Alternative distribution to optical disks : SSD, cards, and download*

[eastmen]

Sure, it takes less than half an hour. I have to wait longer than that just for the muni sometimes.

And how about those still on dial up or on slow dsl connections ? Still only half an hour ? I'm sureo n dial up it take a week to download.

Games will need to drop their retail prices significantly as you're effectively asking the consumer to buy both hardware and software. It also introduces consumer confusion.

I don't agree. Right now a game is $60. Put the game at $50 or $55 and thats it. Publishers wont get hit by the prices as they wont need packaging or shipping costs. They never have to worry about people not being able to find copies.

For stores like game stop and what not they can simply have pre loaded content no them. I don't know what prices will be like in the future but if 16-32 gigs of sd memory can be had for $5 or less simply ever game cna be put on flash to begin with as I said before.

Take an xbox 360 memory card , convert it to a usb 3.0 connection that perhaps has some few small changes so you can't use just any usb drive. And thats that , use it instead of ssd drive or other things. So say Gears 3 is 32 gigs , you can have a 4x8 set up , have high speed transfers and then you can add in 4-8 gigs of flash ram to store future maps and saves on it. That would allow ms to get away with a smaller drive in the console it self and a base sku of no drive with just built in flash for dlc.

The only real question is cost. However bluray sized games may be possible on flash for dollars instead of tens of dollars.

If we want to unchain developers, we need to give them the storage space BD provides. If developers are making 25GB games, you may as well cut out this whole hardware+software approach and simply ship the games on flash media.

Bluray presents the problem with the 360 that we had this gen. Loud ass noise when reading from the disc. I highly doubt that speed of current drives will be enough and when my 6x burner rips a bluray disc its already loud, not xbox 360 loud , but loud.

Then it becomes a matter of economics: ship games on an optical disc that costs pennies to make or else effectively go back to cartridges.

Please , in the n64 era carts were $30 and then more to program the data onto them. Today I can go out and buy a single sd card of 16 gigs for $20 bucks. In 2 or 3 years i'm sure ms can buy 16 gigs of flash ram in bulk for $1. They aren't going to be buying one or two of them at at time , or even a hundred thousand or so. When gears or halo ships they will be buying millions just for that title. I would also think that 32 gigs of flash while costing me $100 right no wouldn't cost the foundrys (is that what they are called) making them more than double the 16 gig carsd. After all its simply double the transistors. So if 16 gig sd cards are making a prifit at $20 I see no reason why a 32 gig card today couldn't make a profit at $30 or even $25. In 2010 ? Much less. In 2014 ? heh prety much nothing i'd say.

we've already talked previously in this thread about other cost cuting that can happen droping optical formats.

1) Smaller console

2) Smaller packaging

3) Less complex / cheaper cooling as you've now freed up the space of a 5 1/2 inch drive.

Those are just off the top of my head .

 

[eastmen]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BD is the only option for retail hidef movies. It is insane to think that PS4 will not have a BD drive. I'm certain the next xbox will have it too. There's no way MS will concede that bullet point. Remember how MS downplayed HDMI

Meh , I rather buy an sd card with the movie loaded onto it. Right now its the only option but in the future not so much. 32 gig sd cards with new codecs and i'm in heaven.

Shipping games on flash media will never be cost effective compared to optical disk, and while the kiosk idea sounds like it could work, it's not idiotproof like simply buying a prepackaged game on BD. Companies would have to set up dedicated support lines for resolving issues like the kiosk machine didnt load the game, or why doesn't this particular media work. You could solve that issue by having only one type of official sanctioned media, but then there would be the issue of counterfeits. Case in point: many memory sticks sold on ebay are actually cheap knockoffs.

thats why i said create a propritary memory card set up with its own form of drm on it. Use a non generic connector and thats it. At some point someone will hack it , but hey it will still be awhile.

Bluray may allways be cheaper than flash ram , but at some point flash ram will surprase bluray in its size. At the end of the next generation you may see something crazy like 256 gigs on an sd card for $20 bucks. If I said this 4 years ago about 16 gig sd cars back when we had 512 meg cards at $50 bucks you'd all think i was crazy.

 

[Silenti]

1. I was assuming that the SSD's would be Sony/MS/Nintendo approved versions that they sold. They/ and potentially the retailers

2. People already understand, either through using memory cards or the hard drive, the concept of limited space.

3. So many people already have keychain USB's drives, use Flash for their cameras. etc, that I think it is way overstating things to talk of consumer confusion.

