Has Blu-ray moved from early-adopter to early-majority phase?
(Credit:
Futuresource)
Just got a press release from UK-based Futuresource Consulting that claims, "Consumers are on target to buy in excess of 100 million Blu-ray discs (BD) across the USA, Western Europe and Japan this year, with sales of High Definition capable LCD and plasma TVs and continued dramatic reductions in BD player prices continuing to fuel interest in packaged HD content despite the economic downturn."
Mai Hoang, Senior Market Analyst at Futuresource Consulting says that, "In the USA, BD has moved from early adopter phase through to early majority, with the format gaining real traction in the marketplace." She adds that last year in the US alone, BD video retail sales increased 320 percent to 24 million units and the momentum would continue in 2009, with over 80 million disc sales forecast.
If you look at the included graph, Futuresource is also predicting that Blu-ray and DVD will be even by 2012--each with 50% of the market (in the U.S. anyway). I can't vouch for the accuracy of the research, but it doesn't seem too out of whack with what other market analysts have been saying. And on a more anecdotal level, we're seeing a lot of interest in Blu-ray players here at CNET--even in this down economy.
Who agrees or disagrees with this analysis?
Hunkered down in New York City, Executive Editor David Carnoy covers the gamut of gadgets and writes his Fully Equipped column, which carries the tag line "The electronics you lust for." He's also the author of "Knife Music," a novel. E-mail David. Follow David on Twitter. 
Unless the prices of BR (player/disc) come down I don't see 50% in 3 years. Streaming services are leading hand over fist, so I doubt there will be many "disc" buyers left in 3 years; which I might add was the project lifespan of BR altogether. Sounds like FUD from marketing...
But statistically your argument is flawed unless you've been monitoring a bunch of stores at different locations at different times.
In any case their prediction is pretty bold, but not too hard to believe since blu-ray sales on average have been doing well on Amazon.com (http://eproductwars.com/dvd).
In fact, HiDEF will be called standard and the regular DVD's now will be low def.
I agree that the discs are expensive, but dont compare blu-ray with upscale dvd. There is no contest when it comes to picture quality of blu-ray.
You mention prices drop as if they aren't already happening. Which they are and will continue to do so. You sound like a hater. Serious say say crap like "they better drop the price" Duh they already are dropping prices. Prices will continue to fall. Just like the did with VCRs and DVD players. 25 years ago a low priced VCR cost $150 which is $300 in today's money.
Streaming? Are you serious? First of all streams, even so called "HD" streams, are nowhere near the quality of blu-ray. They are barely the quality of DVD or SD Tv. Second you are obviously one that think everyone has a 10Mbps or greater internet connection. hate to tell you the MAJORITY doesn't have that kind of connection. Also ISPs are imposing caps. A 10 Mbps connection from Charter has a 100 GB cap per month. That's not very many HD streams not to mention all the other things you need to use your connection for.
Wanna bet? Say about my soul and all of my earthly possesions... Deal?
In addition to being expensive blu-ray has far too many problems to become mainstream. To this day I fail to see how it won the format war. I have a blu-ray player and I know a few other people who have blu-ray players. Blu-Ray players take too long to load, even a standard DVD. The menus are jerky and take forever to come up. And that's even if your disc will play. If you don't believe this look at all the reviews on websites like Best-Buy, Amazon, and others. The comments are fairly consistently along this line. The only useful Blu-Ray player is the PS3, and that's saying something. It's not worth the effort when Iron-Man looks almost as good on DVD playing from one of the first Sony DVD players compare to Blu-Ray on a brand new Blu-Ray player.
Streaming will beat disc formats hands down. I recently hooked up an old laptop to our TV. My dad was amazed with the quality of some of the stuff that's streamed online. He actually ejected the DVD drive because he didn't believe it was streaming. If you look at the numbers Blu-Ray is being picked up much slower than DVD was. DVD was first released in the US in 1997, by 1999 almost everyone had a DVD Player. Blu-Ray was release in 2006 and very few people have them. There are less than 1500 title available, and of the one's that are available most are crappy
Blu-Ray is Sony's pipe dream. They got pissed off because they payed IBM to develop their brand new top of the line PowerPC chip and theyblow a bunch of money on another busted technology.
