Comments on: How can we expect Blu-ray to succeed?

Can Blu-ray succeed like DVD did? Don Reisinger thinks it's very unlikely.

[3rdalbum]

Some Blu-ray discs have been mastered "with the original film grain". My arse; I paid to see extra definition, not to see the resolution limitations of the original medium!

On movies that have been shot with digital equipment or have had the film grain removed, there is a massive difference between DVD and Blu-ray. As big a difference as that between VHS and DVD, if you're watching on a decent TV (not one made for the American market).

To my mind, "upconverting" DVDs is like those filters people used to put on the front of their black and white TVs to make everything look "colour" - a pointless effort that doesn't do much at all.

Blu-ray is starting to take off now that there's a player price war, and consumers are now much more aware of the need to pair a Blu-ray player with their HD TV. There are also more worthwhile titles available, thank god.

I don't think HD movie streaming will take off this decade, especially as it requires hooking your computer up to your TV or buying some sort of single-purpose media box like the Apple TV. Maybe when we all drive to work in flying cars?

[thejokker]

Blu Ray doesnt offer nearly the benifit to the user that DVD did. Switching from VHS to disk was simple, and logical. No more rewinding, no more wearing out tapes, no more cueing for the right spot, no tracking...

Now its just a better quality, but no big jump in user experience.

[unifex_]

Listen, people, forget about streaming! I got the fastest DSL connection possible for my home (which is not really my choice, the speed depends on the wires, etc, I could only choose something slower). The fastest download speed I've seen so far was 350 kB/s. Now, at that speed it takes more than an hour to download a 1GB clip. A Blu-ray disk may contain 40GB of movie files, so it will take you 2-3 days to download. So unless someone will put a fiber-optic wire in my neighborhood, I'll have to stick with disks, and if I want a high-definition picture, I guess this means Blu-Ray, so I am not sure what do you mean talking about it's success. And in any case, if I download a file, I want to burn it on something and watch on a big screen, not to watch it on my PC, and no, I don't want to have a PC in my living room.

In any case, when comparing DVDs to Blu-Ray, you have to remember that DVDs work on usual TVs that everyone had at the point when DVDs became mainstream. Now, how many people have a 1080p TV right now? Why would you buy a Blu-Ray if you don't have one?

[veer01]

The DVD is a capable and quite versatile media format; however as larger and larger televisions become capable of showing more and more detailed pictures , the DVD simply does not have the capacity to store the information required to use the displays to their maximum capacities. By defacto Blu-Ray is the premiere choice for media playback on larger displays. But for people with 32" or smaller displays, DVDs will suffice and its cost is also a big sales point. However in the coming years, just as how the DVD snuffed out the VHS so will the Blu-Ray snuff out the DVD and after that the HD-Streaming distribution will snuff out the Blu-Ray, but not until high speed internet becomes either affordable or free.

In the mean time, people will soon begin to slowly but surely notice the pixilation in high motions sequences in action movies on DVDs played back on HD sets as well as the lack of depth in scenes with multiple shades of black. DVD upscaling can only do so much as u cant create what isn't there. For now they are not aware of it but as HD-TV channels appear and they switch between HD and SD stations they will gradually see the difference between HD and SD.

Streaming HD is a ways off for most of the world and until such a time as high speed internet is either dirt cheap or free, people will not be able to use HD Streaming Video.

[Scryer_360]

The reason for some of the commenters claims about quality is screen size. I bet they have 32" and 37" displays. Get up past 40", and the quality difference becomes greater and greater. It also becomes bigger as people sit closer to the screen, that is if you have a 37" display and sit four feet from it (the whole point of HD is being able to have larger screens and maintain high quality), the difference between DVD and BD becomes noticeable. But its like I tell people who want to replace a 32" tube with a 32" LCD and they are still ten feet or more away from it: the difference is there, but its just not readily apparent (sometimes with older tube TV's there is a color issue, but that's about it).

To the topic however: I too would love to see streaming HD, but the quality is just not there to make it good for a family movie night. I don't think data is even present for this, but for most 30+ consumers the only time you buy a movie is when the kids want to watch one, and then its probably going to be watched in the living room on the big screen. And with such low bitrates, movies can quickly become stale when the sound sucks (even on the TV speakers) and the images are filled with artifacts.

For HD streaming to become mainstream, two things need to happen: 1) HD streams need to become untethered from the computer. You already said something about HD set-top boxes being available, but they are going to need to hit DVD player prices for people to take a chance on them. Right now, Apple TV or even the Roku Netflix box are still more novelties than anything. And most of these devices only allow either one viewing of the movie and/or the ability to only watch it on one box at a time. But people will want to be able to take the movie and show it in different rooms later (remember that living room movie? The disc makes it into the kids room that night).

