$129 seems to be the price it's floated back up to after the sale.If it stabilizes at that for a couple of weeks, then you know that it'll drop below $100 at least on Black Friday. Some company in the Blu-ray camp should do likewise just for the hell of it -- sell a model for, say, $89.99 for the duration of the Christmas shopping season. Or better still, every Blu-ray manufacturer should do it just to show they are serious and aggressive. You can't convince me that Blu-ray players cost so much more to produce that it couldn't be done. Problem is, mostly only people with HD TVs will buy them, although they make decent SD DVD players until you upgrade your TV.

Originally there were stories that HD-DVD players would be $199 and then drop to $169 on Black Friday. Seeing $129 already was a bit of surprise to me. Maybe Blu-ray manufacturers didn't think $199/$199 that would be as much of a threat. Matybe Toshiba realized the previous price wasn't enough of a market push. It sure seems HD-DVD or at least Toshiba decided to push hard though. I can't help but believe they're doing this as a "lose lead" strategy that Blu-ray may not want to emulate.

I would think that those $449 Blu-ray players could drop to $299 though.


I don't doubt there's an overall market strategy in Toshiba's "lose lead" strategy. Such a low price may push the sale of HDTVs (Toshiba's?). Homes that don't have satellite or cable HD might now be attracted by having disc playback. The "studios" that have invested in releasing HD-DVDs will now have a market to sell to. I suspect the sales on TVs and discs may be the reason for the "lose lead" strategy.

The Blu-ray infrastructure (not simply making players but the disc manufacture and replication) is more expensive than HD-DVD and that's been part of the "discussion" on this format war and one some studio chose HD-DVD. Hence Blu-ray may not be in the position to "lose lead."


If it stabilizes at that for a couple of weeks, then you know that it'll drop below $100 at least on Black Friday. Some company in the Blu-ray camp should do likewise just for the hell of it -- sell a model for, say, $89.99 for the duration of the Christmas shopping season. Or better still, every Blu-ray manufacturer should do it just to show they are serious and aggressive. You can't convince me that Blu-ray players cost so much more to produce that it couldn't be done. Problem is, mostly only people with HD TVs will buy them, although they make decent SD DVD players until you upgrade your TV.

If both drop prices dramatically for Black Friday, I'm buying!

Heath

And I'm seeing base prices for 42" 1080P HDTVs down to $1099 already (Vizio and Westinghouse to name a couple). 720p models are less and when you get down to 32" the prices are not much more than getting a good 27" CRT TV a few years back.

Westinghouse Digital is my pick for affordable 1080p HDTVs. My friend bought a 42" model and I love watching Blu-Ray DVDs on his PS3.

Heath

]Jordi Ribas, General Manager of HD-DVD, Microsoft. "I can't speak to specific numbers, but based on recent NPD data, there have been more Xbox 360 HD-DVD players sold than all Blu-ray standalone players combined. The Playstation 3 simply hasn't been the gamer changer Sony had hoped it would be."

That's all wrong because the Sony PS3 clearly gave Blu-ray a big edge over HD-DVD in 2007. Within a few weeks of the PS3 launch the sales of Blu-ray movies went from slightly behind HD-DVD to basically double, and stayed there for most of this year. (In the past few weeks it's been about 60-40 in favor of Blu-ray.)

At some point the relative cost of standalone players may matter more, but if you can buy a complete game machine and multimedia center for $399 versus something which just plays movies for about half that, the PS3 is actually a better buy. The latest aggressive pricing of HD-DVD players will undoubtedly help that format going into the holiday shopping season, but it's about the only thing keeping HD-DVD alive when most movie studios and consumers are happy with Blu-ray and independent producers don't have a choice because there are no HD-DVD burners.

Sooner or later most movie studios will probably decide to back just one HD format to make their life easier, and once that happens it won't matter how many cheap players are in circulation for the other format.

