Steve Jobs Suggests Blu-ray Not Coming to Mac Anytime Soon

[trip1ex]

What evidence is there that Blu-ray is going out?

http://hd.engadget.com/2009/01/06/blu-rays-first-two-years-outpaces-dvds/

? Did you not read my post?

H.264 can compress hi-def video so it looks just as good. Media streaming devices are on the market and only getting better. Sd cards take care of storage needs and are getting cheaper and better. Bandwidth is only increasing. Harddrive space is dirt cheap and a 2TB hard drive for $100 or so stores thousands of hours of video.

On top of a device like an optical drive takes up alot of room in laptops and uses much battery life. Space that would be better used for a battery or to make the device smaller. AT the same folks are using smartphones more and more, iPads are selling well, neither have optical drives.

All evidence toward the optical disc making an early exit.

 

[fridgeymonster3]

1) "anything you see and get with a BR disc can be downloaded or made at home" LOL. Have fun downloading 35GB 1080p videos over your xx Mbps internet connection from your ISP who is more than likely either already enforcing download caps or pushing for them.

Exactly! I use my blu-ray drive in my Mac Pro to make back-ups of my BRs and then I share my HDD so my other TV's that don't have Blu-ray drives attached can stream the 1080p HD files via WD TV lives. But I have to have 2 TB HDD's to hold my data and then redundant HDD's as back-up. It's a ******** of HDD's and storage.

I have Comcast which has a 250 GB cap. My movies have ranged from 28 GB to 42 GM. That's about 7 movie downloads a month, assuming you use the internet for nothing else at all during that month. I have a 50 Mbps download speed from Comcast, which is approximately 6 MB/s download. Even if I could maintain the max sustained speed, you are talking about an 1 hr and 45 min download time. That's a sustained 50 Mbps connection, which I think is unrealistic due to my testing of Comcast, and is probably in the top 1% of residential speeds in the United States. Now say you have a DSL connection at 3 Mbps. Even a sustained connection at that speed would take over 24 hours to download that 35 GB file! Have fun with that!!

 

[sockdoggy]

Jobs says "we don't need Flash anymore" a lot of people amongst whom lots of stupid iSheep says "we don't need Flash anymore"

Jobs says "there's no antenna problem" a lot of people amongst whom a majority of stupid iSheep says "meeh, u can return it"

Jobs says "we don't need Blu-ray anymore" and you can definitely see all the remaining iSheep fanboi apologists

He has definitely been going out on a limb on numerous issues in the past few months...

I think Jobs has to be careful here. Apple has the consumer at their knees (sell many 1st gen. iPads?) so this is an excellent opportunity to get people hooked on Macs. Apple still has a tiny PC market share that has tremendous growth potential.

Time will tell!

 

[aaaaaaron]

if he loves blu ray, why can't you?

 

[svandive]

The first in line

I'll be the first in line to sign up for a program that allows me to download say five shows / movies into my queue and watch them on my multiple devices. This type of service would completely replace my crappy time warner cable.

However, the issue here isn't the service it's the bandwidth. If I were sitting on a direct 10 Meg ethernet drop off from AT&T or Verizon then sure I'd say give me downloadable content all day long, but the truth is I'm not. I have "Turbo" Road Runner here in Raleigh, NC and it's bandwidth just isn't consistent. If the family heads down to the basement to rent a movie off iTunes for movie night, I have to head down an hour ahead of time to get the Apple TV working on it. Maybe Steve should take a trip through America and just see what "Most" people's home bandwidth situations are like.

The bottom line is internet fed HD media isn't going to take off as mainstream until there is enough reliable cheap bandwidth going to enough homes. The average home in America today has under a T-1s (1.54 meg) down for bandwidth consistently and this figure takes into account measuring what is available at 3:00 AM. So you can see not really what would support an HD media subscription as the primary option especially when your whole neighborhood is trying to download HD quality video over shared cable modem access. Somebody (allot of people) are going to be unhappy.

 

[Mac'nCheese]

No you don't want to give people a hard copy. What you really want is an easy way for others to watch your movie. And an easy to back it up etc.

Instead of grandma buying a BR player she'll buy a media streaming device and watch you movie over YouTube or Vimeo etc.

No I really do want to give people a hard copy. You younger folk might love hitting the net and finding all your memories that way but there are still quite a few of us and older that like to have a collection of discs and walk into a room and pop one in. Just one machine to worry about: the player. No need to worry about internet connection or finding the right file or bandwidth issues, etc. Find the disc with the bride and groom on it and bam! instant wedding memories.

 

[PeterQVenkman]

Harddrive space is dirt cheap and a 2TB hard drive for $100 or so stores thousands of hours of video.

1) You have to plug those into the computer (my macbook pro only has 2 usb ports!)

2) It doesn't store thousands of hours in Blu-Ray quality.

 

[KnightWRX]

? Did you not read my post?

H.264 can compress hi-def video so it looks just as good.

