I’m not sure why I’m resisting the switch to Blu-ray. I have an HDTV, and my DVD player is on the verge of crapping out, so, technically, I could upgrade to a machine that handles both formats with little to no guilt. I guess it’s because I feel like it’s being forced on me. I get press release after press release announcing the titles hitting Blu-ray, as though it’s just assumed that I have one.
Today, my battle came to a head in a Blockbuster store. I had to go rent five Matthew McConaughey movies (don’t ask) and because the store had to display all of its Blu-ray titles prettily, the older films on DVD were now just stacked in horizontal piles on the shelves. The alphabetization was so bad that I actually decided to accept a salesman’s offer to help look for my five Matthew McConaughey movies. He told me that it was his second day on the job, which, I’m assuming, is why he didn’t feel comfortable enough to harass me about my picks. Netflix has never looked so good.
Is your Blockbuster or local video store all Blu-ray’d out? Have you made the switch? If not, what’s stopping you? (I think part of my problem is also that even though the machines are dual compatible now, one day, they won’t be. I don’t want to sit and look longingly at my Kids in the Hall boxed set like I do at the VHS copy of the 1986 movie Separate Vacations that I bought even though I don’t actually own a working VCR.)
Netflix actually started charging more for Blu-Ray discs, and they’ve upped the price twice now in the past 6 months. We’ve lost the ability to play the newer Blu-Ray releases because of some “software” issue – you have to download updates to your player somehow, but every time my husband does it, it doesn’t actually work. We kept sending Blu-Ray movies back, thinking there was something wrong with the movies. We have a player that plays both formats, so if Blu-Ray is gonna be bitchy, we’ll just choose the other format. I figure this is just more “engineered obsolescence” to get us to buy another player, but since it’s just over a year old, there’s no way that’s happening. Blu-Ray is certainly nice, but not very user friendly.
Blue-Ray is way too expensive right now for me to switch, and yes it’ll be heartbreaking when current DVDs are eventually useless. Curse you, technology!
I know the reason I haven’t switched is because there will just be something else out after BlueRay. Im not one of those “anti-technology” people, but I can wait for the next upgrade.
Blu-Ray SUCKS. It’s hella overpriced, the technology is snail’s pace slow and extremely buggy. DVDs did not give us this many headaches (ever), and the players dropped down in price in less than a year. Why the heck are these worthless Blu-Ray players still selling for $300?
Blu-Ray is an absolutely pointless technology that feels to like the Sony Corporation’s middle finger to consumers to show us their resentment for the failure of Betamax and that awful PS3 video game system they also keep trying to screw consumers into buying.
Why would I want a blu-ray player when I own so many movies on dvd and now dvds cost 5 bucks at Walmart? Blu-ray costs 300 dollars and each movie 25 or more. Some ppl say you get what you pay for but what am I supposed to do with my dvd collection? Buy the blu-ray version? I think not. Money is tight now so I got to be smart with how I spend it.
u can still use dvds on a blu-ray player,PS3 is the wat to go
We love our blue-ray player. We finally have a way to max out our sound system and our 46″ TV. We have found we have richer sound and a clearer picture. We have found the CD’s a bit more then DVD’s but we are selective on what we buy. Also many stores have older movies on blue-ray under $20. I recommend moving to blue-ray if you have a TV that can play HDMI and has a decent surround sound system.
I recently caved and bought a stand alone Blu ray player for my family room. It will play both formats (and even upconverts older DVDs to higher resolution) so I don’t have to worry about playing the standard DVDs. My gripe ~ and reason I kinda wish I hadn’t gone Blu ray ~ is that the dang system takes so long to start up and the FF/RR commands are so herky-jerky. For instance, I’ve lost the ability to slo-mo through a scene frame by frame. Arghh. But I have to admit, Blu ray is one sweeeeet picture.
If you care about watching movies in HD, on your Hi-def TV-then and only then should you get blu-ray. It is far from a pointless technology. I like watching movies in the highest resolution available without going to the theater.
Until they make a Blu-Ray that can record DVDs and/or play Region 2 discs, then I’m happy with my DVD-R and my all-region player…
Skip the Blu-Ray altogether and just go completely digital. Invest in a storage device with a ton of memory and download everything. You’ll never get stuck with shelves of unwatchable content again.
WAY to expensive. In a year it’ll either be much cheaper or something new will come along. Yes, I still use my VCR daily…
All the bugs aren’t out yet – and technically your TV can’t handle the difference between Blu-ray and the newer regular DVDs anyway. Even the higher end High Def TVs do not display much difference yet. I would wait for the technologies to get more in-sync – and by then Blu-ray may have become Betamax. Not worth the money yet.
- DVDs will always play on Blu Ray Players, you will never have the same happen as did with VHS. Your current DVDs are good to go.
- Players will be $99 or less this year and Blu movies are as cheap as $10 or less. DVD movies (new) cost over $20 as well still. Compare apples to apples not bargin bin DVD vs new releases Blu.
This article as well as the comments made here are quite wrong about Blu Ray. So many are misinformed.
Several reasons I haven’t updated yet. One, I kept hearing there were new firmware releases coming, and some players didn’t have internet capability to get these updates. Two, while the cost of players has come down since HD-DVD died, it’s still pretty nuts, and disc costs are still higher. Third, I have a Mac, which doesn’t play Blu-Ray, and I’ve been encoding DVDs I want to own as well as getting downloadable content (I have a 2 TB drive for storing movies, etc), so I can’t do that. Finally, my DVD player is a 5-disc changer, which is real convenient for watching TV shows on DVD…I’m lazy, but it’s great for loading up for movie night.
I got one last November (or well, I got a PS3) and I love it. It makes the most use out of my 1080p, 120mhz 49″ tv. Planet Earth and Wall-E especially look amazing. My one complaint is that I noticed when up converting DVDs, there tends to be a green line on occasion that goes through the picture but it’s not that disruptive. So far though, we’ve only bought movies on Blu Ray that are worth the extra money for the better picture (Wall-E, Transformers, Planet Earth, Iron Man, etc.). I’m not about to drop that much money yet on stuff like romantic comedies.