Quote Originally Posted by Mr Peabody
Dave, I definitely agree that the classic movies sure offer more substance. Now that AMC really don't play much in the way of classics anymore, I may be forced to pick up more on disc. We still have TMC but I really don't watch that much TV. If I am going to drive 5 channels plus a sub, I want a movie that will fire them up. It's just two different types of viewing. If I watch an old movie, I usually just play it through the TV speakers.
Ditto for Bravo (at least in the U.S.). What was once a place to catch interesting movies across several genres is now nothing more than a depository for designer reality shows.

The viewing on those channels, especially TMC, might get more interesting once they go HD. Several of the heavyweight expanded cable/satellite channels like A&E, FX, MTV, and CNN are going HD before the end of the year, and it's only a matter of time before the majority of the others add HD broadcasts.

Quote Originally Posted by Mr Peabody
Some day down the road when NTSC gets turned off and people have to go HD, I don't see the point of a DVD player anymore as the HD players are backward compatible. And then, why continue with the DVD standard discs? Of course, that wasn't the scenario with SACD/DVD-A, was it. Man, I hate it when I come up with a counterpoint to my own point. Ah, but no one was turning off CD. DVD users will at least have to have Progressive scan and component or HDMI, or some way to down scale. This could all be a long time down the road though as a NTSC tube TV can sustain some one for a lot of years. It just depends on how consumers will deal with the big turn off.
Another angle to this will be the degree to which retailers tolerate going with multiple formats. Historically, retailers have hated carrying multiple versions for music and video releases. If Blu-ray or HD-DVD eventually builds up enough market share, then the retailers very well could accelerate the DVD format's demise by phasing the format out. This would be no different than when major retailers started clearing out their VHS inventory, even before the DVD had passed VHS in market share (though judging by the DVD's sales growth, it had by then become obvious that the DVD was well on its way to pushing VHS out the door). Or when music stores started dropping vinyl in order to expand their CD sections.

However, if Blu-ray or HD-DVD sales momentum stalls or does not otherwise meet projections, then you might see retailers dial back on the shelf space that they allocate to the HD formats. This would be a similar situation to SACD and DVD-A, which came to market and got some major retailers on board, but the shelf space for those formats never expanded, and those sections have either languished or gotten phased out altogether.

Also the pending phaseout is simply a phase out of analog broadcast signals. Cable companies can continue to retransmit the contents over their analog NTSC cable systems, and that alone will keep the millions of older TVs from instantly turning into oversized doorstops. The mandate is not for HD resolution, but more for the implementation of digital TV broadcasts. A station can cutoff its analog broadcasts, and still keep its OTA digital broadcasts entirely at non-HD resolution.