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So You Bought The Wrong One .... Now What?

The battle between the two newest generation of optical discs is settled. When several major movie studios picked the Blu-ray format over HD DVD the decision was clear. Major manufactures marketing the HD DVD product such as Toshiba almost immediately announced they were discontinuing the line and bowed to the Blu-ray as
the next generation high definition format.

But why Blu-ray? Though the technology developed for Blu-ray and HD DVD are very similar, the differences are subtle enough to have a clear winner. Both Blu-ray and HD DVD use a lower wave length blu-voilet laser rather than the red laser that conventional DVD products have used for many years. The lower wavelength allows for the amount of data that is stored on an optical disc to be increased dramatically. Blu-ray discs have an even larger storage capacity per layer than the now obsolete HD DVD. A standard Blu-ray disc can store as much as 25 MB of digital data. That is more than five times the storage of the standard DVD disc used today. A standard HD DVD disc has a capacity of up to 15 MB per layer, though superior to today's products it does not match the Blu-ray numbers. You may say that the difference is not that big of a deal, so lets compare. The standard Blu-ray disc can hold up to two hours of high definition television or thirteen hours of standard definition television. There are 50 MB to 200MB storage discs in the works that will hold up to 18 hours of high definition television. There are even mini discs in the works that can be used in next generation Blu-ray camcorders that will allow the user to film home movies in high definition like never seen before.

So now that you spent the money on that obsolete HD DVD player what are your options. Well there are a few.

First, if you have purchased a small library of HD DVD movies then you still need a high definition player to watch them on. These discs are not compatible with a Blu-ray DVD player or your old cave man DVD player. So you may need to keep the HD DVD unit for that reason alone.

Second, if you have a high definition TV in more than one room then you may have been thinking you are going to need an high definition DVD player in both rooms so the next purchase can be a Blu-ray version. As more companies began producing Blu-ray DVD players the price will drop and the financial strain will not seem as painful. So if the plan is to someday purchase a replacement for the obsolete HD DVD unit or to buy a second unit you may want to look into the various brands of Duo players. Those that are capable of playing either Blu-ray or HD DVD from the same unit, Samsung currently has the BD-UP5000 which it touts as the "future technology fused into one
perfect high definition player" with full HD 1080p playback from both formats. Though a little pricey, from $400 to $600, it does solve two problems.

Either way, the future has been decided so climb on board and enjoy the future today!