Who is going to win the Blu-Ray/HD-DVD war? - Page 2

I can't find two movies on that 2 for 1 sale that I want to own. I pick Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but then I can't find a 2nd that I want to have. I already have POTC: Black Pearl coming as one of my freebies. There are no other flicks in the list that I'm dying to own.

Eh, for a buy one get one, I just found a couple that I did not own that I thought would look good on HD. I grabbed Blu-Rays of Deja Vu and Apocalypto, and for an average of $15 each it was worth it, I think.

Umm get a $200 standalone toshiba player. You'll get better sound through the analog outs. I'll probably pick one up around christmas depending on sales.

Most Circuit City's have a nice deal going on for bother BD and HD-DVDs right now. Kind of BOGO, but really, buy 2 and get them both for half price.

I picked up Transformers, Casablanca, The Deer Hunter and Bullittt - $55. I'm going back for The Adventures of Robin Hood and... something else. It's only good for discs < $30, so it leaves out a few good titles, but not a bad deal really.

From comingsoon about the HD-DVD release of Transformers:

"Additionally, the smash hit has exploded into the high definition market, selling over 100,000 HD DVDs its first day of release, rocketing past previous releases to become the best-selling day one high definition title on either format since their inceptions. Transformers has sold over 190,000 HD DVDs in its first week making it the fastest and best-selling week one release on either high definition format as well as the best selling HD DVD ever. The Transformers DVD is also the top-selling October DVD release in the history of the home entertainment industry."

HD DVDs are quite popular , but still it is difficult to say that they are better.

Huh?

Sorry I took so long to respond to this, but I remember reading that the first step in the NTSC telecine process is slowing down a 24 fps movie to 23.976. This is the framerate that the vast majority of film-sourced ntsc discs run at, and ones sourced from interlaced laserdisc masters can still be made to go at 23.976 fps through inverse telecine (extracting the 23.976 frames per second from the 59.94 fields per second). When you play it back on a normal television the dvd player has to apply pulldown to make it go at 29.97 frames per second / 59.94 fields per second. If you have a progressive scan player and an hdtv you can watch the actual 23.976 frames per second. Either way, the movie is being slowed down by .1% before it's even put on the disc.

Let's remember that all the Spider-man movies come to Blu-Ray next week, which is still October.

Well, I think you're WRONG!!!

Hehehe. Actually, you sound very well informed and are probably right about it. So I will ask you a question to pay homage to you.

If a film is slowed down to match the NTSC rate, is the audio altered in some similar way as well? Or is the difference between the two rates negligible enough to leave it alone? The two rates are really close, but I feel like the audio would get noticeably off-sync by the end of a 2 hour movie.

The sound is slowed down also. Your average two hour movie would run about ten seconds longer, so yes, quite noticeably off-sync.

I'm learning new stuff all the time!

Still, HD video isn't where it ought to be. Even though the Blu-ray camp touts it's 2-to-1 movie sales over HD-DVD, and the HD-DVD camp trumpets it's record-breaking sales of Transformers, they're bragging about a pathetic share of the home video market. HDTV's have been on the shelves for far too long for there not to be a clear-cut option for HD home video. And still, even with Transformers selling 190,000 HD-DVDs in the first week, the standard DVD sold 8.3 million in that same time. So when Sony rolls out the press releases in a few weeks about how Spider-Man 3 on Blu-ray is shattering HD sales records, I wouldn't feel compelled to share their enthusiasm. They're fighting over scraps.

You hit the nail on the head. 8.3 million vs. 190,000 is just embarassing. Even with the price difference in the two formats the HD movies are barely a blip on the radar. If this was released on dual formats like 300 it still wouldn't have broken 400-500k I bet.

Side note, holy shit is that a lot of money for Transformer DVD sales. Being conservative that makes 170 million dollars in one week.

I'm going to say shill. A few half-assed posts so he can be on the "in" and then comes a DAN IN REAL LIFE thread.

Regular as clockwork.


Or a time lock...


Precisely.

