Blu-ray beats HD DVD... Now get ready for the next format war

I have to hand it to fellow analyst Rob Enderle. Way back in August of 2005, he called the high-def format war in a piece titled "Blu-ray Wins or Nothing Does."

Logo of the Blu-ray Disc Association, winner of the high-def disc format war

(Credit: The Blu-ray Disc Association)

Then again, he also said in that article that "the more likely outcome is that the market will bypass both products and move to something else," so perhaps he wasn't perfectly prescient.

And come to think of it, a year later (in December 2006) he changed his mind entirely in columns titled "Optical HD Battle May Be Over: HD DVD Wins," "HD DVD Wins," and "Sony Kills Blu-ray."

And in August and even November of 2007, Enderle still believed HD DVD would win.

Well, if Rob Enderle couldn't predict the result, who could? Even just before the Consumer Electronics Show this year, when Warner Bros. Entertainment announced it would stop supporting HD DVD and join the Blu-ray camp, I was still hedging my bets: "Blu-ray wins, HD DVD loses. Probably.")

But when Wal-Mart--the Brünnhilde of modern retailing--took the stage last week to throw its weight behind Blu-ray, everyone knew it was over. And this week, Toshiba--leader of the DVD Forum, which developed HD DVD--officially conceded defeat. The company aims to end production on HD DVD hardware for home theaters as well as PCs by the end of March.

So we can all relax. Right?

Well, for a while, sure. But remember, DVD and Blu-ray were separated by only five or six years, so presumably we're due for yet another format three or four years from now. And a new format means the potential for a new format war.

The basic parameters are easy to predict. As I described last August in "After HD, what's next?" the heir apparent to HDTV is what's called "4K"-- that is, a display resolution with about 4,096 horizontal pixels and 2,160 scan lines. Sony already makes projectors that support this resolution. Red Digital Cinema makes 4K cameras. Director Peter Jackson has made a short film in 4K, and the "Final Cut" of Blade Runner was remastered in 4K.

So 4K is coming, and it isn't far away.

But why should there be a format war?

Well, there's always a format war. There was even a DVD format war, although we're all fortunate that it was resolved well before discs or players hit the market.

Sony will want to lead the transition to 4K, but the DVD Forum will still be around in five years. That's a recipe for a format war right there.

Will it happen? I sure hope not. Our best hope for a lasting peace is that Sony, Toshiba, and the rest of the DVD Forum members settle their differences and start working on the next generation immediately. If you have any influence within these companies, now's the time to start cooperating on technology development. The future won't wait.

[NM_Bill]

Fluff article & needlessly speculative. 4K is for commercial uses. Consumers do not need any 4K.

[melsrockpile]

It might be a fluff article but needless? I don't think so. Just a "Heads up" for us all that there are other formats out there that'll surface to the consumer market. Consumers may not need 4K but you can bet that they'll want it.

[raymondo31]

Sony Beta in the early days was always superior to VHS in picture quality by far and maybe Sony can lead again..!. Ray from over the seas ,,,

[abstractcure]

I think that talking about 4K being here for commercial uses, sounds very much like as if you said 10 years ago, that 4 CPU's (a Quad-Core nowdays) will never make it to a cheap desktop PC that costs below $1000. My point is that what seems to be over the top item today will most likely be an average one in 5 years and may as well become obsolete in 10 years. Sure TV screens tend not to age so quickly as computers do, but it seems that with the big screens the wheel of progress keeps spinning faster each month. Or let's put it this way: Bill Gates once said "640 kB or RAM should be enough for everyone". :-)

[3rdalbum]

The two vehicles of video signals leapfrog eachother. First, TV had better quality than VHS. Then DVD came out, and had better quality than the TV. Then HD TV transmissions began in 720p, which is an improvement over DVD. Then discs struck back with 1080p Bluray. So, my prediction is that the next increase in picture quality and resolution will come after TV stations can transmit in *greater than* 1920x1080p. This isn't really on the horizon yet.

