I think TGDAILY posts this stuff just to start the inevitable fanboy war that goes with these kind of "news" posts...

$600 PS3 W/ NO BLU-RAY (DVD) = PROBABLY STILL BUY
vs.
$600 BLU-RAY PLAYER = NO BUY

$400 PS3 W/ NO BLU-RAY (DVD) = BUY
vs.
$400 BLU-RAY PLAYER = NO BUY

$300 PS3 W/ NO BLU-RAY (DVD) = BUY!!!
vs.
$300 BLU-RAY PLAYER = NO BUY!

See the trend? This is the reality; PS3 and no trojan horsed HD-DVD in 360 is the difference. Any technical difference (capacity) between the two is meaningless in the movie/consumer electronics market. In the PC/data arena, things may be different (depending on price).

"but it did not break down how many of those were Playstation 3 consoles" = worthless report

No HD-DVD fanboy spin yet? Looks like the PS3 Blu-Ray trojan horse prophecy is finally coming to fruition. You can argue whether or not the PS3 is a true player or not, but you cannot deny that Sony are getting their product out of the door and into peoples front rooms.

So if we do the math 2.7 million players minus 2.3 million PS3's, so 400,000 people bought blueray vs 750,000 chose HD.

It seems that in the Player market HD is well a head. BD on the other hand has much larger home penetration due to being included in the PS3.

The big question is, do people regularly play movies on their PS3 or does the PS3 normally sit in a different "Game" room away from the main TV.

Saw an add for a $500 blueray player this weekend. i got my HD-DVD Toshiba HD-A3 model for $89 with the same 7 movie deal. Someones $400 to the good. I mean come on, what marketing person is writing this crap??? All we have to do is chart back the last year of how many PS3 sales there are, I bet its a LOT compared to standalone players. Seriously, that is like comparing car sales of one model to a whole division, its not even close to a fair comparison. Now if the XBox 360 was built with HD-DVD and those where counted in the 750K THEN and only then would this be worth something.

Doubtful that these include many PS3 numbers, seeing as how there have been over 6 Million PS3s sold world-wide, according to Wikipedia.org and Sony's own financial estimates. With pricing being the only real advantage for HD-DVD right now, I don't see it doing well in the long-term. The Toshiba HD-A2 does 1080i only, but many new HDTV owners want 1080p, which unfortunately is NOT cheaper than Blu-Ray. Early adopters have ended format wars before. And, remember early adopters aren't always looking for the cheapest solution as much as they want the best solution for their needs. Combine that with the fact that Blu-Ray also better meets the needs for PC/Mac data storage, it's almost a victory for Blu-Ray. Unless something major happens in favor of HD-DVD soon, it's not going to last much longer.

hd dvd drools

From Sony's financial reports they have sold 5.3 million PS3s (as of Nov 5th). So how is there only 2.7 million blu-ray players sold? I don't think the PS3 is doing that bad.

OK they are counting 2 million PS3 consoles where the majority of them are not being used as a BluRay player. Sony has never been on the wining side of a format war (Beta, Memory Stick, MD). The new price point of HD-DVD will hopefully create a victor sooner than later. I am biased toward HD-DVD, but the entire industry and consure looses until there is a single format!!

It does not matter if most were PS3's or not. It is a blu-ray player, plain and simple. The xbox 360 HD-DVD player is part of the 360. So, if the blu-ray player is not considered stand alone, than neither is the 360 HD-DVD player since it has to be hooked up to a system, be it 360 or computer, to even function. Either put both in the sales figures or do not put either. When it comes down to it, no one can deny the quality of blu-ray or the space available on the discs. The movie production companies are to blame if the quality on the disc is not what they expect. Some use different codecs than others. I own both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, and i will have to say that Blu-Ray is much better. Many people I have encountered agree. I think everyone is pretty much tired of this war. The HD-DVD and Blu-Ray companies need to start working together on a specific format or combine the two. It would be alot better for their sales in the long run anyways.

Cheapest 1080p HDVD = Tosh HD-A30 $289
Cheapest 1080p BluRay = Samsung BD-P1400 $339

Has anyone done the numbers on sales of HDTV's by output res? 720p vs 1080i vs 1080p ? My guess is that there are still less 1080p sets sold than the lower res sets. If that's the case then 1080p players are less relevant.

If Sony really wanted to pin the PS3 as a BluRay player, they'd include the remote. Yes you can use the Sixaxis to control playback, but it's a workaround, not a solution.

If PS3 sales were included in the numbers for BD then they would also include the HD drive add-on for the 360

I bought a PS3 to try it out. Frankly, I don't like the controller. I'm a PC gamer, and I guess I'll stay that way. However, as a bonus, I got a Blue Ray Disk Player.

Some are saying my BD player doesn't count. Well, it's in my living room, and the player has supplanted my old DVD player as my DVD player of choice, now including the playing of Blue Ray DVDs.

One person suggested that PS3s might be in some other room. How many people have multiple HD TV sets? I happen to have two, but I suspect that's not all that common yet. I would ask, why would I put the PS3 in some "game" room, if that room could not support HD.

It's not like the connection to the network has to be wired. I'm connected to my internet link wirelessly, so the PS3 can be wherever I want it.

I still can't believe the Blu-ray fanboys don't know that there's no difference between 1080i and 1080p when using a 1080p display.

The display device converts the 1080i/60 input right back into 1080p/24. If you're using a decent display, there's no difference.

I have a gen 1 HD-A1 HD-DVD player, it outputs 1080i. If there were any difference at all, I'd run out and buy a 1080p HD-DVD player as my projector is a true 1080p device.

But it looks exactly the same.

Capacity is of course a non-issue as they have 51gb HD-DVD discs now.