Like Bill Watkins said
"People are saying Blu-ray won the war but who cares? The war is over physical distribution versus electrical distribution, and Blu-ray and HD lost that,"
People aren't spending money, TV sales have declined dramatically, and PS3 sales have declined. It is slightly outlandish to think that a large portion of people who don't have very much disposable income will begin to start paying $25+ for a blu-ray movie instead of $25+ for FIVE DVD's.
I'm a big fan of HD but BluRay was just a few years too late. If they had $250 players when most people upgraded to HD TV they'd be a force, but its too late now and there are way too many other ways to get HD without the upfront cost.
HD movie downloads ITunes are 720p not 1080p like blu-ray and have bitrates from 4 Mbps whereas blu-ray is 40 Mbps. Anyone claiming a 720p HD download with a 6 Mbps bitrate is the same thing as a 1080p blu-ray disc that has a 40 Mbps bitrate isn't doing their homework. It's a good thing HD downloads aren't 1080P with 40 Mbps bitrates because they would take 3 1/2 hours to download even with a 16 Mbps connection and nearly 6 hours with a 10 Mbps connection. So physical media will be needed and wanted for a while longer.
I won't buy a single blu-ray movie. Not one. There is no point. I will use my netflix service to rent blu-ray movies and DVD's but I will not rip myself off at Best Buy just to own something that will be obsolete in a couple of years.
Blu-ray wasn't innovative and it isn't a next generation format. Fragile optical disks that play higher quality content than the same fragile optical disks isn't amazing in any way. Give me something solid.
There is already a realization that another disc format wasn't the smartest idea.
Technology is demanding a smaller more durable format (ie, memory card format like the music industry already accepted with SlotMusic).
Slot Music? Who cares if the music industry has accepted it? Has the public accepted it? WILL the public accept it?
Does anyone want to buy an album that is the size of your fingernail? This is the dumbest idea I have ever heard of. Any one who would be comfortable with slot music; switching a bunch of little chips in and out of a player, would be comfortable with digital downloads, or ripping their own CDs. Slot Music will NEVER catch on!
You may keep your fragile optical disks that become worthless when scratched and must be kept in a case at all times. I will take the physical SD card that I can drag behind my car home from Best Buy and not have to worry about it being unusable.
How is "switching a bunch of little chips" any different from switching a bunch of massive CD's? Well I guess it is different because you have to worry about where you touch the disk because your fingerprints might cause the CD to skip. That is different I suppose.
Every desktop out there, a large portion of laptops, a lot of DVD players, DVR's, and TV's have SD card slots. I'll play my music on whichever medium I want to. Good luck sticking your disk into the DVR and the TV.
Unless BR players come down to the 50 dollar mark, and BR disks come down to the 20 dollar mark I do not see myself converting to BR anywhere close to 2012. Its either too expensive, or I am too cheap.
I finally took the plunge last summer and watching hd programs is like night and day. Is it worth the extra money? I dont think so, but it sure looks nice on my tv. In the end. It's your money and decision.
Streaming media may eventually win the 'format war' , but it will have to be able to match what the physical media can already do, and do it for a compairable price. I like having direct control over what media I can access, and the consistency it works at. Whenever 4k TV's come to the market, we will see a next generation video system to take advantage of the resolution, and this arguement will start all over again.
Now if a company made a box that would let me leaglly download a Blu-ray quality video to my (insert streaming box company here) and copy it to some form of permanent storage media (also legally) for viewing whenever I want, for less than a Blu-ray disc would cost, I'd be in for that.
You can read more on my thoughts regarding the potential failure of Blu-Ray at my blog:
http://warmsounds.wordpress.com/2009/02/20/blu-ray-will-fail/
Also, I could not agree that a true videophile would be ok with an upscaled DVD on an HD set. With an ailing economy, I can almost guarantee sub-$100 profile 2.0 players coming out this Christmas season. At that price range, I doubt any HDTV owner would deny the full potential of their HD set to play the high bit rate quality that only the Blu-ray format can yield.
That will (start) happen(ing) when Blu-Ray players will cost the exact same thing as DVD players. When that happens, there will be a lot less DVD players available in stores, therefore people won't have much of a choice.
Until then, I don't think the mass market will buy a Blu-Ray player when a DVD player still does quite a bit of a good job.
But then again, that's just my opinion.
While I understand that blu-ray is more expensive than DVD, it's worth it to me when the movie was mastered with blu-ray in mind. I'm still not so hard-core that I'll arbitrarily replace all of my existing DVD's with Blu-ray, but on most new purchases, I'll spend the extra few dollars to buy Blu.