Blu-Ray 2 to 1 HD-DVD
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=9390

Well, I took the plung and jumped into the next-gen DVD player market, at this point I am a little overwhelmed! On Sunday I went out and picked up a 37" LCD HDTV as an impluse buy (I couldn't fit the 42" in my car, I plan to upgrade when I borrow a truck in the coming weeks). When I got home and hooked it all up I threw in one of my favorite DVD's, 300, to see what it would look like and I was disappointed in the quality, it was very grainy and pixilated. The only way I could describe it would be like throwing in an old VHS tape into a player that needed cleaning. So Monday I went down to Best Buy and picked up the HD-DVD player for the X-Box 360 ($176). The offer was just too good to pass up. The player itself comes with King Kong and this week there is an offer of Heroes Season 1 in HD for free. I also get 5 movies by mail via a rebate for free. The only downside is they limit which 5 movies you can get(one from each category):

A) Aeon Flux, Babel or The Italian Job
B) The Hulk, Pitch Black or The Thing
C) Charlie & The Chocolate Factory, Swordfish or Full Metal Jacket
D) Firewall, The Frighteners or U2: Rattle and Hum
E) Black Rain, Darkman or Troy

I've decided to go with The Italian Job, The Thing, Swordfish, The Frighteners and Troy.

That's over $250 worth of stuff free for only spending $180 for the player itself(Since I already owned an XBox360). It seemed like a nobrainer but if Blu-Ray wins I guess I am screwed. I would like to also point out I am also one of the 190,000 that purchased Transformers in HD. Hey what can I say, I loved the movie!

So after that long story, I have a few questions for the knowledgable people reading this forum. Where do you get your HD-DVD\Blu-Ray movie reviews? I know AICN runs a few, but their reviews read more like they're shilling them then actually reviewing them. I wish CHUD had HD-DVD\Blu-Ray reviews. Also, what type of sound system is everyone using? I have to pick one up in the next few weeks I was leaning towards a Bose but if someone out there has a sub $3000 one that kicks ass... I'm all for saving money

Swordfish over Full Metal Jacket? No.

Well, I was going with the special effects of Swordfish over Full Metal Jacket that and seeing Halle Berry's ta-ta's in full HD glory.

I am prepared for the flames, but 300 is not crystal clear on HD either. The director purposely added a ton of grain to most scenes to give it a "feel" of antiquity and grittiness. The HD and Blu-Ray versions both show a ton of this grain. Yes, the overall picture is much more sharp and it does look better in Hi-Def, but the grain in this film is almost painful to look at.

I have a friend who bought an HD-DVD player a while ago. He checks http://www.dvdtalk.com/ and http://www.highdefdigest.com/.

I haven't taken the HD plunge yet so I can't say if these sites are any good. But I do vouch for my friend. Hope those help.

Just to be clear, you should NEVER buy Bose. It's overpriced stuff that audiophiles will make fun of you for buying. There are tons of home theater sites that'll give you instructions/reviews on how to get a decent setup for not a TON of money.

The important thing with any setup now though would be its ability to decode audio from HDMI. That's the best way to get lossless/HD audio and will ensure any future hardware will be easy to connect. The advanced audio components in HD-DVD and Blu-ray and Super CD's even can only be output over analog or copy-protected formats like Firewire or HDMI. HDMI seems to be the standard going forward.

Also to get on a high horse for a second, if you bought a 37" knowing you'd return it in a few weeks to buy a 42" one, I'd like to call you out on that. I used to work in customer service and dealing with returns is such a pain in the ass. If you know you don't want something, don't buy it.

That was pretty much my reaction when I saw the film projected digitally during its theatrical run. I couldn't stop noticing the square-shaped grain.

Also, this process called 'crushing' they used on 300 to make it look more painterly. What a crock. Watching the special features, I thought it was something more than just boosting the contrast and extreme color timing. But that was pretty much exactly what it was.

Never buy a Bose. Those demo booths are tailor made to show off the strength of the system and hide all the bad stuff.

I'm so hesitant to jump in to this. It took me long enough to just get the HDTV for my 360 and for HD sports, and I only did it because of Bioshock and a great deal I found on an LCD, but the prospect of investing a few hundred bucks in a losing format is worrying.

Although that 360 player deal isn't that bad... 200 bucks to get the player, King Kong and Transformers, then 5 free movies? Is that 'King Kong included' deal still going on?

It's really tough watching regular DVDs on this HD screen... it's like a regular TV hides all the DVD's flaws or something. Just a matter of time before I switch over, but I can't pull the trigger.

How do regular DVDs look when upscaled to 1080p with one of those cheap players? And don't HD-DVD players upscale regular DVDs as well?

I've found that it depends on what kind of HDTV you're watching a DVD on. I've seen Batman Begins playing on an HD-ILA (I'm not sure what it stands for) and went I took a close look at the screen it was horrible. Obviously, you're not meant to watch the TV an inch from your eye. From a normal distance, it looked fine. Perhaps it's just my brain trying to make up excuses not to want an HD-DVD/Blu-Ray player with every fiber of my being, but DVDs on an HDTV still look fine to me. I kinda like the haziness of it. Feels like film! Ha ha. While watching stuff in HD makes me feel like I'm watching the digitally shot Star Wars prequels all the time.