Of course it can, Blu-ray uses H.264. The problem is the movie is going to be on the big side, above 15-17 GB just for the video.

Your post assumes Blu-ray uses some kind of other codec and that H.264 can reproduce the quality is less space. That is a wrong assumption on your part.

1) You have to plug those into the computer (my macbook pro only has 2 usb ports!)

2) It doesn't store thousands of hours in Blu-Ray quality.

3) Hard drives aren't reliable. Optical media can last years, hard drives are mechanical and more prone to failure.

 

[Carniphage]

3) Hard drives aren't reliable. Optical media can last years, hard drives are mechanical and more prone to failure.

This is why professional video production companies store always store video on optical drives.

Oh - actually they don't.

C.

 

[hiptobesquare]

When will folks get it?

It isn't about whether optical storage is going out of style or not.

It isn't about whether network bandwidth will support high-quality streaming, or not.


It is about CHOICE. Why should the choice be denied? The choice of playing optical, or downloaded, or any other kind of media. Also the choice whether to borrow (rent), or own (purchase digital-file-only, or hard-copy format)

If you prefer internet downloads to keep, or to borrow... have at it.

If you prefer optical disc media to rent or to buy, you should be able to have at it.

Steve Jobs, or any other entity who wants to box you in to one choice over another, is limiting your choices, and limiting their own appeal.

Mac OS-running computers should by all means be extensible, either by Apple, or by a third party, to do, play, record, produce, backup, store, or whatever... within the law and license agreements and fair use or ownership.

Apple/Jobs saying "bugger off, you're not getting this or that... you're holding it wrong, and its just a "_____", get over it..." is intensely arrogant, and completely dismissive and condescending.

I try hard not to treat people that way, and usually it doesn't occur to me as a matter of course to interact with others in that manner. I don't appreciate it from the people at Apple.

As much as I like Mac OS, and iPhone, and Apple's hardware design... they are not too big to fail, and they are not too good to take people for granted. It may not be to the point of failure yet, but continuing in that sort of arrogance, is going to ERODE Apple, not improve it. THAT should be the focus and interest of Apple's CEO, that is the over-arching purpose of his job. Because stock prices can follow public opinion trends that influence sales.

 

[cube]

Optical storage is not going anywhere. It's always getting more spacious.

Even Audio CDs are better quality and cheaper than downloads.

 

[KnightWRX]

This is why professional video production companies store always store video on optical drives.

Oh - actually they don't.

C.

I don't have the budget of a professional video production company so I can't afford a HP XP24000 drive array like we have at work (we actually have 2, and mirror the RAID6 drive arrays using Continuous Access - CA and Business Copy - BC). That means that for every 1 TB of data, we need about 4.5 TB of actual drive space, not counting hot spares drives, a full 4 Gbps SAN and site-to-site Fiber connection over a WAN link.

So no, I stick to what I said, hard drives aren't as reliable as optical media. For my house, Blu-ray is the sensible choice.

 

[Carniphage]

When will folks get it?

It is about CHOICE. Why should the choice be denied?

BluRay is about all Sony trying to replicate its one-trick-pony act.
Create a proprietary format, and sit back to collect license revenues.

Sometimes this trick works for Sony (DVD) sometimes it does not (MiniDisc)

Why *exactly* should Apple prop-up Sony's old-fashioned business model?

C.

 

[itsmeok]

hmm. i am not liking this. hey steve, by your logic, you dont need the superdrive too. then, why have that? personally, i feel you needn't make the brd drive mandatory, you can still make it an option and charge me 200 more for it. but having an option would be nice.

 

[aaaaaaron]

BluRay is about all Sony trying to replicate its one-trick-pony act.
Create a proprietary format, and sit back to collect license revenues.

have you heard of itunes?

 

[itsmeok]

BluRay is about all Sony trying to replicate its one-trick-pony act.
Create a proprietary format, and sit back to collect license revenues.

Sometimes this trick works for Sony (DVD) sometimes it does not (MiniDisc)

Why *exactly* should Apple prop-up Sony's old-fashioned business model?

C.

ummm, because the world is adapting it. the same reason why macs have dvd drives even though dvd is from sony. the same reason why every computer on the planet has usb drive even though usb is from intel. as a business, it doesnot matter who is creating technology, as the world (aka your customers) adapt it, you will undoubtedly make more money by subscribing to it.

 

[ten-oak-druid]

Mac Mini: It will be a blu christmas without you...

 

[Lord Vader]

3) Hard drives aren't reliable. Optical media can last years, hard drives are mechanical and more prone to failure.

Right ...

 

[Carniphage]

For my house, Blu-ray is the sensible choice.

Not very sensible if you want your content to be accessible. Having to go to the cupboard to find a specific file seems massively inconvenient.

But if it matters that much, why don't you just get one of these?

http://www.mcetech.com/blu-ray/

C.

 

[Carniphage]

have you heard of itunes?

You are getting it!
These are rival formats.

C.

