The quick answer is yes…or maybe.

Everyone has been talking about how the Blu-ray/HD-DVD war is similar to the VHS/Betamax war of the 80’s.  Format wars seem to have skipped a generation and didn’t really come into play with the DVD.  We are not that fortunate when it comes to this newest format of the century.  Right now, it only makes sense to consider the move from DVD to Blu-ray or HD-DVD if you have recently purchased an HD television set.   Will the difference in quality/resolution make you want to make the switch?   You all remember VHS and the move to DVD, right?   This could be a similar comparison because HD-DVD and Blu-ray offer fantastic resolutions.   Movie make in the past few years have mainly been shot in digital format.  This will make a huge difference is the quality and resolution that we will be seeing in our home theaters.  Your Blu-ray or HD-DVD can never be more clear than the original that it is made from.  Many companies will re-release remastered versions of their old libraries.   I don’t really care if I get an remastered copy of Star Wars or E.T., but I would love to experience the new films originally recorded in HD in the new formats.  The clarity and interactivity are bound to amaze you. 

In viewing films on both a Blu-ray and an HD-DVD player, I was quick to put HD-DVD ahead in the race.  HD-DVD looks great on a small 27 inch screen.  King Kong in HD-DVD was quite possibly the clearest movie that I had ever seen in my life.  The Blu-ray player was also nice, but didn’t offer the clarity that I found on the HD-DVD player.  This was only a quick test, but HD-DVD won the format war in my book.  One of the major factors in this war coould be the price.  Blu-ray units are currently running for several hundred dollars more than HD-DVD players.  The most affordable HD units are currenltly offered by the Sony Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360 console units.   The PS3 can currently be found for about $500 with a Blu ray player included.  The Xbox 360 is selling an add on unit for about $200.   I have tested both these units and they look wonderful.   HD-DVD players are usually plagued by slow loading times, but the Xbox 360 unit loaded a disk in under 30 seconds.  The Sony PS3 unit loaded and played perfectly.  If you have one of these units, you will most likely be the first to truely experience the HD revolution.  THe PS3 in currently offering 1080p resolution, but I hear that the Xbox 360 has offered firmware upgraged that will offer the same resolution.  Currently, the Xbox 360 HD-DVD unit only offers 1080i resolution from the optional  HD cable.   

To give this issue a little “real world” perspective, I have have come up with a few figures.  I own 400 DVD’s and I would estimate that I paid an average of about $13.00 for each disc.  That comes out to $5,200.  Wow, that sounds like way too much to pay for friggin’ movies.  The same Blu ray discs would run you around $30.00 a pop and end up costing you $12,000.  You can buy a car with much money.  I suggest that media companies offer a trade in value if you own the disc in the DVD format.  They should give you a $7 credit if you turn in a DVD version of an HD-DVD or Blu ray disc that you are purchasing.  That is just my idea, but how many times can I buy Indiana Jones?  I own the VHS and DVD copies already.  We should have all known to sell those VHS copies of movies when DVD was first released, but for some reason, it just kills you to sell a movie that you spent $20 on for about $5.  It kills you even more when the same VHS sell for 50 cents today.  You can’t even unload that crap on Amazon because the shipping charges would eat up any profit.  Don’t let that happen to you.  Start unloading your DVD’s now if you plan on upgrading to the High Definition formats. 

Both formats offer considerably better resolution than the standard DVD format.  Both formats have seen dramatic hundred dolloar or more price drops since the middle of the year.  Several companies are developing media players that will play both HD formats.  The players in development will not be released for at least a year or longer.  Several television and movie studios have already made partnerships with one of the formats, but once a clear winner is picked, all of the media companies will have no choice, but to join.   It has been debated that DVD, HD-DVD, and Blu ray will become obsolete because of the emerging streaming video to television market.  That still requires huge bandwith that cable and satellite companies are many years away from being able to provide. 

Heck, why am I writing this?  I have no clue to what format will win out, but I dread the day when I can’t even sell my used DVD’s for more than $1.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 29th, 2006 at 6:38 pm and is filed under HD Content. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.