Oh, thanks for spotting that. Kind of makes a difference too.

I can see how driving demand is going to be key, but I don't think you're giving enough weight to the "All titles available, all the time." factor. As much as I'd love to have Netflix provide a BD quality 1080p/TrueHD stream, even my very clean 3 MBps won't help make that a very enjoyable experience. Even trying that over FIOS/Uvers won't fair well with that load.

The typical Hollywood Video or BlockBuster could host enough storage that the phrase "We don't have that title" could very well become a thing of the past.

If SD Card distro/rental succeeds, it won't be due to a single attribute, but the sum of its features.

HD is probably at least a year out. Figure that movie with even a half way decent 720p encode & Dolby Digital + would be between 4-8GB, it would take a pretty long time to fill with a class 6 card. We'll have to wait until the Class 10 cards (22MBps writes) hit the market, but even then a 6GB load would take something like 40 min.

SDXC is supposed to start at 104MBps, so even then, loading a 32GB 1080p/TrueHD movie on to one would take about 45 minutes. Is that still a long time? Only the customer can make that call. SD card based kiosks have to potential of making the Netflix "Very Long Wait" or new released Blu-rays that are perpetually "all currently rented" a thing of the past. There are still plenty of ways for it to succeed or fail.

How is this as stupid as self destruct DVD? Maybe because you can wipe and re-use an SD, SDHC or SDXC card multiple times? Or is it because SDHC can hold 4 times as much as a DVD and SDXC will be available in 64GB (bigger than BD) within the next 12 months?

Maybe it's stupid because with a little bit more work the system could allow you to buy the movie you rented and store it on a media server, whereas the self destructing DVDs aren't capable of such a thing.

+1

I hope no one is being paid to write these polls.

Engadget HD content has been a bit thin of late, so my guess is that the "sour grapes" line is just bait for the few remaining people that haven't fully come to terms with the passing of HD DVD over 18 months ago.

Move along folks, nothing to see here.

+1 on the lame Wally World only version with IMAX scenes. Props for multiple coupons one can use on either the BD or DVD.

Another thumbs down for Universal's porting the HD DVD of Waterworld and slapping a DTS-MA soundtrack on top of it. Hello? Does BD not have enough room for the extended cut? Maybe I'll double dip on it if they eventually pull their head out and re-release the extended version.

Looks like they had a disc already in the tray and paused out to the setup menu (that looks a LOT like an HD DVD setup menu, go figure).

Why this is making its way out of China is beyond me.

Probably not anymore likely than a firmware upgrade would make FAT PS3's capable of doing the same, as it's more likely that it's a physical issue more than software/drivers.

What version of Windows does that happen under? Vista? 7? 32bit? 64bit? Is it the catalyst drivers or does it only happen in various motherboard chipset/OS combinations?

I wouldn't be plugging this into my TV as it can neither decode nor pass lossless audio my Onkyo 805.

So does the cheaper 5850. $120 less. less heat, smaller card & bitstream lovin!