The Blu-ray infrastructure (not simply making players but the disc manufacture and replication) is more expensive than HD-DVD and that's been part of the "discussion" on this format war and one some studio chose HD-DVD. Hence Blu-ray may not be in the position to "lose lead."I don't understand this. Why should the price of the manufacture and replication of the media have anything to do with that of the player? If you're saying that player prices are in part underwriting the cost premium of disk production, that doesn't make much sense -- surely Chinese manufacturers wouldn't care about that. Besides, the loss-leader approach is something that Sony and other manufacturers have tried for years to grab market share. The Blu-ray camp simply can't go on pricing their products that much higher than the HD-DVD camp's and expect to win, regardless of the alleged technical superiority of Blu-ray.

The Blu-ray infrastructure (not simply making players but the disc manufacture and replication) is more expensive than HD-DVD and that's been part of the "discussion" on this format war and one some studio chose HD-DVD.

That's a myth which has been dispelled by analyses showing that the bulk cost of making Blu-ray movie discs is only a few cents more than for HD-DVD...and for that extra few cents you get almost twice the content capacity per layer. Movie studios like Blu-ray both because of the higher capacity and (by some accounts) better copy protection. The main reason any movie studios are exclusively making HD-DVDs right now is because they're being paid to do so, and those incentive contracts expire around the end of next year.

Ok guys, everyone go back to your respective corners for a moment. The whole point at the beginning of this thread was not the technical superiority of one format over the other, or each format's strengths and weaknesses but rather the simple principle that when dealing with selling a product to the general public (which is the goal of both Blu-Ray and HD DVD) that a sudden shift in price should have a somewhat equal shift in sales.
Ultimately, Joe Public doesn't know or care about all the technical stuff that we on this board do, he cares about price. When he looks at one player costing $200 and another player costing $400 and sees that they both offer comparable quality on the cheap, poorly calibrated plasma or LCD he's looking at in his local electronics store, he's probably going to take home the less expensive of the two. The format that wins the "war" will not be the one that can capture the hearts and minds of we videocentric pixel snobs, but it will be the one that puts the smaller dent in the average consumer's pocketbook.

I do think Lawrence and Kevin are speaking from biases and NOT about the reality of the business and the calculations that are going on. It's sounds like they're speaking from what THEY WANT things to be like, not on the REALITY or STRATEGY the "studios" have.

You BET the manufacture and price of players is, in part, tied to the costs of disc production. It has to do with contracts and incentives and calculated risk and retooling production facilities etc.

Blu-ray cost more for MANY REASONS.

Like people at a poker table, they're calculating odds and taking risks but those risks have EVERYTHING to do with the cards they're holding.

Price of a player is a KEY and probably a leading point but even that is NOT the only point. There's price and availability of the media (the movies) that is also critical. In fact, in the long run, THAT is probably the biggest issue since there's the studio investment in manufacturing and sales of MOVIES where the money is to be made (from the studio/manufacturer's perspective). The consumer is very much thinking about that too. How much is that HD movie going to cost to own, can you get your favorite movie on the given format, can you rent the movies you want. You're NOT going to spend $129 HD-DVD player when every movie you want will only play on the $449 Blu-ray player.

I do think Lawrence and Kevin are speaking from biases and NOT about the reality of the business and the calculations that are going on. It's sounds like they're speaking from what THEY WANT things to be like, not on the REALITY or STRATEGY the "studios" have.

I'm speaking as much as possible from known facts but won't deny my preference for Blu-ray, which is the better format for my purposes and also the one with the most fully developed delivery options. As far as major movie studios are concerned, there are currently only two which are exclusively supporting HD-DVD and all the rest are either neutral or exclusively Blu-ray. If the last two holdouts switch back when their incentive contracts expire that could be a clincher for consumers no matter what happens with player prices, so in this case I think the movie studios may make the decision for all of us. Blu-ray movies outsold HD-DVD by a ratio of 2:1 this year even though the players for the latter were significantly cheaper, so if that trend continues we can guess what most studios are likely to do.

