Pioneer finally kills production of its remaining laserdisc players

Yes, we're just as shocked and horrified to hear the news as you are, but it seems to be true. Pioneer, the last major electronics manufacturer to continue production of laserdisc players, has announced they'll discontinue all three of the models they currently offer, leaving dozens of hardcore fans in the dust. But cheer up: we'll always have the memories, and this poster.

[Jonathan @ Jan 14th 2009 12:24PM]

YOU DAMN DIRTY APES!

[Jinx @ Jan 14th 2009 12:31PM]

Charleston Heston must be rolling in his grave because of this..

I remember when my elementary school were using Pioneer LDs in science class to show images of the earth etc, it must have taken 6-11sec to load each image lol

[Misuzu @ Jan 14th 2009 3:38PM]

nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

[Aaron @ Jan 14th 2009 2:07PM]

Forget Planet of the Apes - Laser Disc saw the last, greatest release of the original Star Wars trilogy before George Lucas started dicking with them.

[Mr. S. @ Jan 14th 2009 2:12PM]

Which I have, and made my own DVDs from way back when. Sadly, they just sit in the garage now. Big shiny records. :-(

[OneLove @ Jan 16th 2009 2:33PM]

George Lucas rubbed his dick on the laser dics too. I saw him.

[solarpos @ Jan 14th 2009 12:25PM]

Please don't ever post another scary simian in a tuxedo again. Oh and yo soy numero uno, big whoop.

[solarpos @ Jan 14th 2009 12:25PM]

correction:
Yo soy dos

[David Russell @ Jan 14th 2009 12:28PM]

Just remember: Being first to respond to an Engadget story is very important... in the middle of a workday. So refresh... refresh... refresh... refresh... refresh...

[solarpos @ Jan 14th 2009 12:35PM]

What is this strange term you refer to? Workday? Since I'm on Engadget I must be a pimply face 37 year old in his parents basement typing on an old HackinDell munching on Cheetos and dreaming of Demi Lovato.

[Dead_Rebel @ Jan 14th 2009 1:34PM]

Actually, 'yo' is implied in the context of 'soy uno/dos' so the 'yo' is just redundant and will get you goofy stares like when a Chinese guy says "This make wonderful toy gift".

[Precurse @ Jan 14th 2009 2:01PM]

scary simian??

I thought it was one of those scary albino guys from I am Legend

[kieran @ Jan 14th 2009 2:38PM]

Actually, native Spanish speakers often include the "yo" in front of "soy" for emphasis. I had an exchange student from Canary Islands one summer, and when he and his pals were playing hoops they would say, "yo soy machina" whenever they did an especially cool move or shot.

[Jonathan @ Jan 14th 2009 2:38PM]

no... it's Powder!

[Priper @ Jan 14th 2009 4:10PM]

@dead rebel.
Yo soy = I am. word by word. Now you look silly trying to correct a language you don't understand yourself (redundancy intended)

[cloud858rk @ Jan 14th 2009 6:23PM]

Soy is the yo form of ser. You don't need to say the yo in front of the soy, but you can.

[pat1202003 @ Jan 14th 2009 12:29PM]

Laser what???

[El Taco @ Jan 14th 2009 12:56PM]

my thoughts exactly

[xcrunk @ Jan 14th 2009 1:10PM]

newbs

[Frankenstein Black @ Jan 14th 2009 1:19PM]

I have a Sony LDP-900 (still working, digital picture art modes with slow-mo jog wheel and all).
http://www.laserdiscarchive.co.uk/laserdisc_archive/sony/sony_ldp-900/sony_ldp-900.htm
LD is uncompressed (unlike DVD) and the shelf life is longer, so my collection stays (no panic'ed rush to eBay). Oh, and blast you Frankenstein White!

[G @ Jan 14th 2009 3:56PM]

Yeah, what's a LD? :D


Ok, i'd be lying if i said i didn't even know they existed, i read an article on wikipedia about them about a year ago when i was trying to find out what if there was any kind of optical disc older than CDs. But before that i had never heard of a laser disc, i never saw one or a player for one, i thought there was only VHS. It's kind of weird that most of the people here know what LDs are.

[Adam Zey @ Jan 14th 2009 8:49PM]

I'd argue that the shelf life is shorter, what with laser rot being a serious issue on laserdiscs.

LaserDisc doesn't really have any significant advantages over DVDs. Sure, they're uncompressed, but they're an analog (composite) signal with limited chroma information. They suffer from crosstalk and only have about two thirds the resolution of a DVD.