Not having an optical drive as additional feature I can slightly understand. I'm not making the move to BR personally as I consider it too expensive to replace my library for starters. I don't care how far down you get the price of the players. I won't have anything to do with it until the media price is in the area where the content owners consider it the "crapper" anyway. I have not, and will not, pay more than about 10$ tops for a DVD. Same applies to the replacement.

As to the "kiosk" failed to download problem. Yes, this is true. No matter how well implemented this is going to happen. It would be a trade off for all the problems a high speed, near constant use optical drive causes.

 

[MfA]

Flash is already at the bleeding edge of process technology and there is plenty of competition, they won't have huge margins (well not on the bottom end flash we are all using to gauge prices in this thread). Bits/mm2 might go twice as fast as Moore's law for the next generation by a further increase in bits per cell, but they are almost at the limit as far as that is concerned. Moore's law is also running out of steam. Unless someone comes up with some type of roll to roll or embossing technique to hugely decrease the cost of non volatile memory (not necessarily flash) there is a lot more room in optical technology for growth. Holographic storage promises much greater bandwidth than the optical drives of today.

PS. I didn't even notice this before ... go go gadget wikipedia.

 

[specwarGP2]

Meh , I rather buy an sd card with the movie loaded onto it. Right now its the only option but in the future not so much. 32 gig sd cards with new codecs and i'm in heaven.

Well it doesn't matter what you want since the decisions has already been made. How can either Sony or MS market their consoles as being a media hub for the living room if it does not play the defacto retail hi def movie standard?

thats why i said create a propritary memory card set up with its own form of drm on it. Use a non generic connector and thats it. At some point someone will hack it , but hey it will still be awhile.

Ok let me see if if I'm understanding this correctly. I go to a kiosk, download a game onto my authorized flash storage device, go home and load it onto my console? To prevent gamesharing, then that game will be tied to a single user ID, right? Are you telling me that's what you want?

That's ok for a $10 game, but a $60 game? No thanks, but I'd rather have a hard physical copy.

 

[Blazkowicz]

the implications are the same as buying a game on Steam, yet people do it.

But maybe the DRM could be different and the game be tied to the cartridge, that could be an acceptable solution.

 

[eastmen]

Flash is already at the bleeding edge of process technology and there is plenty of competition, they won't have huge margins (well not on the bottom end flash we are all using to gauge prices in this thread). Bits/mm2 might go twice as fast as Moore's law for the next generation by a further increase in bits per cell, but they are almost at the limit as far as that is concerned. Moore's law is also running out of steam. Unless someone comes up with some type of roll to roll or embossing technique to hugely decrease the cost of non volatile memory (not necessarily flash) there is a lot more room in optical technology for growth. Holographic storage promises much greater bandwidth than the optical drives of today.

PS. I didn't even notice this before ... go go gadget wikipedia.

There are alot of things coming in the future in terms of process shrinks and other ways of continuing moores law. I've been hearing about the death of Moores law since the ps2 came out and some how we keep getting faster and faster chips.

Flash or Roms have tons of advantages over optical formats. I'm not to sure how happy I am with my first scratched bluray that now skips which is no repariable. however Unless I drop my flash into water or play baseball with it ,it will have no problems working no matter how scratched up it gets.

Well it doesn't matter what you want since the decisions has already been made. How can either Sony or MS market their consoles as being a media hub for the living room if it does not play the defacto retail hi def movie standard?

There is no defacto high def movie standard. Bluray wants to be it , but who knows

http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/12/09/standalone-blu-ray-player-sales-triple-over-black-friday/

147k units is not even double the 90k that hd dvd did last year. I own a ps3 and have about 40 blurays. Now ask me how many movies and tv shows i've watched on netflix streaming an xbox market place. Its way higher than that. Both xbox and netflix are getting agressive. Netflix streaming now works on all the 360s in the USA all the tivos series 3 and higher and a couple of bluray models.

Ok let me see if if I'm understanding this correctly. I go to a kiosk, download a game onto my authorized flash storage device, go home and load it onto my console? To prevent gamesharing, then that game will be tied to a single user ID, right? Are you telling me that's what you want?

