And so it ends — not with a whimper, but a bang. Well, an official announcement, anyway. Toshiba said today it would stop developing and building HD DVD equipment, killing the format and handing victory in the HD-disc format war to Blu-ray. Of course. We pretty much saw this coming ever since Warner Bros. declared its exclusive allegiance to Blu-ray last month, followed by Toshiba canceling its planned HD DVD events at CES. Even drastic price cutting couldn't save the format.
Can I hear a hallelujah? Nothing against Toshiba or HD DVD, but this format war was never in the best interests of the public. Having two formats to choose from only caused many people to wait on the sidelines. Well, folks the waiting is over. Go ahead and sink you credit card into one of the fine Blu-ray players on the market today. You've waited long enough.
Via CNN
editor@dvice.com
By Traveler at 11:59 AM ON 02/19/08
YES!
By murray at 1:11 PM ON 02/19/08
Finally. Even though I was rooting for the Red, I'm glad it's over.
I wonder if this is how it went down in the Beta vs. VHS war. I'm a touch too young to remember.
By Executive at 7:20 PM ON 02/19/08
I could imagine the HD-DVD Attachment for the XBOX 360.
By runcapher at 2:14 AM ON 02/21/08
Finally! HD DVD just had so much stacked against it from the beginning. Even Microsoft throwing their support behind the format couldn't save it. Anyway, I'm glad the war's over. Hopefully the studios that were doing HD DVD will release Blu_ray versions of their backcatalogue.
By LeadFlinger at 3:45 AM ON 02/21/08
That bites. I want my money back on my new laptop.
By blzrd at 4:23 AM ON 02/21/08
I am so glad this war is over! maybe in a few months I will finally be able to afford one of these things when the prices drop. What's funny is just about 2 weeks ago there was huge sales going on toshiba hd dvd players with like 7 free hd dvds. To think I was actually going to rush out there and get one of these! haha
By EdD at 4:56 AM ON 02/21/08
And I just bought the BLADE RUNNER 5 disc set, damnit.
By Gilmoure at 7:14 AM ON 02/21/08
Doubt I'll be buying a Blu-ray player any time soon. I'm waiting for HD quality movie downloads (and the accompanying bandwidth boost). The iTunes model is the way to go. Now, if the movie companies will just let that happen.
Ok, I know, they see another 10 years of folks replacing all their DVD's with Blu-ray versions. Why the hell would they allow downloads?
By DaMiGiSan at 7:40 AM ON 02/21/08
I would'nt replace my entire collection with the Blu-Ray versions as the DVD format itself is compatible with the Blu-Ray players and from what I have heard the Bue-Ray player is supposed to even enhance standard DVD's somewhat and make them clearer, so we'll see.Congrats to Sony anyways.
By doctorwho52 at 7:53 AM ON 02/21/08
#1 VHS won over Beta because of a superior advertising program. BETA was actually a far superior system but just didn't advertise.
#2 Blue-Ray over HD was inevitable due to technological advancement. Sometime in the future Blue-Ray will be replaced by a new system.
By eddiemyboy at 7:56 AM ON 02/21/08
Hey Murray.Beta died a slow lingering death and alot of people spent their money for nothing,basically.The way it went this time is better.A clean public statement that HD was dead and that is that.Saved alot of people some money so that they could move on to bluray.It was true in my case that I just waited until beta died before I got in an bought VHS.
By madpostman at 8:45 AM ON 02/21/08
Sorry Blu Ray, not biting on your format. I liked HD DVD, but learned a valuable lesson, players are too expensive and so are the movies. In other words, discs are so yesterday. The future is here, hidef downloads and I am not turning back.
By brimguard at 8:47 AM ON 02/21/08
@Doctorwho
Actually it was because Betamax stayed a proprietary technology. VHS was allowed to be sold freely by several companies, but the developers of Betamax held onto the technology for themselves which kept the costs high.
By jaffacree1 at 9:06 AM ON 02/21/08
The war might be won but whats the plan with HD movie line? Does it get clearanced out or does it get returned to the Vender?
By garethj at 9:12 AM ON 02/21/08
A more important question than what to do with old stock - When will HD-DVD exclusive shows be converted to BluRay? I want my Heroes in HiDef!
By psykick3 at 10:03 AM ON 02/21/08
It is unfortunate that the public is being forced
To a more expensive format at a time when
There are two classes of people being created…
The majority of people will not be able to
Afford such luxuries…
By Jediman98 at 10:36 AM ON 02/21/08
BD may have a bigger capacity, but when HD-DVD was approved with the triple layer disc, that's not a viable argument anymore. HD-DVD was the more technologically superior product. How many revisions has it taken Blu Ray to catch up with what HD-DVD came out from the getgo???
By stevefah at 11:14 AM ON 02/21/08
Suck it up, HD owners. Since when did "technologically superior" ever beat out advertising and non-proprietary formats? At least we have a standard now.