Like anything, if you compare a good Laserdisc to a bad DVD, Laserdisc is going to look better. But if you compare a good Laserdisc to a good DVD, there's no question. Plus, DVDs have a lot more future longevity, as they'll likely be playable for decades to come.

[David @ Jan 14th 2009 9:59PM]

You may not realize this, but Laserdisc was actually pushed pretty heavily during the mid-1990s as the next big step for video, eventually to replace VHS. Obviously it didn't work out that way, but if you were old enough to go to video stores fifteen years ago, you've more than likely got at least some vague memory of Laserdisc.

[FILA @ Jan 14th 2009 12:33PM]

WHATTTTT??!!! o my gosh, where the hell would you be able to find these at anyway. thats just crazy

[Asha @ Jan 14th 2009 1:05PM]

I've actually seen them for sale in some used DVD/CD stores. I don't know WHY anyone would really bother buying them anymore, but then people make a lot of decisions that leave me scratching my head.

[Wwhat @ Jan 15th 2009 7:42AM]

Well if you have a collection of 100 disks that you paid a lot of money for, and then your player breaks down seems you might buy a new one.
I wonder if pioneer will do a deal where you can swap laserdisks for DVD's, after all the movies on them are all 15 years old anyway so it's mainly the cost of the media.

[JT @ Jan 14th 2009 12:33PM]

Woah.........I haven't seen an LD for 15 years.

[Jagster @ Jan 14th 2009 12:30PM]

WOW! LaserDisc was still in production?! I would have thought that format was completely dead a few years after DVD came out.. like 15 years ago. It was a format that never even really got it's footing for crying out loud.

[Bryan @ Jan 14th 2009 12:43PM]

Seriously! I thought the format was dead at least 10 years ago.

My uncle had a player and he still has his collection of LD. I remember watching Waterworld on LD as a kid. Stupid DVD-like discs the size of a 33 1/3 LP that also needed to be flipped. I thought it was a dumb idea as a little brat.

[Asha @ Jan 14th 2009 1:06PM]

I'm impressed that there was actually enough demand for players for them to continue manufacturing them until now.

I've actually started seeing the Laser Discs for sale in some second hand DVD shops.

[eddy @ Jan 14th 2009 1:06PM]

For all of you complaining about having to flip the disc, my Pioneer LD player had an auto-flip feature - it didn't literally flip the disc, of course, just read the other side of it. I'm proud to say my player still works. I never had a huge collection though. Very proud to have an original LD copy of MST3K: The Movie. That's probably rarer than the original DVD release.

[Levi @ Jan 14th 2009 7:06PM]

Sooo... LaserDisc outlived HD-DVD by like 13 or 14 years then? That's nuts.

[From My Cube @ Jan 14th 2009 12:31PM]

did LD's offer any benefit?

[barry99705 @ Jan 14th 2009 12:33PM]

When they came out? Yea they did. After dvd came out? Nope.

[Kenjis9965 @ Jan 14th 2009 12:40PM]

They did, they had better video quality and supported Dolby Digital/DTS audio, and multiple audio tracks/subtitles

Also even after DVD came out, somethings, like the ORIGINAL master of the Star Wars trilogy and some other movies were only available on Laserdisc or VHS, and Laserdisc is a much better format from an audio/video quality standpoint...

Hell, you'd be surprised the number of DVDs that are in fact just rips of the Laserdisc version....which means for people with good Laserdisc players, they don't find a big reason to really re-purchase a lot of it...

Laserdisc was more like Blu-Ray than VHS however, it was for Home Theater Enthusiasts....they never got the players affordable enough to the masses and the discs stayed at the $25 mark or so...

[james @ Jan 14th 2009 1:02PM]

When the alternative was VHS, yes, they had a spectacular picture in comparison. Even compared to DVD, the uncompressed analog video on laserdisc lacks the compression artifacts that you see occasionally on DVD. At the time, laserdisc was the only viable format for a serious home theater.

Having to flip the disc is what killed it IMO, then the high cost, and to make matters worse, there were two formats, CAV and CLV, and later on a digital audio track, so each time some new format came out, the older players couldn't play it.

[xcrunk @ Jan 14th 2009 1:14PM]

Superior audio(digital) and video(425 lines of analog video)....

Best picture and sound possible at the time.

But DVD killed it completely....it was bound to happen anyways....plus people like collecting the same movie over and over and over...

I have Star Wars on three different formats...and will buy it on Bluray when released. Why? Cause I'm f*cking stupid!

