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

[eastmen]

Not for every piece of software costing $5-$10 more. Regardless of how much blu-ray cost in 2006, it was always apparent that polycarbonate discs can be produced for pennies. Flash will never be produced that cheap, it will be at least 5 bucks and likely more, not to mention capacity issues.

Why not . If the console is $30 bucks less thats a sizable up front savings. for some users they will only buy 3-4 games over the course of the generation. So that could be $15-$20 and so they would win in that trade off.

I'm sure its not so great for the core gamer who buys 4-5 games a year but we are already seeing price increases on the 3ds not just for the actual unit vs the ds but also software sales it doesn't seem to be a signifigant barrier and unlike this generation that saw a $10 price increase at the start we would actually be getting a benfit in the medium.



What you seem to forget is that last generation xbox and ps2 games were $50 for new releases in the states and this generation games were $60 on both the xbox 360 and the ps3.

How much did that $10 increase help bluray become acceptable because we all know the bluray discs were and still are more xpensive than dvds.

If gamers were willing to accept a price increase 6-7 years earlier at the start of the previous generation they will be willing to do so again in 2013/14 at the start of the new one.

 

[AlphaWolf]

To be fair, there is '1080p' and there is '1080p' if you know what I mean, and the downloadable variant isn't in the same league as the often 30+ mb/sec bitrate of 1080p blu-ray movies. Whether or not the average person would notice or care is a different argument of course, but I definitely do

For the hidef checkmark, downloadable content fills that bill. For the people that care, they are going to already have their blu-ray players by the time the next gen rolls around, in 2 years blu-ray players will be under $50. If they don't have them, well then apparently they don't care about having that feature as much as some people think.

That's actually an interesting point in that blu-ray in 2006 was hella expensive yet they went with it anyways. It may well have been more expensive than going with flash would be in 2013 (I doubt 2012 will happen). It's true that they expected to recoup it through movie sales, licensing, etc, but then again not incorporating an optical drive in the console saves money on day one on every console. I'd love it if they went with flash, but I'm still not sure if they could get the volume needed. Then again maybe it wouldn't matter as I suspect on next gen consoles the games will be offered both in downloadable form and physical form on same day and date, so there may not be a need to print 10 million Call Of Duty's on flash.

ya i'm not buying into 2012 or anything, but I know that if I said 2013 or 2014 people would jump all over me for that. (with kinect just released I have to think it'll be 2014 for MS but it doesn't really matter) By 2014 flash will be a small cost difference over optical on the media, and a big savings up front on the console. So they can use the savings to subsidize media initially.

Flash also scales better than an optical device. The current SDXC spec goes up to 2TB and transfer rates for media are already 100MB/s and going to get faster. Once you stick an optical device in a box, developers are kinda stuck with it.

While not for everyone, people with high speed connections are eager for more DD options. While there's probably some games I'd want the fancy CE box for, mostly I'd just download if the option was there.

 

[corduroygt]

Why not . If the console is $30 bucks less thats a sizable up front savings. for some users they will only buy 3-4 games over the course of the generation. So that could be $15-$20 and so they would win in that trade off.

The current attach rate for 360/PS3 is closer to 10 than 3-4, and that's assuming you can get 16GB flash for cheap when foundries all around the world are being used close to capacity, which is a big if. The process of making flash is a whole lot more intensive than optical discs, and there are really only 3 suppliers that can provide the necessary volume, so you're at their mercy.

 

[AlphaWolf]

MS actually has the money to go into a joint production with any of these companys for a fab just for xbox next media if tey really wanted to and they could do it with the money they would save just by not adding an optical drive.

The thing is, I'm not sure they need any help. The competition is fierce, samsung, intel, toshiba, micron and hynix are all currently expanding their capacity. I think samsung is starting 3 new fabs, this even with prices at their lowest level ever.

 

[eastmen]

The thing is, I'm not sure they need any help. The competition is fierce, samsung, intel, toshiba, micron and hynix are all currently expanding their capacity. I think samsung is starting 3 new fabs, this even with prices at their lowest level ever.