Personaly since I have an internet connection that pretty fast I would want to download it at home. however I don't mind any of the rest. it woul suck not letting a friend borrow the game however they can allways create new things. For instance my netflix account allows me to stream to five diffrent devices. Or they can simply have a friends code that will allow the friend to try out a few levels in their normal progression in the game.

I don't see it much worse than gettng agame on a single disc that can't be replaced and can't be copied (legaly and illegaly) and is easily scratched. I'd love live to become like steam. have th cloud know what I own that way i can delte and redownload at will.

You also seem to forget. You can buy a bluray player for $200 right now. In 2011 how much do you think a bluray player will cost ? It wont be a huge feature to have in your console anymore. If people can get players for $50 and under whats it matter , by that point if bluray was viable enough to last that long that early adopters that would buy a xbox in 2011 will already have 1 or 2 bluray players if not more and by the time the xbox hits main stream prices those who didn't in 2011 will surely have multiple bluray players in 2014. If bluray wasn't able to do this , then i doubt it hardly matters i ms has bluray or not

 

[specwarGP2]

There is no defacto high def movie standard. Bluray wants to be it , but who knows

http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/12/09/standalone-blu-ray-player-sales-triple-over-black-friday/

147k units is not even double the 90k that hd dvd did last year. I own a ps3 and have about 40 blurays. Now ask me how many movies and tv shows i've watched on netflix streaming an xbox market place. Its way higher than that. Both xbox and netflix are getting agressive. Netflix streaming now works on all the 360s in the USA all the tivos series 3 and higher and a couple of bluray models.

Your bias against BD is obvious, but please get your head out of the sand. BD IS the de facto hi def retail standard. Can you buy a prepackaged movie on a format other than BD? No, you cant and you won't be able to for a long time. Just as places like video rental stores existed years ago for those who didnt want to buy DVDs, digital downloads will serve the same purpose for people who don't want to buy BDs.

I don't see it much worse than gettng agame on a single disc that can't be replaced and can't be copied (legaly and illegaly) and is easily scratched. I'd love live to become like steam. have th cloud know what I own that way i can delte and redownload at will.

That's great and all, but at the expense of not being to sell or give away a game that I own if I choose? NO thanks. I'm sure if there was a viable secondhand market for PC games steam wouldn't be as popular.

You also seem to forget. You can buy a bluray player for $200 right now. In 2011 how much do you think a bluray player will cost ? It wont be a huge feature to have in your console anymore. If people can get players for $50 and under whats it matter , by that point if bluray was viable enough to last that long that early adopters that would buy a xbox in 2011 will already have 1 or 2 bluray players if not more and by the time the xbox hits main stream prices those who didn't in 2011 will surely have multiple bluray players in 2014. If bluray wasn't able to do this , then i doubt it hardly matters i ms has bluray or not

And yet even today, when DVD players are $30, xbox 360 has built in DVD playback. If it's not a big deal, then why didn't MS just leave it out like nintendo?

 

[eastmen]

Your bias against BD is obvious, but please get your head out of the sand. BD IS the de facto hi def retail standard. Can you buy a prepackaged movie on a format other than BD? No, you cant and you won't be able to for a long time. Just as places like video rental stores existed years ago for those who didnt want to buy DVDs, digital downloads will serve the same purpose for people who don't want to buy BDs.

I can buy high def movies from other sources though like xbox live. I can rent highdef movies using other sources also.

Bluray can easily go to the way side. Its barely relevent now. Just because there were physical formats in the past doesn't mean there has to be one now.

That's great and all, but at the expense of not being to sell or give away a game that I own if I choose? NO thanks. I'm sure if there was a viable secondhand market for PC games steam wouldn't be as popular.

Developers are already putting in ways to stop you from selling your games. Look at gears , rock band , guitar hero and other games that have codes to download additional content. It wont be long untill they simply add a product unlock key or some other thing that makes your copy of a game worthless on the second hand market.

And yet even today, when DVD players are $30, xbox 360 has built in DVD playback. If it's not a big deal, then why didn't MS just leave it out like nintendo?

Because it was extremely cheap to add in. The first xbox they charged to use dvd play back , by the second time around it was cheap enough to just add to the system since they wer already paying the real expense which is the dvd drivei n the unit.

How many people out there do you think use the xbox 360 as their primary dvd player ? In 2 years or so how many people do you think will still use the ps3 as their primary bluray player ? The ps3 is a huge bulk and many will replace it with more stream lined stand alone units that you don't have to navigate tons of menus to acess the movie

 

[grandmaster]

The only real question is cost. However bluray sized games may be possible on flash for dollars instead of tens of dollars.

