http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/080217/...hiba_hd_dvd_col

Toshiba to Give Up on HD-DVD, end format war: source

By Mayumi Negishi and Kentaro Hamada
TOKYO (Reuters) - Toshiba Corp is planning to give up on its HD DVD format for high definition DVDs, conceding defeat to the competing Blu-Ray technology backed by Sony Corp, a company source said on Saturday.

The move will likely put an end to a battle that has gone on for several years between consortiums led by Toshiba and Sony vying to set the standard for the next-generation DVD and compatible video equipment.

The format war, often compared to the Betamax-VHS battle in the 1980s, has confused consumers unsure of which DVD or player to buy, slowing the development what is expected to be a multibillion dollar high definition DVD industry.

Toshiba's cause has suffered several setbacks in recent weeks including Friday's announcement by U.S. retailing giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc that it would abandon the HD DVD format and only stock its shelves with Blu-ray movies.

A source at Toshiba confirmed an earlier report by public broadcaster NHK that it was getting ready to pull the plug.

"We have entered the final stage of planning to make our exit from the next generation DVD business," said the source, who asked not to be identified. He added that an official announcement could come as early as next week.

No one answered the phone at Toshiba's public relations office in Tokyo.

NHK said Toshiba would suffer losses running to tens of billions of yen (hundreds of millions of dollars) to scrap production of HD DVD players and recorders and other steps to withdraw from the business.

Hollywood studios had initially split their alliances between the two camps, meaning only certain films would play on any one DVD machine.

The balance of power tipped decisively toward the Sony camp in January after Time Warner Inc's Warner Bros studio said it would only release high-definition DVDs in Blu-ray format. With that, studios behind some three-quarters of DVDs are backing Blu-ray, although some release in both formats.

Toshiba responded by slashing prices of HD DVD players, but the loss of retail support has hurt.

In addition to Wal-Mart, consumer electronics chain Best Buy Co Inc and online video rental company Netflix Inc also recently signed up to the Blu-ray camp.

The exclusive backing of Microsoft Corp was also put in doubt when the software giant said in January that it could consider supporting Blu-ray technology for its Xbox 360 video game machine, which currently works only with HD DVD.

Sony has spent large sums of money to promote Blu-ray in tandem with its flat screen TVs and its PlayStation 3 game console, which can play Blu-ray movies.

The Toshiba source said the experience would not be a total loss for the sprawling conglomerate, whose products range from refrigerators to power plants, which would learn valuable lessons.

"Marketing was a weak point for Toshiba. We learned a lot from HD DVD. Strengthening marketing will continue to be an issue for us going forward," the source said.

No surprise here for anybody who closely followed the format war. And by "following" I don't mean visiting the various fanboy-forums but looking at the actual sales data around the world.

I think it was in september when I predicted the Warner switch and the following demise of HD DVD right here in this forum.

I just feel sorry for those people who bought into the format in the last few months because they were made believe by Toshiba and certain internet "gurus" that HD DVD was alive and well even as late as december when Toshiba was already almost giving away their players without getting any momentum to compete with Blu-ray Disc.

Well, now it's over and I hope Universal and Paramount will soon start releasing Blu-ray Discs (again in the case of Paramount) and I hope we will see more classic movies on Blu-ray soon.

So is this another VHS/Beta situation where the crappier format won?

I think both formats are quite good. HD DVD has a clear advantage when it comes to extra features. Blu-ray will get there too but it will take some time.
On the other hand Blu-ray has the potential for better image and sound quality because it offers more storage space and higher bandwith.
I hope Warner will now start to actually USE the 50 GB that a Blu-ray disc offers. I'm sick of their low bitrate HD DVD ports, TROY Director's Cut is the worst Blu-ray disc in my collection.

Blu-ray is the cooler name and that was probably the deciding factor. How many people even knew that HD-DVD was an actual brand competing with Blu-ray and not just a technical category like "VCR"?
"I want to get an HD-DVD player. Which one should we get? The Blu-ray sounds good and that's what everyone's talking about."

Actually, I thought it would go the other way around. People were buying a HDTV, why not pick up a HD-DVD?

