Well, it is a given these days that the HD-DVD vs. Blu Ray war is almost over… The HD-DVD body is still showing some signs of tremors but its heart has given up the day our neighbors from Warners decided to finally take side and go “BD Only”…
So, it is all great. Microsoft have announced that they will go where the consumer goes, Apple has been behind Blu-Ray for a long time but all these are just words in the wind! The real question is “How are things on the ground, on the battlefield or more clearly, in the home?!”.
Let’s assume I would like to buy a Blu-Ray player now and start watching some great HD movies. What do I do? Which one do I buy? A bit of research on the Blu-Ray standard will tell you that there are so far 3 profiles or type of BD movies defined.
- Profile 1.0: THe not totally cooked standard that had to be released to beat HD-DVD at the door.
- Profile 1.1: The one that gives you picture in picture capability
- Profile 2.0: Aka BD-Live, which requires an Internet access to enable all possible features such as online games, audio tracks download.
There are as well hardware requirements for each profile:
| Features | Profile 1.0 | Profile 1.1 | Profile 2.0 |
| Required local storage | None | 256 MB | 1 G |
| Secondary video decoder | Optional | Mandatory | Mandatory |
| Secondary audio decoder | Optional | Mandatory | Mandatory |
| Internet connectivity | Optional | Optional | Mandator |
Today, most of the players available on the market are based on the 1.0 profile. Few are 1.1 profile and last but not least, one a handful are 2.0 compatible. Even worse, afaik, only the Playstation 3 has the built in Internet access required for profile 2.0. So what does it mean for all early adopters? Will their $1000 1.0 Profile Sony BDS-1P turn into a doorstopper as even a firmware upgrade will not compensate for the lack of hardware!
This to me is a big “no-no” in terms of market shares gain. But you never know, I might be wrong!
Having brought our office’s Blu-Ray player home, I thought it was finally time to preach in my own home and see what the family reaction would be. Luckily for me, I was able as well to borrow a couple of movies such as Pirates of the Caribbean 1 & 2.
Here I am, installing the HUGE BD Player in our living room and Sarah already thinking “Oh, oh, another box, another “Best thing ever!”.
The installation is seamless! Power and HDMI… 30 seconds!
I fire the player and after a VERY long time (damn, this thing is slow) I am greeted by a Welcome screen. I then proceed on unwrapping Pirates 2 and inserting it into the player. Close the DVD door. Wait… Wait… Wait more… and NOTHING!
- Is it me?
- Is it the disc?
- Is it the player?
First thing first, is it me? Well, I’m innocent and the player seems to work OK… So no it isn’t me!
Is it the disc? Well, I insert another movie which loads perfectly (despite an awfully long loading time). So it could be the disc!
Is it the player? Well, you never know!!! Following some late night chats with some of my colleagues from Studio New Technologies or Corp New Technologies, I start wondering if the player could require some form of firmware upgrade in order to match some of the recent BD discs releases… So I check the firmware level of the player and decide to go online to compare with any information I could find! Player Firmware: 1.0x. Sony support site says: 3.60. I am 2 generations behind! Holly cow!!!
I patiently download the firmware upgrade and burn it on a blank CD. I insert the CD in the BD player and the disc gets rejected…
I go back to the computer and decide to finally read the instructions… I then burn the firmware on a blank DVD-R and insert it in the BD player. Disc gets rejected…
I then spend a couple of hours online trying to find some reports about Error #9 and finally find out that the blank DVD must have been of unpure origin. It is strongly suggested that I should use a TDK blank disc! Well, I am a geek and after some research in my geek storage, I find a blank, brand new, unwrapped TDK DVD-R disc! Can you believe it? So I then burn (for the 3rd time) the bl**** firmware and insert it in the BD player… Guess what… REJECTED!!!
I am about to declare forfeit when I find out on the Sony website that I can as well simply order the bl**** disc! So I fill the form and hope that the damn disc will show up soon! Sony didn’t disapoint and within 5 days, I received a little disc (looked like a TDK disc to me) and a manual. I hence proceed and insert the disc in the player, read 2 to 3 times the instructions (not that clear actually) and start the upgrade process…
The disc is not rejected! IT SEEMS TO WORK! The tray opens and the disc appears… I fear the worse but the manual claims that when upgrading from a pre-historical version of the player, 2 minutes in the upgrade process, the disc will be ejected. “It is normal and the upgrade is not over. Don’t touch or remove the disc”… Ouch…
And I wait. And wait… And wait more!!! Each minute being a torture as I have no clue if the player will upgrade OK or if it will even restart! And wait more!
And finally, after a good 25 minutes, the player reboots. Everything seems fine… 2 weeks after I first tried this, I insert the Pirates of the Caribbean 2 in the tray, close it and wait… wait… wait… a minute… a minute and a half… and OH WONDER, a loading screen appears… I wait more (as something is clearly being loaded) and “boom!”, I finally get some stunning video on the screen!
AND THIS IS MEANT TO BE USER FRIENDLY? CONSUMER ELECTRONIC GRADE?!?
No effin’ way!
The Alpha consumer would simply have first thought “Oh, this is my disc” and brought the disc back to let’s say “Best Buy” or sent it back to “Amazon” and would have received a new disc (2 hours with traffic in the first case, 2 weeks through the mail in the second case). The replacement disc would not have worked and if by any chance the player was still under warranty, the next step would have been to bring the player back to the place it was bought, to find out that nothing is wrong with it! Even a replacement player, if not loaded with the most recent firmware would have presented the same symptoms!
So imagine my mum trying to figure this out?! Would she have thought “Oh, this disc does not work… This must be the firmware. I should upgrade it! Let’s check the firmware support site at Sony.com…”? Or would she have simply sent both disc and player back to the vendor?
Technology is my job and my passion and this still took me 2 weeks, 3 discs and several hours online to get this to work! Add to this that this only addresses an issue with a profile 1.0 disc! Quid of this once profile 1.1 discs or even 2.0 discs will be out?
The only solution ahead… As much as I hate to admit it, it looks like it is a Playstation 3 with seamless firmware upgrades and Online capabilities…
