Will HD DVD palyers be obsolete?

[bikezappa]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22487481/

[AndyGwis]

Good read. But, I think we are a long way from hd-dvds being obsolete.

Hell, mainframe computers are still alive and well, even with 25 years of further innovation in that space.

[bikezappa]

I assume that they can play HD movies.

It sure would make it easy to match movie if it works.

[danger boy]

there was a service years ago that was test marketed here where i live.. whereby movies were downloaded to a hard drive set top box that sat on your TV.. then you could pay some money to watch each one. it never took off.

[Demiurge]

I use Netflix service right now and use their streaming video service from time to time as well (part of the normal membership). Basically, if I am out of town and want to watch something new on my MacBook Pro I can just hook up to the net and I have a 'free' movie at the ready.

Until everyone has their internet browser hooked up to a big screen TV utilized as a monitor in their living room it's just not going to happen. The reasons seem obvious. I do have that capability myself, but I still prefer to get a hard copy from the store or through Netflix rather than streaming/downloading it. It's better quality and it's portable.

Will we reach the point eventually where concepts like this will work on the mass market? I believe there's no doubt about it, but you're going to be really bored for a long while if you start ditching your DVDs now.

[bikezappa]

there was a service years ago that was test marketed here where i live.. whereby movies were downloaded to a hard drive set top box that sat on your TV.. then you could pay some money to watch each one. it never took off.

Was it coin operated?

Imagine a complete library of movies on demand in HD?

[Demiurge]

I assume that they can play HD movies.

It sure would make it easy to match movie if it works.

They can't (don't) do it now, but it will be interesting to see if they offer that with the box you hook up to your TV. With the service now you just stream whatever you want to watch out of some 6,000 movies (yes, new releases and a whole slew of others aren't available) or so on your computer.

[Sami]

I assume that they can play HD movies.

It sure would make it easy to match movie if it works.

I doubt the streaming service is doing HD's at this time. Internet bandwidth is the bottleneck until fibre becomes the norm. This will be a good service for those who don't care too much about PQ.

[bobman1235]

People like to own things, plain and simple. It's nice to have a DVD and be able to pop it in any time.

With the way copyright is going lately, and the level of control the music and movie industry wants over what you consume and how you consume it, everyone here should be terrified of the idea of purely downloadable content, because you'd be giving up control of your media completely.

[bruss]

totally agree with you.. I like to collect movies. let my friends borrow them borrow my friends etc..

People like to own things, plain and simple. It's nice to have a DVD and be able to pop it in any time.

With the way copyright is going lately, and the level of control the music and movie industry wants over what you consume and how you consume it, everyone here should be terrified of the idea of purely downloadable content, because you'd be giving up control of your media completely.

[BIZILL]

microsoft beat them to the punch with xbox live downloads. pq is there, but audio is not. at least, not high def audio like trueHD and the like.

i prefer more of a 'hard-copy' in a dvd media. imagine when your hard drive crashes. bye bye movies.

[fatchowmein]

Whoever comes up with $14 new HD releases and $10 HD versions of older movies will probably win. I think $24-$36 is a bit much to swallow.

I agree. People like to collect things, especially if the price is right.

[bikezappa]

People like to own things, plain and simple. It's nice to have a DVD and be able to pop it in any time.

With the way copyright is going lately, and the level of control the music and movie industry wants over what you consume and how you consume it, everyone here should be terrified of the idea of purely downloadable content, because you'd be giving up control of your media completely.

Of course we all like to own certain DVDs, but the option to view a wide library of Movies is interesting to me espicially if they are in HD.

The copyright thing is the big issue because some one will find a method to copy these movies on the a DVD or some such device.

[Face]

Hopefully this will put a fire under my local cable company's ass to offer a decent pay per view selection.

[shadowofnight]

Hopefully this will put a fire under my local cable company's ass to offer a decent pay per view selection.

The only PPV I have ever ordered have all been fights...whats the going rate for a PPV new release regular movie on your cable system ? Are Sat PPV prices for the movies better/worse ?

[shadowofnight]

Oh....and I want actual hard copies of movies I like well enough to watch over again...loan to friends...etc.

[Face]

I believe it's $5 a movie.