http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/19/tech...ney_technology


I told you so.

Trevor Wilson

Trevor Wilson wrote:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/19/tech...ney_technology


I told you so.

Trevor Wilson

Makes a change for Sony to win a format war. ;-)

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

"Trevor Wilson" wrote
in message
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/19/tech...ney_technology


I told you so.


If I didn't tell them first! ;-)

"John Williamson" wrote in message
...
Trevor Wilson wrote:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/19/tech...ney_technology


I told you so.

Trevor Wilson
Makes a change for Sony to win a format war. ;-)

**It was a forgone conclusion. Sony did a bunch of things right. The main
one was to ship thousands of players BEFORE significant numbers of software
titles (in either format) became available. HD-DVD lost the war before it
really started. Kudos to Toshiba for pulling the plug early though.
Consumers can buy hardware and software with some confidence.

Trevor Wilson

"John Williamson" wrote in message
...
Trevor Wilson wrote:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/19/tech...ney_technology


I told you so.

Trevor Wilson
Makes a change for Sony to win a format war. ;-)

**BTW: More than 20 years production of the Beta system can hardly be
regarded as failure. Nor can many other Sony innovations. Trinitron picture
tubes, Walkmans, et al. Like any company engaged in high technology, they
can be expected to stumble once in awhile. I guess the bigger the company,
the bigger and more embarrassing the stumbles.

Trevor Wilson

Trevor Wilson wrote:
"John Williamson" wrote in message
...
Trevor Wilson wrote:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/19/tech...ney_technology


I told you so.

Trevor Wilson
Makes a change for Sony to win a format war. ;-)

**BTW: More than 20 years production of the Beta system can hardly be
regarded as failure. Nor can many other Sony innovations. Trinitron picture
tubes, Walkmans, et al. Like any company engaged in high technology, they
can be expected to stumble once in awhile. I guess the bigger the company,
the bigger and more embarrassing the stumbles.

I was thinking that Beta only ever had a small part of the market, even
though it was produced for a long time, MiniDv & VHS-C have mostly seen
off Digital 8 & the other 8mm tape formats, the Walkman used the Philips
Compact Cassette, & so on. I wouldn't say that Trinitron was a format as
such, although it did give a better picture than shadowmask, if you
could live with the shadow of the wires. Oh, & I know DVD was *partly*
created by Sony.

Sony have done a *lot* of good stuff, some of which I have bought & used
regularly, their formats have never been market leaders, IIRC. Now, in
the Broadcast market, it's a different story. Digibeta, anyone? :-)

I was smiling as I wrote the first reaction, though. And as someone else
has said, good for Toshiba for conceding defeat so soon. It's saved me
having to buy at least one new player.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

"John Williamson" wrote in message
...

I was thinking that Beta only ever had a small part of the market, even
though it was produced for a long time,

I agree.

MiniDv & VHS-C have mostly seen
off Digital 8 & the other 8mm tape formats,

I'm not sure that I agree with that analysis. VHS-C was launched
head-to-head with the original 8mm tape format. The supposed advantage of
VHS-C was that the tapes could be played back (with the aid of an adaptor)
on an ordinary VHS VCR. On the other hand 8mm offered better picture and
sound quality and longer recording time per tape. So VHS-C appealed more to
the casual user and 8mm to the enthusiast. Later we had both S-VHS-C and
Hi8. Again Hi8 was the choice of the enthusiast, indeed it was good enough
to be used professionally and there were Hi8 camcorders and editing decks
made for the professional market.

When Digital 8 was launched Sony clearly decided *not* to offer it as a pro
or semi-pro option, all the D8 camcorders were clearly aimed strictly at the
amateur market, the selling point being the ability of D8 camcorders to play
back analogue 8mm and Hi8 tapes. On the other hand there were semi-pro
MiniDV camcorders available. IMO this is a pity as I've found D8 to be a far
more robust format than MiniDV, as good as DVCAM, let down only by the lack
of D8 camcorders with the performance and features expected in the semi-pro
market.


