]

If the reporting is accurate and some of the bold claims prove to be true, it's hard to see BR being derailed.

Remember beta was equal or clearly superior to vhs in every aspect.

I wasn't just referring to the technical aspects although the greater capacity of the format is clear.

I was also referring to the claim that it would only be 10% more to manufacture BD discs, the reference to increasing support from studios, the 1,500 titles Sony could release in BR (presumably just from their own studio alone), etc.

Where Beta failed was that Sony was alone while most other manufacturers went with JVC's VHS because of lower licensing costs than Beta. Matsushita was also the kingmaker of VHS as it shipped more VHS hardware than anyone else. It also wasn't long before there were far more VHS content than Beta content.

It appears BR will have greater capacity, much wider hardware manufacturer support and a big start with Columbia Tristar (Spiderman franchise). Sony is also trying to acquire MGM-UA, which supposedly has the biggest library (James Bond).

So arguably superior hardware, greater manufacturing support (HD DVD only has NEC and Toshiba) and possibly greater software support.

 

[Ty]

How will they convince end users to "upgrade" though? Or have they announced players that can read "normal" DVDs and BDs??

 

[Paul]

How will they convince end users to "upgrade" though? Or have they announced players that can read "normal" DVDs and BDs??

They do Just tack on a red laser, or have they intergraded it yet?

 

[Nappe1]

Where Beta failed was that Sony was alone while most other manufacturers went with JVC's VHS because of lower licensing costs than Beta. Matsushita was also the kingmaker of VHS as it shipped more VHS hardware than anyone else. It also wasn't long before there were far more VHS content than Beta content.

It appears BR will have greater capacity, much wider hardware manufacturer support and a big start with Columbia Tristar (Spiderman franchise). Sony is also trying to acquire MGM-UA, which supposedly has the biggest library (James Bond).

So arguably superior hardware, greater manufacturing support (HD DVD only has NEC and Toshiba) and possibly greater software support.

as you mentioned, VHS had lower licensing costs and biggest problem of DVD has been, suprisingly, licensing costs. until these days, it has been far cheaper to make around 4-6 CD-ROMs compared to single DVD-ROM. when ever you use DVD logo, you have to pay royalties to DVD consortium. while CD (as well as BR is stated to be) didn't. Disc just had to comply with specs. (aka. "Books" as Philips named them.) This is also a reason why some copy protected audio cds do not have COMPACT DISC -DIGITAL AUDIO logo.

 

[Ug Lee]

A question relating to the actual topic name - what have we heard lately from the HD-DVD group? It seems to me like the BR group are more switched on. If BR ends up supporting a wide variety of codecs, just what is the point of HD-DVD?

 

[wco81]

How will they convince end users to "upgrade" though? Or have they announced players that can read "normal" DVDs and BDs??

They do Just tack on a red laser, or have they intergraded it yet?

Yes a few weeks ago, Sony said they had an assembly which could read and write CD, DVD, and BD.

 

[wco81]

A question relating to the actual topic name - what have we heard lately from the HD-DVD group? It seems to me like the BR group are more switched on. If BR ends up supporting a wide variety of codecs, just what is the point of HD-DVD?

There are no technical obstacles to supporting other codecs.

Seems like more of a business issue, whether they want to pay for the royalties and require the players to have better chips for decoding the newer codecs, which would increase HW manufacturing costs.

But if they can make dual-layer discs cheaply and MPEG 2 gives them 3 hours of HD with DTS and 2 more hours of HD video for bonus materials, then why would they need other codecs? Or the other example they gave is they could put a TV box set of 6 DVDs on a single BR disc (dual layer) using MPEG2. It wouldn't be HD but most TV box sets aren't HD yet.

They have to support MPEG2 because backwards-compatibility with DVD requires it. Plus most of the HDTV content produced in this country uses MPEG2 already.

They could include the newer codecs but Blue Ray discs seem to have enough capacity (and throughput of 36 Mbps) even with MPEG2.

 

[Deepak]

Link

"Matsushita Electric Industrial, better known by its Panasonic brand name, will unveil its first Blu-ray Disc recorder next week, the Osaka, Japan-based company says."

"However, most of these (DVD) recorders are unable to duplicate high-definition television and so reduce the resolution to that of conventional broadcasts. The new Blu-ray recorder will be able to retain the high-resolution picture."

 

[cybamerc]

wco81:

> But if they can make dual-layer discs cheaply and MPEG 2 gives them 3
> hours of HD with DTS and 2 more hours of HD video for bonus
> materials, then why would they need other codecs?

Why not? Why not make the most of the space on the disc? Both in terms of the amount of video you can fit on a single disc but also the quality of the video.

 

[PC-Engine]

Initially the BRF downplayed MPEG4 and VC-9 for various reasons and had zero intention of incorporating it into the BRD spec. Now they're not so confident in excluding those codecs and are backpedaling and reassesing the situation because the DVD Forum has approved those codecs in the final ver 1 of the HD-DVD-ROM spec. which will see HD-DVD players next year. Mass production of HD-DVD-ROM has already started. HD-DVD discs can be made faster and cheaper (higher yields) than BRD.

You will see HD-DVD movies and players next year followed by HD-DVD recorders. The problem I see with BRD is that they have to release recorders instead of players which will make it difficult to compete on a price level with HD-DVD players. If you look at the present situation between DVD players and DVD recorders, you'll see a big price gap. The other problem with BRD is that it will also be competing with regular red laser dual layer DVD recorders which will be coming out soon and not costing much more than single layer recorders. Then there's the possibility of red laser dual layer HD-DVD recorders using VC-9 and MPEG4 on the horizon not to mention blue laser recorders.

Consumers will not be jumping to get BRD recorders that cost 2-3 times of regular DL DVD recorders just so they can record HD broadcasts on expensive BRD media. Most of them will be purchasing DL DVD recorders that can also use cheap single layer DVD-R/RWs. And for those who want to watch HD-DVD movies they'll buy not too expensive HD-DVD players.

 

[rabidrabbit]

How much do the HD-DVD recorders cost when they are released?
How much do the BR-recorders cost when they are released?
How much blank HD-DVD media cost when it is released?
How much blank BR media cost when it is released?
What were the reasons BRF downplayed MPEG4 and VC-9?

 

[PC-Engine]

Oh here's another problem with BRD. They currently have a recording spec but no read only spec. If they decide to incorporate say VC-9 into the ROM spec how would BRD recorders decode VC-9 movies? If I buy a $3000 SONY BRD recorder today or a Panasonic next month, how will I watch VC-9 encoded BRD movies next year?

It's pretty obvious why the BRF wants MPEG4 and VC-9 capability. Having HD-DVD movie playback on a BRD player is a pretty enticing feature wouldn't you say?

VC-9 is MS's baby even though it's an open standard now. It'd be funny if SONY was forced to include VC-9 capablility in their BRD recorders...