DVD - The Next Generation

There is currently a war being fought between two cartels of electrical manufacturers. Giants line up on each side as the battle is waged - in the most civilised way, naturally - for the future of Digital Versatile Discs. DVDs are probably the single biggest format success in the last twenty years and have driven VHS to the brink of extinction in only five years. Unlike vinyl - which was soundly defeated by CDs but retained a loyal following nevertheless - video cassettes will be mourned by almost no one. From a handful of titles that could be played on five-hundred pound machines in 1999 to thirty thousand titles being played on twenty-pound machines in 2005, the rise of DVDs has been a testament to their all-round superiority. But the industry which created DVDs hasn't sat back and been content to reap the rewards. Recordable DVDs arrived two or three years ago and have been a moderate success. Problems with three different recording formats have ensured that take-up has been slow. That and the prices stubbornly refusing to fall to VCR levels. But all that is as nought compared to the problems to come. DVDs are going to change in the next year or two and the question everyone else is asking is "which format will win?" I'm going to ask a different question - "will either format succeed?"

There is no point going over the specific differences between Blu-Ray and HD-DVD - they both use a blue laser instead of a red one and this means more info can be packed onto each disc. The capacity of a current DVD (two layered) is roughly nine and a half gigabytes, a blue ray disc will hold between thirty and fifty gigabytes. They will look the same as a current DVD or CD and will operate in the same way. The only differences will be that either more will be on the disc or that the picture quality will be better. Ok, those sound like significant advantages but are they enough to prompt another living room revolution?

There are an awful lot of people out there in consumer land. An obvious statement but a true one nevertheless. An awful lot of people who don't follow what, for want of a better phrase, I'll call the technical press. They didn't rush out to buy a DVD player simply because a few people said how great they were. They probably didn't even notice the tiny DVD section in HMV. Maybe they heard "DVD" mentioned in passing but dismissed it as a fad - laser disc II - and got on with buying videos. You can't blame them - it is a tiny minority who care more about the player than they do about what is being played.

The list of failed formats is long and interesting. Between the two successes of the last couple of decades - the CD and the DVD - we've seen the following (and no doubt plenty of others) fall by the wayside.

Laser disc

Mini disc

DAT

SCD

SVHS

DVD-A

Hybrid DVD/CDs

TiVo

Superbit DVD (not actually a separate format but releases of movies with the maximum bitrate at the expense of extra features)

All of the above offered benefits over the existing technology. All of the above failed to get beyond enthusiasts and professionals. The benefits to them were obvious. The benefits to the consumer were non-existent. They saw only the need for new equipment, a very limited range and/or high prices.

The advocates of DVD-TNG (as I shall call the combined technology of blu-ray and HD-DVD) proclaim the increased capacity as the big selling point but will it work? Of course it would be nice to have a whole season of Buffy on a single disc but that disc would cost more or less the same as the current six-disc boxed set. DVDs cost practically nothing to produce - the costs are in rights fees and extra features. Pence would be saved only using one disc instead of half a dozen. Would the general public pay fifty pounds for one DVD? The studios already know that two-disc versions are required to charge £25 even if all the content could've fitted on a single DVD. Perception is very important - that's why boxed sets are so popular - they give the impression of better value for money. People will, it seems, pay more to appear to get more. Paradoxically, the smaller capacity of HD-DVD may work in its favour as full season sets would still require two discs and in our minds two discs = better value.

So why do the manufacturers want to introduce a new format? There are many reasons - the public buying a whole new machine, the excuse to re-release titles on the new format, providing synergy with the push for high definition television sets. A less obvious reason may be connected with the recent EU copyright declaration. Under EU law it is now illegal to bypass any control mechanisms put in place by a producer. This could well include the hated region coding which splits the world into six different markets. Europe is the major zone for DVD player modification because the Americans don't really care what is available in other regions, the far-east pirates anything and everything so importing isn't an issue, Australia has too small a population to be a factor - only Europe imports huge quantities of DVDs. It is probably illegal to chip a DVD player now. But with so many modified players out there it would be impossible for a court to realistically rule against a company which chipped players. But this new generation of DVDs might have a different system of control. One which, like the Playstation region coding, could be enforced from day one. By introducing a new region coding system and giving it a different name they would, in the eyes of the law, be pressing the reset button.

They obviously think the price is worth paying to press that button. Major titles are still being released on VHS six years into the DVD era. Think a similar time frame for producing both DVD and DVD-TNG versions of the same titles. Will the public be able to tell them apart? Will they even understand the difference? Will stores really relish the prospect of confused customers, endless refunds and their limited shelf space being taken up by what will certainly start out as a niche product? The home DVD market isn't like the Playstation market where the latest machines fly off the shelves and those owning them instinctively know the difference between a PSone and PS2 game. All of the above will be considerably worse if there are two incompatible formats in the market place.

My hope is that they come to an agreement and launch a single format. Then they bypass the player stage and from day one bring out recordable machines. Currently, DVD players and DVD recorders are seen as separate beasts. I know I don't usually watch DVDs on my DVD recorder. If they made the effort to launch machines which could record 50Gb on a disc, which played everything, which had a built in hard drive, which didn't have any region coding nonsense and which gave playback performance equal to a decent DVD player then I'd certainly buy it. If they could pack all of the above into something that cost £200 then it would reach the tipping point reasonably quickly.

If "being better" alone was the guarantee of success then TiVo would've been welcomed into every home in the land.