The second part of this is how people use their internet connection, and how much bandwidth is available. Some of these devices offer wireless connectivity, but to maintain quality and avoid some of the issues inherit in Wi-Fi, ethernet is still the choice way to connect. And that means wires. Which means your computer or router needs to be somewhere near the TV. Drat. And the reason many so-called "HD" streams look bad is that there isn't enough bandwidth to pump in better quality. DSL simply isn't good enough to stream lots of content, and Cable internet barely meets it. Fiber Optic connections would handle it all no problem, but that has an even lower penetration rate than Blu-Ray (I'm factoring in PS3 sales).

Hence, lots more bandwidth and speed needs to become available to make real HD streams. Devices need to get cheaper and be able to be as far from a PC as possible. Some have once again touted HTPCs: its been what, a decade since that idea became a reality, and how much has it not caught on again? And the content has to be untethered from one device and be able to be shown around the house.

Take all that and then add in the general publics unfamiliarity with such devices. Hell, outside of the cities and knowledge centers of America, how many people even know what a "stream" is? Ask and they'll probably tell you its where they go fishing every weekend. Compare that to Blu-Ray's familiar feel (the disc still looks like a DVD), the fact that it can be played on any BD player, and that once you own the disc you don't have to worry about how many times you view it (or a HDD crashing and removing it from your viewing pleasure), and BD is looking good. Nail in the coffin? No one is going to replace their DVD collection with a BD collection. You can play DVD's in any BD player. And for those of us who are not twelve, we're already familiar with the quality difference between DVD and VHS, and we expect that as screen sizes improve eventually DVD's will remind us of how VHS looked on the big screens of yore. Oh I can see a few people running out to buy their favorite classics on BD, but not entire libraries.

That, and this recent Christmas, BD players were awefully close to $100. Over the next year I expect to see the cheap ones hit even lower prices, and maybe even a PS3 price drop as it struggles to keep up under the pressure its found itself under. Now I have no doubt that HD streams will eventually take over from BD, the natural progression of the consumer electronics industry is to make everything as easy as possible for the consumer and eventually someone will find a way to make it a viable option. But that might be at the end of the next decade, certainly not this one. 2012, BD will likely be the dominate sales force for content in the Western world. However, I expect it to never take DVD's place worldwide. More on that some other time though, character limit is incoming.

[bmbizz1245]

Wow...nice post and comments...mostly on shortsightedness. I have noticed the bluerays's I have been buying allow me to have a pass code and stream the video to my pc. You mean they can exist together and I get the best of both worlds?!?!?!? Yea I stream it to my pc's so I can watch it from my pc when I want, but I also enjoy watching blue ray. If you can?t see a difference then you have invested in the wrong equipment, and I feel sorry for what you are missing. Some of the comments here say that the average family won?t spend the money, then why are home theaters becoming so popular? Theater seats, surround sound, bigger TV's. I for one have limited time like everyone else with a family, but when I sit down to watch a movie I want the best experience I can have. I am a consumer that demands the best and I say bring on the competition, we only win from the result. I see that the two formats will be around and coexist or some time together, which is why you will see them packaged together to satisfy the market place.

[jabelar]

The only problem with HD (and I mean true HD) is that the overall upgrade of your home theater takes a lot of money and time. For blu-ray not only need to upgrade your tv, but *all* your tv's and computers, to just be able to play it, and all your cables and displays to take advantage of it. I'd estimate that it costs the average suburban home about $4k to convert to blu-ray (two blu-ray players, a computer blu-ray drive, two new tvs, upgrade of computer graphics card, and a bunch of HDMI cable, and a new library of blu-ray discs). So it is a big upgrade. But it is still "winning". People are definitely choosing HD when they are buying new home electronics, and blu-ray when they ready. Streaming isn't as great as some people are touting -- it has potential, but that potential is not yet realized. The potential for blu-ray is already realized, with just another year of price reduction needed.

[myblurayonline]

Blu-ray technology is here to stay. It is the new DVD. DVD's will be like vhs and be a thing of that past. Nothing is better than watching your Blu-ray Player on a big screen or your Playstation 3 with an HDMI cable
http://www.myblu-rayonline.com/

[hameiri]

1. I think there is a large improvement in picture and audio from DVD to Blu-ray.
2. I download HD from the Playstation Store, and it looks very good.

I think the last statement in the article says it all. "Now bring on the streaming." That's right, it's not really here yet. So, Blu-ray is competing against a technology that is not a reality for hardly anyone. Get back to me when downloading is as reliable, easy and looks as good as a DVD, EVERY TIME. Then solve the renting and owning problems, and we've got a war!

[Waam]

I stream HD all the time, but it never beats actually owning a movie you love. In fact, I have been streaming movies for years now first with regular cable and now with Comcast on-demand, and thats never stopped me from buying actual DVD's of movies I loved. I don't think it will stop others as well.

[secbutane]

I think Don would get the point if all these posts were emailed to him. It would definitely make use of his 7gb gmail account.