Sorry, no victory for Blu-ray on this one (and none for HD-DVD either).

"Unless something major happens in favor of HD-DVD soon, it's not going to last much longer."

This war has barely begun. FAR to early to tell who is winning.

"According to Nielsen Videoscan, over the holiday kick-off Thanksgiving week, Blu-ray players outsold HD DVD by a margin of 3-to-1."

I HIGHLY doubt this is true. With the $99 HD-DVD player that hit the shelves considered, especially.

Do you honestly think hollywood gives a damn if you're watching their movie on a ps3 or a 'blu ray player'? I bet they don't care.

As long as their movies sell they probably wouldn't care if you made your own blu ray player out of chicken-wire, a magnifying glass, and an old NES controller.

Have to wait until after Christmas to see where the war is going. This time last year HDDVD was beating Blu-Ray until January hit. All the HD-DVD fanboys were point to media sold numbers. Then all those PS3 that were sitting under the tree, kicked in. Now all the Blu-Ray fanboys point to the media numbers. This year there are alot of HD-DVD players sitting under the tree, so who know what will happen.

More food for thought. If there are 2.7 Blu-Ray players sold, why only ~200k Spiderman 3 sales? That's bad. That's only 7% people buying. On the other hand, ~200k of transformers sold with 750,000 HD players sold (numbers of in use are probably less because they are under the tree), that's 27%.

im tired of people here saying, well the ps3 isnt a blueray player its a console

the ps3 is ALSO a blueray player, the same as a 360 w/ the hd dvd player(most 360's being excluded due to the fact most dont have hddvd players) is an hd dvd player, and a blueray burner, is a blueray player

if it plays the format, then by definition it is a player of that format.

so if you compare all hd dvd player and blueray players by my definition, i bet blueray still comes out on top. you cant rule out ps3's because there are people who buy it soley to play blueray, because its cheaper than most stand alone blueray players.

you can only exclude ps3's in standalone format player stats, because the ps3 is essentially a multi-format player.

Blueray in my opinion is winning due to that fact, more blueray players are in circulation, you can store more on a blueray disc(which is all i care about). PC people will probaly like blueray more because they can fit a crapload onto them, like everysong you own, or multible movies. every episode of a tv series.
Software isnt important, that can be easily changed and updated without many problems, pure hardware however HAS to be at the high point so it can fit the expansion of space used. 5 years ago how much space was an average hd, now what is it. they should start putting more than one movie onto blueray discs, and putting entire tv series onto them.

If there are 2.7 Blu-Ray players sold, why only ~200k Spiderman 3 (their best title) sales? That's bad. That's only 7% people buying or 1 in 14 blu-ray owners buying. On the other hand, ~200k of Transformers (their best title) sold with 750,000 HD players sold (numbers of in use are probably less because they are under the Christmas tree), that's 27% or better then 1 in 4 HD owners buying.

True, but XBOX360 wasn't released with HD-DVD. If it was, the price tag will be almost as expensive as PS3 if not more. That would cause less sale. Not to mention the fact that if XBOX360 came with the HD-DVD, less people would buy standalone HD-DVD player.

Price isn't really a factor here. Once the format wins, price will drop. DVD used to be expensive, and the price dropped. Whoever wins the war, in the end, prices will be similar.

2.7 million Blu-ray "players" have been sold, but 2.1 million of those are PS3s. How many of those PS3 users are regularly using their consoles to watch Blu-ray movies? I'm guessing not too many. So really, these numbers are pretty pointless, because not everyone who buys a Blu-ray player is actually buying it for the Blu-ray player, while everyone who buys a HD DVD player is buying it to watch movies.

What I'd really like to see is some numbers for actual movie sales. I'm betting that per player, HD DVD is far outselling Blu-ray. Both HD DVD and Blu-ray have two titles in Amazon.com's Top 100 DVDs.

It also seems that when a title is offered on both formats, HD DVD sells more discs than Blu-ray. Planet Earth HD DVD is ranked 19th in DVD sales, while the Blu-ray version is ranked 50th. The HD DVD version of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is outselling it's Blu-ray counterpart (
162nd vs. 271st), as is the Blade Runner Collector's Edition (277th vs. 312th).

It sounds more like PS3 sales statistics. Probably only 100 stand alone BR players were sold. I'd like to see those dumb asses who bought them :) Those people have no brain:):):) lol

I'm sorry that you can't tell the difference between 1080p and upconverted 1080i content, but some of us can. Progressive scanned content is literally TWICE as good as interlaced. When you see pixels, you are seeing ALL of them at once, which, according to my senses, is better. I've watched 1080p content on a 1080i HDTV and seen a difference when comparing that same content running on a 1080p HDTV.

This is also why MANY people are of the notion that 720p is superior to 1080i.

480p > 480i
1080p > 1080i

Period.

You're assuming Amazon.com makes up the entire Blu-Ray market. It does not. It's only one indicator of total disc sales. Blockbuster and Netflix, to me, would be much better indicators of how each are doing, since Blockbuster/Netflix by themself purchase far more discs for renting purposes.

Try again. The Samsung BD-P1200 retails for $299 at Best Buy. Like I said, to get 1080p, you aren't saving any money going with HD-DVD.

HD dvd players sales NEVER SELL WELL UNTIL the fire sale of the Toshiba A2 for under $100. So how many of you hd fanboys out there brought the A2 or the A3 for more than $200? After consumers sees that Toshiba are willing to dump there old player for cheap, how many do you fanboy see Toshiba will sell for under $200 but over $100?

