Gizmodo
Where Blu-ray is a freight train of unrivaled weight and marketing might, backed by 13 of the world's most well known electronics and computer makers, HD DVD is a Little Engine That Could, the product of a much smaller group of collaborators that has gotten over each obstacle by simply thinking it can. Judging from early buzz, HD DVD should have been beaten long ago. Today, though, it appears healthy and gaining in momentum thanks to lower prices, less confusion about disc standards, less in-fighting among the format's supporters and a high likelihood of cheap Chinese models arriving soon. This piece answers the following questions: How in hell has the HD DVD camp lasted this long? And how will the format's backers stay competitive in the next year in the face of cheaper and more plentiful Blu-ray players?
In my recent research into the two sides of the format war, I have tried hard to steer clear of marketing mumbo jumbo on both sides, and examine real issues. As I shared in The State of Blu-ray, there's growing disarray among Blu-ray's hardware makers and confusion about hardware versions and player capabilities. HD DVD has by contrast proven to be surprisingly elegant—at the moment best demonstrated by comparing both versions of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. There's far less confusion and potential backstabbing, but that is to be expected: There are only two household names leading the charge on the hardware side, Toshiba and Microsoft, and they are not engaged in any sort of infighting. Toshiba was one of the companies most involved with the original DVD patents, and creating HD DVD as a blue-laser extension of DVD made good business sense, though not to Sony and others who were left out of that revenue stream. Regardless of its strong roots, HD DVD is run by a smaller posse with less overall reach, so keeping things clear and tight amounts to a survival tactic.
HD DVD has three things going for it that Blu-ray doesn't:
1. Players at lower prices
There's no doubt that price is the deciding factor in an embarrassing number of consumer-electronics purchases, and HD DVD—Toshiba's players—have been priced lower than Blu-ray players from Sony, Samsung, Pioneer and others. At the beginning of November, Wal-Mart dropped the entry-level Toshiba to $99 and apparently sold around 90,000.
2. A finished spec with fully compatible players
Whereas Blu-ray bewilders me with future capability promises and current competing standards, the HD DVD spec is by contrast remarkably sound. Every player meets certain standards, and while there's no requirement for 1080p video like in Blu-ray, there is a consistent requirement of internet connectivity, dual-tuner playback and local storage, which disc makers are now using for fun—and useful—interactivity. It is also becoming typical for combo discs to be released with DVD on one side and HD DVD on the other, making them eminently more compatible. (Blu-ray can't do this.)
3. Coalition members who are not in direct competition
It's easy for the HD DVD camp to work together, since there are very few who have traditionally competed in the marketplace. Because of pricing and product positioning, Toshiba and Microsoft don't vie for the same customers at all. And as others begin to market HD DVD players of their own, they approach different customers in different ways. Of course, you could argue that competition among Blu-ray's supporters is a good thing, but it has not yet led to the holy grail of competition: discounted pricing.
Who is joining HD DVD?
Many people can name five hardware partners in the Blu-ray camp (Hint: if they start with P or S, they're in). Nobody knows who else is getting into HD DVD besides its main founders, Toshiba and Microsoft, but in fact, other HD DVD players are already starting to hit the market. Here are three key players:
• Onkyo DV-HD805 ($900): distingushing characteristics include a Silicon Optix HQV Reon VX processor for upscaling old-school DVD content, and internal support for Dolby True HD and DTS Master HD Audio for natively outputting full-resolution sound. It's certainly a tweaker's special, and only makes sense if your speakers cost much much more.
• Samsung BD-UP5000 Duo ($800): Since this upcoming device
famously has stated support for Blu-ray discs that Sony and Pioneer won't be able to play, it's easy to forget that it's also billed as a fully compliant HD DVD player. But the reviews say it's a winner in both arenas.
• Venturer SHD7000 player ($200): Who? Exactly. That's what they said about Apex Digital when it came out with the super cheap DVD player. Venturer is living up to its name as the first cheap Chinese player to infiltrate American retailers but signs say it will not be the last.
