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Sony drops DVD format for DVRs

13 September 2007 9:46 by James "Dela" Delahunty | 13 comments

Sony Corp. has made another move to display its strong support for the Blu-ray Disc format, by dumping the DVD format for use in its digital video recorders in Japan. The announcement was made by the company at the same time it unveiled four Blu-ray video recorders. The new recorders offered support for dual-layer discs which was missing from earlier models, and also offer some more attractive features.

The new models can transcode into the more efficient H.264 / AVC video format, significantly improving the quality and amount of space needed for video content. Sony would advertise its 50GB dual layer Blu-ray discs as being capable of recording 4 hours of high definition content in MPEG-2 format, but that could be increased up to 16 hours with AVC.

The BDZ-X90 model is the most powerful of the new models, supporting output of 1080p Full HD content, designed for use with a home theater system. It also sports an internal 500GB hard disk drive, supports Deep Color and HDMI 1.3. The BDZ-L70 is made specifically for users with camcorders, supporting one touch transfer of video from Handycam models to its internal 250GB HDD.

The BDZ-T50 and T70 drop the extra special features and are aimed at those who just want to record from TV signals. The sport 320GB and 250GB HDDs respectively. All models support 4x Blu-ray recording, lossless audio output via HDMI and AVCHD compatibility. While it would seem that Sony is gambling a lot on the move away from DVD, it's not as crazy as it may initially seem.

It is very difficult for a company to make any money in the market for DVD recorders, due to increasing competition. A switch to Blu-ray puts Sony in a less competitive area and even just the capacity differences to the DVD format itself is a good selling point if consumers or prosumers are interest in paying the high prices for the models.

The BDZ-X90 will cost a staggering �200,000, the BDZ-L70 will go for �180,000, the BDZ-T50 will go for �140,000 and BDZ-T70 will go for �160,000. They will be available in Japan from November 8th.

Source:
Yahoo (PC World)

Permalink to this article

Target doubles shelf space for Blu-ray titles (16 September 2007)

Warner still not picking a side in the hi-def format war (12 September 2007)

Four new Blu-ray recorders coming to Japan (12 September 2007)

DVD Forum approves 51GB HD DVD disc? (10 September 2007)

Samsung reveals more about Blu-ray / HD DVD combo player (7 September 2007)

Microsoft pushes VC-1 for broadcast (7 September 2007)

Integra to release HD DVD player (7 September 2007)