I wouldn't ultimately mind if HD-DVD overhwhelms Blu-ray to give us one preferred delivery format, but I doubt that's going to happen. Either HD-DVD will falter or both formats will limp along in a pointless deadlock until consumers give up in disgust and switch to online delivery of HD content. This last option isn't realistic yet but could be soon enough. Come to think of it, the Sony PS3 would be just as useful for internet HD downloads as it is for disc-based delivery, so either way it's a safe investment... :-)

Either HD-DVD will falter or both formats will limp along in a pointless deadlock until consumers give up in disgust and switch to online delivery of HD content. This last option isn't realistic yet but could be soon enough.
Why does everyone think the delivery method is going to be online? Why not some type of system where it's sent to a hard drive inside your cable box or satellite receiver and is then transferable to your computer so you can then do with it as you wish. I could be way off here, but that seems possible to me. It might not be any faster than online delivery, but it would seem to make sense to get your content from the cable/satellite company if it's reasonably priced.


Come to think of it, the Sony PS3 would be just as useful for internet HD downloads as it is for disc-based delivery, so either way it's a safe investment... :-)
Next time I try to talk my wife into letting me spend $500 on a personal entertainment device/time waster, I need to give you a call. That was a darn good rationalization.

Why does everyone think the delivery method is going to be online? Why not some type of system where it's sent to a hard drive inside your cable box or satellite receiver and is then transferable to your computer so you can then do with it as you wish.

I agree that satellite/cable HD delivery is likely to be prominent, and may currently be the most widely used option for HD movies...but good luck getting the content out of your cable box to save for future viewing. Plus I don't see the cable companies offering independent producers a way to upload content directly to customers, so that doesn't help most of us. The internet is a more promising long-term solution for my purposes, and it's fairly easy to attach a computer to most HDTVs if someone wants to view HD content that way.

Next time I try to talk my wife into letting me spend $500 on a personal entertainment device/time waster, I need to give you a call. That was a darn good rationalization.

In all seriousness, the Sony PS3 is one of the best electronic gadgets I've ever owned -- it's basically the all-purpose multimedia and computer device some of us have contemplated for many years now. It plays HD and SD movies, digital photos at HD quality, both PS2 and PS3 games and can connect to the internet and your wireless home network. At $399 for the base model it's a no-brainer as a business investment to display your video work to clients, so even if Blu-ray tanks as a movie format you'll have something which is useful in other ways for years to come. The only issue I have with it is that it gets very hot if you use it in an enclosed space, so don't stick it in a TV stand or cabinet with poor ventilation. Other than that, I heartily recommend it.

P.S. My wife's the one who bought a PS3 for me as a belated Christmas present back at the beginning of this year. :-)

I saw this link on HDforIndies.

http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/11/07/90-000-hd-dvd-players-sold-in-one-weekend/

Evidently they sold 90,000 of those players. That's gotta help their cause right?

Yup. Bunch of us home entertainment and video geeks picked one up. I wish I had...

heath

I wanted to post this news up here, but did it in another thread:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showpost.php?p=772965&postcount=24

heath

The price of the Toshiba HDA2 is back to about $199 (and it's discontinued BTW). The A3, replacing it is at $299. At those prices HD-DVD loses its big price advangate. For most people it's back to being a choice between $300 HD-DVD or $420 or so for Blu-ray. That's just not a big enough difference for HD-DVD to run away with a lead.

It'll go back to what movies you can buy and whether you can burn a disc of your "home movies" to hand to family members and friends.

Does anybody have any idea why they're no HD-DVD burners on the market? I belive Toshiba might be including them in some of their laptops but that's about it.

www.blackfridayads.com

I don't see the Toshiba A2 on any of those lists. I do see the A3 listed for either $199 or $169. I don't remember which. There's certainly nothing close to the $99 bargain they had.

Well $169 is the A3 from Sears and Sears.com on Black Friday before 11am. The includes 2 HD-DVD (300 & one of the Bourne Movies) in the box plus a coupon for 5 more (your Choice). 7 Movies at $20 = $140 so the player is $29.
I've been sitting on the fence but I'll be sitting at my computer buying A3 on Black Frioday.

I may take the plunge...I wish I was shelling out $100 for it, but good analogy with the free movies. It feels like 1998 all over again, when you'd buy a DVD player and get a bunch of free rentals and DVDs (albeit, the DVDs sucked).

Heath

I may take the plunge...I wish I was shelling out $100 for it,

Heath

Me too! That special was basically a clearance thing.

