@BrianK

Quote:

I don't agree it's screaming best. It's a good choice. The 360 does all that, in a bit different ways, except for alternative OS.

Yeah, on the other hand it has a killer development kit - even for hobbyist users.

As for the 360 and hi-def formats: Microsoft have already stated that they'd put out Bluray for it if demand is there. With the PS3 you're locked to Bluray and can only hope it goes well for it.

From my perspective the 360 exclusive game line-up surpasses the PS3 by far for now. It really needs to shape up with the exclusives in order to catch my interest - especially considering the BS Sony has caused recently. I'll be needing extremely heavy persuasion and it's the games that do the talking.

That doesn't mean that there won't be great games on both, but since multiplatform games tend to run better on 360 there is little reason for me to get a PS3 if I'm not interested in running operating systems or watching bluray movies on my games console. The tivo functionality could be a useful addition, but I'm not going to believe it till I see it (Sony has a way of announcing things that don't materialize these days) and even then I doubt it will be nearly as nice as the set-up I have currently.

@MikeB

Quote:

For me porn is a non-issue, I am not looking for high definition porn.

Come on man! Don't you want to see pimples in hi-def??

I actually had the impression that porn was backing Bluray (that was the initial report that I head anyway). If they've switched their stance it's great - simply because while they may not make or break a market, they do help drive costs down.

@MikeB

Quote:

http://tech.blorge.com/Structure:%20/2006/12/06/why-the-end-of-playstation-hardware-will-be-best-for-all/

One has to factor in the "Motorola" effect i.e. countless 68K based PC platforms died as the 68K reached EOL in the workstation/desktop market e.g Sharp's X68000, HP/DEC 68K based workstations (replaced with Alpha/Itanium and X86), Atari ST/TT Series, Sinclair QL, SUN 68K workstations (replaced with thier own RISC and X86 platforms) and CBM's 68K Amigas.

These 68K based PC platforms was never unfied under a common standard. Most 68K PC platform vendors faced the prospect of CPU ISA migration.

In the mean time, PC X86 collective has added benefit of Intel/AMD continuing the X86 legacy, the creation of shared patent framework (P2P like sharing), made X86 competitive (against RISC*) by assimilating technologies (latest being stream processor technology by the green team***) in a timely fashion (using Moore’s Law), building working** reference platforms that improves upon the unified X86 PC platform, building of distribution channel and logistics infrastructure.

Gaining critical mass doesn’t happen automatically.

*Intel’s Pentium Pro/II/III and AMD’s K5/K6/K7 nullified the benefits of ACE initiative (it was supported by Microsoft). ACE mostly focuses on the replacement of CISC X86 PC platform with MIPS or Alpha. The release of Intel’s Pentium Pro and the actions of two large corporations practically destroyed ACE i.e. the combined Intel and Compaq (leading clone PC vendor) dismantled DEC (supporter for RISC ISA/platforms like MIPS, ARM, Alpha).

**Friendly with "cut-and-paste" engineering for ODMs and OEMs

***Nullifies CELL.

Last edited by Hammer on 16-Dec-2006 at 10:45 PM.
Last edited by Hammer on 16-Dec-2006 at 07:09 PM.
Last edited by Hammer on 16-Dec-2006 at 07:07 PM.

_________________
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB
Amiga 1200 (Rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32lite/RPi 4B 4GB/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (Rev 6A, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 3a/Emu68)

@MikeB

Quote:

For me the PS3 is the best choice. Alt OS is a killer feature for me, I will probably upgrade the harddrive to 200 Gb for recording and I look more forward to the games planned for the PS3, the only exception being Halo 3.

A 200GB drive? Really? You do realize the PS3 fits a 2.5" drive right? You could make some long cables and do something 3.5" external to the PS3. Here the 2.5" 200GB drive is $170 and the 200GB 3.5" drive is $65. OUCH!

Quote:

For me porn is a non-issue, I am not looking for high definition porn.

Of course the point was what format the Porn Industry was following not how MikeyB likes his porn. As mentioned by Trezzer on PI did say Blu-Ray but when they saw Sony's licensing fees they switched to HD-DVD.

Quote:

With the PS3 Blu-Ray players and content is already cheap enough.

Europe must have some deal the US doesn't. Content is expensive often 2-3x what a DVD costs. Example: The Transporter DVD is $13 the Blu-Ray $35. IMO, it's not cheap enough.

