Blu-ray Discs Won’t Be Cheap

[ericl]

Consumers will likely pay lots more than the $23.45 wholesale price Sony Pictures will charge for its high-definition DVDs.

High-definition DVDs may promise better picture and sound quality but consumers will have to pay dearly for it, with Sony Pictures saying Wednesday new releases in the format will cost $23.45 wholesale—or more than 50 percent higher than today’s retail price for regular DVDs.

link:
BluRay Discs Won't be Cheap - Red Herring

[Smokey]

Sony Pictures saying Wednesday new releases in the format will cost $23.45 wholesale—or more than 50 percent higher than today’s retail price for regular DVDs.

That is true for new releases. But Sony also says that movies from its back catalogue in the Blu-ray format will sell for $17.95 (which is still high )

[GMichael]

I think we all saw this coming.

Thanks for the link.

[Florian]

Well, if the quality is great then ill pay it. Good quality costs quality money :-)

[Geoffcin]

That is true for new releases. But Sony also says that movies from its back catalogue in the Blu-ray format will sell for $17.95 (which is still high )

The price that Best Buy gets them for. Expect to pay $39.95 to $29.95 retail for any SONY title released.

[kexodusc]

DVD's and CD's were both priced pretty hefty originally as well. Companies love luring suckers in who are eager to throw their money away fast. Give it a bit of time and prices will become a bit more reasonable, especially with more competing forms of entertainment these days.

[Geoffcin]

DVD's and CD's were both priced pretty hefty originally as well. Companies love luring suckers in who are eager to throw their money away fast. Give it a bit of time and prices will become a bit more reasonable, especially with more competing forms of entertainment these days.

And they are selling for the same $$$ as standard DVD's then BlueRay will be stuck between a rock and a hard place.

[kexodusc]

And they are selling for the same $$$ as standard DVD's then BlueRay will be stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Yeah, that won't help either...Sony's Play Station might make a bit of a difference though. But I suspect the majority of adults with HDTV's don't have gaming systems, and some of those that do would have xbox or something else.
It'll be interesting...

[Woochifer]

Actually, that price sounds an awful lot like the original pricing for DVDs when they first came out. It didn't take long for the price points to push down once the format gained traction in the market. Given the competition with HD-DVD, and its pricing structure that's more in line with current DVD prices, I don't think that Sony will be able to hold up that price point too long. And with the Blu-ray enabled PS3 due out before the end of the year (and presumably priced around $400-$500), it seems that the margins on these HD formats will get squeezed before the majority of consumers even see one of the new players for themselves.

[Smokey]

Expect to pay $39.95 to $29.95 retail for any SONY title released.

Not me

[djreef]

me neither.

DJ

[Geoffcin]

Actually, that price sounds an awful lot like the original pricing for DVDs when they first came out. It didn't take long for the price points to push down once the format gained traction in the market. Given the competition with HD-DVD, and its pricing structure that's more in line with current DVD prices, I don't think that Sony will be able to hold up that price point too long. And with the Blu-ray enabled PS3 due out before the end of the year (and presumably priced around $400-$500), it seems that the margins on these HD formats will get squeezed before the majority of consumers even see one of the new players for themselves.

It costs like a billion dollars to build a new BlueRay factory. Sony has to amortize that into the price of BlueRay disks.

HD-DVD need only to changethe laser masks to make HD-DVD disks on a current DVD production line, so they have no huge outlay to amortize.

[kexodusc]

I'm not sure it would cost a Billion to build a Blu-Ray factory, but I think Geoffcin brings up a very valid point. Sony's even mentioned BluRay will likely sell at a small premium compared to HD-DVD, but are counting on the benefits to justify the price difference.
It could come down to a war of attrition, both sides taking little or no margins, and even running a loss on their formats for awhile to see if one will blink first. Sony's certainly held on to other formats, Beta, MiniDisc, etc...

