Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler DVD or Blu-ray - why not both!

Back when DVD first came out I spent a ton of money replacing many of my favourite VHS tapes with DVD’s, thinking that since they last forever it was a good investment. Now I own a Blu-ray player, one, in my HT room. I have a DVD player in my Van, my notebook computer, two other rooms in my house and 2 portable DVD players one each for my kids.

Now when I go to the store to buy a new movie, I am stuck with what format to purchase, and I am too cheap to buy both, suspect I am the only one. So do I get the DVD so my kids can watch it everywhere, or do I get the Blu-ray, so they can only watch in one room, but with better quality?

I have a great idea that will solve this problem. Since most people won’t buy both formats, and the cost of mass producing these disks (Blu-ray or DVD) is tiny (must be less than a dollar each), why not put both disks in one box and charge a few bucks more. Now I don’t have a decision to make. This would surly drive not only Blu-ray disks sales but blu-ray players also. The adoption of the new format by the masses would be that much faster. And since you are charging more for both, but not as much as if you bought them independently the value to the customer goes way up. It becomes a win win scenario. The companies would actually sell the same number of disks, but at a higher profit margin and the consumer doesn’t feel like they are getting ripped off, this equals real value to the customer. This seem like a no-brainier to me. Why hasn’t anyone put this into practice yet?

I even suspect that there would be a large part of the population that doesn’t have a Blu-ray player would buy the “combo” set because they know that Blu-ray is eventually going to be the dominant format.

This morning I bought the new Star Trek blu-ray (the one at Best Buy with the model Enterprise the stores the disks in the saucer sect – VERY COOL). I would have gladly paid a couple bucks more to get the DVD also.

You thoughts???

paul

My Up!, and Monsters, Inc. Blu-rays both included a DVD. I believe all Disney titles are that way now. Actually for the Snow White release you picked if you wanted the DVD box which came with a bonus Blu-ray, or the Blu-ray box which came with a bonus DVD.

Up included a DVD recently, and I'm sure there are others.

Chris is faster on the draw.

Disney does that since parents need to play the disks everywhere for the kids. That was the great advantage of HDDVDs as they able to print on the same disks.

I wouldn't pay more for a DVD included in a blu Ray, they already charge extra for the Blu Ray compared to the DVD alone. I do like the idea of simply including a DVD with the Blu-Ray as you said, it most likely costs a dollar more on their end to produce both and in the end BR would displace the DVD as the norm as people would buy a BR player since they now have a BR disc. I may buy UP! and Snow White just so I can justify buying an Oppo to my wife

And riddled will nearly 50 words to before you could barely get 10 off.

It's cool that Disney does this, I didn't know that. Now it's time for the other movie copanies to do it.

paul

I blame my italics.

Wow, that was a serious misfire on my second volley. I wanted to say, "And riddled you with nearly 50..." I have nothing to blame but my brain/finger interconnect.

If internet bandwidth keeps getting wider and cheaper and people like us who want the absolute best quality we can afford and my generation which likes to buy tangible things passes the torch I thing all disk formats will become niche formats. Media-on-demand is the way of the future and I think most people will give up some quality for convenience.

As for Blu-ray specifically I don’t plan on owning that many title very soon. While the quality difference is extremely noticeable to me on the projector it’s less so on my HDTV but still better. Since there aren’t that many movies I watch over and over I don’t see needing to own that many titles when I can rent them from Netflix for under 1.50 a disk and have them here in a day or two at the most.

I can certainly see the advantage to “family” and “kids” titles being bundled but I don’t see the big selling point to the average user. Beyond that I don’t think it’s a great idea for Blu-ray’s marketing to promote a legacy format. I don’t recall seeing a lot of cassette/CD bundles or VHS/DVD bundles. Might make more sense for a HDDVD/DVD or SACD/CD bundle but not so much for Blu-ray which looses revenue the longer people buy DVD. OTOH it may certainly be an advantage to the studios releasing movies to bundle them.

Blu-ray’s total market and even market share will grow for some time but in the not so long run I imagine both DVD and Blu-ray will start loosing out to some Media-on-demand type format.

I'll believe in high-quality internet streaming when I see it. Maybe they can do it in Japan where average internet speeds are much higher. It's just hard imagining the US having proper speeds throughout. Everything's too spread apart, and by the time speeds are increased enough for the majority, maybe Super Hi-Vision will be on the new disc-based format.

Hi Grunt
I think the reason we didn't see cassette / CD or DVD / VHS bundles is that the technologies were so radically different. Both of those were moving from an expensive and clumsy tape based system to a very compact and easy to use disk system. The advantages to moving to CD and DVD were more than quality of picture and sound. Disks don't wear out, and it is quick and easy to find the tracks / chapters you are looking for, where cassettes and VHS required time and effort to do the same. That alone I think was enough for people to move to the new format. Not to mention there was still a large cost to alternate packaging for the different formats.

