BizSpots: Blu-ray, Infogrames, Saitek, 10tacle, Vicarious, Gala-Net

uh, lamprey, if you cant see a VERY noticeable difference between blu-ray and standard dvd then your insane (or in great need of an eye check-up). the ps3 recently had an update that upscaled standard dvds to 1080p and they STILL dont hold a candle to blu-ray. the colors, sharpness, AND sound are all way better on blu-ray. maybe your LCD just sucks, i dont know. actually, yours is 32 inch and the only 32 inch 1080p tv on the market is from sharp, which means you may be running blu-ray in 480p (or 1080i if your tv supports it, but even 1080i looks incredible for blu-ray movies). so, yeah.....its your tv.

I justified my PS3 as a cheaper BluRay player, then after buying just a couple movies on both HD-DVD and BluRay I realized the picture quality isn't that much greater on my 32-inch LCD HDTV. I'm back to buying movies on DVD since they're waaaay cheaper. You can buy the first 5 Rocky films on DVD for the same price of the first one on BluRay. And almost everything is getting to the $10 mark on DVD (except really new stuff). I don't think the DVD format is going to be abandoned for quite some time, and as cheap as DVDs are being priced, I hope it doesn't.

uhhh, satan yoka, spider-man is sony pictures buddy. sony could release it exclusive to blu-ray if they wanted.

Clearly none of you seem to know who controls the format war.... THere are two things that will determine who wins.One beeing Walmart and the other being porn. Seeing how Vivid video has chosen HD DVD and Walmart will be pushing HD DVD along with a slew of basemant price HD DVD players this Christmas, I would not hold my breathe on Blue Ray. Walmart sells more DVDs than any one else in the world, and they sell those DVDs for about $5 off of retail for a few days when they come out, they approached both manufactures and demanded cheaper players and disrtrobution of movies at a better price.... Gues who came up with the right numbers... that's right it was HD DVD. They are going to have Toshiba drop the mail in rebates and switch them to instant. Walmart will also be pushing "cheaper" HDTVs. So I think we can say looks like Betamax, MiniDisc,UMD and Blue Ray will have one more thing in common.

satanyoka, "@Evinco_DX: Yay HD-DVD is kicking Blu-Ray's ass, can't wait for Spiderman 3 on HD-DVD!!!! lololololol" Are you serious... Blu-Ray launched later and is in the lead... you need to get your facts straight...

"I own the HD drive for the 360. There are few titles that I want to pay three times the amount to own over regular DVD. " Same here, except I have a PS3, and there is no way I am paying 30+ dollars for a Blu-Ray movie. I definitely rent them on Netflix, but it would have to be a very good movie to get me to buy something on Blu-Ray at its current pricing. DVD to Blu-Ray is not an amazing upgrade at the moment, as someone else said. Your mind only wants to perceive that the video quality is much better, because your wallet is so much lighter after buying the system to watch it on. I imagine it works the same way with the transition from DVD to HD-DVD. I can definitely hear improved sound though - uncompressed and all.

Forget the blu-ray drop, drop the PS3 price.

Come on infogrames, come out with Star Control 4. Although I wonder how many gamers today know what Star Conrol is.

All this hub-bub over the BluRay and HD DVD formats makes me chuckle. I own the HD drive for the 360. There are few titles that I want to pay three times the amount to own over regular DVD. Its nice and all, but it isn't replacing my collection of DVD's yet. Cutting the price of their player is a step in the right direction, but the format will not catch on until everyone can afford to buy it, not just technophiles. The DVD format was brought to the forefront by the PS2, the first DVD player many people bought for their home...for games no less. Sony thought they would strike twice with the PS3, but the market is not able to sustain the change over to HD format yet. Most people still do not play their games on a HD set. They could care less about changing over their movie format until it is as cheap as DVD. I remember the difference between VHS and DVD. There was no contest, but even I have to admit that going from DVD to HD DVD or BluRay is a little underwhelming...

LosDaddie: "Cheap blu-ray players might be one of the worst things for the PS3......that is until Sony can get the PS3 price at or under $300." Yeah, I can't wait for the year 2034 either.

