HD DVD touts sales growth over Blu-ray's decline

Besides moving low-priced HD DVD players, the HD DVD Promotional Group is taking advantage of Home Media Expo 2007 to announce its most recent sales data, with HD DVD going up, and Blu-ray going down. Specifically, the Nielsen Netratings mentioned show HD DVD hardware sales up 37 percent, and software sales up 20 percent from the first to the second quarter of this year. Over the same period, overall Blu-ray hardware sales (no word on if this includes the PlayStation 3 or not) were down 27 percent and software sales down 5 percent. Shockingly, this trend is attributed to aggressive marketing campaigns and cheaper standalone HD DVD players hitting the market, causing a 183 percent increase in dedicated player sales for the quarter, and over 180,000 players (up from 100k back in April) sold altogether. Whether HD DVD focus on standalones over consoles gives them an edge is unknown, but it seems like Blu-ray may be catching on to the strategy of giving away movies and cutting prices.

[chilicoke @ Jul 18th 2007 1:43AM]

bet they "accidentally" forgot to include PS3 in their data once again

[Zelatio @ Jul 18th 2007 1:52AM]

"...causing a 183 percent drop increase in dedicated player sales for the quarter..."

What the hell is a drop increase? Shouldn't it be one or the other? Or are my English skills a bit rusty?

[Richard @ Jul 18th 2007 1:59AM]

D'oh, fixed.

[paloooz @ Jul 18th 2007 2:32AM]

I don't know why people think they need to be rude about it. Obviously it was a typo, typos happen on accident.

Just be like "Hey man, I think X is a typo in your post."

[Dave @ Jul 18th 2007 1:54AM]

Exactly. They only manage to show "growth" removing the top selling BD player – PS3…

And what? This means that every BD standalone would have out of this planet attach rate… LOL

Get used to it HD DVD … you are going to lose this war.

[Erik @ Jul 18th 2007 2:24AM]

I know 5 people with PS3s, and NONE of them use it as a BD Player. So...you can't really do anything with data on a device that may or may not actually be used as a HD player.

Granted, there are plenty of PS3s out that are seeing use in the format war, but there's just no accurate way to demonstrate this...hence the seesaw battle every week over who's more "dominant."

[solomon @ Jul 18th 2007 2:48AM]

shouldn't it really be software sales anyways ? who cares about hardware..

[Erik @ Jul 18th 2007 9:15AM]

Exactly. I wait until I see software I want (and the hardware's at a good price) to make the jump into anything like this. Right now, I'd prefer to wait until a)I have an HDTV (I'm poor) and b)I can buy essentially any movie I want in a single format.

[fatherofone @ Jul 28th 2007 10:58PM]

Well I will counter your 5 people you know with PS3s that don't watch movies with 4 that I know and ALL OF THEM have bought at least 1 movie. So just taking your 5 to my 4, we can say that around 40% of PS3 owners watch movies. That actually isn't an unreasonable number, and given the fact that the PS3 is currently one of the lowest cost BluRay players out there, it isn't fair for the HD-DVD crowd to exclude it from their numbers. I would love to see if they included the drives for the 360 as well.

[Evan Labbe @ Aug 20th 2007 3:40PM]

Ok, PS3 can't be used in hardware sales data for the Blue-Ray format because the entire play station is a multi-platform device. Could eb used for gaming, could be used for movies. and I dont know if I would argue too much with the 40% figure being tossed about.
However, the HD-DVD player for the Xbox 360 is ONLY for watching movies. That leaves a 100% player-purchased to player-used ratio. Including the MS dvd player and excluding the PS3 is entirely appropriate. The data as presented is very un-biased, and well thought through.
In further defense of the PS3 being dropped form stats for this purpose, how would it sound if the author put in "XX amount of blue-ray enabled devices sold plus roughly 40% of PS3 sales atributed to blue-ray use" That's kind of a wishy-washy statement. Doesn't breed reader loyalty, and counts on a device who's primary use isn't movies.
Would be the same as including every laptop that has a built in HD DVD or Blue Ray drive. They have absolutely no way of tracking the amount of ideal usage for the drive itself. same as the PS3.
I dont really care either way. I have both the PS3 and a 360 with HD DVD player, both running on HDMI on a Grand Wega, I dont see enough of a difference between regular DVD on an HD screen, and High Def(either format) on an HD screen to really care. and for the record, I bought exactly one movie for my PS3, and I never watch it(dont think its been out of its case yet). See, i've bought a PS3 and a BR disc, and haven't used either. Doesn't sound like my sales data would make solid comparison information.