If you want an example of a failed format that almost brought a huge
electronics company to it's knees I'd like to nominate RCA's Selectavision
video-disc system.

David.

In article , Trevor Wilson
wrote:

Consumers can buy hardware and software with some confidence.

I wonder... I am still cautious of the small surface spot size and shallow
depth for the information layer of Blu Ray. I am personally happy to wait
and allow the long term reliabilty to be tested by others. :-)

Slainte,

Jim

--
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Audio Misc http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/index.html
Armstrong Audio http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Armstrong/armstrong.html

David Looser wrote:
"John Williamson" wrote in message
...
I was thinking that Beta only ever had a small part of the market, even
though it was produced for a long time,

I agree.

MiniDv & VHS-C have mostly seen
off Digital 8 & the other 8mm tape formats,

I'm not sure that I agree with that analysis. VHS-C was launched
head-to-head with the original 8mm tape format. The supposed advantage of
VHS-C was that the tapes could be played back (with the aid of an adaptor)
on an ordinary VHS VCR. On the other hand 8mm offered better picture and
sound quality and longer recording time per tape. So VHS-C appealed more to
the casual user and 8mm to the enthusiast. Later we had both S-VHS-C and
Hi8. Again Hi8 was the choice of the enthusiast, indeed it was good enough
to be used professionally and there were Hi8 camcorders and editing decks
made for the professional market.

Possibly I should have mentioned the consumer market, I just took that
as read. Hi8 was about the same picture quality as low band U-Matic, I
think, S-VHS a tad lower?

When Digital 8 was launched Sony clearly decided *not* to offer it as a pro
or semi-pro option, all the D8 camcorders were clearly aimed strictly at the
amateur market, the selling point being the ability of D8 camcorders to play
back analogue 8mm and Hi8 tapes. On the other hand there were semi-pro
MiniDV camcorders available. IMO this is a pity as I've found D8 to be a far
more robust format than MiniDV, as good as DVCAM, let down only by the lack
of D8 camcorders with the performance and features expected in the semi-pro
market.

I've seen a *lot* of Sony gear in Professional & semi-professional hands
over the years, but not a lot in amateur hands. I've no great experience
of the reliability of the Sony D8 stuff, but a lot of the problems I've
read about with MiniDV relate to using more than one brand of tape in
the machine.
Sony also had their pro market to protect, so I'd not expect them to
push the D8 stuff as professional quality. ;-)


If you want an example of a failed format that almost brought a huge
electronics company to it's knees I'd like to nominate RCA's Selectavision
video-disc system.

Quite...

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

"John Williamson" wrote in message
...
Trevor Wilson wrote:
"John Williamson" wrote in message
...
Trevor Wilson wrote:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/19/tech...ney_technology


I told you so.

Trevor Wilson
Makes a change for Sony to win a format war. ;-)

**BTW: More than 20 years production of the Beta system can hardly be
regarded as failure. Nor can many other Sony innovations. Trinitron
picture tubes, Walkmans, et al. Like any company engaged in high
technology, they can be expected to stumble once in awhile. I guess the
bigger the company, the bigger and more embarrassing the stumbles.

I was thinking that Beta only ever had a small part of the market, even
though it was produced for a long time,

**A mistake many people make. Apple only have a small part of the computer
market, compared to PCs. However, they are one of the largest single
manufacturers of personal computers. Same deal with Beta machines. There was
only small number of manufacturers of Beta machines and a large number of
VHS manufacturers. Sony, however, was still one of the largest (and,
presumably, most profitable) manufacturers of video recorders.

MiniDv & VHS-C have mostly seen
off Digital 8 & the other 8mm tape formats, the Walkman used the Philips
Compact Cassette, & so on. I wouldn't say that Trinitron was a format as
such, although it did give a better picture than shadowmask, if you could
live with the shadow of the wires. Oh, & I know DVD was *partly* created
by Sony.

**As was the Compact DiskT. One should never write-off Sony as a serious
innovator.

Trevor Wilson