Homework: HD DVD vs. Blu Ray

The most interesting thing that jumps out to me about this data is the number of units sold. Blu Ray players alone sold more than three times as many units than the HD DVD player by itself. However, I think it is important and interesting to note that when you take the compatability of the X-Box 360 to HD DVD and PS3 to Blu Ray into consideration the data shows that HD DVD players actually did outsell Blu Ray players by a significant amount. This tells me that the decision to discontinue the HD DVD production was a choice made with emphasis on quality rather than quantity. I would assume that Toshiba realized that despite selling more total units than Sony the problem lied in the sale of the actual disc sales. HD DVD's were not selling. I think this has a large part to do with the fact that people were not buying X Box 360 to watch an HD DVD, they were buying it for the game play alone. Sony on the other hand had people buying the PS3 for its high tech Blu Ray player along with game play aspect as well.

Toshiba's decision to discontinue the HD DVD player does not exactly guarantee success for Sony's Blu Ray. With Comcast and Verizon's continuous improvement on internet speed and cable television sales Blu Ray will likely be in for some trouble. Soon watching high resolution, high definition movies will require no more than changing the channel on the television or downloading a movie onto your I Pod With the new XDock HD. People will not have to purchase the high price Blu Ray players and have to replace all of their old DVDs that are not compatible on the system. To combat this shift to downloadable movies X Box has plans to add a Netflix application to their system to allow users to retrieve any movie directly off their console.

The Playstation 3 itself will have to survive the drop in Blu Ray sales with their game play quality. X Box has proven it can do it and PS3 has some catching up to do. The good things about the PS3 are its strong network for live gameplay, backwards compatability with old playstation games, and third party support (which from what I've read will lead to more innovations). Along with this the PS3 is able to connect, without restriction, to the internet, which still makes it a tool to download movies without any need to add new applications. However, improvement in internet speed is necessary.