Early Adopters Say: Round 1 of Format Wars Goes to HD DVD
Long load times and poor remote control made up for by amazing picture quality
By the HDBlu.com Staff – September 26, 2006
Technological specifications and support from electronics, computer and videogame makers will clearly be important factors in deciding the outcome of the latest format war. But we think that user satisfaction with actual products are often overlooked. So HDBlu took a look at what early adopters of high-definition video technology were saying about their purchases by analyzing user reviews on Amazon.com. We analyzed over 120 reviews of two major products, the Samsung BD-P1000 Blu-Ray Disc Player and the Toshiba HD-A1 HD DVD Upconverting DVD Player.
What’s the consensus?
The early reviews are clear – users are very happy with their Toshiba players (HD DVD), and pretty dissatisfied with their Samsung players (Blu-ray). The average review for HD DVD was 4.53 versus a paltry 2.25 for Blu-ray.
Not only do the ratings clearly favor HD DVD, but the distribution of reviews is quite striking. Almost 70% of reviews for HD DVD, but less than 20% of Blu-ray reviews, were 5-stars. And while less than 5% of HD DVD reviews were 1-star, over half of Blu-ray reviews were that bad.
The final slap in the face to the Samsung player is that even those few reviews that were 5-stars were viewed by the vast majority (more than 80%) of other users as “not helpful”. Contrast this with the less than 25% who found 5-star Toshiba reviews as “not helpful”.
What features are people talking about?
Blu-ray users had pretty basic complaints about their system: price and picture quality. It’s hard to say whether the sticker price ($999) on the Blu-ray player impacted people’s perceptions. People may have been thinking, “this is all I get for a grand?” However, the majority of users found picture quality to be to be less than they had hoped for. Sound quality and load times were basically a wash, and many users commented that the player’s chassis seemed cheap given how much they were spending.
In contrast, HD DVD users were extremely happy with picture and sound quality. They were even happy with price, mostly because the price tag was half of the Blu-ray player. The major complaints were the very slow load times and the poor remote control which was hard to operate without sufficient light. But overall, users found these to be well worth the amazing image quality.
Have the reviews changed over time?
Interestingly, the reviews for the two players started out similarly, in the 3-3.5 range. But HD DVD went nowhere but up, while Blu-ray took a free fall. There are a few possible reasons for this. One is that the bandwagon-effect may have taken over and reviewers decided to follow the crowd. Another reason might be that, as the HD DVD player gained more and more users, there was more user-generated information on optimal configuration and setup. A third reason might be that Toshiba did a good job pushing out firmware upgrades to address early user complaints.
A final note on the user reviews is that reviews on the Samsung player have virtually stopped, while Toshiba reviews keep rolling in, even after an upgraded version of the player (the XA1) came out.
So does this mean HD DVD is going to win the format war?
It’s still early in the format war and there are many major battles ahead. While this first round has clearly gone to the HD DVD team, it’s far too early to declare a winner. One major event coming up is the release of the Blu-ray compliant Sony PlayStation 3, and the HDBlu.com team will be there to provide you more information from the front line!