Could we be wasting our time with DVD-9 & DVD-5 authorin

Alan Mintaka · Post by **Alan Mintaka** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:15 am

Hi Everyone,

The more I see Blu-Ray discs for sale or rental, the more I wonder if we're just wasting time with authoring DVD-9 and DVD-5 with DVD Workshop 2 or any other program.

It seems like Blu-Ray and HD will soon dominate the market and sweep the older DVD formats into oblivion. Could we be spending all this time and effort working on something that's going the way of Beta-Max?

Most importantly, could this be why development of DVDWS 3 has evidently been stalled?

Is Ulead ready to trash the older DVD market and throw its support behind Blu-Ray or HD?

I was just finishing a DL version of "Man From Planet X", which gave me a lot of trouble for some reason. I finally got it to be watchable after two days.

Two days! Will that be wasted time in the near future?

What do you think, folks? Am I blowing paranoid steam, or is all this work going to become obsolete soon?

Thanks for taking the time to read this, everyone!

Big Al Mintaka

htchien · Post by **htchien** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:22 am

IMHO the DVD format will still work for 1 to 2 years. Blu-ray and HD DVD formats and their burners are still expensive now.

Regards,
H.T.

heinz-oz · Post by **heinz-oz** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:28 am

DVD-9 and DVD-5, as you called it, is certainly not going the "BetaMax" way. It is going to go the film way or the audio tape way or the video tape way. In other words, it's going to be superseeded.

What might be going the "BetaMax" way may be either Blue Ray or HD-DVD. That's the battle that hasn't been decided yet. If you want to take a punt and don't mind the costs involved in upgrading all your hardware, go for it. I got friends who still have a BetaMax recorder.

I for one am going to wait it out and keep fiddling with the old DVD standard.

Alan Mintaka · Post by **Alan Mintaka** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:28 am

Thanks htchien,

But what happens after that 1 to 2 years? Will the authoring technology become obsolete?

I was wondering about the hardware too. In 5 to 10 years, will we still be able to play the old discs?

I realize the latter is a little off-topic here since this is a software forum. I'm too curious about this to resist asking!

Thanks again,
Big Al Mintaka

htchien · Post by **htchien** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:34 am

I believe the DVD system will still work after that. All Blu-ray / HD DVD system has the support for DVD 5/9, so don't worry about the compatibility. DVD 5/9 media can still be burned in Blu-ray / HD DVD burners and can be played on Blu-ray / HD DVD players.

I agree with Heinz about the BetaMax thing. No matter Blu-ray or HD DVD, anyone who does not win the next generation DVD war will find its way out. In our local TV station they still use BetaMax for their TV program recording and do BetaMax linear editing and they are doing well.

H.T.

Alan Mintaka · Post by **Alan Mintaka** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:35 am

Hi heinz-oz,

I see your point about Blu-Ray and HD. Who really knows at this point if either format will take off?

I should have made my question more general, as in

Will DVD9 and DVD5 soon be replaced by some sort of HDTV technonlogy?

Answers to that may be more along the lines of what you said about DVD9 and DVD5 going the way of film and video tape.

Except for Blu-Ray and HD, there doesn't seem to be anything on the horizon. Or is there? I read too slowly to keep on top of these things.

Thanks for your response, heinz-oz,

Big Al Mintaka

htchien · Post by **htchien** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:50 am

Hi,

Alan Mintaka wrote:I see your point about Blu-Ray and HD. Who really knows at this point if either format will take off?

No one knows, so people are still waiting for the result and hardware manufacturers and software providers will try to support both formats at the same time. Maybe in a year or two you will see the final.

Alan Mintaka wrote:I should have made my question more general, as in

Will DVD9 and DVD5 soon be replaced by some sort of HDTV technonlogy?

I don't think so.

Alan Mintaka wrote:Except for Blu-Ray and HD, there doesn't seem to be anything on the horizon. Or is there? I read too slowly to keep on top of these things.

Maybe you can check Total HD.

Here is a comparison list for the next generation DVD formats:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison ... sc_formats

Maybe it would help.

Since the topic is about DVD formats, I will move this thread to the General->DVD section on this forum.