What about Microsoft?
Microsoft's role in HD DVD may seem a bit mysterious. Besides selling the Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on drive, Microsoft helped write the HD DVD video spec, including VC-1 compression. It also licenses the HDi runtime engine, developed with Toshiba, that enables interactivity on Toshiba players and those of other licensees. HD DVD players don't have to have HDi, but at the moment, it's obviously the software with the most momentum. And software is the key to HD DVD's current successes.
Toshiba's HD-A1 and HD-XA1 players, rolled out first in the spring of 2006, were based on a 2.4GHz Pentium PC architecture, in other words, real hogs. The second generation players were moving on a 900MHz Celeron, and the third-generation HD-A3 has a 333MHz MIPS chip. The funny thing is, menus move quicker on the much more affordable third gen, because of Microsoft's improvements on the back end.
In a tear-down evaluation, industrial analyst iSuppli determined that the components of that first $599 Toshiba player actually cost the maker $674 before manufacturing, accessories and packaging. Though neither Microsoft nor Toshiba would acknowledge any losses, Kevin Collins, head of HD DVD promotion for Microsoft, said, "I don't know if they are losing money or breaking even," adding, "We work together to minimize cost." Jodi Sally, VP of marketing at Toshiba America Consumer Products, echoed: "All of this speculation that we're losing money is just speculation," she said. Working with Microsoft, "we've transitioned our lines three times to lower costs. I can't comment on profitability, but we have increased cost production and efficiency."
So whether you are using a Toshiba player or an Xbox 360, you are watching HD DVDs using a hardware/operating-system combo developed in large part by Microsoft. Given the fact that Microsoft isn't always known for stable and intuitive user experiences, it is even more amusing to see Blu-ray and HD DVD side by side.
Compare One Movie on Both Formats
When I compared Warner's Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix discs, the Blu-ray edition in a PS3 and the HD DVD in an Xbox 360, the differences were startling. Never mind that the HD DVD has an entire online component that the Blu-ray can't yet implement, with features such as mobile downloads and user-organized live screenings. Never mind that you could watch the entire HD DVD with pop-up actor-commentary windows on screen—if Warner had implemented this in the Harry Potter Blu-ray, it would have been compatible with exactly one currently shipping Blu-ray player.
The surprising thing was, even when you compared the exact same experiences, the HD DVD behaved much better. Every so often an icon appears in the top left corner of the screen, indicating a behind-the-scenes featurette about that particular scene. On the HD DVD, you click it, watch what you want to, then click Enter again to return to the point you left off in the main movie. With the Blu-ray, the system had no way of returning you to the movie; it could only dump you in the featurette menu, where you were stuck watching more of those. Sure, these problems could be Warner's programmers, and not a format issue, but Warner is going for as similar an experience on both, and it clearly can't do everything on Blu-ray that it can on HD DVD. Just have a look at the back of each disc:
The difference is still less subtle when comparing the two editions of 300:
As I discussed previously, Blu-ray has specifications for picture-in-picture, but to date, only one Blu-ray player that has shipped, the Panasonic DMP-BD30, will be able to handle the discs when they start making their way to stores in early 2008. Except for some rumblings from Daewoo, nobody has promised an internet-connected Blu-ray player, while all HD DVD players can. (Samsung's hybrid BD-UP5000 Duo has Ethernet, but only for HD DVD.)
