There is a guy I know who LOVES to feed and fuel arguments, He and another Techie guy (who also does Macs) says that Blueray DVD players will become commonplace in the next year or two (actually he said by next Christmas). Not only in computers, but in everyday life just like the standard DVD player is today.

As we argued/discussed, I asked him to define "commonplace". His description of commonplace was:

-available in Home standalone Players at reasonable prices ($100 or less).
-in the Car as standard equipment (like MP3/Aux inputs are becoming standard).
-in most gaming consoles (which I agreed with, money is in games not Hardware)
-Blueray recorders will be available as affordable standalone home units (double price of players)

I said, the current price is about $1000 for a internal computer Blueray unit ($699 on sale was cheapest posted here) and although technology is moving at a faster rate than when DVD came about, I argue that it would be AT LEAST 3 to 5 years before Blueray replaces the standard DVD and hardware like DVD's did Video Tapes.

Again, MY idea of commonplace is if you knocked on 10 doors in a neighborhood, in 8 out of 10 cases you would find a DVD player in the home. They both said Blueray would be that way by end of 2008.

My argument was the fact that with Apple and others delivering content via Home media devices (Comcast On-demand, TiVo, etc) and the development of HD oriented services, BlueRay will still be a slow progress. I could see delivering HD content in the Home via high speed developed before EVERYONE jumps on the Blueray bandwagon.

The main thing that helped DVD become popular was was companies like Apex bringing the DVD player below $100 about 4 or 6 years ago. Now you can buy a decent DVD player for $29 and DVD players are standard equipment in most SUV's and high end family oriented vehicles.

What do you think, how long before Blueray becomes affordable and commplace?

Ooops, I meant Blu-Ray (the official name) not Blueray in above post.

Sorry....

Maybe never. I was just reading an article in a Home Theater mag I get and they say that it's
possible that neither the Blu-Ray nor the HD-DVD will win out. I have a very large DVD
collection and personally I don't see myself switching over any time soon.

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Grateful11

I am with G11, I had posted an article that stated it was dead out of the gate, along with HD-DVD.
I can't find the link now.
Also PopSci did a comparison between DVD, and HD-DVD, not really a noticeable difference.
Why switch?
They're has been better CD's for years, no one is switching.
Maybe as a storage solution.

BGnR

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Tell em to put up or shut up.

If they are that confident in the speed of the Blu-Ray rollout then ask them how much money have they got in the manufacturers stocks?

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If it does penetrate the market the deep (which I'm sure it will if it hangs around long enough...and that is likely so considering the PS3, and just what is available now)...my take on all of those scenarios being the 'norm', or close to each other, is 3 to 4 years...perhaps stretch it to 5...but that would be pushing it.

DVDs are going to be around for a long, long time. HD-DVD and Blu-Ray will likely be around for a very long time too...thought I believe Blu-Ray will win out as the best overall medium (it has much potential for great capacities in its current form, with tweaked revisions).

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The price on electronics drops by about half every 18 months. Given that they are $700 that means three years before they are $175, about the price when DVD players started to get penetration. Next everybody needs to have the majority of their local broadcast stations available in HD to really have a demand for recorders. Now ask your friend when he expects that the cable companies will have local HD channels as part of their basic package.

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In tha 360. MRF User Map



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/31/2006 12:09AM by Filliam H. Muffman.

Terabyte or more hard drives will be cheap and plentiful soon, obviating the need for most optical media as backup or transportable storage.

Last mile fiber to the premises and higher capacities in Flash memory will hasten optical media's demise.

My vote is for never.
Or Tuesday, just to hedge my bets.

DVD technology was adopted by US consumers faster than any other technology at that time. This is because the quality was better and discs were easier to use, and offered more features than VHS, all for about the same price per movie.

It seems like people were fairly willing to buy their favorite VHS movies on DVD again to reap these benefits. Of course early adopters always pay more for the initial hardware investment, but as production costs drop so to do retail prices.

With Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the only benefit that I am aware of over DVD is more resolution. People looking to showcase their new HD TV sets may want the best quality movies out there, which would not be plain DVD anymore, but Digital VHS has been out for years and provided HD resolution as well, but most people never bought into that technology either.

Without additional benefits (other than HD resolution) I don't think there is enough incentive for most people to bother switching at this point. I think the industry will eventually force a change onto the consumer, selling only Blu-Ray or HD-DVD movies, but the fact that there are 2 new formats means nothing will happen because nobody wants to go with one for fear of being wrong and losing customers.

I will personally 'upgrade' when I feel it is affordable to do so. Already owning an HD set I look forward to having HD movies, but honestly regular DVD's look just great already, so I'm not too worried about it.

Ooh, I almost forgot.
Stricter DRM is the REAL reason the "studios" would like BluRay/HD-DVD to succeed.
It's also going to be its primary downfall.

Quote
mikebw
With Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the only benefit that I am aware of over DVD is more resolution. People looking to showcase their new HD TV sets may want the best quality movies out there, which would not be plain DVD anymore, but Digital VHS has been out for years and provided HD resolution as well, but most people never bought into that technology either.

