All was relatively quiet in the world of technology until the summer of 05 when there was a demand that the world uses a uniform video format and that event even though not the first occurrence marked the beginning of the war between the HD-DVD and the Blu-ray. HD-DVD during the entire combat found a timing advantage despite delaying the release of the HD-DVD more than a year of the date it had announced, when the technology came out on April 18th, 2006. The reviews were generally above satisfactory, but the viewer’s felt that the hardware still had a few imperfections. The technology was however updated not very long after. Blu-ray finally stepped into the ring in June of 2006 with the release of the Samsung PD-1000, but Blu-ray was taking more than a few complaints about the film quality and ended up replacing a few of the sold films. The first Blu-ray player sadly also incorporated a bug with noise cancelation and these imperfections meant that the HD-DVD was leading the market.
Following all of these developments, HD-DVD came out with PS3 and the Xbox 360 and the Blu-ray presented the PlayStation 3 to the viewers. Despite the fact that the PlayStation 3 was being sold crazy expensive, the performance of the technology was by far the best. In the end, Blu-ray took the market by five to one. The success of the PlayStation 3 was a huge reason why in November, the Blu-ray was finally taking the lead. By the end of 2006, both the formats were fighting eye to eye and by the start of 2007, Blu-ray was leading the market with its Blu-ray player. Then in the fall of 2007, Paramount and DreamWorks broadcasted that their movies would no longer be released on Blu-ray. Paramount was the company at the time that HD-DVD’s Toshiba rode to glory when Transformers was not released on Blu-ray and the movie set high
sales records. Then both the versions had a face-off when one of the Warner’s titles was released on Blu-ray as well as the DVD and this time, Blu-ray was winning the market. Following this particular success, Warner bros made the decision that it would only release its titles in Blu-ray, and the announcement marked the victory of the Blu-ray.
Toshiba is the company that had released and run the market of the HD-DVD at the start of the 21st century. It is a Japanese company of computers with headquarters in Tokyo. The company was built from the ground up in the year 1939, and it started off under the name ‘Tokyo Shibaura Electric Company Ltd’. The company’s current name ‘Toshiba’ came from a merger between ‘Shaibura Engineering works Ltd’ and the ‘Tokyo Electric Company, Ltd’. The company was originally incorporated with the objective of manufacturing of engines of ocean vessels. It then went ahead to engage in the production of high-horse power steam engines and during the 1980’s the company turned towards the manufacturing of machine tools.
In corroboration with the Sony Corporation and another American firm, the International Business Machines Corporation came up with the Cell Broadband engine, a computer chip that is being used in multi operations from the Toshiba television to the Sony PlayStation 3. Based on the same cell processor, the company also introduces a range of laptops in the year 2008. During the present day, the company engages in the production of a variety of electronic products including HD Television sets, DVD players, Video recorder, printers, and photocopiers. Even after being defeated in the DVD and the Blu-Ray war, the company still hasn’t lost its charm.
The Sony Company was and still remains the mastermind behind the production and the success of the Blu-ray technology. Sony is one of the best-known companies in consumer electronics and holds only the second ranking throughout the world behind Matsushita Electric Corporation. The company was established not very long after the Second World War and since then, it has come out with some pretty remarkable innovations starting from the transistor radio and ending today at the Blu-ray technology. The company today engages in the production of many types of electronics including televisions, video products, personal computers, monitors and also a number of telecommunication devices. Today, the Sony Company is competing in the market with some pretty big names including Motorola, Toshiba, Dell Computer Corporation and the Microsoft Corporation.
All through the war, both the technologies were in some pretty tough competition with one another, and this is because each one of them had a few benefits over the other. The Blu-ray in the same consequence has a few benefits over the DVD, and the first of them is capacity. Because the Blu-ray makes use of a lens with a bigger Numerical Aperture compared to the DVD, it can hold greater data on the same size of the disc. So where the Blu-ray holds 25GB per layer, the HD-DVD can only hold 15GB per layer. The second strong point of Blu-ray is the content that it has to present to the audience. This is because Blu-ray has been successful in securing support from some pretty major movie studios when compared to the DVD. The third benefit is the hardware support. The Blue ray has support from a few of the world’s leading electronic and multimedia manufacturers and this quality has always given it an edge in the
market. In consequence, the Hardware of the Blu-ray players is superior to those of the DVD-payers.
Discussing the case in reverse, we can also point out a few benefits that the HD-DVD has over Blu-ray. One of these benefits is that the HD-DVD could be available to users for lower prices for the technology could be manufactured using the DVD plants that were already installed. The main drawback that the HD-DVD suffered through was the content and at that point in the battle, the HD-DVD struck out.
While the two technologies have very less in common with one another when it comes to technical differences, it is very easy to see how they differ. Amongst the very few similarities are the laser wavelength which stands at 405 nm for both, the Mandatory video codec which is MPEG 4, VC 1 and MPEG-2, the Linear PCM audio codec is Mandatory for both technologies, and finally, the HD-Master codec is an option for both the technologies.
Amongst the differences first and foremost is the disk capacity. Blu-ray has the ability to pack a lot more on the same disk size when compared to the HD-DVD. The HD-DVD disks also have greater surface layer specifically 0.6mm thick as opposed to Blu-ray, which uses the surface thickness of 0.1mm with a 0.85 aperture. This is one reason why the blu-ray technology is more costly.
List of References
Diffen. (n.d.). Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD. Retrieved February 19, 2016, from Diffen: http://www.diffen.com/difference/Blu-ray_vs_HD_DVD
Drawbaugh, B. (2008, February 20). Two years of battle between HD DVD and Blu-ray: a retrospective. Retrieved from Engadget: http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/20/two-years-of-battle-between-hd-dvd-and-blu-ray-a-retrospective/
Encyclopedia Britannica. (n.d.). Toshiba Corporation. Retrieved February 19, 2016, from Encyclopedia Britannica: http://www.britannica.com/topic/Toshiba-Corporation
Open Cloner. (n.d.). What benefits does Blu-ray offer compared to HD-DVD? Retrieved February 19, 2016, from Open Cloner: https://www.dvd-cloner.com/dvd-cloner/articles/what-benefits-does-blu-ray-offer-compared-to-hd-dvd.html
Rawyer, R. (2014, July 06). Format Wars: Blu-ray vs. HD DVD. Retrieved from Engadget: http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/07/format-wars-blu-ray-vs-hd-dvd/
Reference for Business. (n.d.). Sony Corporation - Company Profile, Information, Business Description, History, Background Information on Sony Corporation. Retrieved February 19, 2016, from Reference for Business: http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/history2/61/Sony-Corporation.html