Just give me a ps3 that can play both I don't care what the frikin format is I Just want to have one piece of equipment under my tv play games surf the web order pizza and not worry about who's on top this week. If it's so important to the movie execs what format is better then have both I don't really care about what features each have If I want to see the movie I will pick it up!! Right now I'm not buying any movies so who's really winning now!! If this was about the consumer their would be all dual format players at the very least but instead their are too many CEO's that have penise envy and can't admit their mistakes

I have compared tv series all tv series on hd-dvd are more expensive than blu-ray.

Star trek season 1 is 149.99 , lost season 3 on blu-ray is 69.99.

There are 100's of tv series i can list same thing hd-dvd $100 blu-ray $50-$70.

Same goes for movies prices have been going up, i have been checking at a few big box stores.

My first DVD player (and only for a few years) was a PS2. My first high def player (and only so far) is a PS3. At the time, PS3 was the cheapest BD player (and also a kick-butt console). Who in their right mind would buy a stand alone player when the PS3 was cheaper for so long (and now only $50 more). OF COURSE PS3 far out sales stand alone BD players.

And from everything I have seen, Blu-Ray disks (movies) have outsold HD-DVD disks 2 to 1 overall . . .

guess what now i have a ps3, and she has her blueray to watch the 300. how many other adualt males have bought "BLUERAY" devices that just happen to play ps3 games?

we will never know that is why the ps3 has to be included in any hd-dvd vs blueray player penatration study.

The truth of who is winning is in disc sales not players sold though.

Guess there aren't as many PS3 sold as we thought! Sure, it's great for first year penetration, but given the sales numberss for Xbox 360 and Wii, PS3 is losing very very badly to those 2 formats...let's see Wii sold nearly 10 million, and 360 about 7 million in that same time frame...hmmmm...looks like a major spanking for PS3 to me...the trojan horse plan failed miserably. Sony stands to make more money on gaming then from BD, so this isn't good news. But, let the BD boys spin spin spin....your sales advantage is 3-1 WOW...like we didn't already know this...actually...this means there's like NO Blu Ray players selling....which is what STUDIOS will look at.

6.55 million ps3's have been sold so far so this must not include the ps3.

http://www.vgchartz.com

I did my price check at Amazon for players that were actually available. If the BD-P1200 a phase out, then I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for them to come back in stock.

I still want to see the brake down of sales based on monitor/projector resolution.

1) LCDs and Plasma displays do not display interlaced images. They may accept an interlaced image, but their display technique is always progressive.

2) HD disc media, Blu-Ray or HD-DVD is 1080p, natively progressive on disc.

3) Blu-Ray and HD-DVD players use virtually the identical chipsets, as they are commercial-off-the-shelf. They handle the data from the disc by splitting it into fields (why, I don't know, but that is how the chipset works). Take the A3 (1080i) and the A30 (1080p), for instance -- the main difference being on chip that reassembles (deinterlaces) the fields before output. The source was 1080p so there is no timeshift between the frames, and your flatpanel TV reassembles (assuming you have an A3 not A30/35 or Blu-Ray) the matching fields, harmlessly.

4) 2.7 million Blu-Ray with PS3 must only count North America. The article is rather vague. Last week a TG article counted standalone Blu-Ray at barely 200,000, so that would mean 2.5 million PS3s.

5) I have PS3 and 360 add-on, and HD content on both look great. I believe that selling the HD-DVD add-on to any 360 owner for $50 (some kind of optional voucher included) would ramp up sales much greater than any free movie offer. With the 5 free movies, you still mave to put up $150-$200 for the player.

Look it up, Gullible. It's not in the dictionary. Really it's not. Go ahead look for it...

I guess you'd buy a Blu-Ray player too. Right? HA!

Like with movies, I think these numbers are only reflecting sales in North America...that's the tricky figure, since you can't say US...becuz of our Northern Brethen.

How many sold is not the only important parameter, how many more are yet to be sold is more important. How many Americans are willing to buy a game station for $400 to watch movies in each room ? My guess is, not many. Sony already sold a big chunk of PS3s that will ever be sold, but the hi-def player market is much larger than that number, and hence, the war is far from over. I don't want the war to be over as long as that brings prices down. I think Toshiba's 1080i ploy was as clever as Sony's PS3 ploy, but Toshiba has to lower prices further to stay in the race.

I bought a ps3 for the purpose of playing both BD disc and games.
the PS3 is actually a really good dvd player, plus it got harddrive, so in the near future, it will be a HD DVR. (sony is going to sell tv tuner module for ps3) So the PS3 is even better than a regular BD machine.

I don't have the breakdown that you wanted, but I did notice that Bestbuy's top selling Hi Def player was in fact a 1080p Blu Ray player. A toshiba A3 was second place.

Seriously, why won't you post my comments on this article? There was nothing offensive in any of my posts!

/silenced reader

Due to interest it would be great to see a once a month article on TG daily, with total global sales for:

Blu-ray and HD DVD players (both with and without the inclusion of console players)

Blu-ray and HDDVD movie sales

Blu-ray and HD DVD rental sales (because some ppl prefer to rent movies rather than owning them eg me )

Blu-Ray and HD DVD blank disc sales.

So, you're basically saying that all 1080i LCD and plasma displays are not really 1080i? Care to explain that? Didn't think so.

I honestly can't believe so many people don't see this, but I think HD DVD has sold something like four times as many stand-alone players as BD. And when that last article came out about 750,000 HD DVD players sold, all BD fanboys were saying, "Oh, you're counting the Xbox add-on! Foul!" That's not a foul. Someone made this distinction elsewhere, but the HD DVD add-on for the Xbox may not be a stand-alone but it is DEDICATED. This means you would not go out and spend $180 on it with no intention of purchasing HD DVDs. MANY people, as has been show, however, go out and buy a PS3 and then don't make use of it as a BD player. If they all were, then BD should have something more like a 5 to 1 lead over HD DVD software sales.

