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62 Comments
- geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+77Because, maybe, as it stands, the drives cost more than the computers they're considering putting them in?
Cringely's got a theory about everything, but some things just make too much sense for him to realize. When the drives become cheap and marketable, they'll use them, just as other manufacturers will. - oGMo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+35Precisely:
1) They're first-gen
2) They're expensive
3) They're all being allocated for PS3's, which are a big factor in the growth of the format
4) What's the point? - steelmaverick, on 10/12/2007, -7/+35Yeah, I'm going to download a 25gb Movie. Yup. I'll get right on that.
- igraham09, on 10/12/2007, -6/+20"They're all being allocated for PS3s"
ok... that takes care of the first 100K... - Scruffydan, on 10/12/2007, -1/+12don't forget about HD-DVD. Sure would suck for apple to start shipping computers with blu-ray drives, only to have HD-DVD become the accepted standard.
anyone know if the standalone blu-ray drives and HD-DVD drives work with Macs? If they do then the early adopters should be satisfied. - WiseWeasel, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10This should probably be a BTO option for the Mac Pro at this point, but at $1k, I don't see many people going for it. Apple is probably just waiting for drive prices to become reasonable, and available in the kind of volume they're expecting to use. Apple has long-since learned the hard way about integrating new hardware before it's ready for mass-market...
- SimonKay, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12Cringely's theory is ***** because current drives will not play Blu-Ray movies because:
"commercial content is encrypted with High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), which can only be decrypted using a HDCP-compliant graphics card that offers DVI or HDMI connections. Since there are currently no PCs for sale offering graphics chips that support HDCP, this isn't yet possible." - mywhitenoise, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12uh...because a Blu-Ray writable drive would cost almost as much as the computer? And there is no solid evidence that it will beat out HD-DVD. It's not even mainstream yet! What a stupid question.
- swifty12, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12what makes you think that if the ps3/blueray fails than sony is going to go bankrupt. Yeah sure, they would take a huge hit, but they have plenty of other things going.
- gharding, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8I don't even use my DVD drive. What the hell am I supposed to do with a Blu-ray drive?
- ZeonZumDeikun, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6How can either format go mainstream when it only appeals to people with HDTVs in the first place? A good majority of the population still watches basic cable on big bulky CRT televisions, so the format war can't possibly go mainstream yet.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7exactly. that and there's no real blue ray content out there, AND people still remmeber getting burnt on beta vs vhs.
blueray is going to need a CLEAR advantage over hddvd to win. - staticneuron, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@anonym41414
uh huh.... sounds knowledgable. Except 2MB is the norm in most areas not 15MB and on my 1.5 MB connection watching 1080p movies doesn't seem to be fun.
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/guide/hd/bbc-nhk.html
For anyone that wants to try it out, go click on 1080p and see's if that plays smoothly for you. I am curious how many people here have that fast of connections. - mathmanjeffy, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I'm fairly certain timmarthy meant a marketing advantage. History has shown that superior technology is not all it takes to sell a product.
- ricree, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@swifty12
They probably won't go bankrupt, but messing up blu-ray will be a huge hit. At the moment, they aren't doing particularly well, and now they've tied their games division, which is one of their most profitable areas, into the fate of blu-ray. If the format fails, it's going to be really, really painful for them. - brstilson, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Blu-Ray is going to have to offer significant advantages over standard DVD. Aside from the people with $5,000 Televisions and $2,000 surround sound systems, it offers no advantages to anyone else whatsoever.
- hungarianhc, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Yeah this article is stupid. Apple may be on the blu-ray camp, but they're not going to force the drives on their customers until they feel there's some sort of demand. As a recent mac pro customer, i'm not really missing the BD...
- bleaknik, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4While the MiniDisc format failed in the United States, it sold very well in Japan for many years--only in the past couple of years did MP3 players steal the show.
Sony may have failed with Beta and the UMD, but the MiniDisc was a nice li'l media, even if us red necks never appreciated 'em. - HappyScrappy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3DAT was the RIAA's first victim.
Honestly, the RIAA didn't affect MD much because people usually weren't doing digital recording to MD and the RIAA didn't restrict analog recording.
MD failed in the US because it was expensive, user-made recordings sounded awful in the beginning (coworker bought one first day and we listened to it), and even Sony didn't take it seriously as a prerecorded format. Because of this, music retailers didn't take it seriously and it had no chance of becoming a full-fledged format.
