Let Microsoft be the only vendor to produce HD DVD. Let Apple,Dell,HP, and everyone in the motion picture association do blu ray and it's clear that blu ray will win. Microsoft tried this type of thing with Java and that failed miserably.

It is odd when you think about it. Apple is partnering with Intel for the next generation Mac. IBM is partnering with MS and Sony- both releasing next generation consoles with IBM PowerPC cell processors at their heart. Sony has embraced Blu-Ray for the PS 3, Apple has embraced it as well (though no deployment as of yet). There is rumored iPod support on BOTH the XBox 360 AND the PS 3, but both companies are direct competitors with Apple...I don't know, it just seems very incestuous to me. Not to mention hard to keep straight.

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Anonymous wrote:
Let Microsoft be the only vendor to produce HD DVD. Let Apple,Dell,HP, and everyone in the motion picture association do blu ray and it's clear that blu ray will win. Microsoft tried this type of thing with Java and that failed miserably.

As much as I'd love to see that, Microsoft will dangle their miserable version of DRM in front of the MPAA and probably win them over. Dell and HP will meekly go along with MS, of course.

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acdc1174 wrote:
I don't know, it just seems very incestuous to me. Not to mention hard to keep straight.

It's called "hedging your bets."

You know Blu-Ray in my opinion is better. Blu-Ray was able to have a trademark logo than HD-DVD. Where's the trademark logo for HD-DVD, none! Blu-Ray has a cool logo. Blu-Ray helps associate with blue laser! Blu-Ray is a good product made. Also if you think about it, the ray looks Cypher ray on Strider video game. Blu-Ray is a modern High-Tech device.

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acdc1174 wrote:
.I don't know, it just seems very incestuous to me. Not to mention hard to keep straight.

That's the very word that came to my mind as well.

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Guest wrote:
You know Blu-Ray in my opinion is better. Blu-Ray was able to have a trademark logo than HD-DVD. Where's the trademark logo for HD-DVD, none! Blu-Ray has a cool logo. Blu-Ray helps associate with blue laser! Blu-Ray is a good product made. Also if you think about it, the ray looks Cypher ray on Strider video game. Blu-Ray is a modern High-Tech device.

If all reasoning was done in this manner, the world would be a better place. Amen, brother! Let the video-game inspired, cool-logo flossing technology prevail!

I don’t think this has anything to do with the merits of the technologies involved. It’s all about saving face and politics.

The only reason M$ chose HD-DVD is because Apple already chose Blu-ray. Had Apple chosen HD-DVD instead, M$ would have chosen Blu-ray. The iPod is seriously embarrassing M$ because they aren’t the ones monopolizing that market. They don’t want to be perceived as following Apple’s lead. That’s the true reason for M$’s choice, no matter how they try to rationalize it to the world.

As far as Intel is concerned, they may be an industry heavyweight, but their vote is essentially meaningless. They will produce chips for either technology, so long as there is profit to be made. Their endorsement, therefore, is largely symbolic. The fact that they made a joint statement with M$ suggests that something’s afoot between the two. And i’ll bet it has everything to do with politics. Intel probably pissed-off M$ by embracing Apple, and this is a chance for Intel to sooth the wrath of the Beast of Redmond. In the end, Intel’s HD-DVD “endorsement” doesn’t mean anything.

Have you ever asked yourself who will decide which format wins? It’s not like there’s a deciding authority out there which will decide, nor tally the votes. If all the studios were to line up on one side, that would probably decide the issue… unless, of course, all the computer makers lined up on the other side. Lacking a clear consensus, it goes to a vote of the consumer, as it did years ago with BetaMax and VHS.

If it goes to Blu-ray, it means Apple has already won the media-center war. M$’s pride may be its undoing. Supporting Blu-ray would have been a safe bet for the already beleaguered M$. They may have sparked a format war, one which they have to win, and joined the side which is farther behind and has less momentum at this point.

