The digital transition has been scheduled for over a decade. Yet manufacturers still produced analog televisions (that will require a digital-to-analog converter connected between the antenna and tv) as late as 2006.
The FCC delayed the transition originally scheduled for 2006 to 2009 after they realized that the nation wasn’t ready. Stores are now required to put a sticker on analog TVs letting people know about the transition, but that doesn’t help the people who bought a new analog set in the last year or two.
A similar thing may affect the people who bought DVD players in the last few years. While Blu-ray definitely has the upper hand against HD-DVD, HD-DVD has had the ability of delivering interactive features in all of its players from day one, while the Blu-ray manufacturers are still adding interactive features on a piecemeal basis. As a result, the first Blu-ray Disc players can’t access all the features available on newer Blu-ray Disc releases.
Blu-ray has already won the high-def disc format war. Five major studios are now supporting Blu-ray, compared to two for HD DVD. NetFlix already announced that they will only carry Blu-ray for their high defination format, abandoning many millions of their existing customers. And sales figures show that Blu-ray players and disc sales outpace HD DVD sales.
HD DVD players are currently around $150, Blu-ray players around $400 and dual format players are still stuck around $800. Without another major price drop in HD DVD players and/or dual format players the last two studios will have to support Blu-ray as well, and Sony will have won this format war, unlike the VHS – Betamax format war in VCRs twenty years ago.
And just like then, many consumers will shop carefully and still get stuck .