[ChillyWilly @ Jan 14th 2009 1:21PM]

As a former LD fan and owner (my ex-wife still has 80% of my collection), the format had some great quality advantages. But as others have said, once DVD hit, it was the death knell. I had no idea players were still being made. Anyone with a serious collection should pick up a player or two.

[Jon Acheson @ Jan 14th 2009 1:27PM]

@xcrunk:

I have My Neighbor Totoro in like five different formats: Japanese LD, VHS fansub, VHS commercial release, and both DVD releases. I will probably buy it on Blu-Ray at some point in the future (most DVDs though I wouldn't bother rebuying).

Laserdisc was the best format available in its heydey, but DVD made it instantly obsolete. Particularly for anime fans, as DVD solved the sub vs. dub dilemma.

[J @ Jan 14th 2009 4:13PM]

yeah, they did have an advantage. you could pop them in and actually WATCH a movie.

No forced FBI warnings.
No non-skippable previews.
No menus that you had to try to interpret in order to play the movie.
No floaters in the cases.

of course there was the price.. :-(

[elBravo @ Jan 14th 2009 5:01PM]

@xcrunk:

How is the video analog? How is the analogue video waveform contained on a laserdisc? Do these discs not store information the same a cd/dvd/bd as a series of microscopic pits and landings (0's and 1's)? Perhaps merely just uncompressed digital video? Although that would take so much...
I'm so confused.

[Information Central @ Jan 15th 2009 11:26PM]

"the discs stayed at the $25 mark or so.."

Yes, but movies on VHS and Beta tapes sold for about $100. They were priced for RENTAL; the thought was that video stores would soon recoup the cost. I worked at a VideoConcepts store where we sold all of this gear AND the movies, and once I saw LD I pushed it hard. Great sound, unbeatable picture, and ZERO WEAR. Why would anyone buy a crappy VHS tape for $100 when you could get an LD for $35?

But people complained that "you can't record on it." So I'd point out that you couldn't record on CDs either, but they were flying off the shelves. "Uh, oh yeah, that's true," said the shopper. And years later we come to find out that 99 percent of VCR owners NEVER record anything.

LaserDisc hailed from a time when some people and companies wanted to push quality ever higher, and thought that it would sell. Sadly, we know now that people not only can't recognize high quality, but will setlle for just about anything. Look at the abysmal state of "digital quality" today: screens full of compressed hash that we wouldn't have accepted from VHS tape 20 years ago.

DVD marks the last gasp of the high-quality movement, and even it was crippled by short-sighted design blunders and old technology when it came out. It's downhill from here.

[Valicore @ Jan 14th 2009 12:31PM]

I was actually more afraid the article would say that they were going to try and revamp the format.

[fanman @ Jan 14th 2009 12:32PM]

This isn't the music industry :p

[barry99705 @ Jan 14th 2009 12:31PM]

So does anyone think the average engadget reader actually remembers laserdiscs? I think I sold mine about 12 years ago. Had all three Star Wars movies too.

[Kendall @ Jan 14th 2009 12:35PM]

Wow, Im old school. :) I still have to pioneer LD players and about 60 LD's. I still watch them from time to time.

[Paul @ Jan 14th 2009 12:55PM]

Well, I'm far from average, but I've got 70+ LD's and the last player Sony manufactured. I've got every one wrapped in a nice, clear vinyl sleeve to protect my "investment." Hard to believe I paid $40+ for these things back in the day. More for my Criterion titles. Honestly, I haven't cracked one open in over a year. I'd probably craigslist the whole lot if it wasn't for the Star Wars trilogy. I still can't believe that Lucas hasn't released a DVD set with the original cut for enthusiasts. I refuse to buy it on DVD until then.

[Jack Bauer @ Jan 14th 2009 7:15PM]

Yeah Well, I've got 71+ LD's so top that

[Alpinerover @ Jan 14th 2009 7:07PM]

Nice avatar... I wish I had a wireless card that supported injection in kisMAC.

Back on topic, the only time I think I've seen a laserdisc is during school a few years ago, where they had some nice cheesy educational videos on LD. Schools always seem to keep the most obsolete things... like IE6.

[Jeff @ Jan 14th 2009 5:20PM]

I still have my LD player - in fact, I bought it new just a year or two ago. Guess I'd better hold onto it now and hope it doesn't go belly up! (I got a deal on a "new old stock" LD-2000 or whatever the model # is - it's one of their later "educational" models. Paid $50 for it.)

I have some LD's that have never been released on DVD, so for that small investment, it's worth keeping around. I had an old CLD-S303 before that, but it quit working completely one day - would no longer eject. These things were notoriously unreliable.