I'm guessing both sides don't want to start a price war, though especially early on. If they came out with the margins too low they'd probably never be able to get them back up enough. If DVD is any indication, owning the license for the format is not a lucrative asset, especially compared to the other operations these companies run...Toshiba has made far more of selling electronics supporting the format than they have off DVD itself. I wonder if the fact that formats like non-red book CD's and DualDisc were so easily and cheaply brought to market would make proprietorship of BluRay and HD-DVD less lucrative?

[Woochifer]

I'm not sure it would cost a Billion to build a Blu-Ray factory, but I think Geoffcin brings up a very valid point. Sony's even mentioned BluRay will likely sell at a small premium compared to HD-DVD, but are counting on the benefits to justify the price difference.
It could come down to a war of attrition, both sides taking little or no margins, and even running a loss on their formats for awhile to see if one will blink first. Sony's certainly held on to other formats, Beta, MiniDisc, etc...

I'm guessing both sides don't want to start a price war, though especially early on. If they came out with the margins too low they'd probably never be able to get them back up enough. If DVD is any indication, owning the license for the format is not a lucrative asset, especially compared to the other operations these companies run...Toshiba has made far more of selling electronics supporting the format than they have off DVD itself. I wonder if the fact that formats like non-red book CD's and DualDisc were so easily and cheaply brought to market would make proprietorship of BluRay and HD-DVD less lucrative?

The irony of this situation is that Blu-ray and HD-DVD were developed to prop up the manufacturers' video player profit margins once again, after the margins on DVD hardware got squeezed down so quickly by the flood of cheap players from China. Blu-ray and HD-DVD supposedly have tighter controls over the licensing that were supposed to ensure that the price competition would not get out of control too quickly. But, with the format war and the ensuing fight over market share on one front, and the pending release of the PS3 and the need to keep console prices competitive with Xbox360 on the other front, it looks like the margins for these formats will get squeezed from the outset and the manufacturers won't have anybody to blame but themselvs this time.

[Geoffcin]

The irony of this situation is that Blu-ray and HD-DVD were developed to prop up the manufacturers' video player profit margins once again, after the margins on DVD hardware got squeezed down so quickly by the flood of cheap players from China. Blu-ray and HD-DVD supposedly have tighter controls over the licensing that were supposed to ensure that the price competition would not get out of control too quickly. But, with the format war and the ensuing fight over market share on one front, and the pending release of the PS3 and the need to keep console prices competitive with Xbox360 on the other front, it looks like the margins for these formats will get squeezed from the outset and the manufacturers won't have anybody to blame but themselvs this time.

The business models they are using don't take into account that I, and a lot of us are already enjoying HD On Demand & HD broadcasts, and are also time shifting them to suit our schedual. A lot of the benefits of DVD's of ANY type are gone simply by this ability.

HD is also, and I really mean this, overrated when it comes to most movies. I've seen a lot of movies I already own on DVD in HD now, and while yes it's nicer in HD, it doesn't make me want to replace my collection at all. In my view, sports, and live action benefit MUCH more from HD than movies. The Olympics are fabulous in HD, but which of us is going to buy a DVD of them?

[kexodusc]

Well but Geoffcin... HD is more evolutionary, where the DVD was revolutionary. This might not be a big enough improvement over DVD to most homes to justify the cost for quite sometime. And I'm guessing 3 or 4 years down the road we could be looking at something that's a step up on BluRay...
I suppose the studios do have the power to just quit making DVD's and force the market into a new format, but if backwards compatibility is built in, this probably won't work all that well.

[Geoffcin]

Well but Geoffcin... HD is more evolutionary, where the DVD was revolutionary. This might not be a big enough improvement over DVD to most homes to justify the cost for quite sometime. And I'm guessing 3 or 4 years down the road we could be looking at something that's a step up on BluRay...
I suppose the studios do have the power to just quit making DVD's and force the market into a new format, but if backwards compatibility is built in, this probably won't work all that well.