But with Blu-ray vs Dvd, there is no "convenience" advantage. It is simply media quality, and as you mentioned, the quality is better, but depending on what you are watching it on, the difference may be marginal, and many people might see the difference, I don't know if they care enough to spend the extra bucks.

For me, I now own the Blu-ray Star Trek movie, and can only play it in one room in my house. I can't take it with me to watch on a plane, at my cottage (if I had one), nor can I take it over to my buddies house, etc. And the real kicker here is I actually paid more for less convenience. Not a good marketing strategy in my opinion.
paul

Lets not forget the 8-track. You had to be a math major with a stopwatch to find a song if it wasn't the first one of each set. I'm not sure I could even describe the process to the younger crowd.

They should have labelled the tracks.

I have a few DVDs with "Full Screen" on one side and "Wide Format" on the flip side. I wonder if they could do that with Blue-Ray on one side of the disk and standard DVD on the other side. With the price of the players coming down I think the biggest hindrance to many people switching to Blue-Ray is the cost of the disks. Many people (including myself) just don't want to pay more than they already are for a movie they only watch a few times. If they charged more for the disks I don't think they will have enough sales to justify stocking them in stores.

I agree with Paul, since a BR player plays DVD's any way and there are a number of spare DVD players in a house/car etc. it is simply a matter of convenience to have movies on both formats right now and if BR(Sony)/Studios really want to push this new medium even further, I think a dual disc box is the way to go, no decision to be made, buy the movie and you have both formats. Once a person has a few BR's and their present DVD player dies or upgradeitis hits, I think they would seriously look at buying a BR player, at least I know I would.

Sure it's a great idea, but the studios will never see it like that. They'll see it as, "Hey, we can charge $5 more for this movie! Those sucker's'll never notice. Morons."

It's been done. And they charged more for it. Dualdisc, anyone?

I had many a self made 8 track Beatles tapes. Recorded directly off the Vinyl LP. Plugged em into the orange 1970 Maverick aftermarket stereo connected to the Triax speakers in the holes I cut into the back deck behind the rear seat. I was the schiznit. As far as 'splainin to the younger crowd:
The master was a Disc - just like today except bigger and it held less "data". Did I mention that instead of plastic it was vinyl? Instead of a laser there was a "tone arm" with a needle/cartridge. OH....and you had to have a "Discwasher" cleaner to remove the dust from the disc. Then you had to make sure that when were done with the "data" transfer, you put the big disc carefully back into its paper or plastic sleeve which, in turn, went back into its cardboard sleeve aka "album cover". Additionally the double album sets had a secondary function know as "seed separator" whereby seeds were meticulously removed from organic materials with the use of a Drivers liscense. But wait - maybe you are right - we'll never be able to describe it.

Nowadays we recycle vinyl for speaker finish.

When it comes to the dual formats(DVD and BR discs), it would seem the "movie-makers" might be doing quite the opposite of what the forum discussion here is recommending. I read somewhere recently that at least one of the studios (Paramount, I believe), was going to start introducing the Blu-Ray disc(new flicks) on its own well in advance of the standard DVD release. Obviously, to encourage, "just a little" those that don't have a BR player to go out and buy one.

Of course if you did market both the DVD and Blu in the same package, it would not be the same as a double album as it relates to the secondary purpose of seed separator. I think most would find them inadequate for the purpose.

We can always hope, but sadly I know it is true, Disney looks to be charging a bit of a premium for thier movies right now and I would guess it is due to the dual disc issue . then again a premium for Disney discs is nothing new.

Hey Paul,

I don’t disagree with the differences between the upgrade from the older media and the newer but extend that one step further and the ultimate convenience is portable digital media and media-on-demand (if they can make accessing it as easy as picking a channel on your TV).

I ordered the Star Trek movie from Amazon and it’s a three-way bundle, Blu-ray, DVD and Digital copy. I really think the future of bundling is going to be Digital copies. I think the model it will follow is that of MP3 vs CD quality. While there will always be a demand for top quality anything the vast majority of people will sacrifice a little quality for convenience any day, just look at all the people who shop at Wallmart.

I’m not declaring Blu-ray a dead or dieing format I just don’t think it will become as ubiquitous as DVD at the present prices. Even if you bring the prices down it will still have to compete with “on demand” and other “digital copy” formats. Blu-ray needs to offer some added value other than just improved PQ and SQ which many people won’t see much advantage from playing on a smaller HDTV and w/o a good sound system. Not many people are going to notice a difference in lossy vs lossless audio on TV or HTIAB speakers.

I think the biggest advantage for bundling by studios might be the convenience for them in only needing one set of packaging and inventory streams to their venders. I imagine that venders like Wallmart scaling back there shelf space may even push the distributors more toward bundling to target as many customers as they can with less shelf space.

