The End of Blu-ray

Eyeball Kid said:
Luv me sum lazer disk
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My old professor just finished the repair / restoration of an Akai 8-track for some rich guy in Seattle, and he said the guy has a monstrous collection of LaserDisc media. He said he keeps LaserDiscs around because he only plays his vinyl when he's having sex.

Ah, to be rich.
 
With the new ram just send me a SD chip, smaller, faster, easy. Streaming will be the end, but I told my kids when DVD came out that a chip(computer) the size of a credit card would be what they would carry and it would rule them all.
 
Not bothered. Never invested in it. I decided to wait it out. Most people I know just moan about their BD player.
 
daglesj said:
Not bothered. Never invested in it. I decided to wait it out. Most people I know just moan about their BD player.
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The only problem I've seen with current-generation players is overheating from being placed in an enclosed cabinet. I expect most people around here rip their media with MakeMKV or whatever.

I can understand not being interested in 4k, but the quality jump from DVD/compressed garbage to Blu-Ray is actually quite nice.
 
DeathFromBelow said:
The only problem I've seen with current-generation players is overheating from being placed in an enclosed cabinet.
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I was wondering what the complaints were- I got one of the first Philips that did Dolby Atmos and Vision, and haven't had any problems, but mine isn't 'enclosed'.
 
seanreisk said:
My old professor just finished the repair / restoration of an Akai 8-track for some rich guy in Seattle, and he said the guy has a monstrous collection of LaserDisc media. He said he keeps LaserDiscs around because he only plays his vinyl when he's having sex.

Ah, to be rich.
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So, not played much is your point?
 
Three years ago I sold my entire DVD collection for $100, a collection that I put well over a thousand dollars into. I don't miss physical media at all.
 
lollerwaffle said:
Please tell me if I am being ignorant but IME this started with DVDs and got much worse with Blu-Ray: I have to sit through commercials for other productions etc before I even get to a menu where I can start a movie. I've had a bunch of DVDs like that and eventually said fuck it. Streaming oftentimes does not have this issue. Quality is worse, absolutely true, but I see completely RED when I have to sit through commercials.
I paid for the damn media, I do not tolerate commercials.
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So throw the baby out with the bathwater? just look at it as the REAL theater experience. they have previews at the theater to!
 
I honestly, truly believe that if Sony had built in a UHD Bluray drive in the PS4 Slim/Pro they could have boosted the market for them significantly... I got an Xbox One S SOLELY to play UHD Bluray (cheapest way to do it), as I have PS4 Pro for console gaming, but I'm guessing I'm very much in the minority there.
 
misterbobby said:
I have never bought a blu ray disc and rented maybe 5 blu ray movies ever. I am not paying what they cost for something I will likely never watch more than once and prefer to just instantly stream something instead of driving to go rent it.
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You know... if you watch them, you can get them for 10-15 each on amazon brand new. The price fluctuates a lot. That's basically the cost of a movie ticket.
 
Bluray quality is FAR better than DVD. Streaming is a distant third, well behind DVD.

My fiber optic provider gives me 250/250 Mbps service. (Verified at speedtest.net, etc.) My home network is Gigabit: cat5e or cat 6 hardwired. (48 ports going to a patch panel, a dedicated 48 port switch, unifi router.) I have a 4 AP wifi mesh. Looking at my laptop, right now, it shows me with a connection of 390 Mbps via wifi to my network.

I hardwire my AVR, my bluray player, my HTPC, my roku.

I have a 108" screen, 1080p projector, fed/controlled by the AVR.

I am -NOT- a videophile or movie snob.

When I stream from Amazon, PSvue, or Netflix, I can see banding, pixelating, stuttering, and blocks of pixels which don't update (if they're about the same from one frame to another: obviously not sure what that compression technique is called).

I have a home network which is a bit better than average. I could pay for a higher bandwidth from my ISP, but I already exceed the ability of the streaming services so I would not see any gains. Even with a pretty good network, I am not interested in watching a "good" movie by streaming. I'll watch some shows by streaming and the various artifacts are acceptable (but still visible).

With physical media, I am not dependent on a two other parties having to allow me to view a movie. My ISP and the streaming provider BOTH must be up and running...and agree that I have the "right" to view the product. With a bluray disk, it's in my hand, I drop in my bluray player tray, hit "play", and off I go. No compression artifacts, no problems.

I have not made the jump to 4k, but I'm slowly upgrading with that in mind.
 
mullet said:
Give me a break, I have over 500 Blu Rays and I will not stop. I have no cable TV just Antenna and I never go to the theater. So the money I save from no cable bill and no theaters, I take that money and buy ONLY movies I will watch more then once and I am still money ahead. I love having a hard copy.

