mckmas8808
Legend
Powderkeg said:
You have to have the product future proof. Sony is betting on Blu-ray. If Blu-ray wins, they (sony) made a smart move. The number of HDTV owners are going up quick.
The new PS3 sales pitch: Better gaming, better technology, better value
- Thread starter Acert93
- Start date
You have to have the product future proof. Sony is betting on Blu-ray. If Blu-ray wins, they (sony) made a smart move. The number of HDTV owners are going up quick.
Powderkeg said:
And Sony does not expect 85% and 95% of the US and Europe to buy PS3s this year.
The HDTV penetration rate is accelerating also. It's forecast that by the end of this year it may be at 30% in the US. According to Sony, 34% of PS2 owners already have a HDTV.
Powderkeg said:
And for those with a HDTV, for most of those people, I think the value presented by the HD movie playback will be very relevant. And that's a lot of people in absolute terms - that's most people buying next-gen game systems now, and I've doubt that'll be most people buying them this year and probably next..and depending on how HDTV continues to grow, this may well be the case for the lifetime of the system.
HD movie playback will be a lot more relevant that some give it credit for, IMO. It's easy to dismiss now because it's not really tangible and it has little presence, but that'll have changed dramatically by the end of the year, and even moreso over the next 5 years.
Last edited by a moderator:
mckmas8808
Legend
Titanio said:
Yep! It's called being ahead of the curve. If Sony gets this right then they will have tens of millions of consumers (within the first two years) that can possibly watch HD movies if they have a HDTV. And that's only from the PS3 crowd.
Even if todat most households didn't have HDTV, or even knéw they'd want/need one, it's likely the next TV upgrade in those households will be a flat, High Definition TV even if they din't actually know/care they're buying a HDTV.
The tube TV's are being quickly replaced by flatscreens in stores, and basically every new flatscreen is "HD-Ready".
The tube TV's are being quickly replaced by flatscreens in stores, and basically every new flatscreen is "HD-Ready".
mckmas8808 said:
Where is the demand for Bluray? Or HD-DVD for that matter?
It took 6 years for DVD to surpass VHS in sales, despite the fact that DVD works on every single television made in the past 40 years, that DVD's offered a noticable improvement in image quality on every set, and the fact that DVD's don't wear out and VHS tapes do. Bluray (Or HD-DVD)'s ONLY advantage over current DVD is in resolution, and it only works on HDTV's.
Just how likely is it that Bluray will win in less than 6 years when less than 15% of the population can use it?
Or to put it another way...
Since 85% of the population simply doesn't care about the format, how does the inclusion of it justify the added cost to those who will never use it?
In the end it's a $500+ game console that doesn't have any advantage over their $300 competition for 85% of the population. How is that "pure genius."
Being "ahead of the curve" has burned the likes of Apple before, and it could burn Sony now... but I think they have a better bet ahead of them with Blu-Ray, since it shows strong community support, has active competition (which brings more attention to YOUR product if it's more visible and recognizable), and lacks major technical shortcomings to hold it back. (At least, I'm pretty sure... 
)
The main question is actually if general consumers from the non-gaming end look that way because of it, or if the "video game" stigma will keep the markets from mixing too far.
Obviously gamers will have no problems going wherever they feel like.
)The main question is actually if general consumers from the non-gaming end look that way because of it, or if the "video game" stigma will keep the markets from mixing too far.
Obviously gamers will have no problems going wherever they feel like.
Powderkeg said:
It's pretty hard to judge demand for something that doesn't even have a presence in the market yet, don't you think?
Powderkeg said:
I think most PS3 owners will, and the vast majority paying $500/$600 will. I see some people on messageboards pushing the "but I only want a games machine" line, and while I'm sure they're being perfectly genuine, I don't think they reflect where most of the market for these systems will be this year or next year, and beyond depending on where the whole HD thing is at that point.
Most people buying next-gen consoles right now are HDTV owners. That'll likely persist for some time. For those people, I think for most of them Blu-ray will be a point of consideration at the very least, and the whole HD movie playback thing will enter into their choice of console.
Nobody ewxpects Blu-ray to replace DVD soon.
Blu-ray adobtion is not going to be as fast and as big as was with DVD, and nobody is betting solely on BD domination as the no.1 video format.
But I know some are betting BD as the no.1 High Definition video format.
HD and SD are going to live parallel for some time in disc media, even if the displays were dominantly HD in coming years, DVD is still good enough for many, but at the same time there is enough people who want higher resolution and see the advantage.
