Warner to announce Dual FORMAT HD DVD/Blu-ray discs!

[StingerNLG]

Now here's some interesting news:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/04/te...gy&oref=slogin

Warner Brothers, which helped popularize the DVD more than a decade ago, plans to announce next week a single videodisc that can play films and television programs in both Blu-ray and HD-DVD, the rival DVD technologies.

Warner Brothers, a division of Time Warner, plans to formally announce the new disc, which it is calling a Total HD disc, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Tuesday.

Very very interesting. And as usual, Warner Bros. has the correct attitude:

Barry M. Meyer, the chairman and chief executive of Warner Brothers, said in an interview that the company came up with the Total HD disc after concluding that neither Blu-ray nor HD-DVD was going the way of Betamax anytime soon.

“The next best thing is to recognize that there will be two formats and to make that not a negative for the consumer,” Mr. Meyer said.

And my favorite line:

“We felt that the most significant constituency for us was to satisfy the consumer first, and the retailer second. The retailer wants to sell hardware and doesn’t want to be forced into stocking two formats for everything. This is ideal for them.”

Another little tidbit of info that might deserve it's own thread:

Another wrinkle is plans by LG Electronics, and possibly other gadget makers attending the Las Vegas conference, to announce new DVD players with drives for both formats; however, such players will most likely be initially more expensive than other players.

So a dual format player appears to be ready to go as well.

Next week will be interesting indeed.

[hmurchison]

This could work.

Universal drives may take take off and that leaves content providers with the tough decision to keep supporting both formats or drop one. If they license the Total HD format they can continue to deliver content on both platforms with only one SKU.

Warner may have succeeded in finding the magic bullet here to profits.

[aeonfett]

I refuse to buy these bastard discs...

[StingerNLG]

Well, then I hope you don't want to watch Warner movies in the future, because I think this is the way they're going.

And if that's the case, so much for that lossless audio................Oh I can't wait to see how this plays out. All of a sudden I want to bookmark my thread.

[aeonfett]

Originally Posted by StingerNLG

Well, then I hope you don't want to watch Warner movies in the future, because I think this is the way they're going.

And if that's the case, so much for that lossless audio................Oh I can't wait to see how this plays out. All of a sudden I want to bookmark my thread.

Seriously, can you say you like the combo format HD-DVD's currently in existence?

[hmurchison]

I'm hearing that the discs could be 30GB HD DVD and 25GB Blu-ray. Makes sense since HD30 is much easier to produce. HD DVD wins!

[gtyper]

Interesting.

Dual format discs. Never saw that coming.

I wonder how those little buggers work. Can you truly get all the video quality on there with the extras for both formats? Wow!

[gtyper]

Originally Posted by aeonfett

Seriously, can you say you like the combo format HD-DVD's currently in existence?

Simply because of price ... no. But, otherwise, I could care less.

[sd0]

Will these be two-sided? They must be, I can't see any other way of doing it.

[aeonfett]

All I can say is the Matrix trilogy better not be in this format... I like labels on my discs thank you very much...

[gtyper]

Originally Posted by aeonfett

All I can say is the Matrix trilogy better not be in this format... I like labels on my discs thank you very much...

Go ahead and put one on.

If you have a player of a particular style, just cover the other side.

[hmurchison]

These shouldn't be flippers and here's why.

On a BD ROM disc the recorded layer is just .1mm below the surface. On a HD DVD ROM the recorded layer is .6mm below the surface. Sooooo

If Warner has found a way to allow a laser to focus through the BD layer onto the HD DVD portion then they've got a winner.

[aeonfett]

Originally Posted by hmurchison

These shouldn't be flippers and here's why.

On a BD ROM disc the recorded layer is just .1mm below the surface. On a HD DVD ROM the recorded layer is .6mm below the surface. Sooooo

If Warner has found a way to allow a laser to focus through the BD layer onto the HD DVD portion then they've got a winner.

That could work... I'm just totally not into the idea of dual sided discs on the new formats... Too many bad memories of the WS/FF DVD flippers... UGH...

I thought those days were behind us...

[Blurry]

Originally Posted by hmurchison

These shouldn't be flippers and here's why.

On a BD ROM disc the recorded layer is just .1mm below the surface. On a HD DVD ROM the recorded layer is .6mm below the surface. Sooooo

If Warner has found a way to allow a laser to focus through the BD layer onto the HD DVD portion then they've got a winner.

IF they manage to put it all on one side, then this will advantage HD DVD even more. This is because HD DVD is inherently more resistant than Blu-ray (without the protection), but in order to accomodate Blu-ray, they will need to add the protection which will make the HD DVD data even more secure, since it will have double protection.

[aeonfett]

Originally Posted by Blurry

IF they manage to put it all on one side, then this will advantage HD DVD even more. This is because HD DVD is inherently more resistant than Blu-ray (without the protection), but in order to accomodate Blu-ray, they will need to add the protection which will make the HD DVD data even more secure, since it will have double protection.

OMG... If this is true... Then the Blu-ray portion is like the offensive line to an HD-DVD quarterback...