Both BlueRay & HD-DVD are going at this like it is some revolutionary idea that will change the way we watch. The fact is, as you've stated, that this is a evolutionary format, similar in many respects to how SACD & DVD-Audio were to audio. The botched transition to these superior fomats is clear proof that a STANDARD format is a necessity, and that leaving it to be decided by corporate entities has proven a failure.

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

The business models they are using don't take into account that I, and a lot of us are already enjoying HD On Demand & HD broadcasts, and are also time shifting them to suit our schedual. A lot of the benefits of DVD's of ANY type are gone simply by this ability.

Unfortunately HD in any form right now does not include 1080p, lossless audio, interactive features, and the ability to include data on the disc via broadband connection. The 5.1 audio on HD right now is less quality than what you get on the typical 5.1 encoded DVD. The bitrate is 384kbps, which imo is Lo Fi 5.1 digital. It is also very compressed.

HD is also, and I really mean this, overrated when it comes to most movies. I've seen a lot of movies I already own on DVD in HD now, and while yes it's nicer in HD, it doesn't make me want to replace my collection at all. In my view, sports, and live action benefit MUCH more from HD than movies. The Olympics are fabulous in HD, but which of us is going to buy a DVD of them?

Geoff, you cannot compare severely compressed video with 1080p uncompressed video. There is just no comparison. If you have actually seen what 1080p uncompressed really looks like, it would be very difficult to make this statement. During a demo of Dts-HD that I had a chance to attend, I watched Finding Nemo, Saving Private, and Unfortunate Events in 1080p Dts-HD lossless. It was truely an eye and ear opening experience, and eclipsed anything I have seen in HD broadcast period. Better than anything I have seen from the studio I work at whose entire infrastructure is designed and optimized for HD broadcast at the highest level. We are currently sending out our broadcast signal at 25mbps, which is far greater than our competition average of 14.4mbps.

[Geoffcin]

Unfortunately HD in any form right now does not include 1080p, lossless audio, interactive features, and the ability to include data on the disc via broadband connection. The 5.1 audio on HD right now is less quality than what you get on the typical 5.1 encoded DVD. The bitrate is 384kbps, which imo is Lo Fi 5.1 digital. It is also very compressed.

Very overated in the extreme. I have interactive movies on DVD's already, and they sit in my collection gathering dust. Lossless audio is also wasted on cinema, where the main information is visual in nature. Perhaps someone who does engineering will notice it easily, but for most of us we're not going to be noticing. In fact, I'm quite happy with most of my DTS encoded concert DVD's, and unlike most movies, I am listening for the music as well as the performance on them. Sure DVD-Audio quality would be nicer, but only marginally.

Geoff, you cannot compare severely compressed video with 1080p uncompressed video. There is just no comparison. If you have actually seen what 1080p uncompressed really looks like, it would be very difficult to make this statement. During a demo of Dts-HD that I had a chance to attend, I watched Finding Nemo, Saving Private, and Unfortunate Events in 1080p Dts-HD lossless. It was truely an eye and ear opening experience, and eclipsed anything I have seen in HD broadcast period. Better than anything I have seen from the studio I work at whose entire infrastructure is designed and optimized for HD broadcast at the highest level. We are currently sending out our broadcast signal at 25mbps, which is far greater than our competition average of 14.4mbps.

For a technical standpoint yes, of course it will look better. But will it really MAKE Finding Nemo or Saving Private Ryan more enjoyable? In my view only incrementally, and even then, only on a superior set. I'm not taking the position that I find HD unimportant, only that it's not some quantum leap like DVD was over VHS tape.

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Very overated in the extreme. I have interactive movies on DVD's already, and they sit in my collection gathering dust. Lossless audio is also wasted on cinema, where the main information is visual in nature. Perhaps someone who does engineering will notice it easily, but for most of us we're not going to be noticing. In fact, I'm quite happy with most of my DTS encoded concert DVD's, and unlike most movies, I am listening for the music as well as the performance on them. Sure DVD-Audio quality would be nicer, but only marginally.

