"Rotting" BD discs is FUD, plain and simple. One guy posted highly questionable pictures of a disc that admittedly had been left in sunlight and heat. It looks more like paint splatter to me. That posting has turned into a FUD discussion across the board, and it's silly, IMO.

There are some pictures and first person experiences posted on the avs forum:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=857067http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=857067[/link]

Seems to be mostly on "The Prestige" and a few other select titles. It looks pretty real to me.

Definitely not FUD but could be an isolated title. Still not what you want for your public experiences to be.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CD_rotHere [/link] is an interesting read on the subject of disc rot from Wikipdia. It's not just BD it seems.

I really don't need to know this but what does FUD mean?
JJK

FUD = "fear, uncertainty, doubt"

Here's some fun FUD meanings ;
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fud
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Fud may refer to:

* Fear, uncertainty and doubt, a marketing strategy
* FUD (food), a Mexican brand of cold cuts and hot dogs
* Fud, a Scottish colloquialism for vagina
* Fud, a Scottish colloquialism for a rabbit's tail

See also

* Elmer Fudd, a Warner Brothers cartoon character

F**king Utterly Dumb - Another usage for FUD
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I think DSE was referring to the last reference, but the Scottish reference would be more fun.

It seems Blockbuster tried both formats in about 250 test rental locations. About 70% of the rentals in these test locations where both formats were available were Bluray format. The article attributes this to the proliference of the PS3.

Because the majority of Blockbuster's rentals are going to continue to be SD DVDs, they can really only allocate a portion of their shelf space to HD discs. This means that they don't have space to stock both formats.

Blockbuster will continue to rent HD DVDs online and at their 250 test locations and will be continue to follow the rental patterns in order to make sure they are supplying the majority of customers with the format that they want.

For now however, Bluray is the format which we will see when we walk into a local Blockbuster looking for an HD movie to rent.

"For now however, Bluray is the format which we will see when we walk into a local Blockbuster looking for an HD movie to rent."

Does anyone even go to video rental stores anymore? We have three in my area and every time I pass them, their parking lots and stores are dead. I think most rent online and have them delivered in the mail. I love it that way actually.

It'll be interesting to see which format Netflix.com adopts, too.

Well I'll let the retailers/renters duke it out, sitting on the sidelines til a winning format emerges. Don't want to buy another betamax machine just to see the crowd go the vhs again...

ken

Netflix has already accidently sent me Blu-ray discs, not once, but twice.

The Hollywood Video I frequent currently has both formats to choose from. About 75 titles in both HD-DVD and BRay.

Newegg has about 260 titles of each format.
JJK

Maybe it's just me, but when I go to the local best buy or wherever to see the difference, my tired old 43-year eyes just don't see a huge "wow" difference between regular DVD and HD/blueray dvds...

I mean it's a little crisper of an image, but not something I'd pay extra for, and certainly not something I'd go re-buy hundreds of my DVD titles for. Is that just me?

I think it's akin to Microsoft coming out with Vista just so they can sell more software, not so much for anything it does for users, for 90% of us... And it's also likely just a way to discourage piracy since it requires higher-capacity media and writers, now that everyone who wants to can copy standard-def DVDs, using the various tools out there on doom9.org , afterdawn.com and other places.

Heck I'm thrilled to watch my movies downstairs on a lower-res projector on a 6 x 9 foot 4x3 aspect ratio screen. Much less widescreen. Even much less, high-def widescreen.

I suppose seeing every rendered AE particle dust speckle is neat to some people, but for me, it's a lot of overkill, and just a reason for the studios to try and re-release everything in HD-DVD to try and get people to buy their whole media libraries over again.

Ingenious marketing, but I think I'll sit this dance out. 4:3 standard or widescreen def DVDs are just fine for me. I really don't notice, nor appreciate, the difference. I'm probably the same as about 70% of the other DVD owners out there. Kind of ironic since I make much of my income by producting and selling DVDs. I won't be making them high-def for another 5 years+, if ever.

What Would get me to upgrade and buy new media and hardware, is some kind of immersive 3d screens or wraparound screen technology at least.. but not just a bit higher res, that's a "so what" to me, and most others I've talked with about the topic.

Ken

I agree to an extent. There has been a Samsung Blu-Ray Player hooked up to a HD plasma monitor at Best Buy for a couple of months. It does look better than DVD, but not 5 times better.

Most of the shortcomings with current HD have to do with compression. I've brought this up before, but I've never seen a more crisp, realistic HD image than I did with analog HD 10 years ago.

"Maybe it's just me, but when I go to the local best buy or wherever to see the difference, my tired old 43-year eyes just don't see a huge "wow" difference between regular DVD and HD/blueray dvds.."

=============================================
To a certain extent I will agree to that. I have the A1 HD DVD player, and I still buy DVD's.

The hi def movies look good on a REALLY big screen, but with smaller HD TV's it's hard to see any real WOW difference... especially with the DVD's they're turning out these days. I don't know if you have seen the movie BLOOD DIAMOND, but I had the WOW feeling watching that.... on DVD.... yes I said DVD. They did something different... maybe they shot it in HD... I'm not sure, but if they keep making DVD's like that then I say who needs the Hi Def hollywood movies.

There is a HUGE difference however in home burned video... now that I have the HD DVD player and burn my own HD DVD's.... I will NEVER go back to normal dvd. It's just so incredibly clear and well defined as compared to your video on SD DVD.

Hollywood movies are shot on film and end up on your DVD as progressive video. Home movies are usually 60i. 24p or 30p uprezzes really well and looks really good on an uprezzing DVD / HDTV combo. The 60i SD video that most of us shoot does not uprez nearly as well. Thus the HDV I shoot and edit and playback on my PS3 or Toshiba HD A2 ends up looking much better in HD than it would in SD even though the difference in a 24p Blockbuster movie is much subtler.

Only thing i see a wow difference in is sporting events,, and an occasional nature thing,,I have some hd movie channel and no wow,, no hd dvd player so dont know

but on the surface I think it is a huge deal blockbuster went blue

Didn't know Netflix had BD. They just gained a new customer.

>>...my tired old 43-year eyes just don't see a huge "wow" difference
>>between regular DVD and HD/blueray dvds...

Ditto. Age and everything. :)

I'm 45 and I have to use reading glasses to see anything within three feet of me clearly. My distance vision is nothing to brag about either.

Anyway, even to my eyes, the difference between HD and SD is just incredible. In SD, there aren't individual hairs on anyone's head. It's just sort of a "hair helmet" on everyone. Eyes don't have lines in the corners. Tree leaves are a jumble. Grass is kind of a mosaic pattern.

In HD, it is just so different, even on a thirty something inch set. Yeah, if you glance at it quickly it kind of looks the same, but as you're watching something and your eyes start focusing in on the detail, it's just a totally different experience. You see subtle expressions and little details that just aren't there in SD.

You can have the same experience with snapshots too. Snap the same photo twice, once with an SLR and once with a regular pocket camera. Look at both pictures as regular 6x4 prints. At first glance they look the same. But look a little longer and there is absolutely no comparison. On the regular camera print, there isn't that much to see, but on the SLR photo, you find yourself looking into eyes and wondering what that person was thinking.

It seems the general sales figures seem to reflect the same 70% to 30% Bluray / HD DVD ratio that Blockbuster sees in their test rentals:

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9017442&intsrc=article_more_bothttp://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9017442&intsrc=article_more_bot[/link]