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In the end, nobody was surprised that Toshiba lost the DVD-format war. The reason why is simple. Sony's Blu-ray format allows for almost 60 per cent more storage that Toshiba's HD-DVD format.
That may not sound like enough to decide a format war between two major corporations, but you have to remember that's just a base figure. The storage capacity of both formats can be doubled or even quadrupled, so when quad-layering becomes available, Blu-ray disks will be able to hold 120 GB of data compared to 60 GB for HD DVD.
Now some people are going to ask: so what? A movie's a movie, right? Spiderman III is still going to be one of the worst movies ever made regardless of what format it's in, right?
Well, yes. But anyone who thinks that buying a DVD is just about buying one movie probably hasn't cruised through the DVD racks at the mall recently. "Collector's editions", which contain a movie and extra video that normally the studio couldn't give away, are pretty much the norm, as is putting the entire season of a TV series in a multi-disk pack. Now, thanks to Blu-ray, you will probably be able to get the entire package on one disk. Sony likes this because it only has to pay for one DVD, while still charging you the original multi-disk price.
Now, don't throw away your old DVDs thinking that a few HD version is coming out. The old DVDs will play on newer Blu-ray disk players. That 70s Show was filmed, not digitally recorded, and no technology is going to make it high definition. You can forget about shows like the Family Guy, too. No technology in our lifetime is going to turn animations into HD, which, considering the content of the Family Guy, is probably a good thing.
Pay-off
The victory also means that Sony's gambit in the gaming console arena is going to pay off. The cheapest way to get your hands on a Blu-ray player in recent months has been to buy a Playstation 3. Had the format failed, Sony wouldn't have just been able to walk away. It would have been stuck producing the format, or risked alienating everyone who's bought into the new Playstation.
Not everyone will be cheering the Blu-ray victory though, least of all those you bought into the HD-DVD format by purchasing players and disks. (Don't worry, LG said they won't abandon you and will produce players that accommodate both formats.) Game console makers will now be forced to make a decision on whether to adopt Blu-ray (and pay for the privilege), stick with lower capacity DVDs (4.7 GB), or develop yet another format.
Sony is already aware that Blu-ray will allow it to product bigger games, literally, than consoles like Xbox. It will be interesting to see what Microsoft's response is.
It's hard to imagine a world where Microsoft would actually pay for the privilege of using a rival's technology in their own equipment.
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