Sammy and LG not so keen on Blu's future?

[allargon]

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Samsung and LG Cautious About The Blu
March 25, 2008

Samsung, who always seemed like a big Blu advocate with the first player to market, seems to be scaling back on the rah-rah about the format. At least, according to this Korea Times article. In the story, Samsung execs say they won't be spending a lot of additional money on the format, even as Blu arguably still needs pushing to reach mainstream status.
Likewise, LG is going slowly on the Blu front, as consumers are showing some resistance to the format's relatively high pricing.
Samsung cites fears of generating few profits if it puts too much of its resources into ramping up what is now a nascent Blu business.
Although this seems like a knock on Blu, part of me wonders if these companies aren't just doing some venting over stiff competition from Sony. To date, Sony has basically owned the Blu-ray hardware market with sales of both its PS3s and BD set-tops.
Also, Samsung has been one of bigger set-top discounters, offering its BD player for sub $300 pricing over the holidays. The company could be angry that those efforts still weren't enough to catch Sony.

IMHO, Samsung has only itself to blame. Relatively inexpensive or not, the Sammy players are just too damned flakey with discs. The Sony BDP-S300 may be slow, but at least it plays discs.

 

[teachsac]

Like my rep told me:

"We'll probably come out with another BD player, but ..........."

S~

 

[Chucky Cheese]

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IMHO, Samsung has only itself to blame. Relatively inexpensive or not, the Sammy players are just too damned flakey with discs. The Sony BDP-S300 may be slow, but at least it plays discs.

Got that right. That's why I never bought the Samsung. I have the BDP-301 and my only complaint is the slow boot up time. I've never had a problem playing a disk.

 

[stonecold]

I think that part of it has to do with blu ray screwed up with this profile crap. My uncle got screwed with a 1.0 player and got mad when some movie that had a 1.1 all he could do was play the movie some feature the disc had he wanted to play with was not available do to his player not being 1.1. Now most of my family knows about it and I talked to friends and they have realitives who dont know the difference between 1.0 /1.1/2.0 but know that some players as they say "dont work" with newer disc. Though really you can still play the movie. They probably should of had 2.0 features out when 1.0 players were released as all this has done is make some early adopters mad who talk to there friends and family and then there jaded about the whole thing.

 

[gadgtfreek]

I wont miss either, my BD30 does a great job along with the PS3 and Sony players.

 

[nonrev]

I wont miss either, my BD30 does a great job along with the PS3 and Sony players.

Your missing the point.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Your missing the point.

Not really, its like mitsubishi and mazda saying they were going to quit making cars....WHO CARES.

The point I see is some of you guys grasp onto every neg you can to think BD will fail. Go back and read every post we've argued with you about since Summer '07, youll see. Where are we at now? Get over it, enjoy the movies, BD is here to stay until flash media is cheaper, AND/OR downloads are feasible(think the latter is a long shot)


I wish I had the time to sit around and look for every negative article I could find, then worry about it.

BTW, Panasonic aint doing bad at BD, because they actually make players that are reliable. Poor, poor Sammy wishes they could say the same.

 

[nonrev]

Not really, its like mitsubishi and mazda saying they were going to quit making cars....WHO CARES.

The point I see is some of you guys grasp onto every neg you can to think BD will fail. Go back and read every post we've argued with you about since Summer '07, youll see. Where are we at now? Get over it, enjoy the movies, BD is here to stay until flash media is cheaper, AND/OR downloads are feasible(think the latter is a long shot)


I wish I had the time to sit around and look for every negative article I could find, then worry about it.

BTW, Panasonic aint doing bad at BD, because they actually make players that are reliable. Poor, poor Sammy wishes they could say the same.

Does Panasonic even have 50,000 players sold?

 

[dlsnyder]

How about the combo players from LG? Are they going to keep producing those for awhile? There may yet be life in HD DVD if those players keep selling. Seems like the studios may have pulled the plug too soon.

