“The differences between Blu-Ray and DVD are hard to see on a TV less than 50″.”
Oh,ey? The difference is quiet visible on an 32″ TV.

Depends how close you are to the TV TBH. 32″ at 12 foot? No chance of spotting the difference.

By the way, you own a 360. *If* Live is crap what alternative do you have exactly?! And you suggest that it is PSN which is poor. But *I* use it every day without fault, therefore how can it be … etc etc. Your argument cannot be selected and ignored arbitrarily to suit your personal preference.

(And MS talking of an “unexpectedly high demand” on XMAS DAY was one of the most hilarious examples of bullsh*t corporate excuses one is ever likely to hear.)

And what was that eh? Ask an acquaintance some loaded questions? Do a quick google for: ‘xbox LIVE is down’??

You are more than welcome to load up COD4 on any 360 and check my stats. Up until a while ago I literally played it for an average of around 2 hours a day since it got released.

During that time, I was also playing many other games on LIVE, so I think that I certainly qualify as someone who plays on LIVE more than most. In fact I’d say that with ‘binge gaming sessions’ taken into consideration, my average time might be as much as 3.5 hours a day over the last year.

That would not be the case if LIVE was a flaky service, now would it?

In fact, I’d probably be here ranting right now, much worse than I did when the FM 2009 review got pulled, because I have no problem complaining when things that I’ve paid for don’t live up to expectations.

If LIVE didn’t work as well as I know that it certainly does, then I wouldn’t use it. Or at least certainly not as much as I do.

As a perfect example, last xmas, when LIVE was almost unusable during most of the day, I was literally on the verge of going out and buying a PS3.

All I wanted to do was play COD4, and I got frustrated to the extend that I was willing to fork out £350+ (or however much it was back then) in order to do it.

In the end, I needed to check and make sure that PSN was working smoothly, so I went onto the PS3 bosrds on charlieoscardelta and asked around.

Not only did I see a number of threads comlaining about problems in PSN, but even the PS3 users were telling me that they were having their own problems as it was!

If LIVE didn’t work as well as it does, then I definitely wouldn’t pay for it.

But it does.

So I do.

That’s the big issue, isn’t it?

I’ve heard many friends, acquaintances, and forumites say they want a PS3, but that the price is simply too much for it. I have one friend who’s really into Ratchet & Clank, and wants to continue following the series but the PS3 is simply outside of their budget.

The sad and rather frustrating part is that many would-be buyers of the PS3 are buying an XBox 360 instead, because it’s a far cheaper entry option into the current gen market. I do tend to point out that if they want to play online, they’re going to end up paying the RRP of the PS3 and then some on Gold alone. But that doesn’t really work, because it’s amazing how few people can look past the price on the box. This used to work on PC gamers, what with MMOs charging monthly fees, but luckily PC gamers wised up and MMOs are now generally looking into subscriptionless models. But all the old tricks are new on the console market.

That’s why I think Sony would have a better time cutting the PS3′s cost in half, and then offering a subscription based service. After Gigz’s comment a while back, I did a little looking into Live’s stability, and it hasn’t had a great track record, and there are times when it’s been just as bad as PSN, and PSN is free. So I really think that Sony should consider that, if they can take the price off the box, and then spread the rest of the price across a subscription format, it isn’t going to look so bad to the average, dopey consumer.

And those smart enough to can always just ignore the online element, whilst letting those with more money than sense keep it alive. Works for MS.

iTunes et al have hurt physical media, absolutely, but they simply cannot and will not kill it. The HD movie equivalent is probably nearly ten years away (Johnny Interweb cannae take it yet, for starters), by which time BD will have had a life-span almost as long as DVD has enjoyed so far……

And by the way, DVD had a lousy start in its plan to replace VHS (some would say it was later helped significantly by …. the PS2, though I don’t know if that’s a valid claim) and a awful lot of armchair – and real (sic) – experts scoffed at DVD too.

Well.. it worked on me though.

The Wii is insanely popular, but most people realizes that it sucks far too late, and don’t want to buy another system thinking it would be the same fate. Too bad

Insanity.

