In another bit of Blu-Ray news this day, Panasonic has
revealed its recordable and rewriteable media specs and initial prices.
Beginning in spring 2006, Panasonic will begin supplying single and dual layer
discs in 25 and 50GB capacities to consumers seeking high-capacity removable
storage.
Single layer, recordable discs will debut at $17.99 and $42.99 each respectively. Rewriteable varieties will see $24.99 and $59.99 price tags per disc. While initial prices seem high in comparison to DVD and HD DVD formats, Sony, the main developer and supporter of Blu-Ray, claims that once mass production takes place the price differences will quickly erode. The discs will write at 2x speeds and will be read by consumer electronics players and computer devices. To put this into perspective, 1x in Blu-Ray terms is 36Mbps or roughly 4.29MBps, while standard DVD speed is measured in multiples of roughly 1.32MBps.
Panasonic boasts many special in-house developments which went into its discs. Special inorganic light-resistant materials were used for recordable discs, while rewriteable discs use a highly sensitive recording film. New surface treatments are employed to make the discs more durable the resistant to scratches.
Panasonic expects its recently announced PC burners to be available this quarter, while consumer players will debut in Q2 of this year.
News source: X-bit labs
Single layer, recordable discs will debut at $17.99 and $42.99 each respectively. Rewriteable varieties will see $24.99 and $59.99 price tags per disc. While initial prices seem high in comparison to DVD and HD DVD formats, Sony, the main developer and supporter of Blu-Ray, claims that once mass production takes place the price differences will quickly erode. The discs will write at 2x speeds and will be read by consumer electronics players and computer devices. To put this into perspective, 1x in Blu-Ray terms is 36Mbps or roughly 4.29MBps, while standard DVD speed is measured in multiples of roughly 1.32MBps.
Panasonic boasts many special in-house developments which went into its discs. Special inorganic light-resistant materials were used for recordable discs, while rewriteable discs use a highly sensitive recording film. New surface treatments are employed to make the discs more durable the resistant to scratches.
Panasonic expects its recently announced PC burners to be available this quarter, while consumer players will debut in Q2 of this year.
News source: X-bit labs
$1000 and the entire player is around $1800
probably 4 years later, it'll probably remind me how cheap DVD is now
Sony has said a lot of things about BluRay that seem unlikely. Sure the price will drop, but I think HD-DVD is going to have a very clear price advantage at first.
LOL, anyone remember back when Sony was making the claim that players and media wouldn't cost anymore then HD-DVD. I still think that both formats are going to make it and that dual-mode plays will become the norm, but things keep looking better and better for HD-DVD.
I can't see these prices staying that high for more than a year. Like neufuse hinted at, after the PS3 hits, Blu-Ray will get a sizable user base and the prices will come down.
edit: btw, the numbers 48 and 97 are not random... i did a little math...
And that was after I waited 20 000 years for him to invent the CD!
Ah, those were the days...
I think the rest of us will stick with DVDs for quite a while.
I haven't seen DVD recorables in packs of 50.. I have seen packs of 50 or 100 CDs (70 GB).
They seel packs of 10 DVDs though, and only 20 DVDs will be 96 GB.. with 7 25GB blurays you get 105 GB...
My point is.. the greater the capacity, the fewer discs you need.. the smaller those packs will be.
Last edited by TRC on 07 Jan 2006 - 02:15
To better explain my earlier comment, I'm talking about the single layer blu-ray burner itself that im willing to spend an extra $200-300 on... I don't think I will be buying the blu-ray writable media at $50.
This HD-DVD and Blu-Ray war will slow the industry down greatly. Considering movies will be released on both formats, and some people will pick one over the other in some circumstances, this will hurt sales where consumers can't make up their mind between DVD, HD-DVD and Blu-Ray.
After all, who wants to shell out ridiculous amounts for a player and some movies for a format that may actually die out? These companies are doing everyone a disservice by launching this format war, nobody wins by having one, it is NOT good for competition, it actually slows everything down until one wins and whatever you buy is ensured to work.
If it's backed by Sony, I don't want it. In fact, there was a time when most of my electronics were Sony, but too many of its products started malfunctioning *way* too quickly, and I eventually ended up with all Panasonic stuff, which has worked flawlessly across the board. Every Panasonic product I've ever bought still works. The only thing left of Sony's that I have that still works is one TV. And if that goes, that'll be my last Sony product.
Frankly, I think that Sony is circling the bowl, and if Panasonic hitches its wagon to that company in any way, it's going to suffer some damage sooner or later. Mark my words.
What does that have to do with the price of tea in China?
Did I really need to say, "If it's promoted by Sony in opposition to a competing technology I don't want it" to get my point across?
Hah, in a year from now, prices will be below $ 5 :-P
Doesn't that somehow defeat current trends with respect to newer burnable disc based technology have cheaper medium by todays standards? Even opening day. I guess consumer burnable CDs and DVDs always came some years after commercial mediums were available. Where in this case they are both coming out at the same time.
Its specs were:
DVD+R
DVD+RW
DVD: 2.4x 2.4x 8x
CD: 12x 10x 32x
Price Tag: $879.00 Canadian before tax, Then I bought 10 DVD+R at 10.00 a peice before tax, and 5 DVD+RW 17.00 a peice before tax, then since I was 13 at the time I did not know how to install devices, so the install fee was 45.99 before tax, all in all it came to:
aprx. $1,280.00 Canadian.. and now the prices for Drive Alone in US Dollars is aprx. 1000.00, thats insane. I will defiantly wait. It was cheaper to invest in DVDs when they first came out than DVD to BlueRay, where its less efficient.
If we think, it was from CD to DVD, which was a much needed leap.. but now the leap from DVD to BlueRay is hardly needed, just for an example, a few people in this comment section stated they dont need that much storage ona disk, and its more efficient with other methods.
And still, it was cheaper for me to Buy a DVD writer, 10 +Rs, 5+RWs, and get it installed than it is for my JUST to buy a writer.
plus if you say 25g is too much, then don't worry about spending a lot of money, you'll get one disc and back up whatever you need. All your mp3s for example. Get 50g one back up all your divx movies... i think its worth it... Plus its inevatble that the prices will drop.
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