Who would Microsoft like to see win the format war?

[HEXUS]

According to Transformers director Michael Bay, the answer is no one. In fact, he goes one step further to claim the entire format war is one big conspiracy with Microsoft pulling the strings.

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[TiG]

I didn't want a format war in the first place, All its done in my view is turn me off of both formats. I won't buy either. Shooting themselves in the foot is my opinion of it all.

They both lose out.

TiG

[dangel]

I'll have a line of Mike's special stuff.

[shadowmaster]

Very interesting

[Mblaster]

I didn't want a format war in the first place, All its done in my view is turn me off of both formats. I won't buy either. Shooting themselves in the foot is my opinion of it all.

They both lose out.

TiG

Yeah, that pretty much sums up how I feel about it at the moment too.

[pendulum666]

Very interesting

Indeed. He mentions the "superior" blue ray. I was under the impression that HD-DVD was "leading" the "war" ?

[directhex]

like dvd-r and dvd+r, the differences are moot. no format is universally superior. in fact, most movies on the shelves today have better extras on the hd-dvd version, despite more space on blu-ray

[pendulum666]

But I thought in terms of actual sales and market share, HD-DVD was winning the race?

[nichomach]

I can see where Bay's coming from, but I think he's overlooking a critical factor; dual format players. Yes, because of the differing laser technologies, their manufacture is more complex than was the case with +/- DVDs, but the fact is that they are becoming available and they are coming down in price, and will fall further. He may even be correct in assessing Microsoft's game plan, but the fact of it being their game-plan wouldn't necessarily mean that it was a good plan or that it was going to work.

As far as Blu-ray being superior, it does hold more data, but the question is whether that data has any value; if both formats are capable of displaying the movies that you want at the resolution that you want (i.e. up to 1080p) then the only differentiation is between the extras. Personally, they're a lot less important to me than the main feature, YMMV. OK, Blu-ray has mandatory Java, HD-DVD has mandatory networking, but to be honest, neither fills me with any great joy as a prospect; a software sandbox for wonky games add-ins versus a disk that'll attempt to connect to "rich content" on servers that probably won't be there in a year or so.

TBH, I don't much need there to be a winner, unless we're talking about the winner being the first company to bring out a decent dual-format player under £200. THEN I'll break out the champers .

[Agent]

I dont think a lot of country's have the infrastructure for HD streaming / downloading if it was really to take off. Small scale it would work, but as for mom and dad sitting down and watching it via the net.....not so sure.

[this_is_gav]

Nail & head there Agent. The world isn't ready for entertainment to be shifted purely to the net. It's going to happen, and while us techies are ready and waiting, 99.9% aren't.

[s_kinton]

TBH, I don't much need there to be a winner, unless we're talking about the winner being the first company to bring out a decent dual-format player under £200. THEN I'll break out the champers .

I've been hovering over an LG drive on Scans website, its a BluRay writer, but also a HD-DVD reader!!! Its going for about £196 - perfect for my HTPC in the lounge

EDIT - Just noticed its shot up to £218 and is now out of stock
LG GGW-H20L Super Multi Blu-Ray Writer/HD-DVD ROM

[nichomach]

I've been drooling over that too. I have to say that I've been quite attracted by some of the AM2 platform mATX boards for an HTPC as well; cheap platform plus multiformat = teh win? Play have it listed for release on the 12th, BTW. Guess everyone's waiting...