[Myrddin]

I have the Sony BDP-S300 (BluRay) and Toshiba HD-A30 (HD-DVD). Both are 1080p devices. I have a fair collection of movies in both formats. Toshiba has done a poor job of getting firmware updates delivered for their devices. The HD-A30 often crashes. The HD-DVD is very sensitive to any fingerprints compared to the BluRay disks played on the Sony device.

I installed a special Ethernet drop from my router to support the online firmware updates for the HD-A30 and the special internet based extensions of HD-DVD. Toshiba never delivered a firmware update beyond the 1.3 version I installed months ago. The extended internet features weren't very interesting or impressive.

The audio from the BluRay device has always been superior to what the HD-A30 produced. My receiver is capable of decoding anything the two players can produce.

I tried to select HD-DVD releases that were "dual format" i.e. standard DVD and HD-DVD on the same disk. A few of my disks are HD-DVD only. Together with the HD-A30, these disks join my other obsolete formats. My Panasonic 8-track recorder still works fine, but I can't buy media for it anymore. The same fate awaits the HD-A30...except that it will play standard DVD. The Sony BDP-S300 will play the standard DVD format of the dual format HD-DVD disks.

My local Fred Meyer store recently reorganized the BluRay and HD-DVD sections. The day after the Toshiba announcement, the HD-DVD section was removed and the BluRay display area was doubled. That's fine by me. BluRay has been the better performer for me.

[RandallFlagg]

The HD-DVD is very sensitive to any fingerprints compared to the BluRay disks played on the Sony device.

I remember reading a few years ago that Blu-Ray disks are made with a special coating that basically eliminates the need for DVD sleeves. That they can be rubbed on a sidewalk and still be playable. Is this the case?