Blu-ray: The Future Has Been Delayed

[THE BOUNCER]

Hot on the heels of last week’s report from ABI Research noting that many consumers may not see the picture quality difference between Blu-ray and standard DVDs comes the latest Blu-ray sales figures from NPD Group. And they’re not pretty.

According to NPD, sales of Blu-ray standalone players plummeted 40 percent from January to February, then rose a scant 2 percent from February to March. The general consensus was that once Toshiba dropped its support for the HD DVD format early this year, sales would increase.

In fact, sales of Blu-ray standalone players remain so low that NPD has not yet released actual numbers, for fear that it would be easy to identify individual retailers. The research group will start to give actual figures later this year, said Ross Rubin, director of industry analysis at NPD.

Full Story: Blu-ray: The Future Has Been Delayed - Bits - Technology - New York Times Blog

[hitmansb]

I think sales are slow because a lot of people are waiting for fall, the start of the holiday shopping season. When I bought my home ent. system (they're comign to install on Monday, can't fukkin wait!) I was going to buy a blu-ray player, but the guy in the store told me not to; he said a lot of new players will be coming into the market in time for the holdiays, so the price will likely drop by 150-200 bucks on the higher-end players that are on the market now.

[THE BOUNCER]

your right. prices are sure to drop. especially with poor sales. dont be surprised if you see players at $150 dollars and blu-ray disks being sold cheaper then dvd's.

[hitmansb]

Sales will take off when a higher precentage of people own TVs that can take advantage of Blu-Ray's picture quality. Some discount LCDs are getting close to the price range where almost anyone can afford one...it'll happen soon.

[THE BOUNCER]

Originally Posted by hitmansb

Sales will take off when a higher precentage of people own TVs that can take advantage of Blu-Ray's picture quality. Some discount LCDs are getting close to the price range where almost anyone can afford one...it'll happen soon.

i wouldn't be so sure. sales of blu-ray have actually gone down while sales of hdtv's have gone up. like the article says, for the common consumer, the difference in picture quality is not big enough.