UMD movie prices announced....can you say OUCH???

haha.
PSPii w/ Microdrive or VSP.
But i can see Apple coming with a Vpod that will blaze the competitiors in portable media market.

 

Re: tar dead.

If that holds up long-term, they might as well stick a fork in the music/movie possibilities of the machine on UMD. They should basically be $20 maximum ever and more like $10-15 commonplace and $5-8 to actually establish the medium. (Perhaps ride on their own media mainly for the cheap end to get people used to buying that way and get things in stores, at which point newer albums and movies would hover between $10-15 to be at least a "slightly cheaper alternative" for compelling media. But mainly it should be ~$10 for things. That's the level at which people shrug and buy music online, and that's the safe level people would probably actively pursue purchases for alternative devices like the PSP.

But hey, considering their utter brilliance in handling alternative media presentation over the years, it's not like I should expect much. :?

Granted the GBA movies can sell for $20, but UMD is trying to be a viable broadscale media format, not a "$20 isn't too much to pay for some Spongebob Squarepants to keep your kid happy in the car" deal.

 

Only if there is a market for exclusively portable media devices to blaze over (I think there isn't).

I think people would still prefer to buy the more affordable PSP, that plays games and media, even though it's media playing features were more limited than say Apple's competitor that uses a microdrive storage.

Media playing will always be a "bonus" feature, not a major feature these devices are sold with, IMO.

If people really wanted to or felt a need to watch movies on the go from a small screen, the portable dvd players would've already been a huge success.

Besides, a PSP with 1GB memorystick doesn't have that much disadvantage from a 40GB microdrive media player.
Sure, you can only store and carry one movie at a time, but you can store more of them on your PC.

It's nice to have 40 films on your microdrive while you're on a train, but are you really going to watch more than maybe two of them during the trip. I don't think people will view the more limited storage space as big a disadvantage as you obviously do.

In music players it is a little diferent, as listening music is more "random" and you don't need to focus your attention to it as much as movies, therefore you like to have a wider selection from which to chooce in case you get bored of the song or album playing.

And who knows, if the rumoured streaming and downloading wia WiFi from your PC to PSP from any WiFi hotspot (see: Location Free TV) becomes reality, that would more make a large HD in a portable not so necessary.

 

PSP allows playback of movies in mpeg4@simple profile from memory sticks (res is 320*240 if i remember correctly). 1.8 GB will not buy you any great quality however you twist it. Certainly fine for PSP's small screen but not enough for a tv set. These prices are much too high (imo), they should have positioned these against vhs or something to make it work. Why anyone would shell out 30 bucks for something one gets on a dvd at half that price at much better quality is kind of a mistery to me. Besides you can always rip them of and encode them on a ms pro for mobile playback...

 

Because Sony knows that no sane person will ever buy a movie on UMD. Hardcore Sony fanboys will buy them at any price OTOH. Also, publishing a movie on UMD is likely more expensive than publishing one on DVD and since the UMD version is going to sell considerably less they need to make that much more on each copy.

But really, UMD movies just exist as an excuse to put movie playback in the PSP. Sony knows that nearly every movie played back on the PSP will be an illegal copy. They just can't openly admit that they are using piracy as a means to increase their userbase. Enter UMD movies...

 

Basically i agree, it's like their Super Audio CDs. They must sell 4 a month worldwide, but they still sell them.

Sony has a huge library of movies, and a few people will go out and buy blockbusters on UMD, and even if it's the same number of people who buy SuperAudio CDs, Sony will keep releasing their most profitable blockbusters on that format.

 

Sony's opened up the UMB format for competitors. That's a first isn't it? A new launch proprietary format that they let other systems use? I think it was a few years before MiniDisk was used by non-Sony. Maybe they're going to try and push it as a de facto portable media, in which case prices might drop.

Sony would make far more profit selling old movies at rock bottom prices ($5) where people would pick them up for a casual viewing on long journeys etc.