I'm sure if I got one, I'd get accustomed to it easily.

As for upconverting players... I was under the impression that they only really got upconverted to 720p (and I'm pretty sure the new players upconvert DVDs). But I'm probably wrong. My friend and I did a comparison between a regular DVD player and his Toshiba HD-DVD player. He had two copies Sin City on DVD. Both players had the same disc. The upconversion did look pretty nice. It wasn't a huge change, but it was noticeable. They both looked good on his 42 inch plasma. But his TV can't display 1080p. Its native resolution is 720p.

Never seen the effect of a cheap upconverter, but on an Oppo it's hard to tell.

Whoops... duplicated. Damned free wireless...

I've seen a player that upconverts DVDs to 1080p, so they are out there. And not expensive, I was just curious if anyone had one and could vouch for them.

I just want this to end so I can continue my movie collection, I've only bought 3 DVDs in the past 4 months. It sucks that I had to get Transformers on regular DVD because I haven't gotten a new player yet especially since I know how good blu-ray and HD-DVD look. Watching Apocalypto, Casino Royale and the new Fantastic Four (shit film but looks simply amazing) is just a completely different experience. So I'm getting antsy.

Yeah, I've got a PS3 and it does 1080p upscaling (and is supposedly one of the better ones for that kind of thing). I think it's still painfully obvious HD vs. non-HD content. Of course, it also depends on the transfer. It's not too hard to get a transfer for an older movie that doesn't look particularly good.

Still, when they get them right, they can look great. I rented the Blu-ray of The Searchers a while back and was blown away at how it looked. I was less impressed by others. All the new movies look pretty good though. But yeah, I never mistake an old DVD for an HD disc.

Just to be clear though, I've got a 57" 1080p DLP set though so that could be why. If you're running a smaller LCD monitor it might not be as noticeable.

Good to know about the audio stuff, I'll look into it further. As to the returning of the 37". My logic at the time of purchase was I wanted a nice TV for my xbox 360 and I wouldn't mind watching primetime in HD and I'll just get this now and then buy a 42" closer to Christmas time however having been so disappointed in DVD's on the HDTV as well as non HD channels ....

Quick response about 300, it should have dawned upon me that the movie was that way.. DUH! fuck. I remember it being grainy and gritty in the theatre I quickly threw in another movie a few minutes ago and no where near as bad but still you can see a lot of 'wear' on the picture. I put in Armageddon this time, FYI anyway...

Having been so diappointed in DVD's on the HDTV, I've realized that the only way I could have 2 HDTV's in my house is if I went the whole nine and bought HD DVD players for both rooms and new entertainment centers\Stands for both rooms and new surround sound for both, which was a considerable financial undertaking that I am not prepared for at this time... thus the return and get a bigger HDTV plan. Like I said in the other post, completely overwhelmed!


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As to the question about King Kong, it is included in the XBox360 HD-DVD player box. Just look for the sticker on the top that says "includes King Kong" or something like that.

Even with Transformers sales - and no comparable blockbuster Blu-ray releases that week - HD-DVD as a whole still lost to Blu-ray in total sales for the week it was released. Even under ideal conditions for HD-DVD to win the total sales battle over Blu-ray for a week, it lost.

HD-DVD is a loser. That doesn't mean that Blu-ray is going to be a mainstream success - sales of both are very, very low compared to DVD - but HD-DVD is definitely the worst bet right now. Less discs sold, fewer players sold, technically inferior, less studio support.

Seriously, what's left? Cheaper standalone players? Right now the people buying standalone players are enthusiasts who want the best picture for their 55"+ HDTV, not the general consumer market at large. Enthusiasts aren't going to be swayed to one format or the other by some cheap ghetto player deal at Wal-Mart. And the price gap in players is closing fast anyway.

Wow, you really can't stand that HD-DVD. The truth is that both formats are pretty decent. Really the only difference between the two is the amount of disc space that is on Blu-ray and the required Ethernet on HD-DVD.

Most videophiles have said that they think HD-DVD looks as good (if not better) than Blu-ray even with its lower capacity.

The truth is that HD-DVD is good enough for most people and it's cheaper. Plus, I think it actually generally has better movies coming out for it (no matter how you break it down). And if you look at momentum, Blu-ray isn't gaining any, it's all HD-DVD.