Regards,
H.T.

heinz-oz · Post by **heinz-oz** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 4:51 am

Hi big Al,

if you want to be sitting on the fence worrying about these things, you will never get anywhere. remember the days of good old vinyl records, scratchy as they were? Long time gone, aren't they? Guess what, I still have my old turntable and play these old things from time to time, wanting to convert them to CD one day, just never get around doing it

I know people who still use a PC with a 386 processor with 6 MHz CPU speed and 256 KB of RAM and running DOS6. Just because that is "OLD" technology doesn't make it less applicable to what they want to do. It worked 15 years ago and it still does for them. I wouldn't have a use for that anymore because I moved on.

As HT said, whether it' Blue Ray or HD-DVD, these players will still play todays DVD's. Once the hardware is in place, it's no big deal to transfer todays, than old of course, videos to the new media and find it to be obsolete again a few years down the track, if we live long enough.

Don't worry about these things, enjoy what you have and look forward to new things to come.

Alan Mintaka · Post by **Alan Mintaka** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 5:19 am

Thanks for that, heinz-oz,

I guess I did need a more general-purpose response to get rid of my tic tonight.

RE vinyl, the ones I keep thinking about are 8 track cartridges.

I'd better stop extrapolating like that.

Have a good one,

Big Al Mintaka

kamnet · Post by **kamnet** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 12:33 am

Actually I was thinking about this myself recently, and I think DVD 5/9 may end up being in the same boat as VHS-C or 8mm/Hi8 -- that is, the cost and complexity of using it will come down and it will be a very popular format for the average Joe User to copy his or her stuff in and save it for years to come. I don't think there's any risk of all our working going to waste due to obscurity.

sjj1805 · Post by **sjj1805** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 4:18 am

Just think of your local Video Shop.
Years ago they started off with VHS tapes. Very slowly a few DVD's began to appear on the shelves. Over a period of time the number of DVD's increased and the number of VHS tapes decreased. This was very gradual and took a number of years.

Now ask yourself, how many of your friends/relatives own or intend to purchase a Blue Ray / HD-DVD or Similar format player?
Currently I do not know of a single one. Simply put they cost too much.
Most of my friends/relatives have a HD capable TV but the real reason they bought one wasn't for High Definition, it was simply the fact that the screen was bigger.

Regarding DV5 -v- DV9 - how many of our members actually use DV9?
Although I have a DV9 burner I still only ever use DV5 discs.
Why - cost. DV5 is reasonably cheap and quite easily satisfies my needs.
The major difference (other than quality) is that DVD's require a lot less storage space than the old VHS tapes. I keep mine mainly in solid storage boxes that hold 250 at a time. The box is like a 1' cube.

Now imagine the equivalant amount of storage space required for 250 VHS tapes! OK Blue Ray etc means I can get even more on one disc and use even less storage space - but - the old VHS stuff was taking over the house, DVD's do not.

I think DVD 5/9 will be around for a long time to come.
In fact I wouldnt be surprised if we skip a generation and the next major format will NOT be Blue Ray or HD-DVD but will be some form of solid state medium such as a cartridge or something resembling a SD card.
The advantage of this is 'no moving parts' - discs spin.

Alan Mintaka · Post by **Alan Mintaka** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 6:40 am

Wow. When I got the email notification of a response in this thread, I couldn't even remember what it was about!

Thanks sjj and kamnet, for taking the time to respond to this old thread. After re-reading the posts and seeing your responses for the first time, I find that I got the answers I wanted.

The consensus of the folks who have a good eye on what is really happening in both production and sales are in agreement that the future of DVD5 and DVD9 is pretty much secure. The winner of the HD-DVD/Blu-ray wars is still up in the air, even in the context of the Total HD discs that will allegedly be usable in both formats.

I hadn't thought much about the use of DVD5 and DVD9 for data storage, even though I've done this myself. With all of the archiving that must be going on everywhere, players that can retrieve all that data will be in demand for some time to come.

And, as ssj pointed out, the cheap DVD5 blanks (and eventually the DVD9's too, no doubt) make them good general-purpose workhorses for home media productions and data archiving.

In fact, I could probably fit a bunch of them in the big safety deposit box I use for taxes, mortgages and such. There's my off-site storage, in a bank vault no less. It would also get more mileage out of the fee I pay for the privilege of renting a metal box somewhere else.

Anyway, thanks again for all your helpful responses.

Of course, now I must think of something else to worry about. It's my job. Let's see.... the durability (or lack thereof) of DVD recordings is a good one.

Have a good day friends,
Big Al Mintaka