AudioBanter.com - View Single Post - So-Called "Hi-rez" formats on their way out?

(S888Wheel) wrote:

I said

So why didn't laser disc take off? It was clearly superior to VHS and is
arguably superior to DVD.

Tom said

Not that much better than VHS/Beta and nowhere near DVD

I quite disagree on both counts. DVD ghas some serious image problems that
laser disc never suffered from. There is simply no contest between laser dics
and VHS.

Sure there was. Price was only one. Availability was the other. Picure quality
on LD varied remarkably from release to release.

Personally I've never seen major picture quality problems with DVD and the
basic picture quality improvement with DVD is much greater than the improvement
of LD over VHS/Beta. One BIG improvement of LD over tape was disc access. Some
would call that "convenience" but with music programs it was a godsend.

The one place where laser really shined was for Opera. It provided a medium
with lots of releases and for which it seemed pefectly suited.

Tom said

Also saddled for a
good share of its life with 2-channel sound.

Also a problem that was fixed.

But only near the end of Laser-life format (about the time DVD was being
announced) and only with another hardware purchase or equipment hardware
modification. Like other about-to-be displaced technologies Laser got "better"
when it felt the footsteps of digital video.

I was a Laser-Fan and spent several thousand on laser hardware and software,
enjoying the picture improvement thoroughly, but it was not as major a step
forward as DVD, which dispensed with the analog video.

I said

There is more to the formula of success to these
formats than actual quality. VHS beat out Beta for reasons that had nothing
to
do with quality. LPs gave way to Cassettes for reasons that had nothing to
do
with quality.

Tom said

LPs never "gave way" to cassette.

Complete nonsense. In less than 10 years cassettes went from non-existance in
the market to total domination of the market.

My memory may be wrong but I thought that it took nearly 10 years from
introduction before cassette captured half the market. OTOH CD dominated LP in
a comparatively short time.

IMO analog formats like VHS, Cassette and LP co-existed quite nicely just as
CD/DVD coexist now. SACD and DVD-A are a "laser-like" format, a specialty
market that will keep "going" as long as manufacturers will continue supporting
it. Like Sony did with Beta and Pioneer did with Laser Disc. My gratitude to
both of them.

Something like an 80% market
share. The LP certainly did give way to the cassette. The fact that both are
analog couldn't be less relevant to my claim.

Actually it is relevant. The 'real' technology replacement was analog by
digital. We have also overlooked the digital format wars. Remember DCC and
Minidisc? How about DAT; it replaced open-reel analog tape in an eye-blink for
both studio and on-location recordings.

I said

Convenience and portability have been the key factors IMO in
audio. I think an interest is home theater helped DVDs along with all the
bonus
material and the full support of the industry.

Tom said

Radially new technolgy (genuine replacement technology) such as CD offers
much
improved performance along with convenience

It is more convenient. Without that it wouldn't have made such an impact. I
agree that it was an improvement in quality over cassettes.

And a major, major improvement over LP. If it were primarily convenience than
cassette would still be a major player.

Tom said

The perfect example is cd/LP &
cassette. cd replaced both lp and cassette as the music choice because it
was
better performing AND more portable and convenient.

Yes it was more convenient than LPs and better sounding than cassettes. It
makes perfect sense that it would overtake them both once it was convenient
enough to compete with cassettes. The fact is that better sound from LPs over
CDs comes at a higher price tag that most consumers are not willing to pay.

When CD was first introduced it was Less Expensive than many of the specialty
LPs I was buying at the time. Not only was it cheaper it was MUCH better in
basic performance, annoyance (no ticks and pops, wow and flutter), handling and
convenience.

I began selling off my LP collection about a year before I actually obtained a
cd player; but had a shelf of the 50 or so discs I knew I could NEVER live
without, including 4 (count 'em) sealed copies of my favorite direct-cut LP
which were NOT for sale.

However 6-8 months after I had a cd player installed I realized that I had not
played even ONE of those prized discs except for the few times when a visitor
had asked for a play.

So I began giving them away to encourage friends and acquaintances to get
interested in audio. For those sealed copies I included a photocopy of an ad
for used copies with an asking price (not mine) of $250.

I initally tested the market for those by advertising in The Audio Amateur,
Speaker Builder and LC. Do you know how many calls I received for a sealed
Sheffield, out-of-print "Pressure Cooker" without a listed price? ......
exactly Zero. Nobody wanted them, nobody cared.

Hence it has been reduced to a niche market. A market that continues to
thrive
in it's niche.

I'm thinking that niche is mostly in the DJ and Rap arena. But, it's also true
that nostalgia and collection often has a "thriving" specialty market. For
example antique cars, motorcycles and tractors have a thriving market. For a
while so did Baseball Cards.

One of my friends is an avid collector/musicologist of Garage Rock Bands and
Surf Music. I once told him that I loved "Harlem Nocturn" a late 50s surf tune.
The next time I saw him he handed me a CD-R with 16 recorded versions of that
song dating from 1939 to 1990. He literally stalks used-record stores. If you
ask him he'll tell you that market "thrives" and in that context it does but
it's not a major market player.