And as someone else mentioned - how many regular average adults are going to buy a PS3 to get into the high definition arena? NONE, that's how many. Nobody who does not play games wants to use a games system to play back their movies. The PS2 may have sold something like 20 million units, but there are something like 100 million DVD players in American homes. It could probably be even more than that, as many people have two or three players. I look at it this way - imagine that at the same time as DVD came out, Sony came out with the PS2 and a proprietary disc format for playing films. As is always the case with Sony tech, the cost of producing stand-alone players is astronomical when compared to their competitor, so, like the PS3, they probably would have been in a similar scenario regarding the PS2. So maybe, at first, they would have seemed to pull way ahead with PS2's selling like hotcakes out of the gate for a year or so versus regular DVD, but eventually, there are only so many game systems you can sell. So while it may have looked good in the beginning, once joe and jane consumer got into the mix and players dipped below $100, it would have been all over for a PS2 Sony proprietary movie disc format, had it actually happened. This is EXACTLY what will happen with BD - IF the players don't come down below $200 in price soon... as in, BEFORE Christmas. And with Sony's arrogance and BILLIONS spent on advertising, the losses on the PS3, and the losses on software (is that 90% failure rate true?), it is becoming an IMPOSSIBLE battle for them to win on the stand-alone front. Things are tough for a lot of people. Sure everyone wants to enjoy high def on the t.v.'s they bought in previous years, when money wasn't as tight during the holidays, but price WILL BE THE DECIDING FACTOR. Factor in that HD DVD can still afford to push software prices down should Sony start to get their stand-alone prices down and it's lights out for BD. They can lower software prices OR player prices, but they can't do both because they expect to make money in royalties on this format sometime in the next century. You can only hemmorage so much before something's gotta give. Usually, with Sony, it's the format itself. Also factor in that this 1.1/2.0 thing is out there now and believe me, you can explain to the average consumer that it doesn't have that big of an effect all you want, but all they need to hear is that HD DVD is a universal standard that's not changing and has ethernet for upgrading firmware and again, it's a loss for Sony.

(first off, sorry for the multiple posts, but I don't think anyone has systematically hit BD's faults yet)
IF YOU THINK STUDIOS AREN'T PAYING ATTENTION TO THE STEADY HD DVD STAND ALONE PLAYER SALES THEN YOU ARE INSANE. I happen to know personally that there are some people in Disney who are already growing impatient with Sony and the BD technology. Warner Brothers is impatient with the format war altogether, but look for Disney in particular to start making noises about switching teams or going dual format if BD doesn't get it's act together with regards to their standards and the cost of stand alone players. And with regards to this notion that Disney is the big gun as far as studios, since when? They might be the biggest NOW, but do you realize that Disney's live-action catalogue only goes back to the late 50's, and, even then, they only made sporadic films, like Mary Poppins? Universal and Paramount had, oh, I don't know, FORTY YEARS, on them in that category. And how do their animated classics and the Pixar movies translate to being THE decisive software in this battle? How many parents think they should shell out $500 for a player so that a five year old can see The Jungle Book in 1080p? A six year old doesn't care, they'll watch a torn up VHS tape as long as the content interests them. And if Sony didn't have the Columbia library, they'd be screwed too. Sure the new releases count, but I think catalogue titles drive sales just as much, if not even more. And the king of that is Warner Brothers, which is dual format. Blu Ray's biggest player is Fox, in my opinion, not Disney OR Sony. Maybe in the short-term, but not in the long term. I don't think BD will disappear, but I think that if HD DVD can fight the war by lowering software prices and getting a $130 player to market within the next two or three months, as well as some classic film titles, then it really might be over for BD's chances as THE home high def format.

Ill wait for the NPD's figues to draw any sort on conclusions.

PS3 made into a HD DVR? Talk about worthless. Do you know how long it would take you to fill up 80 gigs with High def content? Maybe a couple movies and a football game and its already full. What good is that? HD DVR with less than 500 gigs is really not worth it.

The number 2.7M is very funny. Is it referred to a period? Or is it an absolute value? I thought that there were more than 6M PS3 out there plus about 300K stand-alone BD players.
Messing up with numbers is a bad thing. You lose credibility.
BTW, as said before, I wish BD won over HD-DVD because I wish to keep using my PS3 also to see movies, without buying another device. However, numbers are numbers and shooting them randomly is not the right thing to do.
It is sensible to include some percentage of PS3 as HD-movie players, if the have done something like that they should tell. It seems that they are saying that BD stand alone players 50% PS3 sold = more or less 2.7M
That's, perhaps, their estimate.
However, you can lower that percentage to 10% and there will always be more BD-players out there than HD-DVD ones!

Come on, you spent about $500 for the console, annother $1000 for the projector/HDTV, and annother bit for the surround sound system. People who have bought a PS3 are going to use it as a BD player, and they generally have the money to. Those who are buying the cheap HDDVD players at walmart are getting it to be cool, but many are breaking the bank just getting the player and the TV, they arent going to spend the money on movies.
And to Derrick; yes most people who have the PS3 have them with the biggest and best movie screen in the house, and with the new firmware updates it even scales DVDs better than most DVD upscalers, so it is beginning to replace DVD players as well. This is what sony has been trying to do sinse the PS2, they wanted to have a 'entertainment system' not just a game console. They may not perfect it till the PS4, but they aim to replace consoles, set-top players, and even computers. They are not there yet, but they are making much progress in this regard.

"The PS2 may have sold something like 20 million units, but there are something like 100 million DVD players in American homes."

