BLU-RAY, HD-DVD Products to vie for DVDs' space

Americans spend half as much going to the movies as they do renting or buying DVDs.
By VICTOR GODINEZ
DALLAS MORNING NEWS
This month, the death march of the DVD will begin.
Just as DVDs replaced VHS tapes, two new formats capable of displaying high-definition video will begin the drive to consign DVDs to bargain bins and yard sales.
But although consumers stand to benefit from the new technology, it's almost certain that only one format will survive, which means that many users will end up stuck with the digital equivalent of Betamax tapes.
Movie players and disks built around the HD-DVD standard will hit stores late this month. Devices and disks built around the competing Blu-ray format will arrive later.
In many ways, the releases seem premature, given the lack of a single format and the fact there are fairly few people who own high-definition TVs.
But movie studios and electronics makers are eager to reinvigorate the slowing DVD revenue machine.
Benefit to consumers
Consumers will benefit, too, as they finally get access to features that are either illegal or technically impossible with current DVDs.
Only about a quarter of U.S. televisions are expected to be capable of displaying HD video this year, and those are the only sets that will be able to take full advantage of the razor-sharp images on HD-DVD and Blu-ray disks.
But the adoption rate for HD-capable TV sets is expected to zoom past 50 percent by 2008.
For the movie studios, it's a simple financial calculation.
Roughly 80 percent of homes in the United States have a DVD player, according to a report from the DVD Forum, an industry group.
Americans spend twice as much buying and renting DVDs as they do going to the movies.
"That is an impressive track record, but its flip side is that the growth years for standard-definition DVD are behind it, as sales of players and prerecorded discs reach market saturation and the inevitable sales plateau," the report says.
"It is time for the DVD industry at large to upgrade its technology, so it can renew market growth and keep pace with competing and complementary technologies."
Both formats cleared their final technical hurdles last week, when an industry consortium called the Advanced Access Content System Licensing Administrator issued near-final specifications for the anti-piracy software that will be used on HD-DVD and Blu-ray disks.
The biggest benefit of the new disks and players, of course, will be the ability to watch movies in full high-definition resolution.
Current DVDs do not display high-definition video because there is not enough capacity on the disks.
Official's comments
Steve Nickerson, senior vice president of market management at Warner Home Video, said people buying HD television sets are looking for something to watch.
But eventually there will be other benefits as well, notably a feature called managed copy, which will finally bring many of the conveniences into the video realm that users have long enjoyed with music CDs.
Managed copy will allow users -- with certain restrictions -- to copy their HD-DVD or Blu-ray movies and TV shows to a computer hard drive or portable video device.
In theory, you could copy all your movies to a home server, and then stream them to any television in your house, like a massive video jukebox.
But the feature will not be available when the new technologies initially go on sale because the movie studios and other groups are still working to make sure that managed copy doesn't throw open the door to rampant piracy.
What's being discussed is a system in which you put the disk in your HD-DVD or Blu-ray drive in your computer, and your Internet-connected PC queries a movie industry database to find out what you're allowed to do with the disk.
How many and what types of copies you'll be allowed to make will depend on the individual studios. The studios might charge a small fee to let you make a copy.
Which will prevail?
Which will be better?
Because HD-DVD and Blu-ray will offer nearly identical features, it's hard to say which format will triumph.
Many analysts think that Blu-ray has a slight edge, for several reasons:
*Blu-ray disks can hold more data (50 gigabytes vs. 30 gigabytes).
*Dell Inc., the world's largest computer maker, is backing Blu-ray but not HD-DVD.
*Some movie studios releasing Blu-ray movies have no plans to release HD-DVD movies.
*Sony plans to include a Blu-ray drive in its upcoming PlayStation 3 game console.
HD-DVD has its advantages, too:
*Microsoft Corp. is backing HD-DVD and plans to heavily support the format in its upcoming Windows Vista operating system.
*HD-DVD movie players and disks are hitting the market first, and the first HD-DVD players will be less expensive than the first Blu-ray players ($500 vs. $1,000).
Without having to worry about vanquishing a competing standard, DVD players and movies eclipsed VCRs and videotapes in about a decade.