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Right, my story begins about a month ago.
I was sitting in my chair, reading my favourite PC-Gamesmagazine when my eye fell onto a nice looking contest where you could win loads of prices (I guess you all know of them huh ?). The first price was this monster of a PC (giving away a Playstation 2 would be quite silly for a PC-magazine) and since I felt very lucky that day, I entered the contest.
A couple of weeks later, I got a mail from the magazine wich said that I had won a price.
You're probably all thinking what this message is all about, well the fact is that afterwards it seemed that I didn't win the computer, no, no. There were also other prices and I managed to steal away the aptly named nineteenth price. Well, fair enough, a price is a price I thought and one should be happy when one gets something for free, right ? I wasn't very happy anymore when it turned out that I had won a DVD. This unhappiness probably found it's origin in the fact that I haven't got a DVD player so the price was very pretty damn useless to me.
But hey, nowadays everybody is talking about DVD and how amazingly great it is so I got a little curious and started thinking about buying myself a DVD-player so I could at least take a look at my one little DVD.
After a little investigation into the DVD and DVD-player market, I am a lot smarter now (ahum) and I'm pretty sure that I won't be buying a DVD-player in the near future. I mean, has anybody ever looked at those prices ??? Sadly enough, Special Reserve doesn't deliver hardware outside of the UK so I had to rely on my local Belgian electronics-shop and there the cheapest DVD-player costs about £ 150 while a DVD costs £ 20 at least.
Did the entire world become rich over night or something ? (And if they did, why wasn't I informed ?).
Then the biggest shock came as the salesman told me that you can't even record a television program on a normal DVD-player, no if you want to do something revolutionary as that, you have to buy a DVD-player at a price for wich I have to work an entire month !!!
I really wonder what is so new and so flashy about a DVD compared to the 'old' videos. You can buy two videos for the price of one DVD and you can record television programs on a video, right ? So why does anyone want to buy a DVD-player that costs more and does less ? If you spend £ 10 on a video and afterwards it turns out that you don't like the movie, then it's a shame but if you spend £ 20 on a DVD and you don't like it, it's a little disaster certainly because you can't even tape over the DVD, making it completely useless at all.
All the DVD-lovers really seem to enjoy the so-called extras that you can find on DVD. These extras mostly contain an interview with a director or an actor or the cleaning lady who made sure the movie set remained nice and shiny, wich is all good when you are a complete movie-freak but when I buy a movie, I only want to see the movie and I don't care about the endless ravings of some director telling us how he made the movie or about all the funny stuff that happend while making it and so on. It was probably the idea of some clever marketing boy or girl to put some boring interviews on the DVD (hey, room enough), announcing it under the promising title of extras and asking a big price for it.
So, I guess it will take a couple of years before I'm going to buy myself a DVD-player (at a normal price and with the same options as a videoplayer)and then I wil finally be able to see what it exactly was that I'd won all those years ago (it better be damn good then).
I was sitting in my chair, reading my favourite PC-Gamesmagazine when my eye fell onto a nice looking contest where you could win loads of prices (I guess you all know of them huh ?). The first price was this monster of a PC (giving away a Playstation 2 would be quite silly for a PC-magazine) and since I felt very lucky that day, I entered the contest.
A couple of weeks later, I got a mail from the magazine wich said that I had won a price.
You're probably all thinking what this message is all about, well the fact is that afterwards it seemed that I didn't win the computer, no, no. There were also other prices and I managed to steal away the aptly named nineteenth price. Well, fair enough, a price is a price I thought and one should be happy when one gets something for free, right ? I wasn't very happy anymore when it turned out that I had won a DVD. This unhappiness probably found it's origin in the fact that I haven't got a DVD player so the price was very pretty damn useless to me.
But hey, nowadays everybody is talking about DVD and how amazingly great it is so I got a little curious and started thinking about buying myself a DVD-player so I could at least take a look at my one little DVD.
After a little investigation into the DVD and DVD-player market, I am a lot smarter now (ahum) and I'm pretty sure that I won't be buying a DVD-player in the near future. I mean, has anybody ever looked at those prices ??? Sadly enough, Special Reserve doesn't deliver hardware outside of the UK so I had to rely on my local Belgian electronics-shop and there the cheapest DVD-player costs about £ 150 while a DVD costs £ 20 at least.