[LiQuiD_FuSioN @ Jul 18th 2007 2:27AM]

Isn't kind of sad that the PS3 has to be included in sales just so it can give Blu-Ray the edge over HD DVD?

Strange that I hear no mention of whether or not sales are included for the Xbox 360's HD DVD at all.

[SimbaDogg @ Jul 18th 2007 3:20AM]

How is it sad? There are hundreds of thousands of people who bought the PS3 for that reason and that reason only. Also it can do IPTV, DNLA/Media Streaming, Web browswer, built in HD to store music/movies/pics, memory card reader...i mean, comparing the $500 for the ps3, and the $500 for the bdp-s300...why the hell would you get the standalone player? the ps3 is an INSANE value.

[LiQuiD_FuSioN @ Jul 18th 2007 3:25AM]

Do you think people who are less tech-savvy than us will want the PS3 strictly for movies?

For home entertainment, they're gonna want a stand-alone player and not a "gaming" system.

[ian9outof10 @ Jul 18th 2007 4:19AM]

SimbaDogg, where do you get your facts. Hundreds of thousands of people buying PS3s for watching Blu-ray only?

I really don't think so.

[Reapman @ Jul 18th 2007 10:25AM]

Think of it like this... I own a PS3 player. Will I now go out and buy a BluRay player too? Noo... I'm going to use the BluRay player I ALREADY HAVE. The PS3 canabalizes the dedicated BluRay player market, and since ITS A BLURAY PLAYER, not including it is straight out lieing. From what I remember reading on another site HDVDVD Player sales are about 50/50 between dedicated and 360 addon (can't find the source so take that with a grain of salt)

[John @ Jul 18th 2007 12:37PM]

Thing is, someone who buys a PS3 may or may not be using it to watch HD movies. If you have an XBox 360 with HD DVD, you probably got that upgrade so you can watch HD movies. While it's true that PS3 sales cannabalize standalone Blu-ray player sales, you can hardly count every PS3 sale as someone taking a stand on the Blu-ray side of the HD format war.

[Austin @ Jul 18th 2007 2:28AM]

Die Blu-ray!

Even without the PS3 numbers including were only talking a few thousand more players.

Sony, I miss it when you made crap worth buying, and charged a fair price.

[scott @ Jul 18th 2007 2:35AM]

Neither can live while the other survives...

[rytard87 @ Jul 18th 2007 2:51AM]

Dude, you gotta lay off the Harry Potter. Seriously, I'm worried about you man.

[Morgan Percy @ Jul 18th 2007 2:35AM]

Movie disk sales would be a better representation of who is "winning" the format war. Its true that there is no way of knowing how many ps3 owners play BR(seems like thats the only thing they can play,no games). It would be fair to use the HD players for 360 because you would only use it to play HD-dvds. Downloadable content will win in the end.

[h0mi @ Jul 18th 2007 2:48AM]

Hardware sales were down 27% for bluray....

Betanews reported PS3 US sales of 296k 127k, 130k for 1Q 2007. That would be total sales of 553. A 27% drop would be sales of 403k for April-June. April-June sales for the ps3 were roughly 250k, which is much worse.