I want to be clear here though, I own a PS3 have watched numerous Blu-ray movies and would actually rather it win to save me the hassle of buying a new player and so that at some point down the road the extra capacity could be useful. But you've got to be honest, HD-DVD is surging right now.

Ok, time to take this post apart. I'm not afraid to spin, I am an HD-DVD supporter and fan. So let's go.

Correct, it lost 51:49. But are you aware of the BOGO promotion that BD smartly threw out to counter Transformers? Folks have been gobbling up the first two Pirates movies in spades as a result. Smart, smart move by BD to offer up the BOGO the same week as Transformers. Had they not done this Transformers would have easily won the week for HD.

Fewer players? HD-DVD has sold more stand-alone players than BD. "HD-DVD 53% of sales; Blu-ray players, 44%; dual format players, 3%." BD fans love using Amazon sales numbers to show how much more impressive the sale of BD disks is over HD disks. Check out the Amazon sales numbers on HD vs. BD disk players. HD players are selling much, much better than BD players.

A limited nbr of sub-$200 players hits WalMart this week, they will go like hot cakes. And this month the 3rd generation players hit stores for less than $300. And "Toshiba estimates that 5 million HD DVD drives for desktops and notebooks will be sold during fiscal 2008"

And technically inferior? Please. Only in capacity. HD disks on the market have many more technical improvements/bells and whistles than their BD cousins.

As for studio support, I agree this one is tough. It really bugs me how I can't get Die Hard or Independence Day on HD. But I think the Universal/Paramount/Dreamworks tri-fecta (not counting WB since they do dual) is a huge boost. Sure Spidey 3 will sell a ton of BD disks but watch out for Shrek on HD.

The price gap is not closing that fast. And each time it closes the HD players get closer to that magic price-point for mass acceptance.

And here is my absolute favorite thing to remind folks of. The PS3 natively plays BD disks. There are 2 million PS3s sold in the US. That immediately gives BD a 2 million advantage in potential movie buyers. That alone should have killed HD. The fact that it hasn't just goes to show how much HD is in for the long haul and ready to take on BD.

Eh, I don't hate either one, and don't think the technical difference is really important to sales. But the capacity advantage is there. And it does look like Blu-ray is winning the overall movie sales battle big-time.

I've argued the very same point. But that's really the ONLY advantage that Blu-ray offers. Do people really care that the HD could look slightly better? Are these are the same people who don't notice that SD stretched wide isn't HD?

The point is that right now if someone said, "I want to buy HD movies because I just got this fancy HDTV, what player will I buy?" They'll either buy an HD-DVD player or nothing because they're not willing to spend MORE for a movie player (Blu-ray) that's just as likely to lose.

I think if Blu-ray had players that cost just the same as HD-DVD they'd have the advantage. No cost difference + built-in PS3 players = an obvious advantage.

As it is now though, most people aren't buying a machine just to play Blu-ray discs. The fact that the format itself isn't driving sales is what gives people pause about its ultimate success (although the whole BD-J 1.1 profile/incompatibility thing is really stupid).

I just think it's hard with such minimal number of sales, that a 2:1 RATIO isn't a huge lead. All it would take is a strong holiday season of people buying HD-DVD players (due to stand-alone players higher movie attach rate) to start to significantly close the gap between HD-DVD and Blu-ray.

I hate I hate I hate seeing clueless people have the best systems! I think to myself, "I KNOW HOW TO USE IT! I SHOULD BE MINE!!!"

They watch 2.35:1 movies stretched thin and have no idea there's anything wrong. And as you said, there are people who watch SD on it and think it looks SOOOO clear! This stuff is just a status symbol for them. They buy it because everyone else is.

But why should I care? They bought it to feel good and they do? Do I really need to call them out on their ignorance and reduced their joy?

ABSOLUTELY!!

Hehehehehehe.

Personally, I love format/product wars. For every negative it throws at a consumer there is almost always a positive to counter-act. I really wish players from both makers dropped, I'd love to get my hands on a Blu-Ray player. If (not when) they drop to sub-$200 I'd snatch one up in a heartbeat. Hell, if I remember correctly I think I paid close to $400 for my first DVD player back in '98 or so. Since I have the 360 add-on at $179 adding a $200 BD player would still be cheaper than what I paid for the ol' Sony DVD back in the good old days.