Did the entire world become rich over night or something ? (And if they did, why wasn't I informed ?).
Then the biggest shock came as the salesman told me that you can't even record a television program on a normal DVD-player, no if you want to do something revolutionary as that, you have to buy a DVD-player at a price for wich I have to work an entire month !!!
I really wonder what is so new and so flashy about a DVD compared to the 'old' videos. You can buy two videos for the price of one DVD and you can record television programs on a video, right ? So why does anyone want to buy a DVD-player that costs more and does less ? If you spend £ 10 on a video and afterwards it turns out that you don't like the movie, then it's a shame but if you spend £ 20 on a DVD and you don't like it, it's a little disaster certainly because you can't even tape over the DVD, making it completely useless at all.
All the DVD-lovers really seem to enjoy the so-called extras that you can find on DVD. These extras mostly contain an interview with a director or an actor or the cleaning lady who made sure the movie set remained nice and shiny, wich is all good when you are a complete movie-freak but when I buy a movie, I only want to see the movie and I don't care about the endless ravings of some director telling us how he made the movie or about all the funny stuff that happend while making it and so on. It was probably the idea of some clever marketing boy or girl to put some boring interviews on the DVD (hey, room enough), announcing it under the promising title of extras and asking a big price for it.
So, I guess it will take a couple of years before I'm going to buy myself a DVD-player (at a normal price and with the same options as a videoplayer)and then I wil finally be able to see what it exactly was that I'd won all those years ago (it better be damn good then).
Right, my story begins about a month ago.
I was sitting in my chair, reading my favourite PC-Gamesmagazine when my eye fell onto a nice looking contest where you could win loads of prices (I guess you all know of them huh ?). The first price was this monster of a PC (giving away a Playstation 2 would be quite silly for a PC-magazine) and since I felt very lucky that day, I entered the contest.
A couple of weeks later, I got a mail from the magazine wich said that I had won a price.
You're probably all thinking what this message is all about, well the fact is that afterwards it seemed that I didn't win the computer, no, no. There were also other prices and I managed to steal away the aptly named nineteenth price. Well, fair enough, a price is a price I thought and one should be happy when one gets something for free, right ? I wasn't very happy anymore when it turned out that I had won a DVD. This unhappiness probably found it's origin in the fact that I haven't got a DVD player so the price was very pretty damn useless to me.
But hey, nowadays everybody is talking about DVD and how amazingly great it is so I got a little curious and started thinking about buying myself a DVD-player so I could at least take a look at my one little DVD.
After a little investigation into the DVD and DVD-player market, I am a lot smarter now (ahum) and I'm pretty sure that I won't be buying a DVD-player in the near future. I mean, has anybody ever looked at those prices ??? Sadly enough, Special Reserve doesn't deliver hardware outside of the UK so I had to rely on my local Belgian electronics-shop and there the cheapest DVD-player costs about £ 150 while a DVD costs £ 20 at least.
Did the entire world become rich over night or something ? (And if they did, why wasn't I informed ?).
Then the biggest shock came as the salesman told me that you can't even record a television program on a normal DVD-player, no if you want to do something revolutionary as that, you have to buy a DVD-player at a price for wich I have to work an entire month !!!
I really wonder what is so new and so flashy about a DVD compared to the 'old' videos. You can buy two videos for the price of one DVD and you can record television programs on a video, right ? So why does anyone want to buy a DVD-player that costs more and does less ? If you spend £ 10 on a video and afterwards it turns out that you don't like the movie, then it's a shame but if you spend £ 20 on a DVD and you don't like it, it's a little disaster certainly because you can't even tape over the DVD, making it completely useless at all.
All the DVD-lovers really seem to enjoy the so-called extras that you can find on DVD. These extras mostly contain an interview with a director or an actor or the cleaning lady who made sure the movie set remained nice and shiny, wich is all good when you are a complete movie-freak but when I buy a movie, I only want to see the movie and I don't care about the endless ravings of some director telling us how he made the movie or about all the funny stuff that happend while making it and so on. It was probably the idea of some clever marketing boy or girl to put some boring interviews on the DVD (hey, room enough), announcing it under the promising title of extras and asking a big price for it.