[Brian @ Jul 18th 2007 2:51AM]

I can actually see HD pulling ahead of Blu-ray with or without having the PS3 being included. Has anyone been to a store lately? The PS3 isn't the fastest thing flying off the shelves if they're really selling at all. The 360 isn't really selling either, along with it's HD player. So its sales figure probably isn't affecting the numbers stated above either if those are being considered too. But you can't include one game system without considering the other with a competing technology. I know it won't take make from the Blu-ray front, but it will take some.

By the way, I would like to say I only have Nintendo systems: NES, SNES, 64, GC, Wii. I also have a non-functioning Sega Genesis that will be replaced, but you can't call me a Sony or Microsoft fanboy when it comes to gaming systems because I don't have either one.

[CharlieX @ Jul 18th 2007 3:11AM]

So I'm still just sitting here with my money, waiting for one of these jackasses to give up so I can go buy a machine and my entire library of movies all over again...

like the cheerleader who's going to go to the prom with the jock who beats the other jock up first.

[Mike @ Jul 18th 2007 3:13AM]

To my knowledge only 100,000 HD add-ons have sold for the x360.

Over 1.5m PS3s have sold. That is a HUGE number to leave out. Even if 50% of those people aren't using it for watching movies (which I doubt) than they're still leaving off 750,000 players. HD will continue to skew it's numbers by leaving off the PS3.

The PS3 just had a $100 price cut and temporarily went out of stock at places like Amazon.com. The holiday season is coming up where consoles SELL. Sony expects the remaining stock of 60GB PS3's to be out of stock by November which could happen w/ the lineup that the PS3 has this fall/winter. HD will do ANYTHING to get people buying up HD now before that PS3 number goes from 1.5+ million to 2+ -> 2.5+ -> 3million.

[Mike @ Jul 18th 2007 3:14AM]

I meant over 1.5million in America for PS3 >.

[Geoffrey King @ Jul 18th 2007 3:30AM]

LOL. Dude you need to check your facts about your Sony predictions. First of all, no one is buying a PS3 now even with the price drop (not even in Japan where they have dominated for years). That is why they are going to stick with the $499 price even when the 80GB comes out in the US. Many reports state that they predict an additional $100 price drop before the end of the year in order for Sony to keep pace with Nintendo and MS.

Amazon may be out of stock, but every BestBuy, Circuit City, etc around the SF Bay has plenty of these overpriced boat anchors collecting dust on the sales floor.

Blu-ray may win the format war, but don't base on the success (or lack thereof) of the PS3.

[Broo @ Jul 23rd 2007 6:19PM]

$500 is still way too much for a console (or DVD player) for most average income people- This is one of the major reasons why the Wii is selling so well. Technical specs don't mean much if no one can actually afford the system.

Which-ever of these formats can get to a $150 stand-alone HD player and put it in Wal-Mart will probably win the format war (currently I see a HD DVD at $240 vs. Blu-Ray at $400 for on Amazon). If neither can make it to this price point I can see this going the way of the old SACD/HD Audio trend in favor of direct-download movies from Amazon/NetFlix/etc.

Also- from what I understand, the $500 PS3 is a soon-to-be-discontinued model with a 60GB drive; when the new 80GB model comes out (with the new controllers) it will be back to $600 again- and who would want to buy an old discontinued model (unless you want a unit with the Emotion chip)? In the Target stores around metro Atlanta there are usually 3-4 PS3s collecting dust in their glass cabinets (I can verify this as I have been to 4 stores over the past few days looking for an in-stock xBox 360 Elite).

[Dman @ Jul 24th 2007 1:53AM]

yeah, and how many PS3 buyers were parents buying for the kids...how many kids actually have HDTV's in their bedrooms? How many teens or early 20's actually own a HD? You can't count every PS3 owner as a HD movie watcher....alot are just game players...but it's a nice try.

[Mak @ Jul 18th 2007 8:20AM]

Dude, you need to check your facts.

1/ PS3 is sold out on Amazon, and at Walmart and most BestBuys since the pricedrop (N4G has the links).

