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Pioneer was excited to release more Blu-ray details today, but claims consumer Blu-ray is not ready yet

A week ago, Pioneer introduced their Blu-ray product line, including the BDR-101A Blu-ray recorder.  The BDR-101A is capable of recording and playing 25GB Blu-ray writeable BD-R/RE discs at 2x data transfer rates, or just about 72 Mbits/sec.  Blu-ray can fit more data on a standard DVD-sized media by using a blue laser with a shorter wavelength instead of the traditional red laser.  

Today's press conference gave us more details on the BDR-101A, including the extremely steep $995 price tag.  Then again, if you don't mind the $50/disc cost of Blu-ray, a grand or so for a burner might be a value. Pioneer representatives stressed that recordable Blu-ray exists only to help get Blu-ray media out to market, and is really only practical for studio productions.  Consumer grade Blu-ray players will not feature any recording capability, nor high definition analog audio output like those of SACD players.  Pioneer's first consumer player, the BDP-HD1, will be ready in May, and come with a $1,800 price tag.

The BDR-101A is expected to ship within the next few months in the US.  The HD-DVD consortium is also expected to release more "official" tidbits about HD-DVD and HD-DVDR, with players like those Toshiba announced earlier today.  As one Pioneer representative said about Blu-ray, "[We're] confident we will preveal. Nobody wanted a format war."  With the recordable format wars starting up again, don't be surprised if we see multi-format burners, perhaps capable of HD-DVDR and Blu-ray.  Several manufacturers we've talked to have already hinted at adding multi-format burners to their lineup around the second or third generation.  

When asked to confirm the details on region settings on Blu-ray, Pioneer simply stated that regional locking and zones is not yet finalized.  The news earlier this week that Blu-ray will combine the US and Japanese regions is still unconfirmed.

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Recording Time
By nomagic on 1/5/2006 11:43:07 AM , Rating: 2
I know future BRD recorder will be faster. But this one doesn't seem fast enough.

1 byte(B) = 8 bits(b)
1024 MB= 1 GB
1024 B = 1 MB

2X recording speed = 72 Mb/s = 9 MB/s
A 25 GB disk would take:
(25 GB) * (1024 MB/GB) / (9 MB/s) / (60 sec/min)
= 47.41 min!

This is a theoretical calculation. I believe the actual time will take longer. The recording time per disk makes this drive less attractive.




RE: Recording Time
By Furen on 1/5/2006 6:41:58 PM , Rating: 2
Dont forget overhead for ECC and the like. Realistically I'd say that around 10 bits are written for every byte of data, which would make your data rate 7.2MB/sec


RE: Recording Time
By tuteja1986 on 1/7/2006 7:29:08 AM , Rating: 2
no wonder sony was so quite about PS3... they can't afford to produce cheap Blu-ray drive and if they somehow managed to then it will full of bugs ;( . Blu-ray drive for ps3 would cost $200 per drive alone. Now the Blu-ray final hope is PS3 and mass support of Movie industry. But if M$ can release a HD-DVD for XBOX 360 as a package and people start to buy them too then its going to turn into all out war. But i think the drive that can sell for arround $300 below early 2007 wins :) and i think that will be HD-DVD.


Sounds about right...
By Furen on 1/4/2006 7:36:25 PM , Rating: 2
This is why I doubt that the "HD format wars" will be decided before the end of 2006, at the earliest. The initial price for blue ray will be insanely sick while HD-DVD can afford to launch a bit later since the technology itself is more mature (as it is an evolution to current DVD technology rather than a format built from the ground up). The only unknown here is the PS3. If it does launch within 6-12 months and it does play blueray movies (and it isnt obscenely expensive) then we may get a replay of the PS2's launch. Then again, the benefits of going to HD-DVD/BR are almost insignificant besides the benefit we got from going from VHS to DVD, so the market iself may resist the change.




RE: Sounds about right...
By n7 on 1/4/2006 11:44:43 PM , Rating: 2
I'm psychic!

I guessed initial price would be $1,000, & i was right, unfortunately.

I just want to see them @ $500 by year end, but even that seems too optimistic


x2 expensive AND fewer features?
By Poser on 1/4/2006 5:38:32 PM , Rating: 2
$1800 for a read-only Blu-Ray drive, and no comment on it's outrageous price? An extra zero got tacked on there, right?




Dear Pioneer
By bigboxes on 1/4/2006 5:47:55 PM , Rating: 2
Get bent.

Sincerely,

The Consumer




What a deal?
By bob661 on 1/4/2006 6:16:28 PM , Rating: 2
I'll get two!




Winner?
By nowayout99 on 1/5/2006 4:34:51 AM , Rating: 2
The price differences between BRD and HD-DVD are drastic here *right now*, but can a winner be determined when such a small percentage of households are able to take advantage of HD content anyway?

I mean, isn't it possible this could drag on for years?




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