I wish I could agree with you here, but after listening to lossless audio, only a deaf person would not be impressed. It sounds so much better than what is currently offered on DVD that it is not even a contest. If you think that 1.5mbps Dts is good, wait till you hear bit for bit Dts, it wil stop you dead in your tracks. From my experience, it sound more like what we hear in the studio, than anything like you currently hear now.

I do not think cinema is more visual than aural anymore. There are movies like "The Haunted" which are not great in and of themselves, but the audio contributes so much to the visual, that the visual is boring without it. Most of the movies in the last two to three years would be the same. Without the audio War of the Worlds wouldn't have been nearly as enjoying as it was. I could say the same for well done movies like Polar Express, Corps Bride, Saving Private Ryan, and many others. We as humans take both aural and visual cues equally, not one over the other.

For a technical standpoint yes, of course it will look better. But will it really MAKE Finding Nemo or Saving Private Ryan more enjoyable? In my view only incrementally, and even then, only on a superior set. I'm not taking the position that I find HD unimportant, only that it's not some quantum leap like DVD was over VHS tape.

It depends on the person whether their enjoyment will be enhanced by a much more clear picture. I personally love when the picture is clean and free of artifacts. Edge enhancement, halo's, compression problems, aliasing, micro blocking, pixelation, jaggies can slap me out of a movie quicker than bad acting can.

I think you need to see 1080p uncompressed before you say that HD that BluRay, or even HD-DVD are not revolutionary formats. The DVD cannot provide uncompressed high def images. Nor can you use bit for bit audio, or be able to download additional content(which may not be important to you, but may be to a gamer or big time videophile), which DVD cannot ever do.

I do not think it does any justice to any of the two high def formats to think of them in your own personal perspective. You and I may never look at the extra's(I know how movies are made, about visual effects, and sound for that matter), but millions of other people do. We must take that into consideration on any evaluation of the new formats.

[ruadmaa]

Consumers will likely pay lots more than the $23.45 wholesale price Sony Pictures will charge for its high-definition DVDs.

High-definition DVDs may promise better picture and sound quality but consumers will have to pay dearly for it, with Sony Pictures saying Wednesday new releases in the format will cost $23.45 wholesale—or more than 50 percent higher than today’s retail price for regular DVDs.

link:
BluRay Discs Won't be Cheap - Red Herring

If Sony or any other company charges too much for their high definition disks, they are going to be eating a lot of them. Hope they have lots of Ketchup.

[Geoffcin]

I wish I could agree with you here, but after listening to lossless audio, only a deaf person would not be impressed. It sounds so much better than what is currently offered on DVD that it is not even a contest. If you think that 1.5mbps Dts is good, wait till you hear bit for bit Dts, it wil stop you dead in your tracks. From my experience, it sound more like what we hear in the studio, than anything like you currently hear now.

First of all, I am not deaf. Not only have I heard lossless audio, (played through some of the best systems avaiable) but I also OWN a system with lossless DVD-Audio. I never said it wasn't better. Of course my system is a bit better than the average joe's HT system, so it's also easier to hear on mine. For most people it's going to be a lot harder. I expect that's one of the reasons that SACD & DVD-Audio bombed so bad. The public has already voted on whether they want to pay more for marginally better performance in audio.

I do not think cinema is more visual than aural anymore. There are movies like "The Haunted" which are not great in and of themselves, but the audio contributes so much to the visual, that the visual is boring without it. Most of the movies in the last two to three years would be the same. Without the audio War of the Worlds wouldn't have been nearly as enjoying as it was. I could say the same for well done movies like Polar Express, Corps Bride, Saving Private Ryan, and many others. We as humans take both aural and visual cues equally, not one over the other.

Again, your missing the point. Time to take off the engineer hat and watch movies like the rest of us. Nobody, and I really mean this, NOBODY but someone like you listens for absolute quality in a movie. Yes, it would be nice to have lossless quality, but in action films, and just about every other genre I can think of it's wasted. Perhaps if you wanted to have a symphonic concert DVD then audiophiles might consider it worthwhile, but for evrerything else I think not.