2/ Japan has sold over 1,000,000 PS3's since launch. Not too shabby.

3/ The boat anchor and gathering dust comments make you look like a total idiot.

[Geoffrey King @ Jul 18th 2007 11:55AM]

Mak,

Not to get off topic about a console war over a format war. But I highly encourage you to visit either 1up, IGN, or gamepro.com to see how bad the PS3 is performing. The PS3 has been outsold 6-1 by a system (Wii) that does not have an HD format. My point is that PS3 will not determine this format war, especially since third party software developers are bailing from Sony left and right. Click http://www.gamepro.com/news.cfm?article_id=122328 to see Capcom's CEO statement about the lack of demand for the PS3.

Comparing the PS3 to Sony's or Samsung's stand alone players is a bit different though. It would be a no brainer to me that if I wanted a Blu-ray player, I would get a PS3 because of the added value (gaming console) it gives me. I just don't know many people who get the PS3 solely for the purpose of Blu-ray. The people I know who have a PS3, bought it for a gaming console.

You will have to excuse my comments about the "boat anchor collecting dust", but the facts say this console is in trouble. Why else would Sony be dropping the price so early after launch, whereas their competitors (ie MS) have not dropped the price of their console for 600+ days.

[Reader @ Jul 18th 2007 3:30AM]

DAMMIT... I just want a fricking winner, I don't care who.

[Serengeti @ Jul 18th 2007 6:17AM]

No need to wait, if you're willing to risk the value of a player. It's not like one format or the other will suddenly not be supported. If Blu Ray wins, there will be BD players that play HDDVD, just like there are DVD players that will play DVD+R discs.

This won't be a repeat of Beta/VHS. Just go out and get whatever the cheapest player is that you can get, and start enjoying it.

[LM @ Jul 18th 2007 4:20AM]

Even without the price drop, people is still buying the PS3 (although at a very slow pace) so your claim of no one buying it after price drop is illogical.

Since you bring Japan into the picture, for the record the PS3 is selling at 4X to 5X the number of XBox 360s sold in Japan EVERY WEEK since launch in last Nov. If Sony decides to drop the price in Japan you can bet it'll easily go 10X the XBox 360 number.

Sony designed the PS3 to be BOTH as a game machine AND as a Blu-Ray movie player, is that really very difficult to unerstand? There are people buying it just for Blu-Ray movies, there are people buying it just for gaming and there are people buying it for BOTH.

Whether you're buying just PS3 games or just BD movies doesn't matter to Sony since they get money for every single game sold and they also get money for every single BD movie sold.

And lastly it's not a matter of Blu-Ray may win the war cause it already has, it's a matter of when HD DVD will disappear from the scene. I give it until Q3 of 2008, which is one year from now.

[Nfinity @ Jul 18th 2007 5:48AM]

LOL, it always amazes me how delusional and unlogical Blu-Ray supporters are. They just don't understand market and neither is Sony. They lost once with format wars and they will lose again. YOU CANNOT force the consumer and yell this is better, this is better and charge 2-3 times the price of the opposing format. This is why they almost fail every time. The only reason they still exist is that fortunately for them, a few times this tactic succeded because consumers did not have a proper alternative and they simply monopolized on that fact. This is why they owe a crap load of money. It's because they keep FORCING their products on consumers and invest huge money in this strategy with very little success.

[milrtime83 @ Jul 18th 2007 9:23AM]

5X a small number is still a relatively small number.

