HD DVD vs Blu-ray
Which is right for your home theater?
The end of the 90's brought about the
introduction of the DVD. In just a few
short years it has made the VHS all but
obsolete. The DVD offered the benefit of
nearly twice the resolution of VHS. It
also added support for Dolby Digital and DTS
sound as well as the convenience of quickly
jumping from chapter to chapter without having
to fast forward or rewind the tape (lest we
forget Be Kind, Please Rewind).
In recent years, with the growth of
home theaters and the HDTV market,
competing technologies have been developed to
take advantage of the new HDTVs and to
become the successors to DVD. These
competing technologies were HD DVD and Blu-ray,
both of which were capable of full
high def resolution and DolbyTrueHD and
DS-HD sound. These are significant
upgrades over traditional DVD and
are tough to pass up for the home theater movie
connoisseur.
Reminiscent of the old VHS vs Beta
wars, HD DVD and Blu-ray both
were fighting over market share and the
trust of consumers who are cautious about
spending money for a technology that they
are afraid may die the death of the Beta player
of old.
Blu-ray dvd: The victor has been
crowned
At the end of February, Toshiba announced
that they will be leaving the HD DVD business
thus ending the HD DVD vs Blu-ray war.
A number of factors contributed to Blu-ray
winning the war, but the biggest reason of all
was the major movie studio support advantage
that Blu-ray
enjoyed. Blu-ray was supported
by Columbia Pictures & MGM (both owned
by Sony), Disney, Lionsgate, Fox as well as
Warner Bros. whose
winter announcement that they were going
exclusively with Blu-ray accelerated the
downfall of HD DVD leaving only Universal,
Paramount and DreamWorks as the only major
studios supporting HD DVD.
Another key factor in the win was Sony's
decision to include a Blu-ray player
in the PS3. Although Toshiba had the
lead in sales of stand alone players, when the
sales numbers of the PS3 were included they had
a substantial lead in the amount of players in
the market.
Toshiba enjoyed the lead in having
a less expensive player, even dipping below
$100 for a holiday season special and it seemed
that the tide may be turning in the favor of HD
DVD, however they just could not overcome the
studio support advantage and thus the
availability of content that Blu-ray had.
Sony is the driving force behind the Blu-ray
player although other manufacturers of Blu-ray
players include Samsung (which produced the
first Blu-ray player), Sharp, Hitachi,
Mitsubishi, Panasonic and Philips. LG and
Thomson/RCA manufacture both HD DVD and
Blu-ray, while Toshiba was the
major driving force behind HD
DVD.
Another advantage of Blu-ray is the larger
capacity. A single layer Blu-ray disc is
capable of storing 25 GB and a dual layer 50 GB
which translates into 22+ hours of standard def
video and over 8 hours of HD
video.
LG and Samsung had both announced plans to
manufacture dual format players and some models
hit the market, but with Toshiba's decision to
abandon HD DVD, Samsung has just released what
appears to be the last dual format player.
What does the Blu-ray win mean for
consumers?
While competition typically is to the
consumers benefit as it often times leads to
dips in prices as a result of competition,
there is reason to believe that the end of the
format war will benefit consumers. Many
consumers had decided to stay format neutral
until a clear winner was decided. As it
now is apparent that Blu-ray is the winner,
demand for Blu-ray will increase and with
increased demand comes increased economies of
scale allowing manufacturers to eventually
produce players and
discs cheaper.
In addition manufacturers who may have been
hesitant to come out with new players until
there was a clear winner can now bring their
players to market without fear. So even
though there may not be competition between HD
DVD and Blu-ray, there should now be increased
competition between Blu-ray manufacturers which
should lower prices.
In the long run a clear winner will be
beneficial to everyone, so if you are still
licking your wounds from being on the wrong
side of the format war, I can sympathize, but
try to take heart. The future of movies
in high definition is bright. If you were
on the winning side, please be kind to your HD
DVD friends and realize that their support of
Blu-ray will help keep prices competitive for
everyone.
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