Blu-Ray Drives for PCs Bombing

[Clintonio]

I've not moved to blu-ray because I'm moving to Digital Distribution by internet only. No more stupid disk media. And I mean that entirely, even the hard disk, when I can afford to replace that with a solid state.

I might get one for burning the occasional high-density data disk, but that doesn't justify their cost.

 

[timbozero]

BluRay for PCs hasn't taken off because the media is too expensive and most PC users that are interested in mass storage will use a portable HDD for data. Add to this that most PC users now realise that movies of near BluRay quality can be fitted onto a regular DVD9 disc using the MKV or HD-WMV codecs and you see why adoption to a pointless format is so low.

 

[jawshoeaw]

$90 player, $50 to upgrade software at least. Mess with HDCP, windows, sound problems, etc., etc. $150 for OK, $200 for good standalone Blu-Ray player. Hmmm. I have an HTPC and I'm seriously considering just buying a standalone. Less hassle, my wife can figure out how to use it.

Real problem is that DVDs just look to good when you finally see them on a set capable of displaying 480P. We've been watching movies for years on sub 30" displays with maybe 400 lines. The first time I watched a DVD on my 720P projector I was blown away. It look amazing, and 5.1 sound kicks ass. How much better is Dolby True HD or whatever? I'm sure it sounds amazing but the jump is smaller in my opinion. 23" TV went to 100" and one speaker went to six including sub. With Blu-Ray my image is still 100" but will be native 720P or better. yawn. I've watched 720P trailers and ATSC TV. Looks good, a little better than upscaled DVD, but who's thinking about that in the middle of soom cool movie? I'm not spending hundreds on new sound equipment so my sound will still be 5.1. But clearer 5.1? Or sharper or my "dynamic" or something? Probably not, unless I upgrade my sound.

OK, truth: If I had the dough, I'd of course upgrade to Blu-Ray. But even if I had the money, I don't know that I'd change to 7.1 amp or even 5.1 that supports all the new audio.

 

[dimar]

I've been using BD-Rs since last year with my LG 6x burner, with the HD camcorder. The main issue is, I have to order the blank disks from Japan through eBay. Here is Montreal, I could only find 2x BD-R and twice expensive than 4x/6x media from Japan.

 

[techguy911]

Lets see where i live 1 blank blu-ray = $20
1 blank dvr-r = $0.20

that is 100x more

blu-ray pc player here is $190
dvd-rw here is $30
blu-ray burner is $299
Ps3 here is $299

Why would i want to spend 100x more for media when dvd's do the job for 100x less money?.

 

[ricdiculus]

BluRay discs only make sense for HD media at this time. The storage aspect is pointless, when you can get a 1tb external usb drive for $120. So no one in there right mind is going to replace a dvd(or even a CD) burner with blue ray. However, for those of us with decent vision, and the proper display, once you've seen true hd, 480p(dvd) resolution seems out of focus, soft, lacking any fine detail. Granted, if your just gonna watch on a laptop bluray looses most of its appeal. Once screen size goes over say 32" the improvement is dramatic. Regular data storage - External HDD. HD movie playback - BluRay all the way.

 

[pochacco007]

[citation][nom]caskachan[/nom]500 gb hdd = 49$1000gb hdd = 130$20 X 25gb blue ray disks = 200$ (@ 8bucks, most places have them at 10-13)cheap ass burner = 100$ (Lite On iHES208-08 Blu-ray Burner)how much Data do you need to "burn"(BACKUP) yeah thats the reason[/citation]

this is the reason why.

hard drives have become a very stable form of storage on the pc. the cost of an external 3.5" drive is about the same price as a blu-ray drive. what's even better with hard drives and the blu ray drive is that you don't need to buy discs to burn anything as they're stored in the hard drive.

you can even get a portable 2.5" 500gb hard drive for $100 or less, which still beats having a bluray drive.

bluray is trying to be a better technology of dvd and it's overshooting what people can understand of it.