And my favorite pro-HD-DVD counter to the 51:49 news of the week:

49% of HDM disc sales / 300,000 HD DVD Players
vs.
51% of HDM disc sales / 3 Million BD players

I'd consider myself an informed consumer, I own an HDTV, and for what it's worth, I have a PS3, and every time I go to the blu-ray/hd-dvd sections, I can't find shit to buy for blu-ray and look longingly at the selection of hd-dvds. Me and my friend often try to buy something that's mindless fun to just enjoy the benefits of having blu-ray players, and would gladly sacrifice some of the resolution/capcity benefit to have a better movie selection.

I know this will inevitably get resolved down the line (hopefully?), but I'm already strongly considering buying a standalone hd-dvd player this xmas and ditching my PS3 (on which nothing gets played except to use it as a DVD upscaler).

See, I'm not trying to "spin" anything, and I don't have a stake in it either way. I was just giving my observations. It probably sounds like I'm coming on strong for Blu-ray, but that's because that's how the evidence seems to be pointing to me.

HD-DVD's supporters being out-manuvered isn't something in HD-DVD's favor, you know. Both sides have run similar promotions for free discs, so this is hardly a unique stunt on behalf of Blu-ray. And this was supposed to be the make-or-break title for HD-DVD if you believe the HD-DVD supporters...and yet, HD-DVD still lost the week.

And how exactly is winning one week important if you've been losing 2:1 over the year as a whole like HD-DVD has? When a marketing gimmick negates your biggest blockbuster title to date, what does that say about HD-DVD?

So let me get this straight, you're ignoring the importance of a 2:1 advantage in sales of actual movies, but are spinning a 9% advantage in standalone player sales as "much, much better"? This looks especially silly when you consider that PS3 sales are swamping the sales of standalone HD-DVD players by about an order of magnitude. And Sony just released a new, cheaper PS3. How many of those do you think will sell over the holidays, a few million? Kind of skews the playing field in Blu-ray's favor, doesn't it?

Stand-alone players are only a small minority of the total players. Omitting the other players is disingenuous, especially since their use is the only explanation for Blu-ray's sales advantage over HD-DVD. A player is a player is a player if the owner is buying movies, which sales sure say they are.

A limited number, meaning not very important to the overall picture. How many PS3s do you think Wal-Mart will sell by comparison?

And you don't think there will be cheaper Blu-ray players for the holidays, too? There is already a cheaper PS3. Standalone HD-DVD players will probably stay cheaper than standalone Blu-ray players this year, sure, but cheaper players haven't really helped HD-DVD take off so far...it has only gained them a marginal lead in standalone players. Which are only a small minority of total HD players.

Their estimates have been notoriously unreliable so far.

Capacity is apparently why the HD-DVD of Transformers doesn't have lossless audio. Whoops.

That "tri-fecta" accounts for only a small minority of studio releases, and most of them are there only becuase of a short-term agreement with Toshiba that paid them to be HD-DVD exclusive. When that expires in about a year, do you think they'll stay HD-DVD exclusive, or try to follow the sales leader, Blu-ray?

Ultimately studio support and movie sales are going to decide the format war. Blu-ray has better sales and and better copy protection and region coding, all things that studios love even if we don't. Hence more studio support, which leads to higher sales, which leads to more studio support, and so on.

And yet HD-DVD movies sell far worse than Blu-ray movies. Isn't that funny?

Way to spin a massive disadvantage as an advantage! Blu-ray has a massive advantage in installed base of players compared to HD-DVD when you factor in the PS3 (and even when you factor in the unpopular xbox 360 HD-DVD player). That's probably why Blu-ray sells so many more movies and why so many more studios support Blu-ray. You can't discount PS3 becuase even though it isn't 100% utilized as a Blu-ray player, there are so many of them that they skew the entire disc sales landscape in favor of Blu-ray, and movie sales are ultimately going to drive studio support, which in turn drives movie sales based on title availability.

HD-DVD needs some kind of massive coup to overcome their disadvantage in installed players (of all kinds, not just standalone) and much lower overall sales compared to Blu-ray. Somewhat cheaper standalone players don't strike me as the answer when Sony has essentially infiltrated Blu-ray players into the consumer market with the PS3 at a radically higher level of sales than any of the standalones.

At least, that's how it looks to me. Though I'll be the first to say that neither format is especially popular in the grand scheme of things, or likely to have mainstream success anytime soon.

Maybe the issue for Blu-ray is that the studios that are supposedly 'supporting it' like Fox and Disney aren't putting enough movies out. Sony typically makes pretty crappy movies and Warner Bros. puts their stuff out for both (although HD-DVD got the Matrix stuff first).

