Could Warner Bros. Support HD DVD Next?
With yesterday's formal announcement of the new HD-DVD player from Venturer, one must wonder whether the other shoe is about to drop in the HD-DVD-Blu-Ray format war. Venturer is a supplier of low cost electronics equipment to Wal-Mart in the U.S. Could this be the low cost HD-DVD player that it has been rumored that Wal-Mart will run with in 4Q 2007?
The press release on the Venturer web page notes that the new SHD7000 will be distributed throughout North America. Wal-Mart will be the likely outlet for such a player. With the Toshiba A2 now at $299.00 ($238.00 on Amazon) and the new A3 likely to carry a msrp less than $299 ($249.00?), it is likely that the Venturer product will have to be priced under $199 to gain any traction. With the various Toshiba products, the Venturer, the Onkyo DV-HD805 and dual format players due from LG and Samsung, the old argument that no one is supporting HD-DVD except Toshiba can no longer be argued.
On the BD side, one must wonder what is going on there given that Denon has announced that their Blu-Ray player will not be available until some time in 2008. It does not look as though there will be any 1.1 compliant Blu-Ray player available in 2007. While it is possible that the PS3 can be upgraded to 1.1 specs via a firmware upgrade, that has not been confirmed by Sony. With this being the case, one must wonder why Disney is going ahead with releasing Cars and
Ratatouie in November with interactive features that no player can play. I am sure that Warner is not at all happy with this development.
It is hard to believe that one year after release, there is still no 1.1 complaint Blu-Ray player on the market. While there have been rumblings of a cheap Blu-Ray player from Funai, one must
wonder what a BD player under $299 will make the other BD manufacturers such as Panasonic feel. They will have seen Blu-Ray player prices fall from $1,300 to under $300 in less than a year. So much for making profits on a new format. BD prices will have fallen as far in a year as it took DVD players to fall over several years. That can't make anyone in the BDA happy, not even Sony.
The upcoming CEDIA next week may prove to be very interesting. With the cheap HD-DVD players looking like a reality, no 1.1 complaint BD players on the horizon, the Paramount/Dreamworks announcement and the fact that Warner is not shipping any new hi-def media until next week while continuing to extol the virtues of HDi interactivity on
HD DVD on their website, one can only wonder if a HD-DVD exclusivity announcement will be made by Warner Brothers at CEDIA. If that comes to pass, can Fox and Disney afford to at least go neutral?
After all, they did both support DIXV over DVD. If they did, would that end the war? We shall see. At the very least, it should prove to be a very interesting week at CEDIA. I only wish I was going!
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27 Comments:
I'm just waiting for BD fans to reply saying 'this is nonsense'. Blu-ray is the superior technology and we have a 2-1 sales lead....blah, blah, blah.
Still waiting in a line to purchase a HD-DVD or Blu-ray. Who says that the format war is not good? The prices came down so fast with those deals and competition. At least, I enjoy watching the fight between two groups of fans.
But but but...PS3!!!
First of all, this is pure speculation regarding Warner Brothers. We will have to wait and see what happens, but I don't think any major companies are going to be changing their positions for the rest of this year.
Second, there are many Blu-ray disc players that have firmware updates and should support 1.1. Denon is NOT the only player coming out that will handle this, and for that matter, is not in the same league as Venture since Venture makes cheap products and Denon makes high-quality expensive products.
The PS3 will have an update for 1.1, it is not a question of "will it happen in time for Cars". I can assure you they will not let that fall through the cracks.
FUD... that is all this report is.
Provide some sources or other facts and less speculation.
i'd appreciate it if the people writing the comments could also provide 'facts'. who says the PS3 will have an update in time for the release of Cars? some 13 year old in his parents basement?
This is nonsense! Blu-Ray is the superior technology and they have a 2-1 sales lead! Sorry, couldn't resist;)
Jokes aside, this is very good news for HD DVD!!!!
This could be true. After all, Sony’s promise of 6 million PS3s in the USA by the end of 2007 is going to fall well short (1.7 million so far) and HD DVD standalone players are still outselling standalone Blu-ray players. From what I hear: WB has strong ties to the DVD Forum and they hold several patents that pays them royalties on HD DVD sales.
Like you say, HD DVD is ready to launch new hardware at both the high and low end of the spectrum, meanwhile Blu-ray is stuck in a hardware quagmire with this profile 1.1 situation. Paramount (incentives or not) sees the situation and made a smart business decision. Blu-ray is difficult to manufacturer, expensive & has varying hardware specifications. HD DVD is ready to go to mass-market status.
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I am still to thsi day astonded by the shear nubmer of die hard fanboys on both sides of this debate. The majority of Americans aren't buying either player until it gets below $150 and the early adopters, well if you can afford it then you can probably afford to switch formats.
Nice thoughtful comment Mr. Laswell. It is people like you that give enthusiats a bad name. Show some class, please.