I told my friend about it and he showed up at Walmart at 8:25am.that morning just as someone was walking out with the last one. Ouch.

In my neck of the woods, it must've been sold out quick, too!

Heath

I saw this link on HDforIndies.

http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/11/07/90-000-hd-dvd-players-sold-in-one-weekend/

Evidently they sold 90,000 of those players. That's gotta help their cause right?

Maybe not - Sony just announced that the recent PS3 price cut doubled their weekly sales in the US from 30-40k a week to 100k:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/11/15/sonys-ps3-sales-in-us-more-than-double-since-price-cut/

Even without doubling the 30-40k a week number makes me skeptical that the 90k number due to the firesale will make much of a difference. While it nearly doubles the installed base for HD DVD the PS3 numbers still mean Blu ray will likely have an 8- or 10-1 advantage in installed players by the end of the year.

Yeah, but 90,000 dedicated players (not just gaming consoles) is a big deal, regardless!

The war wages on (yay). But then there's this, which may back up my predictions of downloads winning the format battle:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/12/technology/12intel.html?ex=1195534800&en=449b95a632dd605e&ei=5099&partner=TOPIXNEWS

I think NY Times is getting rid of logging in; I can still access that page days later. If it becomes unavailable in anyway, I'll find a new link. But that story is great.

heath

Downloads will only win if the masses decide to watch most video content on their computers instead of on their TVs, or if they put a device with internet download capability in their living room. It just so happens that the best-selling Blu-ray player (i.e. Sony PS3) also happens to have internet connectivity, but I haven't heard of an HD-DVD player with similar capability.

And so it goes. HD-DVD is stuggling to survive, and the PS3 is the best multimedia/gaming device available today.

Apple TV, Windows Media Center, etc. Doing it on the TV like with iTunes. You can already watch movies on demand, which is similar.

Heath

And so it goes. HD-DVD is stuggling to survive, and the PS3 is the best multimedia/gaming device available today.

ps-I'm looking forward to playing Assassin's Creed at my friend's tonight. (Grin.)

heath

It just so happens that the best-selling Blu-ray player (i.e. Sony PS3) also happens to have internet connectivity, but I haven't heard of an HD-DVD player with similar capability.

And so it goes. HD-DVD is stuggling to survive, and the PS3 is the best multimedia/gaming device available today.

All the Toshiba HD-DVD players have an ethernet port, it's part of the spec, in addition to some web enabled features of certain discs, it is also used for firmware updates.

Downloads will only win if the masses decide to watch most video content on their computers instead of on their TVs, or if they put a device with internet download capability in their living room. It just so happens that the best-selling Blu-ray player (i.e. Sony PS3) also happens to have internet connectivity, but I haven't heard of an HD-DVD player with similar capability.
The Ethernet port is a standard feature of HD-DVD players. Apparently, Toshiba and co. were aware of bandwidth issue and implemented disk-based player with connectivity used for additional materials as well as for upgrade. Even the crappiest DirecTV-grade MPEG-4 hi-def video requires at least 10Mbps, my internet cable connection can churn out about 1.2Mbps at its best, that is, at night. In the evening when everyone is browsing the Net, the speed falls to dialup levels.

Time for HD online video has not come yet. Video-on-demand is available for several dozens, maybe a hundred of simultaneous viewers, because video requires lots of bandwidth.

I don't know how Intel's chip is relevant at all. The problem is not in decoding, the problem is in the bandwidth.

All in all, even if/when high-quality streaming video is available, I will still prefer to have some movies right with me, on disks, tapes, whatever. It is like having your own book instead of borrowing from a library. No streaming video will change the habit to have ONE'S OWN STUFF.

P.S. I got the HD-A2 from Walmart too. I wanted a real thing, that is, the XA2, but for a hundred bucks I thought what the heck. And it is not that bad, it upconverts regular DVDs quite nicely to 1080i. My TV can lock onto 3:2 cadence properly, so even though the A2 does not produce 1080p output, I am losing nothing when I watch movies. Not bad for $100, not bad at all.

On the negative side, I find the way it handles subtitles very weird, unintuitive and downright unusable. Also, I can understand that it does not play DVDs from non-U.S. regions, but not playing region-free PAL DVDs, come on, this is not even funny. I will be using my old DVD player for PAL, other regions, for DivX and XVID. It is convenient that my TV has two HDMI inputs.