I was thinking ms would invest to convert fabs so that in the same place the chips are programed and put into custom packaging. I'm also sure MS would want a dedicated fab as time goes on for all the software or at least a large share of a fab. With so many devices competing for flash it may be hard to schedual the fabs

 

[-tkf-]

It can play 1080p. I couldn't give a rats ass about uncompressed sound, and neither could anyone else who doesn't have a $15k speaker set up. I'd be willing to bet in a blind test you couldn't even tell the difference in a professional studio.

There's actually a fee attached to the blu-ray playback feature. So no it's not free. You also have to pay to put the drive in the box, which is also not free. The only thing a blu-ray drive gives you is blu-ray and dvd playback, neither of which is necessary to make a successful console. If MS wants to include an optical drive there's a ton of options that aren't blu-ray, could have lower disc costs and would still support DVD playback.

I buy a console to play games, I'd rather not pay for features I'll never use. Especially features that add size weight and power use.

Of course you give a rats ass, you don´t care about picture or sound quality. I am not suprised that you can argue from here until Hell freezes over about how YOU don´t need Blu-Ray movies, and hurray for you.

You even imagine that MS could just dig up a totally new Optical format that can hold the same amout of data and get disc pressed just for them and still compete with the price for a Blu-Ray disc. I think you are not only subjective, but you have something invested in this, you either hate Blu-Ray or Sony. You even pretend weight and power use from a Blu-Ray is a problem, do you carry your console around alot? Do you really think that with the amount of power the CPU/GPU/RAM is going to suck that a Blu-Ray drive will be a problem? Sony was able to take an insane power house, cool it and add an internal Power Supply, all this without breaking any sound records, unlike the competition could with an external power supply. I am not worried about 10-20 watt drives...

Blu-ray was cheap enough in 2006, flash will be cheap enough in 2012.
DD is already there, it's going to get bigger, its not going to be the only option.
It actually adds cost to the console. Probably $30 or so when you add the license fees and the cost of increasing the package etc. Flash would add cost to the media, just like blu-ray added cost to the media in 2006. The price for flash will come down. If they choose optical there's plenty of alternatives.. from high density red laser, to buying HD-DVD and modifying it. I actually believe holographic would be in line ahead of blu-ray for MS.
It won't cost them anything because they won't use it, unless the BD groups gives them a complete pass on fees there's no upside for them (aside from the people who won't buy their products anyway being happier).

Blu-Ray was f*cking expensive in 2006, it´s only getting cheap now. DD is useless in many of the Markets that these consoles are sold in "Hey lets cut of any potential sales from those that doesn´t have a speedy internet connection" Cool idea.. your promoted!

30$ is nothing for a Blu-Ray compatible Console and access to cheap storage. It´s easily made up during the lifetime of a console. And if you are worried about 30$ how can you then argue for "holographic storage" and a revival of a complete dead format? "Hey i see you got those lines of Blu-Ray manufacturing but we decided to put a HD-DVD drive into your console because we heard you like stone dead formats, dog!, then you can play games and buy old movies, dog!"

I don't see what bluray in 2006 has to do with bluray in 2012/2013.

It went from being an incredible good deal to be a defacto standard in Hi-Def formats.

Everyone can buy a HiDef movie now and play it at home. And with the next consoles they can still watch it without having to buy 10$ players that feels and looks flimsy from the cool brand "Chinex". Leaving Blu-Ray out for next gen would be incredible stupid, and i don´t see how Sony would ever be so stupid. Maybe the other manufactors are for different reasons, Sony hate, Piracy worries, "7GB is enough" or whatever.
But Sony has 3D movies to push and TV´s to sell, thank god.

 

[acaeus]

Blu-ray was cheap enough in 2006, flash will be cheap enough in 2012.

Like Joker said, I don't think it was cheap enough then; so much so that winning the format war has costed them the console war (relatively speaking of course).

DD is already there, it's going to get bigger, its not going to be the only option.

Completely agree. Just can't imagine them going DD-only next gen. Besides, the DD implemented in consoles is OK--you can still use the content during an outage. Steam, on the other hand, will not let you play anything if it can't connect to the server.

It actually adds cost to the console. Probably $30 or so when you add the license fees and the cost of increasing the package etc. Flash would add cost to the media, just like blu-ray added cost to the media in 2006. The price for flash will come down. If they choose optical there's plenty of alternatives.. from high density red laser, to buying HD-DVD and modifying it. I actually believe holographic would be in line ahead of blu-ray for MS.