 

Just for curiosities sake... At what Prices do the GBA-Movies sell ? And do people buy them ?
(I really dont know )

 

:? There are GBA movies?

 

http://gamequestdirect.com/gameboy-advance-video.html
Ok, now ive answered a Part of my question myself. Still, did someone ever bought that cra.. ?

 

UMD smells like the worthless format that spawned it, MiniDisc. Sony can do lots of stuff right, but then just go totally brainless when it comes to stuff like this. UMD = DOA. The format won't take off, I'm almost sure of it. And it's not Kutaragi's fault either. The rest of Sony still doesn't have a friggin clue. PEACE.

 

Can't ever see UMDs go mainstream, but there certainly is a market for it. There's a market for GBA movies .. one of the hottest items this past Christmas was/is the Videonow (or whatever u call it) player that plays old CartoonNetwork episodes and Trading Spaces episodes for $16 a pop. Sony certainly has a large library of movies from their movie divisions. As long as Sony doesn't break the bank trying to force UMDs as a replacement for DVDs, there will always be a little niche for them to make some extra money. The rest of us will just buy DVDs and rip the movies to MS.

BTW .. anyone notice that there are a lot of Sony Style stores similiar to the Apple Computer stores springing up all over the place? They are usu in the higher end malls (just like Apple) ie in Palo Alto, the Stanford Mall, downtown Union Square SF, etc.. I can see Sony promoting their UMD formats heavily in such locations .. but not in the small markets.

Sorta makes sense b/c its not the fanboys who will eat up "luxury" items such as these .. after all, most fanboys and haters are usu juveniles (or at least u would hope so), but rather the same consumers who would spend 300-500 on an iPod when there are many cheaper alternatives just as good available just because they have the money to do so.

 

Here in London, there have been loads of Sony stores for years, but the first Apple store only opened a few months ago... Strange.

 

Here in SF, there is a Sony Metreon center that houses a Sony Style store, and a Sony Playstation store. The PS store is awesome because its dedicated to promoting games, and there are plenty of stations available so that you can pretty much try out ever game available, and preview upcoming games. I think Jet Li was there to promote his movie, amongst others. There used to be a Microsoft store, but they packed up and left a few years ago. I Guess they don't really need to promote Windows.

 

at least you aren't paying 3800 yen per UMD movie.

 

We've come a long way from watching Jurassic Park on a 5 disc Laser Disc set for $60.00 .. I really wouldn't mind walking around with DVDs the size of GC discs. I don't care if it's Sony UMD or Microsoft UFOs, as long as they get smaller, better, and cheaper. Oh .. no moving parts would be the icing.

What does the Yen price translate to in US dollars?

 

Wouldn't it be the same as a UMD disc supporting a game title exclusively for the PSP (and even its predecessor) for the price that you would normally pay for a console game? :? That's double the price right there. Unless I'm missing something very important here, I really don't see what the big fuss is about.

Furthermore, I really don't see this mini disc being supported by others for one simple reason: PSP only. That, in my opinion, my pose a problem unless Sony pushes this format in other small, digital devices of their own.

 

Yeah there's a couple of Sony stores in my local shopping center as well, they've been there for a few years AFAIR. The Sony stores are one of the few shops I've never been in.. I'm worried that I might burst into flames if I step inside

 

No it's not at all the same thing. SAC CD is much better than CD. You can't say the same about UMD in relation to any other format. I predict that Sony will drop the format as soon they can, when it dawns on them how worthless it is.

 

Streaming malarky asside, you can actually fit quite a bit on a UMD... The MPEG4 ASP/2ch AAC LC stuff I've been stuffing on them, only come out to about 400-600MB for a 2 hour feature. AVC/multi-channel HE-AAC will get comparable audio in the same size but with multichannel and either a smaller video or better quality. LOTR Extended Editions would easily be doable on UMD (assuming PSP screen resolution)

Probably not even that well... SACD does alright in the specific segments that most of the content released on it is for (mostly classical and jazz listening audiofiles (especially the kind who have tube amps)).

Two years...

They're not even remotely comparable...