The high-def DVD story still isn't over, however. Although the Blu-ray Camp and supporters are celebrating the fact that they have won the format war, they still have to face the standard DVD juggernaut, which certainly won't yield much anytime soon. After all, DVD is the most popular home entertainment format in history. With that in mind, Blu-ray still has an uphill battle in terms of long-term survival.
However, before I get into the challenges that Blu-ray still faces, I want to take a moment and give you my perspective on what consumers have both gained and lost by the outcome of the Blu-ray/HD-DVD format war, and why, in my opinion, why HD-DVD really failed.
What Consumers Have Gained by the Demise of HD-DVD
1.A single high definition disc format to consider: Let's face it, although consumers claim they want choice, what they really want is less confusion in the marketplace that affects that choice. With standard DVD, when a consumer buys a player, no matter what brand, it will play all DVDs available for sale. They want the same simplicity and consistency from a high-definition disc format.
2. All movies and programming to be available on one high def disc format: When going to the store to buy the latest movie releases on high-def, the consumer doesn't make the mistake of buying the movie in the wrong format, or find out they can't buy the movie because a particular movie studio doesn't release its movies for the format player that the consumer owns.
3. More individual disc storage capacity for playback, recording, and data storage: Although HD-DVD had enough disc space for movies and extra features released so far, with Blu-ray having more storage space available on its discs is a plus for that format. More disc space can provide more audio encoding options (especially uncompressed audio), multiple language soundtracks, and bonus features on the disc.
Proceed to Page 2: What Consumers Have Lost by the Demise of HD-DVD
