Apple's time is now to jump on the Blu-ray bandwagon

[neomaxi]

Wow.... Blu-ray will be dead in 5 years

I don't now, but personally would wait 5 years to see if you still want or need it.

Digital downloads is where its at. If you want a hard copy of the movie. Just buy one digiatally and store it on your computer??

Blu-ray is has little life left.

The quality is not that much better than HD downloads..

Vudu's HDX is probably the closest.. but in 2 years.. it will be just as good...

I say no more disks for movies.. just digital downloads..

 

[dukebound85]

theres just something to a physical disc with the physical packaging that appeals to me

 

[NT1440]

theres just something to a physical disc with the physical packaging that appeals to me

Idk, something about carrying around dozens or possibly hundreds of movies on a unit appeals to me more tho.

 

[Michael CM1]

Download vs scratchable disk.......

iTunes doesn't allow you to download your files again if you lose them. Therefore, you're storing music on a volatile hard drive. What does Apple advise you to do? Back all of it up to a CD.

 

[bruinsrme]

Digital downloads is where its at. If you want a hard copy of the movie. Just buy one digiatally and store it on your computer??

Blu-ray is has little life left.

The quality is not that much better than HD downloads..

Vudu's HDX is probably the closest.. but in 2 years.. it will be just as good...

I say no more disks for movies.. just digital downloads..

Like I said in the meanwhile I will enjoy my bluray.
What I don't understand is why apple wouldn''t offer the technology for back ups and media during the proposed transition 5 years away.

 

[janstett]

Download vs scratchable disk.......

Right, and nothing can happen to a download. Hard drives never fail or get corrupted ;0 I guess you haven't been bitten yet. Your time will come. All hard disks are expected to fail (it's called MTBF) and use computers long enough and one will die on you before it should.

As I mentioned, I have 2TB of media I'm no stranger to the joys of having all your media at your fingertips, and the only way I can sleep at night is because I have one master copy that is disconnected when not in use, a working copy on a 5 disk RAID NAS, and an offsite copy. If you only have one copy, you've got a date with disappontment.

 

[janstett]

They aren't: they are, as is typical for them, ahead. They have a habit of spotting what people will be using about 5 years ahead and the lack of sentimentality about old ways of doing things to jump right to that now (even if it hurts them in the short term). Look at their past record: dropping floppies from the iMac in favour of CDs, the iPod vs the Walkman, music downloads from iTunes vs CDs. All choices that were criticised by pundits at the time, now accepted and mainstream. Mark my words, in 5 years or so most people will be downloading their content rather than buying discs, and the company I see making the most popular player for that content is Apple.

Worthy of the best of the Reality Distortion effect. Bravo! Not supporting the latest technology is thinking ahead! I'm still laughing at that one. Apple, the king of media playback, can't play HD movies in their best possible format!

Notice that even the latest MacBooks (Air excepted) still have DVD drives in them. So Apple apparently thinks there's still a place for physical media. Only they haven't adopted the latest format that holds 50 GB and offers high definition movies.

And in 5 years or so, maybe we'll have flexible 3D OLED displays and holographic keyboards. I won't be using my current MacBook in 5 years.

 

[janstett]

Digital downloads is where its at. If you want a hard copy of the movie. Just buy one digiatally and store it on your computer??

Blu-ray is has little life left.

The quality is not that much better than HD downloads..

Vudu's HDX is probably the closest.. but in 2 years.. it will be just as good...

I say no more disks for movies.. just digital downloads..

Neomaxi, let me make a guess -- you don't have an HDTV or a Blu-Ray player. I'd love to hear what you are basing your statement upon that the quality is not much better. I watch all kinds of HD content (from streaming to DVD rips to downloaded cable rips to HD cable to Blu-Ray) on the same 1080p HDTV and I can tell you beyond any doubt that it is far superior on Blu Ray. I will admit that some of the online streaming players are pretty darned good. I've watched a few episodes of Terminator and Heroes on my HDTV this way and it's pretty impressive. But it's not Blu Ray. Heck doesn't even offer 5.1 sound.

And again, saying Blu-Ray has "little life left" is wishful thinking. It's just hitting critical mass and is primed to explode this year. You don't like discs, we get it. But discs aren't going away, not for movies.

 

[JonHimself]

... I watch all kinds of HD content (from streaming to DVD rips to downloaded cable rips to HD cable to Blu-Ray) on the same 1080p HDTV and I can tell you beyond any doubt that it is far superior on Blu Ray...