Funny that was an additional point I made. The geek went on about how stunning the quality was for Blu-ray movies and people will be rushing just to buy it just for the improvement in quality.

My point was that Historically, the masses will always choose PRICE over Quality AND will DELAY until they are forced to adapt. Classic examples in the price example are Beta .vs VHS, and Mac .vs Windows. It the delay category, look how long it took people to move from OS 9 to OS X and from Windows 98 to later versions.

Quote

I think the industry will eventually force a change onto the consumer, selling only Blu-Ray or HD-DVD movies.

I'm sure there was a surge in DVD player sales when Blockbuster and other Rental places decided to not carry VHS titles in addition to DVD's.

Thanks for all the responses. I thought I was missing something with the Blu-ray, just needed some sound thinking to back up my claims and point of view.

I'm sure Blu-Ray is just great, but not that great.

Another example of how the consumer will DELAY- Floppy disks (3.5"). If Apple hadn't stopped putting floppy drives into it's computers back in 1998 with the original iMac, how many of us would still be using them? Probably a lot more than are today as the world continues to spin without them.

I had little use for floppy disks after 99, getting a high speed Internet connection and a portable 2.5" firewire drive. USB thumbsticks have really replaced the utility of a floppy as well.

If electronics manufacturers simply stop making regular DVD players and movies, then people WILL buy the new stuff. Many won't be happy about it, and justifably so as many people still have regular TV's that can't even display the full resolution of a regular DVD! So I don't think any such change will occur until after the analog-TV kill switch in 2009, if ever. After that point everyone will need to have at least a digital tuner, and I bet most people will use that opportunity as an excuse to buy a new HD set.

Also, one thing that has been bothering me lately is how a large percentage of new TV's sold are not capable of resolving full 1920x1080 images. You can get 'ED' sets, which means anything higher than 640x480, but not actually 1920x1080. So you have all these nice new TV's, LCD, plasma, LCOS, whatever, and you're basically short-changing yourself. Given that, why buy Blu-Ray or HD-DVD at all? Your TV can't even display all the pixels you would have to spend even more money to buy in the first place.

Sure, all the nice 1080p sets will become more affordable, and Sony will sell lots of PS3's (with built-in Blu-Ray) but nowhere near as many people will buy those as they did the first generation of DVD players.

I agree that the DVD format over VHS was a huge improvement for everyone--smaller, easier to store, easier to manufacture, etc.

Simply adding better picture quality to an already very good picture isn't enough to make people care.

DVD-Audio, anyone? Ask your friends if they have DVD-Audio in their homes or their cars.

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In the words of DharmaDog: "it may or may not be utter horse@#$%&, but it shouldn't be dismissed simply because it doesn't agree with your opinion."

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I bought my first CD player in 1985. It was a 3rd generation Technics. Cost me $500, which was a TON of money making $3.85/hr @ TRU. But seemed like a bargain to me since the first gens were $1000.

I went to college the next year every was in awe I had a CD player (and I went to school with some VERY rich kids). When I went back for my sophomore year about 1/3 of the dorm residents had CD player. By my junior year, CD players had dropped down to $200 and everyone had one. The Walkman was on it's deathbed.

Total years for adoption...+/- 5


I bought my first DVD player in 1997. It was a first gen Sony. Cost me $1000. I had to buy DVDs over the web because local selection (I live in a major city) was so bad. A few blockbusters rented, but only had 1 copy of maybe 30% of all releases. It's DVD rental display was as big as my nightstand.

In 1998 Sony released it's second gen @ half the price...$500. BB started giving shelf space to DVD titles rather than putting them on a portable cart. By 1999 DVDs were even at Wal-Mart and were the BIG Xmas present.

Total years for adoption...-+/- 3

Bought my first DVD-R equipt Mac in Jan 2001. The $3500 machine seemed like a bargain given that bare DVD-R drives were $1000 IF you could find one, and even you'd have to pirate iDVD. A year later Apple offered a $2500 Mac w/ DVD-R. By the middle of 2002 you could buy a bare DVD-R drive @ Staples for $150.

Total years for mass adoption +/- 2

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Technology seems to be getting adopted faster as the years go on mostly, I think, because prices drop faster now. It's only been 5 years since the DVD-R was introduced and sold for $1000. Now you can pick up a burner for $35 or a set-top recorder for $125.

The key to Blu-Ray's success is going to be content, content, content. The electronic industry will get the prices down to the magical $250 by next xmas, I am sure.

By next Christmas? No way.

Not even by the Christmas after next.

The DVD was a *huge* improvement over VHS tape. Super Beta was a big improvement over VHS tape. SB died in the consumer market fairly quickly.

People are tired of format wars and are slow to embark on them, unless they perceive a clear winner, based on their perception. There were more VHS machines, and they were cheaper. The end.

As mentioned, incremental improvements will not attract mass markets nearly as easily as The Next Great Thing. Early Adopters? Sure. But they're never the ones who take a market by storm.