I own about 600+ DVDs and 100+ HD DVDs (no BluRay at this time but maybe later when the price drops to $10 per disc).
My primary AV setup...
Toshiba HD DVD H35 with HDMI connection set to 720p video output (matches my projector LCD resolution) and six channel analog audio outputs to a Harmon Kardon 7000 AV amp using analog inputs, speakers from various companies and a powered subwoofer.
Sony Cineza Front Projector to light gray painted wall (Bear Silver Screen) 16 foot away. Projector resolution set to 720p (1 to 1 mapping for the LCD elements in this projector). The Dynamic setting is used for 50k to 1 contrast. The maximum viewable horizontal screen width is 11.5ft. Diagonal size depends on the movies aspect ratio. The projector Bulb is set to low output and usually set to 50% output, contrast is set to 100%. The room is fully blacked out so no light from the outside gets in.
DVDs - when watching a DVD and the focus is set correctly the only major video difference I can see is print text either in the credits (readable but smaller text looks a little fuzzy on the edges) or from a printed document when it is shown on the screen (Newspaper - I can read the headlines but the regular print is too fuzzy to read), all other video aspects (color, edge definition and shading) look very good (better than most theaters I attend).
HD DVDs (and BluRay from my PC Movie server using LG BluRay/HD DVD player with Component connections) do seem to have deeper colors and more defined black shades but the difference is minimal and most of my friends and family that watch don't notice any difference between the different Medias. However with HiDef media I can read newspaper print if the newspaper takes 30% of the screen or more.
If you want to pause a scene and read the newspaper or other fine print displayed on a 13-15 foot video screen then go ahead and buy only BluRay - other wise both formats with good equipment and DVD upconversion look as good or better than your neighborhood theater, and no teenagers talking or throwing popcorn at the screen to distract your viewing pleasure.
So if you are limited to only a small 60" or less screen I can't see how any honest viewer could tell which media was playing especially when seated eight or more feet from the display as most viewing rooms provide.
This statement is my humble opinion after over a year watching DVD and HD DVD (and a few BluRay discs) in this environment.
1) MOST consumers don't care about BD: Women (who do most of the spending), Children, the Elderly and the lower classes (PC?) couldn't care less about high definition. So what's left is upper-middle class, tech-savvy males, aged 18-45 who are really the only ones who care about BD. Try convincing a mom that her kid needs to watch Wall-E in Blu-Ray when regular DVD looks just fine? Trust me, she doesn't care about 1080-anything.
2) The truth is, the only movies worth watching in Blu-Ray are the action/effects-driven movies. Dark Knight? Sure. Iron Man? Probably. But for comedies, romances, it just doesn't matter. Nobody in their right mind will ever go out of their way to buy a BD version of most films that are released. I have a bunch of HD-DVDs, and trust me, watching "Old School" in HD doesn't really make it all that much more enjoyable - and that's actually a good movie... imagine the fate of lesser films on BD.
3) The benefit from moving to BD from DVD just isn't significant enough for most to care. DVDs won over VHS because DVDs are lighter, smaller, way more flexible, cheaper to make, and best of all: all you needed was a DVD player to enjoy a DVD disc. What's the sell for Blu-Ray? "Well, if you're one of the few people who has 1) a 1080p display 2) SOTA-sound and 3) a BD-player, then you'll see a great picture and hear great sound." But the initial costs to be able to enjoy Blu-Ray are prohibitive, and normal people can't justify spending ~ $2k on a setup to be able to watch "Atonement" in Blu-Ray.
It's great for movies dependent on FX--but for movies that rely on a great story/plot it's unnecessary.
PLUS, many long sought after titles are only now arriving on DVD. Who wants to wait another 10 years for them to appear on BD?
Why would a $250 or less BD player be cost prohibitive to a person who spent over $1K on a 1080p HDTV? I spent $218 on a Panasonic progressive scan DVD player for my girlfirend at Christmas 2002 (about 6 years after DVD launched). People need to stop acting like BD players are Bentleys. HDTV's continue to drop in price, too. The more people there are with an HDTV, the bigger the market for BD will be.
And I don't want to own every movie, anyway. So, why would it matter that BD (and HD, in general) is more geared toward action and sci-fi movies, nature documentaries, and sports? There is (and will be) plenty of content in those genres, and any person is only going to purchase so much of it, anyway. Should they not enjoy 20 BD's because there are thousands more that don't have the same "pop" -- especially when they wouldn't be buying almost all of those other movies, anyway?
