ALKHOBAR, 12 September 2006 — Coming soon to a movie shop near you will be the start of the new video format war. Just like the old Betamax vs VHS video tape mess, two competing disc storage formats are now vying for position in the home video market. The winner will probably be decided by the US movie studios, but as yet there’s no clear victor.

The two new disc storage formats are Blu-ray Disc (BD) and HD-DVD. They are both next-generation optical disc formats designed for the high-density storage of high-definition video and data. Basically, these formats are being billed as replacements for DVDs — but don’t dump your DVD player quite yet. Early reviews of the quality of the new high definition movie releases are underwhelming.

First of all, to reap any benefit from either of the new formats, you’ll need a new television. Yes, you understood correctly, to see the high-definition picture from an HD DVD or Blu-ray Disc, you need a TV that can provide a high-definition picture. If you aren’t willing to buy an HDTV, then forget all about upgrading to either of the new disc formats.

Next, of course is the issue of all the money you’ve spent on the DVDs you already have. VHS tapes had a life expectancy of only about eight years under ideal storage conditions. DVDs are designed to last at least 50 years or more. Not forever, but not too bad. So while there was a compelling reason to switch to DVD from VHS, the long-term viability of your movies doesn’t provide a straight forward reason to switch this time. It should be pointed out though that most Blu-ray and HD DVD players will be backward compatible with DVD and will play your old movie collection quite nicely.

Before we go any further, it is good to know the basics about the competing technologies. Blu-ray Disc was jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers that include Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson. The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc.

While current optical disc technologies such as DVD, DVD±R, DVD±RW, and DVD-RAM rely on a red laser to read and write data, the new format uses a blue-violet laser instead. Blue-violet lasers (405nm) have a shorter wavelength than a red laser (650nm), which makes it possible to focus the laser spot with great precision. This allows data to be packed more tightly and stored in less space, so it’s possible to fit more data on the disc even though it’s the same size as a CD/DVD.

Blu-ray’s competitor, HD DVD (previously known as AOD) was developed by Toshiba and NEC. HD-DVD disc technology also uses a blue-violet laser, which allows more information to be stored digitally in the same amount of physical space as a standard DVD. In comparison to Blu-ray, HD-DVD has less information capacity per layer — 15GB instead of 25GB — though HD-DVD is easier to manufacture than a Blu-ray pre-recorded disc due to its sharing the same basic disc structure as a standard DVD. The same factories that create DVDs can make HD-DVDs.

If you want to watch HD-DVD’s on your HDTV, you’ll have to purchase one of the players from Toshiba. If you are interested in Blu-ray, then right now Samsung’s Blu-ray disc player (BD-P1000), is the only way to go. Toshiba has confirmed that it will launch its first HD-DVD player in Europe on Nov. 15, the 599 euro HD-E1.

North America of course has been the early target of both HD-DVD and Blu-ray. Movies released thus far are all compatible with players released in that geography. As of now, HD-DVD has no regional coding but that is sure to change with movie studios demanding Region Protection Coding as an anti-piracy measure. The number of regions and the geographies HD-DVD code restrictions will cover are not yet known.

The Blu-ray movie region codes have already been decided. Region code A/1 is for North America, South America and East Asia except for China. Region Code B/2 is for Europe and Africa. Region Code C/3 is for China, the Middle East, Russia, and South Asia. It’s important to keep this in mind if you are an early adopter of either of these technologies. HD disc players that were destined for the US or Japanese market but were sold in Saudi Arabia on the gray market will be unable to show movies shipped with regional coding for the Middle East or Europe.