The Hollywood Factor
Studio support was once Blu-ray's ace in the hole—none of this technical crap matters when the movies you want to watch aren't available in a given format—but ever since Paramount and DreamWorks announced exclusive publishing on HD DVD, even Sony chairman Howard Stringer feels a bit shaken. (Fox, Disney, Sony and others are still Blu-ray stalwarts of course.) Some say there's dirty dealing afoot, specifically alleging that Microsoft and the HD DVD group paid $150 million or so to Paramount and DreamWorks to go exclusive. When Michael Bay made these bribery accusations again the other day, along with the accusation that Microsoft was using HD DVD to destabilize Blu-ray in favor of downloads, Jordi Ribas, GM of the HD DVD Group at Microsoft responded:
Microsoft provided no financial incentives to Paramount or DreamWorks. Michael Bay's additional comments about our commitment to HD DVD are similarly unfounded. We have major technology investments in HD DVD...and have more than 100 staff at Microsoft dedicated to the success of HD DVD.The China Factor
People who are looking to Hollywood to determine the fate of the format war may well be looking in the wrong place. China is where HD DVD's secret to success lies, in a blue-laser format called CH-DVD.
The not-so-secret secret is that a CH-DVD player is an HD DVD player whose laser is set at a different modulation. While you could never play an HD DVD on a CH-DVD player, it is physically more or less the same product. Manufacturing can happen side by side, using the same components such as processors and optical pick-ups.
The funny thing is, HD DVD is known to be region-free—discs from one country can play in HD DVD players from another country. Many discs available on Blu-ray in the US are available on HD DVD elsewhere, making for a higher chance of piracy or at least quasi-legal trade. In our mind, CH-DVD can be an answer to that, an anti-piracy measure coming from a root technological difference. "I guess you could call it a region control," said Collins, "but the Chinese just want to have their own format." Whether this separate-but-equal policy helps the format burgeon, or whether rampant piracy itself is a sign of a healthy format, is for us all to find out.
The upshot of CH-DVD is that, if and when the time is right, China could flood the US market with cheap HD DVD players. Meanwhile, because of this deal, the likelihood of a similar Blu-ray flood gets slimmer. The Venturer is here; keep your eyes peeled at Wal-Mart, Target and other discount big boxes for the next models.
Does the China threat faze Toshiba? It's nice being the one in the spotlight, but Toshiba is well aware that it will soon share the stage with competitors. "There's always a business for a Tier 1 brand in HD DVD players the way there is with DVD players," says Sally. Increased competition will come at the higher end, with combo players from Samsung, LG and possibly Denon, and the premium Onkyo I mentioned above. All of this is good news to Toshiba. Sally adds, "Increasing household penetration of HD DVD players is good overall for the format and for the software [movie] sales."
Black Friday Stalemate
On Black Friday 2007, both the Blu-ray and HD DVD camps released numbers saying they were the overwhelming winner. HD DVD announced it had reached 750,000 in total home penetration (including the Xbox 360 drive). Blu-ray said that it had 2.4 million homes, presumably including PS3. Microsoft argues that all Xbox 360 HD DVD drive purchasers are using them to play HD DVD movies, while not all PS3 buyers are using the game system to play Blu-ray discs. While this is obviously true, there is only unreliable guess work to determine exactly how successful the PS3's Blu-ray drive actually is.
The point is, the format war is far from over, and it's wrong to write off HD DVD now just because it has fewer major japanese manufacturing giants 100% behind it. There's still some time before this whole thing shakes out, but because of the organization and proper planning of the HD DVD camp, Blu-ray no longer looks anything like the predestined victor that it once seemed.
Comments
The picture is hilarious.
If Thomas the Tank Engine is HD-DVD, I know where I will invest my money to support my childhood memories.
HD DVD always seemed like the logical successor to DVD to me. Like TV to HD TV. Its prolly not going away any time soon and this dual format thing has slowed down adoption of either tech so much that downloadable HD movies may be where the future is at.
Pretty good summary. Lost in that analysis, however, is the manufacturing issues around disc production -- and area where HD DVD again has an edge because it is not quite the "leap" ahead that BD was meant to be.
I believe that reasonably priced (i.e., $350) dual format players are what will bring this format war to an end.
I was staying out of this next gen otptical battle. however, the $100 Tosh A2 was too good to pass up. One day, if all the movies I want don't come to HD-DVD I'll get a PS3.
