Mark and Simon,
That people do or do not have systems capable of revealing the details of the high res formats in either video or audio is exactly the problem with thinking these formats have any chance.

You also have to ask, does the mass market care about technical superiority? I think the answer has come back as a resounding: "NO! We want easy and inexpensive."

The whole point here is that the mass market is not motivated by technical superiority. It is motivated by convenience and cost. Name one thing HDDVD or BRD does better than DVD from an ease of use stand point? The average consumer probably sees these new formats as the greedy movie companies trying to sell yet another format to him or her that they have to spend more money purchasing yet again the same movies and also how in the world will they hook up the expected mess of cables (they probably do not know of HDMI and probably wont believe the sales person if the sales person knows of it).

The mass market has hit probably its sweet spot in terms of quality with DVD. Just like with CD.

Just like with CD the consumer is really not requesting a higher res format.

Therefore you see things like DVD, XBoxs and PS3s and HD cable boxes hooked up- even by the cable company's own technicians, using composite video.

Remember a selling point of DVD-A at least was multichannel. But Multichannel fails several convenience tests.

1- its not portable, whereas 2 small earbuds for stereo playback are very portable.

2- its not family (OK lets admit it: wife) friendly. you need lots of speakers as in #1 and speakers are generally considered ugly.

As a matter of fact, you have companies like Meridian throwing considerable resources at in wall speakers and at a different level, like Yamaha releasing surround sound from 1 speaker solutions. Why- because having lets say 75% of the benefit of multiple speakers with the aesthetic benefit of a single box that mounts in the wall or under the flat panel is something the market WILL pay for.

I think the analogy to SACD and DVD-A is a very good one.

1. in both cases (next gen audio/ next gen video) the consumer electronics companies introduce new formats not out of some great consumer demand, but because they want to protect their revenue streams from piracy and also from the simple product life cycle of an aging product.

2. in both cases the replacement products are roughly the same physical size and shape.

3. in both cases the replacement product functions fairly similarly (though there are some differences the mass market will consider them not enough)

4. in both cases the replacement product is less portable

5. in both cases the replacement product requires the consumer to buy a new player which is incompatible with another next gen format that purports to do the same thing.

6. in both cases the mass market has been warming up to downloading content, legal or otherwise.

7. In both cases, we, the early adopter group, which should be 95%+ in favor of supporting such formats instead are more like 50-60% in favor. If you can't win the overwhelming majority of early adopters, I think the format will have problems. Guess what- we don't like format wars either! smile

I see them as much more similar than dissimilar.

best regards,
Jerry

Best regards,
Jerry
Main System: 861v6, DSP8000s in corners, DSP7000s Center and Sides, 1-9 humans.