Hi-Def DVD is coming, where do you stand?

[Peter Hogan]

Why didn't they make the original DVD high definition and all of this would be irrelevant?

Hi,
The main reason they didn't is that a standard DVD does not have nearly enough data capacity to hold a feature length movie in HD resolution. It is only now that you can fit around 50 gigs of data on a single disk that this is possible. With standard DVDs, you'd need about 10 disks to hold a movie...I don't think that would have been too popular, swapping disks every 10 minutes, not to mention production costs for all those disks.

Peter

 

[68sting]

I wouldn't buy any discs until they come to a conclusion on the winner. I would rent them all day long though. Then my only investment would be the player($500). If HD-DVD appears to be on its way out I would then go Blue-Ray obviously. I would just stick with the lower costing player if they were neck and neck and there was plenty of titles available. I will anxiously await more reports from Zip3kx07.

 

[socialxray]

I was once a Blu-Ray backer until I found out how draconian Sony will be regarding our fair use rights. Not to mention the whole rootkit fiasco which really shows what Sony thinks of its customers. HD-DVD is not much better though. So I am on the fence now even though Blu-Ray is the better technology hands down.

But honestly I think Blu-Ray will win. Sony is going to give all the movie studios (Sony included) what they want...complete control over their content and how it is used and no true hi-def over analog connections. (Sorry you can't watch your HD content on your shiny new portable video player but surely Mr. Consumer you will be content with what we decide to give you. And if you are not then too bad.)

Just as Zip said, Blu-Ray's big push is going to come with the PS3. Even though the price is not set it will probably be the cheapest HD player available. Plus it will play videogames. Sure it may not be better than a stand alone HD player but at 1080p who cares?

Anyways, since my HDTV does not have a copy protection compliant HDMI connection my entire HD plans have been put on the back burner indefinitely. Also, since consumers are not allowed to stream DVD-A or SACD I have given up on Hi-Res music too. Actually I have practical given up on the entire thing. I do not see Hi-Res music coming to the next gen formats anytime soon and even if it did it would be just as inflexiable as DVD-A and SACD. Also the cost of everything from 7 speakers to new pro/pros that handle the new formats to new players to new TVs has just put me off. I love multi-channel music and movies but jeez this is just too crazy! Too many hoops to jump through! I feel like a circus act for cryin out loud!

 

[amey01]

amey01 and Robin,

The reason why we got DVD 480p and not 720p/1080i was because when DVD was being designed HDTV’s were not out yet. Why produce a consumer product, when the consumers can’t use it yet? The DVD player hit the states back in 1997, the HDTV hit the states around late 1998 early 1999, and they were about $10,000 for a basic CRT rear projection. Now that the TV’s are in place we are seeing more, and more HD materal because the consumer is ready.

Do you remember the 2003 release of Terminator 2: judgment day? That was the first DVD to include a WMP9 HD-video transfer. To run that HD transfer on your PC you needed at least a 3Ghz processor, 512MB ram, and a 128MB/3D video card. PC’s did not make the jump to 1Ghz processors until 1999. So can you imagine what it would have taken for Sony or Toshiba to create a player that could play back 1080 video in 1997? An act of god. Or maybe $20,000 a player.

Good thing's come to those who wait, and if we skipped DVD and went strait to HD-DVD we would probably still be getting it now because of the development of the Blue laser, which is what makes Hi-Def DVD a reality.

HDTVs might not have been out, but still making the DVD standard "high definition" would be called "Forward planning", wouldn't it?

Sorry, but I don't buy that "it couldn't be done" - it was possible to process 650MB of data back in 1982 (Redbook CD) - this was at a time when computers ran at 4MHz and were lucky to have a 512Kb disk drive and 64Kb of RAM. With the advances that have supposedly been made with technology - ie. "this generation is 6 times faster than the previous generation", etc. - then it was certainly possible to produce high-definition if people wanted to do it.

It is just they didn't want to because they'd rather rip off the consumer and add to the huge environmental problems we already have. And that makes me mad.

 

[Reverb2009]

It is just they didn't want to because they'd rather rip off the consumer and add to the huge environmental problems we already have. And that makes me mad.

Thats Bull and now your just making S++T up.