Versus pennies for the optical disc - it's a straightforward business decision. Sorry, but I just don't see publishers buying into cartridges as a format. Yes, Gears of War 4 might well sell 10 million copies, but that just amplifies the case against flash media - 10 million dollars versus 10 million pennies.

There's also the cost-cutting argument too. These days, games lose 40% to 50% of their value within weeks/months of launch. It's not just the retailers that do this - the publishers must surely reset the wholesale prices in order to clear stock, to cut losses or maximise profits. With a much higher production price, the ability to do this diminishes massively.

So we're left with the concept of the 'personal' flash drive.

The download kiosk idea doesn't work for me either. A $0.99 track from itunes you can download in seconds is fine - it's almost disposable but at the same time easy to store on multiple devices owing to its tiny size, but a $60 game is something you want to keep, something that's collectable, something you expect to have 'on tap' whenever you want or something you want to resell if you're bored with it. And of course at 20GB+, it's going to be impossible to restore to your personal memory card if you fancy a bit of blast on an old title in your collection without a trip to the kiosk.

Whichever way you slice it, it sounds like an inordinate pain in the ass to be honest.

 

[eastmen]

So grandmaster how are ds games profitable. Those are not optical disc and thus they should be expensive to make and retailers can't recoup costs , esp when we are talking $20-30 games not $60

 

[Gubbi]

So grandmaster how are ds games profitable. Those are not optical disc and thus they should be expensive to make and retailers can't recoup costs , esp when we are talking $20-30 games not $60

Nintendo DS games are 256MB max, compared to 50GB max for a next gen game.

That's more than two decimal orders of magnitude difference in base cost.

Cheers

 

[Brodda Thep]

Don't publishers take a license fee hit ($5? $10) per disk that they have printed right now? I thought someone said that.

Also, I think it was covered that no matter how small your flash, it will probably still cost a dollar. Which is all we would be talking about for 32GB in a few years. So the DS comparison seems relevant.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

So grandmaster how are ds games profitable.

DS doesn't have a choice but to use carts. Optical media isn't a good option for cheap handhelds in DS form-factor. But if Nintendo had a choice of using carts and spending $1 per game, or using a optical disc in DS (without the system being compromised, the reason why they went with expensive carts) and spending 10 cent discs on the handheld, which system do you think they'd prefer? Seems to me making almost an extra buck per unit sold net profit would be very appealing!

 

[specwarGP2]

I can buy high def movies from other sources though like xbox live. I can rent highdef movies using other sources also.

Bluray can easily go to the way side. Its barely relevent now. Just because there were physical formats in the past doesn't mean there has to be one now.

Can you go into any RETAIL STORE (you know, the place where most movies are sold) and buy a movie that isn't on BD? Just because you don't like BD and physical media, doesn't mean other people don't. DVD was barely relevant when it first launched too, you know.

Developers are already putting in ways to stop you from selling your games. Look at gears , rock band , guitar hero and other games that have codes to download additional content. It wont be long untill they simply add a product unlock key or some other thing that makes your copy of a game worthless on the second hand market.

If that happens I'll be more than happy to support non physical media.

Because it was extremely cheap to add in. The first xbox they charged to use dvd play back , by the second time around it was cheap enough to just add to the system since they wer already paying the real expense which is the dvd drivei n the unit.

What proof do you have that licensing costs for DVD playback was more expensive for the original xbox? Do you even know how much it costs for playback per unit?

How many people out there do you think use the xbox 360 as their primary dvd player ? In 2 years or so how many people do you think will still use the ps3 as their primary bluray player ? The ps3 is a huge bulk and many will replace it with more stream lined stand alone units that you don't have to navigate tons of menus to acess the movie

If someone is open to using their 360 as a device to stream netflix movies, why would that person all of a sudden be adverse to using the same 360 as a DVD player? It's no secret that MS wants 360 to be a digital hub, how is that possible if it doesnt play DVD? And what's this tons of menus to access the movie crap about? do you even own a standalone BD player? I do and PS3 is far easier to navigate.

 

[eastmen]

Nintendo DS games are 256MB max, compared to 50GB max for a next gen game.

That's more than two decimal orders of magnitude difference in base cost.