Sony let it languish for over 5 years, then right as they decided to relaunch it in the US, the iPod appeared and that was the end of the viability of selling MD to new customers (even in Japan).
MD did well in Japan and the UK, up until the iPod came out. - foolfromhell, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Apple and Disney are backing Blu-Ray.
- anonym41414, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7To the guy who made the "25 GB movie" wisecrack above:
I decided to try downloading a movie from the iTunes store the other day, just to see what it was like. I picked something I hadn't seen, shelled out my ten bucks and started the download. The little progress meter said it would be finished in about an hour. Just to see what would happen, I double-clicked the movie.
Whaddya know. It started playing. Immediately.
After I finished watching it, I took a look at the details. The movie was encoded at a bit rate of around 1.5 Mbps. Because I was downloading it faster than that, at about 2 Mbps on my cable modem, I was able to watch it as soon as I'd bought it.
Now, HD movies naturally require more bandwidth. Depending on the content, somewhere between 4 and 8 Mbps. You can already get 15 Mbps broadband in many places in the US through Verizon's fiber-to-the-home service, and it costs the same or less than a cable modem. As this technology becomes more widespread, I think the idea of downloading HD movies encoded at less than 10 Mbps is entirely practical.
It's not about the total number of bytes. It's about the bandwidth available to download those bytes. - gothicx00, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3@zybch
Actually that is incorrect as well. I picked up a 19" 1440x900 display at Best Buy the other day (for under $250 i might add) and it supports HDCP. Even has the fancy HDCP logo on the box. So the technology is there, but I agree with most of the comments in the fact that it's too early to tell what Apple's long term HD plans are. - brstilson, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5Because Apple has decided to back Blu-Ray. Microsoft is backing HD DVD.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Another thing the iTV isnt even released so whats the point in speculating about blu-ray etc until the specs have been finalised?
- adml_shake, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Wired covered this topic in last months issues. It was an interesting read.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.09/sony.html - kevine, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3This is the problem with the subject field submissions on Digg. Apparently, they couldn't fit the word "yet" in the subject. As such the post appears to be retarded. Oh wait, I just RTFA, it *is* retarded.
They ask, "why else include HDMI and Component and not S-Video?"
Uh, because they can adapt down to S-Video, but not the other way around?
They make statements like "this just isn't like Apple to not include the latest and greatest hardware in their products."
When did Apple *ever* release a cutting edge optical drive? It has always been the case that Apple offers OEM drives that are at least 1 generation behind. If you want cutting edge optical, you always had to buy 3rd party, and it was pretty much never an issue or problem.
"Apple would rather sell you a downloaded HD movie than to help you watch it via Blu-ray."
Statements like this make EngadgetHD seem like it should be called EngadgetDDD. Are Blu-ray discs or drives flying off the shelves right now? Did Apple stop including DVD drives in their Macs so people would be more inclined to download movies instead of buy/rent DVDs?
And finally... EngadgetHD should've considered that the whole f'ing point of the Mac Pro having dual optical drives is so that people can easily add 3rd party optical drives, be they Blu-ray or whatever. - HappyScrappy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Because they can't get enough drives yet.
If you announce a new high-end config, people will order it just to have the top config, even if they don't need what it offers. If you can't build the top-end config, then those orders just pile up and you can't book the revenue. But if you reduce the spec of the top config (by not announcing a higher config), then people just order the current top spec, and you deliver it and book the revenue.
So, as long as Sony is buying up all the blue laser diodes for PS3s, you won't see a Mac config with a BluRay drive. Maybe early next year. - cbiz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Super smart move on Apples part, as all the lemmings head in 1 direction Apple heads in another...
- brstilson, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"Apple just released "near DVD quality" movies right now, and they take a while to download. It will be a while before not only HD content is available, but the Internet in North America is good enough to distribute it in a decent amount of time."
Two words: bigger tubes - Majin_Raditz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I think it's because there to expensive. Once they come down to about the $300 mark you'll see them starting in the Mac Pros.
- MikeCerm, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The Sony of today is basically a movie studio and record company. Their hardware business, an area they used to be technological leaders in, is in disasterous condition. The Sony name still sells products, but the majority of consumers are (or should be) avoiding it, because it generally means "overpriced".
- BenSerwa, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2...because it would be stupid to on several obvious levels?
- iSlayer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Until a clear format is in Apple are sitting and waiting...much like Universal Studios are just sitting and waititng to see which will win the format. Its clear that not both can win this but it does look like HD-DVD as the clear winner right now...