No body, expected DVD to successes, let alone replace VHS. They’re not going to offer HD to the consumers when they can't do any thing with it. This is chess not checkers. You don’t offer a product to consumers that they don’t want and at that time (1997) no body card about HD because they didn’t have a reason to.

 

[Robin]

US Laws and FCC Regulations...

amey01 and Robin,

The reason why we got DVD 480p and not 720p/1080i was because when DVD was being designed HDTV’s were not out yet. Why produce a consumer product, when the consumers can’t use it yet? The DVD player hit the states back in 1997, the HDTV hit the states around late 1998 early 1999, and they were about $10,000 for a basic CRT rear projection. Now that the TV’s are in place we are seeing more, and more HD materal because the consumer is ready.

Do you remember the 2003 release of Terminator 2: judgment day? That was the first DVD to include a WMP9 HD-video transfer. To run that HD transfer on your PC you needed at least a 3Ghz processor, 512MB ram, and a 128MB/3D video card. PC’s did not make the jump to 1Ghz processors until 1999. So can you imagine what it would have taken for Sony or Toshiba to create a player that could play back 1080 video in 1997? An act of god. Or maybe $20,000 a player.

Good thing's come to those who wait, and if we skipped DVD and went strait to HD-DVD we would probably still be getting it now because of the development of the Blue laser, which is what makes Hi-Def DVD a reality.

Joe,

I think a big factor, which I was not considering as much is the fact that even though the High Definition technology was invented earlier, I found this condensed history of HDTV:

http://www.ee.washington.edu/conselec/CE/kuhn/hdtv/95x5.htm

It is apparent that US laws and FCC regulations would not allow HDTV broad casts either, until the late ninties. Joe, I agree it is probably the natural evolution of High Definition DVD technology, but it is still off-putting, none-the-less... But please understand, I highly respect your information and oppinions Joe, that goes without saying...

First, I am looking forward to the newer better greater lines of resolution much clearer picture etc. and Blue-Ray is hands down the best High Definition techonolgy out there.
Second, I can't help thinking beacuse these companies could not aggree to a universal format for players and DVD's (Red-Ray and/or Blue-Ray), they have lost credibility with many consumers. These companies have intentionally placed the consumer in the middle of a format war, in an either or situation, where one form of technology or another will be obsolete and consumers will end-up paying the price. We may say, well that is a risk everyone takes and that is true, but it doesn't make it anymore appealing only disappointing.

Blue-Ray is still the better technology.

 

[Robin]

Format Wars...

Joe,

I am sorry, please do not take offense, at my words. You are a person I totally respect and admire at the ML Club. I value your advise and oppinion greatly. Please forgive me if I miss spoke before. I was just disappointed in the various companies manipulation of a medium I enjoy.

 

[Reverb2009]

Joe,

I am sorry, please do not take offense, at my words. You are a person I totally respect and admire at the ML Club. I value your advise and oppinion greatly. Please forgive me if I miss spoke before. I was just disappointed in the various companies manipulation of a medium I enjoy.

Not at all.

We are all human and with different views on a particular subject, and wile we at times agree there is always that one topic were people will clash. I understand that and respect that.

I am just trying to give my point of view that DVD was expected to fail by many. At the time of its creation no one expected it to replace VHS, but it did. And know no one expected it to sell HDTV’s like crack.

Do you think the public would have bought into HD-DVD back then if they thought they would have to buy a new TV before the player? And you can say, Aw you can down scale the Hi-Def video for any TV, but the consumer is dumb. I know this from my few years of retail experience, and trying to sell widescreen movies to people because they are better and you louse less of the picture and they say to me "but I don't have a widescreen TV". You can say if you build it they will come, but how many products did Sony invented and failed? Mini-disk any one?

What is, is and what’s, what was. We can debate this till we are blue in they face or our fingers go numb. Fact is DVD took off and helped sell Hi-Def televisions across the glob and now we need Hi-Def content for it and here it is.

Eventually HD-DVD/Blu-ray players prices will come down to ware DVD players are today, and when that happen you wont be able to get a regular DVD player anymore because every player will be HD-DVD/Blu-Ray and both formats are backwards compatible with standard DVDs.