Seriously, if the media price comes down then the format will have plenty of traction to gain in the marketplace. If the movie companies insist on the higher price tag, I think there will always be a large segment of the masses who will go with the cheaper alternatives.
I still think that downloading will the ultimate winner here. The convenience factor is hard to beat, and if the stories hold true about recent developments in bandwidth capacity and outright speed, it doesn't seem implausible that you could order one or two HD movies before leaving for work and they'll be ready for viewing on your big screen by the time you get home...and you'd never even had to bother setting foot in a retail store or have to be at the mercy of the USPS.
"Seriously, if the media price comes down then the format will have plenty of traction to gain in the marketplace. If the movie companies insist on the higher price tag, I think there will always be a large segment of the masses who will go with the cheaper alternatives."
I couldn't agree with you more. It's that simple!
Blu-Ray WILL catch on and eventually become as standard as DVD's are today. I find it funny how most of the arguments for why Blu-Ray will fail are the same arguments made for why DVD's wouldn't take off. Prices will drop for both players and discs, and the world will move on to the next greatest thing.
And I'm sorry, but streaming media isn't the answer either. Lower definition and no physical disc to carry around with you or play on your laptop on the go? Maybe one day this method will catch on when our infrastructure is beefed up, but not before Blu-Ray takes over...not a chance.
Mark my words, in 3 years DVD's will be as useful as VHS's.
BD is probably going to be the stepping stone to the next generation of Media.
BD is probably going to be the stepping stone to the next generation of Media. "
In this economy plus the cost of deveolping blu-ray there isn't "next generation" media being worked on. And won't be for years.
1) I don't know that anybody can say what the economy will or will not be like in one, two or three years.
2) The cost of developing blu-ray is reportedly high - To me, that sounds like a good incentive to explore replacement technologies.
That's not necessarily true. There is a movement for content in memory card type format. (ie, MOD Systems). Also, prototypes of better super upconversion technology are approaching true HD quality.
And if it doesn't, I vote for BD. But only if they fix the machines so they work consistently with all DVD and BD discs. I own a Samsung BD-1500 and the only reason it works is because I refuse to upgrade the firmware. A ton of people are complaining (on CNET forums) about loss of function after upgrading the firmware. So far, so good for myself. But I don't trust it to stay that way.
Seriously though, I think all of the question marks in graviz's response is due to some sort of browser issue.
Go Big Blu !!
I think it may be a while before players are $100.. You should go for it.
Blu-ray audio would be cool, but in this era of MP3s, I have my doubts that people would be willing to pay higher prices for music. Heck, many people pay nothing at all any more for music!
If you have the money, it is a compelling option. With the exception of older movies [which make no sense to be on BD anyway] I can always tell the difference. But as things are, DVDs are dirt cheap, BDs are not. Till that changes, my BD player will collect dust [I have an HD-DVD/BD Combo drive on my Acer, which was on sale for cheap].
- by postman424 February 24, 2009 10:46 AM PST
- Interesting topic to talk about.. THe Death of Dvd's with Blu-rays, all becasue of HD TV's.
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- by Bigtimechamp February 24, 2009 6:13 PM PST
- Blu-ray discs are harder to scratch than regular DVDs.
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (80 Comments)Let me tell you all something...
You know after playing Blu-rays for sometime now on my computer i have noticed allot of good and bad things about Blu-ray.
Good would be that it does play ok in allot of ways and the sound is good to.
The Con would be that they are easier to scratch but not to easy to clean(like say DVD's) and they take forever to load up on a computer that is.
Now with DVD's they just play perfectly and I don't see THX ever getting on to Blu-ray or The Star Wars Trilogy at all. So I do see DVD's lasting more then 3 yrs more then 5 or 10 yrs.
In fact isn't that what they said about the CD's? I think I remember reading where they did say the same thing about Cd's. And here they are lasting and maybe for a good full 10 yrs also. Just because there are HD TV's doesn't mean everything has to be in HD! Because the reality is that not everything well be in HD because of this and there are still people that well keep their DVD's and there well always be Dvd players and recorders because DVDS are just that much compatible and convenient. And besides they haven't increased the speed of BD's to record on they are still stuck on the low end of the speed spectrum!
So don't think for once that DVD's well be joining the Tapes and VHS's at all becasue that won't happen at all in the near feature.