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Rainy Day wrote:
I don’t think this has anything to do with the merits of the technologies involved. It’s all about saving face and politics.
...
Lacking a clear consensus, it goes to a vote of the consumer, as it did years ago with BetaMax and VHS.
...
They may have sparked a format war, one which they have to win, and joined the side which is farther behind and has less momentum at this point.

Given the Beast's thirst for winning at all costs, expect the FUD to fly shortly. I still think they will attempt to leverage their DRM "technology" in an effort to woo the studios, and they will do it in a way that takes the heat off the studios, which will make the studios happy. It will also screw the rest of us, particularly anyone who doesn't submit to Windows. Plus, it will get Microsoft's software into general-use consumer electronics, a place they've coveted for years.

It's not what the computer industry does that will determine which format wins out, it is the cheap Chinese hardware manufacturers (go-video, apex, and many more) that produce stand alone dvd video boxes, that will decide which format is better. From the article I read earlier on this, MS has invested quite a bit in promoting HD-DVD in China and I personally believe HD-DVD will win out because of this.

On the Intel thing, there have been many rumors of Intel and MS working together on a "media center" type device. So they potentially do have a strong say in what format will win out.

I don't think MS is capable of preventing a third party from making blue-ray discs work on Windows. So it doesn't really matter what format wins out cause in the end whichever format wins will be supported eventually.

Let's not forget when the PS3 comes out, a lot more consumers(assuming it sells at least reasonably well) will now instantly have a blu-ray set top box hooked up to their high def TV. Sony did the same thing back with the PS2, when a DVD set top box was still pretty expensive so people took the PS2 as an opportunity to bring that newer technology to their homes(this is especially true in Japan).

Ironically in that 1970s war, Sony had licensed Toshiba and Sanyo to market Beta machines, which they aggressively did. Matsushita, now a Blu-Ray partner with Sony, started the VHS competition against Sony's Betamax with its JVC subsidiary.

That was a war to the death. It was (and remains) impossible for VHS machines to record or play Beta tapes and vice versa; the machines employ different azimuth angles to record their signals. However, tomorrow's DVD-format battle may not result in annihilation.It could well be possible for a single player to play (and probably record) HD DVDs and Blu-Ray disks by employing dual lasers (and circuitry).

I still own two Betamax machines, and my newest one--which is 15 years old--still outperforms my VHS units! But while pros still rely on Betacams for much of their recording, the format is dead in the consumer market because of VHS's superior marketing expertise. Ultimately, the public may choose the most-favored DVD format, but it won't necessarily be the one with the best performance or value.

And while all this is going on, Apple hardware enables you to capture, edit and watch HD video.

I know because I've done it, using a Sony HDV camera, and Final Cut Pro HD and DVD Studio Pro 4 to create a HD (both a 1080i and 24p version) DVD, which could be played on the G5 upon which it was created. Lovely it was, too.

From one point of view, Apple is actually leading the pack, but remains a slave to the vagaries of market forces.

And then we have another Microsift announcement several weeks ago, that states they will support FVD as successor. Am I just the only one that's confused?

Something happened on the way to this standards war: It may already be irrelevant.

"What!" you say. "How can that be possible?!"

Three words: Digital Media Receiver.

Very quietly these devices have come down in price and increased in capabilities. In a way, the writing was on the wall when the first CD players could cope with MP3's -- suddenly the old paradigm where players could cope with only one format went out the window. allenkelson alludes to this when he notes that, unlike the BetaMax/VHS conflict, you CAN create dual format players (and, probably not too long from now, recorders) that can handle both formats. Yet let's take it to the obvious conclusion that ANY format is essentially a means to getting digital data from point a to b. If you already have the data, why take the trouble to burn it to a disk?

TiVo, media receivers, media servers, and your PC/Macs. The much sought over convergence of computer and TV is already starting to happen, and HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are bit players. Um... no pun intended.

Thank you for playing.