So the future looks bright for that little format that most thought would not make it, now its going next gen. and the decision to hop on the bus is up to you. I made my decision and I am here to help you make yours, if you would like my help, but know the chouse Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, or stick with what you got, is up to you, I don’t care what your decision is, as long as it make YOU happy.

 

[Robin]

Good points to concider...

Not at all.

We are all human and with different views on a particular subject, and wile we at times agree there is always that one topic were people will clash. I understand that and respect that.

I am just trying to give my point of view that DVD was expected to fail by many. At the time of its creation no one expected it to replace VHS, but it did. And know no one expected it to sell HDTV’s like crack.

Do you think the public would have bought into HD-DVD back then if they thought they would have to buy a new TV before the player? And you can say, Aw you can down scale the Hi-Def video for any TV, but the consumer is dumb. I know this from my few years of retail experience, and trying to sell widescreen movies to people because they are better and you louse less of the picture and they say to me "but I don't have a widescreen TV". You can say if you build it they will come, but how many products did Sony invented and failed? Mini-disk any one?

What is, is and what’s, what was. We can debate this till we are blue in they face or our fingers go numb. Fact is DVD took off and helped sell Hi-Def televisions across the glob and now we need Hi-Def content for it and here it is.

Eventually HD-DVD/Blu-ray players prices will come down to ware DVD players are today, and when that happen you wont be able to get a regular DVD player anymore because every player will be HD-DVD/Blu-Ray and both formats are backwards compatible with standard DVDs.

So the future looks bright for that little format that most thought would not make it, now its going next gen. and the decision to hop on the bus is up to you. I made my decision and I am here to help you make yours, if you would like my help, but know the chouse Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, or stick with what you got, is up to you, I don’t care what your decision is, as long as it make YOU happy.

Joe,

Excellent explaination... I agree with you, the future is very bright for High Definifition and thankfully so. I do look forward to more film like picture quality / resolution also better sound eventually in my HT. You have been and continue to be of great help. I apperciate all of your advise and information as always, Joe. You make a very good point, which is quite true each of us has to make our own decission. For me, I will choose Blue-Ray and let the chips fall where they may. Hey, that kinda rhymes...

Thanks again, Joe...

 

[amey01]

Not at all.

We are all human and with different views on a particular subject, and wile we at times agree there is always that one topic were people will clash. I understand that and respect that.

I am just trying to give my point of view that DVD was expected to fail by many. At the time of its creation no one expected it to replace VHS, but it did. And know no one expected it to sell HDTV’s like crack.

Do you think the public would have bought into HD-DVD back then if they thought they would have to buy a new TV before the player? And you can say, Aw you can down scale the Hi-Def video for any TV, but the consumer is dumb. I know this from my few years of retail experience, and trying to sell widescreen movies to people because they are better and you louse less of the picture and they say to me "but I don't have a widescreen TV". You can say if you build it they will come, but how many products did Sony invented and failed? Mini-disk any one?

What is, is and what’s, what was. We can debate this till we are blue in they face or our fingers go numb. Fact is DVD took off and helped sell Hi-Def televisions across the glob and now we need Hi-Def content for it and here it is.

Eventually HD-DVD/Blu-ray players prices will come down to ware DVD players are today, and when that happen you wont be able to get a regular DVD player anymore because every player will be HD-DVD/Blu-Ray and both formats are backwards compatible with standard DVDs.

So the future looks bright for that little format that most thought would not make it, now its going next gen. and the decision to hop on the bus is up to you. I made my decision and I am here to help you make yours, if you would like my help, but know the chouse Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, or stick with what you got, is up to you, I don’t care what your decision is, as long as it make YOU happy.

Lets agree to disagree then. I think that it is fair enough to simply say that it would be very naive to think that these companies developing this technology would be doing it in our interest without a clear business plan to make money and ensure they have a clear "upgrade" path for themselves.