I am completely on board with not adopting bluray becuase I just don't want to have discs to manage. I am perfectly ok with the HD downloads and whatnot but you are correct: cable, satellite, downloads, etc are inferior to a bluray disc. I think people like me (who don't have bluray/don't want to have bluray) are really just saying that the difference is not important enough to justify having the bluray player but just word their points incorrectly in saying that there is no difference. You'd be crazy to not see a difference, but I think the point is just that for convenience sake (or any other reason) the HD available through streaming/downloading is still good enough... I don't want to speak for others or step on any toes, but that's just my take on this.

 

[~Shard~]

I am completely on board with not adopting bluray becuase I just don't want to have discs to manage. I am perfectly ok with the HD downloads and whatnot but you are correct: cable, satellite, downloads, etc are inferior to a bluray disc. I think people like me (who don't have bluray/don't want to have bluray) are really just saying that the difference is not important enough to justify having the bluray player but just word their points incorrectly in saying that there is no difference. You'd be crazy to not see a difference, but I think the point is just that for convenience sake (or any other reason) the HD available through streaming/downloading is still good enough... I don't want to speak for others or step on any toes, but that's just my take on this.

Blu Ray does indeed look better, I agree - the quality difference is noticeable on my 1080p set, that's for sure. I didn't think it would be that much of a difference when I first updated my system but then I picked up my first Blu Ray movie and WOW.

HD downloadable content has its place and advantages, and will continue to become more relevant, but Blu Ray media right now is pretty damn sweet.

 

[Rich1963]

The only real impediment I see to Apple on the whole DVD ripping and storing in iTunes thing is the MPAA. But not the reason most people think. I don't think the MPAA or the studios themselves would really have a problem allowing this sort of thing. DVD security is a complete joke at this time, anyways. And it won't become any more secure in the future. For $20, you can purchase Rip-It and away you go with a 1-click easy to use program.

Where I think the problem lies is with Apple dominating yet another media. If it worked as simple as iTunes handles the music CDs, this would spread like crazy. And I think the MPAA would have an 800 pound gorilla to contend with, just like the RIAA did with iTunes and Apple basically dictating the terms of the agreement. It's the whole reason for iTunes not going DRM free, as far as any of us will ever know. You have Apple saying "we're going to do it this way", and the recording studios saying "well, then we'll use the only leverage we have left with you, our non-DRM'ed catalog, and say no".

It would be a great thing, though.

And on the subject of digital downloads and storage security, you're a fool if you don't spend 5 minutes to read about securing your data with redundancy of copies and implement something. You're just asking for the inevitable. And that's another area Apple could then supply a piece of hardware in the form of an easy to use Raid 5 set-up, not unlike the Drobo. Just take a time capsule, which is basically just a slightly more capable NAS, and add 4 or even 6 hard disk bays, and away you go.

 

[dynaflash]

The only real impediment I see to Apple on the whole DVD ripping and storing in iTunes thing is the MPAA.

Well, that and can you imagine how long iTunes would take to rip a dvd to h.264 for the atv ? QT encoding isn't exactly quick.

 

[Rich1963]

I agree, Dyna, and that's why in a previous post I hinted that there was a possible "alternative" Apple could license and employ that is cross platform like iTunes itself. Cough, Handbrake, cough.

But there is something else that would speed things up, and that's openCL. While I'm not versed on all of the specs of this, I am anxiously awaiting to see what speed improvements this technology brings to the encoding process.

OpenCL, however, brings up another issue with Macs. With the rash of bad nVidia chips that were put into macs, (and recently reported on in an excellent inquirer.net article) I fear that running a graphics card at 90% for 8 hours might begin to reveal a dormant weakness in nVidia video cards that hasn't been an issue up until now. Those of you who know what I mean will understand.

 

[alFR]

In 5 years this notebook will not be in my hands. So in the menwhile I will be using my Bluray player on this dell. If bluray is no longer necessary in 3 years i will have enjoyed having it while bluray was around.

I'm not talking about playback on a computer, I'm talking about what most people do: watching TV on, well, a TV. Having said that, I assume you're attaching that Dell to a big screen? If not, why bother with Bluray at all? It won't look any better than DVD (or a download) on a laptop....

This thread was nice until this pipe dream appeared again.

Sorry to spoil your day.

Take a look at how long it took Apple to reach the top of the music sales chart. It happened last year, which was about 7 years after the iTunes Music Store began. But that still doesn't mean most people buy music online. With three of the top 5 music sellers being stores (Walmart, Target, Best Buy), I'm pretty sure that most people still buy their music on a CD.

