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DVD future? (1 Viewer)

WilliamHg

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Dec 29, 2002
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116
i've heard and read a bit about DVDs, BlueRay, etc becoming a thing of the past in the future and movies will be downloaded to hard drives instead of having plastic discs. yea, i've heard that thing about how DVDs can be scratched or broken and how downloading would be better. my take on that is if you can't take a disc from the case and put it in a player without scratching or breaking it then you don't need to be watching any movies or fiddling with equipment, you should be in a hospital.
my main question though is IF that does happen, what are you to do with your DVD collection? i have a modest collection and enjoy buying them but i don't want my collection to wind up like my old music LP collection, in a box in the back of a closet and unplayed for years. i just hate the thought of spending money building up a collection and not be able to play them somewhere down the road because thay aren't supported anymore, you know the VHS story.
i just found out about all these possibilities last week so if this is an old subject forgive me. william
 

Movie Madness

Auditioning
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Jan 19, 2007
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Hi William , Thats technology for you. If you kept your first PC that would be collecting dust also and your Black and White tv (lol). Go with whats out at the moment and enjoy the Quality.
 

Joseph Bolus

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I think it can be safely stated that even 20 years from now you'll still be able to play a DVD on some kind of backward-compatible player. That may or may not be true of the current HD-DVD and/or Blu-ray discs due to the format war, but there is no doubt that DVD's will continue to be supported in some fashion even when downloading movies becomes the norm.

Even now you can still purchase turntables that will play 78 RPM records; and I don't think 78 RPM records have been manufactured for over 40 years! (One turntable - the Ion- even comes with a USB output and will convert your 78 RPM records into MP3 files!) So I wouldn't worry too much about whether or not you'll be able to play a DVD in the future ...

Now whether or not you'll *want* to play a DVD twenty years from now is an entirely different question. The bottom line is DVD is a form of entertainment and Home Theater is a hobby. You can't put a price on a hobby. At least with DVD you have something tangible for the dollars that you expended. There are many other forms of entertainment (many much more expensive) that end up providing only memories of the derived entertainment.
 

Carl Johnson

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Five years from now I can pretty much guarantee you that my DVD collection will be in a box collecting dust. The technology already exists where I could download my DVDs to a hard drive play them at the click of a mouse just like I've already done with my CDs.
Your LP collection isn't in a box because record players aren't available, you moved on because CDs are more practical. The time will come when you replace those DVDs with something else but it will be a good thing. When you bought your first CD player were you thinking oh no, what am I going to do with all of these records? :)
 

RickER

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I think that for most of us here, at least us older fellows, we want to OWN our media. I dont want a D/L the studio can take away from me. I dont want to lose my library when my "future machine" breaks down, and takes my 900 movies with it. I want to own some type of software media i can look at, take pride in, decide what do i feel like tonight?

P.S. notice to the spelling police...i got lose right!
 

WilliamHg

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Dec 29, 2002
Messages
116
thanks for the replies fellas. i'm old school, stubborn and as hard headed as they come and i like high technology but am almost at a point to where i feel like i might start a one man boycott against all this changing if i do see an end to DVDs and in the process trying to get me to buy more equipment to watch the very same movies i paid for years earlier.
i understand upgrading but not to a point to where i have to reinvest in order to see what i already have, no way! i might just go ahead and start back renting DVDs and forget about buying them. my ISP has just tried taking me to the cleaners but i caught 'em trying to doublebill me for DSL and they are not going to charge me, so they said.
i don't like comcast trying to make me get all these extra digital channels in order to get a few HD channels. i understand you need digital in order to get the HD channels but if it's only the HD channels you want then i'd think there should be some sort of option to get them without paying an arm and a leg for channels you're not going to watch just to be able to get the ones you do want.
i tried an OTA indoor antenna for some local HD channels/stations but the reception wasn't stable enough so i returned it. it seemed if you breathed when watching those HD channels everything would pixelate then it would get steady for a minute or two then pixelate again, over and over to where i said, that's it and back to radio shack it went.
sorry for ramblin' on, but i had to blow off a bit off steam. i feel alittle better now. thanks for the comments again, william
 

Paul_Scott

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Jul 19, 2002
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William, rightly or wrongly I suspect you have a lot of company in the feelings stated above. That is the main reason I have come around to believing that neither of these formats will grow beyond a niche level for the majority of their lifespans.
Enthusiasts here and elsewhere underestimate the potential depth of the feeling of resentment that many people have to technology in general
Add to that the majority of people owning smaller (under 50") displays, and/or utilizing viewing angles of 2 screen widths or greater, and the need for HD copies of films (films which may have their own individual PQ element or mastering issues) seems to rapidly diminsh.

