Why $100 is the perfect Blu-ray player price
Lite-On might be releasing a $150 Blu-ray player at some point in 2009, recent rumors suggest. There's not much more information available now, but I don't think it seems out of the question to expect Lite-On or another firm like Memorex to release a player for that price sometime during the year.
But is $150 the sweet spot for Blu-ray players? For those who want Blu-ray anyway they can have it, that might be perfect. But for others, $150 is still a steep price tag for a device that would conceivably offer less quality than other, more expensive Blu-ray players on the market.
And as I consider a $150 Blu-ray player, I find myself in the latter grouping. It's not that a $150 Blu-ray player doesn't appeal to me. But for that price, I'm not getting enough that would make me want to spend the money.
For me, the perfect price tag for a Blu-ray player at this juncture, given the economy and the format's shortcomings, is $100.
$100 is the ideal price for media players that are trying to gain traction in the market. Until DVD players came down to that price, the format wasn't even close to ubiquity. But in just a few short months after the $100 DVD players started hitting store shelves, I remember finding one in almost every home I visited. It was astounding.
My issue with the admittedly low Blu-ray player price of $150 goes far beyond the cash I'd dole out. Blu-ray itself is still a question mark to me. Do I really want to spend $150 on an underwhelming player when the jump from DVD to Blu-ray isn't that great on good players and a high-quality HDTV?
I have a PlayStation 3 and Sony Blu-ray player. I've used both to compare the same films on Blu-ray and DVD. I've evaluated them on my Panasonic 50-inch 1080p calibrated HDTV. From The Dark Knight to Eastern Promises, I've found that Blu-ray provides nominally better picture quality.
Worse, Blu-ray movies still cost about $30 when they're first released and considering the same film is available for $20 or less on DVD, I don't think I'm the only one wondering why I should pay an extra $10 per film just to have slightly better quality.
We also can't forget that DVD is mobile. You can watch a film at home, pop it into your car's DVD player for the kids, and finish watching it when you get to your friend's house. No matter where you go, there's a DVD player waiting for you.
The same isn't true for Blu-ray. At this point, adoption rates are too low and player prices are too high to see Blu-ray everywhere we go.
Taking all these issues into account, I simply don't see any reason to spend $150 on a low-end Blu-ray player that may or may not provide better quality than my DVD player. When I can buy an upconverting DVD player for $100 or less and purchase a DVD for about $10 less than its Blu-ray counterpart, can I really justify buying a Lite-On Blu-ray player?
But if it was priced at $100, I think I'd pick one up. Maybe is a psychological thing, but a $99.99 Blu-ray player is ideal. It's cost-effective in an uncertain economy and it gives me the chance to buy a couple Blu-ray films to go with it for that same $150 price tag. And at $99.99, I know a slew of people who would probably pick one up, too. That would make it an even more compelling buy, since I could bring my Blu-ray films to my friends' houses.
But just because I would rather buy a Blu-ray player for $100, it doesn't mean that no one likes the idea of buying a player for $150. So let's hear it: what is your ideal price tag? Let us know in the comments and in the poll below.
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Don Reisinger is a technology columnist who has written about everything from HDTVs to computers to Flowbee Haircut Systems. Don is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and posts at The Digital Home. He is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
That said, I'm eagerly awaiting the media prices to drop -- the player prices are reasonable now.
I, like Don, use a PS3 for playing Blu-Ray discs. In fact, I bought it solely for that purpose -- I haven't yet used the PS3 for games. After reading many reviews, it became clear that there were a lot of lame Blu-Ray players out there. Instead of spending $200 on a player that was slow, had less features, and wasn't software-updateable, I paid $400 for the PS3. I haven't regretted it, especially after hearing about some friends' low-end players.
Many years ago, when my regular DVD player pooped out, I bought a cheapo replacement ($80 or so), figuring it would be 'good enough.' I was wrong. In contrast to VCRs, the performance of a DVD player is highly dependent on the computer inside -- slow computer = slow response to remote, slow layer switching, slow track seeking, etc. I returned that piece of junk and bought a mid-range player from the same manufacturer; I was pleased with it.
And there lies my concern with cheapo Blu-Ray players. Blu-Ray is even more demanding of the hardware; a cheapo player will likely mean (for instance) slow-loading discs. Even my PS3 can take ten seconds or so to load the menus for a movie like Wall-E; on a friend's $200 unit, that delay is more like a minute and a half. No big deal in the grand scheme of things, but combined with other inevitable performance deficits, it's unlikely to encourage people to make the leap, especially considering the factors Don pointed out in his article (such as picture quality improvement being minor for most people, and higher movie prices).
Bottom line: well-performing $99 players could (if it performs well) greatly increase Blu-Ray adoption. Poorly-performing $99 players could sink the format entirely. For a software metaphor, one need look no further than Vista.
Blu-Ray as a format will eventually take over SD DVDs in the market place, but the overall market for optical disk content will shrink as we'll gradually move over to content delivery via the internet. Before the end of 2010, much of broadband will be streaming at 50 Mbps or faster, possibly including wireless LTE technology.
The same is true for CD music. As time goes on, even with SACD technology, the market for physical CDs will shrink as more and more people get their content streaming or purchased online.
I'm not being snarky; I'm genuinely curious. I really enjoy some of the extra stuff, as do my kids. I'm sure that's why that stuff is included -- to sell the discs. Obviously not all people see value in the extras; the question is what percentage? One could hypothesize that the extras will eventually be downloadable as well, but for some reason that doesn't seem likely to me.
And the vast majority of HDTV owners do not watch an HD television signal, so why would they bother with blu-ray? Most people bought their sets for the size and shape of the unit, and the general picture quality improvement over what they had but not because they want high definition.
MOST people don't even own many DVD's. (My parents may own two.) They rent and they don't want to have to look for the blu-ray version of something.
Blu-ray will remain a niche market for videophiles, just like SACD and DVD-audio are for audiophiles, regardless of any price drop. (I may be both, but I know that I'm not typical.) The public isn't picky, especially in this economy.
- by jrolin1 February 4, 2009 12:07 PM PST
- The biggest problem I have with Blu-Ray players is the need for updating to be able to play the latest discs and other playback glitches. BD will not take off as long as the regular person has to have it updated manually or have it connected to a home network to be able to play discs without problems. The price drop will help but everyone will not be ready to jump to a format where you have to do updates regularly to play a movie.
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