 

[siii]

I have 27-inch 2560 x 1440, IPS, LED Backlight display i would like view full hd content on...bluray please.

Once apple introduce TRIM to OSX, (or very soon) i will being purchasing a nice intel ssd (hopefully 320gb by then) I won't want to store 15+gb full hd movies on the hdd... bluray please.

I would like optional of backing up or writing to bluray disks to send large files or projects/movies/demo reels in the post to clients...bluray please.

I dont want to wait 6hrs for a movie to download...bluray please.

Yes bluray is probably on it's way out...but surely thats at-least 2 years away...I will have a new computer by then...Apple is making the bluray issue a 'bag of hurt' for me.

I am getting frustrated by the lack of choice apple give to customers. If bluray was an BTO extra £200+ I would have got it.

I don't want to be 'forced' to buy hd content from iTunes to get hd content on to my personal computer. Thats just plain greedy, wasn't it 40 billion in cash reserves apple has? Isn't that enough?

My computers have a 2/3 year shelf life, so if bluray is dead in two years time, fine...but thats still two years away, i'll deal with the arduous process of converting them

I'm starting to get pissed at constantly being drip and spoon fed by apple...

 

[KnightWRX]

BluRay is about all Sony trying to replicate its one-trick-pony act.
Create a proprietary format, and sit back to collect license revenues.

Sometimes this trick works for Sony (DVD) sometimes it does not (MiniDisc)

Why *exactly* should Apple prop-up Sony's old-fashioned business model?

C.

Blu-ray is owned by the blu-ray consortium, not Sony. CD is also a Sony-Phillips partnership.

I guess you condemn H.264 then, since that is the same as Blu-ray, a consortium held technology of which Apple gets licensing fees ?

Not very sensible if you want your content to be accessible. Having to go to the cupboard to find a specific file seems massively inconvenient.

C.

Really, that's why they write the movie's name on the side of the case. So you can easily find it. Much easier than browsing through my uPNP media server that serves up my fansubs.

Not to mention the quality is way better than any compressed Internet downloads, which is limited by download caps and bandwidth.

 

[hiptobesquare]

BluRay is about all Sony trying to replicate its one-trick-pony act.
Create a proprietary format, and sit back to collect license revenues.

Sometimes this trick works for Sony (DVD) sometimes it does not (MiniDisc)

Why *exactly* should Apple prop-up Sony's old-fashioned business model?

C.

Because, fortunately, or unfortunately, BluRay won the battle. Maybe HD-DVD was better.

But barring high-def optical standards, is not a proper reaction to it.

How is Apple any different, with as proprietary as it is with Mac OS only being licensed to run on Apple-branded hardware? That is still not an excuse for Mac OS to be handicapped from playing or otherwise using a medium that people do buy an wish to use.

Even if Apple doesn't provide the codecs and players, they should be taking a position for a third-party company, or Sony itself, to sell a software-player that runs as an application inside Mac OS, to perform that function for the people willing to pay the license fees.

I am not claiming it to be ideal, and I think Sony is at least as arrogant as Apple is being, But two wrongs don't make anything right, and Apple should remember where they came from, when they had to fight for marketshare, and they had to be better, cleaner, and more versatile than the rest, to appeal to people over the other options on the market.

This sort of arrogance shows that they have crested, and are starting to follow the "we're smarter than our customers could possibly be" mantra that gets people into trouble.

They don't have to be everything to everyone, but they should be open enough for people not to be completely shut out because various people want to do various things with their computers. Not everyone uses their computers, home theaters, or media libraries the same ways.

 

[Carniphage]

Blu-ray is owned by the blu-ray consortium, not Sony. CD is also a Sony-Phillips partnership.

I guess you condemn H.264 then, since that is the same as Blu-ray, a consortium held technology of which Apple gets licensing fees ?

Of course it is Sony.
Why do you think Sony make the PS3 as a vehicle for BluRay.

Apple and Sony are rivals in this space. Why should Apple support its rival's product? Sony does not go out of its way to support Mac computers.

C.

 

[Headrush69]

Steve is making it harder and harder to justify purchasing a Mac again. First, he passes off hardware problems as non-issues. Then OSX and the Mac platform is completely ignored at WWDC.

Why because it wasn't in the day one opening that some new OS version was on the way?

You do know the WWDC is several days long and there were lots of sessions on Mac OS development? Didn't hear about Xcode 4. (Not just an iPhone tool!)

Now he's refusing to support new technology. I'm really going to consider switching back to Windows if this is the future of the Mac platform.

Comes down to value added. For the most part most Apple computers users aren't going to gain much going to Bluray over DVD. You've not going to gain anything on the stock audio system in Macs and even on larger iMac screens good quality DVDs are on par with Bluray. My guess would be that the percentage of users actually hooking their machines up to a second larger display isn't that large either.

What does Apple have to lose:
1) Decreased iTunes sales
2) Cost of licensing fees
3) Without the right hardware assist needed for Bluray, remarkably increased battery consumption.