I like making up numbers too!

2.... your IQ score.

BTW, the PS2 has sold over 100 million units.

These are in fact North American numbers: see http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=719.
"Coming off of huge Blu-ray sales during the early holiday shopping season (which includes Black Friday), market research now shows that consumers have purchased 2.7 million Blu-ray players in the North America region as of November 24th. Additionally, US sales of Blu-ray titles topped 4 million units in November, taking just over two months to achieve the new milestone. This new data dwarfs reports from the HD DVD group stating the format had sold 750,000 players by a factor of over 7-to-2. Interestingly enough, sales of Blu-ray software sold at a similar rate for the week ending November 25th."

Personally, I'd like to see both formats stick around. I'm not an economics expert, but isn't more competition a good thing? And most markets are "niche" today anyway, so why not this one? But maybe I'm dreaming in technicolor (or in HD!).

@winkgood : Worthless? If I want my PS3 (that I'm about to purchase) to eventually act as a DVR, I'll spend less than $100 for a high capacity 2.5" drive. and snap it in. Or I'll spend $400-$600 on a dedicated DVR. Not a difficult decision, really.
Cheers.

Relating to your first long post, let throw some logic at you.

First, the Xbox 360 is a game console, much like PS3 is a gaming console. Some would argue the 360 is an even better one, but I digress.

So, it stands to reason that even if you buy the HD-DVD add on, which IS used JUST FOR movies, guess what, YOU HAVE TO BE A GAMER FIRST by owning a 360. So, your theory is flawed because in order to enjoy the add-on, you will already be a gamer. Get it now? You're a gamer with a 360 who has a dedicated device for watching movies. That is not in the same league as a stand-alone player, because stand-alone players have nothing to do with gaming.

So then, it also stands to reason that the Xbox 360 and PS3 be lumped together as gaming consoles, each capable of playing HD content. And, if you include one format in the "numbers", you must include the other format as well.

Saying that not every PS3 owner buys Blu Ray discs is an old arguement, and it doesn't hold water because NO PERSON ON EARTH accurately knows how many PS3 owners actually watch movies on it. I can speak for myself though. I've so far bought 5 movies (I bought my PS3 on launch day and didn't get 5 free discs).

So, I could also make the same arguement for HD-DVD players. Not every HD-DVD player owner is buying movies right now. Right? Some people just rent. The fact is, right now, more people buy Blu-Ray discs world-wide, so it stands to reason that it's more popular as a format. And you can refute that. Now let's take the number of players sold arguement away for a second. Regardless how many players were sold, more blu ray discs are in peoples homes right now.

Stand alone players only sales of 2.7 million world wide. PS3 sales account for close to 7 million sales world wide.

"So, you're basically saying that all 1080i LCD and plasma displays are not really 1080i? Care to explain that? Didn't think so."

They accept 1080i signals, but convert the signal to 720p for display.

Interlacing is inherent to CRT technology. In a CRT, the electron guns have to scan the screen, painting each line, which takes time. Also, progressive scan caused noticeable flicker on CRTs, so interlacing was a way of reducing the flicker effect. Only computer monitor CRTs are progressive scan.

Anyway, LCD/Plasma/DLP all display progressively.

LCD, Plasma and even most CRT HDTVs are all progressive. A TV that accepts 1080i will scale down to 720 and de-interlace to progressive. It's been happening for years and you didn't even notice. Thought you were really seeing 1080 lines, did ya?

In fact, most HDTVs will also upscale your 480i/p (or 525 if you PAL/SECAM) and de-interlace, if necessary. Maybe not as well as a upconverting DVD player, but they like to display at native resolution, so everything gets converted. I know my DVDs and NTSC signal look much better on my CRT HDTV with 720p resolution (but it does have that deceptive 1080i input).

So an HDTV LCD/plasma is either 1280x768 (which displays 720P resolution) or it is 1920x1080 for the full 1080p. (Some projectors and rear projection/DLP TVs use a 1280x768 panel/chip and then wobble while interlacing to give an actual 1080i, but I would not recommend any projector for HD unless is is truly 1920x1080 and labeled as 1080p). Most of the CRT HDTVs will reveal a display spec'ed at 720p regardless of a 1080i input, when you really search through the specs.

Funny thing is, even on your 1920x1080p HDTV, ABC, Fox and ESPN broadcast in 720p. So while the Superbowl was in 1080i (even on your 1080p TV) last year (CBS) it'll be 720p this year (Fox). See if you notice the difference.

Did that explain it to you? Didn't think so!

Advertising for TVs is very misleading. Just because a TV can process 1080i content doesn't mean that it is displaying at that resolution. TVs advertised as 1080i TVs do not have 1900x1080 pixels, usually they have a strange number of pixels like 1280x1080.

Plasma and LCD TVs have a set number of pixels. If it says that it has 1900x1080 native resolution then all inputs to the TV are processed by the TVs internal signal processor to 1080p regardless of the input signal. Yes this means that if you input standard def 480i it will up-convert it to 1080p to fill the whole screen. So if you have a native resolution of 1280x1080 and if the signal processing of the TV is capable, it will convert the 1080i signal into a 1280x1080p to fit the available screen area. Some TVs are better at up-converting than others.

Thank you for clarifying the LCD/Plasma phenomenon. I myself have a CRT HDTV and was not aware of that fact. But still, to me, an LCD/Plasma/DLP HDTV that is taking a 1080i signal and "upconverting" it will still not look as good as a native 1080p-capable HDTV. As with any conversion process, there is almost always degradation in the signal quality. So, when purchasing an LCD HDTV, I will still be buying 1080p for maximum performance.

