Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD: the war is over
By Marques • Feb 17th, 2008 • Category: Entertainment, Lead Story, News
The two-year dispute between Sony’s Blu-Ray and Toshiba’s HD-DVD has finally come to an end. Consumers play a major role on the final decision.
The fall of the axe on the HD-DVD started before Christmas with Nintendo not managing to supply all the demand for the Wii, which led thousands of consumers to choose the PS3 instead as a gift, which reads Blu-Ray discs.
The next big blow came from Warner Bros. when, on January 4, announced that would drop the HD-DVD format and go exclusively with the Blu-Ray format for high-definition discs.
While, up to now, the format war looked still far from the end, everything went downhill from here for the HD-DVD. After Warner Bros., Paramount/Universal, Netflix, Best Buy and lastly, two days ago, Wal-Mart all announced Blu-Ray as their choice. Even Microsoft (and early supporter of HD-DVD) mentioned that it could consider using Blu-Ray on the Xbox 360.
…and the end…
According to the japanese public broadcaster NHK, a source at Toshiba confirmed the announced dead:
We have entered the final stage of planning to make our exit from the next generation DVD business
What I find somewhat weird is that, although they are going to pull the plug and stop development and support for the HD-DVD players they sell, Toshiba will still keep selling the existing stock. Isn’t this ripping off the customers?
After the move, which will cost Toshiba hundreds of millions of dollars, they’ll have no other choice than to start producing their own Blu-Ray players if they want to stay on the high-definition discs market.
Do you own a HD-DVD player? What is your take on this announced death?
Others talking about the dead of the HD-DVD format:
- Toshiba pulling the plug on HD DVD already? – Yup it’s over. – at Engadget
- Market sources claim Toshiba to give up on HD DVD format – at TechWhack
- Toshiba to withdraw HD DVD support soon – at qj.net
- Toshiba Confirms Withdrawal from HD-DVD – at RealTechNews
- It’s all but Official: HD DVD is Dead – at Practical Technology
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News is a little old but it still sucks. hd-dvd was much better and not run buy Sony. I guess the only thing that matters to these companies is what kind of kickbacks they get.
Hey Valparasio , I agree news is old but from my point of view Sony is good , I can say it is the best.
Both formats are good.
* It’s not over until the fat lady sings, even Steve Jobs of Apple Inc., an important member of BDA, referred to Blu-ray as a failure. He said that while Blu-ray may beat HD DVD in the so called format war, it has lost the battle to dominate HD content distribution, and that’s true for many reasons, including the expensive nature of Blu-ray, its anti-consumer limitations and the bullshit politics in how it may “win” in the first place.
Anyway, I think I’ll leave it at that because I think I’ve said some very good points which were validated by not being challenged at all ;-)
P.S. It doesn’t matter who wins in the grand scheme of things anyway. This is not the second coming of DVD, and it will never be.$$$$$$$$…