ISE 2012: Top 10 Intriguing Products
Super Bowl: The Ultimate Home Theater System
Inside Former New York Giant Amani Toomer's Home Theater
Neat-O: Wired for Prime Time Makeover
Print
Email
Comments (36)
Share
Are Blu-ray, HD DVD Incentives Changing the Format War?
Both the software and hardware sides have seen heavy promotion.
Here in Canada, retailer Future Shop (a subsidiary of Best Buy) is promoting select Blu-ray and HD-DVD titles at 2 for
There are rumors raging across the blogosphere that Circuit City is unloading their HD DVD player inventory, not as a "get ready for the new model" move, but as a strategic shift toward backing Blu-ray.
At press time, Circuit City had not supplied me with an official statement on their position.
Reading the sale flyers in my mailbox for the past few weeks, the retail offers for Blu-ray have been extremely aggressive. Through the big-box retailers, Panasonic, Sony and Sharp have all been offering free Blu-ray players bundled up with flat panel televisions.
Some industry watchers (myself included) have called foul on this, asserting that getting a free player with a TV you would have bought anyways is hardly indicative of swelling consumer demand. (Especially considering that Panasonic and Sharp are industry leaders and the darlings of Consumer Reports in the plasma and LCD categories, respectively.)
But is any of this indicative of either HD optical disc format gaining traction with consumers? Or are these last ditch Hail Mary plays on the part of both camps?
In my opinion, bundling hardware along with TV purchases seems like a last ditch effort to increase the installed base, even at the cost of devaluing the product as not just a commodity, but a freebie.
Even though more industry watchers are declaring HD DVD's death, I can't help but wonder if the Blu-ray camp knows that they have a limited amount of time to press their advantage before HD downloads make the whole struggle moot.
With iTunes' now offering sales and rentals of HD movies and with the expected growth of media centers, you don't have to look to far into the future to see the end of the sidewalk for physical media.
Last March, tech guru Paul Kedrosky described the format war as "two dog packs fighting over a decomposing bone." His quip is starting to look even more correct than it did a year ago.
So far, we know what's going in in retail, and we always know what the fanboys on either side who fill up the comments section think, but I'd like to hear input from integrators about what's actually happening in custom.
Are any of you installing any players that aren't a Playstation 3? What are your clients asking about, and how are you answering them?
Let us know in the comments below.
Lee Distad is a freelance CEDIA Certified Professional Designer who offers design and process consultation to firms in the Custom Installation industry, as well as copy writing and other professional writing services. Lee’s business and industry blog can be read at http://www.leedistad.com
This story was updated at 1:00 PM EST to fix the price of Future Shop's promos, as pointed out by commenters Daniel, Craig and Stephen.
Subscribe to the CE Pro Newsletter
Read more Blu-ray stories
Kaleidescape vs. DVD CCA: Judge Rules Against Movie Servers‘The Art of Flight’ Represents State-of-the-Art Blu-ray
McIntosh Adds XR Speakers, MVP891 Blu-ray Player, MC8207 Amp
Director Ridley Scott: Streaming Media Stinks
ISF Blu-ray Demo of the Month: Jeff Beck Live at Ronnie Scott’s
More in Blu-ray
36 Comments (displayed in order by date/time)
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.
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.