Let's all remember that this is not a war to the general public, only to us techie folks out there. Only 2.5% of the total movies sold were sold on BluRay or HDDVD in Q1 2007, the rest were good ole' DVDs. Plus with dual format discs coming out, the true public war will probably never come to be. Sorry guys....

I remember the first CD players coming out at $1000.00. A year or two later you could get them for $100.00. Blue-Ray -vs- HD-DVD will eventually go the same route. Once they both offer 1080p at a reasonable end-consumer price for what they are...a media playing device...I'll buy one. In the meantime, HD video plays just fine on my media PC...even with no hardware accelleration.

And for the PS3 fanboy, please shutup already. Blu-Ray is the better technology and its about 2500% more of the cost PER DISC (thats every single copy of every single title).

An HD-DVD, per disc, cost $.09 a disc. Blu-Ray cost $3.00

Blu-Ray shows uncompressed 1080p. HD-DVD shows uncompressed 1080p.

HD-DVD uses the MS High Definition codec for its movies.

BLU-RAY uses the SAME MS High Definition codec for its movies. Same bitrate, same quality.

BLU-RAY can transmit more data per READ cycle

HD-DVD doesnt even user 100% of it data on the READ cycle (aka blu-ray's is pointless).

Blu-Ray's number 1 contributor is Sony, which is known for stepping on consumers rights to become a standard, which ( to the best of my knowledge ) they have never set, after multiple attempts (MiniDisc, BetaMax, PSP, Blu-Ray).

HD-DVD's main contributor is Toshiba. MS has NOTHING to do with the HD-DVD format. it just sat back and decided to pick HD-DVD because Sony is still (after 3 years) try to make it so its IMPOSSIBLE to backup blu-ray data. (which they think means make copies)

Food for thought> fight it all you want> its all true.

Your eyes, as a HUMAN, cant see the difference. Any difference you do see IS PYSCOLOGICAL, just like the response that you are going to type and try to convince people I am wrong. It makes a difference in video games, NOT in movies.

---
I'm sorry that you can't tell the difference between 1080p and upconverted 1080i content, but some of us can. Progressive scanned content is literally TWICE as good as interlaced. When you see pixels, you are seeing ALL of them at once, which, according to my senses, is better. I've watched 1080p content on a 1080i HDTV and seen a difference when comparing that same content running on a 1080p HDTV.

This is also why MANY people are of the notion that 720p is superior to 1080i.

480p > 480i
1080p > 1080i

Period.

Now you have to bring up an inference about non-square pixels, don't you?

You're just making something that most people don't understand even more complex. ;)

Fortunately for LCD/Plasma displays you don't really have to worry about those pesky rectangular pixels to give you the 16:9 format. But your CRT uses non-square pixel to stretch content into widescreen format.

As far as 1080i not looking as good as 1080p, that depends. How big is your TV? And, how good is it's de-interlacing algorithm? If you have a small set (

1080I becuase of the interlaced conversion losses about 30% of its resolution so its only slightly better than 720P. This resolution loss is not reversable by converting it back to 1080P.
You can't reproduce lost data.

Kgrach

Zupek, of COURSE it depends on the content you're watching. I never insinuated otherwise.

And yes, I was using a Gran Turismo Prologue when viewing the HDTVs that I was referring to.

Neither format can contain a full length movie with an uncompressed 1080p stream as this would require more space than multiple discs could hold. Just compare a RAW image from a camera with a JPEG compressed version of the same image. (Sorta good comparison but for videos compression allows for an even larger size reduction with motion compression)

[Uncompressed 1080p requires approximately 250 MB/s of video audio data. It's an absolutely enormous strain on equipment, hence its expense and general view of "no one needs it". -Rick]

There is a large number of encoding technologies to compress movies, but more importantly there a number of subsets of each type of encoding that define the quality settings for each video. The choices made will define whether a movie looks like crap or excellent on either format. It is just that with more space an encoder can be lazier and just increase the base bit rate. The more advanced the compression technology the more tweaks can be applied to help squeeze a movie onto a smaller disc. However, encoding to optimize quality while keeping bit rates as low as possible is much more difficult and time consuming as it requires knowledge of the nature of the video file.

Also wasn't the CD made by Philips and Sony. However, many more of sony's own formats have fallen into disuse and also many into niche markets. When a company makes that many formats its probably expected that many will not succeed but that doesn't mean they will all fail.

"I would ask, why would I put the PS3 in some "game" room, if that room could not support HD".

Because it belongs to a child - a parent may buy a child a PS3 but the child may still have a standard definition, regular, CRT television. This is what happens to gaming systems.

HD content is compresses in many ways. The most popular on BD is MPEG2 (just like a DVD) for HD-DVD it's VC-1. Although both can use both codecs and also the AVC Codec (also known a H.264)for compression.

All are interframe compression codecs, which means that key frames containing all data for the frame are spaced out through the movie with frames in between reconstructed with data from key frames both in front of and behind the frame being reconstructed.

So again, the codec used can affect picture quality. However, 1080i does not lose resolution when de-interlaced. It's still 1920x1080. There may be artifacts that degrade picture quality, but no loss of resolution 1080 is 1080 is 1080, you can't change that with de-interlacing.

I think that this is the biggest myth perpetuated by the video (and still picture, for that matter) industry. Just as clock speed is separate from performance in different CPU platforms, resolution is separate from Picture Quality in video.

Many factors contribute to picture quality, the first being your eyes and any corrective lenses that you wear (maybe it's time for new glasses). Next the size of your TV. The codec used for compression. The algorithm used for scaling and de-interlacing (the "Picture Engine"). The ambient lighting in the room. Oh, and the resolution of the video.

