These are the factors that will determine the outcome

1) more popular movies available (blu-ray has this)
2) more electronic companies creating standalone players (ppl are picky with brand) (blu-ray has that)
3) lower cost of players (hd-dvd has this, but the blu-ray drives have been dropping in price more rapidly than hd-dvd)
4) cost of media (BD's tend to be cheaper)
5) availablity of pc drives in mainstream stores. ( I have yet to see a hd-dvd availble in stores)

BUT WHEN?
I am so,so tiered of hearing "HD-DVD will rule Walmart" "Blu-ray will own the studios"

I stoped caring about this war when I realized how far they are from the war being won, wars needs time to diffuse.

really. toshiba said the exact opposite... hmm. tards.

Provided HD DVD can hold onto 20-30% of the market share, we'll be mired in this war for a little while. And as dual-format players come down in price, the real question will be, "who cares?"

There are two reasons I choose BR over HD-DVD

1. ps3 owner, therefore, for my sake I want BR to win so i can keep watching hd movies

2. disk space. I don't remember where i saw this but for uncompressed audio at 1080p video, HD-DVD can only hold 2 hours of data. So for long movies, they probably compress some (yes, they can add layers sometime in the near futur). While this will never make a difference to the human eye/ear, its a matter of principle. Your spending a fortune upgrading your home system and your already selling yourself short.

which do you think companies will go for eventually:

hd-dvd that has been cracked because of the 360 add-on
http://arstechnica.com/news...

or bluray?which has better copy protection?not saying bluray hasn't been hacked.but bluray does a better job of it.companies don't want to lose their profits to pirates.something will have to give,and companies will run to one disc that at least has an extra layer to slow down theft:

bluray.

....................mag lev super train................

he just mean BDA is coming out with something big. stay tuned

They'll all be hacked, repeatedly.

Companies don't do this for the pirates. They know the pirates will always find a way. No, this is for parents whose little kids scratch up Toy Story. Can't have them jumping on their computer and making a backup, not when the parent might shell out another $20 for a replacement.

So it doesn't have to be unbreakable, just hard for a soccer mom with a legal reason to copy it. In fact, I doubt it can be unbreakable. There's been very little drm that hasn't been hacked at one time or another. The only long-term one I can think of at the mo is DirectTv's encryption, whereas DishNet keeps updating theirs and it keeps getting hacked.

Anyway, this is non-news. A supporter/manufacturer of a product says their product will win... that's profound. It's not like they're risking much. Their TVs pushed in this announcement obviously will work with either format. They stand to gain a lot, but lose very little. Whereas a consumer stands to lose several hundred dollars.

Specs, specs and more specs. Price will be the deciding factor. Is it not nice that we have the luxury to buy both? As so many claim to be able to do.

Problem is, we will not decide this war. Stay on the sidelines or enjoy both. A war is going on, it is all hype.

Everyone only compares the studio backings because they think that this format war only involves movies. It involves computers too leading to electronics companies.

BluRay:
Sony, Panasonic, Philips, Samsung, Pioneer, Sharp, JVC, Hitachi, Mitsubishi, TDK, Thomson, LG, Apple, HP and Dell

HD-DVD:
Sanyo, NEC, RCA, HP, Toshiba, Niveus, Acer, LG

Both of these are taken from their respective promotional sites
http://www.hddvdprg.com/
http://www.blu-ray.com

Panasonic!!! What machines are they making? Oh yeah, Blu-ray.
Its not as if they are going to say HDDVD are going to be certain to win it......

i didn't say bluray wasn't hacked.it has.but which disc makes it easier to copy movies?that's what i said above. that would be hd-dvd.and bluray provides better protection.

i support better technology and reliability.bluray,however you look at it,is better tech.more space,can have same codecs and features,costs less or equal to hd-dvd to buy in discs.more companies back it.bigger blockbusters are on it.more scratch resistant.can be used for games.

these are things soccerluv misses.he's just frothing at the mouth.fanboyism at it's worst.

...............mag lev super train.................

Me:"None Will Win, Be Certain"

Streaming thats the future.

but still im not so sure. with all of the heroes commercials on tv(dvd & hddvd only) even I almost thought about getting an hd-dvd player. im worried that that particular show will significantly boost sales for hd-dvd, but im not sure.

i do hope bluray wins though.

blu-ray is going to win because there's so many supportive studios behind blu-ray it's just keep growing bigger and bigger as we speak. Blu-ray all the way is what the future is to.

Panasonic do make great TV's by the way.

Panasonic "Buy our Bluray players". We have lots of mony vested in Bluray so we hope it will win.

This guy doesn't read. The new (or just made public technology) that was just released about the holographic disc technology that will hold an insane amount of data.

By the time a "real" winner is decided in this whole mess, that technology will probably be cheap enough to integrate in everyday life. And they will tell SONY... and M$ for that matter to suck it. If you haven't read about it I suggest it. www.howthingswork.com It's amazing. A terabyte of info on a disc the same size as a DVD, using holographic storage. Yea..

Blue ray is the future! Hddvd is only delaying the enivitable. I agree with with Panasonic that its the dominant high definition format of choice. PS3 rules!!

And this news comes after announcement of HD DVD for $199. Surprising.

Yup, i'm totally agree.