What will bring and end to the format war is if they JUST WORK TOGETHER. I don't care about director commentary or picture in picture. I just want 1080p movies with 5.1/7.1 surround sound for 20 bucks. I want a 1080p capable player for 100 bucks. DONE.
"How in hell has the HD DVD camp lasted this long? And how will the format's backers stay competitive in the next year in the face of cheaper and more plentiful Blu-ray players"
MS is wealthy enough to loose billions a year on home entertainment and not bat an eye.
Toshiba is so damn large it can't be fathomed. Their CE division is huge and funded by DVD sales. They can subsidize that division with the sale of Nuclear reactor components, or other heavy industry sales.
Don't be fooled. Sony may be 'big' but even with all the other content companies and CE BD is at a disadvantage.
Regarding the Harry Potter disc:
You fail to mention that the extras on HD DVD are good old fashioned Standard Definition while on the Blu-Ray disc they are in 1080 HD. This is directly due to technical advantages of the Blu-ray format and thus a big deal.
So on HD DVD you can get some online feature and the "in movie experience" while on Blu-ray you get, you know, *actual high definition*.
What bugs me is that I the consumer want a good quality item with alot of storage. Blu-Ray almost fits it with the quality being lacking in user experience. Then again I hate all that extra crap anyway. BD has more capabilities in my mind nuff said but hey what do I know.
Wow, I thought Gizmodo's were Apple Fan Boys so it surprises me they are also fan boys of an MS-backed conspiracy (just ask Michael Bay). ;)
You also glanced over a huge disadvantage to the HD-DVD version of Harry Potter. Not only is the 45 minute long High Definition documentary on the Making of Harry Potter eliminated on the HD-DVD version, but all of the extras are in 480p. On the Blu-Ray disc all of the video features are in high definition, with the addition 45 minute documentary included. So it's basically pick your poison, as both versions have advantages and disadvantages.
Ah, Sony vs. Microsoft. My two favorite consumer companies. Let's see, on the one hand we have Sony, the company that tried to put a root kit on my computer, lied about it, and then botched the removal tool. And then we have Microsoft, the company whose vision of innovation is being able to make more and more stuff (such as Microsoft Office, Internet Explorer, and, quite possibly, Minesweeper) part of the Operating System.
Who to support? It is so hard to choose between two such worthy contenders!
I think I'll vote for movies on demand. I already have too many CDs, DVDs and books (remember those?) littering the house. In the future, everything is a stream of bit, available off the Internet, whenever you want it. And the future will arrive just about the time those sub $200 hi-def players go mainstream.
Wasn't there a (smaller) bru-ha-ha over DVD-R and DVD+R a few years back? Your media would only work in certain drives, and then, eventually, it didn't matter? I'm not sure, as I don't burn a lot of DVDs, but I think the burner I have in my Mac Pro can at least read (and possibly even burn) both formats these days.
Perhaps this is what will happen with Blu Ray and HD-DVD in a few years? Everything will just "work" and the consumer won't even care what format it is as long as it plays when they stick in their High Def DVD player...
High Def as in High Definition in general, not specifically an HD-DVD player (or a Blu Ray player for that matter).
While all HD-DVD players have an ethernet port, all Blu-Ray players output 1080P - unlike the lowest tier of HD-DVD players, which are also glacially slow and tend to hang when accessing the net (I have the HD-A2, maybe the A3 is better). All that said, Blu-Ray is about a year behind in terms of finalizing its hardware specs, which is why the only Blu player I would buy now is the PS3, since it is among the cheapest and has the greatest potential for upgrades (via its gigabit ethernet port).
Everyone talks about how Blu-Ray has more studio support, but the thing of it is, if you check the list of titles:
Blu-Ray
[bluray.highdefdigest.com]
HD-DVD
[hddvd.highdefdigest.com]
There are 427 Blu-Ray titles in release compared to 382 HD-DVD titles. That's only a difference of 45 discs. It's not the significant difference you'd expect from Blu-Ray having that much more studio support.
