hd dvd debuts! but... :(

crosvs · #1 04-19-2006, 04:26 AM

... but ... please tell me why Best Buy (at least here in SD) is being so stupid?!

HD DVD has just hit the market as of yesterday, and BluRay is on its way in July. But curiously, despite a highly skeptical market regarding the incentive to embrace this new technology, adequate promotion seems curiously lacking from one of the nation's largest consumer suppliers, Best Buy.

They've got this nice (but VERY little, un-flashy) display to showcase the new technology. And, appropriately enough, they've got it hooked up to a gorgeous 50" plasma screen.

But then I thought something didn't seem QUITE right. I looked closer at the screen and read its specs:

BEST BUY WAS USING A FREAKING EDTV INSTEAD OF AN HDTV TO DEMO ITS NEW HD DVD PLAYER!!!! (I believe its resolution was an odd 1386x768 or something like that)

(note to the uninitiated in the alphabet soup of acronyms: EDTV is the so-called "partial" or "half" HD resolution. Thought of another way, EDTV is sufficient for "simulating" an HD look with half the resolution. It allows one to get a plasma screen for far less money than a true HD plasma screen would ordinarily cost.)

What gives?!

Meanwhile, with BluRay still several months out (July), this is just bad for the VERY necessary HIGH IMPACT marketing promotions these new, and less obviously necessary upgrades demand.

Admittedly, the leap from DVD --> HD/BluRay DVD is nowhere near as significant (read: obvious) to the casual consumer as VHS --> DVD.

But now, in addition to creating ANOTHER VHS/BETAMAX war like back in the late 70s/early 80s (wow I was born in 1979 and I still remember that as we STILL have our BETAMAX VCR *AND* BetaCam video camera!!), they're also not marketing with NEARLY enough push ... nor is it being marketed CORRECTLY!!

I'm all for the promotion of newer and better technologies for the greater good of technological innovation and adoptation, even if such "leaps" seem negligible at first. And so I'm very bothered by this seeming lack of care to properly push this new era in home video technology as I think it is a very necessary next step in the ongoing transition from SD to HD, without which the transition from SD to HD television broadcast will likely be delayed EVEN MORE than it already has been.

Thoughts?