All the Toshiba HD-DVD players have an ethernet port, it's part of the spec...

Okay, but do they have a web browser built in and a way to access web addresses so you could use them as an internet download device? The PS3 is a fully functional internet terminal with an optional wireless keyboard, so if internet downloads of HD content becomes the norm it's ready to go for that. Do any HD-DVD players have that capability?

Okay, but do they have a web browser built in and a way to access web addresses so you could use them as an internet download device? The PS3 is a fully functional internet terminal with an optional wireless keyboard, so if internet downloads of HD content becomes the norm it's ready to go for that. Do any HD-DVD players have that capability?

Nope, not that I'm aware of.

I bought my HD DVD player to play back films and my own authored HD-DVD discs[footage from my HDV Camcorder.]

If downloading HD content becomes the norm, I think I would rather build myself a Home Theater PC/Mac with a HD tuner card and as many hard drives that I can stuff in it.

My Nintendo Wii has a web browser built in---but you will never find me surfing the Web that way...it's painful!

If downloading HD content becomes the norm, I think I would rather build myself a Home Theater PC/Mac with a HD tuner card and as many hard drives that I can stuff in it.

With a little work you can also connect the PS3 to a wireless home network and stream video content from a beefy computer in another room, so you don't have to have a big computer box in your living room. :-)

I know you can load some version of Mac OS X operating system on the PS3, but what about the XBox 360 or Nintendo Wii? All three have processors from IBM, similar to the PowerPC that both IBM and Motorola (Freescale) made.

heath

I know there are people who bring up the fact that the A2 and the A3 doesn’t have 1080p but the reason that I use it is because I don’t think the price of a player that is capable of 1080p and have HDMI 1.3 should be compared to a player that doesn’t have those features. It has nothing to do with rather or not the player is a good value and its true that if you don’t have a 1080p TV and a high end surround sound system, the player is good enough.

Still, I believe that the A3 will be the last player that doesn’t do 1080p because if you look at today’s prices at Amazon for example, you can get the Toshiba A30 for $323.98, A35 for $412.27, and just for the heck of it, on the Blu-Ray side you have the Sharp BDHP 20u for $414.19, Samsung BD-1400 for $339.99, the Sony BDP-S300 for $399.98 and obviously the PS3 for the same price. Once the A3 becomes nearly discontinued, their will be a lot more 1080p TV sets in peoples homes and I bet that at least the A30 will be less than 200 dollars by then.

Even today, top featured 1080p TVs are getting very cheep such as the Sony 40” XBR4 with HDMI 1.3 and 24p support for just $2,199.99. Next year you’ll probably get an equally featured TV for around 1500 dollars or much less.



Now on the topic of using a PS3 as a multimedia device, as we all know Sony has a deal with DivX, and playing back those videos are good enough for a lot of people but I can imagine the deal going a bit further like having a Stage6 section of the PlayStation store. That’s sort of like the YouTube part of Apple TV. Like Apple, Sony also has a very good relationship with Google so it wouldn’t surprise me if you will see YouTube videos on the PlayStation store as well. Almost forgot, the PS3 will be getting an HD TV tuner/recorder.

This is all really a moot point. If Disney's advertisements are correct, and their titles are being offered "exclusively on DVD and Blu-Ray" (pre their television commercials), then the 'war' is basically over, and Toshiba is simply unloading inventory. I have several consumer friends who will buy Blu-Ray players simply on the strength of Disney's advertisements. While they may or may not buy HD-DVD players, they will most certainly buy Blu-Ray players just because of Disney. Personally, I'm holding out only due to paying down credit cards used to by camera equipment--next year I'll get a PS3 and a BR burner (dual-layer is what I'm holding out for: I can store on entire project on one of those discs, and not worry about more HDD crashes).