So, I guess it will take a couple of years before I'm going to buy myself a DVD-player (at a normal price and with the same options as a videoplayer)and then I wil finally be able to see what it exactly was that I'd won all those years ago (it better be damn good then).
I was sitting in my chair, reading my favourite PC-Gamesmagazine when my eye fell onto a nice looking contest where you could win loads of prices (I guess you all know of them huh ?). The first price was this monster of a PC (giving away a Playstation 2 would be quite silly for a PC-magazine) and since I felt very lucky that day, I entered the contest.
A couple of weeks later, I got a mail from the magazine wich said that I had won a price.
You're probably all thinking what this message is all about, well the fact is that afterwards it seemed that I didn't win the computer, no, no. There were also other prices and I managed to steal away the aptly named nineteenth price. Well, fair enough, a price is a price I thought and one should be happy when one gets something for free, right ? I wasn't very happy anymore when it turned out that I had won a DVD. This unhappiness probably found it's origin in the fact that I haven't got a DVD player so the price was very pretty damn useless to me.
But hey, nowadays everybody is talking about DVD and how amazingly great it is so I got a little curious and started thinking about buying myself a DVD-player so I could at least take a look at my one little DVD.
After a little investigation into the DVD and DVD-player market, I am a lot smarter now (ahum) and I'm pretty sure that I won't be buying a DVD-player in the near future. I mean, has anybody ever looked at those prices ??? Sadly enough, Special Reserve doesn't deliver hardware outside of the UK so I had to rely on my local Belgian electronics-shop and there the cheapest DVD-player costs about £ 150 while a DVD costs £ 20 at least.
Did the entire world become rich over night or something ? (And if they did, why wasn't I informed ?).
Then the biggest shock came as the salesman told me that you can't even record a television program on a normal DVD-player, no if you want to do something revolutionary as that, you have to buy a DVD-player at a price for wich I have to work an entire month !!!
I really wonder what is so new and so flashy about a DVD compared to the 'old' videos. You can buy two videos for the price of one DVD and you can record television programs on a video, right ? So why does anyone want to buy a DVD-player that costs more and does less ? If you spend £ 10 on a video and afterwards it turns out that you don't like the movie, then it's a shame but if you spend £ 20 on a DVD and you don't like it, it's a little disaster certainly because you can't even tape over the DVD, making it completely useless at all.
All the DVD-lovers really seem to enjoy the so-called extras that you can find on DVD. These extras mostly contain an interview with a director or an actor or the cleaning lady who made sure the movie set remained nice and shiny, wich is all good when you are a complete movie-freak but when I buy a movie, I only want to see the movie and I don't care about the endless ravings of some director telling us how he made the movie or about all the funny stuff that happend while making it and so on. It was probably the idea of some clever marketing boy or girl to put some boring interviews on the DVD (hey, room enough), announcing it under the promising title of extras and asking a big price for it.
So, I guess it will take a couple of years before I'm going to buy myself a DVD-player (at a normal price and with the same options as a videoplayer)and then I wil finally be able to see what it exactly was that I'd won all those years ago (it better be damn good then).
I take it you meant "prize" not "price"?
Hmm you have a point mate. I got a PS2 which has a DVD player option. But yeah not being able to copy tv programs is a big let down unless you want to fork out for a writeable DVD player. (This would also increase Piracy).
X Asmodai X wrote:
> a DVD costs £ 20 at least
I've never paid more than £18 for a DVD, and even at that price it's at least a double disc one. I bought the 3 disc Simpsons Season 1 for £17.99. Shop around a bit (and avoid HMV). The picture and (especially) sound quality improvements over video justify the extra couple of quid alone.
> a DVD costs £ 20 at least
I've never paid more than £18 for a DVD, and even at that price it's at least a double disc one. I bought the 3 disc Simpsons Season 1 for £17.99. Shop around a bit (and avoid HMV). The picture and (especially) sound quality improvements over video justify the extra couple of quid alone.
before going on about DVD players have u actually tried one out before...
And what about surround sound?
a dvd layer and a good system would cost about £500.
A SS system alone would cost about £250 and a VCR that uses SS would be a hefty £200 ( i know these things) and now are you able to justify the fact that paying an extra £50 for a DVD player and probably get a couple of DVDs chucked in ...