That means realistically, when you look at what's available on either HD-DVD seems to have more quality movies. I mean, unless you really love Stealth.

Still, it's hard not to get excited by this:

Haven't you heard of, I don't know, amazon.com? :P

Selection for either format isn't that great IMO.

Even on amazon, I find way less for blu-ray than hd-dvd. Believe me, I've looked.

way to ignore the final bold lines:

You're saying that the fact that it has a 10:1 advantage in players but only a 2:1 advantage in sales is a sign of its strength? I'll agree that the larger install base has helped it gain a lead but not as much as it should have.

If sales were 4:1 or 5:1 I'd be more impressed. The truth is though, that people who own Blu-ray players buy 1/5 the number of format specific movies of HD-DVD owners do. Is it because the movie selection sucks or because they don't realize the PS3 actually plays Blu-ray discs or what? Who knows.

This really just means that if HD-DVD can double the number of players it's sold (not too hard since it's just 300K more) it'll be at the same number of movies that Blu-ray has. Meanwhile, Sony would have to sell 1.5 million more PS3's to see that same increase in movie sales.

The number of different titles offered on each format is almost identical last I checked.

EDIT: official U.S. title tally as of 5/31 for each format: HD-DVD - 207 titles released, plus 54 more announced. Blu-ray - 241 titles released with 40 more announced. (that's the most recent number I have handy)

Not the number of GOOD titles offered on each though.

Exactly. Children of men? Army of Darkness? 40 Year Old Virgin? Knocked Up? Transformers? Batman Begins? Serenity? Hot Fuzz?

It isn't really a matter of being "impressive" though. Neither side is impressive sales-wise if you get right down to it. But the Blu-ray players of all kinds are in the houses in much greater numbers, the standalone player advantage for HD-DVD is small in spite of the much-touted price advantage in standalone players, and the movie sales are all going Blu-ray's way.

HD-DVD bringing cheaper players helps them, of course, but Blu-ray player prices are droping as well, so there is no reason to expect some kind of huge paradigm shift where suddenly HD-DVD players sell 10x as well as Blu-ray players when the small price difference didn't make much difference before.

Really, I think the studios are ultimately going to decide this. They're going to follow the sales, and Blu-ray's better copy protection and region coding will be the icing on the cake. It's hard to see how HD-DVD will suddenly close the gap when the one advantage they're touting most (cheaper players) is the one they've always had that hasn't done much of anything for their movie sales yet.

That's an interesting mystery. There are a number of possible answers:

1) Fewer PS3 owners have HDTVs, and thus wouldn't benefit from the improved format,

2) Poor title selection (although that's pretty subjective- I own an HD-DVD player, and I'm considering getting a PS3 if only to watch the LOST S3 discs), or

3) It's a PS3-As-Blu-Ray-Player misconception. Whereas owners of the XBOX add-on/standalone players have made a conscious decision to purchase their HD-DVD player (implying that they plan on watching many high definition films!), PS3 owners don't necessarily have to make the same conscious decision. I'm sure there are plenty of PS3 owners who don't give a shit about high definition movies- maybe they're only interested in the games, or maybe they're unaware of the benefits of HD. Or, like I said, maybe they don't own an HDTV. The point is, if you go out and purchase a product designed only to play HD movies, you're probably going to purchase more discs.

EDITED OUT: comment on igc's trolling.

Blu-Ray discs have superior capacity. That's about it. The disc sales trends are negligible to this point, because so few discs are sold for either format. If I have a lemonade stand and I sell two glasses of lemonade, and you have a lemonade stand that sells four, neither one of us is going to go acquire Coca-Cola.

Strategically, they seem to be at equilibrium. The most important question is how many $200 HD-DVD players get out there this season. No matter how much you want to claim that Playstation 3 is important, it's not. Because of a lack of games, I bought 9 Blu-Ray discs. They were a waste of money, because I don't watch them that often. The presumption that college kids are going to be buying enough $30 movies to beat back the tide of standalone players in the long run is laughable. Standalone players have always been dominant, and a minimum $400 videogame system that doesn't come with a proper remote or fit well in many entertainment centers isn't going to change that.

Finally, I'll echo Soul's point: BD movie selection is awful. Frankly, none of the good Die Hard flicks will even benefit from HD, and they're some of my favorite movies. I'd love to be able to watch Hot Fuzz, The 40 Year Old Virgin, Children of Men, and Knocked Up in HD. Instead, I can get crap like Stealth and Gridiron Gang. Awesome.