I think your concerns and annoyance are rational and justified to a large extent.
Given the choice, I'll always opt to pay a slight premium for the HD version over the sd version- but in all honesty The last few weeks I've gotten more enjoyment out of discovering new (old) movies on sd that I hadn't seen before, than I have from watching catalog favorites on HD DVD.
 

Ryan-G

Supporting Actor
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Oct 13, 2005
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621
Well,

It's not really the very same movies. There are technical differences. It's like arguing that one shouldn't have to go out and buy a car with various features in it because car's didn't have those features 5 years ago. Technology progresses, things improve. If you're happy with what you've got, stay with it, if you like what you see, upgrade. It's backwards compatible, so there's no need to repurchase.

As far as Digital Downloads go...

1. The bandwidth isn't present for 1080p quality like that found on discs, nor will it be any time in the foreseeable future. Even when it becomes available to consumers, it'll be years before it's widely available. As such, it'll be just like DVD vs VHS. One is quality, the other is cheap.

2. The whole point of Digital Downloads at the moment is to be the Neo-Rental market, and to alter how TV is distributed. Within a decade, it may change over to replace physical media, and it may also replace Movie Theaters if the penetration of Home Theater is sufficient. Digital Downloads aren't threatening to replace physical media anytime soon.

3. By the time Digital Downloads can hit speeds sufficient to stream or D/l a 1080p title in acceptable time, it's *very* likely the standard will be alot higher. There's a number of LCD's that are approaching the 2k resolution right now(Monitors), and going well beyond that isn't unthinkable at the moment. Odds are that down the road the difference between physical media and downloaded media will still be fairly huge. HD is just now in it's infancy.


Actually, I think many people overestimate the "Resentment" towards technology.

First, given a choice between a 30" TV and a 60" TV, people will hands down pick the later. It's been a sign of affluence for years. Keeping up with the Joneses and all.

Second, A significant portion of society(At least in the U.S.) are well conditioned to upgrade cycles. Everything from Phones, to cars, to computers, to consoles. Upgrade cycling is nothing new or extrordinary.

Third, the difference in quality on a small display between any HD and SD resolution is obvious. 720p and 1080p might not be, but either vs SD is.

Fourth, a very large number of people spend vast amounts of time in front of the TV. They want it to look as good as possible. If people didn't care, Sony wouldn't be getting a 50% markup for their quality products over LG's line on any type of TV.

Finally, it's a moot point. People will be grandfathered in whether they know it or not. HD will replace SD invisibly. As it is already doing.

Technology progresses, as it has for centuries, things improve, and this is one of them.

Seriously, we live in a world where a 700$ console with virtually no games is front page news, causing fights and even deaths. I doubt highly that a world where that happens over a video game machine will suddenly decide "No! We don't want better looking TV and Movies!"
 

WilliamHg

Stunt Coordinator
Joined
Dec 29, 2002
Messages
116
well, as i mentioned i'm for technology moving foward but what gets me is here you have DVDs which will or can OUTLAST most everything else especially a hard drive. if you have downloaded tons of movies which will be stored in the hard drive and it goes bad because it will, how to get those movies back?
that is how it is with computer games/simulations. it is difficult if not impossible to get them in stores anymore. if your HD crashes then you have to confirm a purchase order number along with some other things and redownload. some people don't any problems doing that and some do, i do. anyway what ever it is that you download is only as good as your hard drive then you have to do it all over again. the reason for all this is because of piracy.
personally and i may be wrong here, i think they are aware that money can not be made from DVDs because they last. think about it, they're about the only thing in this hobby that does. well then that has to change! i guess it's like everything else in life... a two edged sword. william
 

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