It's not as big a market as was when VHS was being replaced by DVD, but it's still significant enough.
Blu-ray adobtion is not going to be as fast and as big as was with DVD, and nobody is betting solely on BD domination as the no.1 video format.
But I know some are betting BD as the no.1 High Definition video format.
HD and SD are going to live parallel for some time in disc media, even if the displays were dominantly HD in coming years, DVD is still good enough for many, but at the same time there is enough people who want higher resolution and see the advantage.
It's not as big a market as was when VHS was being replaced by DVD, but it's still significant enough.
Titanio said:
Forcast by who? Sony?
And are you positive that you are looking at the number of people who will actually have HDTV, and not simply the new TV sales estimates. (30% of new sets sold will be HDTV by 2007)
Because most people hang on to their televisions for 10 years or more before buying a new one. Just because 30% of new sets sold are HDTV doesn't mean that 30% of the population has one.
And how many people who are willing to spend the money to early adopt HDTV are going to be cheap with their movie player and use a game console instead of a stand alone player?
And how long do you think it will take stand alone players to drop in price to the PS3 level? Somehow I doubt too many people are going to rush out to jump into this next-gen format war if the price for entry is over $500. Especially when that's a $500+ gamble that you won't end up with the next Betamax.
Like I said before, DVD took 6 years to surpass VHS despite offering several clear advantages to the VHS format, and despite DVD working on 100% of the televisions out there. And that's with DVD being a single, clear standard.
Based on that I would really like to know how you figure Bluray or HD-DVD will be in higher demand than DVD in less time, especially with a format war going on.
Truth is, neither format is going to "win" within the next 6 years, and it's extremely unlikely that a major portion of the population will buy into either format when they don't have HDTV's to begin with, and even if they did, there isn't a single standard format of HD movies.
A good while ago I bought a 82cm Widescreen 100hz TV just because Gran Turismo 3 looked (looks) so great on it. Of course it's great for TV and movies also, but then I watched my movies on my PS2, so there.
I will buy a PS3 and then I expect at some point some stuff will look so much better in HD that I'll get a HDtv for it also (or computer screen). Being able to use a new TV screen for HD browsing as well as download and watch HD movies is certainly going to help make that choice for a HD tv easier. Especially the browsing is probably going to stimulate getting 1080p, as that resolution seems to match the way I use a TV pretty well.
You can't fully compare VHS with DVD. Just as there are big technological advantages that helped acceptance, DVD was also read-only, which didn't help. And lots of people had VHS tapes, which they couldn't play on their DVD player, so that didn't stimulate getting DVD either. Initially, DVD wasn't up against VHS, but against video-cd (in Europe and Japan) and Laserdisc (in the U.S.). Certainly it was that way in our stores in Europe - you had a slowly growing video-cd section (not nearly as big a success as it was in Japan) that was slowly but steadily taken over by DVD. Only when DVD burners became more popular did DVD start to push out VHS completely.
With BluRay, that's different. You can get a BluRay player and be future proof without having to sacrifice your current DVD collection. I had a nice little VHS collection and a lot of those movies I still enjoy, but I sold them off for practically nothing because my VHS player broke down and VHS tapes age badly anyway (not to mention the sound isn't quite up there). My DVDs though I'll be able to keep watching, and they'll probably look even better on a BluRay player, with upscaling abilities to all sorts of Progressive Scan stuff. Don't forget that many who have DVDs now don't have progressive scan capable TVs yet, so if they had a basic DVD player, they may actually be able to look at their DVDs in higher quality than they could before.
And that is apart from being able to get stuff like Lord of the Rings, the Pixar stuff, Star Wars and what-not in full HD resolutions, now, or in the future.
All that, mind you, quite apart from that I'd get the PS3 for the games anyway.
I will buy a PS3 and then I expect at some point some stuff will look so much better in HD that I'll get a HDtv for it also (or computer screen). Being able to use a new TV screen for HD browsing as well as download and watch HD movies is certainly going to help make that choice for a HD tv easier. Especially the browsing is probably going to stimulate getting 1080p, as that resolution seems to match the way I use a TV pretty well.
