[quote user="Will Harris"]
You can get twice as much raw data on a Blue Ray Disk.
Doesn't that basically do it? The player is responsible for processing the data. Once it's off the disk it's up to the elecronics to do their thing. But BD is capable of holding twice the data of HD DVD and should have more potential for dynamic content etc etc. On that basis alone, it should be the one we choose for the next 20 years.
[/quote]
At the moment capacities stand thus:
Single Layer BD: 25GB
Dual Layer BD: 50GB
Single Layer HD-DVD: 15-17GB
Dual Layer HD-DVD: 30-34GB
Toshiba and co., however, are about to release a tri-layered HD-DVD with 51GB of space (Ihttp://www.toshiba.co.jp/about/press/2007_01/pr0801.htm). I also remember reading, a good year ago mind, that due to the thicknes of BD layers dual-layer is the max capable in conventional sized drives. HD-DVD, however, has a much thinner per layer thickness which would allow up to an EIGHT layered disc to fit in a conventional sized drive. By my calculation that makes the max possible HD-DVD at 120GB.
Whilst I doubt an 8-layered disc could ever be economical, the 3 layered (and possibly 4 layered in the not so distant future) discs will match the capacity of any BD and perhaps surpass it. They have stated the production cost for triple layer discs to be of very little increase on that of dual-layer costs.
If these are all lies, please tell me 🙂
On top of the storage, you've also got a much stricter minimum mandatory specification for all HD-DVD playing equipment which means all owners will know exactly what there player can do.
On top of this you have the backwards compatibility issue. HD-DVDs are much such that, if manufacturers chose, they can actually have a single 'Combo Disc' which on one side is HD-DVD and on the other SD-DVD. They can even put both sets of data on the one side on their 'Twin-Disc' format.
Anyway, I have some work to do... I'll finish this later.