What compelled you to finally get DVD? LOTR?

[V]

I'm having this discussion, about how Blu Ray beat HDDVD for the next gen platform, but few people are buying them yet; half due to price, half for fear they'll be like Laserdisc; superceded by something else in only a year or two.

So the question is, what will finally compel people to go out and buy Blu Ray players and get the ball rolling.

The Dark Knight sold 29,000 Blu Rays...but in Japan, the release just now of the Blu Ray of Rebuild of Evangelion 1.0 : You Are (Not) Alone, sold 49,000 Blu Rays *in its first week*

so at least in the anime industry, I think that that might be "the movie that gets us all to finally get a Blu Ray player"

****my memory is rusty, but the first thing I "actually needed a DVD player to watch" was the Fellowship of the Ring DVD box set.

Certainly, it *redefined* what we expect from DVD's, with several movies worth of special features; it was an experience unto itself, and the LOTR trilogy boxset as a whole is still my gold standard for bonus features.

Still, around when we were switching from VHS to DVD, what was officially "the movie that compelled people to finally buy DVD players when it came out on DVD"?

I *think* it was Fellowship of the Ring.

 

[Hermiod]

Like a lot of people - The Matrix.

 

[FPAlpha]

Price.. simply put.

I'm not a video fanatic, i.e. i don't go around with a magnifiying glass and analyze a TV screen and how it displays the picture or notice small imperfections in a DVD transfer.. i'm not that sensitive to it.

When i bought my DVD player agaes ago it cost 50 Euro.. about as much as a Videogame today and i usually buy my DVDs in the 10 Euro range with very few new releases where i buy full retail (like when the Firefly box came out or LotR Extended Editions).

So the price of the general movies will decide it for most people and that can only happen when BR movies reach normal DVDs in pricing.. i don't think any single movie or box can do that.

At last count good BR players are around the 250 Euro mark which is the extreme end of what i'd shell out for a player and the discs themselves are around 20-25 which is too much for me to buy on a regular basis.

When i finally get around to buying a HD TV i'll probably get it in a package with a BR player and be done with it but that will happen in early next year, i.e. next spring maybe.. i'm in no rush to get the latest tech at all cost.

 

[TheMasterOfOrion]

DVD has in the old DVD format?

I didn't but into it at all and I mostly avoid trends like the plague, DVD players were expensive and the movies were also overpriced

what happened was I got a computer and a PS2 around Y 2002. All of a sudden I have 2 DVD drives. Curiosity got the better of me so I rented a couple of DVD movies (think it was Kubricks Shining and a Jackie Chan movie) and was surprised by sharpness of the picture, the extras, the subtitles, the behind the scenes etc and I haven't thought about VHS since 2002

 

[backstept]

Like a lot of people - The Matrix.

indeed

 

[Lindley]

Hmm....DVD players were in all the bedrooms when my mother completed construction of her Vermont house in 1998. So I guess I was fairly early on the bandwagon, but not by choice really.

 

[Roshi]

Captain Kirk's split infinitive!!!!

As Hermiod said, 'twas the Matrix.

 

[Deckerd]

We didn't get one until after we got our first xbox. We were watching dvd with that until someone got us a cheapo dvd player.

 

[Pingfah]

Matrix.

 

[Too Much Fun]

I've been a serious movie buff (as in wanting to watch as many great movies as possible old and new, not just the latest releases) since I was about 15, but it wasn't till I turned 20 that I started thinking about owning my favourites and building a collection. My favourite movie ("Scarface" 1983) just happened to be released on DVD at the time, so it was a no-brainer what I'd start with.

 

[od0_ital]

Star Trek: The Motion Picture - The Director's Cut

I was readin' an article about the new cut of the movie, the "updated" effects that, unlike certain other updates, was done as they would have been done back in the '70s, and the bonus features, especially the Phase II stuff, and decided that on my way home from work, I'd stop off at Wal-Mart. If they had TMP on DVD, I'd get it and a player to watch it on.

And they did, so I did.

 

[bigdaddy]

Price.. simply put.

Yep. I can't remember the first DVD I bought for it, but I remember paying $30 for it from Sears and the guy asking me if I want to spend $35 on a 3 year warranty. The thing lasted 4.5 before it started to screw up and I bought another one for $30.

 

[Warp Coil]

1. Price. I waited until DVD players became cheap enough that it seemed reasonable to buy one. My Sony DVD player cost somewhere between $200-250 back in 2001 when I bought it. It still works perfectly.

2. Availability. DVDs started coming out before VHS. I believe this happened with a few Trek titles. You could rent the VHS or buy the DVD, but stores like Best Buy wouldn't offer VHS copies until later. I realized that if I wanted something new, DVD was the way to go.

3. Analog vs Digital. No tape that could get messed up. No worry about signal degradation over time. No need to rewind and fast-forward the tape. Bonus features available on DVD only.

 

[Starbreaker]

I started using DVDs when I first got my PS2. I'll get a Blu-Ray when they release Lord of the Rings on a single disc!

 

[the Dagman]

I went DVD back in 1998. It wasn't one particular movie that did it. It was the fact that I hated VHS, too many ruined tapes, and I saw an online auction for a Toshiba DVD player that was a good deal back then.

 

[John Clark]

For me, it was price.

At the time, the SG1 dvds were £16 for four episodes. At the same store, the VHS were £14 for two episodes.

 

[TheArsenal]

DVD? The Matrix.
Blu-Ray? Got it when they came down in price.

 

[barnaclelapse]

For DVDs, it was when the PS2 came out.

For Blu Ray, I still haven't made the jump, and I still don't a significant enough reason why I should.

 

[Ayelbourne]

LOTR for me.
Special Extended Edition of Fellowship, to be precise.

 

[nx1701g]

Mine was a Christmas Gift in 1999.