Comments on: Blu-ray camp fires back at latest HD DVD announcements

The emails and voice mails were flying fast and furious yesterday after Paramount and DreamWorks made their little announcement about going HD DVD exclusive.

[gullclaw]

Wait a little longer

I would wait until they put a DVD player that supports both formats into perfection. I knew this was going to happen ever since they both came out to the market. I feel sorry for people who paid $1000 for a BluRay

[HDGuy7]

Answers from Paramount Exec on why they switched

Here's a good interview with Paramount Exec Alan Bell on PC World. Interviewer asks many good questions: http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,136253-c,dvdtechnology/article.html

The Exec re-iterates what many of us believe who have researched both blu-ray as well as HD-DVD.

[gburkett]

Blu Ray Vs HD DVD

Now that prices for Blu- Ray players are in the $350-$450 range, it seems that most of the justification for HD DVD is going away. I can't say I blame Katzenberg for taking the rumoured $500 miliion up front for making this unbiased decision, but it sure did nothing to promote an end to the stupidity of two formats. But seriously people, why wait? The sit on the sidelines philosophy doesn't make sense any more. Just buy one, rent from Blockbuster or Netflix and start enjoying the technology today instead of whining about wasting posibly $400.00 over 4 years if you guess wrong. Bet you spend that much in LAttes in 6 months. I don't see how you can describe yourself as a Tech expert if you won't chance $300-400 bucks to adopt a technology to use with the HD TV you spent so much on. You were right to keep those Rabbit Ears antennas though Tech Guys, they actually did make a come back for broadcast HDTV, so what do I know.

[RRosal]

All this does is turn uncertain customers away...

All this hubbub over which format is better for basically movies that are nothing but recycled garbage. I've pretty much lost my taste for anything that comes out of the Hollywood media circuit at this point, DVD or Blu-Ray or HD-DVD formats regardless. Think I'll just stick to watching fanmovies on the net from now on ;-)
Everyone forgets that all this format war does is confuse the customers even more and after all is said and done, the customer loses because of a choice they made while companies continue on with their money-making schemes.

[Gary Mickel]

We have a DVD-VHS Combo that is fairly,

I had the opportunity to purchase a new HD- or Blue Ray but I will not purchase anything until the battle between those two is over and the one that becomes the most used and reaches the lower prices that will come with the one that is chosen as the winner of all this turmoil between and hopefully we will be able to get a High Def TV to go with this.

[xklevin1]

microsofts dieing format

Why would anyone choose hd when they started selling ps3s with blu-ray players i knew sony would win microsofts hd-dvd player is slowly dieing with every ps3 and blu-ray player and as for the 150 mil deal with paramount who wouldnt accept it microsoft needs to go ahead and give up so i can go ahead and buy all of movies in the blu-ray format.

[KidAmnesiac01]

Sony's diehard fan-boy

(First off, you may want to use some punctuation when you post. It makes your post appear to have some bit of credibility...even if it doesn't.)

HD-DVD is not a Microsoft format, but is simply backed by them. Toshiba is the creator.

As for the sales of PS3... well, here's a quote from wikipedia:

"In North America, the PS3 was outsold 4.4 to 1 by the Wii and 2.2 to 1 by the Xbox 360 in June 2007, and sold the least units of any seventh generation console in the period January through April. Additionally, the PS3 saw the largest drop in sales of the three systems, selling 37% less in April than the previous month"


One would think that Sony would learn from it's past mistakes with their proprietary formats. Obviously they won't give up. But, go ahead and keep on being the PS3 fan-boy that you are... Sony's glad to have your money.

[leonpurvis]

Sorry, Folks. It'll be EVD in the end.

In the end, EVD will reign. It is presently in the late stages of development in China, it is said to be impossible to copy. The format will probably be compatible with HD/DVD players, hence the studios' choice to go with HD DVD. Whether the studios will be willing to pay the licensing fees to use this format remains to be seen.

The development of the EVD format came as a response to China's signature to the Hague Agreement in 1984 (and other accords) to do its part to stop piracy.

[es18]

A Sign of Desperation?

Is HD-DVD so desperate to gain market share that it has to issue what are
essentially bribes to studios to sign an exclusivity agreement with them? With
early signs pointing to Blu-ray winning the battle maybe the HD-DVD group
felt it was a necessary move.

It was obvious that Universal Studios would be an HD-DVD supporter given
the partnership between Microsoft and NBC Universal (MSNBC) but it's
surprising for other studios to join the HD-DVD only bandwagon - but as the
saying goes, money talks.

Can't help but wonder if Bill Gates/Microsoft threw in some cash as part of
the $150 million to lure Paramount and Dreamworks to help justify
Microsoft's investment in HD-DVD.

[snotfester]

Oh for cryin' out loud!!!!!

I just read about EVD. I'm not even gonna follow up on this **** any more!!!!!

[es18]

EVD will take over?

EVD is NOT high definition. In this era of HD, it doesn't seem likely that
consumers will settle for a non-HD format.

[filmmack]

I'll buy whichever High Def format is made in America! Wait...