The HD DVD supporters are saying this is "good news" when it's not news at all, it's speculation. I could write a blog about the possibility of Universal going neutral and that wouldn't make it news. (Of course I've heard from an insider that Universal has a price and Warner is firm in their stance.) There is no reason for Warner to go exclusive. As the sole dual-format supporter, they have a much stronger position to influence and/or receive benefits than if they were exclusive.
"Second, there are many Blu-ray disc players that have firmware updates and should support 1.1. "
Uh...no. It would have to be a damned impressive firmware update to add the necessary hardware to be able to decode a second video stream to any of the existing standalone Blu-ray player. It may be possible on the PS3 just because it's so much more powerful that it will likely have power to spare to decode two simultaneous video streams.
HD DVD SUCKS STAY TRUE TO BLU
we all know blu ray will win, so it doesnt really matter
we all know HD-DVD will win, so it doesnt really matter
Can anyone explain why people get so angry about this topic? I mean, cmon. Look at some of these comments, hell, some had to be removed!
Blu-Ray is only superior because of the 50gig capacity. There is nothing special about blu-ray. HD DVD is the only way to go. You can watch most discs on a regular dvd player, which has come in handy, and not to mention the interactive features. As far as video goes, the two formats look identical. Also, the only reason blu-ray has a lead is because of those studios supporting only them. I think all studios should support both formats and we shall see that HD DVD would be the true winner!!!
I think they are not releasing any hd movies for a week is because they are going to only support 1 format. Which one that is the question. I'd say by there track record it would be hd dvd. I think studios are getting tired of the format war. With $150 hd dvd players coming and 51 gig triple layer disc from hd dvd one can say what does hd dvd not have that blu doesn't. As for blu's studio support look what Fox has done to them with there horrible transfers as well as Disney. The Pirates movie is cropped very badly. Sony has a track record for releasing formats that fail. Those are facts and they started the dam war to begin with.
I can tell what Blu-Ray dont't have when compared to HD DVD. A standard spec,web features on all players, combo flipper discs,hdi pip, no pal/ntsc crap,vc1 coding on all discs ,cheaper players thats just to name a few. Sorry for the run on :)
HD DVD- CHEAPEST PLAYERS DO NOT HAVE FULL 1080P ONLY 1080I
BLU RAY- ALL PLAYERS HAVE 1080P OUTPUT INCLUDING THE ALMIGHTY PS3!
Considering that the two top movies of this summers which I believe is Transformers and The Bourne Ultamatim, are exclusivly going to be on HD DVD, I think this will be a HUGE boost for the HD DVD format. Spiderman 3 was a pretty stupid movie, and I didn't bother watching Pirates of Caribbean 3, but from what I hear it wasn't that great, so bluray can keep those. I am pretty sure people would rather watch Transformer's on HDDVD rather that Spiderman 3 on Blu-ray. Another factor is the video consoles war between Microsoft Xbox 360 (where you can buy an separate HD DVD player that attaches to it for $179) and Sony's Playstation 3 which is also a bluray player, The Xbox 360 is selling much better than the PS3. The PS3 has been a failure because there hasn't been any popular games that came out for it, and it's still too expensive, even with a price cut. In fact the archtect for Sony's playstation franchise, Ken Kutaragi, has actually stepped down because of the dissapointing sales of the PS3. Even though bluray has made some gains over HD-DVD such as the blockbuster and target deals to only have bluray and better sales, I am pretty sure that will change soon, because the tide will definitly tilt to HD DVD's favor since they are gonna have better movies coming out exclusively for them, and I also forgot to mention that NBC's Heroes which probably was the best show that came out last season is also going to be excusively on HD DVD.
Your blog is nonsensical and incorrect. First of all Denon didn't delay their 1.1 player release, they delayed the European release. They've confirmed the US release will take place this year.
Secondly, why would BD vendors be upset that prices have fallen (from $1K, not $1300), while HD DVD vendors would be happy about it? Toshiba has already ensured there will be few name-brand competitors with their fire-sale pricing. Samsung even admitted demand isn't there for an HD DVD player (http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/08/30/business/dvd.php).
The CE were sold on new formats and BD in particular on the ides that they can make some real profits. The plunging prices on BD players is not making them happy. They have not even been able to keep anything close to their projected price points for a year and they will be sinking even further real soon. Toshiba on the other hand looked at price as a way to get market share and keep HD alive compared to the BD onslaught. Ask Panasonic if they are happy with their price points and sales. I am confident you will find they are not.
The original price of the Panasonic BD player was $1,299 pretty close to $1,300 no? The msrp of the Pioneer was $1,850 and dropped to $1,500 at launch. The Sony was $999 as was the Sammy.
What's more likely is Warner t stay neutral to keep the war going while pushing its TotalHD. No victor equals two formats equals more TotalHD licensees equals more royalties for WB.
And even if only 10 or 20 per cent of Ps3 users buy HD movies, money is money, it doesn't matter where the buyer is watching the movie.
HDDVD is a double dip for studios, Hey here is a super duper Specail edition untill we pull are head out of our asses and put it on a new superior format. What kind of world do cheap HDDVD fans live in that they can possibly think that they own a superior format.
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