 

[BobMurdoch]

I bought the Samsung Duo. It lets me keep playing my HD DVDs I already own, but opens me up to the new disks. It was overpriced, but I didn't want to rely on my XBox 360 drive to play movies on as it will probably get replace with the XBox, um, 720 in two years....

Hopefully this player will last as long as most of my other components and keep working for 10 years..... Heck, I still play laserdiscs on my combo DVD/Laserdisc player I bought in 1998 when Laserdisc was where HD DVD is now..... I don't play DVDs on that player anymore to try and nurse it along to play those old LDs every now and then.......

 

[allargon]

I would've bought the LG, personally. Samsung's Blu-Ray players have too many compatibility problems. Moreover, Samsung doesn't seem to keen on fixing their bugs unlike LG .

 

[BobMurdoch]

I refuse to buy anything by LG. It is the same company that used be called Goldstar. It will be several years before I trust them to make anything reliable on a long term basis.

Also, their first generation dual player charged $1200 and didn't even comply with the standard (and therefore couldn't even have the logo on it).

Meanwhile the Samsung has been well behaved, I've had two firmware updates already over the ethernet connection (The only downside is that it keeps resetting my audio to PCM afterwards.... not terrible, but annoying...).

It's played every HD DVD I've put into it without issue (up to dozens now). I've only played three BluRays on it so far, but none of them have flaked either.....

 

[JoeSp]

I have said this before -- Samsung makes great tvs (I own the 4068ltn led backlit lcd) but when it comes to DVD players and now BD players they just can't seem to get it right. I do not know why? I believe that they just can't seem to stick with the rules and are always trying to skirt some issues and always get caught. I owned the 941 upconverting player and it crushed blacks and whites worse then the PS2! That was the last Samsung player I owned.

 

[nonrev]

I have said this before -- Samsung makes great tvs (I own the 4068ltn led backlit lcd) but when it comes to DVD players and now BD players they just can't seem to get it right. I do not know why? I believe that they just can't seem to stick with the rules and are always trying to skirt some issues and always get caught. I owned the 941 upconverting player and it crushed blacks and whites worse then the PS2! That was the last Samsung player I owned.

Your missing the main point on the thread, which is the collapsing support for BD among the manufacturers. I guess they are one by one seeing that it’ll never be more then a niche format and its not worth it. Why else would the truest and first manufacturer start to pull the plug?

 

[db2]

I can't believe how many people are still hoping and praying for Blu-Ray to fail. Move on for goodness sake.

If you hate Blu-Ray and will never buy a disc or player that's fine but rooting for BD to fail out of spite and sour grapes seems a bit childish.

At this point the only remaining parts of the "war" are fueled by 1) people who spent money on HD-DVD and are ticked 2) people who thought HD-DVD would win and can't admit they were wrong and 3) people who spent money on HD-DVD, thought HD-DVD would win, can't admit they were wrong and are ticked.

 

[navychop]

Yep. And they see no connection between their being wrong about HD DVD and their current predictions about Blu-ray. Can't separate their emotions from objective thought- just confusing the two.

Their audience is dwindling. Notice how traffic in this "zone" has declined so much? Fewer people care to read their nonsense. And perhaps more of us have decided to use the ignore list.

This "zone" for me, serves as a place to track the final demise. After that, the Blu-ray forum will serve to track BD vs standard DVD.

Some people's fantasies that BD will only succeed if they "destroy" DVD are just that. BD will do just fine alongside DVD. Eventually, they may outsell DVD. But there is certainly no need to drive DVD off the market. When I can buy the movies I want in BD, I'm happy. And more are available each day. Heck, I just learned today that Battle of Britain is coming out in June. Not a very popular title, but certainly one that I want.

 

[nonrev]

I can't believe how many people are still hoping and praying for Blu-Ray to fail. Move on for goodness sake.

If you hate Blu-Ray and will never buy a disc or player that's fine but rooting for BD to fail out of spite and sour grapes seems a bit childish.