The question now is should I sell off my inventory quickly, or hang on to it?


marc

HD-DVD was a finished format, Blu-Ray isn't. And Blu-ray is regionally coded. HD-DVD isn't.

Luckily I didn't buy into either format, and I still won't until I can get a Profile 2 Blu-ray player that will allow me to play Blu-ray and SD DVDs from around the world.

All I wanna know is:

1) will I be able to play my DVDs on Blu-ray players?

2) will I be able to play Blu-ray discs on my DVD player? (obviously without the same image sharpness, I know)

As long as the answer is yes to both of the above, I couldn't give a rat's behind about the corporations' latest "let's wring more money out of the consumer with a new technology everyone simply must have" scam. I just want to watch movies, I don't care much about this techie stuff, and DVDs look just fine.

Yes.

No. (Different laser. Different video codecs. Different...well, everything, aside from the size of the disc.)

Thanks, Adam. One out of two ain't bad... er...

Well, the first one was the most important, anyway.

Oh, here's another one:

Somebody is going to be making all-region BluRay players, right?

As somebody who bought into HD-DVD in October (thank you, $99 Walmart deal!) and who has over 50 HD-DVDs so far, I don't feel sorry for myself at all. At worst, I have a really good upconverting player that I bought for $99 that also plays HD-DVDs which will now be discounted like mad. I plan to continue buying HD-DVDs until they are no more (and I'm sure there will be many blow-out sales so I'll be able to pick up a ton of titles dirt cheap, just like when LD bought the farm and you know what, I still have those LDs and a player that works), and will be buying a Blu-ray player in a few months, to boot. So basically, there's no reason for you to "feel sorry" for me- what, exactly, have I lost? The $99 I paid for my HD-DVD player?

Vincent

Why is it "the worst"? Actual screen grabs and scientific comparisons done at the AVS forums have shown the TROY "Director's Cut" to be a reference-quality High-Def encode. So what exactly is wrong with it?

Vincent

As someone who also bought my HD-DVD for 99 bucks I concur with Vincent. I actually do have a Blu-Ray (and LOVE it!!) but find that my HD-DVD upconverts my regular DVD's better (1080i seems to work better in this case than 1080p). So its a win-win situation with both machines getting equal play. Now I just need to wait for the deluxe Blu-Ray of Killer Nun or Camille 2000 and I'll be a happy man! (smile)

It feels wierd to have so much in common with Vincent and HD-DVDs! But all he says is right, and echoes my sentiments. Recent 'fire sale' purchase of 3rd Gen Toshiba HD-DVD player E30 (which is also a great upscaler for SD) will see out my HD-DVD collection (as my Pioneer LD-S9 sees out my large Laserdisc collection still).

But to hark back to Mark's point about BluRay not being a finalised product, the reason I could not support it originally was around last year in February - no dual layer BD discs, and only somewhat crappy single layer MPEG2 encoding - Sony apparently didn't want to pay the liscence for the superior MPEG4/H264 codecs. So at that point, I really had no choice but to go HD-DVD on XBOX 360, and don't regret the past years HD viewing at all! And although purchasing BluRay disc exclusives already, I too await a multi-region BluRay player (or hack/chip/etc) or may get a PS3 when it is updated or a new model Sony VAIO TP1 PC.

I wouldn't call it "reference" - like several Warner titles it appears to have been slightly filtered - but it's a big improvement on the overly harsh, detail-lacking theatrical cut, and I agree there's absolutely no way it could be considered the worst. By far the weakest discs I have seen are TRAFFIC from Universal (which looks to be an upconvert of a standard definition 480i master) and the two Paul Naschy titles from BCI on Blu-ray, which are so riddled with blatantly obvious problems that I'm surprised quality control signed off on them (incorrect black level, extreme grain-sucking robbing the image of detail and texture, continual picture freezing on ZOMBIES). Beyond that, SPARTACUS and CAT PEOPLE (both Universal) are both very weak, as is AMERICAN PSYCHO from Lions Gate.

On the subject of Warner titles, I know for a fact (this comes from my brother who has spoken with technicians from Warner) that they optimise all their titles aggressively, squeezing the bit rate down as low as they can get away with, regardless of how much disc space they have to play with. Therefore, many Warner titles have ample room to spare on an HD-30, let alone a BD-50 (the final cut of BLADE RUNNER, for instance, takes up less than 15 GB). I see no reason to expect this to change once they are exclusively producing for Blu-ray.