Your brain is the biggest factor. It has generally been shown that if you think the picture (or anything else) is better it will seem better to you. The other factor is they way retailers set up displays. They spend hours or bring in special technicians (especially if the manufacturer foots the bill) to set up the latest and greatest in HDTV. But they will not adjust the picture on the other models at all.

Wow! That 1080p 70" giant looks spectacular! Way better than this 1080i (really 720p) 42" POS.

Psychology plays a huge role. If you tell people the new TV they paid $4000 for is "Full 1080p" with unmatchable picture quality, they tend to want to believe it. It doesn't matter if it's a 13" screen. It's similar to the placebo effect.

First of all, let it be known that I do not own an xbox 360 or a PS3. I do all my gaming on my PC. I do not have a side in the format war, rather I waited for one of the formats to drop in price so it is afordable, since arguing about specs is dumb and there is no diference a human can detect between a blu-ray movie and a hd-dvd movie. They both look spectacular and have plenty of storage and perks (no I do not care that blu-ray can hold more, I think that is irelevent to the masses in the format war).

I do think that standalone players will win this war. I am sure that some of you do buy PS3's just for the blu-ray, however, MOST people buy a PS3 to game on.

I checked amazon.com's top sellers in electronics and in the top 100 there were 4 HD-DVD players and not one blu-ray player. Hell even a sony upscaling DVD player came in at #95. Now that HD-DVD is at a relatively afordable price, I think it will eventually win the war. That is unless blu-ray gets their price of standalone players to $200-$300.

Feel free to criticize me, I am open to battle on either format.

Take a look at how many Blu-Ray disks sold versus HD-DVD disks. The total sales of the Blu-Ray disks are higher, which means that people are obviously using these home consoles to play movies. Mystery cracked!

Ok, I'll take a shot here.

As I said previously, Amazon.com is but one source of sales. It is, by no means, the ONLY source.

For example:

Bestbuy.com's bestselling player is the Samsung BDP-S300 (Blu-Ray)

Sears.com's bestselling player is the BD-P1400 (Blu-Ray)

Tiger direct shows a Blu-Ray player in the #2 and #4 spots, overall.

Circuit City shows a Blu-Ray player in the #3 spot.

With the last two, Blu-Ray players were beat out by HD-DVD players for top spots, but BD players were still top 5 in every case.

And, these are all stand-alone players sales. When you factor in how many PS3s are likely selling (around 150-220k per month last I checked), it's anyone's game.

The reason that they chose interlaced for the original TV is that the human eye has a difficult time destinguishing between progressive and interlaced and so they only need half the bandwidth for almost the same virtual resolution(depending on sweep rate).

There is about 30% difference in resolution in calulations but only about 5% to the eye. If you look at two monitors, one P and one I you will have to think to look or you will not see the difference.

If from tomorrow, on, all PCs or all Macs manufactured are stuffed with HD-DVD players, with 5-10 free HD-DVD movies, would that count? No, not in any legitimate count of Hi-Def player sales where the player is intended and known to be used to watch movies (not as a CD player, paper weight, or a centrifuge).

The M$ HD-DVD add-on counts because it is purchased with the sole intention of playing HD-DVD movies. It does NOT play games. It is actually more legitimate to count the add-on than it is to count a standalone HD-DVD player. Why? Because a standalone HD-DVD player, arguably, could be used to upconvert DVDs, play CDs, and not watch HD-DVD movies.

Only an idiot would buy the add-on to do these things and not watch HD-DVD movies, when those capabilities are built into the 360 and every other DVD player in said idiots house.

The PS3 should not count, unless used for propaganda purposes. (SONY doesn't even release accurate numbers for PS3 sales, as they've admitted, and posters here claim 3.5-7 million.) It screws up the numbers if you're trying to get any REAL, USEFUL data. Hell, everybody is just giving away movies, I bet they count those, too. I guess both sides have their own internal numbers, so they know actual performance of standalones, add-ons, and PS3s. SONY/Blu-camp won't release the sales numbers for standalone players, because the know they are well behind HD-DVD players.

Hey guys just another point of view here. I work at a circuit city, and as far as it goes I would say there is at least one person per day that buys a ps3 with the major reason for the purchase being the blu ray player. On the other hand I see maybe 1 or 2 stand alone player from either blu or hd move out of the store per WEEK, if even that. My own father (hasn't played a video game since asteroids) purchased a ps3 just for the blu ray movies. You cannot just completely dismiss the ps3's numbers, people are more aware of it than you think!

Compression characteristics are very important for quality. But think about this:

If quality is what people want, why is MP3 the most popular codec for audio? MP3 sucks! It's no where near CD quality. There are many codecs out there that are better or yield much smaller files at the same quality. Yet those iPods keep flying off the shelves.

The average consumer doesn't really care about quality. They watch movies on their cell phone, for Pete's sake. Quality matter to some, but from a business perspective, quality cost money and adds limited value.

And the space issue is still bunk. You dont' have enough extra space on a BD disc to make a noticeable difference. With the current codecs, I doubt the average consumer with their 720p HDTV (the biggest seller by far)would even be able to tell the difference between uncompressed HDV and MPEG2.

Besides the extra space isn't for the movies. It's for HD extras that you might, MIGHT, watch once. The movie will be compressed even further to jack up the extra content so they have something to brag about.

