On Tue, 27 May 1997 16:31:18 -0400 [log in to unmask] wrote: > Why manufacture a movie on laserdisc for a > few people *and* DVD for the masses when the quality is at least as good on > DVD? As a cinemaphile, why collect laserdiscs and not DVDs, when the DVD > has more information (multiple aspect ratios, guided tours from the > director, subtitling or dubbing, etc.) and as-good-or-better image quality? All this depends on whether "the masses" actually go out and buy DVD players. The situation may be different in America, but when DVD players are launched here in August the prices being talked about are UK£700-1000. Given that the people who are likely to want them are, by and large, the people who currently play laserdiscs and have invested in the kit, I rather suspect that the players will have to be a lot cheaper (a top-end laserdisc player sells for £600 and you can get a perfectly decent one for half that), or that the format will have to offer more than what are to my mind (with the exception of multiple aspect ratios) a few gimmick features. If the situation is different in the US and the players are actually selling in significant numbers then, of course, none of this applies. But, if the discs are sitting on video store shelves, the idea being to inspire confidence in consumers to go and buy the players, then I have ironic memories of DCCs, Betamax tapes and RCA Selectavision discs, exampes of which can now be seen in the Science Museum. Basically, what I was trying to say was that, although laserdiscs have a small market, it is an established and, within its limits, economically viable one. From the point of view of the people who buy them - people who either care a lot about how they watch films, or are consumer technology enthusiasts, or both - any format which supercedes it is going to have to offer demonstrable improvements (a magneto-optical recordable disc of the sort that are already available as a computer data carrier, for example) if it is going to persuade people to part with their cash. ---------------------- Leo Enticknap Univ. of Exeter, UK [log in to unmask] P.S. I heard rumours this week that Dolby are preparing to slash the price of their SR-D cinema digital sound reproducers; presumably in an attempt to vanquish Sony and DTS... ---- To sign off SCREEN-L, e-mail [log in to unmask] and put SIGNOFF SCREEN-L in the message. Problems? Contact [log in to unmask]