 

[truerock]

A 1TB HDD costs $100 and gives you storage at 10 cents a gigabyte. A BD-R cost $4 (or more) and gets you 25 gigabytes at 16 cents per gigabyte. Only a total frigin moron would put BluRay on their PC.

 

[aaron216]

Blue ray read only drives are fairly cheap but purchasing the software necessary to play the movie along with it is not. Also if you read the reviews on many of these "budget" blue ray drives lots of people are very unsatisfied with the quality of the drive as many seem to go defective after a few months.

 

[fogartini]

[citation][nom]Nick_C[/nom]Until BD-R discs are more cost effective than HDDs (and I don't think that that will happen any time soon with the advent of 2TB and 2.5TB hard drives and ever decreasing costs per GB) I don't see the general population buying BD-Writers.Me - I'll stick to large HDDs.[/citation]

Yah I too bought a Blu Ray player about a year ago and the version of Power DVD that came with it was the single most frustrating program I've ever tried to use and I say "try" because I've still never been able to get it to function properly...... Fix the software and I will buy the drive

 

[steiner666]

by the time games and the average user need removable media with this much capactiy, there will be a better option available. bluray is too expensive, and everyone realizes this.

 

[blackbyron]

[citation][nom]Zirbmonkey[/nom]I bought a Blu-Ray drive for my computer, grabbed the transformers movie to watch, and then I tried playing my movie on my computer ...World of hurt!Apparently there are only a handful of programs on the market that allow Blu-Ray discs to be watched on a PC-Theater system. Instead of paying $200 for a program I knew nothing about, I found a cracked version of Cyberlink DVD. Sure, the picture is in 1080p, but the frames skip every 30 seconds. I do not have a slow system, and had freshly installed windows twice to try to fix it. I only bothered with the Blu-Ray because I wanted a flawless picture... which doesn't exist on a PC. I was too annoyed by the constant frame skipping to enjoy the movie.Fix DRM (which means get rid of it) and then people will buy Blu-rays. As long as PC drives require $200 software that doesn't work I don't see why people would bother to buy a drive in the first place.[/citation]
Agreed, epic fail

 

[truerock]

The diference between VHS tape and S-VHS tape was very noticeable. The difference between S-VHS tape and the newest high-quality DVDs is very noticible.

I see only a small difference between DVD and BD. Perhaps my 42" plasma just doen't do BD justice?

 

[ravenware]

[citation][nom]demonhorde665[/nom]no the truth of teh matter is , poeplesuch as myself don't feel compelled tio get blue ray on acomputer for mltiple reasons 1. external hard drives have gotten extrememly cheap ( particularly models that are 160 gig down to 80 gig, both sizes vastly larger than a blu ray disk size) so as a data storage device they are sort of antiquated in the limited space they hold. 2. there is no need for blu ray media on computer , TV's do this job fine aside from laptops there is no compelllignr eason to see blue ray media on comps , games scertaly don't require work apps all fit nicely on dvd's 3. dvd's took for ever before they became main stay on comps , hell not just two years ago most software was stil being released on cd for comps (this relates to statment 2 btw)4. the last reason that many pc users dont feel love for blu ray, the format is largly owned by sony adn sony alone , real techies (aka lotta pc users , don't like the idea of any company owning to much of any thing (look how much every one loves to bash MS )[/citation]

Holly shit. I thought my typing was bad.

 

[Guest]

It's largely a matter of WHY would you use the media? DVDs never replaced CDs (how about using music DVDs? or sharing presentations and documents on DVDs? people still use CD's for these), DVD's just found another niche (movies, games, some file backups).

BluRay has some major benefits in quality over other formats no doubt, but they don't translate into huge (sell-able) benefits to the consumer. Even at the same price as DVD's, they wouldn't replace DVD's.

You know what will replace DVD's?
The internet. Downloading movies to your computer is already becoming a simple reality to a lot of people. streaming movies of decent quality is also a simple reality (hulu, netflix, many others). 25Gb files don't do so well for this, but that will probably be the one niche that keeps BluRay from dying completely.