You can't fully compare VHS with DVD. Just as there are big technological advantages that helped acceptance, DVD was also read-only, which didn't help. And lots of people had VHS tapes, which they couldn't play on their DVD player, so that didn't stimulate getting DVD either. Initially, DVD wasn't up against VHS, but against video-cd (in Europe and Japan) and Laserdisc (in the U.S.). Certainly it was that way in our stores in Europe - you had a slowly growing video-cd section (not nearly as big a success as it was in Japan) that was slowly but steadily taken over by DVD. Only when DVD burners became more popular did DVD start to push out VHS completely.
With BluRay, that's different. You can get a BluRay player and be future proof without having to sacrifice your current DVD collection. I had a nice little VHS collection and a lot of those movies I still enjoy, but I sold them off for practically nothing because my VHS player broke down and VHS tapes age badly anyway (not to mention the sound isn't quite up there). My DVDs though I'll be able to keep watching, and they'll probably look even better on a BluRay player, with upscaling abilities to all sorts of Progressive Scan stuff. Don't forget that many who have DVDs now don't have progressive scan capable TVs yet, so if they had a basic DVD player, they may actually be able to look at their DVDs in higher quality than they could before.
And that is apart from being able to get stuff like Lord of the Rings, the Pixar stuff, Star Wars and what-not in full HD resolutions, now, or in the future.
All that, mind you, quite apart from that I'd get the PS3 for the games anyway.
Last edited by a moderator:
Powderkeg said:
No, not by Sony. One group, Kagan Research estimates 20m HDTVs will be sold this year.
It's worth noting that many HDTV forecasts in the last couple of years have turned out to be quite conservative
Powderkeg said:
It is expected, in NA at least, that the majority of TV sales this year will be HD. The figures of 15% and 30% are household adoption, not percentages of all sales or overall population (obviously). 34% of PS2 owners is just that, 34% of households with a PS2.
Powderkeg said:
HDTV isn't a rich man's game anymore. The type of person who spends maybe $1500 on a HDTV probably isn't the type of guy who'll want to spend $1000+ on a standalone player.
Powderkeg said:
I'm asking you to consider those who are already walking out and looking for videogame systems. They already know they're going to be spending a few hundred dollars on that system. When they look at PS3, they'll see it's $100/$200 more, but they'll also see it has one of those new HD movie players. That will speak to most people with HDTVs, and people with HDTVs make up most of the market for next-gen videogame system sales right now.
Powderkeg said:
I'm not talking about demand relative to DVD. I'm talking about the relevance it'll have for people buying systems this year and going forward, not relevance to the entire market. It will be a lot more relevant to people with HDTVs buying videogame systems, as relevant for many perhaps as DVD was in their PS2. That doesn't mean it'll be the same for everyone, but not everyone is buying next-gen consoles yet. And when the others are in a couple of years, wanna bet how much more relevant HD movies will be?
Titanio said:
No, it's not.
It's pretty easy to judge potential demand based on the number of people who can take advantage of the format. Less than 15% can use the format at all, less than 100% of those that can will buy into either format, less than 100% of those who buy into either format will choose Bluray, and less than 100% of those willing to buy into Bluray will rely on a game console as their movie player.
If we assume that half the people who own HDTV's will buy into one of the next-gen video formats before there is a standard, and half of those will buy Bluray, and half of those will rely on a video game console as their movie player then we are only looking at about 1.825% of the population willing to buy a PS3 at any time because of the movie playback ability.
That's less than 6 million people in the US who are likely to buy the PS3 because of Bluray.
See, that wasn't so hard to judge, was it?
But what are you basing that on? Clearly not HDTV penetration, or adoption rates of previous video formats.
Are you basing this on some sort of factual information, or is this just your own desires being voiced?
I think the vavst majority of HDTV owners won't buy into either video format until a standard is achieved. I think you are drastically overestimating the number of people willing to bet $500+ that they won't end up with the next Sony Betamax.
Powderkeg said:
Certainly more than enough at this point? Add 6 million for Europe (for whom the PS3 price point is just like the PS2's at release, so they don't care about that), and assume that Japan, while slightly smaller, like BluRay probably just because it is Sony, we're soon at 18 million worldwide, in just the major regions. Add a few people who will buy the PS3 for the games alone, and Sony has another hit.
Powderkeg said:
It's over 15% actually. I saw a figure of 25% recently, again perhaps 30% by the end of the year.
If the current HDTV owning population went out and bought one system this year, that'd probably settle the "console war" in NA. We can talk in relative terms all you want, but in absolute terms, 15 or 20 or 30% is a lot of households, and more than enough to create a market for these systems this year. And it's a market that's quickly growing.
