i just heard today DVDs are out and something called BLU-RAY is now in?
i don't even know what BLU_RAY is.
i thought that was something you used to control you computer?

very confused
why would you not have DVDs?

the gray hair never bothered me, no, people telling me, oh your just getting old, no, thinking computers were just a fad, okay i missed that one, i can admit it, but man i am lost, BLU-RAY.
when did this all happen?

Relax...You are not as bass-ackwards as you think...

DVDs are still the real deal...what was dropped was the HD-DVD (hi definition) ,,,Blu Ray uses a purple laser (higher up in the spectrum, thus more information), and is reported to provide a much hihg capacity of digital data than the HD DVD...

But what the hell do I know? I still like VHS....

my wife said she had read that most stores were planning on dropping DVDs and moving only to the BLU-RAY?
so DVDs ( like what we get movies on ), are different then HD-DVDs?

The wife is back in school (her turn) and among ridiculously young people. So she heard one of the children say something months back that one of the formats would have to win. Why? Laserdisc didn't. DVD-A and DSD don't seem to be making headway. Hell, the popular news in the music format wars about a month ago was yet another mini-resurgence of vinyl. HD-DVD is Beta without VHS per se winning--it's a hybrid of Beta and Laserdisc. DVD will soldier on, as it's HD-DVD that is out.

What's it all mean? My worthless opinions: DVD is probably around until faster data transfer rates catch on, and higher-quality formats are probably the laser disc of today. CD's are vulnerable not to higher quality formats so much as to downloads and I gather full WAV's are starting to hit as a download format. LP's are interesting because there is something to the physical medium that is not readily equaled in a download format.

Bear

I hate to say it but HD-DVD appeared way cooler and more advanced other than storage space. The powers that be did not promote the coolness of HD-DVD's features and Blu Rays lack of them other than just more storage. As with VHS and Betamax, the poorer format wins again.

sorry to bring up an old thread.
the difference between this war and the beta/vhs war is that beta was sony's baby and lost (at least on the consumer market, pro video production still loves beta) and this time blu-ray, sony's thing won. (go sony!) about time they come up with a winner. beta was better than vhs, a-trac was better than mp3, sony lost due mainly to limiting content, now that they own like a third of the movie industry they came up with a winner. BTW blu-ray has more potential than hd-dvd did, and hd-dvd still had more features at the time but blu-ray is being upgraded piece meal style and will be better than hd-dvd in features. the video and sound quality are equal for both. now without any perceived competition blu-ray prices have gone up and are really too expensive. the thing is upscaled dvd looks dang close to hd, and it's hard to justify the cost, and legal hd downloads are on the brink of exploding and blu-ray may never take off. dvd will be around for a long while, trust me on this. go sony!