Everyone knows that media format wars have historical point in the world of technology. Remember the most notorious battle in the middle of the Beta max and the Vhs? The winner of such battles will make millions even billions. Later we had the upgrade of tape to Cd, a revolution in music. In 1980 the Philips/Sony compact disc proper was finalized and nobody has looked back for the last 26 years (until mp3's came along).
Well as ever there is a new media battle but who will win again is yet unknown. This contemporary forest of technological mass has produced a new insurgency: The High Definition War. Blu-ray vs Hd-Dvd are two competitive formats which are ultimately going to replace Dvd's. As you look around at your local galvanic retailers you can see changes happening in the broadcast world, not only are we changing from our approved Crt screens to Flat screen but also to Hd ready Tv. The impact this has on our lives is not as large as black and white to colour, but nevertheless a turn that will definitely be a benchmark for time to come media.
Hd Media Player
Why New formats?
The presume we have introduced these new formats is that your customary Dvd can hold a maximum of 9.4 Gb (Dual Layer) of information. This is not sufficient for Hd broadcast as the information required is higher, being a resolution of 1920x1080. Blu-ray discs can hold 50 Gb (Dual Layer) and Hd-Dvd 30 Gb (Dual Layer).
These new discs cannot be played on normal Dvd players but on new Hd media players of which examples are Samsung Bdp 1000 (Blu-Ray), Sony Playstation 3 (Blu-Ray), Toshiba Hdxa1 (Hd-Dvd). This means spending more money for good resolution.
Price
This is all the time leading especially when new models of media come out; at first it is all the time costly as supply out strips demand. The players are expensive, the cheapest being the Playstation 3 supposedly retailing at £549. Blu-Ray media also being expensive; similar to Dvd's when they first came out (taking inflation into consideration), blank media costing from £11.99 to £24.99.
To play a Blu-ray Disc on a Pc has brought about a price concern. The fact that you have to buy a Hdcp (High-Bandwidth Digital content Protection) descriptive card, along with a Hd monitor, not to mention a Blu-ray Drive and media, controversially may bring about decrease in sales. This is presently being contested with new Laptops and Pcs that are Blu-ray compatible, look at the New Vaio Vgn-Ar21S.
The Hd players need to be up to scratch on price. The Toshiba Hd-Dvd player retailing at almost half the price of the Blu-ray Samsung player creates even more competition in the middle of the two media. This could encourage sales of Hd-Dvd over Blu-ray, even though it's rumoured that Toshiba will be manufacture a loss initially.
Prices of movies doesn't seem to be as high as anticipated; a Blu-ray movie 'House of flying daggers' from amazon.com will set you back .95 (£10.68). This may encourage sales. Movies in Hd-Dvd selfsame in price, yet Blu-ray is a larger size disc.
Upscaling
Another problem Hd may face is that the new Dvd players have the upscaling technology ie. Dvd is played at 480p but upscalers upgrade the image to 720p or 1080i. This produces a picture which is of high potential to the untrained eye, in fact even the trained eye has strangeness distinguishing in the middle of the two. The incompatibility is seen on a 50 inch Hd projector and seeing right up close. So the ask is will 1080p be much separate to 1080i? Will citizen fork out the added charge when they know that a cheaper Dvd upscaler will create more or less the same effect?
Media Backup
Software and Hardware clubs have invested a lot of money in subsidising Hd media. Samsung, Panasonic, Mitsubishi, Lg, Sony, Tdk, Jvc and Sharp keep Blu-ray and Toshiba and Microsoft back Hd-Dvd. Hollywood movie studios Disney, Paramount, Warner, Sony, Eagle rock, Fox and Mgm and Lions gate keep Blu-ray also. None of these large clubs would take such a gamble if they didn't know that this is what the buyer wants.
PlayStation 3
Sony love to bring out their own media either its Sony Duo Sticks or Sony Mini Discs. Their hunger to dominate the buyer store has all the time been there and this is nothing different. The Playstation 3 will play Blu-Ray discs, still having the potential to play older media like Dvds and Cds. The success of the predecessor's Ps1 and Ps2 will give much expectation to the issue of this new console and is what Sony are hoping will turn citizen to use Blu-Ray. A Sony spokesman has imaginable that Blu-Ray will dominate the Hd store within 12 months.
The encouraging highlight with Hd-Dvd is the name, everyone's ears will ring with the name and automatically assume that this is a high definition movie. Request person in the street what 'Blu-ray' is will bring looks of confusion, along with the fact that both will yield similar potential pictures.
Region Coding
Region coding with Blu-Ray may put citizen off; the fact that you may not be able to watch a new issue from the states or Japan on your European locked regional player will raise eyebrows.
Region 1 South America, North America, East Asia (except China)
Region 2 Europe and Africa
Region 3 China, Russia other Countries
Multiregional configurations on Dvd players has encouraged sales worldwide especially with worldwide films from Bollywood, Japan (manga) and South America.
So far the Hd-Dvd camp has not announced region coding just yet, and if they don't then this will be very advantageous for consumers.
Future Proof
Realistically you only need about 15-20 Gb for a highlight length film in High definition but who would have known that Dvd's could not be able to hold sufficient for high definition. Theoretically they can with Mpeg-4 Compression. In any case media like Blu-ray will hopefully be time to come proof in years to come.
Conclusion
The timescale and price are the two main issues here, how quick we will universally turn to Hd and either this is affordable. From a buyer point of view the necessity for Hd doesn't seem imperative, after all Vhs was around for 20 odd years twice that of Dvd (so far). You could argue that technology is changing exponentially and that changes occur quicker.
As for the battle in the middle of the two media there may be compromise ahead. A Uk firm has announced a solution to the media war. London-based New Medium Enterprises (Nme) has industrialized a low-cost, multilayer Dvd disc that can store Blu-ray content on one layer and Hd Dvd content on another. This would leave the buyer with the choice of buying either type of player to play the one disc.
The key setback I feel with the looming Hd turn is the cheaper alternative to a Blu-Ray player or Hd-Dvd player, the Dvd upscaler. Do citizen want to get rid of those hundreds of Dvds they bought to replace them with an costly alternative, especially when they might not even consideration the incompatibility in picture quality?
However I do feel that Hd is encouraged with consoles such as the Playstation 3. Blu-ray is its main format and may revolutionise the games industry.
The Hd Media future
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