TV isn't the greatest source of info, but lots of people go by what they see advertised.

ciao,
Matt

I know there are people who bring up the fact that the A2 and the A3 doesn’t have 1080p but the reason that I use it is because I don’t think the price of a player that is capable of 1080p and have HDMI 1.3 should be compared to a player that doesn’t have those features.
I will agree with you on HDMI 1.3, but not on 1080p. The latter is merely a transport, take data from the disk and send it to a TV. Unlike upscaling or deinterlacing, no super-smart processing is needed. Reserving 1080p for "upscale" (are they really?) models is a pure marketing ploy.
its true that if you don’t have a 1080p TV and a high end surround sound system, the player is good enough.
If a TV can detect segmented frames and recover them properly, there is absolutely no difference between 1080i and 1080p. This player will work perfectly fine for such a TV and will utilize its 1080 lines in full. Well, a correct statement would be, that a TV capable if IVTC will utilize 1080i signal in full.

I have to say, that the 720p mode delivered by this player is horrible, so I am lucky that my TV can properly detect and process 3:2 cadence. I bought this player for movies, so I don't have real need for 1080p output.

Still, I believe that the A3 will be the last player that doesn’t do 1080p because if you look at today’s prices at Amazon for example, you can get the Toshiba A30 for $323.98, A35 for $412.27
If you read reviews you will find out that a30/35 do not deliver proper 1080p60 (one of them deliver proper 1080p24 though, go figure), just like A2 does not deliver proper 720p. To date, the only proper player from Toshiba is the XA2. Everything else is substitute. But I am ok with a substitute if it costs $100.

If it really doesn’t matter then why do all the new HD-DVD players except for the A3 claim to offer 1080p?

I understand that the A30 doesn’t have all the audio features of the A35 but the A30 does have 24p support so if your 1080p TV can handle 24p than the A30 would be an extremely smart choice over the A3. Also, I don’t know of any content that is offered in 1080 60p.

I may take the plunge...I wish I was shelling out $100 for it, but good analogy with the free movies. It feels like 1998 all over again, when you'd buy a DVD player and get a bunch of free rentals and DVDs (albeit, the DVDs sucked).

Heath

Yup, I was going to wait, but may jump in too. I hope the Sears Black Friday thing true and is going to be for sale on the internet with unlimited amount.

Mike

The Sear's deal looks real here
http://bfads.net/Toshiba-HDA3-HD-DVD-Player-at-Sears although I'm sure Sears.com will end at noon. I'm going online at 5am EST.

Stand alones are nothing compared to game player consoles. It was only April 18 this year that HD-DVD stand alones passed 100,000 in total sales. The $100 sale this month pumped out 90,000 in one weekend.
See here for details http://www.engadgethd.com/tag/VideoScan/

I'm going to be very interested to see how the 1080P upscaling of SD DVD's works on the A3 with my 42" 1080P LCD. If it looks goodd less reason to buy HD DVDs.

This is all really a moot point. If Disney's advertisements are correct, and their titles are being offered "exclusively on DVD and Blu-Ray" (pre their television commercials), then the 'war' is basically over, and Toshiba is simply unloading inventory. I have several consumer friends who will buy Blu-Ray players simply on the strength of Disney's advertisements. While they may or may not buy HD-DVD players, they will most certainly buy Blu-Ray players just because of Disney. Personally, I'm holding out only due to paying down credit cards used to by camera equipment--next year I'll get a PS3 and a BR burner (dual-layer is what I'm holding out for: I can store on entire project on one of those discs, and not worry about more HDD crashes).

TV isn't the greatest source of info, but lots of people go by what they see advertised.

ciao,
Matt

That Disney bit was flown by yesterday. I don't think that Disney has that kind of clout yet. Snowflake's "Finding Nemo" is about the best MPEG2 conversion I have seen (all of the latest top-tier animations are stellar in standard def.) This Disney bit is relying on a market that I think is smaller in demographic than the console market to "win" for Blu-Ray. Not sure that is going to work. Cheapest media that can be replaced will win. That will still be DVD for awhile. Let Blu-Ray "Finding Nemo" sit paused on the menu for a couple of weeks and let's see if mom and dad are ready to replace the player so quickly.