Okay Vincent, I won't feel sorry for you ;-)
But I DO feel sorry for my workmate who was an HD DVD fanatic until the Warner switch hit him very hard. Now he bought a Blu-ray player and he's starting to get friendly feelings for this "devil's machine".

I'm just glad I made the right choice from the start (based on my expectation of the outcome of the format war, not because of a personal preference for Blu-ray).

Reference quality? Have you actually watched the disc?
I made a quick internet survey and I can't believe that the disc is actually getting good reviews for its picture quality.
To my eyes the transfer has all high frequency information filtered out, it has absolutely no fine detail left. It almost looks like the movie was shot on video.
Maybe I'm overreacting because digital filtering is one of my pet peeves. (It's the main reason I don't like most Paramount transfers of the last few years.)

I want to see film grain on my plasma TV ;-)

SPIDER MAN 3, CASINO ROYALE and, for an older movie, BLADE RUNNER, that's what I call "reference quality".

Yeah, I just watched THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD, another low-bitrate Warner transfer. A 160 minute movie squeezed onto a BD-25.
It doesn't look too terrible but it sure makes me wish there will be a "superbit" release in the future. The picture could be much better.

Guess that's why I consistently see the most compression artifacting on Warner HD titles. SUPERMAN and GOODFELLAS come to mind.

Could it be inherent to the source? Some DI's are way too manipulated for my tastes. I'm getting a little tired of seeing ringing on 35mm prints, for example.

That's possible. I haven't seen TROY in a theater.
I just realized that THE SEARCHERS, also a Warner title, has one of the most amazing transfers.
So they DO have some great transfers, especially when it comes to their classics.
Many other titles are just average. There are compression artifacts in THE SHINING for example.

Thank goodness this format war mess is over! Now it's time to resume the war against phrases like "win-win situation"
:P

Ha Ha...consider it stricken from my vocabulary!....another small victory (wink)

The color timing is weirdsville, though. No matter how much Ned Price tries to justify it, it's too far yellow.

I'm afraid this is not totally accurate. The reason some Warner Blu-ray titles have such a low bit rate is specifically because they must conform to HD DVD spec, as the same encode is used for both formats. What is sometimes not taken into account is not only the difference in total capacity of the two formats, but the MAXIMUM possible bit rate. HD DVD maxes out at 30 mb per second, while Blu-ray is 50 mbps, with 10 of that reserved for audio/subpictures, leaving a max video bit rate of 40.

Let's use BLADE RUNNER as an example: It has variable bit rate audio that peaks at about 5000 kbps, four 640 kbps audio tracks (because this encode will also be used for international versions), and three commentary tracks at 192 kbps each. Add in the subpictures and muxing overhead, and you're left with a peak bit rate of about 19.5 mbps. Because the VC1 codec performs best with some room between the max and average bit rates, the video was encoded at 18 average mbps, giving a total file size of about 15 gb (video only).

Now, if this had been encoded for Blu-ray only, the peak bit rate for the same spec would be about 38.5. This means more variability in the bit rate, increasing picture quality during difficult-to-encode scenes. Even as a single layer disc, the average would have been higher at 19.5, and as a dual layer could have been a whopping 37 mbps.

Warner's (or ANY studio) doesn't use excessive compression just to do it - there is no point to that, and only increases their cost, as making a movie look good at lower bit rates takes the compressionist more time. Once encoding can be done for Blu-ray only, you will indeed see higher bit rates and higher quality encodes. This is why I had been rooting for Blu-ray all along - HD DVD was causing a "lowest common denominator" effect, keeping hi def from reaching its full potential. Of course, I'm speaking solely about picture quality here - issues with BD-J and online access not working with earlier iterations of Blu-ray are perfectly valid, but for me the bonus materials come a distant second in importance to how the main feature looks and sounds.

A possible side benefit will be more releases, as higher bit rates mean encodes can be done quicker, costing studios less to produce titles and increasing title capacity at production houses.