HD-DVD

Blu-Ray had been saying we'd never get a three hour movie on an HD-DVD. Well, we did. Highlighting the many types of misinformation being bandied around in the HD wars, Kevin Collins - Director of HD-DVD Evangelism at Microsoft - makes a good case for his format. While Sony have been mocking HD-DVD's inferior disc capacity (30Gb to Blu-Ray's 50Gb and rising), what hasn't been made clear is that HD-DVD's video and audio actually use half the memory space of Sony's, which is using MPEG-4 video like you'd download off the internet, bumped up to HD strength. The question of disc capacity is then made even more irrelevant by HD-DVD's use of a network connection. Rather than having all the possible features like subtitles, commentaries and deleted scenes on every disc, with HD-DVD you can download the features you want to the player, which can be renewed by the content author indefinitely. Information like filmographies and locations will instead link to sites such as IMDb and GoogleEarth, so it will always be up to date. The hardware is also impressive. Committed to lowering the price as quickly as possible, a box can now be bought in the US for $299 (£150). Also economical is the fact that every HD-DVD will play on every HD-DVD player, regardless of new technologies, and that the box will include a high quality amp, so there's no need for anything else but TV and speakers. As well as their consumer-friendly approach, HD-DVD have the European film distributors taken care of. "What's interesting for me is that there are movies that are Blu-Ray in the US, that are coming out here in Europe on HD-DVD. There's a few reasons for that. One is cost; there are eight HD-DVD replicators (manufacturers) in Europe, Sony has just one, so it's cheaper to get films onto HD-DVD as these replicators want to keep their production line busy. Also, as a manufacturer, you're always going to create products for the lowest common denominator. You're not going to author special features for your disc if you're not sure if enough people will have the player capable to read it. With HD-DVD you're guaranteed that compatibility."

Pros: Major film rights, net-powered features, one-box solution

Cons: Not much good if you don't have broadband