I have been advising and selling my clients DVD Players that upconvert to 1080; because if you persuade them to choose either format which happens to be the format that looses the war the first question you receive is why did you sale me that player?...I followed your advise your the expert.

I to have been selling upconvert DVD players also.  I had a client go with HD DVD in their main room as they had a PS3 in the second room.  They preferred HD DVD since the used Netflix. 
Most clients were planning on HD DVD as the payer and the discs were more affordable until the Warner decission. Now they are considering Blu-ray but are holding off since they really can’t justify $30/disc.

I’m taking advantage of the HD DVD disc sales myself.

I’d like to know what HD video on demand or HD Pay Per View sales are compaired to Blue Ray and HD DVD.

I’m tired of the HD download argument.  I DO NOT WANT HD DOWNLOADS.  I want to be able to hold the movie I own, not have it sitting on a hard drive waiting to get corrupted. 

Those HD dowloads on Itunes are sorry examples of HD, full of compression artifacts and no hires audio.  This is not acceptable to me.

Not sure I understand the Netflix comment above as Netflix supports HD-DVD and BluRay.

Where the heck is this Futureshop deal??? All I see is 2 for 50 Blu-rays!??

http://news.punchjump.com/article.php?id=5485

The official CircuitCity statement can be found here.

But basically, if you don;t bother w/ the link, the pertinent info is:

(from the punchjump.com article)
Circuit City stores will continue to sell HD DVD products at retail amid a recent clearance of stand-alone players at select locations.
A representative told Punch Jump Wed. that Circuit City will continue sale of Toshiba Corp.’s HD-A3 HD DVD player at $149 and the HD-A30 at $199.

The clearance of third-generation HD DVD players was said to be inadvertent.

Additionally, the representative said that over the last week Circuit City experienced strong HD DVD sales and will continue to remain platform agnostic.

Select Circuit City stores last week sold the HD DVD stand-alone players as clearance items as low as $100.04.

I am tired of uninformed authors, writing articles about the HD format war.  Anyone who has followed it all would realized that Amazon routinely runs specials on both HD DVD and Blue Ray movies.  To suggest that they are somehow in “Clearance” mode is ignorrant.  By the way, they are also selling 27 Warner Blu Ray Titles for up to 53% off… Oh my god… Blu Ray must be buckling!! 

That must also mean that Blu Ray was on “Clearance” all last year due to the Buy One Get One Free deal that Amazon ran for almost a year.

As for speculating on Circuit City’s motives, that is rediculous and only spreads rampant rumors and hearsay.

Get a clue man.  Do some research before posting Fanboy articles.

Let’s also state something that seems to go unmentioned.  Blu Ray currently has roughly 70% studio support and HD DVD the other 30%.  This is including the “exclusive” move Warner has made to Blu Ray.  Also, average statistics show that of all HD movies sold 66% are Blu Ray and 34% are HD DVD.  This to me translates to a win for HD DVD.  Look at it this way, Blu Ray has twice as many studios, so they should in theory sell twice as many discs.  Not happening.  Especially considering the stand alone installed base of HD DVD players is 64% more than all stand alone Blu Ray players combined, which doesn’t include the PS3 for obvious reasons.  Which also doesn’t include the 1 free Blu Ray that everyone got when they bought a PS3, which accounts for at a minimum 8 million movies.  Recent promotions have allowed even more free movies, so that number is certainly higher.

Those are the numbers.  Believe in that.

“Buy a stand alone HD DVD Player and GET FIVE FREE MOVIES!!” just seems to strike more than a few people as an act of desperation. Don’t come in here flaming because you called a winner before the dust cloud even started to rise and are now in need of a little preperation H.
When does a format war end? Who cares? It’s the momentum that leads one side to victory that counts, and it’s obvious who’s got it.
It also strikes me funny that no one wants to count the PS3s in the numbers game. Like they don’t matter, or count. I know I bought mine strictly to collect dust.

Just made a mental note to “read with caution” when I see Lee Distad’s name on a column.  The undeclared (insidious) anti-BluRay stance makes his comments suspect, and dangerous to the sheeple…

“Buy a stand alone HD DVD Player and GET FIVE FREE MOVIES!!” just seems to strike more than a few people as an act of desperation.”

Neil, maybe you missed it, but you get 5 free movies when you buy a Blu-ray player as well. Is Blu-ray desperate as well?

That’s an error. Future Shop has them 2 for $50. Not 2 for $25.

Will HD downloads replace physical media?  Yes, but not right now and probably not for awhile.  Downloading “POTC 3” took 3 hours on my Xbox 360 with a 8MBPS connection.  The quality was great but three hours?
For now downloads will be used in conjunction with Blu-Ray/On Demand/HD DVD. 
Instead of arguing whether downloads are as good as disc, which format is better, etc. we should be ecstatic that we have so many ways to access HD material.

The Blu-ray camp has to hurry to stave off HD downloads that will replace Blu-ray? ROFL!

Let me know when you have the bandwidth in your home for your 1080p streaming video at the same quality as Blu-ray discs, and enough hard drive space to save what you download.

See you in 2015 or so.

I am sorry to say that your are absolutely wrong.....futureshop.ca is offering 2 movies for 50 bucks not 2 for 25 bucks as falsely stated....boo...you guys should check your lead off info....

shame on u…

In my comment I was referring to ppv and on demand from cable, fios, or uverse. I am not a “fanboy” for any 1 particular HD format. From a businessman’s point of view I am interested in where Joe Consumer Prefers to get his content. This is CE Professional site .... isn’t it? I’m interested in what’s best for my customers and my business. Not what I prefer.