Also Blu-ray player sales increased more than 300% in Nov this year compared to last year. then on black-friday sales were even higher still.

Blu-ray is not dead. I think we need to find a chart of how quickly DVD sold in its first two-three years, people are slow to adopt, and DVD didn’t hit the road running till the PS2 became a mega million seller. So if/when Sony drops price things will turn around again.

It is a sinking ship and when CNN and others start hammering the concept home, it tends to sink faster.

Do you see?

I think a thingy-on-a-stick will sell 2million units this year from 1million last year, no I revising that to 1.5million now (or reducing by 25%) it doesn’t mean sales fallen, do you see?

I still don’t understand what Japan has got to do with anything, but there you go.

Anyway, I’m trying to discuss something with you sensibly. What am I doing?!

So sales figures from the manufacturer of the product is guesswork but analyst prediction from two months back has more relevance?

Sure. OK. Funny how people like to dig their heels in with analyst guesses as some sort of rock-solid proof of something when that something happens to go along with the predefined view.

I’m loving how you’re basing a counter argument on the presumption that hard sales figures are actually guesswork on my part. AND ignoring the factual data about growth (and rate of growth) from my other linked article.

Gee, I guess if you just ignore any information that doesn’t fit your pre-determined view then you can convince yourself that your view is unquestionably correct!

Sorry morriss, quoting out of date analyst guesses might work for you but I don’t think it holds up against any sort of objective scrutiny. Not when there’s more up-to-date, factual information that shows otherwise. (But, obviously, feel free to ignore that if it doesn’t suit your purposes).

Edit: “Not talking about Japan”.
Haha. Yes. Let’s not talk about any region that completely disproves your rhetoric!

Classic stuff.

I really don’t think I need to state anything else morriss. You don’t seem to be interested in making an argument based on anything more than second-hand, out of date guesses and you don’t want to discuss any areas that don’t match your predetermined view of things.

“Despite blockbuster success of “The Dark Knight” in theaters, industry analysts are closely monitoring the movie’s sales in the home video market in order to take the temperature of the audience’s willingness to spend in the midst of a recession. Though sales of DVDs and Blu-ray discs have dropped 5 percent in the past year, the market remains strong relative to other sectors of the retail economy.”

Sales of both formats are on the decline, for many reasons. Although given the relatively small nature of the BD market share, I’m worried for its future. If you want to turn this into yet another criticism of me and use it as a platform to tell everyone how you can so clearly see the wood for the trees, then be my guest. I’m not getting involved.

Sound good to you?

Oh, and 600,000 is plenty. It’s a day one figure.

Are sales increasing exponentially? I guess not. Oh wait! What does that second article I linked to demonstrate?

Not only that, the same article states:

“Gfk also reports that Blu-ray machines are replacing DVD recorders 1.5 times faster than the latter replaced VHS machines. DVD recorders exceeded 50 per cent after 82 weeks. In comparison, Blu-ray recorders achieved the same results in only 53 weeks.”

Like I said, and as is being demonstrated perfectly here: when the media only asserts one view of something you can’t ever expect to be told the full story.

But it’s funny isn’t it: if you waffle on with nothing but guess work and popular rhetoric then you can convince a lot of people that your opinion is fact. Even when there is hard, factual evidence to the contrary.

So, is 600,000 a lot? No. Are Blu Ray sales increasing exponentially? No.

Yes, even when they conflict with my transparent platform loyalties!

Even so, the statement was

“Too bad no one seems to care about hi-def DVDs.”

600,000 people (at the very least) seem to dispute that claim otherwise this ‘popular film’ would have been bought on a more ‘popular format’ instead of the one reported, wouldn’t it? I wonder what it is that morriss is actually attempting to dismiss with his folol-up statement?

Then again, people don’t care for “Hi def DVD”. That’s why HD DVD vanished. Blu ray isn’t HD DVD though is it?

What a spectacularly shoddily written and poorly researched (or perhaps just one-sided) article.