@Trezzer
Quote:

BS Sony has caused recently.

Many PS3-fanboys criticized Microsoft heavily for the shortages of the 360 and other problems. They were welcomed by Sony with even greater PS3 shortages and their own set of problems. For working on the PS3 for ~4+ years Sony missed the first rung. They may make it up but they did flub the launch worse, IMO.

@MikeB

Quote:

But PS1/PS2/PS3 have more common ground as the new models are compatible with the old, just like new PCs may run older PC games, while new games may not run (well enough) on older PCs.

Older PS1/PS2 doesn't run new games.... Why treating the older MPC1, MPC2, PC97, PC2000 standards differently to PS1/PS2?

Both Intel VIIV and AMD LIVE replaces the old MPC1/MPC2/PC97/PC2000/etc.

_________________
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB
Amiga 1200 (Rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32lite/RPi 4B 4GB/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (Rev 6A, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 3a/Emu68)

@BrianK

Quote:

Many PS3-fanboys criticized Microsoft heavily for the shortages of the 360 and other problems. They were welcomed by Sony with even greater PS3 shortages and their own set of problems. For working on the PS3 for ~4+ years Sony missed the first rung. They may make it up but they did flub the launch worse, IMO.

I wasn't thinking so much of shortages as their forced closure of Lik-Sang, their DRM rootkits, their closure of Bleem!, their illegal ad campaign (fake fan sites) and various other things - besides their idiotic handicapping of their own products like the PSP, where you're forced to buy movies over again and not even being able to play those movies elsewhere (like a tv-out option for instance or UMD drive in the PS3).

Sure, the others are guilty of all sorts of things as well, but Sony are just way, way out of line.

@Trezzer

Quote:

I wasn't thinking so much of shortages as their forced closure of Lik-Sang, their DRM rootkits, their closure of Bleem!, their illegal ad campaign (fake fan sites) and various other things - besides their idiotic handicapping of their own products like the PSP, where you're forced to buy movies over again and not even being able to play those movies elsewhere (like a tv-out option for instance or UMD drive in the PS3). Sure, the others are guilty of all sorts of things as well, but Sony are just way, way out of line.

I agree it's not like Sony is a friendly'company. They do those sorts of heavy handed tactics and think of all of the failed Sony 'standards': Betamax, DAT, MiniDisc, SDDS, HiFD, Atrac, UMD Movies, and SACD didn't do much good either. Those were further attempts by Sony to corner and control the market.

(Okay yes studios use DAT but no real use of it by consumers which was supposed to happen according to Sony.)

@ Trezzer

Quote:

With the PS3 you're locked to Bluray and can only hope it goes well for it.

Even if Blu-ray suffered an unlikely sudden death, there would still be less elegant options available to Sony. A multi-disk reader would also be an option for future PS3 units.

It's not only Sony supporting Blu-ray. Sadly some XBox 360 fans almost make this sound like a Microsoft vs Sony thing.

Major Blu-ray backers:

Apple, Dell, Hitachi, LG Electronics, Miramax, MGM, Mitsubishi Electric, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony (Electronics / Computer Entertainment / Pictures Entertainment), Sun Microsystems, TDK, Thomson, Twentieth Century Fox and Walt Disney.

VS

Major HD-DVD backers:

Toshiba, NEC, Sanyo, Microsoft, Intel and Universal Studios.

Supporting both formats:

Hewlett Packard
Warner Bros
New Line Cinema
Paramount Pictures

IMO HD-DVD is more "risky" at this point, if you really want to play on people's 'Betamax vs VHS' fears. IMO Microsoft's main reason to supply XBox users with an unelegant HD-DVD solution right now is its fear that early Blu-ray popularity would trigger widespread PS3 adoption.

@MikeB

Quote:

It's not only Sony supporting Blu-ray. Sadly some XBox 360 fans almost make this sound like a Microsoft vs Sony thing.

It is indirectly, but yes, it's also on a much larger scale.

Quote:

IMO HD-DVD is more "risky" at this point, if you really want to play on people's 'Betamax vs VHS' fears. IMO Microsoft's main reason to supply XBox users with an unelegant HD-DVD solution right now is its fear that early Blu-ray popularity would trigger widespread PS3 adoption.