It won't cost them anything because they won't use it, unless the BD groups gives them a complete pass on fees there's no upside for them (aside from the people who won't buy their products anyway being happier).

Fair enough, but do you think big players like MS and Nintendo getting a free pass on anything would be that far-off? What if the BD group wants to speed up BD adoption before DD becomes more viable and widespread. You know, while we like so much to talk about the technical merit of the techs, companies only care about making money. Hence I'd not be surprised to see the next xbox and Wii with BD--I've seen far stranger things.

BTW, I agree with TKF above. the power consumption of the BD drive is negligible. And ironically I've always thought that the HD-DVD supporters were in the "less is more" group.

 

[eastmen]

Of course you give a rats ass, you don´t care about picture or sound quality. I am not suprised that you can argue from here until Hell freezes over about how YOU don´t need Blu-Ray movies, and hurray for you.

I have blurays that look horrible compared to buying the movie over netflix. It is the rare exeption but things like Robocop and evil dead are just pathatic .

Blu-Ray was f*cking expensive in 2006, it´s only getting cheap now. DD is useless in many of the Markets that these consoles are sold in "Hey lets cut of any potential sales from those that doesn´t have a speedy internet connection" Cool idea.. your promoted!

So you admit that costs didn't play a role in blurays acceptance into consoles. So it shouldn't have an affect on flash being added to a console instead of bluray

30$ is nothing for a Blu-Ray compatible Console and access to cheap storage. It´s easily made up during the lifetime of a console. And if you are worried about 30$ how can you then argue for "holographic storage" and a revival of a complete dead format? "Hey i see you got those lines of Blu-Ray manufacturing but we decided to put a HD-DVD drive into your console because we heard you like stone dead formats, dog!, then you can play games and buy old movies, dog!"

How is it made up for over the life of a ocnsole . A bluray drive costing $30 is 1.5b over the 50m consoles ms had sold. Instead of that ms could invest that money into better hardware in consoles. Not only that but the cost of flash could be put onto consumers.

hd-dvd will be dirt cheap there are already plants for pressing the disc and no one is using the format so it will be hard to find burners and rippers to get acess to the disc.

It went from being an incredible good deal to be a defacto standard in Hi-Def formats.

Everyone can buy a HiDef movie now and play it at home. And with the next consoles they can still watch it without having to buy 10$ players that feels and looks flimsy from the cool brand "Chinex". Leaving Blu-Ray out for next gen would be incredible stupid, and i don´t see how Sony would ever be so stupid. Maybe the other manufactors are for different reasons, Sony hate, Piracy worries, "7GB is enough" or whatever.
But Sony has 3D movies to push and TV´s to sell, thank god.

They could also simply keep their current bluray player (ps3 or stand alone ) and play movies next gen also.

Leaving out bluray wouldn't be stupid , it would be smart for everyone but sony because it would cost them alot less to implement. As i said it would save 1.5B over the life of the console at least by not putting in a bluray drive. That is alot of money .


If ms left out bluray and went to flash they could use that $30 more to put towards the cpu or gpu or even more ram compared to what sony would have inthe console with all other price points being equal.

Next gen hardware will be more powerful meaning it can use more portions of mpeg 4 formats to get even better compression or next gen compression out there that is better increasing the quality of streaming video and download video.


For next gen bluray wont matter because the cost of a bluray player will be dirt cheap at impulse level prices that consumers wont care if its a feature. Just like no one was buying an xbox 360 for its dvd play back feature

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Ugh, if the number is accurate (it's only an estimation), it's far from "pathetic." US$98.2 million in US$1 billion is nearly 10% of all revenue for that game, and that's only from a single platform (and actually a single retailer!), for a game released on five platforms.

A few things to consider there.

Revenue for Valve is ~30% of the sale price of a game on Steam. That was from an example of a 29.99 pound game from head of 1C Publishing. So if we assume no adjustments to that percentage due to price bracket, that would imply total sales of close to 2.3 billion USD for Steam.

Then again, this is a market research firm (FADE) that is estimating how much Valve (a private company that doesn't have to file with the SEC) made and how much each title sold.

