The Rocky Mountain Collegian

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September 11th, 2007

HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray, where do you want your movies?

Here’s something that’s been a hot topic for a while, but I thought I should give a whack at it to make sure everyone who hasn’t been following this subject is on the same page. You know those wonderful little plastic discs that you stick into your Chinese made whatchamajig that makes the pictures and the sounds on your television? Well, coming soon to a home theater near you is… something else.

If you know your home media history then you’ve probably heard of the epic clash between the Betamax and the victorious VHS back in the 80’s. It was a battle between corporations that helped define the direction of movie technology for years. Well, now we find history repeating itself with the struggle between Blu-Ray and HD-DVD. Of course, beneath the duel of formats are two major corporate powers. Sony is pushing for their proprietary Blu-Ray technology, while Toshiba are going all out for their HD-DVDs.

I see Blu-Ray as the big expensive SUV of media formats. It makes all your movies sound and look great, provided that your other home theater technology is up to snuff. It has a shit-load of special features that are only going to benefit the movie companies as they make for stronger defense against piracy(by the way, I do not condone the piracy of home movies). The strongest draw here is that Blu-Ray has a much higher data storage capacity, that is to say that there can be more stuff on each disc (a single layer disc can hold about 25 gigabytes). The kicker that comes with all of this, however, is that Blu-Ray is much more expensive to produce. This added cost will invariably pass down to the consumer.

HD-DVD, on the other hand, is like a small sedan. It still has all of the options installed, it just isn’t quite as big and mean looking as that SUV. The HD-DVD will enhance movie-watching in the same way that Blu-Ray will as it is capable of producing high quality visuals and audio as well. HD-DVD holds less data (about 15 gigabytes on a single layer), but is cheaper for the consumer. Also, HD-DVD players are backward compatible with regular DVDs.

I’ve been watching this one pan out from the beginning and I am still leaning toward Toshiba. Is it really worth the extra money to get more director’s commentary or movie previews on each disc, as you would with Blu-Ray? And even if the picture you can get from Blu-Ray does end up being superior… how the hell am I going to take advantage of it if I still have a crappy CRT television? Sony made a huge gamble by making sure their new Playstation 3 has a Blu-Ray player. But I’m sure everyone knows the results there (namely a $500-600 price tag).

I don’t want you all to start thinking “Oh shit! I need to make a decision! I need to start CHOOSING SIDES IN THE MEDIA WAR FOR THE AGES!” This technology is going to phase in about as gradually as DVD did from VHS. It is true that the folks that will determine the victor here are all of you, but don’t go throwing out your DVDs just yet. Once this technology becomes available to the average consumer, one format will come out on top.

(Please post comments if you have anything important to add on this subject!)

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 11th, 2007 at 11:59 pm and is filed under the reel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.