Do you like blu-ray?

Question

so, the deal with it is, the image is sharper and clearer than dvds. and expectations are blu-rays will be replacing dvds.

what is the point of this? it's not like dvds are unclear and fuzzy! there really isn't much difference.

and blu-rays are, like, 3 times the price! i like lost, and so far i have all three seasons, and the fourth one is coming out soon. the other seasons (on dvd, not blu-ray) cost 50 dollars each, and i checked the blu-ray price, and it was 99 dollars. why would they replace dvds with something not much better if it costs so much more??

what are your thoughts on this? will you be able to afford 60 dollar movies and stuff?

Answer 1

Blu Ray is overpriced.  With a larger HD TV - especially 1080p - there is a difference with DVD though.  However, an UPCONVERTED DVD (Upconvert DVD player or HD-DVD player) will make a STANDARD DVD LOOK JUST AS GOOD AS BluRay.  Oh, and there is no movie limitation on availability with DVD, not to mention they're about half the cost of a BR.

Answer 2

Blu-ray is this generations version of LaserDisk (LD).

As you may remember, when VCRs were the king of the home entertainment center, the movie and home theater enthusiasts were all gushing about LD.  Like blu-ray, LD offered better video and audio over the more popular VHS, but required higher end equipment in order to be enjoyed properly.  This was before home surround systems were cheap, mind you.  LDs were also more expensive than VHS tapes, mainly because the market was smaller.

Blu-ray is still a young technology. When DVD was blu-ray's age, it too was quite expensive.  Players were around $1000, and movies were $45 or so.  If you were lucky, you might find them for $35 (woo-hoo!) but as DVD's popularity grew, prices dropped.  Quickly.

I'm uncertain if blu-ray will actually replace DVD or not.  Remember, it took DVD just over 8 years before it overtook VHS in terms of marketshare (which is amazing!) yet it was only a few years ago (2005?) that studios stopped selling VHS movies.  By that time scale, we're looking at 2020  before DVD would be in danger of disappearing from store shelves.

Also, In DVD's case, there were plenty of good reasons for EVERYONE to upgrade - better picture, better durability, better sound, better features, etc.  You didn't need new equipment, either.  More importantly, however, was that the DVD player would work with your existing TV and sound system.

Blu-ray, meanwhile, only really provides better picture, and at best, slightly better sound - but only if you have the equipment and home theater room to appreciate it.  Most experts agree that blu-ray will be mostly indistinguishable from an upscaled DVD on anything smaller than a 40" 1080p screen.  Of course, these sets start at $1500 and only go up in price.  Likewise, blu-ray's 7.1 surround sound support requires a 7.1 capable receiver and additional speakers but even then, will probably not sound much different than the 5.1 surround sound system most folks currently have.

This means your average person without a HDTV is easily looking at an investment of $2000-3000 to upgrade his TV and sound system all before spending another $400 or more on the blu-ray player itself (in my case, the PS3 works just fine.)  That's quite a barrier to entry, which I'm pretty sure will keep blu-ray firmly in the realm of the high-end, movie or home theater enthusiast, and out of the reach (or care) of the average consumer.

As for the higher prices on blu-ray, that's to be expected as well.  Newer technologies always cost more money in the beginning.  Personally I don't see a reason to buy Lost in blu-ray.  A good upscaling DVD player on even a modest HDTV will look about as good as when you watched the episodes in when they were broadcast in HD because almost ALL HD broadcasts are only in 720p to  begin with.

Personally, I think DVD/blu-ray prices are just outrageous to begin with.  $50 for a season of TV?  But then you know they'll go back and do a "complete series" super boxset that simply contains all the boxes duct-taped together, and the whole thing will cost much, much less than $50/season.  I've just about given up buying DVDs.  Now, I just rent through Netflix (TV series too!)  When the super-duper-el-cheapo box arrives, then I'll buy.  Needless to say, I haven't bought any blu-ray discs (yes, I have a large HDTV and a PS3)

Answer 3

No, I dont like BluRay. But I do buy favorites on the format.

Standard DVDs are based on the 1940's television standard.  It's a very high-tech way of encoding what was state of the art 70 years ago.

BluRay is the ONLY way to get high def from a disk.  It is a HUGE step up in visual quality.

The price is artificially high because Sony had to wave hundreds of millions of dollars in license fees to studios to get them to abandon HD-DVD and put the format out of business.

(They did the same thing to RCA in the late fifties - but thats another story)

Sony is also limiting sales of BluRay to NetFlix and BlockBuster to try and force the public to buy the disks at inflated prices.

(Remember - Sony is the company that put the root-kit virus on their audio CD's because infecting your PC is less important that them being able to scan your hard drive for copies of Sony music titles.)

The LA Times reported after the last studio abandoned HD-DVD that prices on BluRay players was going to go UP and Sony was already planning on adding new features to new players before next Christmass to try and force early-adopters to re-buy the BluRay players.

So the price of the disks are the least of the problems if you have been paying attention.

Answer 4

If you have a 1080p tv that is 50 inches or bigger it is worth it. I have a blu-ray player and I hate watching regular dvd's now.....dvd's aren't unclear or fuzzy but they do suffer from compression artifacts such as pixelation which is not a problem in blu-ray. Trust me when you have a bigger tv you see all these flaws that you don't normally see on smaller tv's.

Lost is quite expensive, I am going to wait for prices to go down before I buy it. Most movies on blu-ray are pretty decent prices on amazon.com and usually under 30$ at walmart.

Answer 5

Blu ray has a sharper image on larger screens even through sdtv.

Some dvds can become unpleastent to watch on a large sdtv because of the resizing of the dvd to fit the screen

you can see the scan lines and become fuzzy the larger the screen through sdtv

I agree that dvds look clear on a 20" sdtv but compared to a 60 " they start to loose clarity and look fuzzy.

The Reason why these blu ray discs are EXTREMELY expensive is only because it is more advanced than dvd and is newer.

Answer 6

Since people are just starting to adapt Blu ray the prices are kinda high.Hopefully it should fall by the end of this year for the holidays.But still you can get some real good deals on blurays from amazon.

Obviously you will be stunned with the picture and the audio clarity.I think its worth it.

Answer 7

I find dvd's to be almost unwatchable on my 47 inch HD.

The clarity is absolutely LIGHT YEARS better with blu-ray.

The price will go down once the dust settles.

Answer 8

I like Blu-Ray because of the sharpness and clearness, indeed. That, and I have a PS3, so it's fun to compare the blu-ray & dvd quality on my tv. I don't buy the movies, either, i'm just subscribed to netflix and i rent them and watch them. i'm not much of a movie buyer