...John Halbig

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Anonymous wrote:

TiVo, media receivers, media servers, and your PC/Macs. The much sought over convergence of computer and TV is already starting to happen, and HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are bit players. Um... no pun intended.

Thank you for playing.

...John Halbig

I would agree with you if we were only talking about home users burning discs. But I really doubt you will ever have to go out and buy a tivo just because it's preloaded with some hollywood blockbuster in HD format. HD-DVD and Blue-Ray discs will be preloaded with HD formated video.

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coaten wrote:
And while all this is going on, Apple hardware enables you to capture, edit and watch HD video.

I know because I've done it, using a Sony HDV camera, and Final Cut Pro HD and DVD Studio Pro 4 to create a HD (both a 1080i and 24p version) DVD, which could be played on the G5 upon which it was created. Lovely it was, too.

From one point of view, Apple is actually leading the pack, but remains a slave to the vagaries of market forces.

And your point is? I can do the same too, but I can't yet put it on a high density DVD, either Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. How is Apple a slave to the vagaries of market forces? They've invented and lead new markets for years, vis. FinalCut Pro HD.

Had MS waited a little longer and included a HD-DVD drive in the xbox 360 they would have had a much better chance and winning the format war.

I wonder if MS will include a HD-DVD player in a future version of the Xbox 360 and what that will mean to soon to be 360 owners.

I would choose a format that allows me to rip and burn Blu-ray movies, put it on my video player, and allow streaming of Blu-ray media, yet contaon security features that stamps out piracy and provide new business models such as super distribution where I can use special software that allows me to make a copy of a movie and give it to friends in a legal manner.

When I went from cassettes to CDs, which was the first modern successful optical format, burners and computers as well as the digital media has allowed me to rip the CD to the drive and new game models allowed me to import the soundtrack into a video game.

Quite frankly though, piracy was a problem. DVD has enacted the Content Scrambling System, but the CSS provided frusteration to consumers as I can't play it on my PC and it was easily cracked. And, because of the DMCA laws, I was totally restricted to what I can do.

Copy protection on the CDs also created havoc on consumers, as earlier ones didn't work on PCs and some CD players, while the new CDs enabled me to do more, but I was restricted on what format I can rip it to. Song BMG enacted copy restrictions that only allowed me to use WMA files instead of MP3s, which was a pain in the butt and it was incompatible to my computer games, as I've tried to put a WMA file in it, but it won't work.

So, I want a format in which I can make unlimited personal copies of the media and stream it over my network and also make copies of the media and put it on the electronics that I own.

And to these people who say it can't be done...It can be done. All they need to do is talk like a computer. It is simple as this coding:

(Consumer imputs Copy, and the system is copy-righted and the consumer has registered and it's copied for the first time:)

If Object B.PROM Chip.ID = Consumer.ID ROM Chip, than
Copy Files to Object B.
Write ID to ROM area
Else
Display Message: "This product is not registered to use this product. Can't Copy."
EndIf

And if it's a re-writable media, if a consumer does a disc-to-disc copy, assuming that this copy disc is authorized by the recording studios, than:

Burn to Disc
Write Consumer ID on the disc.

When it's played, if the consumer ID on the disc does equal to the ROM chip on the electronic device, than, if the ID is present in the copyright database, than play. If any of these don't match, than don't play. Eject the disc.

And with these simple technologies, consumers register the electronic they buy using this one security ID chip code, and then this will make life for consumers much easier, and they can use the full amounts of these technologies to enjoy, edit, or mess around with the nedia.

So, I will choose whichever media gives me more fiexibility, media interoperability, and the ability to edit and mess with content. Right now, I may buy a drive that plays both HD-DVD and Blu-ray. An as an artist, I want consumers to have fun, not to deal with frusterations of the security coding, and hopefully, it will play on all players, allow consumers to make personal copies as well as editing and being able to play a movie, take a "Screen still image", and with that image, view it, do what I want to do, etc.