I'm a PC gamer on a high-end rig. PS3 for games? no thanks.
I did however buy the PS3 because I'm a major movie fan and so far, I've acumulated over 50 BD titles. Blu-Ray is technically superior to HD-DVD. Those who don't (want to) know that; here's my eye-opening advice:
Pop in the HD-DVD version of 2001: A Space Odyssey (top-notch 70mm negative transfer) into player of your choice and compare the landscape scenes in the prologue with the Blu-ray edition of the same movie...using the same full-HD display. See it now? No? Feel free to make comparisons until you pass out. BD is in its own league.
I'm not a fanboy so don't flame me please...I'm just a guy who made a decision based on facts and they spoke loud and clear to me.
If you feel that sub 100$ player is a way to go into next-gen HD video, fine. Your choice.
On the other hand, if you REALLY want to depart from SD-DVD, then you will invest into BD capable player and you'll -know- that you're getting the best possible audio/visual experience at the comfort of your own home.
BD kicks the living daylights out of HD-DVD anytime, anyplace.

Add up the true Blu-Ray players and the rare few that use their PS3 for movies, and HD-DVD still is higher in numbers.

Blu-Ray is dying folks. That's why you see spin like this from Sony. They are gasping their last breath and lying about every little number they can on the way down. RIP Sony and Blu-Ray.

I'm interested in your comparison. Was this done on the same TV with the same settings and the only difference was the HD player attached?

Did you know which movie was which or did you use an A/B switch where you have to determine the best picture "blind" so to speak?

What size TV was it and how far from the set were you?

I hear a lot of people saying that this format or that is better, but looking at the specifications for the codecs, there really isn't much difference.

If you know which is which, then placebo effect comes into play. If it's 2 different sets at a store where the retailers adjusted the settings, it really isn't a fair comparison. If you have to have a huge TV and stand inches away, not a very realistic comparison.

I have seen great BD movies in stores. But they are set up with TVs that have been specifically adjusted by Sony-approved (and trained) technicians (I asked) to give the best picture in that environment. If you want to push BD in your store, you just don't adjust the pictures on the other sets and tweak the BD-playing TV for hours until it looks perfect.

I've looked at both in stores and, if the set is adjusted well, I have yet to see a difference between the two, or that much of an improvement over my DVD player hooked up to an HDTV at home. If I had a 70" set, I'd have to decide on one format or the other, but with my little 36", it just makes more sense to wait for pricing to come down and one to win.

So for this Christmas, the PS3 is not even being considered, as all the search engines do not report it being one of the top 100 search items. The Wii, of course being #1 on many, and the Xbox 360 being in the top 20 for many too.

PS3 sales will tank soon. As will Blu-Ray. HD-DVD will become the undenied choice within the next 12 months. Bank on it.

space odyssey bluray and hddvd have the same video encodes so you obviously are a stupid fanboy.
these numbers are for america not worldwide. hddvd includes xbox add-on , bluray includes ps3. so hardware sales favour bluray about 75/25 %
movies sales are about 65/35 % for the year with the most recent neilson numbers 58/42 favouring bluray. stop the FUD

What kind of drugs are you on? LOL

Given the stubbornly consistant 2 to 1 sales advantage that Blu-Ray has over HD-DVD, the 10% figure just doesn't hold up. Look at the numbers given above... 400,000 standalone BR vs. 700,000 standalone HD-DVD players. That means if every console owner buys roughly the same number of titles, there's 1.4 million blu-ray titles for every 700,000 HDDVD titles sold - leaving 1 million unaccounted for Blu-Ray sales. According to numbers given above there's a bit over 2 million PS3's kicking around, which means about 50% of those console owners are buying blu-ray movies... which imo is much closer to reality than 10%.

I've owned my PS3 since last christmas... I've purchased 4 boxed games for it and I've got about a dozen blu-ray movies.

In reality - up until recently the PS3 has been a very poor value as a game machine (due to a serious lack of decent content), but it's been a very GOOD value as a blu-ray player all along, so it only makes sense that a significant percentage of sales are going to movie watchers who figured that a $600 ps3 was a better value than a $600 stand alone player (that's the only reason I bought one).

Since the sales for either formats discs don't even amount to one disc per player (if you count the PS3), the point is moot.

Most movies are the ones they have to give away to get anyone to buy a player (or PS3 for that matter).

If you use the logic that one format will win because right now the sales ratio is 2-1, then it's DVD FTW!

BTW, you say you "purchased" 4 games but "got" (have) about 12 BD movies. How many movies came with the system and how many did you actually shell out the cash for?

my retarded Beavis, overall image quality isn't determined by the compression codec alone. There's the hardware, advanced image processing engines and many, many other things. Blu-Ray is MILES ahead of HD-DVD in this department too.
But you wouldn't know anything about that with your Wal-Mart, buy-washing powder-get-two-free-HD-DVD players, would you?
Here's my advice: Get your Butthead buddy, drive up your pickup-truck to the nearest Pioneer shop (providing you got one in your Deliverance town), scrape the horse manure off your boots and walk into the showroom.
If they don't immediately throw you out,let them demo Planet Earth BD from their Blu-Ray player on their 50" or 60" Full HD Kuro (which is pretty much the Holy Grail of full HD panels).
What you're going to see is sure to set your overalls on fire.
What you need is perspective, not more burritos.

Lets look at it this way guys. Whether the stats include PS3s or not doesn't matter. Whoever keeps on saying blu-ray will fail cos of betamax, MD, memory stick is just dumb. History does not determine the future. Yes, Sony has made some mistakes. In NO way does that mean it will happen again. I happen to have a HD-DVD add-on to the XB360. I also happen to have the PS3. I bought BOTH for the Hi-Def movies. In all cases, i buy Blu-ray first, then if the movie is not available on Blu-ray, then i will consider HD-DVD. Don't tell me that I didn't buy the PS3 for the Blu-ray, cos I did. And cos of the previous price differential between Blu-ray stand-alone and PS3, those that wanted Blu-ray playback would have chosen PS3 - so people DID and DO buy the PS3 for blu-ray movies.