There were other good reasons to get behind HD-DVD. Look at who was on the board – intel, microsoft, and a good number of the studios. Blu-ray had sony, apple, dell, hp, and some other big shots. As far as market dominance goes, if I had to bet between microsoft/intel and apple/sony – I’d absolutely expect intel/microsoft would trump.

HD DVDs were XP readable with the 360 HD DVD drive and the driver. I don’t know that Blu-ray is there yet. For storage, I’d absolutely pick blu-ray, but Sony has a long history of creating an arguably better product (betamax, minidisc, atrac3, etc), locking it down, and being supplanted by a cheap alternative. This seemed like more of the same, but I suppose sony learned their lesson.

When hd dvd was completely cracked, and blu-ray was only partially cracked, studios probably started looking at blu-ray. You can get blu-ray drives for $150 now, so hd dvd isn’t cheaper. Game set match.

Travis: Yeah, that makes sense, until you realize that the porn industry supported HD-DVD this time around. As far as I can see, this contest was determined by Toshiba and Sony whoring themselves out to content creators, and Sony just happened to be the bigger whore (more experience, probably).

I’ll be waiting for the price to come waaay down, and for there to be stuff I actually want to watch that I can’t get any other way.

Could be a while

Hi Luke,

I would not buy any of PS3 or BR player until it is actually deadly necessary (i.e. until any of my favorite games is sold only in BR format and I have a brand new computer). By that time the price will have dropped under the $100. I don’t like to get ripped off or racketed and I don’t need a PS3 (I am a PC owner, which means that any game out there is going to be looking three times better on my PC). So simple it is…

May I remind you all of Laser-Disk and VHS, Laser-Disk was much better however the porn industry supported VHS, so VHS won.

Industry picks the standards in technology, not the user. We are very weak as consumers and don’t stand up for our selfs; We buy Nike shoes even though they are made in sweat shops for pennies while we pay hundreds of dollars, same thing with wal*mart.

Back in Techno-land, we pay high prices to play video games online, when we know they could be ad-supported. I know many people don’t like advertisements but honestly it could make life cheaper, fly in an airplane, have your announcements start with “thank you for flying cheap-o air, this flight is brought to you with limited interuption by SONY ENTERTAINMENT” and such.
Nothing on the internet NEEDS to be paid for, paying for things should give you an incentive, not a requirement.

We allow our selfs to become overwhelm with wants without working together as consumers and getting what we want.

OMG! Anetta commenting on my blog! NO WAI!!! 8O

I guess best bet is to wait a bit and see what will happen on the market next. Especially since you are not going to be getting that much use out of it. The movies will continue being expensive, and places like Blockbuster are still relying mostly on DVD. :)

Btw, did you actually even use the HD-DVD player for anything since we tested it Christmas Eve?

Ok so I’m the cousin who should have waited till the war was over before getting a player, but what can I say, it was a nice xmas gift. So yeah as Luke said I returned the Toshiba HD-DVD player to Costco yesterday. Luckily I still had the box and the gift receipt and got my money back. I think I’m going to wait it out a bit before I jump in and get any particular player. I like the idea of the PS3 but I am more of a wii person.. dunno what to do.. I heard from many reviews online that the PS3 is definitely not the best blue ray player out there but who knows. I’ll take all the suggestions I can get!

@Adam – nice deal. Thanks for the info. With the Profile 2.0 thing it does seem like PS3 would be the smartest choice now.

I wonder if they can add DTS-HD Audio via firmware upgrade, or does it require specific hardware to be present. :/

@Zack – I think you are right. I’m gonna wait. But my cousin wants to be an early adopter. She already got burned with HD-DVD (she returned the player to the store yesterday LOL) so she will probably wait a bit now but she keeps asking which she should buy. So that’s what I’m bringing this up.

Personally, I’d probably go with PS3 if I wanted a console AND BluRay just because of the games. But I could pretty much get the same games with Xbox which would be much cheaper.

My cousin is not a big gamer – although she does play from time to time. I remember she used to love Sims, and Age of Mythology. Oh, and she used to play Toombrider 2 on my PS1 back in the day. All things considered she kinda seems more like a candidate for a Wii though.

PS3, I guess.

Also: loose != lose. Check the first two paragraphs. </grammar nazi>

Yeah…this sucks. There’s not one reliable Blu-ray player out there except for the PS3 and I’ll be damned if I buy one of those. The players are more expensive, and the discs less reliable and more costly to produce…with way more DRM crap. Makes me pissed too, that I spent money on it…um…based on YOUR recommendation btw! You owe me $200 Cdn for the player and about $100 for movies :) heh I have a paypal account lol