Video Asylum

Posted by oscar (A) on January 21, 2008 at 17:27:59

In Reply to: RE: Interview : Universal EVP Ken Graffeo says HD DVD is here to stay . .... posted by ZS KEKL on January 21, 2008 at 16:30:40

"...But he does leave the door open to ending the format war by coming to some sort of an agreement with Blu-ray...
"
But even if he's stubborn, here's a bit from the Digital bits.

"...Word is that Best Buy is already planning to heavily favor Blu-ray in their stores, but may also be planning the phase out of HD-DVD by the end of the 2nd quarter of 2008, so they can focus entirely on selling Blu-ray to their customers in the 2008 holiday season with a clear message. These sales you're seeing on HD-DVD hardware are - from the retailer's perspective - about clearing them off the shelves. Don't look for them to restocked much. The exact timing of this will depend on sales, and HD-DVD software will continue to be stocked for a while to service those customers who have already purchased players. But despite the retailer's public statements, which help Toshiba save face, privately they know which way the wind is blowing.

So too do Universal and Paramount. Paramount is expected to announce a return to Blu-ray Disc by mid-year, if not sooner. They reportedly want to give Toshiba some time to sell out current inventory, and to make their own preparations. Paramount at least has done all the ramp-up work needed to release on Blu-ray, as they've already done so as recently as last year.

Universal's position is a little more perilous, on the other hand, as they're more than two years behind all the other major studios in terms of Blu-ray development. Word is their HD-DVD video encodes can't simply all be ported over to Blu-ray, as some of them "aren't good enough." So some of the digital film masters have to be re-encoded, which is a lot of work. Sources are telling us that one of the things Universal is hoping to negotiate with the BDA is help doing just that. Nevertheless, expect Universal to have at least announced a decision to support Blu-ray going forward, in addition to HD-DVD, by the end of the year...."

HD DVD is on life support. A couple of weeks of a Blu-ray sales advantage of 85:15 will confirm a supposition that the Toshiba HD DVD player fire sale will have little impact on software sales. If this comes to fruition, we can pretty much pronounce HD DVD no longer has a brain pattern.

• Best Buy to eventually force the issue ?!   (Open in New Window)