I have one of the aforementioned systems and am more than happy with it.. why shouldnt you?
And what about surround sound?
a dvd layer and a good system would cost about £500.
A SS system alone would cost about £250 and a VCR that uses SS would be a hefty £200 ( i know these things) and now are you able to justify the fact that paying an extra £50 for a DVD player and probably get a couple of DVDs chucked in ...
I have one of the aforementioned systems and am more than happy with it.. why shouldnt you?
SmokedKipper wrote:
> The picture and
> (especially) sound quality improvements over video justify the extra
> couple of quid alone.
I agree, the quality of both picture and sound is noticably alot better on DVD.
Not being able to record onto DVD (not affordably anyway) doesn't really bother me too much, but I can understand that some people don't want to fork out for the latest technology and find that it hasn't got a feature that's standard on VCR's costing alot less.
The cost will eventually come down, and in time the technology will move on to something better that we all must have.
> The picture and
> (especially) sound quality improvements over video justify the extra
> couple of quid alone.
I agree, the quality of both picture and sound is noticably alot better on DVD.
Not being able to record onto DVD (not affordably anyway) doesn't really bother me too much, but I can understand that some people don't want to fork out for the latest technology and find that it hasn't got a feature that's standard on VCR's costing alot less.
The cost will eventually come down, and in time the technology will move on to something better that we all must have.
Recordable DVD players will be comming down to a much more affordable price over the next few years...
And if DataPlay fails to take off, then the DVD music format will be a standard feature of DVD players...
Why not pick up a cheap DVD player (SR DVD players are pretty cheap?) to use now, and for the next few years, then upgrade to a recordable DVD player when they become more reasonable priced?
Even though you cant reconrd you should be able to attach both your DVD and VCR to the TV at the same time?
And if DataPlay fails to take off, then the DVD music format will be a standard feature of DVD players...
Why not pick up a cheap DVD player (SR DVD players are pretty cheap?) to use now, and for the next few years, then upgrade to a recordable DVD player when they become more reasonable priced?
Even though you cant reconrd you should be able to attach both your DVD and VCR to the TV at the same time?
Whenever anything BIG in the technological world comes out the cost is astronomical. Does anyone remember how much a simple CD player cost in the early 80's? Alot! Everyone said then you can't record to it like cassettes and that vinyls have better sound quality (they do you know). Now just about every home in the uk has a CD stereo system. They are the standard now and even the expensive cd writing hardware has come down to affordable prices.
The same scenario is happening with DVD's, astronimical prices to start off with but the prices are still coming down and so will the dvd writers. The dvd hardware is alot cheaper if you simply buy a dvd drive for your pc as you can get them for about £30-£40.
I have to say though, I have probably only bought 3 videos in my life however I have a DVD collection of about 30-40. The benefits of DVD's for me is that the sound quality is sooo much better (dolby set-up, heheh). The fact that you don't have to rewind or fast forward, simply enter in your favourite scene or, to be even more accurate, the elapse time of your favourite "bit". You can also loop it so it repeated your favourite "bit" in a continuous loop (When I got my dvd player I looped the Matrix hall scene, amazing!!). Last time I checked video tapes cost about £8 whereas DVD's cost about £15 (I've never paid more than that for a dvd). It is obvious that DVD is superior to VHS, once you have tried DVD you will never enjoy watching a film on VHS again!
Life is all about change and I say accept it!
The same scenario is happening with DVD's, astronimical prices to start off with but the prices are still coming down and so will the dvd writers. The dvd hardware is alot cheaper if you simply buy a dvd drive for your pc as you can get them for about £30-£40.
I have to say though, I have probably only bought 3 videos in my life however I have a DVD collection of about 30-40. The benefits of DVD's for me is that the sound quality is sooo much better (dolby set-up, heheh). The fact that you don't have to rewind or fast forward, simply enter in your favourite scene or, to be even more accurate, the elapse time of your favourite "bit". You can also loop it so it repeated your favourite "bit" in a continuous loop (When I got my dvd player I looped the Matrix hall scene, amazing!!). Last time I checked video tapes cost about £8 whereas DVD's cost about £15 (I've never paid more than that for a dvd). It is obvious that DVD is superior to VHS, once you have tried DVD you will never enjoy watching a film on VHS again!
Life is all about change and I say accept it!