Blu-ray DRM may cause BenQ delay

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BenQ may delay its schedule to produce Blu-ray Disc drives one or two quarters because of issues implementing the Digital Rights Management (DRM) employed by the Blue-ray Disc Association (BDA), according to local industry sources.

Production was originally scheduled for the first or second quarter of 2006.

Taken from http://www.digitimes.com/systems/a20050826A9060.html.

So a delay from Q1/Q2 to Q3/Q4. Will it effect the PS3 if it is planned for release in march next year ? :-|
 
-NakedZ- said:
If BenQ would be producing and providing the drives for PS3, yes. If not, no.

- Z
Click to expand...
Benq was one of the first partners scheduled to mass produce Blu-Ray drives. If DRM issues really plague the Blu-Ray association, wouldnt it also effect Sony ? Sony wouldnt release non-complaint Blu-Ray drive in the PS3.
 
I think that the DRM issues probably are software issues. That may be a problem if you don´t have a powerfull CPU and that is not the case of PS3.
 
deathkiller said:
I think that the DRM issues probably are software issues. That may be a problem if you don´t have a powerfull CPU and that is not the case of PS3.
Click to expand...

i believe its hardware/media related...i dont see how software would delay the production of blu-ray drives
 
Since BenQ did not say what exactly was the problem (and I doubt they will ever do that publicly), we don't know exactly what.

But my guess is that the BenQ's guidance is related to a recent adoption of SPDC by BDA ("BD+"). SPDC requires a VM in the player and this requires a bit of processing power and memoy. Maybe the chipset BenQ was planning to use did not account for this development. They probably need to revise their design to include more powerful processor/memory, which will require a bit of delay.

Hong.
 
I believe sony only said quarter 1 or mabye it was winter 2006 ... anyway since they didn't give a firm date as long as it stays close to the time frame we've been told it wont seem like there are problems even if it comes out 2or 3 months later than sony thought it would . Perhaps with the added time they can launch with more units . Well depending on how bluray drives are
 
µCOM-4 said:
software works with hardware, it doesn't work with itself
Click to expand...
Typically though, when a company says they're having a software issue, that doesn't mean we should just go like, "oh, they're having HARDWARE difficulties".

That's extrapolating facts beyond the point of support in reality.
 
DRM is not s software only function, dependant on the device and the DRM implementation hardware may be needed to specifically support it - especially so when we are talking about HD DRM formats.
 
Guden Oden said:
Typically though, when a company says they're having a software issue, that doesn't mean we should just go like, "oh, they're having HARDWARE difficulties".

That's extrapolating facts beyond the point of support in reality.
Click to expand...

Where does the report say software issues? It just says DRM, and DRM in hardware involves hardware/firmware in one form or another. If DRM was just software, it would be easier to hack.

I think you're the one reading info into the report that just isn't there.
 
Well I thought AACS (DRM format being used for Blu-ray) would cause problems, I didn't expect it would happen before the units shipped.
 
> AACS (DRM format being used for Blu-ray)

Just knitpicking...

AACS is used by both BD and HD-DVD. BD has additonal protection schemes such as "BD+" (an implementation of SPDC) and ROM mark.

And strictly speaking AACS is much closer to copy protection than DRM.

Hong.
 
hongcho said:
And strictly speaking AACS is much closer to copy protection than DRM.

Hong.
Click to expand...

You can't separate copy protection from DRM. ROM Mark (Identifies valid blu-ray disks) is also really about preventing making copies and BD+ is mostly an active system that acts as a backup should AACS fail.

But yes I should have mentioned BD+ and ROM Mark, sorry for the omission.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Bouncing Zabaglione Bros. said:
If DRM was just software, it would be easier to hack.
Click to expand...

not really , if its the function of onboard bios/control software, which is most likely the case, it will surely take some time and not to forget testing/QA which takes most of the time. So 1Q delay is quite normal but they maybe saying a delay of 1-2 Q just to be on safe side.
 
> You can't separate copy protection from DRM.

I have a slightly different view, I guess. DRM manages "rights". Where as copy protection does not manage "rights". Once you have the medium, the rights are implicitly implied. No need to get a "license" issued, that is.

However, the "managed copies" feature of AACS is bordering DRM, where an explicit authentication will be required. Except for the managed copies, AACS is, in my opinion, a copy protection scheme, jus as CSS for DVD was.

Hong.
 
crystalcube said:
not really , if its the function of onboard bios/control software, which is most likely the case, it will surely take some time and not to forget testing/QA which takes most of the time. So 1Q delay is quite normal but they maybe saying a delay of 1-2 Q just to be on safe side.
Click to expand...

If you look at region protection, that is easily hacked because it's part of the firmware. It's accessable to the user by changing the stock firmware and realoading it into the drive. If that part of the drive was read-only, it would be magnitudes harder - you'd have to blow new chips and replace them on the circuit board of the drive. This is much harder to physically do, and impossible to circulate around the net like firmware that disables region protection.

If DRM is easily accessible to the user in the form of re-writable firmware, it will be cracked. If it is closely linked to the hardware, it will be a lot harder, but manufacturers like BenQ won't have the luxury of getting the DRM wrong and then issuing an update later. They will have to get it right the first time, and that's what this reported delay may be about IMO.
 
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