Better Audio 7.1 Atmos....
Better Video quality.
Watch it as many times as you want.
Special features,...
No data usage.
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Amen. For the movie franchises I really follow, I typically go to the theater and also buy the Blu-ray. For any other movie I'm on the fence about, I'll just wait for the Blu-ray because 95% of the time, I can get the Blu-ray cheaper than paying for my wife and I to go to the theater AND I get to keep the movie.

I rip all my media to my Plex server and store my media away. When I built my last PC, I got the predictable comments like "LULZ WHY ARE YOU BUYING AN OBSOLETE BLU RAY DRIVE?!?!?!?!" I just laughed them off.
 
Keep in mind we are an enthusiast forum and probably a piss poor representation of the market as a whole.

Most people I know would not be able to differentiate between a blu-ray and streaming on their garbage $300 55" 4k TVs. A couple of them may have a sound bar, not a single one has real surround sound.

The incoming wave of buyers are accustomed to streaming 480p content to their mobile devices. Hell my GFs kid has a TV in his room with all the standard smart apps but never turns it on. If he wants to watch something he uses his phone, like every other teen on the planet.
 
lollerwaffle said:
Please tell me if I am being ignorant but IME this started with DVDs and got much worse with Blu-Ray: I have to sit through commercials for other productions etc before I even get to a menu where I can start a movie. I've had a bunch of DVDs like that and eventually said fuck it. Streaming oftentimes does not have this issue. Quality is worse, absolutely true, but I see completely RED when I have to sit through commercials.
I paid for the damn media, I do not tolerate commercials.
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I am able to skip through them, not all at once though, with the chapter next button. Im using a PS3 for my blu-ray player so maybe my experience is different.
 
Kardonxt said:
Keep in mind we are an enthusiast forum and probably a piss poor representation of the market as a whole.

Most people I know would not be able to differentiate between a blu-ray and streaming on their garbage $300 55" 4k TVs. A couple of them may have a sound bar, not a single one has real surround sound.

The incoming wave of buyers are accustomed to streaming 480p content to their mobile devices. Hell my GFs kid has a TV in his room with all the standard smart apps but never turns it on. If he wants to watch something he uses his phone, like every other teen on the planet.
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Yeah, I'm having a good giggle reading some of these responses. There will always be enthusiasts who want the highest quality experience, of course. But every one here is pretty out of touch with your average consumer. With media, easiest always wins, and streaming is easiest.
 
Samsung isn't the only manufacturer to stop making BD players. OPPO was the first to quit making them citing lack of profit (at $600 per). I'm hoping this isn't a trend, but the downward trend in Blu-Ray sales doesn't sound promising.

I have a great quality 75" 4K display (Sony Z9D), Atmos capable AVR, and an OPPO 203 4K BD player. With larger screens the difference in video quality between streaming and 4K BR is obvious not to mention ATMOS sound adds quite a bit to the experience as well. Going forward I'm really hoping we either continue to have availability of physical media or a way to download full quality (uncompressed) movies.
 
Don't own and never will own a BluRay movie.

Got fed up owning so much plastic back with DVDs. Built a media server instead! :D
 
bluray is dead, baloney! even DVD is STILL alive. my dad buys DVDs and has thousands. I bet there's millions of people like him all around the world still buying DVDs. bluray will stick around too.
 
I preferred physical media but the hassle of putting in the disc and actually getting to play the what you want to look at is utterly frustrating. Validation or what ever the disc is doing before it displays, then the FBI warning, commercials, some disks won't play unless you update software/firmware. Had a Blu-Ray player (cheapo) that would not play hardly anything but was also only WIFI (bad choice on my part) and it would not hook up to my WIFI no matter what, so could not update - threw it in the trash can. If Blu-Ray and user experience was better, easier and not treat you like you are a criminal from the get go - it would probably do a hell a lot better. When someone want to watch a video, most are not interested in the random stuff, unknown time period before you get what your after on a Blu-Ray disk.

DVD on the other hand you can normally get to the media you want much faster, hence it still is around today and preferred over Blu-Ray on sells.
 
akaliel said:
Yeah, doesn't sound like you're niche at all ;)
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I have a couple hundred BD movies. I rarely go to theaters, do stream stuff, but some movies are just too good to lose when X streaming service loses the rights. Not only that but some movies really did benefit from going to DVD, and later to Blu-ray.

Compare a good VHS copy of Bladerunner to the DVD to the Blu-ray. Just going from DVD to Blu-ray: Holy cow. The level of detail in the flight to police headquarters is phenomenal, and it was done waayyy back. All of the individual windows lit up. The careful outlines of the buildings on the flyby. Just awesome.