And to my first comment, it's entirely possible that the website reporting on FADEs numbers mixed up their terminology and they actually meant total sales versus revenue.

Let's look at exactly how many people are buying before jumping to conclusions in that list:

http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/news/58910/Steam-Rakes-in-Nearly-1-Billion-in-2010

Given that BO and MW2 each made close to a billion dollars by themselves, the sales figures on Steam are pathetic. Any console game that sold a million copies would be above number 2 on that list.

Are you being deliberately dense? We were talking about the effects of DD on PC games. It's obvious we can't make any serious comparisons for consoles with regards to DD as there is currently no console platform that offers day and date DD releases to go along with retail copies.

It sold 400k units on PC/Wii/DS combined (http://news.bigdownload.com/2010/12...ps-for-pc-only-accounts-for-small-part-of-ga/ ) in November. Even at full retail price of ~50 USD (versus ~60 USD for X360/PS3) that's a whopping 20 million USD. Now, do you think December managed to more than quadruple those sales in order for 3 platforms to exceed the almost 100 million from Steam (a SINGLE DD vendor). And that completely ignores all of the other DD vendors out there.

And that isn't even a fair comparison. As pointed out that's like taking game sales from Gamestop and saying that represents all console retail sales period.

Regards,
SB

 

[AlphaWolf]

Of course you give a rats ass, you don´t care about picture or sound quality. I am not suprised that you can argue from here until Hell freezes over about how YOU don´t need Blu-Ray movies, and hurray for you.

Don't put words in my mouth.

The best selling consoles of this generation, lack blu-ray. It was not a major impediment to acceptance in 2006, it won't be in 2012 and beyond when I can pick up a blu-ray player at walmart for $29.99

You even imagine that MS could just dig up a totally new Optical format that can hold the same amout of data and get disc pressed just for them and still compete with the price for a Blu-Ray disc. I think you are not only subjective, but you have something invested in this, you either hate Blu-Ray or Sony. You even pretend weight and power use from a Blu-Ray is a problem, do you carry your console around alot? Do you really think that with the amount of power the CPU/GPU/RAM is going to suck that a Blu-Ray drive will be a problem? Sony was able to take an insane power house, cool it and add an internal Power Supply, all this without breaking any sound records, unlike the competition could with an external power supply. I am not worried about 10-20 watt drives...

They wouldn't have to look very hard for an optical format. There's plenty of them out there. And yes power is always a problem, less is better. It's more than just the cost and space of the physical drive, you have to power it and you still have to ship it and you need to keep the whole thing from overheating. It was a wonderful feat of engineering that Sony was able to stick all that in a box and keep it quiet and cool, but there's no reason for MS to do that, they have nothing invested in the blu-ray industry.

Blu-Ray was f*cking expensive in 2006, it´s only getting cheap now. DD is useless in many of the Markets that these consoles are sold in "Hey lets cut of any potential sales from those that doesn´t have a speedy internet connection" Cool idea.. your promoted!

How much money does MS make on every blu-ray sold? Why would you want people to buy a loss leading product from you to watch someone elses content? MS is heavily invested in DD, they are going to push it, it won't work for everyone. Those people that want a fucking blu-ray player can buy one for $30. The absence of blu-ray from the box hasn't been a significant barrier to acceptance up until now, there's no reason to believe it will be in the future.

30$ is nothing for a Blu-Ray compatible Console and access to cheap storage. It´s easily made up during the lifetime of a console. And if you are worried about 30$ how can you then argue for "holographic storage" and a revival of a complete dead format? "Hey i see you got those lines of Blu-Ray manufacturing but we decided to put a HD-DVD drive into your console because we heard you like stone dead formats, dog!, then you can play games and buy old movies, dog!"

It's $30 more than 0. And when the console hits $200 its pretty much your complete profit margin on the damn box. That $30 won't go away. Once you stick the drive in the box, you're stuck with it until you build a new box.

I never made an argument for holographic storage, I merely said it was more likely than blu-ray for MS, because blu-ray still makes absolutely no sense for MS. Neither makes a hell of a lot of sense, but holographic at least competes with flash on speed and capacity. And I don't know where you get your facts but there's a number of holographic storage options currently in development. If they want an optical drive, HD-DVD could work as well, it doesn't really matter they aren't selling movies on disc.

t went from being an incredible good deal to be a defacto standard in Hi-Def formats.