I go back and forth on buying a player (HD DVD or Blu Ray) or not. I love Criterion (http://www.criterion.com), and they haven't really mentioned going HD (either format), so I'm enjoying not taking the plunge yet, and watching some Criterion in glorious SD DVD.

heath

SD DVD still looks great on a 50" plasma, so until the cost for HD systems comes WAY down I just can't see any major migration happening. The massive sales that selling the HD-DVD players at $100 generated is proof positive of this.

My bet is that the company that can put out a $100-$130 dual-format HD player will steal all the sales the big players are after and make itself an absolute mint in the process.

Just saw that Best Buy is advertising a $400 Blu-Ray player, which includes 6 disks and a $100 Best Buy Gift Card.

SD DVD still looks great on a 50" plasma, so until the cost for HD systems comes WAY down I just can't see any major migration happening.

SD looks fine until you start comparing it to decent HD material, and then it looks like low-resolution mush based on antiquated 1950s technology. As far as a "major migration" is concerned, the purchase rate of HD-capable playback devices is running at least double that of standard DVD players when they were first introduced ten years ago - and at prices which are a bargain by comparison for what you can get. We're in the midst of one of the most historic consumer technology shifts in decades and many videographers are still talking about HD like it's just a fad. News flash: buggy whips are no longer readily available and HD is here to stay.

SD looks fine until you start comparing it to decent HD material, and then it looks like low-resolution mush based on antiquated 1950s technology. As far as a "major migration" is concerned, the purchase rate of HD-capable playback devices is running at least double that of standard DVD players when they were first introduced ten years ago - and at prices which are a bargain by comparison for what you can get. We're in the midst of one of the most historic consumer technology shifts in decades and many videographers are still talking about HD like it's just a fad. News flash: buggy whips are no longer readily available and HD is here to stay.
HD is already here, that is true. On the other hand, I watched two HD movies already, "Good night and good luck" and "Apollo 13" and I am not THAT much excited. Probably this is because I already have seen good HD shows on TV. I would not say that these movies look better than HD TV shows, and why should they.

But the shocker is that with TV shows the difference in quality between "old" SD shows and new HD shows is evident, while the difference between upscaled SD movies and HD movies is not so. The most visible difference is in text, whenever there is text onscreen, it is more legible and rounded and smooth. But overall... I would not say I see a lot of difference. Maybe the movies that I chose to watch are not the best showcase of HD transfer. All in all, HD is better, but the difference is quite subtle, so watching regular DVDs does not make me wanting for more.

In my opinion, what is more important between "old" video and movies and "new" ones is aspect ratio. IMHO, having 16:9 AR is more important than having HD.

P.S. I have a rather large 50-inch TV, but the panel is not 1920x1080, it is only 1365x768, so with "true" HD panels the difference may be more pronounced.

Films in HD are incredible to watch, but viewing documentaries shot in HD, like the underwater ones I see on Discovery HD, are truly wonderous. To my eye, films in HD look more like films in the theatre, but 1080i60/30p/720p to me at least, feels like HD.

Does that make sense? Probably has to do with frame rates and lighting.

Anyway, if someone makes a dual-format hi def DVD player for even $300, they'll be a dominant force.

heath

Just saw that Best Buy is advertising a $400 Blu-Ray player, which includes 6 disks and a $100 Best Buy Gift Card.
That deals is as good as what Wal Mart’s offering for the 80 gig PS3 which includes any 10 under $30 movies for free. That’s a total of 15 free movies. Although I think they should have also offered a deal where you can choose any 3 PS3 games for free instead of movies.

At the rate things are going, I wouldn’t be surprised to see 20 free movie offers for both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD players by Christmas.

Films in HD are incredible to watch, but viewing documentaries shot in HD, like the underwater ones I see on Discovery HD, are truly wonderous. To my eye, films in HD look more like films in the theatre, but 1080i60/30p/720p to me at least, feels like HD.

Does that make sense? Probably has to do with frame rates and lighting.

Anyway, if someone makes a dual-format hi def DVD player for even $300, they'll be a dominant force.

heathIt also has to do with Filters and colour correction as well.

Movie stars still have to look good, they don't want you to see every blemish and wrinkle. Fish... not so much. :)

True, true. I feel for the actors and actresses being shot in 2K and 4K. MAKEUP!

heath