The Blu-Ray price cut is in respones to Toshiba having a $100 price cut on their HD-DVD players for a month (or a $200 dollar if you buy a Toshiba HDTV). In the first week of the HD-DVD price cut hardware sales went up 10%.

Cheap blu-ray players might be one of the worst things for the PS3......that is until Sony can get the PS3 price at or under $300.

did it drop prices in canada too.

@Evinco_DX: Yay HD-DVD is kicking Blu-Ray's ass, can't wait for Spiderman 3 on HD-DVD!!!! lololololol

well i am pretty hyped about sigma at end of the month and lair in july so guess to each there own

its not the price of the console, its the games. There are no games on the ps3, it feels like buying a blue ray disc player to me at the moment. I seriously would just spend in on a cheaper xbox with more and better games (yes, lots and lots of games are owning ps3 games on xbox). I am not trying to be biased, but no games on the ps3 that is available now even made me turn when i walk past the shelf, that's just bad marketing strategy. (not only does sony's launch titles stink big time, there are no highly anticipated, or even anticipated games coming out, guess we gotta wait until heavenly swords).

ArchAngel2284: $200 price drop on the 60gb would be nicer some time down the line, even though sony would lose money Did you know Sony already loses $150 for each PS3 console that is sold? A week ago, Sony stated not to cut the prices of the PS3. Duh.

HD DVD players are now priced at $299 vs paying $499 or $599 for a blu ray player.

$200 price drop on the 60gb would be nicer some time down the line, even though sony would lose money, but what ev, i don't plan on getting a ps3 this yr as it is, or a bd player either, or a new tv for that matter. sheesh

gmayronne you said it man. Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Spider Man, and Pirates. 4 Great series made even greater on Blu Ray...drool. And 2 of them have no chance to see the light of day non HD-DVD and im sure Star Wars and LotR wont come out in high def until only one high def format remains

luckily i can afford to own a 1080p sharp aquos and a ps3 with hdmi (baaarely affording this) and i must say, blu-ray is clearly the way to go with movies. the picture is incredible and the sound is so crisp and clear. i was watching pirates of the carribean dead mans chest the other day on blu-ray and was totally blown away. seeing every individual hair, pores in skin, and how blue and crystal clear the water looked was truly jaw-dropping. i cant wait for star wars, lord of the rings, and spider man to hit blu-ray, movie-heaven.

*mah PS3 fanboy comment...* WTF?!?!?!?2? thats just plain broken...

Now Sony HAS to drop the price, everyone is just waiting for it, and if they don't, people will just end up buying something else to entertain them this christmas.

IMO - neither HDDVD or BluRay will become standards. By the time HD tvs have any kind of market share in the US, ondemand services over high speed internet will be the prevalent. High capacity disks will be relegated to a niche market of home theater enthusiasts who think nothing of plunking down $15k+ for A/V gear.

[quote]So as of now HD-DVD/Blu ray are more of a novely for movies and not much else.[/quote] Not hardly. The number of pixels in a high definition release are roughly the same as your average movie theater version (approaching 2000 pixels). There is now 4K technology for theaters, but the human eye can't detect any difference beyond current 2K (i.e. HD/BD formats). To call it a novelty is ridiculous and anyone who says so obviously has never viewed a true high definition movie or they wouldn't be saying such silly things.

[quote]come on - u guys actually still buy dvds - netflix & burn & return seems to be growing and growing[/quote] Never since 1) I like to have the original packaging and disc, and 2) Unless you have a double layer burner and double layer DVDR, you are losing a huge amount of information and taking a quality hit. This completely undermines the point of DVD.

come on - u guys actually still buy dvds - netflix & burn & return seems to be growing and growing - i agree that this is a good way to counter piracy - it will just take longer to compress into a divx vid.

and some of you guys said gamespot is anti-sony, psshaw!

Price cut at least $200 would be nice. :)

A $100 drop on a BR player which is now less expensive than the top of the line PS3, which was somewhat marketed as a cheaper way to get into HD movies and content. I don't however see the PS3 dropping in price anytime soon for the simple fact that the gaming division is loosing money for a myriad of reasons; I could be wrong but who knows.