Powderkeg said:
Microsoft has told us. According to them, most 360 owners own or plan to buy a HDTV shortly. (edit - 90% in fact).
The early market for these systems is not a representative sampling of the entire market, which you seem to think. It'll be heavily weighted toward HDTV owners, and there are lots of them. I think it's safe to say most people this Xmas going out to buy a PS3 or 360 will be HDTV owners, and for most of them I think HD movie playback would be an attractive feature.
Last edited by a moderator:
Titanio said:No, not by Sony. One group, Kagan Research estimates 20m HDTVs will be sold this year.
It's worth noting that many HDTV forecasts in the last couple of years have turned out to be quite conservative
It should also be noted that the sales growth rate is so much lower than previous estimates that the Digital Broadcast Standard which was supposed to be implemented this coming December has been pushed back to 2010.
I think you mean a 30% increase in adoption rate, which means HDTV sales will only be 30% higher than last year, which is still FAR below SDTV sales.
And FYI, in 2003 the HDTV estimates were that 30% of the US would have HDTV by 2006. Here we are at 2006 and less than half that have HDTV.
But they are the kind who would spend $500+ to gamble on a non-standard video format?
Someone who isn't rich isn't likely to make that gamble.
I would like to see some proof of that.
Got a link that says HDTV owners make up the majority of the video game market?
I'm willing to bet in a few more years when stand alone players can be had for under the price of a new PS3 that very few people will be motivated to buy a PS3 based on it's movie playback abilities. I'm willing to be then, as now, you'll have a hard time finding a person who actually bought a game console to use as a movie player.
And I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of people, HDTV owners included, won't buy into either HD video format until a single standard is achieved.
Titanio said:
You saw a figure of new TV sales, not of total market penetration. Those are two entirely different things as most people don't buy a new television every single year. Most keep their current televisions 10+ years before replacing them, meaning everyone who bought an SDTV in the past 5 years (Over 70% of new TV sales this year alone) won't be in the market for a new set until the PS4.
Correct that mistake, and then adjust your claims accordingly.
I think most of them won't care. I think the number of people willing to spend $500+ on the next Betamax is really tiny.
Powderkeg said:
No, I don't. Look it up, it's expected most TV sales this year in NA will be HD.
edit - and no, I'm not looking at figures for percentages of sales, that 15%+ figure is addressing penetration. The figure is probably higher than that now, I've seen 25% claimed.
Powderkeg said:
I've seen much lower estimates than that from 02/03. But we're already over 15%.
Powderkeg said:
If he's going out looking for a videogames console and knows it's already going to cost him a few hundred dollars..$100 more for that functionality won't seem unattractive IMO. That'd take the edge off your gamble..and TBH, I think Blu-ray will look pretty damn standard, a lot more standard than the alternative (but I'm not going to get into HD-DVD vs Blu-ray debates here!).
Powderkeg said:
You have got to be kidding me. I'll say this very slowly - I think most of the market for PS3 and 360 this year, and probably longer than that, will be HDTV owners. If you look at the demographics for 360 owners to date, that is not unreasonable. I did not say that most of the total videogames market was currently made up of HDTV owners, but the segment of the market adopting these systems early is.
Powderkeg said:
A number of people I know use PS2s to play DVDs, and certainly when they bought them. Less may use them now than when the systems were purchased, but that's somewhat irrelevant if its movie playback functionality was part of the reasoning for their purchase in the first place - as it was in many cases.
Last edited by a moderator:
Powderkeg said:
I was talking first year. In which this kind of demand will push their production facilities probably beyond capacity. After all, you are talking about the current level of HDtv adoption rates, and you haven't mentioned a timespan or future developments and trends in HDtv penetration over a long period.
In the meantime, Sony is happy to have 6 million PS3s produced by March 2007. If they can then step it up to 2 million PS2s per month, they can do 18 million more during that year, adding up to 24 million. By your estimates, that's barely enough to satisfy those who *currently* think BluRay is a selling point on the PS3. There's likely to be a few more out there who just think that BluRay means more room for game content on the disc, or lower compression rates = lower CPU usage, or who just really really want to play a certain exclusive game badly, or just think the PS3 will be the best next-gen gaming platform and so on, or because they liked the PS1 and/or PS2 and want more of that. Regardless of if any of them are right, it doesn't matter - they'd be well on schedule to hit 100.000.000 in just four years this time round.
