HD DVD War: Blu-ray 1.1 is a Dead Format, Long Live HD DVD
Buying an HD DVD player is less of a waste of money than buying a Blu-ray Player. Say wha? Didn’t Blu-ray win the format war when Warner defected? No.
I have been preaching for a while that HD DVD is superior because it is a complete format at a reasonable price – especially compared to Blu-ray, which is a half-complete over-priced DRM riddled format. What is most telling is that those early blu-ray adopters (the same ones that convinced Warner to defect) who shelled out $500+ for a 1.0 Blu-ray player are pretty much screwed. By way of Crunchgear we learn that Blu-ray owners, may miss out on the movies Warner is set to release – unless they buy a PS3. The Blu-ray spec 2.0 due out in October is not compatible with the now “legacy” players
None of the Profile 1.0 players can be upgraded to Profile 1.1, which was finalized recently, with the exception of the PlayStation 3 — whose update arrived in mid-December. Likewise, Profile 2.0 is expected to arrive in October bringing Internet connectivity that Profile 1.1 players lack. source
On their visit to the Blu-ray booth at CES, BetaNews reporters were told the only Blu-ray player suggested to be purchased is a PS3. WHAT?! This shoudl not be a surprise that Sony is basically taking a crap on all the standalone players and telling people that the PS3 is the device to buy to watch next gen HD movies just to peddle their crappy gaming rig.
And how about this insight:
In addition, the BD-J interactivity layer, based on Java, has continued to evolve since the introduction of Blu-ray Profile 1.0. This means that early players may have a buggy implementation and perhaps more importantly, they are not powerful enough to play the latest films properly.
So why would Blu-ray release a crappy player that has bugs built in and that is incomplete?
When BetaNews asked why these manufacturers rushed out players that were not fully capable and potentially buggy due to their BD-J implementation, the Blu-ray partner pointed blame across the room to HD DVD. “We should have waited another year to introduce Blu-ray to the public, but the format war changed the situation,” he said. HD DVD was already coming and the BDA had no choice but to launch Blu-ray
Once again, Blu-ray is a half-complete, over-priced DRM riddled beast
thanks Crunchgear - I love you too!
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8 Comments, Comment or Ping
Ari
It’s time to move on. Blu-ray has won. The difference between Profile 1.0 and 2.0 is internet connectivity but that has nothing to do with the playback of the main feature. The PS3 was upgraded via firmware to 1.1 recently and 2.0 would be a mater of another free firware update given that the PS3 has both ethernet and WiFi. I have a Ps3 and a Toshiba HD-A2 but I never used the internet connectivity features on any of my 19 HD DVD titles. I have tried out the pip features on both HD DVD and on Blu-ray titles like Resident Evil: Extinction but I did not see the point. Boring.
It’s time for you to shutdown this site and find another hobby.
Jan 12th, 2008
Harvard Grad
So basically a half-assed Blu Ray Player is still better than a HD DVD player.
Thanks.
Jan 12th, 2008
Ole Olsen
Why don’t you just purchase yourself a Blu-ray player, pop in one of the hundreds of exclusive titles and watch it in full 1080p with lossless audio and enjoy yourself? All this ranting and raving just makes yourself look foolish and takes a couple years off your life in the process.
Jan 12th, 2008
admin
You have your preferences, I have mine. I have no problem watching movies in 1080p with lossess audio in HD DVD.
I’d spend a bundle on a Blu-ray player to keep if I had any confidence that the spec was complete.
Don’t gloat yet, Blu-ray fan boys … the HD DVD market is only 4% of the home video market.
Jan 12th, 2008
Ari
How many HD DVD titles actually have lossless audio compared with Blu-ray. If your goal is to watch the main feature in 1080p with lossless audio, you should have confidence in being able to playback all blu-ray titles with any blu-ray player currently on the market.
Profile 1.1 only adds a requirement for a second video decoder solely for the purpose of providing pip video commentary however any 1.1 compliant blu-ray title will playback just fine on any Profile 1.0 player sans the option to enable pip video commentary. Profile 2.0 is irrelevant for the time being given that there are no Profile 2.0 titles bu even if they were out, you would not be missing anything. The U-Shop stuff on Universal titles are a cheap gimmick to separate suckers from their money.
Harvard Grad, unlike you, I have tried both formats because I try products before I criticize them.
Jan 13th, 2008
admin
In this kind of argument, one premised on preference, there is no winner. My opinion, and I have been pretty consistent on this, is that Warner’s stated justifications for going BD exclusively are poorly thought out. For instance they said that the customers have spoken – yet the market for net gev HD DVDs is only 4% of the home video market – that’s a pathetic number. This justification also contradicts their actions as they unilaterally decided that customers should have Blu-ray.
Warner should state the obvious, they went Blu-ray 1) because it has superior DRM schme; 2) they got paid by Sony (even though there are news reports to the contrary). Sony has made it clear that the PS3 is a BD player first and a gaming rig second. Stating, as said in the above article, that the PS3 is the best Blu-ray player to buy is pretty transparent and pathetic.
Early Blu-Ray adopters are going to be in a hole having to buy new players to have all the features avaialble to the newer generation of BD discs (fetures already avaialble on HD DVD players). This will falsely inflate sales numbers, and when will updates to the Blu-ray spec end? Remember, the only Blu-ray player you can buy with confidence is the PS3 – what a load of crap.
HD DVD adopters can be very confident that even if no new HD DVD movies are produced, their HD DVD players will be able to play those movies well into the future. And because all HD DVD players have native ethernet, upgrading the BIOS will be pretty easy.
Jan 13th, 2008
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