To be frank, a $100 price drop on the PS3 is not only far fetched at least for this year, but it wouldn't even make much of a difference anyway, as $500 is still way too much to pay for a video game console that you have to pay $60 per game for. Hell even if the games were $20 each, $500 is still too much for a console IMO.

I'd be pissed if I was a New-Yorker gamer

Infogrames really needs to step up. They haven't really had any good sellers for a while.

Well, they aren't gonna cut the price for the ps3 now, but I bet ps3 that they will this holiday season if sony is smart.

Mkeegs79 - The DVD will be phased out EVENTUALLY, but it'll be slow going. Hell, VHS is still around after 20 years. As long as DVD players are made, there'll be DVDs. Severe_Gamer - Agreed. The winner of the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray battle will be the premier format for video for a good, long while. True high-definition is a beautiful thing, and with HDTV prices dropping quickly, these formats aren't going away. Sony may have been grossly premature putting Blu-Ray in the PS3, but people here better not act like people aren't going to want HD sooner than later.

Anyone who has seen a movie in true (meaning: not unconverted) 1080 or even 720 knows HD-DVD and Blu-Ray aren't novelties that will wear off. In addition, the increased storage size of Blu-Ray allows for glorious and totally uncompressed sound. A lot of people are focusing on the HD video these new formats allow for, but with Blu-Ray, you will also be hearing the difference. Note that you need a minimum of $3,500 of speakers to really take advantage of uncompressed sound, but, since you can buy individual speaks, you don't have to spend that much all at once.

DVDs are not staying and the HD-DVD or Blu-Ray format will stay! DVD will slowly faze out. All movie studios will continue to push the formats because it is more revenues for them! DVD is already mainstreamed pirated around the world so companies want something a "little" more protected! They don't want to continue to lose sales. That is the number one reason! Get used to it! It's coming and staying John1912! If people really don't care then they shouldn't be getting hdtvs in the first place!

Price cut would be nice

now, i like how that sounds. "lower production costs". lets hope the price of the ps3 drops just like the blu ray player did.

$100 Price cut!? Wishfull thinking by those that can't afford a PS3. Maybe if you can't afford it... you really shouldn't get one. It's like trying to get your hands on a Ferarri when you should just settle for the Corvette.... though I wouldn't mind settling for a Corvette. :/

"can someone enlighten me why blue ray is important?" For the most part it isnt too important, in 3-4+ years it prob will be. All HD-DVD/Blu Ray disks do is just store data. Standard DVD is like 8.7 Gigs, vs 25-50+ Gigs on Blu/HD. So for gaming, it "can" offer more HD quailty video, and cinematics (Dont think affects in game graphics at all, least not yet, im not clear on what impact space differences are for games running in native 720p/1080p are, but I dont think its much of an issue) So basically its for Video, or keeping the few games that need it on 1 disk vs 2-3, HD video has like 5x the pixils of standard TV, does it look 5x better? No, prob like 2x better. Many of the pixils are redundant and moving to fast for the human eye to really absorb. So as of now HD-DVD/Blu ray are more of a novely for movies and not much else.

goldeneye_basic, you can bring more sales to more people if you drop the price to a certain level. So, yes. dropping the price can lead to better sales. The only time you rase the price is if the item is a fad where parents fight over the product.

Increased demand != price drop

pondarosa, maybe you should explain what you are laughing at? The increased demand for cheaper standalone blu-ray players is a FACT. And blu-ray is winning the format war if you haven't noticed. These are people that just want blu-ray for less than $600.00. But don't play games. Next...

MS would counter any Sony price drop, this could be fun to watch.

HD-DVD players are considerably less than BD Playrers at the moment. << LINK REMOVED >>

this could mean the ps3 might have a price drop which would be instrumental in increased sales.

Nice, Blu-ray is coming along very well. I'm glad the PS3 upscales as well, I did not want to re-buy any titles I already have.

I also have an HDTV and have not moved away from DVD. I have a large collection and I'm VERY satisfied with the image quality. When a winner emerges, the formats begin to cooperate or the prices get nice and DVD player low... I might jump in.

Sony should just join the hybrid club and make blue/HDDVD players.