Poll: Is Final Cut Pro an indication of more Blu-ray support coming from Apple?
By Richard Lawler 
posted July 25th 2009 2:00PM
posted July 25th 2009 2:00PM
posted July 25th 2009 2:00PM
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I think it will start as a build to buy option, ie when you order the laptop/desktop they'll charge you extra for a BD drive but superdrives will be the norm.
Yeah, an extra $800 w/ Apple Tax
only bad part is i think it will give them another gray area in which they can pump up the price more. hopefully its not too bad and will still be affordable, i think it would make my laptop perfect if i had a blu ray burner.
There is a big difference between offering Blu-ray playback and offering Blu-ray drives.
It wasn’t until about March that I started seeing the 9.5mm BRD available for other vendors, and those were tray-loading drives. I have yet to see a 9.5mm slot-loading BRD. This is what is needed to support Apple’s notebooks, the Mac Mini, and at least the 20” iMac.
The price would also probably be price prohibitive even as an option would make Apple not want to include a BTO that so few people would opt for, but the real issues are that Apple is pushing digital downloads for computers (keep the Blu-ray for your home entertainment system) and that optical media is slow, power hungry, and takes up a lot of room for the amount of space it uses.
I think we’ll find that Apple will be pulling optical drives from their machines in the not too distant future. Reinstalling or troubleshooting OS X from an included SD card would be very fast and use very little power compared to an optical disk. It would also alleviate a lot of space in the machine and open up 5” of space for ports. The cost for disk-to-disk is cost prohibitive, but when you consider the savings from not including an optical drive the price falls into the SD card’s favor. That may be why Apple have decided to get Snow Leopard under 4GB. A read-only SD card with very slow MLC (still a lot faster than optical media) would be very inexpensive indeed.
None of this means that Apple can’t offer Blu-ray AACS support for OS X. There are plenty of external Blu-ray drives on the market and of course the drives that fit a Mac Pro. I suspect that Apple will offer this once the optical drives start going away.
On a related note, the new SSDs are 2mm thinner than the typical 2.5” HDD. Removing the 9.5mm optical drive and using a 7.5mm SSD means that notebooks can get even thinner in the future. This is something Apple would surely be interested in. That is pretty much the limit with current port sizes and SSDs as a common HDD replacement are still several years off do to cost-per-GB, but I found it interesting.
Sony Optiarc slot loading bluray reader is out there and slim or as you say 9.5mm.
If anyone will alienate there customers from using cd/dvd it would be Apple.
Thanks for the reply. I checked the Optiarc site again and the only slot-loading, slim Blu-ray *anything* is the BC-5600S, which is a 12.7mm slim drive.
• http://www.sony-optiarc.com/products/slim_slotbdcombo/index.html
Bender, absolutely correct. Even if Apple wanted to support the format, they physically can't. I've said it before, but when the MacBook Pros initially came out, they were lacking dual-layer superdrives, because they weren't thin enough. 3 months later the 17" came out and compatible drives were available, and shortly after that the 15" got them too.
Also, you're question and poll is fundamentally flawed. The question is "Blu-ray support" and that is a yes, it's present as of Final Cut Studio 3. But the poll itself asks "offering Blu-ray drives and playback" soon. These are two different issues. I don't need to begin mentioning all the digital protections that are required for full-res BD playback, whereas making the disc is entirely easier. If it was coming soon, then I don't see why it wouldn't be in Snow Leopard, and if it's coming in SL, then there'd be some underlying code or something that developers would find and leak. The only hint is in iTunes 8.2, the mention of BR in the About screen.
-Brian
There is nothing todate in any SL developer build and it's close enough to the launch dye to not expact any. Giving two weeks from Glod Master to get discs
made, packaged and mailed and assuming a late Sepember launch there is only about 4 to 5 weeks left of SL betas.
The BLu-Ray mention and support in iTunes has to fo with Gracenotes. Unfortunately, I think my assesment of what will likely occur is correct, and that is unfortunate for those who nearly want to play Blu-Ray from their Macs.
Apple will not be pulling optical drives from their computers any time soon. The MacBook Air is a special instance to deal with the portability factor they were trying to push. Sure they could include OSx on an SD card, but what about all other software manufacturers? What about creating dics? What about importing all those CDs to their iTunes music player? What about watching a movie on your laptop on the go? Are we to believe that you can once again just do all those through a network off another computer using their optical drive, or better yet a Windows machine since they'd still support it - because I'm not buying that one.
Apple pulling optical drives from their computers = the death of the company once again. I'm sure we will see a day when optical drives are pulled, but that day is decades off.
getting rid of optical drives is stupid and idiotic. a MBP or Macbook with no cd/dvd drive is lame. It ain't time to do away with them and any cry to do such is lame.
Yea, I expect it to be an option in the next Mac Pro or two and maybe the 17" MBP. But I don't see the other computers getting it any time soon.
A Blu-ray burner seems viable when Apple refreshes their line with Corei7 CPUs. I doubt it until then.
I don't think Apple will use Core i7's in the iMacs, maybe the i5's when they come out in the fall. Is there any evidence that will happen?
It's all about Calpella. I'm waiting for the extinction of the FSB.
I got a great deal on a unibody macbook on craigslist in february, but now I need a firewire port for a recording interface I just got... but I'm trying to hold out until the fall refresh, praying for calpella and a freaking SD card that sits flush. I would really love to get some BD in there too, and may wait until spring if its not in the fall.
They better include a BD burner and not just reader- I'm much more interested in archiving long term on BD than I am watching a movie on my laptop. I'd get a copy or rip it myself if I wanted it to go. And it should be standard with no price hike.
I hope so, I ain't buying any new macs for my business or personal until BD is in them. I am due for a new Macbook Pro, and would love to upgrade my desktops and mac pro. but... until Apple decides to favor Blu-Ray with mere consumer acceptance and proper pre-recorded movie playback I won't buy new macs nor monitors.
Sorry, I love my Apple TV, itunes, iphones (for my wife and me) use movie rentals alot. but something is wrong when Apple stonewall's Blu-Ray just to protect the itunes movie store. Consumers are demanding choice... each standard works... let us enjoy Apple's Movie store rentals, Netflix streaming subscription, Blu-Ray movies and more. Mac OS ought not Censor formats because of a separate corporate agenda.
The time is now... give us BD!
See Bender's comment above. At present, it is physically impossible for Apple to offer Blu-ray in any computer except the Mac Pro (and MAYBE the iMac).
I vote yes meaning that I hope so.
I don't see Apple supporting BD playback ever.
I agree with the poster who mentioned their laptops will soon come without optical drives. When my friend got her MacBook Air, I realized how little I use my superdrive in my MacBook Pro, especially when I travel. I always have movies either ripped or from BitTorrent. I would just have a slim external drive on my desk or just share the drive from another mac on my network wirelessly. I would also much rather have that large space in my laptop go towards the battery than something I rarely use.
Another thing I though of is that Apple is a very environmental friendly company. You can see what they have done with packaging and build materials. I believe they think movies should move away from physical discs and packaging and just be made available online. And it just so happens iTunes is one avenue of getting movies without physical media. I've heard Steve say that Apple builds products that they themselves want to use. I can't see many Apple engineers buying BR discs, they probably all have free unlimited iTunes Store access ;-).