I Know HD DVD is Dead

[wulf109]

I ask this out of curiosity,were there ever any HD DVD computer burners?

[solarfox]

For desktops, you mean? The only one I know of offhand is the Toshiba SD-H903A. (Toshiba did have a couple of slimline models intended for laptop manufacturers to integrate into their products, but I don't know if any of them ever did...)

[jman98]

No. And while it's not the biggest reason HD DVD died, it sure didn't help at all. People warned Toshiba that this was a problem they needed to fix, but Toshiba didn't listen.

[jman98]

Based on solarfox's post I seem to be wrong. I never heard of a single burner. I guess the fact that I thought there weren't any gives you an idea of how this was bungled by Toshiba.

[wulf109]

Interesting,I suspect Blue-Ray is doomed,I give another year before Sony pulls the plug. As long as the hardware remains at astromamical price levels it's going nowhere. Sales dropped after HD died,not a good sign. I think what really seals it's doom is that you cannot backup the disks unless your a Nobel prize winner.

[SCDVD]

When you compare the relative quality of a DVD played on an upconverting player with a Blu-ray disc, the difference is discernible but slight especially at normal viewing distance versus nose in the screen. How many users are going to pay almost double the price for a Blu-ray disc compared to the same title on DVD? Add to that another $400 + investment for a Blu-ray player and the audience really shrinks.

The burn-your-own Blu-ray market is almost non existent. How many people are willing to pay $15 to $20 per blank disc plus another several hundred dollars for a Blu-ray burner.

The Sony "boys" have a giant marketing problem that I doubt their twisted egos are going to be able to see - until their stock holders point it out to them.

[solarfox]

How many people are willing to pay $15 to $20 per blank disc plus another several hundred dollars for a Blu-ray burner.

Probably about as many people were willing to pay that kind of money for DVD burners back when they first hit the market.

(Which is not to say that that BluRay doesn't have some significant problems to overcome in growing its market, just that price alone isn't what will doom it.)

[MOVIEGEEK]

There were HD DVD writers slated to come out this year...before Toshiba pulled the plug.The one thing HD DVD had going for it was you could play 3X DVD(HD on a DVDR) on it.

[gshelley61]

When you compare the relative quality of a DVD played on an upconverting player with a Blu-ray disc, the difference is discernible but slight especially at normal viewing distance versus nose in the screen. How many users are going to pay almost double the price for a Blu-ray disc compared to the same title on DVD? Add to that another $400 + investment for a Blu-ray player and the audience really shrinks.

The burn-your-own Blu-ray market is almost non existent. How many people are willing to pay $15 to $20 per blank disc plus another several hundred dollars for a Blu-ray burner.

The Sony "boys" have a giant marketing problem that I doubt their twisted egos are going to be able to see - until their stock holders point it out to them.

On a relatively large 1920x1080p native screen (say, 60" or more), the difference between HD DVD/Blu-ray and upscaled DVD is easily noticed. The high def discs really are superior in every way... except that the general public didn't want them. I have players in both formats and rent the discs from Netflix. Just watched "3:10 to Yuma" on Blu-ray last night... and "Elizabeth: The Golden Age" on HD DVD the other day. I've probably watched at least 100 rental HD DVD's and Blu-ray discs so far. It's definitely been worth it to me. But most people are totally happy with standard DVD, especially if their screen size is not that large. That's why HD DVD (already dead) and Blu-ray (dying) will not become mainstream.

BTW, I don't feel ripped off about buying the players... my HD DVD player is the best standard DVD upscaler in my rack (and I got it for really cheap on eBay) and my Blu-ray player is a 60GB PS3, so it does lots of other stuff like gaming, internet surfing and high quality media file playback. The only high def discs I bought were Blade Runner and Planet Earth. The rest I got for free as incentives. Renting HD DVD and Blu-ray discs costs the same as regular DVD, so there is no loss there, either.

[Marvingj]

gshelley61,I agree whole heartly with your statement....................................

[SCDVD]

On the technical side, or perhaps I should say visual quality wise, I agree as well. The thing I was trying to point out is that a company's marketing plan that starts with, "...... Most people don't want .........." is not very good for the company's hoped for sales on that particular product. I rent Blu-ray titles from Netflix but it will take a lot more than Netflix rentals for Blu-ray to become a successful consumer product.

[videopoo]

I managed to grab an HD DVD burner. It's a prototype from Europe and paid $1500 for it. Haven't used it in awhile...any takers?

[[_chef_]]

I managed to grab an HD DVD burner. It's a prototype from Europe and paid $1500 for it. Haven't used it in awhile...any takers?

Great, is it the 901??

IMO, HD-DVD is only dead for big biz but i give a darn about them........

[videopoo]

It's the SD-L902. I'm still receiving HD DVD work for corporate work. It's perfect for kiosks, demos and dailies work.

[[_chef_]]

Wow, 902! This one is really better than the 901. What is your experience in case of burning quality??

[Bjs]

Whats this then

http://www.dealsdirect.com.au/p/lg-ggw-h20l-blu-ray-hd-dvd-writer/

Might grab one

[MozartMan]

Whats this then

http://www.dealsdirect.com.au/p/lg-ggw-h20l-blu-ray-hd-dvd-writer/

Might grab one

That's Blu-ray burner and HD DVD reader.

BTW, it is $299 at Newegg.com:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136137&Tpk=LG%2bGGW-H20L

[[_chef_]]

Sorry to revive this thread from the dead, but Toshiba has put out 4 HD-DVD burners AFAIK, 903 which is HH (rare!), 901, 902 and 912, which are all slimtype, the 912 can also burn HD DVD-RW media.

Reason for reviving is that I grabbed a 902 and a whole bunch of cheap media to make some fine backups.