Cheers

ANd when the ds first came out ? Was 256MB cheap and little in 2003/4 when nintendo was making up the spec. I think at that point 256MB sd cards were still in the $60 dollar range. Currently 16 gigs is $20-30 and 32 gigs is $100 and we are still 2 years out from a new system

DS doesn't have a choice but to use carts. Optical media isn't a good option for cheap handhelds in DS form-factor. But if Nintendo had a choice of using carts and spending $1 per game, or using a optical disc in DS (without the system being compromised, the reason why they went with expensive carts) and spending 10 cent discs on the handheld, which system do you think they'd prefer? Seems to me making almost an extra buck per unit sold net profit would be very appealing!

So the psp uses something other than an optical disc for its games? Mabye umd is a cart then.....

Don't publishers take a license fee hit ($5? $10) per disk that they have printed right now? I thought someone said that.

Also, I think it was covered that no matter how small your flash, it will probably still cost a dollar. Which is all we would be talking about for 32GB in a few years. So the DS comparison seems relevant.

It all depends on how much a bluray disc costs. How much will dual layer blurays cost in a few years ? I doubt its pennies. Mabye quarters. Going further to quad layers and the price goes up. I'm sure also when you need to make a faster drive to fill up next gen ram amounts thats going to cost more also.

If we are looking at a quarter vs $1 that is only 3 times the cost but your also saving money in other ways to off set that . Each process shrink will give acess to larger capacitys or reduce the size and cost of past amounts. 32gigs may be big now and cost a few bucks but if its on 45nm right now how many can you fit per wafer at 22nm . It will continue to drive costs down. Not only that but how many copies of games does the xbox 360 push each year? Now suddenly your pushing that many flash based cards and alot more money will get invested in making them cheaper/larger capacity/faster

 

[grandmaster]

Your argument is fundamentally skewed - it's as though you're saying that flash media is going to collapse in price, but optical prices won't. Bottom line is that the platform holders will choose the delivery format that makes them the highest amount of money. I also believe that the vast majority of next gen games will be single-layer BDs just as they are now, simply because asset generation costs so much money from a development perspective. Suggesting that devs will be demanding quad layer BDs doesn't sound particularly realistic. If they do require 100GB of space (!!) then you're certainly NOT going to see it on flash cartridges.

In the case of Sony, considering the cash they need to recoup both from the development of PlayStation 3 *and* from the Blu-ray format, I think it's basically a foregone conclusion that PS4 will have a BD drive. It's especially obvious considering how much the PS3 has carried the BD format thus far.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

So the psp uses something other than an optical disc for its games? Mabye umd is a cart then.....

Now you're just being silly . Sony developed their own optical drive to fit in with their handheld which is very different to the DS. Sony wanted its handheld to have movies on it, requiring lots more storage than was economically viable at the time in flash. The system required a complex drive, had shorter battery life thanks to the motor, and everyone is wanting flash-based storage instead because it is better for a handheld, though in Sony's case they'd be looking more into digital distribution. Optical is not a good system for small portables, but Sony needed it for movies.

For DS, with the clamshell design and two screens, there isn't room for an optical drive. There's no point in 2 GBs of storage for the DS's games either, and Nintendo appreciate the longer battery life. Now if the DS could be functionally identical to what it is now, but use a 10 cents optical disc pushed into a slot instead of a dollar cart (my original question ), which would Nintendo prefer?

 

[eastmen]

Your argument is fundamentally skewed - it's as though you're saying that flash media is going to collapse in price, but optical prices won't. Bottom line is that the platform holders will choose the delivery format that makes them the highest amount of money. I also believe that the vast majority of next gen games will be single-layer BDs just as they are now, simply because asset generation costs so much money from a development perspective. Suggesting that devs will be demanding quad layer BDs doesn't sound particularly realistic. If they do require 100GB of space (!!) then you're certainly NOT going to see it on flash cartridges.

In the case of Sony, considering the cash they need to recoup both from the development of PlayStation 3 *and* from the Blu-ray format, I think it's basically a foregone conclusion that PS4 will have a BD drive. It's especially obvious considering how much the PS3 has carried the BD format thus far.

