Posted by nospam on 12/10/05 19:21

On Sat, 10 Dec 2005 08:37:36 -0500, "Matthew L. Martin"
<nothere@notnow.never> wrote:

>You might be right, but there are real differences between LD and DVD in
>the market at the introduction of the successor.
>
>LD was in a extended year over year decline of sales when DVD came out.
>There probably under 1 million LD player owners that bought LDs
>DVD didn't require the purchase of a new display for image improvement
>DVDs cost significantly less to buy than LDs
>
>DVD sales may have peaked, but the are not in an extended decline
>There are tens of millions of people who are actively buying DVDs
>HD-DVD/BR requires the purchase of expensive display for improved image
>Who knows where the studios will position HD-DVD/BR prices.
>
>I think HD-DVD/BR will take a lot longer to displace DVD than it took
>for DVD to displace LDs.

It's true that DVD is the first to establish a sale thru market for
movies so I agree HD/BR DVD won't finish off SD DVD cleanly in a short
period of time.

Studios are counting more and more on DVD sales as part of their
profits. For new releases, the hybrid HD/SD DVD will do continue the
sale thru. So from a studio's sales point of view, HD DVD isn't
primarily aiming at new releases but catalog titles, one which you've
already purchased a DVD for.

That's why the James Bond movies, LOTR movies catalog rights still
worth a bundle because studios can resell them few more times over.

The biggest obstacle for HD DVD is the higher priced HDTV set but
that's not the case anymore. A 32" 4/3 Sony 4-5 years ago was selling
for $1000, the same as a 32" 16/9 LCD is selling now.

To say HD DVDs won't sell because it needs a HDTV set is like saying
SD DVD won't sell because there're a lot of older TV without a
RCA/component input.

When I first saw the first gen DVD player in action, I thouhgt it was
a little pixalated and LD had a better picture. The second gen DVD
player was a bit better but I thought, why would anyone replace their
LD with DVD for marginal picture improvement.

Well, you know what happended next.

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