Everyone can buy a HiDef movie now and play it at home. And with the next consoles they can still watch it without having to buy 10$ players that feels and looks flimsy from the cool brand "Chinex". Leaving Blu-Ray out for next gen would be incredible stupid, and i don´t see how Sony would ever be so stupid. Maybe the other manufactors are for different reasons, Sony hate, Piracy worries, "7GB is enough" or whatever.
But Sony has 3D movies to push and TV´s to sell, thank god.

Oh I'm sure Sony will still have a blu-ray player. They bet the farm on it, so they better hope it lasts more than 6 or 7 years. The comments about bias coming from you are incredibly amusing.

 

[-tkf-]

Don't put words in my mouth.

I didn´t argue that streaming was good enough, that was your words.

The best selling consoles of this generation, lack blu-ray. It was not a major impediment to acceptance in 2006, it won't be in 2012 and beyond when I can pick up a blu-ray player at walmart for $29.99

The best selling console is the worst console of this generation. The 2 others both had optical HD one just died a horrible death.

There's plenty of them out there

Enlighten us with this list of 25GB+ cheap optical storage

. And yes power is always a problem, less is better.

And 10-20 watt is not an issue

How much money does MS make on every blu-ray sold?

Nothing, since they made their bet with the losing format.

Why would you want people to buy a loss leading product from you to watch someone elses content? MS is heavily invested in DD, they are going to push it, it won't work for everyone. Those people that want a fucking blu-ray player can buy one for $30. The absence of blu-ray from the box hasn't been a significant barrier to acceptance up until now, there's no reason to believe it will be in the future.

1: Cheap storage media
2: DD is discussion in itself.
3: Movies, they can add the playback as a DLC if they want to.
4: I think the HD-DVD addon sold pretty nicely.

It's $30 more than 0. And when the console hits $200 its pretty much your complete profit margin on the damn box. That $30 won't go away. Once you stick the drive in the box, you're stuck with it until you build a new box.

30$ is an example, at launch how much did the BR drive cost in the PS3? how much does it cost now?
How much does a DVD-Drive cost?

but there's a number of holographic storage options currently in development.

And these formats are ready for a million capacity production just like HD-DVD discs would be now?

Oh I'm sure Sony will still have a blu-ray player. They bet the farm on it, so they better hope it lasts more than 6 or 7 years. The comments about bias coming from you are incredibly amusing.

Bias about what? About me preferring a Flash for the next generation of consoles but arguing against it because i can´t stamp up valid arguments? Preferring the best HiDef format over Streaming Video? I got bias alright but it´s not against the media of choice for the next gen. My bias is for good and valid arguments not any special format for the next gen.

And i am not even sure Sony goes with a Blu-Ray format. Who knows what they are planning. NGP compatible PS4 with flash as the gold standard? Cheaper hardware with less performance than the competition ala Wii and sell it on something completely different?

 

[AlphaWolf]

I didn´t argue that streaming was good enough, that was your words.

I was talking about you claiming I don't care about picture or sound quality, when you know fucking well that isn't what I said.

The best selling console is the worst console of this generation. The 2 others both had optical HD one just died a horrible death.

Sounds like you have a terrible case of sales envy. The 360 didn't ship with any HD format.

Enlighten us with this list of 25GB+ cheap optical storage

learn to google, there's several formats that were discussed when HD-DVD was announced.

And 10-20 watt is not an issue

Awesome you can pay for the 1billion watts of power/hour 50 million of them use. Look seriously, the current consoles are using around 100 watts, that's 20% of their power running the damn drive.

Nothing, since they made their bet with the losing format.

No they made their bet in 2005 before anything but DVD was feasible. Right now DVD is still by far the winning format.

1: Cheap storage media
2: DD is discussion in itself.
3: Movies, they can add the playback as a DLC if they want to.
4: I think the HD-DVD addon sold pretty nicely.

So movies is your answer... how much money does MS make on movie disc sales?

30$ is an example, at launch how much did the BR drive cost in the PS3? how much does it cost now?
How much does a DVD-Drive cost?