True. But the figures for Best Buy at least include their online sales, and a lot of CD sales are through Amazon - both these are catering to people who like the convenience of online ordering, but currently still want a CD. Why? Maybe DRM, maybe the quality of compressed download files, maybe they just like to have a physical disc. At least in the case of iTunes music the DRM is going (well, is nearly gone), quality is going up and we have a generation of young people coming through who are completely familiar with music downloads and buy most of their music that way. Other people will continue to be won over from CD by the convenience and increasing quality of downloads. It's a small step from there to buying their movies online too.

With video content, you are talking about a massive increase in the download speed needed for the same type of services. We're also talking about formats that don't allow as much portability -- you can't burn a video DVD and play it on a DVD player like you can burn an audio CD for your car.

True on the bandwidth, not on the convenience: I'd argue that a video file that you can play on your Apple TV, computer, iPod and iPhone is more convenient than a disc that you need to rip and encode. I think the iTunes store has shown that it's all about that convenience/quality balance: for a lot of people, the convenience of a download outweighs the extra quality you'd get by buying a CD and ripping to lossless. Eventually video will reach that tipping point too, it's just a matter of when. Personally, I pretty much always buy CDs still rather than downloads but I'm seriously considering going to downloads for movies just because it's so time-consuming to rip and encode them from DVD.

Ergo, this pipe dream of downloading everything in a couple of years is just that -- a dream. Discs will be around for a VERY LONG TIME because of how much less prone to failure they are. Downloads will keep getting better and probably dominate the rental business, but they won't come close to dominating movie ownership.

I agree discs will be around for a long time, but i think they'll become an increasingly niche market. However, I disagree about the failure rate: I haven't yet found a three-year-old spreading jam on a hard disc, or throwing it around the room.

Worthy of the best of the Reality Distortion effect. Bravo! Not supporting the latest technology is thinking ahead! I'm still laughing at that one. Apple, the king of media playback, can't play HD movies in their best possible format!

Did you actually read what I wrote, or did you just start ranting? I'll try to make it clearer for you: Apple have a knack of predicting what people will be doing in 5 years' time and moving to support that ahead of the rest of the market. I said nothing about whether that means supporting the "latest technology", whatever that is. It seems they think that for the average consumer the convenience of a download will outweigh the quality increase of a Bluray disc. Based on the current uptake of Bluray I think they're right.

Notice that even the latest MacBooks (Air excepted) still have DVD drives in them. So Apple apparently thinks there's still a place for physical media. Only they haven't adopted the latest format that holds 50 GB and offers high definition movies.

Er, yes. You have heard of Mac OS X, right? I believe it comes on DVD in case you need to reinstall it. So does lots of other software. Hopefully that'll never need a 50Gb disc.....

As for the HD movies, why would it benefit you to be able to watch them on the (at most) 17" screen of your Macbook Pro? It won't look any better than a DVD. Also, for travel you'd have to cart all the discs around, you'd be better with an encoded version on the hard disc. Do you really sit in your office enjoying a Bluray on the screen of your computer? I'll bet most people don't.

To me the only benefit of a Bluray drive in my Mac would be to rip movies to watch on my ATV. If I'm going to do that, a good-quality HD download would be as good. I admit you could attach the Mac to the TV, but why not use a standalone player or a PS3?

And in 5 years or so, maybe we'll have flexible 3D OLED displays and holographic keyboards. I won't be using my current MacBook in 5 years.

Frankly, I'm not sure what this has to do with anything I wrote.

 

[bruinsrme]

All choices that were criticised by pundits at the time, now accepted and mainstream. Mark my words, in 5 years or so most people will be downloading their content rather than buying discs, and the company I see making the most popular player for that content is Apple.

You do realize xbox360 and PS3 offer downloadable movies. I think it is a pretty safe bet that there are and will be far more game consoles out there than any apple device for sometime to come.
Apple will have to do a lot of catching up to do.

 

[dvince2]

BR is at least 5 years off yet.

True, but Apple has a precedence of using cutting edge technology and dropping the old. Eg, dropping the floppy disk.
Not to mention, a lot of Apple users are either professionals or prosumers. What's the point of having iMovie HD without blueray support?

I've never understood this about apple.

I can go to Staples, and buy an Acer Laptop with a GeForce 9600, Blue Ray player, 4GB of memory and 320GB hard drive for $1200 CAD. It may look like crap, but that is a sweet machine. If apple had a machine with those stats, I would happily pay the apple premium for a better looking machine running OS X ($2100+)

But instead, you pay more and get less.