In fact, the HD-DVD library is 89.46% the size of the Blu-Ray library.
I'm saddened that I know that it is Thomas the Train and NOT the Little Engine that could. Fix the pic!
Both formats are on the clock. If they don't penetrate the market soon, they may never get the chance. If holographic discs reach the market in the next year or two, it's clear tech superiority may put it ahead in a hurry. The longer the two industries fight, the more likely they'll both become irrelevant.
meh...who cares...until someone comes up with a plan that does not force me to buy the 100s of DVDs I already own all over again at full cost, I am not going to commit to either BD or HD. Neither is a compelling enough leap technologically to make it worth my time or money.
@Jordan Lund: it is also logical to factor in the head start HD-DVD had over Blu-Ray, number of movies already released is not enough evidence to argue the number of studio support. Whats more important is the number of titles releasing weekly now, and the coming year(s).
The Onkyo player was recently recalled after releasing a handful (literally) in Europe.
@CHILICOKE
You can use those two links to see upcoming releases as well...
I also found it interesting that out of the 427 Blu-Ray titles, only 286 of them are exclusive to Blu-ray. This compares with 241 exclusives on the HD-DVD side. (Again, a difference of 45.)
Of the future dated releases there are 57 HD-DVD (33 exclusive to the format) and 73 upcoming Blu-ray releases (49 exclusives).
This is not the tidal wave of titles that Blu-Ray fans would have us expect.
Betamax, MiniDisc, MagicGate, UMD and now Blu-Ray?
Is there no end to Sony's incompetence when it comes to formats? With everything in its favor to crush HD-DVD as a format, the fact that they haven't done so already is a loss and a signpost to the inevitable.
Love that, on the HD-DVD Harry Potter...
THE REBELLION BEGINS!
I own both a 360 with the HD-DVD drive and a PS3 and I can tell you without reservation that I like HD-DVD better. I will concede that at least on the Harry Potter DVD that Bluray's "extra content" is in HD where the HD-DVD extras are in SD. HOWEVER dMek I feel is incorrect that this is because Bluray is a better spec. It's just the simple fact that there is more space on the Bluray disc itself.
I read that HD-DVD should have a triple layer disc that levels the space lead Bluray currently has.
@CruJones: Didn't you see the M$ Zune ad's posted all over the site earlier this morning?
For me, the format war boils down to the game system. I hate, hate, hate the 360 for it's noisy fans, crappy interface, 12lb power brick, horrid design, and the fact that everything is an 'add-on'. BUT... it has the games. And if I'm going to have a machine to play games and watch movies in HD I just prefer it to be one-in-the-same. So... I HAD to get the HD DVD add-on for the 360.
I would LOVE it if the PS3 had games, but without games it's just a huge Blue-Ray DVD Player with an awkward remote. It's definitely got superior hardware, is nice to look at, quiet, etc... it just has no games like Mass Effect, Halo 3, BioShock, etc...
As a result I'm forced to put up with MS crap. But rest assured - once some games hit for the PS3 and developers start really taking advantage of the RSX Engine, I'll eBay the hell out of my 360.
Like I said several times on topics like this one... the only thing that matters to me in new gen formats is:
Who will release a cheap ass drive recorder with cheap ass media first?
My sight is crappy, so TV or HDTV doesn't really matter.
Hell, I can be plenty satisfied watching VHS...
And for all I read from both formats, HD-DVD is way closer to achieving that than BluRay.
BluRay needs to consolidate a standard fast. I've read too many problems while trying to play BluRay movies, mainly due to each BluRay player using a different set of standards thus causing major problems.
@Tehrab: Yeah, the Playstation format sure was a failure... It was over aa decade of dominance (and the worldwide fate of the PS3 is still an open question), which is just about exactly how long DVD will last as a standard, primary format.