“two dog packs fighting over a decomposing bone.”

I disagree on this point. Online movie downloads and physical media, are targetted towards two different audiences. Online downloads cannot provide the same image and audio quality as you would get with physical media. A hidef movie that is compressed to 1Gig will have compression artifacts and picture noise, which make it un viewable in a large screen. However, it is the best choice for viewing in a computer screen or an iPod or similar device. The Blu-ray/HDDVD media on the other hands brings the best possible picture with minimal compression and best possible audio including uncompressed hires audio. So, the physical hidef media is here to stay.

My bad on the 2 for $25 typo.  Correction has been made.

We don’t count PS3’s in the Blu Ray player count becuase of the base of people who buy it.  For instance kids.  They want it for gaming, not movie watching.  Most people who own it don’t even know it plays Blu Rays or even know what a Blu Ray is.  I am quite certain that anyone who has bought a stand alone HD DVD or Blu Ray player knows exactly what it does, and what it plays.  The same cannot be said for PS3 owners.

These points of contention are all too passionate and interested to observe what is really happening.  And it is simply this...media markets are fracturing.  HD media will ultimately share the stage with downloads and old DVD tech.  I’m sorry folks but what you have here is the makings of a fabulously fractured marketplace.

1) Xboxers are embracing downloading as well as new school kids who have access to highspeed lines.  Further Sony is rumored to be revamping the PS3 for the Home store where they will also sell downloads. Add Vudu and Apple to that mix...that’s a whole lot of downloading starting to happen.

2) Look for Walmart, Best Buy and others getting into the download business along with NetFlix and BBuster.  But they need to maintain existing lines as well and will for a while...a whole division of profit can’t just be let go into the wind...and not given current economic conditions.

3) Finally, the average consumer doesn’t fully use DVD tech.  Many lack a TV to show progressive in 480. Further hi-res sound doesn’t mean jack if you are even listening to Dolby Pro-Logic (yes, many are that far behind).  1080P will become more mainstream over time, but hi-res sound will like SACD/DVD-A remain niche to truly high-end users that have the money for 1.3a receivers, 7 channels of speakers and the know how to blend in a sub to get great sound such as myself.

For at least those reasons, this market will remain very fractured for a lot longer than anybody in the tech community really wants to see.  Sorry, but facts are what they are.

I agree with Bryan; as various technologies evolve, what we see emerging are numerous ways to get HD content.  So what?  I don’t understand why the studios fear this (other than Sony, for obvious reasons).  They will be able to sell their content multiple times, in multiple formats, with the consumer choosing the format that has the best quality to utility ratio for his intended use.

To Jason’s comment,

Actually the people that really know whats what purchased a PS3 because its the ONLY future proof blu-ray player and HD player in general as HD-DVD loses.

Bryan’s,

LOL.. Walmart has already closed the doors to its movie rental service. What makes you think they’re going to open up a digital download store? Especially for HD content? A vast majority of their retail stores carry very few blu-ray movies and NO hd-dvd movies.

Most people rent their movies from Netflix or one of the others and that would be closer related to downloading than buying a hard copy. Also stop thinking about just USA in this. I live in Japan and have a 100MBPS connection and so do a lot of other countries and if you think any HD disk is superior to Discovery Chanel HD I would be shocked

Love Bryan’s comments.  I think he hit right.

To Jeremy,

The PS3 may be future proof, but if you aren’t using it for a Blu Ray player then what does it matter?

My HD-A30 will play all of the movies I have until either it dies, or I die.  It seems you are suggesting that if Blu Ray were to win the “format war”, that all of the sudden all HD DVD players would cease to function.  Even without studio support it will still play all of the HD DVD movies I currently have, and any standard DVD with a sweet upconvert for a long time to come.

I own a PS3 and an HD-A30.  1 Blu Ray Movie (which came with it) to 26 HD DVD movies.  I know my PS3 plays Blu Rays, but I would have rather paid $350 for it with a standard DVD drive, since I paid $600 for it at launch.

If I wanted a Blu Ray player I’d buy one.

And of all those 8 million PS3’s sold out there,… how many of them are hooked up via HDMI, to a 1080p television?  Given that the average consumer says 1080 what?, and thinks that S-Video is a great picture, I would say less than the majority.  Which would make it pointless to spend an average of $30 for a movie that won’t look any better than the SD counterpart for $15.

That’s my 2 cents.

Bryan was close but no cigar with his statement about 1.3a receivers being necessary for lossless codecs.  This is a widespread misunderstanding, since all that’s necessary is a receiver with HDMI 1.1 and a player that can decode the formats and output LPCM over HDMI 1.1.

I have HD Cable, Blu-Ray and HD-DVD.

HD Cable looks horrendous compared to either HD Disc format.  If HD downloads wins the battle and both disc formats go extinct, it would be a terrible blow to the quality of my home movie experiences.

HD Cable/Sat has all kinds of compression artifacts, the worst are during very busy visual moments when the whole screen breaks up into digital blocks.  It isn’t the kind of thing you only notice when you look for it.  It is obvious, distracting and ruins the immersion factor of watching a movie.

I can only assume people that promote it as “good enough” have never watched it on a decent sized setup… Anything, even SD-DVD will look good if you sit far enough back from a small enough screen.