I really don't know how much the BR drive cost at launch, probably closer to $100. The DVD drives now dont really cost a lot less than a blu-ray drives cost, mostly just licensing fees would be the difference now. They won't get much cheaper to build, if any.

And these formats are ready for a million capacity production just like HD-DVD discs would be now?

They don't need to be ready today, they've got time before a console launches, but meeting the relatively low volume required for a launch console probably wouldn't be a problem in a couple years. It's not like they are inventing the wheel here, they just need a package for existing tech that's already being produced in massive quantities (it's a $20billion a year industry)

And i am not even sure Sony goes with a Blu-Ray format. Who knows what they are planning. NGP compatible PS4 with flash as the gold standard? Cheaper hardware with less performance than the competition ala Wii and sell it on something completely different?

So let me get this straight, the only thing that makes sense for MS is blu-ray and leaving blu-ray out of their console would be suicide but Sony who are heavily invested in blu-ray could jump to flash? Do you even read what you type?

 

[specwarGP2]

That's actually an interesting point in that blu-ray in 2006 was hella expensive yet they went with it anyways.

BD50 was expensive in 2006 and 2007. But no games used BD50 until 2008. Considering that BD ROM replication was a fairly new and complicated thing, BD25 was relatively cheap to produce even back in 2006. Now its pennies/unit.

Flash can get cheaper per GB, but there will always be a floor... I think the consensus is $5/unit?

 

[AlphaWolf]

BD50 was expensive in 2006 and 2007. But no games used BD50 until 2008. Considering that BD ROM replication was a fairly new and complicated thing, BD25 was relatively cheap to produce even back in 2006. Now its pennies/unit.

Define relatively cheap? It was an order of magnitude more than DVD.

Flash can get cheaper per GB, but there will always be a floor... I think the consensus is $5/unit?

You're telling me all those $20 DS carts cost no less than $5 to produce? I find that hard to believe.

 

[-tkf-]

I was talking about you claiming I don't care about picture or sound quality, when you know fucking well that isn't what I said.

My mistake then, but your lack of support for the superior format did indicate that you might not be so much into quality and since streaming, which you seem to see as the answer to Blu-Ray, isn´t on par as well i guess i just miscalculated those comments.

Sounds like you have a terrible case of sales envy. The 360 didn't ship with any HD format.

Uh? envy towards what, when you make these comments you need to back them up, if not they look and read like personal attacks. MS invested millions into a HD-DVD addon and the software to go with it. And as i think you once said, they were very likely to introduce a SKU based on HD-DVD, until Blu took the crown as the undisputed HIDEF champion of the world.

learn to google, there's several formats that were discussed when HD-DVD was announced.

Your claims should have you backing them up.

Awesome you can pay for the 1billion watts of power/hour 50 million of them use. Look seriously, the current consoles are using around 100 watts, that's 20% of their power running the damn drive.

I think the PS3 used a bit more power to begin with. In any case, the old consoles used less power so the DVD drive in those should have had a greater percentage of power use, without any problem.

No they made their bet in 2005 before anything but DVD was feasible. Right now DVD is still by far the winning format.

And they would have included HD-DVD if they could.

So movies is your answer... how much money does MS make on movie disc sales?

No, cheap storage is the answer. The other points comes "free".

They don't need to be ready today, they've got time before a console launches, but meeting the relatively low volume required for a launch console probably wouldn't be a problem in a couple years. It's not like they are inventing the wheel here, they just need a package for existing tech that's already being produced in massive quantities (it's a $20billion a year industry)

They would be re-inventing the wheel, up until 2011 350 million bluray discs have been pressed, of those 170 million was shipped in 2010, excluding PS3 games. Cheap storage with plenty of production capacity on tap.. you got it. If they chose something else they will have to pay large amounts of money to avoid Blu-Ray.

 

[AlphaWolf]

My mistake then, but your lack of support for the superior format did indicate that you might not be so much into quality and since streaming, which you seem to see as the answer to Blu-Ray, isn´t on par as well i guess i just miscalculated those comments.

You still keep trying to read things into what I have written. I said the hi-def checkbox can be filled with VOD, netflix etc. Blu-ray isn't essential or an impairment to adoption.

