Why the Blu-ray HD-DVD combo player is stuck in neutral
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Blog: Consumers can buy a high definition disc player that plays everything, or they can save money and buy separates.
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Toshiba Corp (6502.T) said on Sunday  its HD DVD high-definition video format is not dead despite  being dealt a big setback by Warner Bros studio's decision to  exclusively back Sony Corp's (6758.T) rival Blu-ray technology.
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Blu-ray, one of two much-hyped  high-definition DVD formats, debuts next week, but the launch  is expected to be muted amid device delays and consumer  confusion, industry analysts said on Thursday.
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Toshiba has hammered another nail in the Blu-Ray coffin, by announcing a dual layer HD-DVD and DVD disc. This means that studios will be able to sell discs that have the DVD version on one side and the HD-DVD
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HD DVD continues to show some fight in its seemingly unending war with Blu-ray. Meanwhile, LG and Samsung introduce new dual-format players.
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Consumers looking to upgrade their home theaters can now choose between two types of high-definition DVD players &#151; the confusing result of a long-running format war involving Hollywood studios and technology companies.
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Blu-ray appears to have won the high-def DVD format war, as Paramount announced on Monday that it would dump HD-DVD in favor of Sony's Blu-ray format. Last week, Warner Bros. also threw its weight behind Blu-ray.
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Warner Brothers, the only studio to back both high-definition video disk formats, now will only publish movies in Blu-ray. Some say this shift will quickly kill the competing HD DVD format.
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With the news early Tuesday that Toshiba is ending the next generation optical disc war by pulling the plug on HD DVD, the manufacturer said it has no plans to support or manufacture Blu-ray players. Likewise, Microsoft said it has no plans to announce.
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Bringing next-gen DVD goodness into the Europe's living rooms Review While other manufacturers flap about trying to decide what format to back in the HD DVD/Blu-ray Disc war, Toshiba has been solidly behind HD DVD since the start. The HD-E1 is the first consumer-oriented standalone HD DVD player available in Europe, so you can now feed your HD telly something decent.â¦
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InfoWorld - The high-definition movie disc battle between HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc can be traced all the way back to 2000, when companies began experimenting with using new blue lasers in optical disc systems.
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Samsung confirmed Wednesday that it was canceling one of its Blu-ray players, while delaying its dual-format model until the end of the year.
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(InfoWorld) - It's an interesting contrast: consumers are fast ditching videotape for DVDs and hard disks, but the people who make TV shows are sticking to tape for some cutting edge applications. When it comes to recording broadcast-quality HDTV, today's optical disc systems just can't spin fast enough to keep up with the video -- but that may be about to change. Current optical disc systems are speed-capped at about 10,000 rpm (revolutions per minute.) Spin them any faster and there's a danger the discs will physically disintegrate in the drive leaving nothing but a pile of sharp plastic splinters and data that is gone forever. And even if they don't break apart the disc can begin to wobble making reliable recording a problem. Engineers at the Science and Technical Research Laboratories (STRL) of Japan's public broadcaster, NHK (Nippon Hoso Kyokai), are working on an optical disc recording system based on consumer Blu-ray Disc technology that can spin as fast as 15,000 rpm without these problems and demonstrated it last week. It's needed because broadcast quality HDTV signals of the type NHK records stream at 250MbpsÂ making a fast-spinning optical disc a necessity. A 1X Blu-ray Disc records at 36Mbps so the new system is equivalent to 7X speed. NHK has gotten around the stress problem by making a flexible disc that is just 0.1 millimeters thick. The disc, which was co-developed with Ricoh, is essentially the recording layer from a Blu-ray Disc without the 1.1 millimeter plastic substrate that is used to give the disc rigidity. It won't break apart at higher speeds but is not rigid enough to be useful in a drive at any speed. To solve this second problem a thick stabilizing plate has been added into the drive. When spun, the disc is kept steady by the stabilizer and can be used up to 15,000 rpm, said Daiichi Koide, an engineer at NHK STRL. The set-up is similar to Hitachi Maxell's Stacked Volumetric Optical Disc (SVOD) that wasÂ introduced in prototype formÂ at last year's Ceatec exhibition in Japan and shown again at Cebit in Germany this year. SVOD packs several 0.1 millimeter thick optical discs into a cartridge and holds them against a stabilizer in the drive to keep them steady while in use. However there is a key difference between the two, said Koide. In the NHK drive the stabilizer doesn't rotate. If it did it would be susceptible to the same stresses that as the discs. The result is that NHK can spin the disc up to 15,000 rpm without any mechanical problems. The system is still under development and there's no word on when it will literally be ready for prime time. NHK envisages cartridges stuffed with a number of the thin discs that can replace videotapes. Â
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Hardware manufacturers are in fix when it comes to settling down for a standard for DVDs. Toshiba, NEC and Sanyo are favoring a next-generation DVD standard called HD (high-definition) DVD while Sony and other
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While the format war rages, movies must still be watched Review The HD format wars may be inching forward on the content front, but on the hardware side Toshiba has made a very aggressive move with the HD-EP30 - an HD DVD player which could be yours for less than Â£200. Not only that, but if you buy one now youâll get seven HD DVD discs thrown in for free.â¦
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Toshiba has abandoned the HD DVD high-definition video disc format, it announced Tuesday. (More to fol...
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Blu-ray triumphs in the hi-def war. Did you choose wisely?