I've seen some movies streamed and the problem with streaming is the variability at times. Now for some movies, yeah, whatever. Some movies, however, are audio/visual masterpieces like Mad Max: Fury Road. Streaming just doesn't do them justice. I can see why some groups might like it, as it may end up with more people wanting to experience a movie in the theater again to get real A/V quality. I even see why some people like it as some movies it really doesn't matter much.
 
only problem with blu ray is that many movies are not on it. We still buy blu ray. we started replacing all our DVDs with them. I can't watch a dvd anymore, the quality is just so poor compared to the bluray.

Our internet isn't great. we can stream HD but not always the greatest on a 24mb DSL.
 
I like having physical media for movies. It is nice to have some way to watch good quality video without requiring internet connections. For me if a movie is worth having for life I want a disc of it, not a download for some service ill forget I had in 5 years. Still pull out dvds to watch that I bought back from when I was in highchool.
 
akaliel said:
Yeah, I'm having a good giggle reading some of these responses. There will always be enthusiasts who want the highest quality experience, of course. But every one here is pretty out of touch with your average consumer. With media, easiest always wins, and streaming is easiest.
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These optical vs streaming threads are always a denial-fest, with the outliers beating on the irrelevant: "It can't be dead because I have 500 blurays", or arguing technical merits. Most consumers don't care, is the problem.

Calling it "dead" is just hyperbole for slow decline, and optical has been for many years. Thank mobile, streaming, generational shift, whatever - but Samsung getting out is just one more datapoint along that slow decline.

The moment that producing and selling content on optical media is no longer profitable, they'll stop being produced. Simple as that. That said, I have no patience for streamed anything and have been storing optical rips on harddisks for two decades.
 
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odditory said:
Whenever one of these optical vs streaming threads rolls around it's always a denial-fest, with the outliers not seeing the big picture "It can't be dead because I have 500 blurays." Or arguing technical merits when it's irrelevant too most consumers.

When it's said something is "dead" it's often an exaggeration but often just means "trending downward". And optical has very much been in slow decline for many years. Thank mobile, streaming, generational shift or whatever but Samsung getting out is just one more datapoint along optical's slow decline.
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Yup, everything you said.
 
viper1152012 said:
If they cared and rushed bluray to ultra hd then maybe... At this point I think I have to agree... Its dead
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Only on the internet can people agree with an article that says this segment of the industry is generating ~$4 billion with minor growth and it's going to replace this other segment which after LOSING tons of revenue to the other market already is STILL making ~$4 billion.

The article also declares the future is streaming because it grew ~$2.2 billion. Which is basically the kind of money that walked away from subscription cable. Instead of pulling that cash out of about half a million subscribers, streaming options are pulling it out of several million streaming subscribers.

No matter how you slice it, people are spending a lot less money for video entertainment than in the past, and they are doing it by more diverse means. If you have a niche audience that wants their video on blu-ray or UHD disks, and you are already doing 90% of the labor to generate it to supply streaming and cable outlets anyway, you leave that market intact.

But it is a niche market, and when you have game consoles intruding on the low end at an effective buy in of "free, cause I game" and on the other end you have to compete with brands that give a crap and are all cinaphiles, well you mihgt just opt out of the middle ground producing mediocre, good enough players.
 
mullet said:
Give me a break, I have over 500 Blu Rays and I will not stop. I have no cable TV just Antenna and I never go to the theater. So the money I save from no cable bill and no theaters, I take that money and buy ONLY movies I will watch more then once and I am still money ahead. I love having a hard copy.

Better Audio 7.1 Atmos....
Better Video quality.
Watch it as many times as you want.
Special features,...
No data usage.
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This, this, and this... Now physical format may need an upgrade and call it what you want but Blu-ray is far from dead.

/thread
 
mullet said:
Give me a break, I have over 500 Blu Rays and I will not stop. I have no cable TV just Antenna and I never go to the theater. So the money I save from no cable bill and no theaters, I take that money and buy ONLY movies I will watch more then once and I am still money ahead. I love having a hard copy.

Better Audio 7.1 Atmos....
Better Video quality.
Watch it as many times as you want.
Special features,...
No data usage.
Click to expand...