At this point the only remaining parts of the "war" are fueled by 1) people who spent money on HD-DVD and are ticked 2) people who thought HD-DVD would win and can't admit they were wrong and 3) people who spent money on HD-DVD, thought HD-DVD would win, can't admit they were wrong and are ticked.

Is it a crime to point out a flaw? Is pointing out a flaw “hoping and praying” for something to fail? IcePup just posted a thread in the BD cheer zone that said BD was now 20%. When this was questioned he started crying that we should take it to the warzone. This BD defensiveness has got to stop and let this be a free forum where no one is scared to post without fear of being attacked for pointing out a flaw or concern.

 

[JoeSp]

Your missing the main point on the thread, which is the collapsing support for BD among the manufacturers. I guess they are one by one seeing that it’ll never be more then a niche format and its not worth it. Why else would the truest and first manufacturer start to pull the plug?

What collapsing support? Every manufacturer has new models coming out for the fall -- EVERYONE OF THEM including Toshiba! How do you see this as collapsing support? Heck 2.0 is not even out fully you just have two titles and only the PS3 to try it out and folks are complaining that it is not up to speed. If you are that fickled (lookit up) that you cannot at least wait 90 days to see if both the manufacturers and the studios can flesh 2.0 out before you condemm then maybe you better keep your money in your wallet. Early adopters don't whine this much! They make suggestions but they just don't cry as much as I am seeing. Toshiba sure did screw up the market by selling product so low that it allowed non-early addopters to get into a game they were not ready for! In the early adoption phase there are alot of changes and product is not inexpensive to own or operate. Toshiba and the HD-DVD group tried to circumvent the normal timeline for introduction of new product to the market and acceptance and they just about lost their shirts doing it. This is not how new technology is delivered for public consumption. You guys need to take a breath and wait a few months, I don't believe the BDA will disappoint you. If you are still spoiling over the loss of HD-DVD -- well then nothing will console you -- sorry.

 

[db2]

Is it a crime to point out a flaw? Is pointing out a flaw “hoping and praying” for something to fail? This BD defensiveness has got to stop and let this be a free forum where no one is scared to post without fear of being attacked for pointing out a flaw or concern.

This is the War Zone. The OP posted part of an article and gave his opinion on it. The rest of us gave our opinions. We are all free to disagree with each other here.

 

[nonrev]

What collapsing support? Every manufacturer has new models coming out for the fall -- EVERYONE OF THEM including Toshiba! How do you see this as collapsing support? Heck 2.0 is not even out fully you just have two titles and only the PS3 to try it out and folks are complaining that it is not up to speed. If you are that fickled (lookit up) that you cannot at least wait 90 days to see if both the manufacturers and the studios can flesh 2.0 out before you condemm then maybe you better keep your money in your wallet. Early adopters don't whine this much! They make suggestions but they just don't cry as much as I am seeing. Toshiba sure did screw up the market by selling product so low that it allowed non-early addopters to get into a game they were not ready for! In the early adoption phase there are alot of changes and product is not inexpensive to own or operate. Toshiba and the HD-DVD group tried to circumvent the normal timeline for introduction of new product to the market and acceptance and they just about lost their shirts doing it. This is not how new technology is delivered for public consumption. You guys need to take a breath and wait a few months, I don't believe the BDA will disappoint you. If you are still spoiling over the loss of HD-DVD -- well then nothing will console you -- sorry.

I’m not going to argue your new technology early adapter timeline, but why was Toshiba able to get so much right from day one? I will give them a failing grade for not having deep pockets to wheel and deal behind the scenes. You always seem remember that Toshiba lost its shirt, but you also always seem forget that Sony also lost its shirt during the war, cutting prices making it hard for other manufacturers(Sammy and LG) to stay in the BD business. Its not relevant what rules Toshiba may or may not have broken in regards to early adoption. We’re here today dealings with today’s issues and the article speaks for itself. Its hard for other manufacturers to compete with Sony’s(patent holder) undercutting of prices.