New technology could nip DVD format war in the bud
The format war around next generation DVDs may be over before it has begun, thanks to a breakthrough from a British media technology company.
Britain-based New Medium Enterprises (NME) (NMEN.OB: Quote, Profile, Research) said on Tuesday it had solved a technical production problem that makes it possible to produce a cheap multiple-layer DVD disk containing one film in different, competing formats.
“Current technologies to create multiple layer disks mostly don’t work. We’ve created a technology for mass production of multiple layers that does not suffer from the well known problem of low yields,” said NME Chief Technology Officer Eugene Levich.
Wouldn’t discs containing multiple formats be expensive? Not just because of the production costs, but royalties would have to go to multiple consortiums.
FTA — “The production costs of a multi-layer DVD using the new NME technology are estimated to be around 9 cents, compared with the 6 cents for a standard single-layer play-back DVD”
But those production costs don’t include the fees to the consortiums. Right?
Can you imagine the MPAA sleazebags settling for less than double the price for two kinds of content?
I understood this to mean regular dvd format with many times the capacity. Who needs more formats?
Um…couldn’t they just make a drive/player that reads both formats? Reads DVDs and HD-DVDs and Blue-ray discs? Oh, and also CD’s?
Also, David you used “consortiums” when they’re really “cartels”.
Reading the entire article gives me hope.
Maybe they’ll make writable disks with dual formats! So I can write 45 GB on the Blue Ray layers and then continue writing 30 GB on the HD-DVD layers ending up with 75 GB total storage. And if they add a regular DVD on top we’re going all the way to 80.
Second multiformat story of the past weeks, a clear sign the whole thing is about to collapse. Get ready for online distribution.
A shame that it takes such sophisticated tech to overcome the idiocy of politics. Especially when the disc distribution model is heading for the tar pits.
Let me quote Dan Ramer from http://www.dvdfile.com:
“With HD DVD and DVD hybrids listing for $40, I can’t imagine the cost of these tri-format discs. Are we talking laserdisc territory? …. If you have a Blu-ray Disc player, you do not want to be forced to pay for an HD DVD copy of the same film. Or if you own an HD DVD player, you probably aren’t happy about being forced to pay for a DVD copy of the same film. So how do you expect to feel about having to buy all three formats when you want only one? Studios, are you reading? Let’s abandon the hybrid. Just produce the individual format discs and allow the market to decide the winner of the format war.”