HD DVD is Dead -- Blue Ray Wins

WallyWorld's recent announcement that that they have adopted the Blue-Ray format for high definition disks pretty much drives the last nail in the coffin for HD DVD. You can also bet that the plain old DVD format is going to disappear pretty soon. Now that the industry has a "standard" that they can count on, movie publishers will stop producing them on DVD, and will switch to Blue Ray.

So, what does this mean to you as a consumer?

• more movies will soon be available in Blue Ray format
• you will need to buy a Blue Ray player soon, as access to new movies in regular DVD format will be limited
• you can expect to pay nearly twice as much when purchasing movies in Blue Ray format. I expect that prices will come down eventually, when the novelty wears off
• you will not be able to experience any of the improvements of Blue Ray without an HD television and surround sound system

Backwards Compatibility
Don't worry about your old DVDs becoming obsolete. The Blue Ray players are backwards compatible, so you can play your DVD collection on them. You can also connect the player to a standard TV and it will work just fine.

Curious about the technology behind Blue Ray discs? Check out this article.