@ Charles - While the U.S. certainly lags behind in high speed internet due especially to the vastness of rural areas most of the target markets are urban and just as the rural U.S. lags behind in electrification and telephone service it will continue to lag in high speed internet unless satellite service becomes cheaper. I don’t see this being a significant factor slowing the growth of media-on-demand. As more people want the convenience of media-on-demand providers will upgrade their infrastructure accordingly. It’s just that right now most people don’t care about high definition on demand content. It’s up to early adopters like you (I’m usually second tier) to drive the demand and infuse the telecoms with the capital to expand.

Cheers,
Dean

I guess it always frustrated me that when I purchase software; either record, tape, DVD, whatever, when newer technology comes out and I purchase the software again to get the better quality or convenience, I end up paying the artist twice. When I moved from records and tapes to CD's in the late 80's all my fav. artists got my money again. I don't know what the answer is, but it just doesn't seem right. I will gladly pay for the technology, but I should not have to pay the royalties. How you police it, probably impossible.

I agree that in the future the internet will be if not the main, but the only method of getting our software. It's only a matter of time. Like many of you have said, it's just a matter of compression and bandwith. Can you imagine a time when Blockbuster is a vitural company. Imagine the money they would saved. No more store fronts, employees, distribution costs, etc, and best of all, no more late fees.



paul

Personally, I am not so sure I will ever see HD content streaming from a store front on the net in my lifetime. I have a hard time seeing the companies involved forking out the kind of money required to upgrade the Internet back bones to handle the kind of bandwidth required to allow millions of people access to HD content considering their solution to everything right now is higher compression.

Hey, I noticed that one of the disks that came with my Star Trek Blu-ray is a "Digital Copy", but when I put it in my dvd player, nothing happens. Does anyone know what they mean by Digital Copy, what is this for?

paul

I believe it means that you can store and play a copy of the movie on your PC, PS3, media player etc.

Hey Murph,

That sounds right, when I put in it my notebook it prompts me to copy it. OK, that is cool. Now I have a whole bunch of other quetions.

1. What is the screen resolution for Digital Copies?
2. What is the audio mixed in 5.1 DD, TrueHD?
3. Can I burn this to a DVD if I had a DVD burner?
4. Is there a limit to the number of times I can copy it to my computer or someone elses computer?

paul

1. It depends on the movie. It ranges from lower than DVD and some are actually slightly higher than DVD
2. Stereo
3. Typically no as each hosting system uses DRM. You'll have to check.
4. Yes. There should be a "Fair Play" ID somewhere. I think it starts at 3 copies allowed.

Funny part is once you copy it, you can now make copies of the copy and so on, which makes all this DRM just a pain in the ... it solves nothing and usually never works right.

I beleive it is of DVD quality.

Speaking of on demand:

Adult Swim's Build a Custom DVD Project Allows Fans to Create Fully Customizable DVD on Demand (TVShowsOnDVD.com)

Interesting read. I wonder if Universals on format of Blu-ray would be a little premature at this point in time. As Blu-ray players are still above the $100 mark, I don't think the masses are ready to give up DVD yet.

Good on them for doing the bundles though!

paul

This member of the masses is waiting for the $100 bluray players to hit Canada. I bet you will see a jump in bd players this Christmas. With HDTVs in the $1000 range the player will be an easy sell for an extra $100 (well, in the US anyway).

I have seen BR players in the $150 range without a big sale, so figue on a $100 BR for Boxing day sales, but they will be the older models. I think I am going to buy an Oppo when the time comes to get one. The new special edition is now available but way too much for me and I won't need the better analog outs anyway.

Anyone needing a new TV may find some bundle deals. I've seen a regional chain that has a 50 inch 1080p Panasonic plasma for $1100. They also include a free Pansonic BlueRay player with all Panasonic plasmas over $1000.

It seems some of the latest offerings on Blu-Ray are becoming quite tantalizing. I got an advanced copy of "Terminator Salvation" and the package includes "Three" discs. 1. The "Theatrical Version"
2. The "Director's Cut" (both on Blu-Ray AND lossless audio) and 3. The digital copy for PC's.

The "Director's Cut" is three or four minutes longer and I preferred watching it because it avoids all the previews and advertising that are on the "theatrical version".

Gah, I hate flippers. And dual-layers on both sides. Last time that was tried with DVDs, we got a bunch of TV series discs which wouldn't play because of obvious physical manufacturing defects.

Blu-ray players are so cheap now there is no reason not to have one. The only setback is the cost of buying the Blu-ray disks themselves. I wouldn't upgrade my DVD collection with the Blu-ray equivalent. If you look hard enough there is usually sales though. DVD is dead. I did however watch Star Wars epdisode 2 on DVD the other day and the sound and picture quality are fantastic. The acting on the other hand....

DVD may be dead among people like us, but for the general population it is alive and kicking. There are still a lot more people watching movies on DVD than there are Blu.

That's certainly true at the moment, but as more Blu Rays are released and the prices become more reasonable, Dvd's will get fazed out albeit slowly.

Blu Ray is dead.

<runs away>

...trips over stack of "laser discs" and bumps head on "betamax" player...

And the demise of the DVD is starting:

http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/20...mpaign=20091225