Analyst: Blu-ray still has a long road ahead despite winning the war

Posted Apr 24, 2008 at 8:18AM by QJ Staff Listed in: PS3 Tags: ABI Research, Sony
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Sony Blu-ray player - Image 1The war may be over, but it seems that Sony still has a lot of rebuilding on its hands before it can safely establish the Blu-ray player into a comfortable market. New market data from ABI Research pointed out that Blu-ray still faces many challenges ahead.

According to principal analyst Steve Wilson, a lot of people are generally satisfied with the quality of their conventional DVD players when "upconverted" to play on HD TVs. There has also been an increase in DVD players with built-in upconverters lately to reflect this fact.

While future projections see the increase of more DVDs with upconversion, the current state of the Blu-ray player market isn't very encouraging. Aside from PlayStation 3, the installed user base for Blu-ray players is quite weak. Wilson mentioned that "the dedicated consumer electronics and PC-based types of Blu-ray players wonÂ’t catch up in terms of market share until about 2013".

Prices for both PCs with Blu-ray players have been lowered across the board lately in an effort to spur the market. However, Wilson explained that this sort of configuration was rather skewed considering the Blu-ray player costs nearly half the price of the actual PC.

He concluded that many studios were rather disappointed that the volume of Blu-ray players still hasn't increased ever since it won the format wars. While consumer electronics manufacturers maintain the high prices for their dedicated players, it may take quite a while before this may actually happen.

 
 
 

Comments [refresh]

by ISOHaven - 2008-04-24 06:10
» WTF!?!?!?!?!

"According to principal analyst Steve Wilson"



You can stop reading after hitting the word analyst! The rest is nothing but BS.



These analysts are ignorant in the ways of technology.



For example:



1. Who was surveyed? People with smaller screens then larger screens?



2. Now that the PS3 is going to get more HD Audio options, a very large number of people who have been waiting for a more expensive BR player are now going to jump on the PS3.



........... These analysts are such a waste of time!

by RexNox - 2008-04-24 07:25
» I don't think sony looked close enough...

into customer needs. I agree with the picture quality issue. However, knowing this...I would have offered DVD quality box sets on one disc and capturing the HD market at the same time. Sure, people would have been confused, but then again, average Joe can't tell the difference.

by platon - 2008-04-24 09:33
» dah!

It's not because there is no competition that everybody have a BD player :S. But it's the biggest step to kill the competition. Now it's not going to be really long before it wins. Just like the dvd format, that slowly killed the tapes, lol.

by damonous - 2008-04-24 09:55
» Exactly.

"He concluded that many studios were rather disappointed that the volume of Blu-ray players still hasn't increased ever since it won the format wars." .......That would be almost exactly TWO MONTHS ago. (And it's only been a couple weeks since most retailers in my area have extinguished the last vestiges of HD-DVD from the shelves.) Not to mention that Warner Bros is still obligated to produce HD-DVD's until the end of MAY. .....The analyst's very premature "conclusion" that studios are so impatient that they're already smelling a problem, is probably just evidence of that analyst fulfilling a late-received paycheck from Toshiba.

by Datnizzle - 2008-04-24 10:05
» People have to catch up...

To the tech. Not everyone has an HDTV. A blu-ray player is pretty useless without one. Sales will pick up in the US after FEB. 19th, That's when our TV stations switch to digital. I think the # of HDTV sold will explode around that time.

by ISOHaven - 2008-04-24 10:27
» WTF!?!?!?!?!

"that analyst fulfilling a late-received paycheck from Toshiba."



HAHA!!!

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