Is the HD DVD camp dropping the ball in marketing? (1 Viewer)

[Tim Glover]

And with each sd-dvd release attach a nice quick promo ( I know we all hate em ) at the beginning talking about HD DVD and/or Blu-ray.

 

[Adam Gregorich]

Yes they are dropping the ball. For the last several weeks Best Buy has been featuring only Blu-Ray in their weekly flyer (My guess is Sony is throwing marketing $$ their way). Someone here made a crack about the 18 wheeler. I think it is a great tool for the industry (take to the studios and to trade shows), but I don't think it reaches the average consumer. They would be better served to have a demo running at all the major stores and have someone there on weekends to show it off and answer questions for J6P, even it is donesn't sell players it will at least show that the format is still there. I also think they need to get the price of combo discs down and discontinue the regular DVD SKUs for these titles so people are buying a HD version even if they don't have a player yet.

Neither format is going anywhere anytime soon, but it seems like HD DVD is shooting themselves in the foot lately with a lack of information, and not challenging Blu-Ray.

 

[Chris Dugger]

Look......

The HD-DVD format is dead in the water until:

1.) We start seeing some NEW releases consistantly.....
2.) Warner stops holding back titles because thier IME won't translate over to BD-J.

Blu-Ray is getting great title support..... HD-DVD is getting squat..... Until HD-DVD studios stand up and support this format with great titles, it will continue to slide.

Dugger

 

[Steve Tannehill]

Has everyone seen the lengthy HD DVD ad on the "Man of the Year" DVD?

Warner, Universal, Paramount titles featured. Variations of the Warner HD DVD intro. XBox 360 and Toshiba notebooks mentioned.

- Steve

 

[ppltd]

Haven't seen it yet, but it makes since. this is a Universal Release. Now the real question should be, why didn't Universal release this film in HD-DVD?

 

[Tim Glover]

There was one on the sd-dvd side of Hollywoodland. Rather cool. So anyone seeing this film will get to see the HD DVD promo....Forced promo? You bet!

 

[Yumbo]

Universal's HD promo has been there for a while since Miami Vice came out. Great push on DVD for all HD studios. That's unselfish!

 

[Ron-P]

I was just in my local BB. They used to have an XA1 on a 70" + size screen at the entry to Magnolia, it's been replaced with a Sony BD player. I could not find any HD-DVD players set up in the store anywhere but they had several BD machines up and running.

A shame for HD-DVD.

 

[Dave Mack]

HDdvd had all the momentum. It was their fight to lose...

 

[Brent M]

The Magnolia I was in last week had a Blu-Ray hooked up to the new Pioneer Elite 50" 1080p plasma with no HD-DVD players in sight. :frowning:

 

[CRyan]

I am not sure for what reason but the Bestbuys here also seem to have dropped almost all sight of HD DVD. Odd I think, but they seem to have taken a turn to VERY pro BD. Got to be a reason for this...

 

[Adam Gregorich]

I was talking with my long time sales person from Magnolia (an original Seattle store) and they never carried Toshiba, so they never carried any HD-DVD players. They are big Sony and Pioneer dealers. They have recently started to carry the $999 Toshiba HD player though.

As to Best Buy....I believe that they are getting marketing support from Sony. Most if not all of the titles they have been pushing have been Sony, and I always see them pushing the Sony player or PS3, rarely the Panosinic or Samsung. Sony is subsidising the BluRay production costs for Disney, Warner and Paramount, so why not provide marketing support to large retailers too? It makes sense and is a smart move on their part.

 

[Alfonso_M]

double post...

 

[Alfonso_M]

My local BB has three Blue-Ray displays going for the past three months or so, on the floor there is now a Sansung player where the only Toshiba HD_DVD display ever (maybe for a month) used to be, there is also a Sony display that seems to attract lots of traffic, in the Magnolia area they have a Pioneer Blue -Ray player hooked to a 50" Plasma on the floor, didn't check the rest of the Display rooms.

Recently I visit a local Florida Mega electronic discounter store that competes heavily with BB and CC, the sales people told me they don't stock HD-DVD players, only Blue-Ray, even though they sale both format's discs.

Another interesting observation, I see they are selling Blue-Ray recordable Media discs at places like Staples and others, it is my understanding that Blue-Ray recorders are already available.

I was inclined to place my bet on the MS/Toshiba team against Sony, since Sony has a long history of abandoning formats,( Beta, Mini-Disc, SACD, Plasma) but it looks like they are pushing hard with Blue-Ray, if they could only manage to bring the prices down, then I think HD-DVD would be in a heap of trouble.

 

[CRyan]

Not only are they being sold, Lite-On even has a drive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827106037

 

[Tim Glover]

HD DVD is not going away anytime soon folks.

New promotional website that will co-exist with the www.lookandsoundofperfect.com...

www.thisishddvd.com

Kind of cool looking. And...

HD DVD Plugs Into Circuit City:
http://www.videobusiness.com/article....html?nid=2705

 

[Stephen_J_H]

It sounds like Toshiba and Microsoft are ramping up for something with this new site and the announcement of a hardware price drop. I wouldn't count HD DVD out just yet, folks.

 

[Peter Overduin]

Hardware issues are not the core of the problem. HD DVD outsells BD in my area as well from both a hardware and software side of things, and continue to tell me that PS3 has only a marginal effect on BD disk sales - the crux of the problem is that HD DVD is not supported by a number of major studios...and THAT will eventually be a problem for the format, when consumers actually do start seeing price points where a real choice between BD and HD players becomes apparent and feasible.

 

[ReggieW]

I posted in another thread that more CE manufacturer support for HD-DVD will be coming. Claims that they have given up pursuing CE support are patently FALSE. We will see the exclusive support from CE manufacturers of BD narrow in the year ahead, and undoubtedly, we will be given the usual spin from the BDA why this is.

...and we are not just talking "cheap" chinese players, though a few of those are definitely coming, but some quality players as well. The HD-DVD group has done a good job of now making an HD-DVD platform affordable & profitable for CE manufacturers.

This has been one of their goals all along.

Onkyo's CES statement to build an HD-DVD player is now up on their official USA website, and I now hear (sorry, can't give source) there "might" be TWO players from them at two different price points. It would certainly be nice if they would build a high-end HD-DVD player based on the DVP-1000 platform (drool!) with the Wolfson DAC's and full DVD-A and SACD support in the $2k plus range and a lower end model in the $700 range with full 1080p/24 support.

.....We can only keep our fingers crossed.