Why is blu-ray beating HD dvd?

Question

i mean, they both have the same definiton. why is blu-ray better?

Answer 1

There are many reasons, but before getting into them consider some basic info.

Blu-ray and HD DVD are essentially equal in terms of actual video and audio quality -- despite all the talk about Blu-ray's theoretical advantages. Note that neither addressed the 8 bit colour limitation of DVD (banding), so neither has really got it right yet, leaving room for a new format (and further colour space improvement to xvYCC).

HD DVD was a finished spec from day one, while Blu-ray still isn't. As one commentator (John Archer, see link) wrote " ... if Blu-ray has now pretty much seen HD DVD off, it's pulled off the seemingly impossible feat of winning without actually ever having caught up!"

HD DVD was the only format that allowed combo HD/DVD disks, allowing backward compatibility for consumers with several DVD players to buy one disk that could be played on ALL their players (car, bedroom, cottage, etc).

HD DVD is less encumbered by DRM mechanisms than Blu-ray and not region coded. Both these features, while they should be attractive to consumers, are unpopular with studios, encouraging more studio support for Blu-ray.

Blu-ray playback capacity was built into PS3 game machines, making Blu-ray an automatic choice for millions of PS3 owners. They didn't buy very many Blu-ray disks (low attach rate) but even though there are more stand alone HD DVD players the sheer number of PS3 owners made for more software sales for Blu-ray. Microsoft chose to make HD DVD players an add-on, which proved to be an error.

The perception that many manufacturers were supporting Blu-ray (Sony, Pioneer, Samsung, Panasonic, etc) while only Toshiba supported HD DVD made Blu-ray more attractive to some.

Computer drives for HD disks were ignored far too long by Toshiba, allowing Blu-ray to be seen as the only choice.

HD DVD was intended to be a logical extension of DVD, while Blu-ray was supposed to be a major step beyond. As a result HD DVD is cheaper to produce (minor changes to DVD replication lines, rather than a whole new plant as required by Blu-ray), but a bit more limited in terms of future needs. It was also aimed at the lower end consumer (hence it supports 1080i rather than only 1080p) and was intentionally priced lower (at least for lower end players). Blu-ray used this against HD DVD in ads making it seem like 1080i players were inferior and Blu-ray was better because it had more storage space -- despite the fact that there is no disadvantage to 1080i for anyone (a good 1080p HDTV will deinterlace this fine and a 720p/1080i TV can't benefit from 1080p) and the extra space isn't necessary for the vast mnajority of movies.

In my view the single largest factor though was that despite being able to reduce prices on hardware for HD DVD Toshiba, since it does not own any studios (unlike Sony, who own Sony Pictures), could not really influence software prices. And, despite HD DVDs being, at least theoretically, less expensive to produce, disks were never sold at lower prices. Blu-ray disks were much more frequently priced at, or sold in buy one, get one (BOGO) sales for, less than HD DVD disks.

So, more studio support for Blu-ray (more movies), studio aversion to some of the consumer friendly features of HD DVD (no BD+ DRM, no region coding), smart sales strategy by Blu-ray to use the advantages of HD DVD against them, smart strategy by Sony to build Blu-ray into the PS3, inability of Toshiba to successfully influence software prices and the tendency of consumers to overemphasize the advantages of Blu-ray and underemphasize the advantages of HD DVD all combined to kill HD DVD.

The result is a half baked and more expensive format beat out a more consumer friendly format. The result is that Blu-ray will never be sold at the same price of DVDs (more expensive to produce) and therefore is doomed to niche format, with DVDs continuing to be the primary consumer disk format.

Answer 2

The main reason is that blu-ray has wider support from Hollywood and more and more retailers have gone Blu-ray exclusive in the last month or so.

So while the technical differences between the two in terms of video playback are minimal, IMHO its the support of the content providers that has been the biggest deciding factor.

Answer 3

Its a beta-max vs VHS story....

Answer 4

The short anser is companys have decided to just "pick one" instead of producing to equivalent formats and since recently most of the major movie studios have gone exclusively to blu ray, others such as netflix, blockbuster, wal-mart have also followed in choosing a side. toshiba will eventually discontinue hd dvd and start making blu ray players.

Answer 5

Because Sony learned their lesson well. Sony's Betamax failed because Sony tried to do it all themselves and keep all the money to themselves. This time they partnered with many more companies, both software and hardware manufacturers. No longer was it Sony against the world! Instead it was the Blu-Ray army against the HD-DVD camp.

This along with a better marketing campaign and including Blu-Ray in the PS3 (guarantying that millions would have Blu-Ray players in their homes).

Incedentally it isn't winning. It won. Toshiba announced that they are closing up shop.

Sorry GH, there are no reports of payouts to retailers not to push HD DVD. I am sure that Blu-Ray did buy shelf space but all catergories do that.

Answer 6

Bluray is beating HD DVD in terms of software sales.  A large portion of this is due to the fact that the Playstation 3 plays Blurays, and by buying a PS3 you get 5 free movies.  So people started with that, and some have expanded their movie collection even more through a series of Buy One Get One promotions on sites such as Amazon.