- cybernezumi, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Yeah, MD is still pretty easy to find in Japan and I still see people using it. And I really wouldn't wholly blame Sony for its failure in the US -- as I recall it was the RIAA's first victim. Long before MP3 players, they insisted on onerous restrictions before it was released.
- camkerr, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Apple would rather sell me a downloaded HD movie from iTunes? No *****. The "iTV" is coming out when? Q1 2007? Apple just released "near DVD quality" movies right now, and they take a while to download. It will be a while before not only HD content is available, but the Internet in North America is good enough to distribute it in a decent amount of time.
- mariusaz, on 10/12/2007, -6/+7Probably because no one at this point knows whether not Blu-ray, yet alone Sony is going to survive for much longer.
- alobos, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Analog Component video can be easily converted to S-Video as well as Composite video. The current outputs serves the three, just with a very cheap adapter needed.
- StephenCIreland, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1*cough* what happened to HD-DVD, its a better format. So apple is biding their time as to which choice of drive, but ill be sitting with a HD-DVD waiting for macbook rev 2.0
- BigBrother87, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Has anyone reasoned that they don't want to support either format because they are both equally useless? Both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are already dead. Players are slow, formats are very incompatible, and the bottom line: does anyone care? What is the point right now? What are you going to do with either one? Watch one of 5 movies? I'm waiting for the next universal standard, like the CD was.
- zeppo, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3Because there isnt a HDCP compliant PCI-X graphics card for the Mac yet thats why... what a ***** dumbass
- Zuggy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1My theory is that with 2 competing formats apple's waiting to see which comes out on top. Plus the current graphics cards can't decode Blu-Ray so what would be the point of including a $1,000 drive to begin with
- HappyScrappy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1HD-DVD has three companies backing it:
Microsoft, Toshiba and Vivendi/Universal.
BluRay has every other drive manufacturer other than Toshiba, every device (player) manufacturer other than Toshiba and MS, and every other content provider other than Universal.
HD-DVD is doing pretty well considered it's basically orphaned. But at this time, BluRay is what is winning.
Stay tuned though. - maninblac1, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Simply stated there no availability of parts, at least not that are cheap and easy to come by. There is a shortage of blue Diodes, sony sucked all of them up as fast as they could so they could get the first 400K out the door. Not only that, but BD and HD DVD players both require the same diode as well. Simply said, there is not enough supply for these markets as it is. Apple would be fighting just to get it's hands on the hardware. Let alone design and manufacture "superdrive" style reader to put it in.
Not only this, it's virgin technology, and with the format war not settled, i don't think apple is going to jump on until it's clear whether or not the investment will pay off, which may be years down the road. - GMorgan, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Game division, profitable?
They never made a great deal from any of their consoles since their spending their profit margins fighting off rivals. All the console makers (bar Nintendo who are awake) are aiming to break even at the moment. This entire generation is just a battleground to gain position for the next one and so was the last one. Sony need to sell 14 games per box just to break even this time around which is really pushing it.
Reality is they can't afford to put the technology they are together in a box at the prices in question. A gaming quality PC costs at least £1000 in the UK, how they hope to match that with a console starting at £400 and dropping quickly makes no sense whatsoever. I personally think the technology charge from the consoles is over, they just aren't in the financial zone that PC's are. - rajulkabir, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Hear hear. Outside of the IT community, where people are mostly skeptical about the new formats, and Best Buy sales staff community, where know-nothing losers pontificate ignorantly to each other about it until innocent bystanders in the next aisle are moved to vomit, nobody gives a *****. Pretty much everyone in the real world is happy with DVDs as they are. I've never heard any normal person complain about the audio or video quality (unless it was a bad pirate version).
- vcleniuk, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2I agree with your points.
Also, I read somewhere recently that Apple has plans to reduce the lifecycle time of it's computers -- which I took as meaning they'll be putting more systems on the market to persuade people into continuously upgrading, much like Windows / Intel has done. - Kosterfield, on 10/12/2007, -6/+6That quote is incorrect, there are graphics cards that support the HDCP standards.
- Spo8, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Because everyone is scared that Blu-Ray is going to fail?
Or is it going to fail because everyone is scared that it is going to fail? - Bootes, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1You don't even need Fiber for 10mbps. The cable company here has been offering 10mbps for years and is now offering even higher speeds. My Verizon Fios is 30mbps.
- pantuky, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2Why hasn't Apple included a Blu-ray? Because Blu-ray is a partial birth abortion, that's why.
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