BTW--I still have my beta VCR, along with several tapes that have never been released on disc that I know of.
Looking forward to getting that clearance HD-DVD!
By Hawkofva at 11:32 AM ON 02/21/08
On the bright side, the things will probably be dirt cheap with everyone trying to get rid of them, and it's not like the HDDVD's they made already will magically stop working...
By Shaun at 2:11 PM ON 02/21/08
Was the format war truly that bad? I do not believe so. It may have kept the vast majority of consumers on the sidelines, but it also helped to bring about the lower prices for Blu-Ray that are currently in the market today.
God bless competition!
By Gamecuber7 at 2:57 PM ON 02/21/08
Everyone seems to have wanted HD DVD to win, but they did'nt. How disappointing. I don't look forward to saving up 1000 dollars to buy a format similar to a 300 dollar dead system that I already paid for . . .
By tomcasino at 3:38 PM ON 02/21/08
Anyone know where I can get some cheap 8-Tracks? LOL
By Neal at 4:13 PM ON 02/21/08
I would not rush out and buy a Bluray player right now. Most of them out there are profile 1.0 and will be junk in about a year. I would wait for them to finish the format (atleast to where it can do the same things HD DVD can do right now) before buying into the format. I have invested in HD DVD and I am not sorry I did so. We still will be getting new releases for a awhile still and it is also a Great upconvert dvd player. Now the real war starts. DVD 98% Highdef 2%
By kycop at 4:14 PM ON 02/21/08
I love my hd-dvd player and movies, I have imported several blu-ray only movies that companies will not release in the usa on hd-dvd. I see people acting like they bought these and they will no longer play. I for one think its a great bargain, Toshiba stopped support, Go buy a 30-50 hddvd player and buy movies that are selling for bluray for 34.95---to---41.00 each for 9.00-15.00 hddvd. They will still work.. HAte to see bluray win, but I will be getting lots of hddvd movies dirt cheap to put in my collection, If you guys want to sell your hddvd movies email me at. kycop_10@yahoo.com
By jrfrogman at 12:03 AM ON 02/22/08
You should check out the Blu-ray specs on Wikipedia. I don't know if I would own one of these. They can shut off your player. All kinds of DRM that can turn your box into a boat anchor. If they fully realize this spec, i am sure you will set lots of viruses that will exploit this flaw and kill lots of boxes out there just for fun.
By permster at 2:27 AM ON 02/22/08
Now that this announcement has gone out Blu-ray prices will drop drastically over the next year to be more in line with what HD DVD was at. I feel for those of you who have HD DVD players, but that's the price you pay for the bleeding edge.
By ahipdude at 7:56 AM ON 02/22/08
I have been waiting and waiting for this to be finally done. On one hand, it was a shame to see Sony win out, because it was their stubborn attitude that cost them the Beta demise. On the other hand, I was pretty sure that whatever side Paramount chose would be the loser (DiVX, anyone?) and whatever side Disney chose would win out.
Overall, I think that BluRay has the larger potential, which means maybe it will go almost as long as DVD before a new, microchip format wins out. I expect to see movies on some sort of thumbnail drive before 2020. Downloadable, and able to be viewed multiple times, with all the extras. Bye bye, cover art.
By gibbsgr at 9:37 AM ON 02/22/08
Lets go on to solid state memory media for movies! Rotational disc media is already dead.
By Braithwaite at 10:06 AM ON 02/23/08
It's all hype anyway. I personally didn't care who won. Why? you ask. Because as you read this, they have already created a disc that has more information (video and audio) that can be crammed onto it, thus making the picture even clearer than HD DVD or Blue Ray. And by the time that comes along, they'll have more sophisticated discs. And the pictures they are developing a clarity your own eye cannot detect. It's a joke leading to what we all know is eventually going to happen: A card with a chip embedded in it; and a movie downloaded on the chip. Insert card in machine and watch one of Bogey's classics!
As I said: A joke. I shant pay for their comedy act.
mr braithwaite
By justmetoo at 11:36 AM ON 02/23/08
I remember the beta vs VHS time very well. I ignorantly thought that better would win out over cheap and was so very wrong. Sony flooded the market with cheap VHS players and even though the first movie rental stores poping up everywhere had mostly beta format, people didn't know that as they bought the cheaper player. Eventually, the video stores changed their stock to meet customer demand.
It was a very slow and very expensive process. I still have a box of beta tapes and three beta players stacked up in the garage that no longer work. Maybe this time it will not be as bad since people can wait and see. Before we were all just so excited to have video systems at all, we could not wait to see which one would win.
By justmetoo at 11:43 AM ON 02/23/08
Correction:
I'm sorry, maybe it wasn't Sony that put out the cheap VHS players. Whoever it was, they were everywhere all of a sudden.
Justmetoo