And, of course, the other argument is that if manufacturers started working on a 4k disc, it would slow adoption of Blu-ray - consumers would say "Why should I buy a Blu-ray player when this 4k disc thing is in the works?".

BTW, abstractcure, although quadcore processors are in cheap desktop PCs, they're mostly the low-end Core 2 Quad that costs the same as their best Duo. Let's see a *fast* Core 2 Quad in sub-$1000 PCs, and then we'll start talking.

[froasier]

There will be absolutely no demand for 4K in the consumer market, at least unless huge screens suddenly become dirt cheap. Currently 1080p isn't even necessary for the majority of people, as evidenced with all the "720p vs 1080p" debates here on CNET. You'd need a wall sized screen to get any significant advantage from 4K at normal viewing distances. There is virtually no market for wall sized screens, hence I don't see 4K consumer products coming any time soon. Theaters have a use for 4K. Living rooms don't.

[froasier]

There will be absolutely no demand for 4K in the consumer market, at least unless huge screens suddenly become dirt cheap. Currently 1080p isn't even necessary for the majority of people, as evidenced with all the "720p vs 1080p" debates here on CNET. You'd need a wall sized screen to get any significant advantage from 4K at normal viewing distances. There is virtually no market for wall sized screens, hence I don't see 4K consumer products coming any time soon. Theaters have a use for 4K. Living rooms don't.

[quality4me]

Alright I'll start with the basics. I have a 42 inch LCD, 720P. I also have close to 500 DVD movies. I own a Playstation 3 which is upconverting my DVD's to 720P. The movies look spectacular. There are thousands of people just like me, we arent going to buy into blu-ray. Why would we? I think this entire war and this next gen DVD is bogus. You know what it reminds me of, Mini Disc players and the CD burner. People are not going to start rebuying movies for the sake of blu-ray, I'm buying DVD's like crazy right now 7-10 dollars, and they are in perfect high def, ooh yeah and they have bonus features. And to top it all off I have a 500 dvd start. People will argue with me that it isnt as good of a picture, well the human eye can't tell the difference between 720p and 1080p on a 42 inch tv 15 feet away, and the upconverter on the PS3 is extrodinary you cant tell the difference on my tv between spiderman 3 blu ray or spiderman 3 DVD upconvert, execpt the additional content.. And I'm almost future proof, I can put my DVD's on Hard Drive and view them in 1080p if I want later on. The blu-ray is a non permant fixture, maybe 3 years. Why pay 35$ for a cooler case?

[AnthonyNYC]

I feel just like quality4me except I have a Toshiba A3 which i paid $99 for and now they are going for $79 at Costco with HDMI cable and 7 movies.
The upconverting features in both HD format players is so much better than any cheap upconverting dvd player I ever seen, and i had bought 3 before this.
So for me also, my current DVD collection of about 300 movies, and 20 HD-DVD is fine, I'll just go back to buying regular DVD's gain at lower price than BluRay.
And I have a 52" LCD and the Toshiba Converts to 1080i and looks great! on it.

[BrianTman]

Actually, most of the speculation I've been hearing is that the next format war won't be over physical media at all, but which of the digital "cloud" media architectures will win. Xbox 360? Apple TV? TiVo? Netflix on-demand? Cable TV on-demand? BitTorrent?

I'm not prepared to back any horses in that race (I'm going to go with Apple TV just because I'm a raving partisan and think it's cool), but I'm increasingly of the opinion that owning physical media is less and less important. There are a handful of movies that I want to have "special edition" DVD sets of (and will buy the same thing when it shows up on Blu-Ray), but for the bulk of the world of movies, I don't need ownership at all. Renting is fine. I only need to see a given movie once every few years, as opposed to music which I can leave in a daily rotation and not pay much attention to it. And when renting is the model, a broadband download seems like a perfect solution for my needs, especially if it only costs a fraction of the full purchase price and takes up zero space on my shelf.