It depends on the person whether their enjoyment will be enhanced by a much more clear picture. I personally love when the picture is clean and free of artifacts. Edge enhancement, halo's, compression problems, aliasing, micro blocking, pixelation, jaggies can slap me out of a movie quicker than bad acting can.

I think you need to see 1080p uncompressed before you say that HD that BluRay, or even HD-DVD are not revolutionary formats. The DVD cannot provide uncompressed high def images. Nor can you use bit for bit audio, or be able to download additional content(which may not be important to you, but may be to a gamer or big time videophile), which DVD cannot ever do.

I do not think it does any justice to any of the two high def formats to think of them in your own personal perspective. You and I may never look at the extra's(I know how movies are made, about visual effects, and sound for that matter), but millions of other people do. We must take that into consideration on any evaluation of the new formats.

Luckily I have seen both HD-DVD, and BlueRay on stellar sets. It's better yes, and I never said it wasn't. Unfortunately I already am enjoying both 720p & 1080i performance on my HD-Cable service so the impedus to run out and get these formats is muted.

[kexodusc]

I think Geoff and Sir T have indirectly asked a very interesting question - does the majority of the market really care enough about audio/video improvements at this stage to warrant these new formats? Or will this be a case of audio/videophiles driving demand like SACD and DVD-A?

I would like to consider myself a bit more of an a/v enthusiast than the average joe. But I have to admit, when I'm watching a movie, the bulk of my satisfaction comes from the movie itself, the finer aspects of audio fidelity and video clarity are secondary. But they're important enough that I'm always looking for ways to improve them. I can't think of many movies that were ruined for me because of poor audio or video performance. Alien 3 is probably the only one I can recall. Even the botched Star Wars Ep IV spots were just a minor annoyance to me.

I wonder if the average joe would really care a great deal? These days portability seems to be the biggest concern, people want audio and video on their ipods...if they can get it with better quality great. If not, well, "good enough" rules the day.

At home, I'm guessing a huge share of the market doesn't really have premium audio equipment that would benefit enough from the audio enhancement these HD formats offer (and let's face it, for most people, the audio enhancements will be marginal). And HDTV's still aren't the standard, though I suspect that will change as people replace sets.

It would seem to me that both the BluRay and HD-DVD camps are at the stage now where they are trying to create "perceived need" in the market...then satisfying that need with their format. The end goal of course isn't to deliver the best movie possible to the household, but to sell new electronics equipment to support the new formats people suddenly feel they need. Planned obsolesence in the Henry Ford model.

This site's regulars are probably the exception to the rule - how many movies at home would the average joe watch per week? I'm guessing it's below 1. Maybe 1/2 a movie per week isn't too far off.
Given that, there might be some merit to Geoff's suggestion that on-demand HD services will be "good enough" for most people. Even if it was 2 movies per week, would they spend $500 to upgrade receiver and source player, or just select the movie from their on-demand cable provider?

If this extremely likely scenario is correct, I can't see BluRay (or HD-DVD) standing a snowball's chance in hell if it sells for anything but the smallest inflationary premium to the current DVD standard immediately. Most people have only had a DVD player for a few years now, and probably aren't in a hurry to upgrade again.

It could very well be that HD formats success is being driven more by the desire for a safer, more "copyright friendly" format by the Industry, rather than by the end-users.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if they both go down in history as "transitional formats" in between DVD and some future offering. Laserdisc 2, anyone?

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

First of all, I am not deaf. Not only have I heard lossless audio, (played through some of the best systems avaiable) but I also OWN a system with lossless DVD-Audio. I never said it wasn't better. Of course my system is a bit better than the average joe's HT system, so it's also easier to hear on mine. For most people it's going to be a lot harder. I expect that's one of the reasons that SACD & DVD-Audio bombed so bad. The public has already voted on whether they want to pay more for marginally better performance in audio.