People like you and I aren't the majority. When I rip a movie that I love to Plex I don't encode it with Handbrake. I leave it raw so that it's as if it were off the BR disc. But let's face it. As data speeds and latencies become better for the consumer hard copies will be less and less frequently used. Eventually everything will be either streamed or digitally delivered. I only hope that what becomes available as a download is BR or better quality and isn't bound to some f-ing service like Amazon or iTunes. Personally I want something I can control myself and throw it into Plex or whatever else I want. Not something that some a-hole like Apple can reach out and delete because their SJWs found it offensive.
 
funkydmunky said:
Very nice. Besides your logical points, which are all solid, I agree we all need a system where we get to keep and collect a HARD COPY!
It is the essential element to collecting.
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There are apps that let you remove the encryption from iTunes movies. I buy movies on iTunes and then use winx mediatrans (there are several other apps that work the same way) to make a drm free copy that works with VLC/serviio etc. It literally launches iTunes and starts the movie for a second and then does it's thing for a minute or two. I believe they are capturing the encryption keys during the launch and then just decrypt it. Anyways, it's a 4-5GB 1080p rip, so nowhere near the blu-ray bitrates, and iTunes doesn't let you download 4k versions so it's only 1080p. But if you can live with both of those negatives it's pretty low effort. I've ripped some of my blu-rays with makemkv but the resulting files are large and need a lot of storage so I haven't done my whole collection. I'd need a new blu-ray drive for my pc and a new blu-ray player for my tv to play 4k blu-rays. As the newer discs often don't include iTunes copies anymore (and we use the apple tv alot) I've mostly stopped buying blu-rays so I probably won't bother upgrading my drive and player to 4k.
 
Dead Parrot said:
The sad problem is most folks don't know what even 1080 is supposed to look like. A lot of cable providers default the lower channels to 720 and many folks won't bother to try the higher numbered channels with the 1080 HD content. They find the first channel that has their show and go "Cool, it looks great on my new 60 inch TV" Now they try streaming and that 480/720 stream looks like what they are used to and they think "Cool, I am watching HD streaming on my new 60 inch TV" So now they think, "Why do I need Blueray or DVD if when I have HD streaming for my new 60 inch TV?"

I bet there are a lot of folks that got 4k TVs this Christmas that are convinced they are watching 4K content when what they are really watching is 720 stuff because that is the channel numbers they are used to selecting.
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So I see you've met my dad.

Except I bought him a 55" 4k tv for Xmas, and he watches the "low" channels as he has them memorized, and they are in "SD".

He sayd he can't tell the difference. He doesn't even watch 720p!
 
c3k said:
I've got fiber optic streaming, a pretty good home network (hardwired)...and I think streaming sucks. The compression artifacts distract me. Bluray is what I use/buy for "good" movies.
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Amen to that. While shitty streaming quality persists, I see no reason to bother and physical discs will remain. In principle I don't mind if the steam was actual UHD BD quality, heck even regular BD quality would be good but it's far from that and nevermind UHD quality. At least something other than Steam would have seen benefit from a gigabit internet.
 
c3k said:
Bluray quality is FAR better than DVD. Streaming is a distant third, well behind DVD....
.
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I have nearly the same setup as you, 1080p projector, 133" screen, 300/250 Mbps Fibre, etc. All my streaming devices are wired with gigabit networking. But I gotta say I strongly disagree about the streaming being well behind DVD. DVD looks horrible at 133", you can literally see the pixels. I'm using a sony blu-ray player, maybe yours has a way better upscaler. But we stream netflix, prime, crave, itunes, and cbc and I think they all look better that dvd. They aren't equal though, I think netflix and itunes are noticeably better than cbc and crave. I normally use a 4th gen apple tv (with the mouse/microphone remote and 1080p) as my player but I sometimes use a small windows pc (kangaroo pc) and I generally find the apple tv does a better job. Anyways, I'm curious (not trolling) what blu-ray player you are using that you find your DVD's look better than streaming and also curious what hardware you are using for streaming that you get video artifacts on? I'm wondering if just need to try another streaming device.
 
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UHD Blu Rays are all I will buy, and only then I have to have seen the movie and liked it enough to watch it again.
 
I already mentioned I can't believe DVD's still exist in the Samsung thread. Not even HD is absolutely insane in 2019. DVD's are no better than VHS in my mind, shouldn't even be an existing format anymore.

I used to go to Red Box for BR's all the time, but they disappeared around me and had less and less available anyway. I wish there was a good UHD disc rental service, or a UHD streaming service that doesn't show buffering/banding/artifacts all the time. I have uncapped gigabit, those should be a thing of the past for me.

I don't think BR ever should have separated 1080 and 4k. They should have just always been the 'best possible' image format, regardless of which one you buy. Splitting the same movie into DVD, BR and 4K BR is just milking an already shrinking and confused market. If 4K is available, that should be the only disc you can buy/rent.
 
I only have a 720 tv, but I'm slowly upgrading DVD's to Blu-ray's, as I find them cheap. I enjoy Netflix, but for family favorite films, nothing compares with the quality of a physical disc.
Also, I OWN these discs and don't have to worry about 'digital rights' issues in the future.
I did move all of my CD's onto MP3 format a decade ago, so I guess someday I'll need to learn to build a media server for films and tv shows.
 
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