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I'd say that the transition from VHS to DVD has only recently been completed for the population as a whole (maybe a few years, if that). Asking them to make another transition this soon is too much for too little benefit. I also don't see that great a benefit for storage. Tape and hard drives work just fine and offer more commonplace solutions.

Maybe several years after a single format is determined. How many years for that to happen is anybody's guess.

Ipods and MP3 players have been out for 5+ years and car manufacturers are just starting to offer inputs for some models...

I have a Blue Ray !

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All I can say is, Blu-Ray is to DVD as DVD was to VHS. If you have a Sony store near you take a look @ Blu-Ray on a 1080p set. It's absolutely stunning. It makes DVD look like a '70s movie.

Blu-Ray is going to have a nice installed base come next Spring once PS 3s start arriving in store in mass quantity. So in March you'll easily be able to get a Blu-Ray player for $499. That is going to be the new price benchmark for a non-videophile BR player. I think prices drop from there before xmas.with Gen 2 or 3 players.

I hope that it never replaces DVD's.

Same for HD DVD's.

I want another choice.

people have gotten spoiled with $50 dvd players and $10 dvd movies so i don't see Blueray making a dent until the price comes down...

Hi everyone,

I've though about this and have come to the conclusion that Blu-Ray isn't going to be commonplace anytime in the near future. In a couple of years, maybe. Not likely, but maybe. At this point, the format war between Blue-Ray and HD-DVD alone is reason to avoid them both. The average movie watcher doesn't want to risk investing in anotehr format until one is the clear winner.

The other reason is that it's another format to deal with in one's library. The selection of titles is extraordinarily limited at best and will improve but just dribs and drabs in the immediate future and the benefits aren't dramatic enough for the average movie-watcher. That the hardware required is also expensive to say the least is another issue.

The advent of the next PlayStation may improve the pace of adoption but not dramatically. I think the other issues will continue to make people avoid the newer format for quite a while.

Robert

Quote
Chupa Chupa
All I can say is, Blu-Ray is to DVD as DVD was to VHS.

Sure, in image quality alone.

It offers exactly nothing in terms of portability and storage and longevity of the medium (it may even be easier to damage). And it extracts a cost in player/display requirements and expense, plus the possibility that the format will be dead in a year.

The buying public doesn't care about the relatively small bit of enhancement in image quality over regular DVD, especially not for the cost it requires.

Image quality isn't everything. You can't just look at image quality alone, in a vacuum, and decide based on only that one thing.

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In the words of DharmaDog: "it may or may not be utter horse@#$%&, but it shouldn't be dismissed simply because it doesn't agree with your opinion."

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Trying is the first step to failure. -- Homer Simpson

Remember that the Beta format was superior in quality than VHS. Look where it ended up (mostly because Sony refused to open the format to others). Cheaper won over quality.

The price of Blu-Ray amd HD-tv is dominated by the cost of the laser assembly and the increased precision needed in the positioning mechanism, so the cost determinants are all in mechanism costs. Process yields need to get much better and they will, and some form of HD media will "take off" at the $100 to 150 price point. About two more years.

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What it is, man, a low-down and funky feelin'

mostly because Sony refused to open the format to others

No, they did open up the format to others. There were several licensees, just as there were in the VHS camp.

But VHS evolved faster than Sony. Sony was far too slow in adding features, maybe because they were trying to "preserve" the genre.

VHS had lesser quality than Beta, but had three speeds before Beta had two. The 2hr cassette was probably the single biggest factor in VHS's favor. That went to 4, 6, and 8 hours, and Sony barely got to 2.

The vast majority of people just didn't care about great image quality. "OK" was good enough.

Sony also had a problem getting studios on board for movies on cassettes. JVC didn't. More selection on Beta.

People didn't care about Beta Hi-Fi or PCM.

Average quality was good enough. And without true HD TVs, most folks just won't see a DVD-to-VHS difference. And any of "most folks" who can see the difference will want to pay for it.

The 'Philes are the one who'll be buying HD and BR DVDs. Unless they sell for the same price, AND have an SD version of the movie on the other side, it will take much longer for either to be as common as the current DVD.

DVD format wars, high end gear, moderate to small gains... John and Jane Q Public aren't having it.

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I am that Masked Man.

All you can do, is all you can do.

There’s trouble — it's time to play the sound of my people.

Your boos mean nothing to me, I've seen what you cheer for.

Insisting on your rights without acknowledging your responsibilities isn’t freedom, it’s adolescence.

I've been to the edge of the map, and there be monsters.

We are a government of laws, not men.

Everybody counts or nobody counts.

When a good man is hurt,
all who would be called good
must suffer with him.

You and I have memories longer than the road that stretches out ahead.

There is no safety for honest men except
by believing all possible evil of evil men.

We don’t do focus groups. They just ensure that you don’t offend anyone, and produce bland inoffensive products. —Sir Jonathan Ive

An armed society is a polite society.
And hope is a lousy defense.

You make me pull, I'll put you down.

I *love* SIGs. It's Glocks I hate.