DVD – Page 2 – Devices View

More Inputs, Please!

August 12, 2009 - by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

I was talking with Microsoft about the XBOX 360 earlier this week, and one of the things they said will drive consumers to their console vs. the competition is the integration of multiple features into Live, such as Netflix streaming, gaming, and other content. At Current Analysis our Digital Home service covers game consoles from the perspective of connected services; we treat a PS3, XBOX, or Wii like the fancy set top boxes (that not coincidentally also play games) that they have become. However, I thought we were a bit ahead of the curve – most consumers haven't fully embraced …

DVD

Blu-ray Not Dead?, Part Whatever

January 21, 2009 - by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

CNET lists 9 Reasons Why Blu-ray Will Succeed.Jeremy Toeman says CNET is wrong.Jeremy is right. Look, it's a great format, and I certainly try to rent Blu-ray (from Netflix) and buy Blu-ray discs in the rare cases where I'm buying. I'm even upgrading a few discs from DVD to Blu-ray: Groundhog Day is coming out on Blu-ray on January 27! We watch that one at least annually. When Star Wars comes out on Blu-ray, yeah, I'll buy it yet again even though the DVD is pristine. The thing is, even CNET admits that the only reason a consumer would buy …

Home Theater Basics: 720p vs. 1080p, Analog/Digital Switchover

October 19, 2008 - by Avi Greengart - 1 Comment

Here's one from the mailbag: Avi, We want to buy a 37" LCD TV. Is there a significant difference between 720P and 1080P? Yes, there is a significant difference between 720p and 1080p – though it depends on what you’re watching on it, and even then you may not be able to see the difference. The bottom line is that you can almost always get away with buying a 720p set and saving the money, but nobody seems to believe this answer, so here’s a slightly more involved one: First, two quick definitions: 1. the “p” in 1080P …

CES 2008: High Def Disc Format War Over, Thin TVs, and Steve Jobs

January 11, 2008 - by Avi Greengart - 1 Comment

Well, I’m back from Las Vegas, but my body is still on the wrong time zone. There were three main stories at this year’s CES: The death of HD-DVD. With Warner’s announcement that it will no longer sell HD-DVD movies, the high definition disc format war is effectively over with Blu-ray as the victor. Toshiba (one of HD-DVD’s primary backers) offered a weak reaction, saying that it is stunned and upset, but that HD-DVD has been declared dead before. That’s true, but formats are only as valuable as the content that they are tied to. With Warner gone, only Paramount …

Displays / DVD / HDTV

Consumers Still Think They Have HD When They Don’t

November 14, 2007 - by Avi Greengart - 1 Comment

The Leichtman Research Group (an ex-Yankee Group analyst) put out a press release with some interesting stats on consumer HD awareness. LRG claims that over 75% of HDTV owners believe that they are watching HD programming, but LRG estimates that "about 53% of all HD households are actually watching HD programming from a multi-channel video provider (cable, DBS or a telco), and about 4% are watching HD programming via broadcast-only – leaving about 20% of those with an HDTV erroneously thinking that they are watching HD programming when they are not." That may actually be better than previous studies, which …

DVD / Industry

State of HD Disc War

September 9, 2007 - by Avi Greengart - 2 Comments.

Engadget just posted a nice wrap-up of their CEDIA coverage. (I was not able to attend CEDIA; after Nokia’s big London event last week, I went to RIM and Motorola events this week and even had to follow the Apple announcements from afar due to scheduling). The big news both at CEDIA and in the press last month is around the HD-DVD Blu-ray war; HD-DVD gained a studio just when it appeared Blu-ray was pulling away with software sales, and both Samsung and LG have new dual-format players coming to market demonstrated at the show. Back in January at CES, …

DVD

Getting Harder To Sell Obscure DVDs

March 5, 2007 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

The New York Times (free registration required) has an article up on the difficulties facing independant DVD labels: DVD sales are stalled Retail is flooded with titles Retail space is shrinking (big box stores are cutting back, while independents and record chains are going out of business) Shelf space that might be dedicated to less mainstream titles is instead allocated to HD-DVD and Blu-ray The most important point? Overall DVD sales are stalled. I suspect that sales will start to fall next year as collectors have built their libraries and the market is saturated: anyone who doesn’t already own a …

Displays / DVD / HDTV / Industry

50% of HDTV Owners Don’t Have HDTV

February 28, 2007 - by Avi Greengart - 1 Comment

The Wall Street Journal has a great article (subscription required) quoting a recent survey showing that 50% of consumers who bought an HDTV set don’t actually have HDTV service. What’s more frightening – and yet entirely believable – is that 25% of HDTV owners think that they do have HDTV when they don’t. Well worth a read. -avi

Audio / Computing / DVD / Industry

What it takes to launch a new media format

July 6, 2006 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

JupiterKagan’s Michael Gartenberg has a great post about the three elements needed to successfully launch a new consumer media format. He concludes that neither HD-DVD or Blu-Ray measures up. -avi Full disclosure: I created the diagram that Michael uses to illustrate his point back when I was an analyst at what was then called JupiterResearch and he was my Research Director; it was for a report on next generation audio formats.

DVD / HDTV

Samsung Blu-Ray Launch Did Not Impress

June 16, 2006 - by Avi Greengart - Leave a Comment

I attended Samsung’s Blu-ray Disc player launch this evening at the Samsung Experience in New York and came away disappointed. There were several things wrong with the launch, starting with the fact that it was off by ten days (the players won’t actually be available for sale until the 25th): Samsung’s prepared remarks were overwraught, telling us over and over again how much we would be blown away by Blu-ray, and to prove this they showed a cheesy video and a few movie previews that, quite frankly, weren’t all that impressive on the pair of Samsung DLP TVs at the …