HD vs. Blu-Ray DVD - out of the ashes of defeat...

If you read my previous two posts (here and here) about the HD vs. Blu-Ray DVD battle, then you know that I had an HD DVD player and a fledgling collection of HD DVDs before HD lost the format war to Blu-Ray.

It turns out, I didn't have to leave the HD versus Blu-Ray field of battle feeling totally defeated. For those of us who put our money on the HD format earlier in the battle, there are a couple of DVD players on the market right now that will play both formats.

Since I just reached another anniversary of my naval career, I also just got a nice bonus check in my bank account. Aside for any of you midshipmen reading this: Don't join the submarine force because someone's luring you in with dollar signs. Join the submarine force because you want to do some really cool tactical stuff on the pointy end of the spear that's important for our national security. Then, enjoy and make good use of the extra money along the way. LW and I don't plan on the bonus in our regular budget. In fact, LW was surprised by the deposit in our bank account this week. When it comes, we'll usually splurge on a couple of things for us and for our church, but we'll put the majority of it in some form of investment. With our pending move back to the mainland in September, we're setting most of this year's bonus aside to help with a downpayment on a house. We decided to go ahead and get a Blu-Ray DVD player though, and I was pleased to find two models that will also play HD DVD as well.

Best Buy had both the Samsung BDUP5000 and the LG BH200 in stock and for the same price even, and I had a 10% off coupon from Best Buy. For the most part, the two seemed to be the same. As I stood there looking at them in Best Buy, LW got on the internet and read the user reviews. Both models had very positive reviews. However, one user pointed out that the Samsung did NOT have Dolby TrueHD. I looked at the specs on the LG model, and it DID have the Dolby TrueHD, so I took it.

So far, we really like it a lot. Friday night for family movie night, we watched National Treasure 2 in Blu-Ray, and it was really good. Then today we watched Night at the Museum in Blu-Ray. NatM in 1080p high-def is AWESOME!

Out of the ashes of defeat... It didn't turn out to be such a big loss after all. I'm putting the HD DVD player up in our bedroom, because it still plays standard DVDs and the HD DVDs we've bought so far. Also, now I won't hesitate to scoop up a bunch of the HD DVDs that Amazon has on sale for like half price.

HD vs. Blu-Ray DVD - Follow Up

Follow-up to my previous post on HD DVD versus Blu-Ray.

First, on Tuesday, Netflix and Best Buy announced they are letting HD DVD go by the wayside and are sticking with Blu-Ray. It sounds to me like it's "game over" for HD DVD. (See "Netflix and Best Buy Feeling Blu").

Then, yesterday, in spite of this article back in April 2007 in which Wal-Mart had declared HD-DVD the "winner" in the HD DVD vs. Blu-Ray format contest.

There is one retailer that has the power to call the winner of the protracted Blu-Ray vs. HD DVD fight and that vendor is Wal-Mart. Over the weekend they apparently leaked plans to bring in a massive number of low cost (possibly sub $200) HD DVD players for Christmas...

What does this Mean?

It means that any studio wanting Wal-Mart’s support after year end had better be selling HD DVD movies. Wal-Mart won’t be promoting Blu-Ray and, after year end, will increasingly focus their marketing on getting people to buy into HD DVD players and the related HD DVD movie from them. (Rob Enderle, Digital Trends, 23 Apr 2007)

The latest news says that Wal-Mart is switching sides and will only sell Blu-Ray

Wal-Mart Stores said on Friday that it plans to exclusively back the Blu-ray high-definition movie format, in the latest blow to the rival HD DVD camp backed by Toshiba.

In a statement on its Web site, Wal-Mart said that over the next few months it would phase out sales of HD DVD systems and discs, and by June will sell only Blu-ray products.

The decision marks the third retailer this week to turn its back on HD DVD in favor of Blu-ray... (Reuters, 15 Feb 2008)

HD-DVD is like a sinking ship. I wonder how long it will be before Toshiba, Microsoft, and anybody else clinging to a hope of HD DVD staying afloat will give up and get on board the Blu-Ray boat? I suppose they have to continue to publicly support it until they get their inventory of HD-DVD players and DVDs sold off to minimize their losses. In fact, I think that must be why my mom found such a great deal on the HD-DVD player - the retailers see the righting on the wall and they're trying to clear out their HD-DVD inventory (note: HD DVD movies are like 50% off on Amazon.com right now).

Follow-Up 2/25/2008: Toshiba has raised the white flag and announced they will no longer manufacture the HD DVD players. Game over, man.