So far HD-DVD is the cheaper alternative by far. Both when it comes to 360 and stand-alone players. So far it is also the best-selling format by a fair margin. It's still far to early to draw any conclusions based on that, but it is a small step on the way to critical mass - if it will be attained by either one at all that is.

As far as inelegant.. sure, it's not all-in-one. On the other hand you have your options open with a 360. It's certainly a more elegant solution than a stand-alone player. You get great quality and if HD-DVD isn't the winning format, at least you won't have wasted a lot of money on it.

In my book it's not so risky. In fact if there's merely a handful of films that I'd want to own in hi-def I'd consider getting the add-on. So far it's only Serenity, though, so I'm taking it easy for now

Quote:

Even if Blu-ray suffered an unlikely sudden death, there would still be less elegant options available to Sony.

We're talking about the company that still believes in minidisc, memory sticks and UMDs. Honestly, do you think their pride would allow them to do that?

Last edited by Trezzer on 16-Dec-2006 at 09:52 PM.

@MikeB

It seems Metal Gear Solid is going multi-platform.

@Trezzer

Quote:

It is indirectly, but yes, it's also on a much larger scale

Yes much larger Hitachi, Samsung and Matsushita Electric have higher sales and by far more employees than Sony and Microsoft.

The first 3 above mentioned companies have 820,000 employees combined worldwide. Quite some market muscle I would say. Add Sony (162,000) and Philips (158,344) to this and you will have a working force way beyond a million.

Quote:

So far HD-DVD is the cheaper alternative by far. B oth when it comes to 360 and stand-alone players.

No, the XBox 360 core + HD-DVD costs 500 dollar. Premium 600 dollar.
PS3 core (with HD, wireless controller, etc) with Bluray costs 500 dollar.

"HD-DVD supporters have long claimed their format was cheaper than Blu-ray"

"But as the prices for HP and Dell notebooks show, there is practically no difference now in the price of the drives. "

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Burnette/?p=219

Last edited by MikeB on 16-Dec-2006 at 10:39 PM.

@Trezzer

That would be great for XBox 360 / MGS fans. But AFAIK it's not official yet.

@MikeB

Quote:

No, the XBox 360 core + HD-DVD costs 600 dollar. PS3 core (with HD, wireless controller, etc) with Bluray costs 500 dollar. "HD-DVD supporters have long claimed their format was cheaper than Blu-ray"

US Xbox 360 core list price is $299, premium $399
US Xbox HD-DVD list price is $199
US PS3 core list price is $499, premium $599.

So your statement that the core + HD-DVD is wrong it's only $500 in the USA. Additionally deals can be found on the 360. The best one I know of is $100 off from Microcenter making that combo $400.

As for HD-DVD players they are typicaly $500 for the 1080i and $800-$1K for the 1080p. Blu-Ray players are $800-$1K - however a few models don't currently play dual layer disks but few Blu-Ray Discs use that currently. The PS3 is the cheapest entry point to Blu-Ray.

Format cheaper? Blu-Ray vs HD-DVD the answer is it simply depends. They're about the same price. But, you don't get the same movies on both formats always so it's a bit hard to more directly compare.

HD-DVD is cheaper for the studios in so far as the licensing fee and manufacturing costs for HD-DVD are less then Blu-Ray. Thus, if there ends up being a price war between the 2 formats HD-DVD studios stand to lose less cash.

My worry for Blu-Ray is actually the PS3. The majority of homes have SDTV. Blu-Ray on SDTV isn't noticably any different then DVD. If someone runs out and gets a Blu-Ray DVD and sees 3x cost for the disc and little significant difference due to their SDTV being the weak point the consumer may well be turned off.

@MikeB
Quote:

Supporting both formats:

ASUS (supports both HD-DVD and Blue-Ray in thier notebooks).
AMD (supports both HD-DVD and Blue-Ray in thier marketing material). Statistically, there's a slight bias towards HD-DVD e.g. laptop examples from Toshiba, ASUS).
ACER (supports both HD-DVD and Blue-Ray in thier notebooks).
Ben-Q.
Lite-On (major ODM/OEM for optical drive).

Last edited by Hammer on 17-Dec-2006 at 12:31 AM.
Last edited by Hammer on 16-Dec-2006 at 11:18 PM.