@axiomatic: Yeah, but by the time triple-layer HD DVD rolled around Blu-ray would have finalized it's spec with PIP and internet connections across the board, so the point is moot. Basically for the next year it's "do I want internet extras" or "do I want HD extras". And in a year Blu-ray will likely have both.
@axiomatic: I, too, have the X360 HD DVD drive and the PS3. Unlike you, though, I have no preference between the two from a visual/features standpoint -- although I don't have a ton of HD discs in my collection. My concerns are more estoteric, and there's a +1 for each side:
(1) PS3/Blu-ray: much quieter, but Bluetooth remote is laggy
(2) X360/HD: Loud! But the remote is nice and responsive.
That's really about it. I think some of the other differences -- the differing audio encoding formats, for example -- aren't things that the average consumer using average equipment can distinguish.
@jriga: Not to beat a dead horse, but: Resistance, Motorstorm, Warhawk, Heavenly Sword, Skate, Rock Band, Guitar Hero 3, Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty 4, Uncharted, Ratchet & Clank, Unreal Tournament...
The "PS3 has no games" argument just isn't true anymore. Maybe you like the 360's "exclusives" (don't count the PC!) more, but that's not the same as the PS3 having no games.
you know...
what the hell are we suppose to do with the DVD's after we get an HD or BR player?
i have 4 boxes full of movies...I'm not planning on restocking all of them to HD DVD's or BR.
screw this war...
List games that are exclusives and don't suck.
PS3 games that can be had on other consoles: Rock Band, Guitar Hero 3, Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty 4, Unreal Tournament
PS3 games that aren't console movers (which is what the PS3 needs): Motorstorm, Warhawk
So you've got Resistance, Uncharted, and Ratchet & Clank left. Not really worth $399 to me.
Thomas the Tank Engine contains lead paint... very poisoness comments.
hd-dvd has to connect to internet to get options that it can not hold
because the disk is small. Menus options on hd-dvd is limited to
a generic layout with a SD loop playing in the back ground because again
lack of space. The format won't last as technology changes like dvd.
Blu-ray because of it's compacity of 50 gigs can change with time and get
better, whereas hd-dvd is limited.
This was the best article I have read on the format war. I learned a lot from it. And I am happy with my decision to purchase a Toshiba HD-DVD player. I am a 360 gamers as are my kids. I am happy that I did not get the 360 player simply because if I want to watch a movie and the kids want to game (or vise versa) we can do it. The price to get a PS3 and then another Blue-Ray player is just not worth it. All the games we like are on 360 and many are not on PS3 as someone else mentioned. But that being said had I been able to pick up a BR player for $200 or less I might have went with BR. So after reading this article I am glad I went HD-DVD.
@iDeadman: You can play DVDs on either HD-DVD or Blu-Ray drives. They're backwards compatible.
@iDeadman: Both HD and BR players also play DVDs, in fact they also upscale DVDs to make them look a little better.
@dagamer34:
LOL that flame war was settled 10 months ago and is thankfully not to be revived here.
Even before I get a chance to read this post - GREAT illustration again Jesus! You get better and better!
@tomaartist: Exactly, HD-DVD just seems like a kludged solution, like they hacked a DVD to make it store a little more data on it.
I recall on black friday the sales on Amazon...where they offer consumers a chance to vote which item of 3 gets their super low price. The 3 items were a blue ray player (Samsung I think), an HD DVD player (Toshiba) and the Tivo HD player. The HD DVD player garnered 38% of the votes winning the vote. Second was Tivo. Third was Blue ray. I thought that was pretty interesting...mind you, I'm not yet in the market for either just yet but I'm trying to keep abreast of things.
To those saying the 360 is loud. It is, but only when playing games.
When the HD-DVD drive is in use it is far more quiet. In fact, my 360 is actually up on my desk and I just popped in a HD-DVD and can not hear it spinning.
But as I said, the internal DVD drive on the 360, INSANELY loud.