[Spider1981 @ Jul 18th 2007 9:33AM]

@ Nfinity
I guess I wasnt home when the Blu-Ray Disc Association busted down my door, held a gun to my head, and forced me to choose Blu-Ray. If you are referring to the tired old "Sony FORCED consumers into Blu-Ray incorperating it into the PS3", well, if people are so violently opposed to Blu-Ray, they arent being forced to buy it.
Infact If you want to talk about having a choice, lets look at this. If I want a choice in Blu-Ray hardware, I have Sony, Panasonic, Samsung, Phillips, Pioneer, etc. If I want a choice in HD DVD, it looks like all I have is Toshiba. Looks like Blu-Ray takes the lead in major studio support too.
I could just as easily say Toshiba is FORCING HD DVD. I don't know if you keep up with the Year to Date and Weekly software sales ratios, but Blu-Ray has been pretty steadily stomping HD DVD, which is a little different than the 'barely hanging on' picture you paint.
I am currently a Blu-Ray supporter (I gave HD DVD a chance and they let me down) but if by some massive shift in the current trend HD DVD eventually does win, I'll try them again. I'm mainly in it for the high definations sake, and see the delivery method as secondary, I just geet annoyed by all the 'venom spitters' from both sides.

[Jack @ Jul 18th 2007 5:25AM]

With a HD player ALL of my videos look great with up conversion. Blu-ray players do not do this. To me it's like HD is to VHS as Blu-Ray is to BetaMax. The choice is clear.

[Serengeti @ Jul 18th 2007 6:20AM]

You shouldn't draw comparisons to Beta/VHS. This will not be like Beta and VHS. Beta and VHS are different sizes and shape, and so one player would never be able to play the other. Here, however, the discs are the same size, and the only thing differentiating the two is software. Eventually, there will be many good players that will play all formats that fit in them.

[Galley @ Jul 18th 2007 8:49AM]

The PS3 just happens to be one of the best 1080p upconverting DVD players on the market.

[milrtime83 @ Jul 18th 2007 9:27AM]

Beta also had the better quality of the two

[Ang @ Jul 18th 2007 5:57AM]

My Sony PS3 is a Bluray Player (amazing quality), a 1080p upsampling dvd Player DVD, Up-sampling CD player, SACD Player (creams my more expensive Philips Cineos 9000 Up-sampling DVD/SACD Player), a Media Player for my MP3s and H.264 video, a Digital Photo Album, I can surf the net and the icing on the cake, it's my best game console (also own a wii).

Don't know what the HD DVD Camp is smoking or if it's in self denial. But my PS3 has replaced ALL my other devices that were plugged into my AV system, compared to what I have paid for my separates over the years it's a bargain.

[zunq @ Jul 18th 2007 6:50AM]

You also forget that the entry price for blu-ray hardware is $500, which is double that of HD-DVD. With claims that the image quality difference between the two formats are almost indiscernible what is the point of standalone blu-ray players over their hd-dvd counterparts?

[Ilya @ Jul 18th 2007 7:12AM]

Read all reviews on HD-XA2 HD-DVD player. so far its the BEST HD and SD (DVDs) player out there. and the only stand alone player that has HDMI 1.3. it also has a built in decoder for TrueHD and DTS-HD sound, and you don't even need a receiver supporting TrueHD/DTS-HD to hear it. in addition you get LAN port for quick upgrades and 5 free HD-DVDs.

I would just buy this player for its SD up conversion abilities. sure beats Denons, Marantz, and all other DVD players.

[Mak @ Jul 18th 2007 8:16AM]

Nice trick there, exclude 4.5 million Playstaion 3s

Are people really fooled by this? You have to be pretty thick to actually think HD DVD is gaining anything right now..

[Dman @ Jul 24th 2007 2:06AM]

And you think all 4.5 million ps3's are hooked up to HDTV's? I'd like to see numbers on how many kids have ps3's and are buying BRD's for the quality...that should bring the numbers back to reality. These kids dont give a crap about this "war" they want it to play games...BRD is simply trying to use it to boost numbers. I'm waiting for the day all the internet capable HD/BRD players are updated to read both...after this "war" has tricked abunch of people into handing over lots of money.