Bluray has a higher capacity than HD DVD, but HD DVD was the more finished specification.  Bluray was rushed in order to ship the PS3 out the door, but the trojan horse strategy worked.  There are more Bluray players (PS3 inclusive) than HD DVD players.  The higher capacity of Bluray also allows for higher quality audio, assuming the 1080p sourced video takes up the same amount of room on both discs.

For example, Transformers (HD DVD) had to go with a slightly higher audio compression (not lossless compression) just to fit the movie onto the disc.  If it had been on Bluray, they could have gone with the director's desire for lossless audio.

EDIT: It's a prototype 8 layer Bluray disc = 200GB

Answer 7

Yeah the ps3 has helped blu ray....plus warner bros went from hd dvd to blu ray...best buy stores said they are going to start recommending blu ray dvd and players over hd dvd to customers..and on top of that all the porno dvds are going to blu ray..lol....i myself like hd and blu ray...they both look great..but i think sony has a better name than toshiba...sony puts alot of money into there products.

Answer 8

the rise of the PS3 could be one reason

also I heard somewhere that someone is developing a 10 layer blu-ray disc --- That would have massive storage capacity...   Image quality could go up again or  the whole series of your favorite tv program in Hi-def

Answer 9

b/c paramount has now signed a contract with blu ray which pretty much means paramount signed off the death warrant for hd

Answer 10

Because Sony created Blu-Ray and Toshiba created HD DVD......Sony has way more money to throw around at studios to get them on Blu-Ray's side.....and then they pay retailers to push Blu-Ray on customers....stores in my area either did not carry HD DVD or the salesmen had both and swore up and down how Blu-Ray was better instead of letting the customer seeing the difference between the two for themselves and making an informed decision.

Answer 11

There's alot of factors involved. From a technical standpoint, yes they both have the same definition and they support just about all the same standards. However, there is more to video quality, for instance, then pure definition/resolution. One thing that may make one HD video look better then another is how well or how less it's compressed.

Sony's Blu-Ray format not only can hold more data/video/audio, but it can also play it back at a higher bitrate (a fact many seem to leave out), so technically it's capable of achieving less compressed video, which is technically higher quality. This doesn't mean every movie that comes out takes advantage of this, nor does it mean you'll always see a difference, in fact the average person probably won't most of the time. However, two situations where you might are A) when you try to fit a particularly long movie on 1 disc and/or B) when a portion of a movie is particularly hard to compress (complicated visuals) without compression artifacts.  For instance, if they tried to fit the Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King on a single Blu-Ray and a single HD-DVD disc.. then you may notice more of a quality gain on the Blu-Ray, since they'd need to compress the HD-DVD more.

Basically Blu-Ray was made with more headroom and is more future proof.  HD-DVD seems like it was pretty much made to be just enough to handle the high definition video and sound just as well as DVD handled its standard definition and sound... if you compare the specs you can see the mathimatical connection.  Blu-Ray however went a bit further, so you could almost say Blu-Ray does HD video/sound better then DVD did standard definition.  Again though, doesn't mean current releases always take advantage of that ability.



Other then from a technical standpoint, marketing wise Blu-ray had alot going for it from earlier on.  The PS3 may of been a small factor, since it came with Blu-Ray built in and was likey many peoples first HD move disc experience. Also, Blu-Ray is sort of more catchy a name, kinda sounds cool, it's easier to say (less syllables)... plus HD-DVD gets confused with other things that are HD or with regular DVDs.  Combine this, with the technical data, and a bit of luck.. and boom, you have Blu-Ray in the lead.  Sony took a gamble and shelled out alot of money with the PS3.  Initially each unit cost allot more to make then what they were actually sold for. They MAY be close to breaking even with them now.. on some models, though I'm not positive.

It'd be also worthy to note that Toshiba is now dropping HD-DVD.. which is a incredible and possibly deadly blow to HD-DVD as a standard. Walmart and Best Buy recently dropped HD-DVD too.  Plus, Blockbuster's in-store rental is Blu-Ray exclusive, save for perhaps some select stores.

HD-DVD has it's pluses... like a combo format (DVD one side, HD-DVD the other)... though not all movies came like this.  I also just read that they may be coming up with technology to store regular DVD data on the same side of a disc as Blu-Ray/HD-DVD data. In other words they may be able to make Blu-Ray (or HD-DVD) discs that'll be readable and play on a regular DVD player.. but of course only show regular DVD video/sound. If they can perfect that, it'll help the HD market alot.

So in review, there were plenty of decent reasons why many companies went with Blu-Ray... though I'd say a little luck was factored in as well. Plus, it's about time Sony actually had some luck with one of their proprietary formats.  Remember, Digi8?  Mini-Disc?  UMD?  They were all Sony and in the end didn't fair that well. I suppose MemoryStick Duo and such are doing okay.. but not exactly great compared to SD Cards.