 

[SteveInNC]

Certain technologies had to happen before HiDef DVDs could be developed, the main one being that someone had to invent a blue semiconductor laser. This was necessary to get the increased data density on the disc substrate that HiDef content requires. Blue LEDs weren't even invented until 1993, and took awhile to become viable for the market. It took until 1997 before a functional blue semiconductor laser was invented, and until 1999 before it was dependable enough to become commercially available. From Scientific American:

Tweaking the two-flow MOCVD system sufficed to produce first blue, and then green, LEDs of higher and higher brightness. But to get a dependable laser, [Nakamura] had to tackle the defect-density problem. The breakthrough here was inspired by a talk by NEC researchers, in the spring of 1997, at a panel session in which Nakamura was the chairman. After making some major inferences from the researchers’ purposefully oblique statements, Nakamura began exploiting a technique known as lateral overgrowth. By growing a layer of silicon dioxide strategically, he managed to block some of the defects in the gallium nitride crystal. The method could reduce the defect density only in a minuscule volume of the crystal, but the low-defect space was large enough to contain the indium gallium nitride active region. By using lateral overgrowth, within six months, he increased the lifetime of his blue semiconductor lasers from about 300 hours to several thousand hours. By the end of the year, he says, he achieved the 10,000 hours needed for a commercial product. In 1999 Nichia began selling five-milliwatt blue semiconductor lasers.

Note that there are some proposals out there to use red laser DVDs for HiDef discs, relying on better compression algorithms and minimizing "extras" on the discs. Because the disc is still limited to 4.7Gbytes, this format would only support shorter programs.

In a chicken-and-egg problem, there was no market for HiDef DVDs until there was a reasonable penetration of HiDef TVs. As production of HiDef TVs has ramped up, economies of scale have reduced costs enough to where these are no longer niche products. Related to this, there is finally a reasonable level of HiDef terrestrial and/or cable content out there to make it worth owning a HiDef TV.

The general public can be slow to change - it took until 2003 before DVD sales exceeded that of VHS tapes...

 

[socialxray]

Honestly Blu-Ray and HD-DVD will be surpassed very shortly by holographic storage technology which will enable a 130 mm disc to hold 1 TERABYTE of data. This will far surpass the measely 50 GB and 40 GB that Blu-Ray and HD-DVD are capable of. Here is a link if you are interested: http://www.technologyreview.com/InfoTech/wtr_14742,294,p1.html

Of course it will face some of the same issues in regards to reliablility and marketablility that Blu-Ray and HD-DVD face now. Most likely our controlled entertainment content will never end up on this format (if it succeeds); but, wouldn't it be nice if the software format and the hardware format could be divorced from each other so that the consumer could decide a format the would work best for him or her? Then, these format wars could be decided by market forces and not marketing forces.

 

[SteveInNC]

I'm looking in a different direction, and it's one that the content owners will like...

Connectivity providers in the US are finally getting around to rolling out fiber-to-the-curb, such as Verizon's FIOS. This will yield the bandwidth necessary to give true on-demand access to complete catalogs of movies. I think that the two HiDef DVD standards are going to fight each other in the market for a few years, then suddenly discover that the market evaporated out from under them, much the way that most dial-up Internet providers seemed to miss the rapid adoption of broadband technologies.

I would be much more interested in an on-demand PPV model with reasonable unit pricing. I spend about $90/month on satellite broadcast video with TiVo. A pricing model at around $1 per view would immediately have me interested. I doubt that I actively try to watch 90 shows/episodes of anything each month. In particular, access to back catalogs of series and/or old movies would serve as a great product differentiator. Simply spewing the recent movie theater releases as is typical of current PPV models would not interest me at all. Full-catalog, on-demand would also supercede the existing rental market, and could afford to undercut that pricing because there is no need to move, maintain, or store physical media.

The home sales and rental market for videos was around $24B in 2005 ...

 

[taylode]

I'm looking in a different direction, and it's one that the content owners will like...

Connectivity providers in the US are finally getting around to rolling out fiber-to-the-curb, such as Verizon's FIOS. This will yield the bandwidth necessary to give true on-demand access to complete catalogs of movies. I think that the two HiDef DVD standards are going to fight each other in the market for a few years, then suddenly discover that the market evaporated out from under them, much the way that most dial-up Internet providers seemed to miss the rapid adoption of broadband technologies.

I would be much more interested in an on-demand PPV model with reasonable unit pricing. I spend about $90/month on satellite broadcast video with TiVo. A pricing model at around $1 per view would immediately have me interested. I doubt that I actively try to watch 90 shows/episodes of anything each month. In particular, access to back catalogs of series and/or old movies would serve as a great product differentiator. Simply spewing the recent movie theater releases as is typical of current PPV models would not interest me at all. Full-catalog, on-demand would also supercede the existing rental market, and could afford to undercut that pricing because there is no need to move, maintain, or store physical media.