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Discuss this article!
NexGen76 (Member) 13 September 2007 9:57
Smart move because they own the HD market there like 95%. [ + quote]
nobrainer (Inactive) 13 September 2007 11:12
*Originally posted by NexGen76:* Smart move because they own the HD market there like 95%. well its either really smart or extremely dumb! what's the analogy about placing all you eggs in baskets? [ + quote]
lecsiy (Senior Member) 13 September 2007 13:25
At prices like that i cant see them flying off the shelves... [ + quote]
Pop_Smith (Senior Member) 13 September 2007 15:36
Personally I think Sony is crazy for doing this, although this could help out there format in the short-run in my opinion. I decided to convert the prices, here they are: $1,742.70 or �1,256.56 or �862.546 - BDZ-X90 $1,568.13 or �1,130.65 or �776.411 - BDZ-L70 $1,394.33 or �1,004.89 or �690.231 - BDZ-T70 $1,220.04 or � 879.590 or 603.967 - BDZ-T50 Peace [ + quote]
error5 (Senior Member) 13 September 2007 16:32
*Quote:* The BDZ-X90 will cost a staggering �200,000 A little history lesson here: When Pioneer introduced the first consumer-use DVD recorder to the Japanese market in November of 1999 it was listed at �250,000. The unit price of each DVD-RW disc was �3,000. http://pioneer.jp/press/release63.html [ + quote]
Solo_Tek (Junior Member) 13 September 2007 16:53
*Originally posted by Pop_Smith:* Personally I think Sony is crazy for doing this, although this could help out there format in the short-run in my opinion. "I decided to convert the prices, here they are: $1,742.70 or �1,256.56 or �862.546 - BDZ-X90 $1,568.13 or �1,130.65 or �776.411 - BDZ-L70 $1,394.33 or �1,004.89 or �690.231 - BDZ-T70 $1,220.04 or � 879.590 or 603.967 - BDZ-T50" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- I agree that Sony maybe taking a leap but truthfully that is not a lot of money form what I understand about Japaneses culture. Its my understanding that the driving for of the Japanese economy is a young demographic of men and women who have many high paying jobs and they live at home with there parents. Many Japanese families live in one home all through out there lives so they have more money to waste on these new electronics. So if you look at it from Sony's stand point I think its a good test to see how they will react to the market. Now if Sony pulled this in the US it would not go over well at all. LoL. Peace [ + quote]
HDextreme (Inactive) 13 September 2007 23:16
@Pop_Smith - Thanks for posting the converted prices. You saved many of us an extra google search. I agree with Solo_Tek that this may work in Japan, but not here in the US... at least not now. [ + quote]
SProdigy (Member) 14 September 2007 4:51
I see this as more useful for companies that may monitor security, or have a need for large capacity discs. Although, why wouldn't they just record to a hard disk and then, if needed, back up the hard disk to something like a tape drive? It would be far less expensive than buying these burners and Blu-Ray media. I suppose they would archive X amount of days, then back up on tape X amount of days, then rinse and repeat? [ + quote]
nobrainer (Inactive) 14 September 2007 5:20
*Originally posted by SProdigy:* I see this as more useful for companies that may monitor security, or have a need for large capacity discs. Although, why wouldn't they just record to a hard disk and then, if needed, back up the hard disk to something like a tape drive? It would be far less expensive than buying these burners and Blu-Ray media. I suppose they would archive X amount of days, then back up on tape X amount of days, then rinse and repeat? because of mostly speed but price comes into it, companies use tape drives. blu-ray or hd-dvd will never be adopted by companies for backups. the home user may use it, if burners and blank media about and cheap, i say again, CHEAP! (if it ain't cheap the format will fade from pc use very quickly). but in reality who has 50gig of data to back up, a 4.5gig dvd is more that enough unless you are a pirate, and seems blu-ray BD+ blocks all attempts to use pirated software its a pointless format for backup. Track What Companies Have Edited Wiki http://wikiscanner.virgil.gr/ (very heavy load atm) [ + quote] This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 14 September 2007 5:25
Riotard (Inactive) 14 September 2007 7:38
Just like to put in, for American and EUrope and the UK the rpice would be even higher, because like they woudl jsut charge higher, take the ps3 as an exampel of that, because its more then double the price ppl in japan have to pay for the UK. USA pay �100 more then japan, probably �50 with the price reduction, but still its a 20% increase in price, so you should probably add that into the equation. [ + quote]
eatsushi (Senior Member) 14 September 2007 8:05
*Originally posted by error5:* A little history lesson here: When Pioneer introduced the first consumer-use DVD recorder to the Japanese market in November of 1999 it was listed at �250,000. The unit price of each DVD-RW disc was �3,000. http://pioneer.jp/press/release63.html Good point there. I remember the earliest Panasonic and Pioneer DVD Recorders were $2,000 to $3,000 here in the US. The earliest 2x blank media were about $20 per disc. This just shows that new technology is expensive. On the HD DVD side - the first HD DVD standalone recorder released by Toshiba in Japan is the RD-A1. It has a 1 TB hard drive and retailed for �398,000 or around $3,500. http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/22/toshi...-with-1tb-disk/ [ + quote] This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 14 September 2007 8:06
borhan9 (AfterDawn Addict) 14 September 2007 22:16
Big step by Sony. [ + quote]
HDextreme (Inactive) 15 September 2007 0:34
*Quote:* *Originally posted by error5:* A little history lesson here: When Pioneer introduced the first consumer-use DVD recorder to the Japanese market in November of 1999 it was listed at �250,000. The unit price of each DVD-RW disc was �3,000. http://pioneer.jp/press/release63.html Good point there. I remember the earliest Panasonic and Pioneer DVD Recorders were $2,000 to $3,000 here in the US. The earliest 2x blank media were about $20 per disc. This just shows that new technology is expensive. On the HD DVD side - the first HD DVD standalone recorder released by Toshiba in Japan is the RD-A1. It has a 1 TB hard drive and retailed for �398,000 or around $3,500. http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/22/toshi...b-disk/ The RD-A1 is a beast! It's a little surprising that Sony didn't match the storage capacity of it's competitor. I guess they figured 1TB of storage is overkill. [ + quote]