This here survey may have been conducted by GfK across the pond, but we'd be willing to wager the results are actually indicative of most major developed markets. Baseless assumptions aside, the facts are that a subset of surveyed individuals has led the research firm to conclude that at the tail end of 2008, DVD-RW drives still held a 92 percent share in the optical disc drive sector. Needless to say, sales of
standalone BD optical drives were much, much lower, holding just a 4 percent volume share in November 2008. Moreover, some 81 percent of "mobile computers" and 86 percent of desktops came loaded with a DVD-RW drive last October, and just 1 percent (yes, one) of desktops came with a high-definition drive of any kind pre-installed. It's not shocking to see that the PC market is adopting BD slower than the standalone home entertainment segment, but what this could also signal is the
declining interest in cutting-edge HTPCs altogether. What say you, oh knowledgeable ones?
posted Jan 24th 2009 4:08PM
Lack of BD-ROM and BD-R/RE drives in PC's has nothing to do with HTPC's. It has to do with a lack of software and other data distributed on BD-ROM/BD-R discs. When DVD first appeared it was very useful to distribute a large software package on one DVD vs. 5 or more CD's. This saved time (no swapping discs) during installation as well as weight and package size to reduce shipping costs. (This was just before broadband got super cheap making downloads the easiest way to distribute software.)
I haven't looked at the entire PC market, but I'd recently been shopping for a new PC and noticed many of the mid-high end PC's were packing BD-drives, or at least alot more then I would have expected with the apparent low adoption of BD.
So my new PC comes with one(got a PS3 last year, so didn't exactly need it), also a few of my friends have recently purchased PC's n laptops that have Blu-Ray drives. I'm enjoying it because I have more n more folk's to swap Blu-Ray's with :D.
There's a lack of BR drives in US PCs too, it's because the damn things cost too much, let alone think of picking up a BR burner
High end DVD ODD = £20
BLU-Ray = £70 upwards.
I do plan on buying a Blu ray drive for my new HTPC when the price comes down although that depends on how long Blu ray lasts.
DVD Burner = $25
Blu Ray Burner = $350
Blank Single Layer DVD = $0.20
Blank Single Layer Blu Ray = $8
Do the math. DVD didn't become popular in computers until Burners and media came way down in price either.
I dont know where you're buying your burner from but mine cost me 150 euros. Blu ray players with DVD burning functionality can be had for 75 euros. Some people would be quite happy with read only Blu ray functionality since they just want to watch moves.
The prices arent especially different from DVD or CDROM during their time. I paid much more than 150 for a DVD burner.
My BD burner included a BD-RE which is what I needed for running backups and PowerDVD for playback. It also plays HD DVDs which was handy when stores were practically giving them away. I doubt I will be buying BD-Rs until the price drops because its too easy to turn write once media into coasters.
I'm expecting that this year or next is when Blu-ray is going to really start taking off on the PC side. The media is finally starting to get into the semi-reasonable range (25 GB blanks are $6-8 apiece in quantity), and the burners are now getting pretty close to $200. I'll definitely be putting one into the next PC I build, hopefully around the end of the year.
The 25GB for 6 bucks thing hits me where it hurts. Hard drives are cheaper. When the price of the optical media drops below the price of fixed disk media, we can talk.
Comparison:
Seagate 1TB external drive: 11.22 cents per gigabyte.
BD-R 25GB @$6.00: 24.00 cents per gigabyte.
You have to just shake your head at that.
I can't help but wonder if a big part of the problem isn't the fact that many monitors won't allow Blu-Ray movies to play on PCs. I found out after buying a Blu-Ray drive that my Viewsonic 22" was not HDCP-compliant.
Another case of hurting the folks who actually BUY the product: Download a rip and you can play it fine but the Blu-Ray Disc you buy legitimately won't play. Ridiculous.
I got around the problem but I would imagine tech support for these types of issues end up with a lot of angry customers.
I got an LG GGC-H20L (Blu-ray/HD-DVD reader, DVD burner) a few months back. It turned out to be incompatible with 2 out of 3 chipsets I installed it in despite all three systems meeting or exceeding listed minimum requirements. Once I did get it working, I found the software support to be troublesome. The included Cyberlink package had to be patched to run and then only with 2-channel audio. The lack of native BD/HD-DVD support in any of the major operating systems and limited selection of compatible programs make things difficult for those purchasing the cheaper OEM drives. In general, one would have to pay $80 for a full software suite to enable feature-for-feature performance to match most stand-alone players. In addition, multichannel audio over HDMI is still a rarity in PCs and not every display is currently HDCP compliant. With so many hurdles standing in the way of high-definition movie viewing on a computer, it's not a stretch for adoption rates to be low.
Suppose all other hardware is in place to enable proper playback and the decision comes down to choosing a BD drive or standard DVD burner. At the low end, the cost difference is around $80 for just the drive; newer drives and BD-R drives increase the premium to nearly $200. Forget BD-R/E burning for this example as it remains wasefully expensive and anyone needing such capability don't have much choice. Full-featured software for playback is still necessary and will need to be bought separately. That's an upfront premium of roughly $160, less than retail Blu-Ray players. But how does power consumption change. Smaller HTPCs use, and I am merely guessing here, 300W while running. People putting these drives into bigger gaming machines can use 600W or more. In either case, the computer will have greater power consumption. Also consider load times. With a standalone player, I can pop in a movie and have it run, depending on the hardware, within a minute or so. With a drive, one would have to wait for the computer to boot and the software to load before the movie can be read. And those not fortunate enough to have a media remote for the computer will be forced to fiddle with mouse-driven menus and keyboard shortcuts while a standalone player's remote provides quick access to the various functions.
I do like my drive, but I don't find it a practical substitute for an actual player.
I'm sorry you had such difficulty, but your experiences don't necessarily reflect what's typical. I bought an Asus BC-1205PT Blu-ray reader/DVD-RW for $150 (and it's now down to $100) for my latest system build. Windows XP SP3 handled it fine, the included Cyberlink software required an online update to play some titles but otherwise worked fine. Almost all newer monitors are HDCP compliant; as are some motherboards- HDCP is supported over the on-board chipset over DVI.
Also, 300W is an extremely high power estimate for most HTPCs, which don't typically use the latest and greatest video card. Mid range HTPCs with onboard video and audio (like mine) use half that while playing Blu-rays (thanks Zalman MFC2). The difference, and I compared stats from several manufacturers in addition to the readings from my drive, shows that the Blu-ray drive itself consumes a mere 10W while playing. That's certainly not enough to worry about getting dinged on your next power bill.
And your complaint about load times applies to DVDs as well if you're counting boot time and all that, which is an unfair comparison, and not always true for home media server setups or other always-on PCs. The software takes LESS than a minute to load and start up the Blu-ray disc.
And what HTPC doesn't come with a remote control these days? Between wireless mice and keyboards, everyone who plans on using their system for viewing movies picks some option that doesn't mean getting up.
Blu-Ray is still too expensive. A player, not burner, for my laptop is a $500 option and I'm having a hard time finding a 5.25 one for the server under $100. The laptop is the only thing I have that will take advantage of the higher resolution. The server isn't high on the priority list so I'd only consider something
Its a Sony product in DRM hell. i wonder are we getting root kits installed on our PC's with placing a Blu-Ray disc in a PC. next question is. Do you have the right to view something you just bought from Sony?