Blu-Ray wins the format wars

[Retro-Nerd]

btw: Toshiba denies today:

http://www.toshiba.co.jp/about/ir/en...0080218_01.htm

[Ian]

Originally Posted by zenox98

A shame, as I was hoping to get a HD DVD very soon.

Betamax loses again (for those that remember!) ;/

You obviosuly don't.

Betamax was superior to VHS, HD-DVD was inferior to Blu-Ray on just about every thing they can be measured with.

The only thing better was HDi as BR-J appears to be shite.

[seuden]

Originally Posted by Ian

Betamax was superior to VHS, HD-DVD was inferior to Blu-Ray on just about every thing they can be measured with.

What about price?

[DDNI]

BD player £299, with free Wifi console and HDD.... not that bad a deal

[Ian]

Originally Posted by seuden

What about price?

Since when did a lower price mean something was better.

Anyway, Toshiba sensing they were up shit creek the day the PS3 was released have been selling players for a loss to try and stay in it, and even that failed.

[seuden]

Originally Posted by Ian

Since when did a lower price mean something was better.

Since when has it not meant something is better because it's cheaper, it's an attribute. They're both meant for providing us with HD content, they both do it very well, HD-DVD is cheaper so that is an advantage, so in the sense of economy it's better.

Originally Posted by DDNI

BD player £299, with free Wifi console and HDD.... not that bad a deal

Agreed, for those that want a console and HDD, not so good if all you want is HD movies.

[Ian]

Yes and it would be false economy.

Yes I could buy that cheaper, inferior format, just like I could buy a Vauxhall Vectra, but does that make it better than my Subaru?

I sense the ramblings of a fanboy. The PS3 is currently the best blu-ray player on the market, it's completely future proof and fully upgradable.

I can tell you now, if you someone buys a Blu-Ray movie player for £300 instead of a 40GB PS3 for £300 they are a mug. We aren't talking about the dodgy DVD that was in the PS2 here, the PS3s blu-ray drive is highly regarded amongst the tech-savvy.

[Galahad/FLT]

Originally Posted by Ian

Yes and it would be false economy.

Yes I could buy that cheaper, inferior format, just like I could buy a Vauxhall Vectra, but does that make it better than my Subaru?

I sense the ramblings of a fanboy. The PS3 is currently the best blu-ray player on the market, it's completely future proof and fully upgradable.

I can tell you now, if you someone buys a Blu-Ray movie player for £300 instead of a 40GB PS3 for £300 they are a mug. We aren't talking about the dodgy DVD that was in the PS2 here, the PS3s blu-ray drive is highly regarded amongst the tech-savvy.

If your Subaru is only a Impreza Sport or a Justy then a Vectra is instantly better

[spiff]

Originally Posted by NLS

BD is definitely the better format. I always supported it.

Until I found two things (verify please): (1) BD doesn't (yet) use a better compression algorithm than HD-DVD, (2) the worse - BD is much much much more tied to stupid security and locking mechanisms... hate this stuff.

1 BD supports the same compression/mpeg profiles as HD-dvd. The difference is that HD-dvd started using vc1 and h264 profiles earlier, while BD still used mpeg2, probably due to licensing costs. These days they usually share the same VC1 encode for the video, and have different audio. The blu-ray has a PCM track (lossless) and a DTS (lossy) track most of the time while hd-dvd has a True-HD track (lossless) and a DDigital plus (lossy)

2 BD has a extra layer of (per disc)security and is region locked, other then that it's the same as HD-dvd. The protection pretty much means that it will take some extra 3 days for a scene release.

Either way the compression isn't the problem, rather the mastering. A well mastered mpeg2 track will look just as good as a vc1 track when you have 30 gig to spend. Even more interesting, a well mastered h264 (around 2h) movie can go down to around 15 GB and still look great.

Now to grab shitloads of cheap HD-dvds from amazon

The problem with ps3 and xbox 360 as HD players are that both of them are noisy and hot.

[Anubis]

In the middle of last year, the biggest video-rental store - blockbuster announced to support only blu-ray and at that point it was already clear who will win this format war.

http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9730569-7.html

[NLS]

Originally Posted by P-J

Any device with firmware is updateable

Maybe you know better, although I doubt what you say is true. Even 10 years old CD-ROMs could be firmware upgraded.

Spiff thanks for clearing out things.

[Ian]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

If your Subaru is only a Impreza Sport or a Justy then a Vectra is instantly better

Luckily for me it's not just an Impreza Sport, or even just a WRX for that matter

Anyway, superior format has won, lets all rejoice that we have a good 5 or 6 years to bed done with the best format available for a change.

Originally Posted by spiff

The problem with ps3 and xbox 360 as HD players are that both of them are noisy and hot.

I can barely hear my PS3 when I'm watching Blu-Ray's.

[killergorilla]

Originally Posted by Ian

I can barely hear my PS3 when I'm watching Blu-Ray's.

[BippyM]

Originally Posted by Ian

I can barely hear my PS3 when I'm watching Blu-Ray's.

I have to agree here, but then I do have it up load with the 5.1 surround :
D

[Anubis]

It comes with the age... hearing loss.

[seuden]

Originally Posted by Ian

Yes and it would be false economy.

Yes I could buy that cheaper, inferior format, just like I could buy a Vauxhall Vectra, but does that make it better than my Subaru?

Blu-Ray is not going to give you a heightened HD experience over HD-DVD.

Originally Posted by Ian

I sense the ramblings of a fanboy.

Why is it when somebody has a different opinion they're automatically labelled a fanboy? I could say the exact same thing.

I am not going to purchase either, I have no need to.

Originally Posted by Ian

The PS3 is currently the best blu-ray player on the market, it's completely future proof and fully upgradable.

I can tell you now, if you someone buys a Blu-Ray movie player for £300 instead of a 40GB PS3 for £300 they are a mug. We aren't talking about the dodgy DVD that was in the PS2 here, the PS3s blu-ray drive is highly regarded amongst the tech-savvy.

I haven't said any different. If I only wanted to experience HD and I didnt need the option for HD gaming then the PS3 wouldn't be the best option, a £200 player would be.

[Ian]

Originally Posted by seuden

Blu-Ray is not going to give you a heightened HD experience over HD-DVD.

So Higher bit rates and much better sound don't heighten the HD experience then, my mistake.

Originally Posted by seuden

Why is it when somebody has a different opinion they're automatically labelled a fanboy? I could say the exact same thing.

Because you are talking complete bollocks thats why. Only HD-DVDs most staunch fanboys or biggest Sony haters ever argued it was a better format than Blu-Ray, anyone that looks at a list of specs would tell you Blu-Ray was better.

[Ian]

Originally Posted by killergorilla

I take it you haven't got one then KG or for that matter even seen one :

My PS3 is clean, in open space and I can barely hear it watching a blu-ray sat no more than 2 feet away from it.

[Avanze]

Okay, now it is official.

[IFW]

My view is biased - but Ian is right.

btw: the only reason I stopped buying 360 games (I might consider Mass Effect though) is that the console is bloody noisy and I can't stand to hear that anymore. Now imagine using the HD DVD player for 360...!

PS3 is completely silent, especially during movie playback.