_________________
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB
Amiga 1200 (Rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32lite/RPi 4B 4GB/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (Rev 6A, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 3a/Emu68)

@MikeB

Quote:

No, the XBox 360 core + HD-DVD costs 500 dollar. Premium 600 dollar.

I don't live in the US. Furthermore you get both a better movie as well as a remote that works with the system in general when you buy the HD-DVD add-on. The 360 premium also has a high quality hi-def cable out of the box. You can in fact play hi-def movies out of the box on the 360 without ever getting an HD-DVD drive.

If you want to buy a high quality HDMI cable expect another $85 or so (Danish prices at one of the cheaper stores - you can probably get it cheaper elsewhere in the world).

Actual market prices here:
Xbox 360 Core: 1999 DKK
Xbox 360 Premium: 2599 DKK
Expected retail price for HD-DVD: 1800 DKK (hasn't launched in Europe yet)

So ... just for fairness sake, let's take the premium 360 and add the HD-DVD.
2599 + 1800 = 4399 DKK.

This is with King Kong, a free remote, composite and component cables, wireless controllers, headset for voice communications, a free game on the hard drive (Hexic HD), some free music pre-loaded (V/A), a bit of video on it, an online movie rental store/series sales out of the box as well as support for stuff like PSPs, iPod etc.

As an added bonus you can hook the drive up to a PC or a Mac and use it there as well - not too shabby.

Now...
PS3 basic: 4295 DKK
PS3 premium: 5495 DKK
Add in 500 DKK for HDMI cable if you really want the high quality visual experience. Go with 300 if you want to skimp on it.

Either way the cheapest way of experiencing Bluray with the PS3 is 4595 DKK and you get no remote, you get Talladega Nights instead of King Kong, you get no free games and so far no video store in sight outside of Japan.

The quote about laptop drives isn't really relevant when the only stand-alone players on the market are twice as expensive as the HD-DVD players.

@MikeB

Also don't forget if you want to play your CD and DVD collections you can't do it with a stand alone Blu-Ray it doesn't have a red laser. HD-DVD can play those old formats.

@BrianK

I already noticed and corrected my typo regarding the combo price.

Quote:

only $500

Just like the PS3 but without HD and with a wired controller. See first post in this thread.

Quote:

HD-DVD is cheaper for the studios in so far as the licensing fee and manufacturing costs

Even so there are already more Blu-ray movies available and more high profile studios backing Blu-ray.

@MikeB

Quote:

Even so there are already more Blu-ray movies available and more high profile studios backing Blu-ray.

According to amazon: 6 more titles for Bluray.
When it comes to titles that can actually ship right now HD-DVD is ahead by 11 titles.

Sales and searches for hd-dvd are much higher than for Bluray though.

Last edited by Trezzer on 16-Dec-2006 at 11:12 PM.

@MikeB

Quote:

Even so there are already more Blu-ray movies available

Nov must have been a huge month for Blu-Ray going into Nov HD-DVD had the title count hand downs. I bet the numbers are close now.

Amazon lists Lord of the Ring HD-DVD but no Blu-Ray. Some studio doing a big enough money on just 1 format may well swing the tide. Not sure if there's a Blu-Ray version coming of LotR. Star Trek is another movie that has a ton of followers and is shipping both versions.


EDIT -- actually LotR may be HD-DVD only. Here's my thoughts and I reserve the right to be wrong. Peter Jackson is making a Halo game for the 360 and announced he's working with Microsoft on the Halo movie. PJ's King Kong is the free movie that ships with the HD-DVD player for the 360. It could be that the relationship between PJ and Microsoft is sweet enough that a LotR Blu-Ray is out of the picture so PJ only authorizes a HD-DVD version.

In the end if it turns out Blu-Ray wins PJ can always do another release. So really it just delayed a bit of cash for PJ for a couple of years if he choose the wrong format. Again this is a guess from an outside observer who reserves the right to be completely wrong.

Last edited by BrianK on 16-Dec-2006 at 11:20 PM.

@MikeB

Quote:

Apple, Dell, Hitachi, LG Electronics, Miramax, MGM, Mitsubishi Electric, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony (Electronics / Computer Entertainment / Pictures Entertainment), Sun Microsystems, TDK, Thomson, Twentieth Century Fox and Walt Disney.

MGM is part of Sony btw.

_________________
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB
Amiga 1200 (Rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32lite/RPi 4B 4GB/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (Rev 6A, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 3a/Emu68)