Please remove the emotion and re-read my statement. I never said YOU were deaf, I said anyone who couldn't hear the difference between compressed and uncompressed audio is deaf. Big difference. Seocndly, uncompressed audio is not even close to an uncompressed soundtrack. The soundtrack carries at the minimum twice the amount of information. Remember you are dealing with dialog, effects AND music, not just music.

DVD-A vs uncompressed movie soundtracks= no comparison.

The reason the SACD and DVD-A didn't make the grade had nothing to do with sound quality. It has to do with people's changing listening habits(nobody sits for long periods listening to music anymore) portability ( folks like to take their music with them) and the ability to integrate the formats easily within most folks hometheater (the lack of digital access to bass management, delay, and other alignment tools in receivers) are the reason it didn't make it. No one pushed any of the formats, and certainly not to the level of CD, DVD, or even the cassette tape for that matter.

Again, your missing the point. Time to take off the engineer hat and watch movies like the rest of us. Nobody, and I really mean this, NOBODY but someone like you listens for absolute quality in a movie. Yes, it would be nice to have lossless quality, but in action films, and just about every other genre I can think of it's wasted. Perhaps if you wanted to have a symphonic concert DVD then audiophiles might consider it worthwhile, but for evrerything else I think not.

Take off my engineers hat?? Come on Geoff. You have to actually hear a uncompressed movie soundtrack to understand the benifits it brings. To assume that a soundtrack cannot benefit from the lack of compression is short sighted, and shows a complete lack of understanding of how soundtracks are created. Take a ride over to hometheaterforum.com and see how many folks just look at the movies and don't notice the flaws in them. You have never seen more complaining about the QUALITY of the video and audio like you find there.
Everyone doesn't look at movies like you do, they enjoy the movie, but flaws within the video and audio can pull you out of a movie quicker than you can say your name. Haven't you ever heard a great symphonic piece poorly recorded? I love the Organ concerto No. 3 by Saint Saens, wonderful piece, but I have heard it poorly recorded so many times it is shameful. Didn't keep me from liking the piece, but I didn't enjoy the recording of that piece. The same can happen in a movie. I love the movie Thoroughly Modern Mille with Julie Andrews and Mary Tyler Moore. Great movie. However if the tranfer had alot of film grain, halo's, edge enhamcement, or stair stepping, it would be pretty hard to watch the movie without being aware of the artifacts. For videophiles, nothing is wasted, or we(or they) could have easily stuck with laserdisc and called it a day. As you see, that did not happen. The quality of the presentation is just as important as the movie itself. A trip to a theater will show you that.

Luckily I have seen both HD-DVD, and BlueRay on stellar sets. It's better yes, and I never said it wasn't. Unfortunately I already am enjoying both 720p & 1080i performance on my HD-Cable service so the impedus to run out and get these formats is muted.

I respect your thoughts on this. However, don't be mistaken that early adopters or videophiles share your thoughts. Broadcast HD is nothing like either HD-DVD or BluRay. You find way too much artificating in broadcast HD(not because of the technology, but how it is used) that it may be good for some, but not the holy grail for others. Keep in mind, one mans floor, is another ceiling. "I" cannot be effectively transferred to "others". The very nature of the letter makes it too personal.

[Geoffcin]

I respect your thoughts on this. However, don't be mistaken that early adopters or videophiles share your thoughts. Broadcast HD is nothing like either HD-DVD or BluRay. You find way too much artificating in broadcast HD(not because of the technology, but how it is used) that it may be good for some, but not the holy grail for others. Keep in mind, one mans floor, is another ceiling. "I" cannot be effectively transferred to "others". The very nature of the letter makes it too personal.

Personally I'm quite happy with broadcast HD, and I don't see the need for a multi-thousand dollar outlay in new & potentially buggy technology + $40 a pop software to get incrementally better quality. I think I'm going to be in the majority on this one.