So its Blu Ray then.....

[Ben]

Seems like the format battle between Blu Ray and HD DVD has come to a climax.

I heard towards the end of last week that Toshiba are pulling out of the software development of HD DVD thus leaving the door open for Blu Ray

so HD DVD = betamax and Blu Ray = VHS

So your ok if you bought a playstation 3 but it remains to be seen if Microsoft will bring out a Blu Ray add on for the X box.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technolog...n_trouble.html

Who does this affect?

not me

[cpiddy7]

Well i own both Xbox360 and PS3. Ive only got one blueray movie at the moment as if your running either through a HD TV they upgrade the normal DVD format. The quailty of DVD's look really good so i dont see the point in buying all my DVD collection all over again.

[hagis]

It's stupid that they even had a format war like that, didn't they learn from Betamax?

I'm not too bothered at the minute, until I get a big fancy TV, normal DVD's are fine for me.

[dansansome]

well i was waiting for the battle to conclude before buying my new player. now that its over, i might not bother, as i think that everything will go over to on-demand style. i have virgin v+ and there are already quite a few HD films available to rent (most are pap though...) and i doubt it will be too long before nearly the whole catalogue is available.

the only downside to this method, is not actually owning a copy, but for the amount of times we watch a film more than once, it probably isnt worth it.

[cpiddy7]

Microsoft launched a download service for Xbox Live. Some of the films are avaliable in HD. I understand that most people like to own films but lets be honest, unless its a really good film, how often would you watch them again? I agree with dansansome, i think High Def films will go to on-demand. When you think about it, internet connection are getting faster and cheaper. It will get to a stage where you'll be able to download the lastest movie while your at work without the hassel of going out to rent or buy the film. Think how much time you'll save not having to find a parking space ect. Thats why im not really all that bothered which format wins. Oh and one last point, Betamax was way better quality than VHS. VHS won in the end because it was cheaper to make. So much for the consumer getting the better deal!

[hagis]

^ ^ ^ Agreed. I'll be getting an XBox 360 in the next few months and look forward to using that for films instead of going to Blockbuster (see my last post in the Room 101 thread).

How much does it cost to download the films on XBox live?

[cpiddy7]

It depends really. You dont buy them with cash, you have to buy them with Microsoft points. I think you can download Transformers in HD for about 570 points. You can get 1000 points i think for £8.50. If you were to download it in SD it costs less points. I love xbox360 so much that have both a normal and an Elite!

[prolfe]

Microsoft will release a Blu-Ray add on for the xbox so it will effect you a bit less if you have one of those. And it will be a good thing for XBox users. They could of seen game releases on two HD DVD's as opposed to a single Blu-Ray DVD.

The difference between normal dvd and blu-ray is massive.

Check out Planet Earth.

Try LoveFilm for DVD rentals - they are excellent. They have a blu-ray section as well, bottom left.

Blockbusters have blu-ray films as well. We went in a while ago to get Die Hard 4.0 and all of the two panels of DVD's were out. But in the blu-ray bit they had one left, was most pleased

[Desertfish]

Microsoft launched a download service for Xbox Live. Some of the films are avaliable in HD. I understand that most people like to own films but lets be honest, unless its a really good film, how often would you watch them again? I agree with dansansome, i think High Def films will go to on-demand. When you think about it, internet connection are getting faster and cheaper. It will get to a stage where you'll be able to download the lastest movie while your at work without the hassel of going out to rent or buy the film. Think how much time you'll save not having to find a parking space ect. Thats why im not really all that bothered which format wins. Oh and one last point, Betamax was way better quality than VHS. VHS won in the end because it was cheaper to make. So much for the consumer getting the better deal!

A couple of thoughts here:

First: Like Hagis, I wasn't all too bothered about the whole HD vs Blue Ray battle as well and told myself I would look into it once I bought an expensive TV. Well, I just recently upgraded from a normal 28" TV to a 37" flastscreen. The improvement in image quality is already such that at the moment, I'm still not bothered about HD or Blue Ray.

Second: With HD and Blue Ray movies coming onto the market now, the prices of normal DVD's have dropped so much that if you're willing to wait a month or two after the release date you can pick up a DVD for the same price as you would rent it. You watch the movie a second time and you already got your money back...!

Anyway, the above two are just my personal opinions and I'm completely aware that someone else might have different idea's about this.

Third: Don't be so sure about the whole internet thing... Which way it's going to go is still uncertain. Nearly everyone cen get 24Mbps broadband at the moment. The technology is already there to wack this up to 100Mbps over the same copper line. The problem with this though is that IPS's are looking at extreme costs of upgrading their networks in order to support this capacity of data transfer.

Up until now, we've been in the golden age of DSL. With the adven't of the whole .com industry, BT and other providers put so much fibre in the ground I'm surprised the roads didn't lit up. When the whole .com industry crashed, there was about 90% redundancy of cabling in the ground which has up until now been used for DSL. But now with so many people having 24Meg broadband, ISP's selling VoIP and IPTV, the capacity is running at it's limit... Why else do you think that ISP's are capping your monthly download's?

ISP's won't carry the cost of the expensive network on their own so at the moment, they are finding ways to pass this cost on to the consumer by giving you a cheap internet connection with a download limit of about 10Gig. You can't download that many movies with a 10Gig monthly download allowance... So what do you do, you pay more to increase your download capacity.

Another problem is that content providers at the moment don't really need to pay to make their content available on the internet. ISP's at the moment are under the impression that this should change and in my opinion they're right. Why should the increased cost of maintaining theyr networks be passed on to the consumer only? Then again, if content providers are going to be charged for the previlage of putting content on the internet, in the end it will be the consumer that will pay the bill...

Downloading might be fast and easy but don't expect it to be cheap...

(Sorry for the long post guys but I haven't been around for a few weeks so I thought I would be easily forgiven for writing an essay... . How's everyone been by the way...?)

[cpiddy7]

I see what you're saying there about internet speeds but look at it this way. You could start to download a couple of movies before you set off for work and by the time you get home they would be downloaded.