Sony - Kaboom - Financial Meltdown etc

[dataDave]

I agree. I don't know anyone in real life with a Blu-ray player. lol.

They need to flat-out stop producing DVDs if they want it to take off, and that will never happen.

Wasnt it around 300 quid at launch. That wasn't that cheap back then was it for a dvd player?

No, not at all... especially one that couldn't run full colour in RGB (not that anyone I know gave a toss or were even educated enough to know what RGB was, mind. Again, lol)

[saif]

£300 was a reasonable price for a dvd player at the time. People moaned about the RGB lackage but many at the time were totally unaware. The PS2 had so many complaints from the forumites in the know about it being ****e and Dreamcast forever etc.
PS2 was my first dvd player and i was the first person i knew to actually have a dvd player that wasn't a computer.

[dataDave]

I paid £150 for my multi-region DVD player in late 1999. I still have it in the bedroom and it's used regularly.

If you're paying £300 to watch DVDs (and at the time, play **** games bar one or two) and you don't know about RGB then you need a slap. I used to get so damn wound up at people not knowing about RGB, I was kinda glad about HD coming through but I still find people using composite leads for their main input. They disgust me.

Also, 95%+ of these f**kers with big, huge, bollocks-out, 1080p TVs don't even have anything HD to plug into them!! LOL! They sit there with their standard sky+ boxes plugged in using the RGB socket wanking over how 'good' they think their picture is, talk about brainwashing. It's so easy... If the government had sense (and believe me, they do have tons of that, they ain't stupid like they may make themselves seem in the slightest) they could have the nation by it's balls, and they do. The general stupidity of people genuinely disgusts me unlike anything else, without stupidity you'd be free of war, hate, racism, all that ****.... but more importantly **** picture quality, it aches my heart.

I normally go extra out of my way to be really poilte around new people I meet (of course), but if they have a **** picture due to a **** cable I'll tell them straight, and then usually ridicule them.

Don't get me started on the chavs I used to try and 'educate' during my brief stint at Gamestation, f**k me what a waste of breath that was.

[Lyris]

Sorry, perhaps i should have phrased it "no one bought it soley for its dvd capabilities".

But plenty of people are buying the PS3 solely to use it as a BD player, which is great because bar a few usability annoyances (no easy infrared remote), it's a perfect BD machine.

I normally go extra out of my way to be really poilte around new people I meet (of course), but if they have a **** picture due to a **** cable I'll tell them straight, and then usually ridicule them.

Nowadays with people getting more savvy to HDMI, the cable isn't really an issue. Badly set up (or NOT set up) displays are the real killer.

[eastyy]

have to admit...when i got the ps2.....i didnt have any dvds....and after i got that i then started collecting them....dvds were such a huge leap over video...skipping..subtitles ...extras and more importantly better picture and sound on my standard tv

With blu ray....i dont feel as compelled to upgrade my tv....i am happy enough with dvds for the moment....untill the moment blu ray adds more then better pic and audio...then i might consider it

blu ray just isent anywhere near as big a leap over dvd as dvd was to vhs

[dataDave]

Nowadays with people getting more savvy to HDMI, the cable isn't really an issue. Badly set up (or NOT set up) displays are the real killer.

I'd be lucky getting most of the people I know to even spell HDMI...

This doesn't go for any of my friends of course if any are reading, they all know their ****.

[Brats]

The big problem for MS with the Xbox was the component costs. nVidia never passed on any savings in the cost of manufacturing so MS made a loss on the machine until it was droppped. Note how quickly they dropped the Xbox after the 360 appeared. And that was as the Xbox had it's best year ever and the "Xbox is no.2" mindshare had set in.

They did pass on some savings - MS negotiated a sliding scale for the cost of parts at the outset which reduced year on year. Unfortunately they had to drop the price of the machine much quicker than they anticipated and nVidia wouldn't then budge on the agreed sliding scale (and who can blame them).

The 360 is, like the PS3, full of custom components as well. And MS doesn't have access to fabs like Sony / Toshiba / IBM does.

It's not as custom. The IBM chip in the 360 is fairly similar to other multi core Power PC based chips around and benefits from the improvemets in processing that are discovered with these other chips.

[Matt]

Nowadays with people getting more savvy to HDMI, the cable isn't really an issue. Badly set up (or NOT set up) displays are the real killer.

I think a lot of people have at least heard of HDMI by now, and know it's the "best" connection. I agree more people are getting tech savvy.

While I don't imagine BR will hit the heights of DVD anytime soon, I believe is will be a success and once more people have HD TV broadcast in to their homes, they'll buy in to BR. Prices are really low now on players, wasn't there a sub ?100 BR player on sale recently, if only for a week or so?

Regarding the other discussion on MS XB1 costs, I believe the HDD was the real killer over time, hence the decision to not have put one in every 360.

[Brats]

blu ray just isent anywhere near as big a leap over dvd as dvd was to vhs

I've been surprised how many people have said 'is that it?' after seeing a lovely HD image. Michael Mcintyre does a sketch on buying a HD Ready tv without knowing what HD is that I think sums up the general attitude at the moment.

I have no idea whether Blu Ray will take over DVD or become another minidisc. There's just too many factors that could swiing it either way.

[Miguel007]

A colleague at work was conned out of £100 for leads, that she was told she would need for HDTV, she actually thought when she got the TV home she had HD.

Companies must see people and instantly think '£££' when it comes to HD.

[Concrete donkey]

I've been surprised how many people have said 'is that it?' after seeing a lovely HD image.

I'm a 'is that it?' person when it comes to HD. I have a nice Panasonic 42" plasma TV but it's a standard def, having brought it about six months before the first Hi-def sets were readily available in the UK. It looks amazing, and the 360, PS3 and even the Wii look great on it (I can even read the text from games like Dead Rising clear enough). From what I've seen from HD, the difference looks negligible and not worth buying another TV for especially if SD devices like the Wii won't look as good on it. Perhaps if I jumped straight from an old CRT to an HD plasma I'd have been more impressed, but I find nothing wrong with my 480p capable tv and don't intend upgrading till it brakes.

[charlesr]

The fact that people are perfectly happy to watch films on their mobile phones should pretty much show that Bluray is going nowhere. I think most people would rather watch "HD" movies streamed cheaply to their 360 or SkyHD box than fork out for a bluray. Note that I'm not one of those people. Yet.

NOTE: F-Word used in clip below.

[fuse]

<3 David Lynch.

[Dirty Sanchez]

Well the Magicbox PS3 figures came from Business Week (based on iSuppli research):

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/dec2008/tc20081222_257990.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index+-+temp_technology

I'm sure the 360 has gone through the same process (and is of course 3 years old now).

Apologies for not creditting you for this. I am genuinely surprised at the drops in cost, they are not small saving, they are HUGE.

[Lyris]

The fact that people are perfectly happy to watch films on their mobile phones should pretty much show that Bluray is going nowhere. I think most people would rather watch "HD" movies streamed cheaply to their 360 or SkyHD box than fork out for a bluray. Note that I'm not one of those people. Yet.

Blu-ray is certainly going somewhere. The sad reality that I see every day is that the average person (and the average disc reviewer) just has very poor observational skills. I don't mean that "the average person isn't an OCD video geek" like me; I mean that they'll enjoy what they're told to enjoy. People will (and are) warming to BD despite watching it on badly set up displays, because they know what they're seeing is amazing; because they've been told it is.

And yes, as Lynch says, people who watch feature films on their telephone frankly deserve a talking to. Soap operas, OK, but cinema on a 2" screen. Watching films on a television is enough of a compromise as it is, but a phone?