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Sunday, November 14, 2004

I want my HD-DVD, or is that Blu-Ray?
Here I sit with a pair of beta VCRs and three Laser Disc players. Do I have an inside track on this story or what? Here's the deal. A few years ago, rumblings were heard coming from the consortium (Ah! That word again!) responsible for developing DVD burner technology. Basically, basically, there was a disagreement over how larger capacity DVDs should be formatted. It started with the switch to a blue-violet laser, from red, to gain some bandwidth for the switch from TV to HDTV. (And I predict that they'll eventually switch again to ultraviolet for the same reason in the not too distant future.) On this they all agreed.

Where they cam to blows was over how that new bandwidth should be formatted. Blu-ray, backed by, among others, Sony, pushes the max to 25GB on single layer discs for up to 2 hours of HDTV (supporting MPEG 2 Transport Stream) or 13 hours of Standard Definition TV (SDTV). Dual Layer discs will also be addressed. There are already Blu-Ray burners on sale. HD-DVD burners will have roughly the same capacities but prefer to use VC-1, H.264 or MPEG-4/AVC encoding and will have Advanced Access Content System (AACS), which not only allows distributors to prevent the making of copies but also to take control of the playing modalities. Movie studios are leaning toward HD-DVD. (Gosh!)

There's also a bastardized red-laser format from out of left field that should be several hundred dollars cheaper. One thing's for sure. We're the losers.
# Permalink Posted at 4:36 AM 3 comments Email this Link

Comments on this Item:

I get really annoyed that the industry is so focused. on making sure that the consumer cannot back-up the DVD's s/he's purchased. Some people may say that you'd never need to if you take good care of them, but I beg to differ. I have two retail copies of the same DVD and guess what. The plastic around the center is breaking on both of them. It is out of no fault of my own since I have multiple other DVD's and these are the only two with problems. The problem is with the way they were manufactured - using cheap and brittle plastic to save money. I spent the extra dough on a dual-layer burner and got a hard-to-find DVD+R DL disc and copied it using DVD Decrypter. I think that I'm more than justified since I bought not one, but two copies of this same DVD and both of them are breaking because of a manufacturing defect.

# posted by David 8:14 AM

Can't argue with you on that, David. While I am strongly opposed to "shareware" I am an equally strong proponent of fair use. Unless the manufacturers are willing to provide lifetime replacements, copies I keep for myself should be possible.

# posted by Bill 8:30 AM

I think HD-DVD will win for the following reasons. First, I think it was backed by Microsoft before they looked at BlueRay. Afterall HD-DVD favors the VC-1 codec which is another name for the Windows Media Video codec. Second, the more meaningful movie studios in my opinion go with the HD-DVD format.

In the end, my opinion is that whichever format Microsoft chooses to stay with will be the winning format in the USA at least. As we all know Microsoft is making aggressinve inroads into the television industry.

As much as I would like the bickering over the format come to an end, and BlueRay emerge the winner, the truth is that whatever the monopolies push on you, you accept whether or not better or more robust alternatives exist.

# posted by Anonymous 11:15 PM

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