Today I’d like to address the many video enthusiasts who may be considering purchasing a Blu-ray Disc player and/or the accompanying Blu-ray Discs. As you can see from the title of this post, I’m not sold on Blu-ray and I advise you to “be careful” when considering investing in Blu-ray. I firmly believe that Blu-ray is not going to have the same amazing impact that DVD did when it first came out and ever since. Optical drives will soon be a thing of the past, as many netbook and notebook manufacturers opt for drive-less designs in their computers (less weight, more space for a larger battery). Let’s investigate further:

1) A bit of quick history:

In 2006, a format war began between HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc. These two high-definition optical disc formats were incompatible with each other and were attempting to improve on and eventually replace the DVD standard (1080p HD video resolution compared to 480p for DVD). Two years later, in February 2008, Toshiba, the main company supporting HD DVD, “raised the white flag” and the format war was over: Blu-ray was the victor! Blu-ray would now set the new standard and become the “king” of high definition! Blu-ray all the way! Right? Well keep reading!!

2) Some revealing facts:

In 2009 (three full years after the arrival of Blu-ray), digital movies and TV shows generated more revenue than Blu-ray. Digital movies brought in nearly twice the revenue of Blu-ray, while DVD brought in nine times more revenue than Blu-ray!

3) Some key points to consider:

A) Without a doubt, if you have a large screen HDTV (≈ 50″ or larger), then a Blu-ray player will give you the best picture and sound quality on the planet. You will sit at home and say “wow”! You’ll think you’re actually in the theater, which of course is the point! However, if your HDTV’s screen size is smaller than ≈ 50″, you simply won’t be able to take full advantage of the color and detailed information found on the Blu-ray disc. In my opinion it is not worth the expense.

B) Enhanced DVDs look great on a smaller HDTV screen. Any decent upconversion DVD player (much less expensive than a Blu-ray player) will convert the 480p DVD to 1080i and you’ll be hard-pressed to tell the difference in picture quality with Blu-ray. DVD also looks great on any non-high-definition television (digital SDTV).

C) DVDs have been around for 12 years and are consequently more numerous (1,900 available Blu-ray movie titles compared to 105,000 available DVD movie titles). Also, there are only 7 or 8 new Blu-ray releases per month compared to 900 new DVD releases each month. Many times you can’t find the movie you’re looking for on Blu-ray!

D) Do you really want to start another collection of discs/video players? First I bought a VHS player and amassed a nice collection of VHS movie titles, then I bought a DVD player and amassed a nice collection of DVD videos. Am I going to start another collection of expensive Blu-ray Discs and players now? I think you know the answer! Just say no to Blu-ray!

E) Last but not least: The future of video access and viewing is to deliver it digitally over the Internet. Very soon, all televisions will come with ethernet or wi-fi connectors, allowing you to purchase, watch, and stream video content directly from the Internet. Right now, Microsoft’s Xbox Live streams instantly from Netflix over the Internet to your TV and Roku’s awesome box instantly streams high-quality movies from Netflix and Amazon Video On Demand. This is just the beginning. Online digital downloading of movies on Internet-enabled televisions will soon make discs and disc players virtually obsolete.