Uh? envy towards what, when you make these comments you need to back them up, if not they look and read like personal attacks. MS invested millions into a HD-DVD addon and the software to go with it. And as i think you once said, they were very likely to introduce a SKU based on HD-DVD, until Blu took the crown as the undisputed HIDEF champion of the world.

Dunno, you're the one who claimed that the consoles with more sales were the worst ones. What are you basing that on besides your personal bias?

Your claims should have you backing them up.

I mentioned one, that's plenty to make my case.

I think the PS3 used a bit more power to begin with. In any case, the old consoles used less power so the DVD drive in those should have had a greater percentage of power use, without any problem.

Of course it did, it used over 200 watts to begin with, the 360 was just a bit less. The point is the power that the drive uses will never go down, it's essentially a fixed cost that will never go down.

And they would have included HD-DVD if they could.

If it was the same price as a DVD player? Probably? Would they have shipped a $600 monolith? I think not.

No, cheap storage is the answer. The other points comes "free".

You keep using "free" in quotes. That's another way of saying its not free, which is correct, because its not. And cheap for the media, but expensive for the box.

They would be re-inventing the wheel, up until 2011 350 million bluray discs have been pressed, of those 170 million was shipped in 2010, excluding PS3 games. Cheap storage with plenty of production capacity on tap.. you got it. If they chose something else they will have to pay large amounts of money to avoid Blu-Ray.

I don't think you really understand what re-inventing the wheel means. And you might want to actually look at the numbers for flash before spouting off blu-ray numbers like they are impressive.

 

[Platon]

They tried the multi SKU approach this gen and it does not seem as if that has been any problem so they might as well do it next gen as well.

They could go for a 2 SKU approach where one of them could be split into three alternatives.

1: An SKU without an optical disc which accepts flash as a game data input which can:
a: not be expanded with a HDD (find this unlikely)
b: be expanded with HDD and therefore also use DD (arcade unit of next gen)
c: has the HDD build in from the get go (can be changed to a bigger one) (the pro unit)

2: An SKU with optical media most likely BluRay and everything else of course (the elite unit)

Then it is up to the consumer to choose their preference and price range. The problem with this approach is not so much the SKUs as much at to have to provide games both on flash and disc, which could complicate matters but in the end you pass the cost to the consumers and they choose.

DD is here to stay and it works even now and even on the consoles, I mean we have XBLA games that are around 2 gigs already and that does not seem to be preventing those games being successful. I think many times it is more a state of mind and psychology rather than practicality, but with the whole being connected all the time thingy, all the smartphone apps and stuff, I think it becomes more and more evident that people are not too foreign about not owning physical copies anymore of their movies or music and stuff and are happy just having access to them...

 

[aaronspink]

Hi-def movies usually include high bitrate 1080p content with lossless sound. Doubt your 360 can play them.

nobody cares about lossless audio. Hell, no one can even tell the difference. I swear, what's next, PS3 can use $100k platinum plated ethernet cables?

 

[aaronspink]

so, you are saying that MS, Sony, and Nintendo would disregard all potential buyers who do not have (proper) Internet connection and/or don't want or don't want to bother to connect their console to their internet?

Honestly? Yes. I'm pretty sure that MS, Sony, and Nintendo can safely ignore all potential buyers who don't have an internet connection. I would even go so far to say that they already HAVE! I would be surprised if the number of people that don't have an internet connection but have a current gen console is %1.

 

[aaronspink]

Like Joker said, I don't think it was cheap enough then; so much so that winning the format war has costed them the console war (relatively speaking of course).

Winning the format war was like winning a war to die first. In the end, they are both dead and neither Sony nor Toshiba got any benefit.

Completely agree. Just can't imagine them going DD-only next gen. Besides, the DD implemented in consoles is OK--you can still use the content during an outage. Steam, on the other hand, will not let you play anything if it can't connect to the server.

I could easily see them going DD only next gen. And you should check your facts before you post, you can play any steam game without an internet connection (well except for ubicrud games with their broken system).

Fair enough, but do you think big players like MS and Nintendo getting a free pass on anything would be that far-off? What if the BD group wants to speed up BD adoption before DD becomes more viable and widespread.

You mean, what if they want to spend millions on building a really expensive straw house on a beach in the path of a hurricane? DD is already viable. It already is the number one choice. Exhibit A: blockbuster.