Comments on: Note to Chinese HD DVD: Olympics 2008!

By: Pravin

Pravin — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 17:21:06 +0000

Monthly sales figures on products that people only buy once are misleading. People don’t buy a new console every week or every month, so once you’ve “voted” that’s it for a long time. These monthly figures only appear to show you how popular something is. And until the 360 and PS3 have equivalent installed user bases, it’s a little tough to directly compare one console’s popularity over the other. The only thing that’s for sure is that the 360 is the #1 console for 360 fans, and the PS3 is the #1 console for PS3 fans.

The PS3 is the best Blu-ray player deal out there. Yes, you can get cheaper machines, but they’re not going to be as handy as the PS3. Not for another year, at least.

By: Jeremy

Jeremy — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 16:58:37 +0000

Okay,

One of the best players on the market for $399 is the Sony BDPS350. It is half the size, runs 4 times faster and plays just about all of the codecs (except DTSMD).
Still better than that is the PS3 of course! Nothing is held back (notice sales have overcome 360), and 87% of these owners watch Blu Ray movies on it (over 14 million sold).
If you check http://www.blu-ray.com and look at the movie titles, you will see pricing and sales. All of these titles are sold through amazon, which many sell for less than $15 each.

By: gns100

gns100 — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 18:22:24 +0000

After debating about it in my mind, I purchased a XBOX HDDVD player that plugged into my HTPC. With 6 movies I paid $114. 6 blu-rays (without a player) would have cost me about $120-150. At rates of 50-75% less than blu-ray titles, I’ll continue to buy HDDVDs. Yes, I do have a ps3, but can’t see spending those high prices to expand my bluray collection beyond the 1 that came with the ps3. This China thing might make things interesting and provide a future supply of HDDVD. Maybe microsoft will just open source the HD codecs and take sony and bluray down.

By: Awesome

Awesome — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:14:34 +0000

HD DVD still is better than Blu-ray for simple reasons, like price and better players. But eventually that *may* come to an end. China could, of course, choose to affect the course of future events in the high definition optical disc arena in such a way that HD DVD continues for many years rather than slowly (but at great prices for the very well-off adopters who are not at all bitter because they *won* in more ways than any Blu-ray/spending-lots-of-money-for-1080p individuals did) not get replenished with new titles or future players. Transformers looks great on HD DVD and it costs a whole lot less than the equivalent Blu-ray title. Loving my HD DVD and laughing at Sony as it soaks its customers for high definition movies!

So, China, what’s it going to be?

Change the course of world history and decide the real winner of the next-gen hi-def optical media format! This match ain’t over.

Give us a Chinese format high definition video disc, with HD DVD compatibility of course, and make the world a better place!

By: Pravin

Pravin — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 16:15:04 +0000

CBHD discs may be physically compatible with HD DVD players, however they’re likely to contain data that can’t be properly decoded without a firmware update (which we’re unlikely to get). Remember, this Chinese standard eschews as many of the typical western trappings as it can, which means it uses proprietary compression that did not exist on HD DVD titles.

I don’t know if regular HD DVD discs are available in China or ever were, but your girlfriend might find something. Recordable HD DVD media never really got off the ground, so I’m sure she won’t be finding pirated movies, that’s for sure. Since region coding was not implemented, any discs she finds are likely to work just fine, however the audio and subtitle options may be different on the Asian version of a disc than for North America.

By: Vijay

Vijay — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 16:05:49 +0000

I have a question that may sound stupid. Do these Chinese HD discs play on the Toshiba HD player. Also, If one was to get regular HD discs in China, would they play, or are they region coded? I ask because my girlfriend is in China watching the Olympics, and wondering if it would be worth it for her to find some cheap discs?

By: Pravin

Pravin — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 20:33:16 +0000

I got my PS3 over a month ago, but it’s primarily been a Metal Gear Solid 4 workstation. I need to get some more first-hand Blu experiences under my belt before I can start writing some useful articles about it. But that won’t be under this Red banner, and more likely to be some kind of sister site.

By: Rick

Rick — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 20:16:52 +0000

Thanks Jeff for your Blu input in this Red matter!

By: Jeff Bridgers

Jeff Bridgers — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 19:33:15 +0000

No you are not trashing Blu Ray at all. You just need to finally break down and convert. By the way I have been a blue fan for working on two years, and have followed and read your web site many many times. Always good information.

Jeff B

By: Pravin

Pravin — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 19:16:49 +0000

I’m not bitter about it Jeff. Reread the article and point out if I’m trashing Blu-ray some place in there.

As for the other ideas, something along those lines is already in the works but I haven’t had a chance to do a bunch of it.