[dman @ Jul 24th 2007 1:06PM]

and you think combo drives aren't right around the corner? Your quite short sighted if you think BRD is end all be all. Smart companies will put out players capable of playing both. As far as your 1,000,000 people buying a Playstation 3 for movies only, is just plain stupid...it's an added bonus to the GAME console. Thats like saying everybody ran out and bought the PS2 because it played DVD. Out of the ten people I know that bought the PS3, 2 have HDTV's, but the PS3 isn't hooked up to them, they are in their kids rooms on regular tv's, because they don't want their kids hogging the big tv. Now how many other households are like that, where kids have the game consoles, and the adults use the actual players. If sony sold a seperate BRD player like the XBOX HD player...then you could use it in the numbers. Like I said when the combo drives come out there will be no issue...that is if BRD allows
it...why wouldn't they, it would mean more sales.

As far as Blockbuster going only BRD, it wont last. My local store has the BRD, and the guys at the counter said that they have received alot of complaints about not having HD-DVD also. Blockbuster will get flooded with complaints and offer both...which would be the best move for them, money wise.

I can't understand why people are so far up sonys ass, that they want HD to fail, why wouldn't you want both to come out, get cheaper, then get the next technology out. More choices mean price wars which means cheaper prices...so yeah chear for HD to die, so BRD player can sky rocket back up in prices, since it would be your only choice...idiots.

[dman @ Jul 25th 2007 3:38PM]

SO tell me Mak, why do you have such a personal vendetta against HD-DVD? Did an evil HD player burn your house down or something, or do you own stock in Sony?

I have nothing against someone owning BRD. I will by a PS3 whenever Sony lowers it's typical overpriced product down, but it will mostly be for game playing, because I have always had a Playstation, when the prices dropped. The BRD will be a nice option, but by that time there will be a combo player out anyway.

DO you really want only one HD format? Do you want prices of BRD players to skyrocket because it's the only choice? Is that what you really really want? Because it doesn't make sense. People should be hoping for a third format of high def...more choices...cheaper competitive prices...makes sense.

Believing Blockbuster will get only 2-3 complaints from HD-DVD customers is more delusional thinking than wanting a BRD monopoly. What I had said was, the workers at the blockbuster counter, when asked about not having HD-DVD also, said they have received A LOT, not a few, or a couple, of complaints...one worker said it, the other chimed in and said he didn't know why they didn't offer both, because they have just as many HD-DVD customers asking as they do BRD renting, and waiting. Thats only one location. Why would they want to offer HD you asked...because there are movies on HD-DVD that people will want to watch that aren't on BRD...and vise versa.

So I ask you again...WHY do you want on one choice of format? WHY would you not want people to have a choice? WHY would you want companies like Sony, who are notoriously high in price to have the upper hand with demand?

[jim.wightman @ Jul 18th 2007 8:16AM]

Is it just me or do the BR fanboys take this all a little too personally? Whats up with that? You guys got shares or something?

[chadow @ Jul 18th 2007 8:21AM]

They almost seemed as wound up as iPod fanatics. Man, them guys are just mean!

They do have a stake in it though. Many have either paid WAY too much for a standalone player, or paid WAY to much for a machine that hasn't got much use other than a player.

[chadow @ Jul 18th 2007 8:17AM]

I wish evidence would come out that the movie studios backing bLuray were paying tons of money to Sony to help with their losses and to try to help them sell more of the pathetic PS3, because its quite obvious the future of bLuray is dependent on PS3 sales. The whole Blockbuster thing is a bit dubious as well. Blockbuster is owned by Viacom....Viacom owns Paramount...Paramount is releasing on bLuray only, and Blockbuster is going to rent bLuray only "due to the way they think the market is going"......mmmmm......yeah. I'm glad I stopped renting from them years ago, so I don't really care what they rent.

I really don't care what format comes out on top, but watching Blockbuster have to put HD-DVD on its shelves and watching all those studios exclusive to bLuray have to switch, would be fun to watch. Who doesn't like to watch corporate blunders??

Meanwhile I will continue to wait for my HD format. Maybe Nintendo has a Wii-DVD standalone 'not quite' HD player in the works.