http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/ Engadget Comments for Sony to begin Blu-ray marketing blitz http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/Jun 8th 2006 10:23AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/
Blu-Ray's game to lose right now. Hardwarewise Blu-Ray isn't good enough to warrant paying too much more for so it's going to boil down to content. ]]>Jun 8th 2006 12:13PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/Jun 8th 2006 12:20PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/
I'm looking forward to the $100 player before I even think about buying either format.]]>Jun 8th 2006 2:26PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/Jun 8th 2006 4:22PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/
Basically, its a sterotypic male-and-female action scene with a helicopter(!) and the ever cliched "GRAB MY HAND!" but this time they fall. And where do they land? A couch in front a Toshiba TV with and HD-XA1 (and a bowl of popcorn that must have come from the helicopter). Continuing the cliches, deep voice guy comes in, and says "Toshiba HD DVD. So real you can feel it."

I thought the ad was well-placed (HDNet = Target Audience) and well made (I thought it was a movie trailer up until the end) but I still think Sony is doing a much better job by jamming Blu-Ray down average joe NBA-Final-watcher's throat. People are noticing.]]>Jun 8th 2006 4:58PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/"SO REAL YOU CAN FEEL IT"
It is a spot cable run, I saw it on comedy central (if I remember right), not an HD network.
]]>Jun 8th 2006 7:23PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/
The Playstation 3 is Sony's only opportunity to make up for lost ground. Newsflash people Sony delayed their own player until mid Aug or later. Samsung may or may not hit June 25th of this month and even if it does I doubt you see 10 thousand people shelling out a cool grand for it.

Toshiba's shipping their Qosmio laptop with a HD DVD player in it. Acer was showing a HD DVD laptop at Computex this week. They plan to have a Blu-Ray model as well but they can't get the drives. Speaks volumes about how the BDA executes. Sending out press release bragging out your product does not equal shipping said products. Toshiba had delivered players and then patched the firmware to take care of the initial wave of glitches which are inevitable. I give them an B+ on the whole affair but had to dock them because they haven't manufactured enough.

Enough marketing...more execution please. ]]>Jun 8th 2006 7:49PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/Jun 8th 2006 8:12PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/
HD DVD's head start does NOT MATTER. They're only reaching a MINISCULE segment of the market. Blu-Ray will have tons of units ready to ship, and oh... 6 MILLION PS3s.]]>Jun 8th 2006 10:17PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/Jun 10th 2006 3:46PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/
I think both HD DVD and Blu-Ray have an uphill battle. Both are convinced we need the technology, but I'm not sold yet. Whoever sells the player hardware at @300 or below most likely has my attention.

]]>Jun 11th 2006 6:22PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/08/sony-to-began-blu-ray-marketing-blitz/
As of today, both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD are on the market.

Here are the facts:

-Blu-Ray didn't wait for their launch for smart reasons; they did because they have problems with manufacturing.

-Proof of concept, Blu-Ray is still using one layer discs and Mpeg2 encoding, allowing a low quantity of content.

-Sony also gives the reason for the Mpeg2 that it’s because it gives a better image quality then H.264 (WTF).

-Sony hasn't yet started its publicity.

-HD-DVD forum has created a group called TheLookAndSoundOfPerfect to promote their format everywhere.

-HD-DVD has 34 movies, Blu-Ray has 14 movies.

-Blu-Ray does have more major movie hits under the arm. (Star Wars, Matrix etc.)

-Companies publishing for both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are now releasing movies only on HD-DVD or delayed their release on Blu-Ray.

-Video game consoles like the Playstation 3, especially due to its integrated Blu-Ray drive at a low cost (compared to the external problematic HD-DVD Xbox 360 drive) may play a large role in promotion of the format, especially in Japan.

-Estimations that today's DVD will still be the market leader in 2010 is foolish since the United-States will adopt HD as a broadcast standard in 2009, thus making anything standard definition obsolete (for example, the DVD).

-Blu-Ray uses Java for its menus which are easier to program then the new iHD created by Toshiba for its HD-DVD menus.

-Current Blu-Ray movies suffer from bad mastering and give poor impressions on consumers. The best movies of Blu-Ray, not matter how much there are, may not go out until the one layer only Mpeg2 problem gets fixed. This gives enough time for HD-DVD to get a good head start (which it already has) and convert other studios to make HD-DVDs.

-Blu-Ray production costs are higher then HD-DVD.

-Java has royalty costs that are directly charged to consumers with higher machine and movie prices for Blu-Ray.

-iHD and HD-DVD are royalty free and Microsoft is even giving money to PC producers to include HD-DVD drives instead of Blu-Ray in their future Windows Vista systems.

Considering the above facts and the price to convert to either format, companies probably won’t ever convert again (ex: Blu-Ray to HD-DVD). This might lead to the reign of Hybrid systems that read both. (Already in development by such manufacturers are Samsung).

We may also see the same thing as DVD-Audio or SACD. Both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD might get killed by future movie download services. (Widescreen iPod, iTunes Movie Store???, who knows)
]]>Jul 18th 2006 7:28AM