I'm saying nothing of the sort. Everything we produce has a floor in terms of how cheap it can become. Dvds came out in 1996 correct ? How much did a dvd cost Sony to produce in 2004 and how much does it cost in 2008. From what I have heard dl discs are more expensiev to produce and their price has remained stable for a very long time. On the flip side if dvds cost a dime 4 years ago , did they become 1 cent since then , in another 4 years will each dvd they make give them money back before its even sold ? Dvds are made of plastic that costs money. What ever the plastic cost is , is the base cost of a dvd. It will never get cheaper than that and considering the disc presser needs to make money , those working the plant , machine up keep and what not need to be added to that cost also to get to the base price of the dvd. Bluray will be more expensive because its new, it takes more steps to produce , it takes an extra coating for protection and other things.

Flash is diffrent. The floor for flash ram is going to be the silicon cost and the fab costs. I don't know what that is. However what I do know is that every so often fabs are upgraded or new ones are built that can produce larger quanitys of flash ram. They can do two things with a new micron process. Shrink the current flash to a smaller size and produce more per wafer driving costs down or increasing capacity and selling at the same price. As I noted in 2005 when the ds launched 256 meg roms were in its spec. In terms of flash 256 megs were sold at retail for $60 still. We currently see 16 gigs of flash ram on sale for $20-30 from big name brands. We see 32 gigs of flash ram selling for $100. Now. Look at this logicly. 32 gigs of flash ram would be double the transitors at most. Which would at most double the cost. If they are making a profit on 16 gig flash cards at $20 then surely they could easily make a profit on 32 gig flash cards at $40 and we will see those prices early next year. Its the same way we saw 16 gig cards costing $100 earlier this year. In 2011 its still going to take the same amount of steps as it did in 2006 to create Bds the only change will be that most of the inital costs for building the new plants will have been recouperated.

Now you say that you believe most games will be single layer bluray. That is 25 gigs of space. So I don't see why 16-32 gigs would be a problem for an xbox next. I'm sure a the start of the gen some games will get away with 8 gigs. As allways as new micron processes are used in the future costs will come down or capacitys will go up. So while we may start the gen with 8/16/32 gig options avalible to developers we may end the gen with 64/128/256 costing the same as the 8/16/32 options costed at the start of the gen.


There can also be many options to the end user. I don't know about yuo but i'd love the end of loads. SD cards can go up to 30MB/s. Using their own set up ms can use multiple ones per enclosure. A 4 chip array would net you 120MB/s which is up there with some of the fastest hardrives around. Using this ms can skip the hardrive all together. An 8x bluray drive (fasted announced so far) would give us 36MB/s and a 12x would give us 54MB/s. However the faster you go the nosier it is. I also don't know if that is sustainable across the disc either. Taking a 4gig ram pool into account the bluray at 12x would need 75 seconds to fill the ram while the flash set up only 34. You can also refresh the ram almost twice every minute. Depending on whats needed you can even go with more chips offering more speed. An 8 chip array would net you 240MB/s.

The question really the cost to benfit equation. There are already bluray burners out there and you can get cheap bd blanks for $5 bucks now. They will only fall in price. However if you create your own Rom based set up with its own connection you can control piracy much easier than previously. Esp if you set up some insane transfer speeds

 

[eastmen]

Now you're just being silly . Sony developed their own optical drive to fit in with their handheld which is very different to the DS. Sony wanted its handheld to have movies on it, requiring lots more storage than was economically viable at the time in flash. The system required a complex drive, had shorter battery life thanks to the motor, and everyone is wanting flash-based storage instead because it is better for a handheld, though in Sony's case they'd be looking more into digital distribution. Optical is not a good system for small portables, but Sony needed it for movies.

For DS, with the clamshell design and two screens, there isn't room for an optical drive. There's no point in 2 GBs of storage for the DS's games either, and Nintendo appreciate the longer battery life. Now if the DS could be functionally identical to what it is now, but use a 10 cents optical disc pushed into a slot instead of a dollar cart (my original question ), which would Nintendo prefer?

THe fact of the matter is that rom wasn't their only choice as sony demenstrated with umd. Not only that but I don't see developers leaving the system in droves because of the cost of rom vs umd.

As for what Nintendo would perfer. I think they'd perfer a non hackable format that pirates can't copy and harm software sales. Both the psp and ds failed in that. The psp because of its memory stick slot and the ds because others were able to get their hands on the gba cart specs and introduce sd cards to it.

The ps3 has so far been able to avoid piracy because of the expense of bluray blanks. But the 360 has not. I'm sure ms and developers would have rather spent $1 vs 10 cents to recoup tens of thousands of sales per title lost due to piracy .