The home sales and rental market for videos was around $24B in 2005 ...

I like that model only if it matches the sound quality of the recorded medium. Currently, HDTV does not compare to a high-quality DTS recording. They improve that and offer hi-end satellite or cable boxes and I would be a very happy man. However, with DVD sales equalling box office ticket sales I don't see that happening very soon. I was just reading that a couple of upcoming movies will be released on DVD at the same time their being released to the theaters. I don't think they're quite ready to kill their low-risk golden goose.

 

[socialxray]

I like the true on-demand model too but there will always be people who want to own the content that they pay for. It would be awesome to be able to buy the content and then just download it to my computer for later streaming. Unfortunately I doubt this scenerio will ever happen. The studio heads will never allow this. So one format will succeed even when true on-demand is available and thriving.

 

[Reverb2009]

I like the true on-demand model too but there will always be people who want to own the content that they pay for. It would be awesome to be able to buy the content and then just download it to my computer for later streaming. Unfortunately I doubt this scenerio will ever happen. The studio heads will never allow this. So one format will succeed even when true on-demand is available and thriving.

Are you so sure about about that Socialxray? iPod any one?

There are a lot of people out there that are predicting Blu-Ray/HD-DVD as being the last disk based media format because of the success of the iPod. The biggest hurdle is of course drive space, and HD needing lots of it, there is also how you will download it? right now downloading 30GB just isn’t very practical. But there is a concept out there that would allow you to go to a store with your storage drive, plug it into the stores movie kiosk so you can pay and download the movies you want to a storage drive and then upload them to your player at home.

 

[socialxray]

Yes iPods have changed a lot of things. But my prediction is that movie studios will never let you keep HD movies on any hard drive device on a permanent basis. I guess the keyword here is permanent which I should have made clear in my previous post. There will always be people who want to own the HD content permanently. That is why I said at least one format will succeed. This is based on current DRM and marketing forces. That is just my prediction, I could very well be wrong.

One company (Kaleidescape) is trying to market a home movie server where DVDs are permanently copied to hard drive and streamed to a home AV system. They are currently being sued by the DVD Copy Control Association. This is the very organization that Kaleidescape bought a license to make DVD copies. So what is the problem? The DVD copies are permanent.

Here is a link to the abstract. Unfortunately if you want the entire article you will have to buy it.

http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/latimes...FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&dids=816282481:816282481:

 

[LaserMark4]

I like that model only if it matches the sound quality of the recorded medium. Currently, HDTV does not compare to a high-quality DTS recording. They improve that and offer hi-end satellite or cable boxes and I would be a very happy man.

You and me both-- Just can't replicate the DVD DTS quality over the Dish for now. The Dish TV 1080i picture quality (811 receiver) on the G70 is incredible! But the sound is not there....which is still a significant missing piece to the equation. I think the TV guys have been fixated on the picture, and forgot the sound.

We'll have to see how that all marries up with the new, prevailing formats. Undoubtedly, it will keep getting better.

 

[LaserMark4]

...and from what I have read there will be greater "fallout" in the the manufacturing process and greater failure in the market place. This is due to a thinner substrate about 1/6th the size of current cd & DVD's if my memory is correct. There will have to be new equipment designed to be able to handle the offset in disk thickness and with that comes a greater "wobble" of the disk so new logic and possible a more forgiving laser electronics. Jeff

Definitely!! Another issue is that the longevity of life of the disks will most certainly degrade as you put that much material on a smaller, thinner footprint. Dust, body oils, air particulates, label adhesives.....all will have a greater damaging impact from what I have read.

CNET just had a great series of articles and threads describing in layman's terms as to the differences with pressed vs. burned disks, and the growing issues with burned disks lasting only 2-5 years. This might only compound with the new HD formats. Check it out here: CNET Pressed vs. Burned Disks

 

[LaserMark4]

For all the techie propeller heads, here's another good article I found on CDFreaks.com that boils down the laymans and scientific comparison of both formats-- head-to-head. Great illustrations and clear explanations.

Check out the multiple chapters at the bottom of each section: HD-DVD and Blu-ray: What are the technologies?